singillatim | Summer of where the hell are we

Entry tags:

Summer of where the hell are we

Who: Raylan and you!
What: Feasting, MemLoss, around town SoL
When: Month of August
Where: Around Milton, Community hall

[Methusalah's Feast]

Raylan always made sure to come to these when he was able to without betraying himself in one way or another. He also made sure to come with plenty of firewood and dried fish over his shoulder and in his hand respectively, to offer new 'settlers'. Free supplies made things a lot easier when you were just learning how to survive like this and he remembers all too well how harrowing it was to just show up here in Milton out of regular life. It didn't hurt that he liked to see who came in, as well as take an opportunity to check up on the message board. It could be it's own form of entertainment sometimes.

At his side moved a wolf, tall at nearly hip level, with the standard kind of grey and white most people would think of when thinking 'wolf', but seemingly perfectly well behaved as his eyes stay on the rest of the room. Quiet but ready. All up until he got distracted by a smell and starts to nose into someone's meal.

"Goose! No, goddamnit, that's rude," he tuts as a long stride carries him over to push the wolf away. Goose didn't even look sorry, in the way he licked his chops, still eyeing the plate. Raylan sighs and offers an apologetic smile. "Sorry about that. Normally, he's got better manners then that."

[In the Woods somewhere]

It was cold. It was the first thing he'd noticed when he woke up and while a deluge of other wildly concerning circumstances were upon him, the cold dug at him more sharply than anything else. He felt sure that he must know who he was, if he could only warm up enough to think about it. What did it matter who he was if who he was didn't have any goddamn fingers? The flash of irritation warmed him only slightly, and he pulls the coat he's lucky enough to be wearing closer around his ears as step by step, he makes his way through the forest.

It was quiet and the kind of quiet that left live nerves under his skin. The kind of quiet that make his ears try and stretch somehow, to hear more clearly anything that might be moving in the roving mists. He couldn't decide if it had worked but after a little while, the crunch of something else stepping in the snow sent his ears right back to their proverbial stretching. Unnerved enough by not knowing who he was, the man without a hat hurries his stride a little bit, in the hope that what was making that noise was human.

"Hey! Hello, yes-" All it would take is eye contact for him to start moving closer. "Can't tell you how good it is to see someone else out here. Is there a- a town or something nearby? I seem to've gotten lost.."

[Around Milton - Wildcard]

Raylan hated this month. There was at least one shiny good part about it, but that withstanding, he wasn't sure how anyone here was sane anymore. The day in and day out that was only broken by terrible things upon terrible things, the gnawing hopelessness that felt harder and harder to fight each time they got knocked down was starting to fray his edges. So Raylan did what he always did when he felt like this (since there wasn't enough whiskey to drown it all out); he stayed busy.

Wood chopping was always needed. The library? Well there were some books he thought Tim might like. The clothing store? Just checking in, to see if anything new has come in. A few t-shirts end up over his shoulder after a quick hold up against his chest sizes it out. Hell, he even stops by the church, just to see the place again. He was happy to do anything that wasn't sit still and think. What he needed was a proper bath in the hot springs but honestly, he would need company lest his head get too far away from itself.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

His eyebrows lift a little at 'dumb shit' but he doesn't argue with her about the opinion.

"Not much different. Save for there bein' a cannery and inside that, a place to make ammunition. More wolves. I saw less of it than I should, due to the bullshit but I'm sure I'll make it out there again. Dam is pretty messed up though. Don't suppose we're riggin' that up to work anytime soon."

His head tilts a little as he studies her.

"You okay?"

A place to make ammunition, that sounds good. She’ll have to tell the younger Levi, if he doesn't know. He's been guarding his ammo stash pretty carefully.

“They had the hot water going in there for a while. The dam. I used to go there sometimes when I visited the restaurant in Lakeside.”

She hadn't known how good she’d had it.

“One of the people like me, he killed someone. The hunger. You felt it.” He and Arthur might the only non-afflicted people who really know. “They had another one of those big meetings over it. If they find out, they're going to kill me.”

"What I wouldn't give for a hot shower," he mutters with a sigh. He's missed all the windows, apparently. Save for taking Chloe up on her previous offer to use it here, but he didn't know the state of the boiler.

Raylan's brow furrows slightly as Chloe continues and as she comes to her last statement, his expression gets stormy, eyes going to that dark near black they did when the light didn't hit them right.

"The hell they will." Raylan knew full well that Chloe could defend herself, but that's not a lot of help against half a town. She wasn't his but she was one of his people, one of those people that Raylan would color the snow for if the situation called for it. He could count on one hand the people that he would defend so swiftly and Chloe didn't even have to ask.

"And like hell they're passin' that kinda judgement after the bullshit last time-" He shifts, one hand lifting like it was ready to pull her behind him for safety as he starts asking.

