omar | 13: Spam: Man got to live what he know.

13: Spam: Man got to live what he know.

[Open spam]

[Omar is a roamer. As long as he's not forced to stay in his cabin -- in his cell, comfortable as it may be -- he spends very little time there. He's just as likely to sleep in an empty cabin, or even once or twice in the Enclosure. He keeps bizarre hours, and he keeps them largely to himself.

None of this is new. This is how he's been since he got here the first time. Since his last death toll, though, he's become even more erratic in his efforts to stay unpredictable, and the recent spate of unwarranted brutality has him feeling especially restless. He can be chanced upon at all kinds of odd times and places: at the library early in the morning, in the showers and the laundry room around noon, eating in the dining hall in the late afternoon. In the evening, smoking up on the deck with so many of his fellow passengers, because it's not actually that he's antisocial -- just very, very careful.

Careful enough that he takes data, and so some of the newer passengers may or may not be surprised to glimpse him out of the corner of their eyes every now and again. Maybe even writing something down.]

[Spam for Cold and Dark]

[But there's a predictability even in unpredictability, and he does from time to time spend the night in his cabin, if only to keep up the illusion that he does so much more often. It might take a more careful observer a while to figure out when he's likely to return, but the time comes around eventually.

It's late in the evening, but he's been up for the last 36 hours, and he's tired -- and therefore both baffled and a little annoyed to hear a knock on the door right when he's about to lay his head down.]

Man, who is it?

[Edit: Voice to Ricki, post-Tiffany spam]

You know what? I remember a time this place didn't feel like a cross between a day care and a circus.

[Edit: Spam for Luna, post-pairings announcement]

[Omar's been playing the warden shuffle for a while now. At best, it's been ineffective -- the closest thing he's gotten to a decent temporary warden, in Horatio, got ripped away from him halfway through the month. At worst, it's been disastrous. So he's not inclined to pay much mind to the announcement, not anymore. He goes about his day. Let Luna Lovegood come to him, if she likes.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

You home?

Yep.

[He'd known that Omar knew, but it's a little sinister actually seeing it make a difference. Enough that Ricki grins, once, quickly, as he slips up to clean up the day's worth of crap that has accumulated, make the small bed.]

[He raps lightly on the door a few minutes later.]

'Ayo, Scalphunter.

[Ricki opens the door for him, to his little corner. He actually didn't have his own room, back on Earth, so this is an anonymous Istanbul hotel, quite like the one where he'd met Irinia; the small brass bed, the textured, slightly peeling paper on the walls. A cross here, a mostly empty desk there. The bed is freshly made, and the clothes have all been put in the hamper.

He has a wastepaper basket down on the ground under the desk, with a few of the molotovs that he and Eggsy never used that time with the portals. He has a spare clip, with a few rounds in it, weighing down a couple of papers on the desk. The rest of his stuff is stashed elsewhere.

He has a couple of days stubble, and a look about him that he still gets when things get bad, though he'd thought he'd have outgrown it by now. But he has a quick smile for Omar, as he nods him in, and for the single, rusty desk chair.

Ricki locks the door behind him.]

[Omar takes in the room as soon as he gets inside, with a look Ricki is probably used to -- has probably had himself on more than one occasion. He's looking for exits, weapons, potential shields... anything someone with a healthy dose of criminal intent might look for. Not that he has any right now; in here, it's just force of habit.

He looks at Ricki second, though he softens a little when he does. He can respect the pain. He takes a seat in the rusty chair, lacing his fingers together.]

You know, I like Anya. She and me got some history from before -- back when she was still on our side of the fence.

[Ricki considers him right back, crosses his arms and leans back against the door.]

She's tough as nails.

[Approvingly, a moment late.]

Smart, too. Her believing in this place pulls me back from the brink, now and again. What did the two of you get up to?

I hurt her, actually. Or tried to. I wasn't in my right mind at the time.

[He frowns, like he's suddenly realizing that he never told Ricki the most important part of the story the other night.]

One thing you ought to know about me -- I got a whole lot of bodies on my name, back home and up here, but ain't a one of them a taxpayer.

[That might be Baltimore slang too, he realizes. Cops and robbers slang.]

A civilian. I don't do that. Not ever.

You must know that that makes only one of us.

[He says, because he's sure he does, but feels all the same that he can't let it go unsaid.]

But I like that. Very principled. So you were floating on some flood or breach-

[He does know, although there's a part of him that's been avoiding the thought until Ricki says it out loud. He's never been able to entirely bypass dealing with people who do the things he doesn't, but it doesn't sit right with him; especially not in someone whose acquaintance is more than a necessity. He wrinkles his nose slightly, but lets it pass without comment.]

