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Taym, by contrast, avoided the common rooms as much as he possibly could, holing himself up in his room in his free time, or in forgotten corners of the library when he could get away with it, or in the shadiest parts of the cafeteria when the comings-and-goings of people would be more of a comfort than a trial. But there were vending machines in the common rooms, and he was feeling the sort of trembling-edged bone-weary that suggested an immediate sugar influx might be a wise course of action, and so he'd steeled himself up to down a soda, not feeling particularly enthused at the prospect.

He was arrested in this plan by the realization that the room wasn't empty, and he paused and withdrew his Deus-issued debit card from where he'd been teetering on the brink of swiping it.

The Island's silence was heavy with the power out, unbroken even by the ambient hum of indoor lighting and air conditioning. So he paused before he crossed the room with a stealthy quiet that would, he thought, have made his division proud, and he sank down on the floor next to her. He sat on the floor regularly, which she knew. If she abruptly woke up there'd be nothing unusual about this at all. Taym had a strange aversion to chairs, and to comfortable, soft ones most of all.

Arranging himself into a nonchalant pose and, for good measure, pulling a paperback book out of one of the oversized pockets of his coat and resting it open on his knee, place held with a finger--and there, now he looked like he was just reading and waiting patiently for Peyton to wake up, which was a little creepy but not entirely suspect--he gingerly reached out and, without moving the phone from where it rested on the floor, swiped his finger across it to indulge in some snooping, casting leery glances up to her every couple of seconds.

Which was about the moment he decided he'd taken the risks far enough, and Fiona's sullen irritation at his lack of honorable behavior caught up and turned into actual guilt. If there'd been anything significant perhaps he wouldn't have felt so bad, but there hadn't been.

So he got up, and he quietly procured a can of soda (absently wondering why vending machines counted as emergency power but hot water heaters didn't and deciding it was because Deus was cruelly capitalistic), and for a while he considered just leaving her there. They hadn't last parted on the best of terms, and probably she had no desire to see him. This was an urge with which he could empathize.

But it stuck in his craw to feel like he had to scurry away for the sake of her feelings, and it made him contrary.

He perched on the arm of the chair next to her outstretched legs and, coiled to avoid an instinctive kick if it came, he pinched gently at her ankle to wake her up.

He hadn't opened the can yet, which gave him a convenient thing to do with his hands: awkwardly playing at the tab on the top. He could, when he wanted to, manifest the strangest, most innocent-seeming schoolboy gestures, wildly at odds with his appearance.

Probably nothing in the world would ever mend Taym's shaving habits, but the new clothes, at least, made him look better than walking filth.

"Peyton," he responded, glancing at her sideways. "Been waiting here for hours like a dog at a damned gravesite, I will have you know. You sleep like the dead."

He interpreted this as playing along and felt a wave of relief. Maybe she wasn't as pissed as he'd thought. "Seriously," he returned solemnly, shoulders loosening when she withdrew. "I was about to send for emergency rations."

"Haha," he deadpanned, still unaware that she was doing anything but theatrically joking. Which seemed out of character, but maybe she was over-eager to smooth over the disaster he'd created. He cracked the tab on the soda but didn't drink it, instead eyeing it like it might bite him. "From what I understand, the infirmary's more likely to have you walking out worse than you went in than offer any kind of help. Why are you sleeping in the common room?"

He narrowed his eyes at her, concern creeping in.

"You OK?" he asked, taking a swig of his drink and looking distinctly displeased by the results. "You seem, uh." He waved a hand vaguely. "Nervous. It's not--not me, is it?"