"What'd they decide in his case? Who was it? Who'd he kill?"

“I don't know who he killed. I don't know if he knows who he killed.” There are a lot of people here and they're pretty spread out now. “It was a woman, and it happened in Lakeside. Not one of the ones in their little in-crowd, I assume, or we’d never fucking hear the end of it.”

That's probably not completely fair to say. Chloe sighs, rubbing a hand over her face. “Sorry. It's been rough here. It was Dorian. Who did it.”

Someone she spends a lot of time with, if he's keeping track.

“Someone had broken his nose before the meeting. People were talking about killing him. Someone said that lying about having this power was worse than the murder! A guy called him a thing; a monster who hunts interlopers.”

She grabs the outstretched arm. “In some ways this curse makes me powerful, but it makes me weak, too. I don't know if I can get away if they turn on us.”

Raylan's frown deepens. Chloe is probably right about about the victim not being in the 'in-crowd' - if they all really cared, they'd find out who the victim was. Still, this wasn't civilization and Raylan tries his best to not apply the legal reasoning that he was trained and educated in to such a place.

"Dorian," he echoes with a faint nod, noting the name for later. Just because he wasn't talking to every new face that passed by him didn't mean that he wasn't going to afford them the same common respect he gave people he did know.

Chloe admits her fear and Raylan's expression darkens stormily, hand turning grip her gently in return. He was already an intense man, but as he speaks, the old bear's blessing creeps into the tone, making it all that more intense an expression and statement.

"You hear so much as a whisper of that happening, you come down to Tim and I. If I hear so much as a whisper of that, I'll be headed right up here after kickin' someone's ass. They're not gonna lynch you without lynchin' others and like hell are we gonna stand to the side and let 'em. You're an important part of this community. Shit, bring your friend too. I'll still ask him questions, but I'll protect him just the same as you, darlin'."

It's strange to feel protected like this without feeling like she needs to buy it.

“I will. I’ll tell him, too, in case someone goes after him in his house like they did with Hickey and Gibson.”

That could have gone a lot worse if Billy hadn't had the fire power.

“You’re the only one who really understands what it’s like, I think. Aside from the ones who got cursed themselves.”

When he’d been in her body, he'd been able to feel that hunger.

Even if he got into his head and kept himself apart sometimes, there was no world in which Chloe would be allowed to trade anything for his protection and affection. Never mind that Raylan Givens couldn't be bought with cash or hot food or ass, Chloe was his friend and had seen more of him than anyone else here.

That and he couldn't stand the hypocrisy when common sense laws weren't something the general populace seemed to want to agree on. The injustice of that alone irritated him and a Givens with his backhairs up could be a hellva pain in the ass when he wanted to be.

"The vampires should too, I'd expect. If they have any goddamned sympathy to begin with. Life here is hard enough as it is and it ain't gonna be the last body by Interloper hands we have to put in the ground." Why should the pattern stop? Why should that change when people remained in a terrible situation, psychologically assaulted constantly.

"A fuckin' saint would lose their minds here," he mutters, pulling her into a hug. He didn't know how she'd take it but she looked like she needed one.

Raylan knows Chloe better now than even most of her friends at home, after the things they'd had to say to one another to get out of that cave and then his sojourn in her body.

She leans into the hug, hungry for touch after so long without. But she's hungry for other things, too. Chloe shakes her head.

“I could hurt you.”

"Darlin'," he starts softly. "I could hurt you back. This ain't about coulds. It's about what we gotta do to make sure we survive. Together."

He wasn't going to be dissuaded. Granted, it was because he knew that Bear's Blessing or not, Darkwalker's Revenge or not, no one dodged a bullet. He didn't like to think of doing that. He didn't want to.

"An' I've been hurt before. We both have. Tough cookies," he continues, pulling back a little to smile at her. "We'll make sure it comes out okay."

Chloe shakes her head again. This is definitely something that she needs to hear, and it is a relief to know that he’ll fight back if she loses control, but it feels more serious.

“By touching you, I could hurt you. Drain the life out of you. That's what happened with Dorian.”

She thinks the contact is less risky if it isn't skin to skin, but she really doesn't know anything.

“I try to fight it, but I’m so hungry.”

He lifts his head, suddenly wary, but his embrace didn't loosen. They weren't touching skin to skin just now, though he couldn't tell if the twist in his stomach was from the clear complication that threw into every thing or because she had started to draw whatever life force this thing sucked away from him. He had to start planning.

"I know. Next time, I'll wrap you in three different blankets." He squeezes her again before slowly letting her go. "It doesn't change my position. The only rules are common sense ones. Don't .. 'feed' on Gutterson or myself. I won't see him hurt like that." It was so out of left field, he didn't know how he was going to explain this to the sniper.