A port, but more or less the same thing. Sort of a Hotel California type of deal, if that ain't after your time--?

[Voices in the walls. Voices whispering, leading him into all kinds of trouble. Brandon's voice, loudest of all.]

[It'll come out in '77, so Ricki shakes his head.

He shifts, though, stepping away from the door and towards his tiny bathroom. He kicks the door open, and toes a shoe to stand in front of it, then steps in, out of sight, to run the water in his little sink.

He badly needs a shave. Instructs;]

I'm listening.

[Go on.]

[He watches him go, puzzled, and then ends up following out of an innate dislike -- distrust -- of talking to people he can't see. He leans against the doorframe.]

Haunted hotel, basically. Ghosts getting in your head, talking you right into badness.

[It had been his warden's father for her, he remembers suddenly. She'd been so happy to talk to him, and then Omar had forced her to hand over his watch. Something shiny to lure Brandon back to him. He grimaces -- it was a long time ago now, and he knows it wasn't his fault, but the shame had eaten him up for days afterwards.]

Anyway, some of that badness was messing with Anya, so I wrote her a letter after that.

[Ricki glances up, and meets his eyes in the mirror, gives him a sheepish tug of a smile through the shaving cream.]

Just be a minute.

[He promises, or asks, maybe. He could use the second to pull himself together. But it's fine, with Omar standing there, as long as Ricki can turn back to the sink, to his own face in the mirror, and to slowly, tangibly uses each careful pass of the stupid little barge-issue safety razor to return himself to human.

Between passes;]

She write you back?

Edited 2015-07-01 01:59 (UTC)

She did. That was how we met -- felt I owed her a favor after all that.

[...Which, come to think of, she never actually cashed in. Hm. That's... hm. He folds his arms and looks out over the room, a little pensive.]

Didn't expect to see her on the warden side, but I always knew she had heart.

When I got my first temporary, it was this hotshot shrink. You remember Cambridge?

[They'd both been around before Ricki was, he's sure. Besides, the man had made an impression.]

I wasn't sure I'd last the month.

Only spoke with him once or twice, but I recall the man.

[He had, indeed, been memorable. And as for Omar's history with temporary wardens... Well, that just reminds him why he's so angry all over again. His jaw tightens a little.]

Half of them now ain't nothing but children. And I don't mean in age -- I've known far younger boys with far more sense in 'em.

I've played double-double games with Moscow trained hoods, and I've never felt so cat and moused in my life. He struck me as someone who was having a ball.

[And yes, Ricki had egged him on in retrospect, but if it had been a string like that- Anya had saved him, in a big way. He rinses the blade clean, starts up again.

But that brings them back to where they started.]

What happened?

[He's quiet for a moment.]

Know that girl Tiffany Doggett?

Yep.

[He's interested now. Tiffany is-

Well, he won't offer that unless Omar asks. For now, his expression betrays nothing but benign curiosity.]

Sound like she more or less cut ties with the Admiral over that Lourdes girl.

Arming her up again?

[His eyebrows lift in surprise. He doesn't know why, when;]

Well, that makes the pair of them.

She better hope it do. She say her credit with the Admiral is all used up for anything else.

Now, the girl got heart, too, so I thought I'd try and talk some critical thinking into her, but...

[He shakes his head, lip curling with irritation. He knows he overreacted, but that doesn't mean it isn't still frustrating.]

So any inmate of hers, here on out-

[Right. Right. Ricki sighs, and cleans the blade again.]

Comes by for bible study, sometimes. [A tiny little crook of a smile in the mirror. It's embarrassing, but it's true. He's got the good book hidden in one of the drawers.] I like her fine. Can't say as I'd trust her to shepherd me anywhere. Can't say as I'd want my life in her hands.

[Omar's gaze is on the bedroom behind them, but his eyes cut over to Ricki's mirror-glance, brows lifting at bible study. Granted, he has his monthly Sunday mornings, but it's still a surprise.

The rest, however, isn't. He sighs.]

The thing of it is... back in the day before, I ain't saying the wardens was anything like perfect, or even all that good at what they was doing, but I never doubted that most of them really was trying to do right. Honest people trying to do an honest day's work, and not just playing at it.

How many we got like that now, you think? 'Cause it feel like a painfully low number to me.

Count 'em up. You've got to figure the bad ones are loudest, the good ones stay paired.

[He scrapes the last bit of foam away, and reaches for a cloth to wet.]

Anya, good. Steve Rogers, heart in the right place, good in a crisis. And Lloyd likes Lettie, so I'll give her the benefit of the doubt.

Man, Letty a straight up thief. She told me so herself -- she in the game as much as I am. Maybe more.