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Post by Deleted on Oct 22, 2013 0:06:10 GMT
He pinched the finger of his glove between his teeth, pulled it off and groped with bare hand like a blind man in the alley's shadows. He could feel the wound, sticky and mottled and still pulsing on the side of the almost-dead man's head. Lower, he could feel the pulse, and it felt like his had matched in its unsteadiness.
He wasn't quite dead, and there was time to salvage, to profit. His car was a few blocks away, his shitty car with a tarp-loaded trunk and seats that stank of bleach. Minzhe stood up, wiped a bloody hand on his pants and stepped into the streetlight.
@roya |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 22, 2013 0:26:26 GMT
Home ends up being a sad Motel 6, with bullet holes in a wall. After one night, Roya is uncomfortable and hates the squelching noises the building makes when she's trying to sleep. She'll take to the streets again.
She walks steadily, head down and she hums the odd ends and bits of songs, rhythms forgotten and shoved in junk drawers. Her gloves are fingerless and worn in the knuckles. She clenches and unclenches her fists, watching her fingers like tiny pink explosions.
Without warning, a force hits her sideways. It's light but unexpected and Roya just instinctively grabs it for balance. When she realizes she's grabbed a living, breathing person she pulls her hands back sharply. Her fingertips feel funny now, and she brings them close to her face for inspection. Dimly lit, she sees that her gloves are red, barely, fingertips moist, barely. She's not sure what she grabbed. Swallowing, she looks up to see the oxymoron of the familiar stranger's face, features warped in the harsh light.
Roya's heartbeat quickens, hammering in her throat, and she doesn't understand why. @minzhe |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 22, 2013 1:02:32 GMT
Minzhe is tall, he takes up space that way, but there isn't much weight to his frame, he's like a gangly teenage boy that stumbles back a step when they collide. When he feels hands clinging to him, he grabs her by instinct, he leaves bloodstain bracelets around her wrists.
For a moment, he doesn't recognize her. For a moment, she's a terrifying stranger and then he realizes he'd seen her before and he feels uneasy in a different way, having caught her again. He lets go. She's looking at her hands now, bloodied, and Minzhe subconsciously presses a hand to his jacket, damp in spots but too dark to show stains.
He looks down on her, expression impassive but he's trembling. He backs up, away, glancing into the alley behind him where she might see glinting puddles, where he might retreat to.
@roya |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 22, 2013 1:21:38 GMT
He backs up and Roya follows, matching him step for step. It's a small dance, a miniature waltz, and she's finding it hard to breathe. Maybe her capillaries swelled up, she can hear her heartbeat in her ears.
Phantom limb, in his absence she realizes he was trembling. Without much thought, she grasps at his coat, not sure if she'll grab the burlap fabric of it or just close her bony fingers around air. "Wait," she manages, and to her ears it sounds gurgled. Suddenly Roya worries if she's choking on her own blood. Logically, she knows that's impossible but her eyes grow wide in a moment of panic. @minzhe |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 22, 2013 3:06:23 GMT
ʃij stɛps ɪn æz hij stɛps ʌwey, ænd hijz bækɾ ʌp ɪntuw ðʌ ʃædowz ægɛn, howpɪŋ ʃij wownt fɑlow. ɪnstɛd ʃij rijtfəz awt fɔr hɪm. ʃij hæz hɪm ɪn æ fɪstfəl ʌv fæbrək. ɪf ʃijz nʊrvəs, hij dʌznt nowtəs ɔvər hijz owvər hijz own ræɾləŋ brɛθs ænd hæmərɪŋ hɑrt.
ɪt fijlz lajk ðʌ fʌrst tajm ðej mɛt, ɛksɛpt naw ʃij hæz hɪm ænd hij hæz now plejs tɔ rʌn. It's a weak hold, but it feels unbreakable in his panic.
Minzhe opens his mouth to say something, but instead he only gapes. He only swallows thickly and looks into her eyes - he isn't sure what he sees. |
She steps in as he steps away, and he's backed up into the shadows again, hoping she won't follow. Instead she reaches out for him. She has him in a fistful of fabric. If she's nervous, he doesn't notice over his own rattling breaths and hammering heart.
It feels like the first time they met, except now she has him and he has no place to run. It's a weak hold, but it feels unbreakable in his panic.
Minzhe opens his mouth to say something, but instead he only gapes. He only swallows thickly and looks into her eyes - he isn't sure what he sees.
@roya |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 22, 2013 3:50:07 GMT
She's got him, and absently she rubs the fabric between her fingers. It's damp, too. She can't see well in the light, but Roya has a hunch. Mirroring him, she gapes and swallows. She doesn't mean to, but it's happened.
She's suddenly aware of a large bandaid on her cheek that she had forgotten about. Bandaids felt like a second skin, regularly shed to reveal small and wispy scars. This one came from falling in the grimy motel shower, cutting her cheek on exposed tile. "Are you," she pauses, her voice still sounding far away. They look at each other, each one both the hunter and the prey. "...alright?" Her voice is hardly a voice - an exhale, a rasp. @minzhe |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 22, 2013 4:15:34 GMT
He's caught off guard by the question, even though it's one he hears all the time. From friendly drunks noticing his hunched posture to the teachers, back in school when he showed up with bruises painting his entire face.
Minzhe never answers the question - alright in what sense? Really though, the guy will be dead soon, and then it's only a matter of time until it's too late to save his organs. He doesn't have time to ponder the intricacies of the word and what it insinuates.
