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 Posted: Sun Apr 05, 2015 11:07 pm
Lucky tested the handle of room 113, lightly at first, but within the space of a minute he was all but attempting to break it. So much for the faint hope he had just forgotten to lock it. Nobody he'd passed on the way over looked remotely familiar, and the post-podding haze had left him with little other motivation than to make it where he was now. He hadn't planned for this. For the tenth time he dug around in the pockets of his somewhat threadbare jeans, practically running himself into a circle. Totally empty, every single one. No phone, no keys, nothing. Mentally he berated himself for not checking when he'd left the pod room, but the last few times he'd awoken from near-death in there they'd at least had the decency to leave his stuff alone. He pressed his back to the door and slowly slid down to rest beside a box overflowing with christmas lights. The hunter on pod duty had been all too eager to finally 'return' the assorted decorations and miscellaneous tripping hazards to whom she believed they belonged to. He wasn't even going to begin to think about it, or even look at it if he could avoid doing so. For the most part, he was succeeding.
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Posted: Sun Apr 05, 2015 11:28 pm
Twitter had sucked her into another void of distraction, now that she'd lost the others. She was trading one vice for another, and it wasn't working, it wasn't helping her get where she needed to be. She should have known better than to think there was any way she could learn to be a better - Lucky sat against the door in the hallway that she was walking by, and her eyes had flickered up just enough to see his body there, and register who it was. Her phone clattered to the floor, and a second later so did she, in an attempt to crawl away as quickly as possible. This couldn't be happening again. It had been months. MONTHS. She'd convinced herself he wasn't real, and she was safe now. She hadn't seen him, heard of him, felt him, in so long, that it was only common sense to assume his spirit had finally passed on and stopped haunting her. But there he was, right there in the hallway, where she'd never have expected him. The world shifted, and turned, and her head swam with the threat of unconsciousness, but she fought to stay awake if only because she was so not going to let herself get possessed by his ghost, damnit. So instead, Thaw was summoned, and held protectively in front of her. "Stay where you are," She warned. "Or I'll kick your ghost a** back to wherever it came from."
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Posted: Wed Apr 08, 2015 2:30 am
Maebe's phone bounced several times until it collided with Lucky's hand. He stared at it blankly from his ragdoll position against the wall. And did nothing. It was only when an entire person also hit the ground as well that he was obligated to actually look up and gauge whether patient zero of the latest hunter plague was him, or them. He picked up the phone and began to offer it up blindly in the direction of the 'thud'. "Uh. You dropped your..." He blinked. "M-Maebe?" Lucky's eyes quickly snapped to the pitchfork prongs that were inches away from his neck. His expression was now one of moderate concern. "Oh." And then he stumbled backward, doing a similarly uncoordinated crabwalk just out of immediate reach. He was still holding her phone in front of him, whether as a shield or a peace offering even he hadn't quite figured out yet. "Waitwait wait--"
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Posted: Wed Apr 08, 2015 2:35 am
"Wait for WHAT?" She stayed where she was, even as he shimmied away, and Thaw never moved from his defensive position in front of her. "For you to turn into little computer boxes and fly away on me again? For the world to go all bonkers and make me think I'm losing my mind again? What would you have me wait for, Lucky? Because if it's not obvious, I have no patience for your creepy games anymore." She flickered her eyes at her phone in his hand, and back at him again. It happened one more time, but when she looked up at him, her grip on her trident tightened. She wanted her phone, but Lucky.. Desperation won out, and she carefully reached over, like a wild animal accepting a treat, until she snatched the phone away from his hand and put Thaw between them once more. "What are you doing here? No, better question, what the hell are you?"
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Posted: Sat Apr 11, 2015 2:59 am
Lucky's mouth hung open a little - as though he had meant to say something to the first question, but never got the chance. His eyes continued to dart between Maebe and her weapon the whole time, with increasing alarm, even after she retrieved her phone. "Uh - um --" Maybe he was just imagining all of this. He could accept that. "Uhh." He rubbed one eye beneath his glasses, jostling them. Still asleep, probably. "I. Uh. I can't find my key. To my room," he added. An awkward pause. "Is... everything okay?"
