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 Posted: Wed Sep 25, 2013 7:23 pm
No matter how hard he scrubbed the shirt in the large sink in front of him, the blue goop clinging to it refused to come off. “s**t!” It was the next evening, and the stuff hadn’t come off his skin either, though he’d nearly washed himself raw that morning. It wasn’t like he swore often, but he had thought he would be clever, wearing Ian’s shirt to the party on the beach. But instead of feeling clever now, he only felt stupid. In the end, he gave up the shirt, and on himself, thinking at least everything was clean otherwise. He felt stupid, and tired, and even though the island was hot, he felt vaguely chilled. Shiloh wrung out the shirt, and tossed into a hamper with the rest of his ‘blue’ clothes. He’d deal with them later, and he shrugged on a clean hoodie, a compromise along with his shorts, since after the battle he hadn’t felt entirely well, and his body temperature seemed to enjoying alternating between boiling hot and freezing. The Life hunter gathered up his hamper of wet clothes, and pushed his way out of laundry rooms, and made his way down the hallway back to his dorm. With most of the outdoors cordoned off, he’d resorted to hanging his laundry in his room.
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Posted: Wed Sep 25, 2013 7:36 pm
He felt sick.
This was less due to the fact that he was, in fact, actually ill from the aftereffects of the incident and the fact that he had not even slept yet, and more due to the fact that he had fallen prey to the worst of his enemies - namely his own, stupidly, human emotions.
It was a sharp contrast to the ghost zombie ship he'd been thrown onto near his first day after being recruited, and Ian suspected this was because he hadn't known anyone; not to mention, somehow zombies had not been as oddly scary as the massive creature that had threatened to overtake the entirety of Deus Ex Machina.
He also felt, much to his chagrin, somewhat stupid; the spots of blue on his face stood out starkly against his dark, tanned skin, and spread out along parts of his arms where he had come into contact with the slime. It didn't hurt, but he felt weirdly cold during random times of the day and then feverishly hot during others.
Which was why he was sitting outside of his dorm room, on the floor in the hallway, dressed in a pair of sweatpants, a teeshirt, and a grey hooded sweatshirt with the hood pulled up over his head. Ian leaned back, arms folded across his midsection, and closed his eyes briefly, exhaling slowly.
He wondered how Shiloh was doing; whether he had put any more thought into the fact that he'd almost died, or if he was still as happy-go-lucky as ever. Either way, Ian figured he might as well go and find out; he'd check up on him, that was it.
He made it as far as a few doors down before he sat down again, slightly (and embarrassingly) out of breath as he sat a few feet away, sighing and leaning back with his head against the wall.
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Posted: Wed Sep 25, 2013 8:15 pm
“Yo.” The tip of his shoe nudged Ian’s knee, and though his voice was quiet, the smile on Shiloh’s face was as pleasant as it usually was. He had the basket of laundry tucked in his arms, and he shifted it so he could better see the man sitting on the floor. He hadn’t seen Ian since launching him, he had seen that the Mist hunter had landed okay, of course, but after that, things had turned into frenzy as the creature fell, and everyone regrouped. He probably should have tried to find his friend afterward, to check on him, but honestly he had just wanted to crawl into his bed and sleep after the party gone wrong, and so that was exactly what he had done, and he had the blue sheets to prove it. He hadn’t had the strength to be cheerful, so he’d slept. Shiloh hadn’t given his ingestion anymore thought either, and was almost thankful for the slight daze the blue ooze had put him in. It was easy to be happy-go-lucky when feeling a little loopy.
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Posted: Wed Sep 25, 2013 8:22 pm
He didn't hear the footsteps approaching, lost in his own thoughts, but he did feel the shoe poking against his leg. Ian craned his neck upwards to see who was talking about and caught a flash of pale pink hair and a basket of what looked like laundry.
A small smile spread its way across Ian's face. "Morning, Shyduck," he said lightly, though it was clear from the circles beneath his own eyes that he hadn't had any sleep whatsoever. Shiloh seemed to be all right, however, and Ian pushed himself to his feet, feeling slightly relieved and slightly wary all at the same time.
"Doing a bit of spring cleaning?" he asked lightly, leaning against the wall and inclining his head towards the basket in question.
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Posted: Thu Sep 26, 2013 10:24 am
Shiloh had indeed slept, though he felt like he could still sleep for a week and still not be satisfied. The whole ordeal had subdued him, until now, but when Ian lifted his face and looked at him, Shiloh couldn’t help himself – he burst out laughing. “Morning Ian,” he said carefully, stepping aside as the man got to his feet, trying to stifle his laughter. “Ah, no, just trying to get the damn stuff clean. How about you… Getting ready for the big game?” Then he was snickering again, knowing full well who was to blame for the glowing blue marks on Ian’s cheeks. Shiloh supposed he should feel sorry for the guy, but considering that he himself was covered in blue, it was hard to be overly sympathetic. He grinned from behind his laundry basket.
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Posted: Thu Sep 26, 2013 2:28 pm
"Excuse me," said Ian, in a testy sort of voice, though it was obvious he wasn't really mad but he knew exactly what Shiloh was laughing about without the other having to say it out loud. "But I seem to recall that my nice blue face is direct result of a certain someone."