Instead he moves to side step her, to slip his jacket out of her grasp, to free himself of her. "I'm busy." He says flatly, though he can't quite inject any sort of authority into his tone.
@roya |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 22, 2013 4:25:16 GMT
Letting him go, Roya watches. The night is stale and she doesn't know how late it is. Something about him sucks her vibrance away, makes her somber. She brushes it off, turns around. "With what?" her voice is earnest. Roya isn't sure what she has to offer - it's very certain she's just annoying.
What's the worst that could happen? It's macabre to think. Roya knows the answer fairly well, but she doesn't regret asking. @minzhe |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 23, 2013 2:46:29 GMT
She doesn't do anything to keep her hold or to keep him close, and that's probably for the better. A bit of breathing room helps, and he's rewinding the tape that tells him just what he's going to do with the almost-corpse in the alleyway.
He feels calmer, but Minzhe isn't sure why he answers this question, so honestly - though he's never been a very good liar. "Bodies." He says. He sounds nervous, and he is. But not in the way he should have been. She hadn't told the cops before, and why would she now, when this had nothing to do with her.
@roya |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 23, 2013 3:35:20 GMT
The word makes her think of simulated crime scene photos, the ones you see in TV. She thinks of bloated bodies, she thinks of sunken in eyes and zip ties, maybe even the Amityville Horror or the Bunnyman, something she's seen on the internet that's questionable and gory. Maybe she was overexposed.
Roya opens her mouth to say something, but pauses. This is turning into a habit. She makes a soft sound before she finally spits something out. "Plural?" she says. Her voice isn't calm, but it isn't shaking. There's a sterile sound to it. Roya is experiencing a lull in her patterns; she's eager to learn, she can't think of consequences. Maybe this is the way everyone should live.
Follow the example of the girl who leaped headfirst into the cavernous mouth of certain disaster. @minzhe |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 23, 2013 5:30:17 GMT
Maybe he spoke too fast, and she points it out - whether that was her intention or not. Bodies is his career, the man with a head wound in the alley is tonight's work. He bites his lip - he hates being corrected - and shakes his head.
He still isn't sure if he's threatened by her or just uncomfortable as he would be with anyone. He isn't sure what she wants and why she's elbowing into his business. There's no logic in it, but Minzhe doesn't understand logic in people very well. He's only slightly aware that what she's doing is not quite normal. Not because he's dangerous, not because he's insane - just because he's never had this happen before. It's out of the ordinary.
It's different, but not the same way Minzhe is different. He's one of a kind. Evereyone is encouraged to be, unless they're one of his kind.
It's pointless to try and understand. He shakes his head and turns on his heel.
@roya |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 23, 2013 23:29:18 GMT
There is most likely a chemical in the brain that tells people they are in danger. It's a shrill warning siren that a boundary is being overstepped, that this wrong turn could be the last turn ever.
This chemical probably has a friend, a brother, a comrade in arms, who tells the body and heart when the line of normalcy has been scratched out of the dirt. It says that you are in Wonderland now and that fact should alarm you, should frighten you vert much. That's why he goes hand in hand with danger.
Roya's mother probably kept this from her, genetically. In her development her mother's hormones told her uterus that baby Roya would never really need these things. They just got in the way, really. Such a shame for all the kids who were rational and rightfully fearful. Such a shame.
So, seeing as she didn't have these things, Roya did not question it when her body lurched forward, when she walked after Mnizhe and followed him deeper into the rabbit hole. It was not out of sick curiosity, it wasn't because of misplaced affection. It was simply because she lacked the devices that would say this is a Bad Idea. @minzhe |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 28, 2013 22:51:07 GMT
He is very attuned to when he is being followed, but in this case it doesn't serve much purpose. His pursuer isn't making any effort to be subtle, her steps are plodding and her breathing is loud and he doesn't need to turn around to see her.
He keeps moving in long, rushed strides, until he reaches the end of the block, just before he has to cross. He stops, then, and glances over his shoulder. For some reason, he does turn around, hands in his pocket and eyes trained on her feet.
"What... do you want?"
@roya |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 28, 2013 23:00:55 GMT
He turns around, catches her trailing after. Roya's eyes are mirrors in the light. She licks her lips and somewhere the smell of tobacco wafts over. Maybe it's just the damp and moldy smell of the alley ways, though.
"Ah," she says, like this thought didn't occur to her. She goes to scratch the side of her face, but the band-aid is there. "Dunno." Her voice is noncommittal, and she shrugs. The way she's holding herself, the slight tilt of her frame and the way one foot seems ready to take another step - Roya's not about to stop. @minzhe |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 29, 2013 2:25:01 GMT
Minzhe's not sure what to think of this woman, chasing him like a shadow. She looks more like a ghost in the street, and he wonders if he isn't imagining all of this. He knows his brain works on different frequencies, and maybe she's a bit of white noise he's caught. Nobody is ever like this with him, so easy and fearless and simple, an he isn't sure if he feels any reassured by it. Well, he hasn't snapped in self defense yet.
Not a man of many words, he just stares at her a few more seconds and then turns around again. He's not very good at ignoring people, not unless he's absorbed in something else, but there isn't much to catch his interest, here on the dingy streets, the occasional stray cat or passing car.
Again, he starts walking, towards his car, very consciously of the shadow at his back.
@roya |
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