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Posted: Sat Apr 11, 2015 3:13 am
Key to his -- This Lucky wasn't looking at her with those dead, knowing eyes. It wasn't smiling, or reaching out to her. It was shy, and unsure, and most of all sort of a dork, and Maebe started to feel the shudder of realization overtake her. Was he not dead? Or were those other times really a clone, and he'd finally returned? Maebe dropped her trident to her side, but remained firmly gripped on it. "Tell me something." She murmured, her voice tense with hesitation. "What's the full name of the big mountain that Mimsy is married to?" It wasn't a hard question, and perhaps it could have been easy to find out, but clones did not find out things. This would be enough. And if it was true.. if this was really Lucky, and he was alive.. Her hands began to tremble.
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Posted: Sat Apr 11, 2015 4:11 am
At the word 'married', his eyes went wide. Lucky wasn't looking at Maebe now though - he was looking at the beaten-up box overflowing with Christmas lights. It took a little too long for him to answer. "Robert. Robert Morris." It wasn't a difficult guess - but it was a weird question. The sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach was reaching terminal velocity. A lot of things weren't adding up, and he was so tired.
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Posted: Sat Apr 11, 2015 4:29 am
The breath she inhaled was audible. Thaw disappeared in her hand, and Maebe was moving instantly - she flung herself at him, arms wide enough to wrap around his neck and hug him fiercely. She felt a real and solid body in her hold, and it only made her want to hug tighter, as the weight of at least one horror lifted from her heart. "You ******** p***k." She breathed out, noticeably elated with the grin that plastered on her lips and distorted her words into something more affectionate. "I thought you were dead. I thought you were something else completely. Where have you been? You have to tell me what happened. I deserve that much, after all you just put me through." She slowly disentangled herself from him, and looked at the door to his apartment. "Maybe Mimsy has your key. If you need a place to stay, you can crash in my room tonight until she gets it to you. Just don't tell her you were with me, if you value either of our lives." She grinned, bright and free and entirely inappropriate to the girl he'd known before he'd left. She'd transformed while he stagnated, hidden away where all she could see was his shadow.
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Posted: Sun Apr 12, 2015 5:17 am
His mind was still fixated on the enigma of Mimsy and Robert's marriage, leaving him no chance to process Maebe coming at him. She collided with him and he nearly lost his balance, propping himself up above the ground on two shaky arms. "Sorry," he wheezed in immediate knee-jerk. He tried to smile back, but it felt forced. His mind reached backward in time and all he had were strange dreams and even stranger nightmares. It felt like lifetimes had passed since the last time he'd seen Maebe. Everything about the waking world was still hazy, almost dreamlike - just as it had been after that vivid New Years Eve mass hallucination. "Prepare to be disappointed, then. I was podded. I don't even remember why." "How long -" he began, then seemed to reconsider his words. He jabbed his teeth into his lower lip, drawing a few small beads of blood. He could taste iron and rose water. "Never mind, actually." A few moments after Maebe released her hold on him, he scooted into a real sitting position again. wringing his hands in his lap. "Are- are you sure? I mean - thanks," he exhaled, letting his tensed shoulders finally drop in relief. .
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Posted: Thu Apr 16, 2015 8:09 pm
Podded. Not dead. Then what in the hell was she seeing, all that time? If it wasn't his ghost, was it really a clone? Or was it something else entirely, a third option she couldn't fathom in her small, closed off little mind? She didn't care. Lucky was alive. She hugged him harder, even when it was clear he was totally uncomfortable with the action. It made her smile, because that meant it was Lucky over any other test she could give him. She could have told him how long. The moment he began to ask, her lips parted to tell him. She couldn't blame him for not wanting to know, but figured the truth was going to come out anyway. He couldn't hide from the current date, forever. She closed her mouth, happy to not be the bearer of that inevitable bad news. "Of course I'm sure. Don't be a dumbass. You know I'd take care of you." She crawled up onto her knees, and then hopped up onto her feet. Under the assumption he was going to get up and follow, she headed to her own room. "I've got some blankets and a pillow for sleeping on. I mean, I'm not giving up my bed for you. Duh." She looked back at him over her shoulder and smiled. "I missed you, but not that much." Reaching the room, she opened the door and let him in. It was perfect, because nothing about her room had truly changed since he'd visited her. It would be a gentle transition, his fragile psyche covered in familiar pink and stuffed animals. "I can't believe you were podded this long. You should do some yoga or something. Stretch."
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Posted: Thu Apr 23, 2015 1:53 am
Lucky followed, if slowly, gathering up the box on his way to her door. He felt weaker than he remembered. In his distracted state he processed her words at face value. "Oh, uh. The floor's f-fine, really. I've slept in... worse places." I think she likes you, a familiar female voice commented with a hint of laughter. He nearly dropped the box. "Not that - not that your room is - see, um, there was one time, in the desert -" His face was turning a very vivid shade of red to match the pink of the room, while his voice seemed to give up halfway through the sentence in favor of awkward silence. A stuffed alpaca made a faint squeak under his sneaker, startling him back a step. He hugged the cardboard box closer with both arms; a few loops of christmas lights began to slither out of containment. Currently he was the embodiment of whatever yoga wasn't. He could only blink owlishly at the suggestion of taking care of himself.
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Posted: Thu Apr 23, 2015 2:11 am
Once she'd made sure the door was closed, she set to work separating the blankets and pillows she usually let Dawson use during the one or two times he stayed over to escape the darkness of the basement. She set them down on the ground, spread them out carefully and flattened them with a slide of her hands. Then she dropped the pillow and crawled into her bed. None of what he was saying made a clear impact on her. It was for this reason people felt comfortable telling Maebe their deepest, darkest secrets. The same reason she knew more about clones, Sasha, and even good old Lucky, than most people would have ever expected. Nothing ever stuck - and nothing was ever worth thinking about for too long. "Desert, sure. That's not comfortable." She eyed him critically, her face crunching in dismay. "Boy, do you need a shower. And a haircut slash shave. And probably a really big, greasy meal. Not in that order, of course - sit down, make yourself comfortable."
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Posted: Sat Apr 25, 2015 1:52 am
Lucky responded in dog-like fashion, landing in the middle of his floor-bed, with the box sitting haphazardly in his lap. It took him a moment to think to set it aside, but he finally did. At Maebe's assessment, he reached a few fingers tentatively toward his jawline. They were met by coarse, overgrown hair, a far cry from the expected stubble of a few missed days of shaving. He met her gaze with a wide-eyed expression that read 'HELP'. It was uncanny how good he was at silently expressing that one word in particular.
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Posted: Sat Apr 25, 2015 2:01 am
She barked out an unintended laugh, and cupped her hand over her mouth in remorse. The amusement remained on her face, however, as she climbed down off of her bed and knelt down in front of him, surveying the scruffy mess he'd managed to grow. She even reached out and touched it a little, but the touch was brief enough to hopefully keep from disturbing him. "Well, uh." She read it in his eyes, but she came up blank, a little wary about whether she could help or not. "I guess I could shave it off for you, if you really need my help with it. But I'd be using a woman's razor. This may be a hit to your male psyche, you know." She'd shaved men before, and trimmed their hair, but these were men who'd have forgiven her for a mistake or two if she made it up to them. Lucky would not be getting that same option. "Depends on if you trust me around your neck with a knife. I am pretty shifty." She smiled, with the least shifty expression her face could manage.
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Posted: Fri May 29, 2015 11:07 pm
It took him a few seconds before he'd realized why Maebe was (trying to avoid) offering him a trim. Lucky finally stopped clawing at his own face long enough to shake his head. "Oh! Uh - no, it's just -" He trailed off as Maebe ran her hand through his unexpected beard. He'd never felt more like Mark in his life - dazed, stuttering, with a beard he didn't remember growing, and just as desperately in need of a shower. And honestly... the more he thought about it, the less he liked the idea of just pretending nothing had happened. It was evidence that something had... he didn't even know. "I think... I'm going to wait. To get rid of it." "Maybe next time," he half-joked, keeping his hands occupied by toying with his weapon totem instead of anything else self-destructive. Though, on second thought: "N-not with the knife, though." "So, uh..." He still looked a little overwhelmed by how colorful her room was. Or that he was awake. Maybe both. Though he was still mostly unaware of it, he still looked like he could use a haircut. The beard was passable despite its scruffiness, but his hair was still messy, unkempt, and a bit too long to be a deliberate choice. "What have you been up to?" Had he ever had a haircut since he'd arrived on the island? Probably not.
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