orderfromchaos | 23. the creatures in tide pools

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23. the creatures in tide pools

[Open spam in the chapel, since the kid flood, whenever.]

[When he isn't on shift at the infirmary, or trailing after Abigail like a concerned ginger puppy, Dillon is spending a lot of time in the chapel. Just - sitting, in the very front pew or the very back, wishing for saints and stained glass and stone, for something gaudy and familiar, the smell of sand and wood polish. But the chapel resists his homesickness, neat white plaster, well kept, effusively inoffensive. He tries kneeling, a couple times. But it doesn't feel right, and neither does prayer. So he sits, quiet, eyes forward on the Unitarian nondenominational emptiness, for an hour or two, watches the shadows from the little candles, tries to think about his mistakes, about his options, about nothing at all.]

[Private to Arthas]

I want to see you. Anywhere you'd rather meet?

[Spam for Jerry, backdated to after Allison's post, early the next morning on the tenth.]

[He's just sitting in the hallway, across from Jerry's door. He's not impatient. He's not even angry, really, just calm and steady. He was sloppy, he was absorbed with his own messes. But he made a promise. Allison's rambling plea for understanding as revenge didn't change that. Jerry made his choice, and now he has to face the consequences.]

[Private to Arkin, backdated to after the above]

I've turned Jerry human. I promised him he would, if he hurt anyone else outside self-defense, before you were assigned to him.

[Filtered to Abigail, Scott, Chris, Bucky, Gene, Helena, and Iris, backdated to after the above]

I turned Jerry human, and now he's threatening to leave my friends' corpses at my door like the worst cat in the world.

[He doesn't sound scared. He doesn't even sound mad. He is irritated, and a little disgusted. It was one thing with Okoya and Carter - there were actual stakes there. This is just Jerry being petulant.]

All of you could probably take him in a fair fight, but he's sneaky and mean, so keep an eye out, and kick him in the balls for me if he tries anything.

[Gift List]

Abigail - a print of Starry Night. Some clever board games - like, the kind that are actually interesting and thoughtful? Wise and Otherwise, Ticket to Ride, things like that. I don't think she got to play much as a kid. And some kind of meditative geometry game she could use for like - calm without emptiness, when she needs that. And some pretty dresses.

Bucky - a pineapple upside-down cake, and like, kevlar insert panels that work with the jacket he already has.

Bush - another pineapple upside-down cake, and good boots. Better boots? Like, comfy and insulating, modern REI science stuff, but looking period on the outside. And with the one weighted to make balancing on the fake leg easier.

Cambridge - the collected poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins.

Chris - ridiculous Motherfucker merch. Like, a bobblehead. And T-shirts with golden-age style onomatopoeia impact balloons. A pez dispenser!

Gene - a St. George Medallion. Silver, and a strong chain.

Helena - one of those little personal fold-out cabinet altars, with an old style painting of a bible story she always liked in the panels.

Iris - a tinsel crown, the Al Green christmas album, and tickets to all past and future black-and-white Harry Hunsacker plays.

Scott - The True Story of the Three Little Pigs

Simon - myrrh incense

Snafu - altoids, warm socks with good wicking layers or whatever, and a couple collections of Far Side comics.

Steve - some really good lamps? With flexible necks so he can position lighting how he wants for drawing. Bright and not too harsh, full sun spectrum.

And give all the forties guys a bunch of girl scout cookies.

Threaded | Flat

[Gene spends a fair amount of time in the chapel, too. Not hours, not every day, maybe a little less now that he's got a buddy from back home around and an inmate he really wants to try and help, but he still comes in pretty frequently. Sometimes he prays (or tries to), sometimes he just tries to sit and turn his thoughts off (or tries to), and sometimes he thumbs through the tattered Bible he's still carrying around with him everywhere, like its muddy, stained pages are the only physical proof that he hadn't just hallucinated

So it's really only a matter of time before he runs into Dillon. He pauses awkwardly when he enters the chapel and realizes someone else is here, but then the pause turns into one of either curiosity or vague concern, or maybe both, so he lingers instead of just turning around and leaving.]

Why?

[Simon isn't sure he'll be visiting the chapel regularly -- the makeshift altar in his bedroom has suited his needs thus far -- but he at least wants to see it before abandoning it to the living. Whatever holy power keeps some undead away from the place, it clearly doesn't work on Simon's kind: he strolls right in like it's his own neighborhood parish, hands in the pockets of his chinos as he looks around.

As a born and bred Catholic, it's a little disappointing: the blank secularism of it, the lack of the cross or the iconography he's so used to. He takes a pew in the front and kneels anyway, bloodless hands folded, praying in a quiet murmur: First Corinthians.]

For I am least of the apostles, that am not meet to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am: and his grace which was bestowed upon me was not in vain; but I labored more abundantly than they all: yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me.

[Just siiigh.]

Kinda figured something like this would happen. I warned him too. That he was gonna piss off the wrong person sooner or later.

Thanks for the heads up. I'll take care of him.

[Roderick isn't fool enough to think he could sneak up on Dillon. Not Dillon. Not after everything that's gone down; he knows better.]

[But he doesn't have to announce himself, either. Just intrudes on his solitude, with God or without God, sits in the second pew from the front, at an angle so that Dillon can see him in his periphery. It feels a little sacrilegious to the part of him that still believes in a Christian god, but he does his best to ignore that part.]

[This is about remembering injuries. Making sure they're remembered by the one who caused them. Nobody's slate is wiped clean here - not his, not some god's in the body of a boy.]

[He is afraid. But only a little that he'll admit to himself.]

[ Jerry had been waiting for this. Things had been a little TOO quiet ever since he'd turned Allison. Granted, he'd been keeping his head down since then, waiting for Dillon to appear. That had been part of the reason for his actions, after all. To test the kid. He'd started to grow a bit too comfortable when there was no back lash. He should have had at least Allison's friends breathing down his neck. He'd seen the announcement, her grand tale of his actions, while he was out of his room. So he was on his guard again, and he wasn't exactly surprised to see Dillon waiting for him. Jerry stepped out of the stairwell, but didn't go any further. He just stood there, arms at his sides, watching Dillon. Waiting. ]

Honestly?

[This is ridiculous.]

What if we'd rather shoot him?

[bucky is a basterd 8v

he's also 90% kidding]

That's what Joker did when 'e 'ad Jack's body. Unless 'e knows 'ow to possess me best friend, it's not 'appening, Dillon love.

I'll keep an eye out. And an eye on him whenever I can.

I guess I should say thanks, in the meantime.

...Holy shit, now way.

No way.

Serves the asshole right.

[It's....Scott doesn't know what it is. He doesn't know if this is right, or the most stomach turning thing he's ever heard. It takes him a few hours to respond, mostly because he's staring at the far wall of his bedroom trying to sort it out.

Jerry, as much as it sickens him to make the allusion, is like Scott: vampires are made, not born. Someone taking that away from Derek would be - monstrous. It would be taking away an intrinsic part of him. But that' snot how Jerry is.

He wishes, not for the first time, that he got to meet the other Jerry, the human one from the other Barge. Maybe then he could find his faith in this more easily. Eventually, he gets there - if still a little hesitant.]

Is it permanent?

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