B22: An Unholy Row

[epistemological]

WHO: Jon and you
WHAT: Starving and heartsick, Jon's on the galley and not doing well
WHERE: Oars, Deck, Yard, Cabin
WHEN: early part of August
NOTES: No warnings to begin with other than deep DEEP depression. If you'd like a starter, or to plot for something, feel free to ping me on plurk @ yarnzipan

Jon? Hadn't been well when the ship had been taken. He'd been spending the last few days between being dead and being recently not-dead, which had used up what fear energy he'd had stashed up so when he was brought to the room? He... hadn't been entirely coherent. Or particularly lovely. By the end, he'd been snappish and snarky and he's reasonably certain he hadn't agreed to anything, strictly, but he'd probably said something clever that had allowed him to be brought here and of course it'd been as a prisoner.

One one side, he can feel that his power is gone, that he certainly can't hurt anyone else regardless of how hungry he is, how desperate. Contrary to one might think? He's glad for that.

On the other, however, the list of his crimes looks like the tickertape from an episode of supermarket sweep, his various 'crimes' in dooming the entirety of his world laid out before him in a length of parchment that wrapped around his arms and dropped between them to dip against the floor. The two month 'reprieve' added to the end for his effort in reversing the situation is the crowning cherry on the mixed metaphor of a shit sandwich, and he's not ashamed to say he spent some time, weak and sick and starving, just weeping in his assigned room.

But he had duties at the oar bank, as he was told by one of what he found out to be Advocates, the one who was connected to the room he'd been deposited in. They informed him about the yard, where he'd end up eventually, and that there was, in fact, a tiny selection of reading material that he could enjoy while there.

He'd never much liked detective novels. He put the pieces together too quick to make them satisfying even before he'd become what he was.

He gets a chance to see the deck, to see the stars, and some part of him doesn't even see them so much as he simply needs to be somewhere open, somewhere... almost familiar. He doesn't know... anything. What he's going to do, how he's going to survive this place, if he'll make it through his sentence, even though he'd never dream of refuting it. Especially since it seems like he's lost his chance.

He can never save his world. The worlds connected to it.

He can never make himself safe to live anywhere.

Those doors were closed now. So... maybe this is best.

Which is why it isn't that much of a hardship for him to be stuck in his cabin all the time, regardless of someone able to watch him, regardless of it being more spartan than his old college dorm. Right now, about all he can manage, when he isn't working or reading the same page of a detective novel he found over and over again is stare up into nothing and wonder if this is what Daisy felt like in the coffin.

It's what he deserves.

Comments

For Daniel

[epistemological]

Jon's been rowing for a while, long enough that exhausted as he is, starving as he is, he's mostly being rowed rather than rowing to be entirely honest. He makes as much of a motion as he needs to not to be shocked but... that's about as much as he can manage. Nosy by nature, he can't help looking up and over as a new face shows up in the oar banks.

And his heart sinks, the humiliation complete.

"Good afternoon, Daniel."

[choosetoforget]

No.

That's his first thought as he spots him on the oars. His heart sinks. His entire body freezes slightly and, for a moment, he can't even breathe. He wants to go and rip him off of there, to demand that he be released, to insist to the Judge that she's made some sort of mistake.

But Gonou was right.

"Jon," he says, all grief and confusion and horror. "How much longer do you have?"

[epistemological]

Jon just... huffs, something dusty and wasted and completely lacking in humor but it might have been the ghost of a laugh. Its too dry even for him. That question is... why, it's hilarious.

"Four thousand, seven hundred, eighty nine years, ten months, and ... three days, I think, at this point." Another of those broken sounds. "Something like that. I stopped counting eventually."

Deck

[major_rawne]

Seeing the stars around him like this is still strange, but now it's a reassuring kind of strange. A strange he seeks out when he can. When he sees Jon, he perks up a little, happy to see a familiar face.

Then he remembers Jon's... situation, and frowns, worried. "Are you... do you need stories? Are they starving you?"

Re: Deck

[epistemological]

Jon is... waving a little, on his feet, and when he turns to look at Rawne, it's obvious from his color and the way his eyes are a little too wide, that he's not even remotely well. At Rawne's concern, he shakes his head.

"No one's- no one's starving me. I'm- I'm here the same as everyone else. I just- had a bit of a rough turn at the end of things on the Barge. I'll be... fine."

He is not even remotely fine. But he's not about to start- start cannibalizing his allies. No. No.

Re: Deck

[major_rawne]

"Right. Yeah. You'll be fine." Rawne's paler than usual and he's got dark circles under his eyes. He hasn't been sleeping well since he got here. But he shoves that aside out of concern for Jon. "You're no use to anyone if you drop dead."

yard

[riseunparalleled]

Xie Lian has looked healthier himself, and he's lacking a number of his usual bandages, including the one that, on the Barge, covered the black band around his neck, but the smile he gives Jon is as warm and genuine as always.

"Hello, have you found anything interesting?"

Re: yard

[epistemological]

...he hates this. Automatically, immediately, he hates how rough Xie Lian looks, and he's angry that his bandages have been taken. He doesn't know what the black band is but he's still angry all the same.

"What happened to you? What did they do?"

You could knock him over with a feather but he still looks like he's going to complain to the manager.

Re: yard

[riseunparalleled]

Even beset by his own troubles, Jon still asks. It's the sort of kindness - care for others - that helps Xie Lian's smiles remain real, even when the circumstances are far from ideal.

"Nothing that hasn't happened to any other prisoner." Though, admittedly, definitely made worse by his pervasive bad luck, which he isn't shielded from here as he suspects he was on the Barge. "How are you?"

