Logs:Uno Reverse

Uno Reverse
Dramatis Personae Naomi, Roscoe
In Absentia	2023-07-17 "Happy belated!"
Location <PRO> Testing Room E 39, Lassiter Research Facility - Ohio
There are dozens if not hundreds of rooms like this in the sprawling research complex, and while their specific purposes vary, most of them could easily be mistaken for exam rooms at a regular doctor's office. This one -- less so. A mirror of one-way glass takes up most of one wall, the door to the other side of it heavy and missing a handle on this side. There's an intercom speaker installed with the fluorescent lighting overhead, larger and more prominent than those in some of the other testing rooms. There's a rolling exam table against one wall, with heavier restraints attached than are seen in other exam rooms -- all the exam chairs in here, too, come with restraints. In the corner there is a small set of shelves and cabinets, labeled and stocked with supplies for biofluid sampling, and minor wound care, all locked. None of the restraints are in use yet, but the silence in the observation room has a foreboding sense to it anyway. Roscoe, sitting hunched in an exam chair, is staring at the one-way window like he can see through it. His empty water cup is half-crushed in his hand -- when he tries to take another sip he looks at it with surprise that he can't, but when he looks at the guard by the door he evidently decides he doesn't want to ask for more. Instead he balls the cup up in one fist and slouches back against the padded chair. "This blows," he says. "Hey, Alexis." He's not raising his voice much, but he seems confident that the labcoats will hear him nonetheless. "How much longer are we doing this. I wanna go watch Law & Order." "Yo, shitbag. Get us more water." Naomi, too, is slumped in one of the exam chairs, her voice audibly trending towards ragged without the hissing undercurrent. Her scrubs are new from the laundry and too big on her slender frame, the bruising just under her scales faint but clear at the bottom of her cheek. She's favouring one side in her lean (tiling her more towards Roscoe than their guard). Probably she shouldn't be so cavalier with the man with the gun, but -- hasn't she been cooperating? Isn't she just asking, with only a flash of green after instead of during her request? The guard gets them more water. "Can you read lips?" Naomi asks. "Or is she ignoring you?" Roscoe finishes his second cup of water in one gulp, then crumples that cup too, folding it around his first cup. "She's ignoring me," he says; only now does he swivel in the exam chair to look at Naomi, letting his feet dangle over the side of the seat, letting his head loll sideways into the dip under the padded headrest. His eyelids, too, droop downward, though he tilts his head at Naomi like he's looking at her anyway. With his free hand he reaches to massage one shoulder, fingers digging deep into the muscle there, and blows a tired raspberry. "I'm sick of your bullshit powers," he says. "You should have to do the plank, too. I think that would be fair." "Sorry," says Naomi with a roll of her eyes and heavy youngest-child-brattiness in her faux-sympathetic tone, "am I ruining your chess muscles?" The second cup of water doesn't go as quickly as her first -- Naomi takes small, small sips. "The minute they figure out how to hit the Uno Reverse card on this shit I'll be doing forever-planks too, dumbass. What crawled up your ass while we was gone?" She leans heavier on the arm of the chair. "They ain't even brought you one Dorito this time." Now Roscoe's head lifts, now his eyes snap open. "Shut up," he says, "I'm very muscular for my weight group -- you know, I'm not using my power on you." His eyes narrow as soon as he says this, like he is either strongly reconsidering this moral stance or has already reneged on it, but then he flops back against the chair, pulling one foot up in front of him. "You and all your prep school friends are getting lawyered out of here way before that happens. Why you think Alexis is stressing so hard about her PhD?" He toys with his paper ball, rolls it between his palms, in his fingertips. "You're the one with mind control, you ask for Doritos." "Bruh." Naomi squints back. "Are you -- ew, 'don't look at my damn underwear!' Good Lord." She takes her time with the water, but it's gone far too soon. "Sheesh, I hope she ain't putting -- how long's a PhD anyway, like, three years? -- three damn years of work on me, we only been here two," Naomi's face crumples for a second, hard, under the scales of her forehead "... going on three months now. You think if our school was gonna lawyer us outta here they woulda done it by now. Anyway --" Hard pivot back to just pissy, here, "-- ion even like Doritos." "I'm not!" Roscoe protests, his voice rising sharply in pitch. It drops back to the petulant, disgruntled baseline a moment later as his posture turtles in again. "She's gonna take way more than three years," he predicts. "Her data collection sucks and her dissertation sucks balls." He bats his paper ball between his hands like a hacky sack until it tumbles onto his chest; he snatches it up before it can roll away. "Who cares if you like Doritos? I'm the one burning all the calories." "I care, it's my damn b--" Naomi cuts herself off, this time, crumpling the paper cup in her hand. Quieter, with a look towards the very unimpressed guard, she continues. "... Mister Doctor Landry prolly extra keen to get our eyeballs before this all gets blown up. Pack of two-bite brownies ain't worth anything else happening to Lael." She looks down, folding her cup into tiny pieces. "-- One of our teachers, she's some lawyer-by-night kinda badass. Maybe she can lawyer your ass outta here, too." Roscoe's gaze flickers up to meet Naomi's, for a moment, and then back down to his own destroyed paper cup. "Everyone knows Landry's a weirdo, he almost never actually gets to just take people's eyes. Chill out." He doesn't sound overly convinced by his own reassurance -- his shoulders have crept defensively up toward his ears. It takes him a few seconds to find a response to Naomi's -- suggestion? offer? -- but it comes with a good deal less bravado. "Maybe." "Maybe," agrees Naomi miserably, "if we don't get disappeared and ever even see her again, I'll ask her. You're a brat, but..." She goes to rub at her temples, makes a soft annoyed sound when there are unmoving scales in her way. "... We got you in trouble, didn't we." She tucks the crumpled cup into the first, then looks up with a bright flash of green at the guard. Naomi, at least, is imminently getting more water. Roscoe makes a stifled half-laugh half-cough sound, caught in his throat. "Okay, if you get disappeared, then you should start worrying about Landry," he says. He is snapping his head toward her with open-mouthed offense, probably to make an earnest claim that he's not a brat he's not!!!, but it deflates before it can take shape, and he leans back in the chair. Pulls his other leg up in front of him, too, wraps his arms around his knees. "Naw. I shoulda just went back when I got split up from everybody, I don't know why I --" He trails off, his gaze following something behind the one-way glass Naomi isn't seeing; a moment later the handleless door opens. "Okay, kids," Alexis Gillespie, almost PhD is saying much too brightly, "We're getting back to it. You okay over there?" is directed at Roscoe as he flattens himself in the exam chair again with a groan, but she isn't waiting for a response before she swoops on Naomi. "I just noticed in your file we missed your birthday yesterday, so I brought you a little something-something! Happy belated!" Something-something is a package of Hostess DingDongs, which she holds out for Naomi on one palm. She does not have something-something for Roscoe. Perhaps it would affect his bloodwork. "Why did you --" Naomi starts to ask, looking up from her just-deposited third cup of water too late to track why Roscoe cut himself off. Her eyes flare emerald up at Alexis, straightening up with a wince and press of hand to her side. Doesn't say anything, at first, even though the glow may seem like prelude to some ask -- Naomi just stares at the glossy package, expression flat. "'What,'" comes out at last, hissing power worming into Gillespie's ears for one frightening moment before the green in Naomi's eyes turns dull and human once again, "no candles? I'm kidding I'm kidding." She's quick to snatch the cakes away, hold them close to her chest. Does not open them, does not look at Alexis nor Roscoe -- bows her head away from the rest of the people in the room entirely. Softer, quieter, only a little bit shaky, she adds, "--Thank you, ma'am."