"For now, stay here. I'll be back regularly to check in, okay?"

Chloe takes a reluctant step back once Raylan lets her go. Distance is probably safer right now for both of them - though she can still feel the bear’s strength in the air between them - but it's hard to take any contact with anyone for granted right now.

It shouldn't be hard to keep to his conditions so long as she's in her right mind. She doesn't really want to feed on anyone this way. Kostya had offered to test things out with her, but she's been reluctant both because he's her friend and for worm reasons.

“Okay. Gutterson… Tim?” Chloe’s met him a few times now. Sounds like maybe the lady doth protest too much over the work partner thing. “How’s he doing? Heard my house fell on him.”

He hums a note of confirmation, head bobbing oh so slightly with it.

"That's the one. Still sad about that house goin' down, it was a damned shame." Even moreso because it fell on his partner, directly. "But he's doin' as well as any of us, I suppose. Don't think any of us are doin' particularly great, if I'm bein' honest. He's-"

Well, he didn't feel he'd protested too much, but the situation now was not what it was then.

"We're livin' together. In the same bedroom and all."

Take that for a lack of protest. It helped that his situation now was not at all like the situation the last time they'd talked about the sniper. Still, he shifts a little restlessly on his feet and seems a little reluctant to meet her eyes. It didn't matter that she knew he was bisexual, but also, he still wasn't wholly comfortable in being out, even in private. He was working on it.

Tim had scrambled so hard around the word partner when she’d first met him that Chloe had been surprised later to learn he was gay. She's starting to realize off the tentative confession here what that had probably been about.

“Sounds like it wasn't an entirely bad thing then, my house falling on him.”

If there's one thing she's learned about Raylan by now it's that in these situations he's in his own head enough that he needs a little kick to move him along.

“Want me to keep that to myself for now?”

Chloe loves gossip, but she’d told Raylan that she doesn't out people and she’d meant it.

"Not entirely, no." He huffs a breath and smiles. It wasn't a bad thing at all, the trauma of it aside. Tim put a shine on Raylan that no one here had seen, save for Chloe glancing at the starts of that shine from Lalo. Raylan was a man who was softer and easier, for all the ease he already carried, when he had people to care about in this way.

Chole's question quickly chases the ease from his face and he nods as he glances down, shuffling on his feet.

"Yeah. If you don't mind. Folks'll see when they see and I don't even know if he-" He was dangerously close to the edge of showing his hand and he covers it with a faint lift and fall of his shoulders. He didn't know if Tim even wanted that.

"We'll see."

Chloe nods. It's nice to see that smile again - that bit of ease for her friend - even if it's something she can't share with him this time.

“Oh, it's that new, huh? Want me to pretend I don't know around him, too?”

Tim would probably be so fun to tease a bit, but she doesn't want to hurt Raylan.

Raylan could only wince and bob his head back and forth. New? Was it? He didn't know the math on that and was reluctant to show too much of how they'd been dancing around each other.

"No. No sense in makin' things weird by lyin'. He'd probably smell it anyway. An' any wolf that's smelled me or him knows already, no matter what we'd like either way." Though if Tim has considered that, Raylan didn't know and he wasn't going to mention it himself without a damned good reason.

"I'm not here to endorse lyin', just keeping folks business where it belongs." Close to the chest but since Tim was part of it and Raylan valued Chloe's support and care, he felt it was only right. Even if Tim wouldn't know exactly why. Raylan's paranoia about anything known about him being used against him ruled all his decisions, and he wasn't sure if that was something that could be changed.

Have your fun, Chloe. Tim deserves a little shit sometimes.

Chloe nods with a sideways smile. Tim had better watch out.

“Gotcha. I really am happy for you. We’ve got to take happiness where we can get it out here.”

"Maybe." He looked quietly pleased as he said it, head bobbing to one side and back with another little smile crawling back onto his face. He was reluctant to let himself hope too much or get too excited. The higher it was, the harder he fell. It was part of the reason he'd taken Lalo leaving as well as he had, for all the walls he let down when he was by himself. So set in that seed of worry to grow anew. Happiness almost always equaled some kind of devastation at the end.

"Anyway. Is there anythin' I can do for ya in the now?" Save for bringing a body to drain.

It was going to be a constant looming concern, now. Every body that was dropped, suspicious eyes would turn Chloe's way. It put his back hairs up just thinking about it.

Chloe shakes her head. “The firewood’s going to be a big help. I’ll burn through it quicker now that it's getting colder at night.”

Also more people are opting to be paid in showers now for the same reason.

“It means a lot knowing you'll look out for me, too.”

Chloe knows she's a lot of work, and appreciates anyone willing to shoulder the thankless task, especially for no real reward.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Summer of where the hell are we

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject