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rest for the wicked

"What happened to your face," he said, rolling his eyes like it was obvious. "Gone for ******** ever and come back like a cat tore you up."

rest for the wicked

Jack retorted, obviously hedging. "No-one's comin' back fr'm tha' pretty, not even sexy ******** like me." He inched his hands closer to the fire and Owain made a distant, tinny noise of apprehension. "Cat. ******** ' wished was a damn cat."

He went quiet for a while, brooding.

"Ever went out onna real mission there?" he eventually asked.

cherno astra

rest for the wicked

Leslie grimaced. He'd seen what the Sahara had done to Thompson, and it wasn't pretty.

"No," he replied, uncurling a little to drag his palette a little closer to the fire. Aleria's numbing went both ways, and the end result was that Leslie was just kind of always cold.

"No. Juss Russia." No matter how he laid down, he couldn't get comfortable again. "Been pr'tty lucky no one pays me any att'ntion, nvr assigns me nowhere."

rest for the wicked

Russia...s**t, that sounded awful. Like a cold Sahara.

he said, a half-hearted jape. "Too ********' short."

Jack didn't smoke but he almost wished he had the comfort of a smoke cigarette in his hand. Movies had beaten into him the image of a calm, collected individual holding a long drag, or a cigar, or something smoking, puffing smoke and looking moodily into the distance as they collected their thoughts. He wanted to be that image, not some damn freak giant with a chip on his shoulder the size of Alaska. He wanted the music to start up just before he stormed the lair of some ******** (preferably in a warmer and swankier place), whipped out some badass moves, found the boss, threw out a Bond one liner, and then killed him.

"Told us were s'possed t'be clearing out clone nest," Jack began, hushed. "Go clean out a base 'long th' way. Got ambushed there." Completely naked and so close to finishing; the ******** worst scenario to be getting blue balls. "Got dragged out w'someone else. Fred. Stupid asswipe called m'self Weasley. Had a gryphon sword n' s**t."

He paused and ran his hand over his face, eyes closing. "Underground lair right beneath th'base. ********. Saw Hallows down there too, like they were workin' f'r them or t'gether, hell if I know. One've 'em really wanted us dead. Had, like, ********' powers. Shock therapy, pony called it. ******** there just...obsessed w'figurin' out how we ticked. Wanted my eyes too. b*****d must've been high, he kept ramblin' 'bout how sun'd preserve images in the eyes like ********' photos. Wanted me t'give him something other n' fear or cryin'. Started wishin' I died 'fore he could take 'em lot've times. Had angry 'nuff peopel there. Lot've pain, lot've bullshit healing, lot more pain. Really wanted t'die. No point comin' back if yer blind, right?"

Silence. He gave a shaky sigh and dragged his hand off his face. "Dunno how long we were out. Lost track've days after a while. s**t happened. I got real hungry n' thirsty, then I wasn't, n' Fred was dead. Got rescued, obviously, just have shitty eyes now. Might need glasses, keep gettin' ********' headaches."

cherno astra

rest for the wicked

He snorted and almost said something about that (<******** copy cat; What the hell do you read anyway you can barely stand reports; Stupid midget bitches, am I right?), but nothing came out. Jack continued to brood by the fire, fingers twitching as they warmed up. He craved pizza but felt his stomach twisted at the idea of pepperoni and grease.

"They don' eat, Halloween things," he said after a moment. "Don' hafto. Famine guy just gave s'both one bowl've food n' one've water. Maybe he wanted us 'live longer n' just didn' know how; had pets but no manual. Was okay fer a lil', y'know. Team only ate a lil' e'ry day anyway, rash'ning fer th' long trip. 'Ventually, though, s'not 'nuff."

He pulled his hands back and tucked them under his arms, almost hugging himself as the warmth breached his layers with inviting ********>" Jack growled suddenly, muted by alcohol but absolutely bitter. "Called m'self Weasley, right, but his name was ********' Fred Ashton n' he was a ********' goddamn b*****d. He saw me gettin' th'worst've it, 'cause m'partner decided, <******** e'rything, I'll just heal it all right back up so y'don't die, n' horsemen were real ********' n'trigued. Ashton was a f**, but he could take s**t; he wuzza spec'd hunter fer ******** sake, he lived fer this s**t in hellhole terrain.

"N' then one day he says t'me, he says, Take 'em t'day. ******** gives me all th' food n' water n' I didn't ********' make him say it twice. Again n' again." He spat off to the side. "Master wasn' happy 'bout it. Made him eat ********' leftovers while I starved. N' Ashton looked so ********' relieved. Prolly forgot how good even s**t is when yer really hungry."

He clutched himself tighter against the cold, desperation starting to creep into his tone. "He was slowly figurin' it out, I know it. He knew he had a better shot at livin'. I saw th'look in his eyes after that, I saw it: he was sizin' me up. Both've us couldn' live offa what we got. He had a ******** boyfriend waitin' fer him. All I had was n' ex n' a whore. None've us knew if they were comin'. He kept goin' on n' on 'bout not just givin' up, n' he kept ********' smiling, but I knew, I knew one day he'd decide I wasn' worth keepin'."

"So I got him while he slept n' I ******** bashed his brains in 'gainst the wall," he hissed. "N' he screamed n' clawed but rank means s**t if you got a concussion, n' I stuck m'foot to his throat t'shut him up n' kept beatin' the ********' s**t out've this <********' goddamn b*****d—"

His breaths were shaky.

"N' then," Jack whispered, licking his dry lips, "realized: holy s**t, had a bag've meat. Just right there. S'all—all I could think. Food. So I just..." He finally glanced at Leslie, forlorn and wanting acceptance. "It tasted so good. You geddit, right?"

rest for the wicked

Memories, like trash plucked from beach water, rose and fell and filled his nostrils with something rank, disturbed the waters and turned them murky. He closed his eyes momentarily and willed himself not to puke as he remembered. Saliva built up in his mouth for the inevitable, but he kept fighting the urge. (Can't you control yourself?)

Deep breaths.

At the sound of movement he cracked his eyes open and saw Leslie standing in front of him. Any other time he would have pointed out the hilarious height discrepancy, but that night Jack just gazed at him distantly. This was a bizarre position he was in: getting sympathy from this guy. He was too drunk still to recognize the fact that while he had arranged the excursion, Leslie had been taking point for the most part.

"N' what'd it've meant t'win, Miller?" he asked, puffing air straight up to lazily try and get hair out of his face. It failed. "Kill e'ryone?"

rest for the wicked

The answer didn't bother him, it had been a rhetorical statement he already knew the answer to. The world hadn't suddenly changed while he was in the Sahara. He already knew how it worked, when one stripped away politics and social order: murder was just dressed up at something else in the waking world, passed over, replaced, let go, overshadowed, forgotten, and occasionally just raw violence from the blips that made it past the facade of working society. But the look in Leslie's eyes reminded him that the only thing he had on him that could be remotely lethal besides his weapon was Barbara, and it struck him as remarkably stupid that he had allowed the little punk to lead him there alone, drunk as a white girl post-break up.

"Yeah, I know." He filed away the idea of something recruiting them for later. Jack stared unblinking at those red eyes, calm and cold and nauseated. "That gonna be a problem t'night?"