Rolling his eyes, he reached out and gave Shiloh's shoulder a push before plucking the laundry basket from his fingers.
"Move it, move it," he said, nodding his head towards the door to Shiloh's room. "Come on, Mr. Guy Who Thinks He's So Funny."
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Posted: Thu Sep 26, 2013 2:55 pm
“Oh gee, I couldn’t possibly think of who that someone might be…” He snickered again, neither Ian’s tone nor the bump to his shoulder deterring his laughter. It had to wear off soon enough, right? Vaguely Shiloh wondered if hanging up his obviously still blue clothes in front of Ian was a good idea. What if they stayed blue forever? Not to mention that one of the articles in the basket happened to belong to Ian, and Shiloh had assured him he wouldn’t spill anything on it. Oops. “Okay, okay,” Shiloh gave in. He unlocked the door to his room quickly and held it open for Ian. “So pushy today, the big game must have you all riled up, huh? And I’ll have you know, I am so funny.”
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Posted: Thu Sep 26, 2013 2:58 pm
Ian was still rolling his eyes as he all but pushed Shiloh into the room before him, jabbing him in the back with the laundry basket. "You're so clever, really," he said dryly. "And funny wasn't exactly the word I was looking for, Duck Duck Goose. Though maybe funny looking..."
Once inside, he glanced around for a place to set the laundry basket and finally decided the foot of the bed was as good a place as any. Ian shuffled over, plopped the basket down, and promptly fell onto the bed beside it, face down in the pillows and exhaling slowly.
"I am so freaking tired, good grief."
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Posted: Thu Sep 26, 2013 6:30 pm
“Then have a nap,” Shiloh offered amicably. “The sheets are clean.” He pushed the hamper out of his way with his foot, going to his closet to retrieve the thick line of string he’d fashioned into a makeshift clothesline. Crossing his room, he attached it to a notch on his window, pulling it taut. It took up a lot of space in his small room, but there wasn’t particularly any other alternative at the moment, so he didn’t mind bearing with it. He frowned again as looked at the basket of clothes, the item lying on top being the on belonging to Ian. “So, I have some good news, and some bad news…” He started.
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Posted: Thu Sep 26, 2013 6:39 pm
He debated for a moment on actually taking Shiloh up on his offer to nap, but then he thought about the way he felt tense and jittery from a lack of sleep and from nerves, and decided that maybe it wasn't the best idea after all. And, for that matter, he was doubtful he'd actually be able to sleep at all, what with everything that had happened.
Ian rolled around on the bed and gathered the pillows towards him, pressing his face into them and exhaling a long, exhausted breath.
"Please tell me the good news is that you found me another bottle of booze and the bad news is that you don't have a bottle opener," he said, his voice coming out muffled from the fact that his face was still in the pillows.
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Posted: Thu Sep 26, 2013 7:31 pm
“Well, I guess I have even worse news for you,” he replied. “Besides, you were the one that broke my bottle on the beach, I didn’t even get a sip.” He hadn’t had a drink in what felt like forever, though in reality it had only been a couple months. It wasn’t even like he drank often, but after the day they’d just had, a beer or two sounded awfully nice. Instead, all they had were the bottles of water and their emergency rations. Not exactly prime living. Ian had his face hidden in the pillows, but though Shiloh could have quickly stashed the shirt, he opted for honesty and leaned over, giving the Mist hunter a little push. “Time to face your bad news, sleeping beauty,” he said, pulling the shirt out and holding it up in all it’s glowing blue glory.
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Posted: Thu Sep 26, 2013 7:48 pm
What, no booze? Ian resisted the urge to pout and said dryly instead, "I was slightly distracted by the giant monster thing eating people, my bad."
He wondered whether someone - anyone on the island had a stash of alcohol tucked away somewhere. Woefully he thought of the bottle of whiskey he and Harland had drunk and regretted drinking all of it, though it had seemed fine at the time.
Hindsight was twenty-twenty, after all. Ian made a low groan at the push, resisting at first, but finally rolling over, rubbing his eyes.
"Oh, how nice," he said teasingly, as he lowered his hand. "You think I'm bea..."
Ian trailed off as he realized just what he was looking at. Shiloh was holding up a black shirt, yellow block letters typed neatly across the front of it - though the letters were obscured by thick quantities of a bright, heavy blue that glowed ominously in the somewhat dim lighting.
Ian stared at it.
"...is that...what I think it is..."
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Posted: Thu Sep 26, 2013 8:05 pm
“Yup,” Shiloh said as brightly as he could manage. “And good news is, now it’s tye-dye!”
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Posted: Thu Sep 26, 2013 8:08 pm
There was a long moment in which Ian just stared at Shiloh.
"I find your definition of good news to be sort of confusing."
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Posted: Thu Sep 26, 2013 8:38 pm
His grin gave way to sheepishness, and he hung his head a bit. “I know, I’m really sorry, really! I really hadn’t expected the party to end like that. I’ll make it up to you somehow…” Shiloh nodded his head suddenly, looking determined. Determined, but a little sleepy. He'd definitely make up for it, but for now the best he could do was hang it out to dry. At least it was clean otherwise, he reasoned again as he moved pin the shirt to his makeshift clothesline. “If we are ever on the mainland, I’ll buy you a new one, promise.”
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