Oars

[therebedragons]

Flint has been doing a lot of shifts on the Oars and some of that is on purpose. Here they can talk, they can plan, and he can pull more to his ranks, his new Advocate knows that. Missing an eye and a hand for killing his last Advocate is an easy excuse as well. No one questions it.

He looks over at the other, exhausted as he is, and frowns.

"You look like shit."

Re: Oars

[epistemological]

"I spent most of the last few days before our capture dying and falling over before reviving again," he explains, yes, tiredly. He's not going to beleaguer the point, but he'll add-

"The Advocate attached to the room I was in wasn't particularly interested in excuses. Hence, I'm here on my shift."

He looks at Flint.

"You... seem to have faired significantly worse. Which is saying something."

[therebedragons]

There's a soft chuckle at the fact Jon points out how he's fared, "I don't know about that, I wasn't dying."

And he's doing alright, all things considered, at least at face value. Alone with just his thoughts is another story.

"We need to get out of this fucking place. And I plan to do something about it."

Oar banks

[everswirlingtoilet]

Nick stares at the rows of oars and the people working them. His arms are crossed over his chest and his face has a decidedly pugnacious expression. Basically he looks like a child who's refusing to eat his broccoli.

"I want to file a complaint. This is a violation of my rights under the Geneva Convention," he says loudly to whoever in authority might be listening. Or to no one at all. Sometimes he just likes to make noise.

He turns to look at Jon, seated just behind him. "Right? This is bullshit."

Re: Oar banks

[epistemological]

A tired, humorless chuckle dribbles out of him.

"Hardly penance, in my estimation, but I don't believe my estimation counts for fuck all at the moment."

[everswirlingtoilet]

Nick ponders that for a moment, then nods. "I'm pretty sure none of our estimations count for anything. In fact, I'm positive they don't because if they did, we wouldn't be here."

oars

[reformedsinner]

When he sees another familiar face, already chained into his place at the oars but barely able to move, Gonou makes sure to head in that direction, settling down into place beside Jon. The heavy shackles click into place, he sets his one whole and one bandaged hand on the oar, and begins to row.

Without his benchmate able to move much, it's more effort, and he suspects he'll open some of the wounds on his hand for what feels like the hundredth time. Still, better that than watching Jon struggle alone.

His ears are long and pointed, his fingers end in razored claws, and although the shape of his face is the same, his eyes are yellow and vine-pattern markings wend across all of his visible skin. It's possible, if not likely, that it'll all be enough misdirection to prevent Jon from recognizing him.

So he doesn't speak first.

Re: oars

[epistemological]

He's no longer the Archivist, at least not in any way that's useful, but he still has the two eyes in his head and his brain working. He waits a moment or two until they've done a few motions before looking over at Gonou.

"...I'm sorry," he says with a breath out, "Whatever it is I did, which I know is a garbage apology but I honestly don't know and I can't really-"

He almost moves to gesture with a hand before thinking better of it and sort of wobbling his head.

"I'm in the dark, Gonou, so if you please."

Beat.

"U-unless you're not Gonou?"

Re: oars

[reformedsinner]

Well. He should have known a few profound physical transformations wouldn't hide his identity from Jon, Gonou supposes, and glances to the side between sweeps of the oar.

"You didn't do anything," he murmurs, and lets his gaze fall again to his hands as he rows. "I'm -- I thought you might not recognize me."

Which he might, almost, have preferred. But still.

"Yes, I'm Gonou."

[somekindofmeta]

Now here is a man who knows the value of reading, thinks Vetinari.

He comes up to Jon's cabin, knocking politely on the door, and sets a book down on his night stand.

It's an unpublished manuscript about running a hellish city-state full of greedy, selfish people all wanting something and unwilling to give up ground to do it. And how best to come out on top.

It's called The Servant, by Havelock Vetinari.

[epistemological]

Jon is more than a little surprised to find a book in his room, mostly because he's reasonably certain that the ox of a man whose own is attached would have rather thrown out a book than provide him one. But once he starts reading it... well, he doesn't want to put it down.

He'll be found reading it out in the yard if he's not troubled for it.

[somekindofmeta]

Pleased that Jon seems to enjoy his book, Vetinari walks up to Jon in the yard, clearing his throat.

"I hate to interrupt. But it's rare I find someone as interested in the written word as myself."

He bows his head in greeting to Jon.

"I am Lord Vetinari."

[littletonoidea]

The oars aren't an easy shift, by anyone's measure. Certainly not for Eiffel, who hasn't lifted anything heavier than a boombox for most of his life. But however badly he's struggling with it, sitting behind Jon makes it abundantly clear that the other man is doing far worse. At least Eiffel isn't getting shocked, as narrowly as he's avoiding it.

At least it puts them on the same meal shift after, before they get thrown onto different paths again, and after they're herded like animals back to the dining hall, Eiffel makes a point to sidle up next to Jon, holding one arm, still trembling faintly from exertion, at the ready in case the other guy needs it more.

"Hey, Jon." He tries to offer a smile, but it doesn't quite reach his eyes.

[epistemological]

The 'other guy' is at least made of sterner stuff at this point; while his powers aren't working, he's gotten used to never entirely getting used to being harmed as a regular occurence.

Today was just... a day.

"Good day, Mister Eiffel. You... look about as good as I do. No one's ruffed you up, have they?"

Oars

[lealte]

Captain Levitt strolls up and down the bank of oars, keeping an eye on the prisoners and ensuring no one slacks off. He stops by Jon's bench and observes him for a few seconds before commenting.

"I really thought you'd be the type to start fading after five minutes. You're more durable than you look."

Re: Oars

[epistemological]

That earns a soft, dusty laugh, lacking quite a bit of humor, because... really?

"You're not the first to say so."