Logs:Advisory

Advisory
CN: Alcohol, graphic description of disease/death
Dramatis Personae Polaris, Wendy, Winona
In Absentia	2020-03-26 '
Location <NYC> Polaris, Wendy, and Winona's Apartment - Lower East Side
This tiny apartment is on the fifth storey of an aging and ill-maintained walk-up, its walls dingy and paper-thin. The living room immediately inside the entrance has space for a couch and a coffee table, but little else, though its windows offer a commanding view of the narrow sidestreet below to anyone who cranes far enough to look past the rusting fire escape. The kitchen is tiny and has no windows at all, but being partly open to the living area is at least not completely claustrophobic. One bedroom is almost the size of the living room, which doesn't say much, and the other is much smaller -- really only intended as a study or home office -- to make room for the single closet-sized bathroom. Even with mostly cheap, second-hand furniture, the place has grown steadily more homey over the months. A creaky futon is flanked by an empty food service drum on one side and two stacked milk crates on the other. In place of a coffee table is a long, low bench with a flowery sarong as a tablecloth. Potted herbs line the windowsills, and whimsical metal sculptures line the walls and tables (or the items serving in place of them). A brightly colorful fused glass mezuzah is mounted in the doorway, while a set of matching candlesticks and goblet sit on a disintegrating radiator cabinet in the living room. The days have kind of started blending together, a little bit, whether from too little to do or too much of the same. Wendy is still working, at least -- not now, though, her (kind of long! kind of tiring!) shift frantically delivering groceries come to a stop for the day. Now she has curled up on a corner of the futon, bright and cheerful in an empire-waist red sundress dotted with white daisies, the gauzy white shrug she had been wearing outside since removed and folded in half, draped across the futon's arm. In her hands is a Switch, its joy-cons pastel blue and green; the cheerful if repetitive theme music from Animal Crossing has been playing for a while, now. Thankfully, at least, it's turned down fairly quietly. Her phone buzzes at regular intervals; she only checks it at irregular ones -- but at the latest long and persistent jangling alert from her phone (one that is echoed across most smartphones citywide) she actually does pause to look down. Frown at the city's push alert that has just popped up on her screen. Frown deeper after she continues reading it. Having finished not long ago with some of her online learning, Winona has left her room to be slightly more social, occupying the other side of the futon, though that sociality does not extend so far as offering any kind of conversation. In cozy navy blue pyjama pants and a faded yellow t-shirt with a sunflower on it, she's been reading a book, titled Bad Endings. Her expression remains mostly neutral, and every once in awhile she looks over at the sound of some animal or another talking in animalese on Wendy's screen despite not being able to see anything. Her phone does not get much in the way of notifications, so she quickly dog ears the book and puts it aside when it does actually buzz, rested as it is on her lap. Her lips press together, in a firmer and firmer line, while her eyebrows draw down as she scans the alert. From behind the closed door of the larger bedroom there's a thunk followed by the loud buzzing of a smartphone screaming its silenced alert at the floor. When the phone doesn't cease vibrating, its owner emits a groan and a string of muffled curses. Then a much *louder* thunk and a much clearer "*Ow* mother*fucker* what the fucking fuck..." After a moment's grumbling, Polaris shuffles out, wearing green yoga shorts and a black t-shirt that reads "Magnets: how do they work?" above a cartoon horsheshoe magnet in an unlikely suit and tie, carrying a suitcase. Her leaf green hair is a wild mess, half obscuring her face, which looks paler than usual, and she shies away from the sunshine slanting in through the window, still squinting at the screen of her phone. She's so absorbed in its warning that she slams her foot squarely into the corner of the coffee bench, though she doesn't curse this time, just whimpers and sits down on the stacked milk crates. After a moment, she followed up with an almost perfunctory, "Well, *shit*." In her hand, her phone is still buzzing furiously, drawing her attention to the public alert: NYPD ADVISES ALL CITIZENS TO BE ON THE LOOKOUT FOR LEONID CONCEPCION, 5'11" 140LB 25 YEAR OLD ASIAN MALE WITH BLACK HAIR, BROWN EYES. DO NOT APPROACH THIS HIGHLY DANGEROUS MUTANT CRIMINAL, KEEP YOUR DISTANCE AND CALL CRIME STOPPERS AT 212-555-NYPD Wendy is slow to look up. Her fingers have curled very tightly around the phone, her eyes shifting to Winona first, and then Polaris. Her tongue flicks out, wets her lips; she stays quiet a moment longer. Looks back down at the screen as thought the message might have changed in the interim. "They sent this to everyone?" Winona looks up from her phone when Polaris slams her foot, asking the polite, 'Are you okay?' in a reflexive way. She taps the button on the side to darken the screen again, to hide it from sight. "Must have." She starts to chew on her lip. The tension remains in her expression. "Shit. Shit. Is Leo... does he need..." She leaves the thought incomplete, to instead stare down at the darkened screen. Polaris stands again and starts pacing in the limited space in front of the windows, tapping her phone against her thigh in a quick and agitated tattoo. "I mean they've *been* looking for him, I'm sure, but this--" She shakes her head hard, green hair flying. "Fuck." She darts into the kitchen, pulling a large plastic jug of Popov vodka--only acquired yesterday and already almost half empty--and pouring liberally into a blue mug with a white silhouette of a hanukkiah and the caption 'GET LIT!'. "Yeah, he needs help." She takes a big gulp. Then, quieter, "And God help the rest of us." Wendy turns her phone off. Sets it down, slowly. "Do you know where he is? Can we..." Her mouth presses thin. "The rest of us? Are they -- is this some kind of sweep? Do you think they'll come for more of us? He didn't do anything, did he? I mean I know he's -- that he was -- that he doesn't have --" Her frown is slow, and deep. "But I haven't seen them do this for other mutant immigrants either." Winona starts to try and move her phone into her pocket, but the pyjama pants do not afford her any such luxury, so she instead just rests it face down next to her. Her brow furrows still, one eyebrow raised slightly higher than the other. She looks from Wendy to Polaris, "Do you know something? Did something... happen?" With more sincerity this time, she asks, "Are you okay?" "No--well..." Polaris looses a frustrated groan. "I have no idea if they're going to come after the rest of us. I just meant we might need help because of...him." She draws a long, tremulous breath and stalks back into the living room. There's a kind of edgy, blundering grace to her movements now, as though adrenaline had honed the hangover into something sharp and dangerous. "He--fuck--he killed a guy. I mean, he saved Flicker's life! Probably mine, too, but..." She starts pacing again. Takes a swig of her vodka. "He like fucking liquefied the guy. With disease. Like instantly." Wendy just stares, her eyes wide and tracking Polaris's movement. "What." Unthinkingly, her hands have moved to curl around her own stomach. "Disease doesn't work like that. I -- mean clearly it did but -- he can -- since when can he..." For a moment it looks like Winona has not processed what Polaris has said, and then her eyes widen. "Just... instantly?" A queasiness settles into her posture and she looks down at her hands. "You're not-- it didn't-- it's not contagious? You're okay? I mean, physically?" "Yeah, fucking tell me about it." Polaris stops pacing and just sits back on one end of the radiator cabinet. "I mean, okay, his wholeass body didn't dissolve, but it sure as fuck looked like his insides did. Sorry!" She starts to press the heel of her hand to her eye but stops herself. Takes another gulp of vodka instead. "Yeah, he said I was clean. He made us sick -- me and Flicker -- by accident, then took it back. But all that shit they gave him back in the labs?" Her hazel eyes are huge and staring and can't seem to decide where to focus. "I think he still has all of them, and he can just. I dunno. I have no idea what he can or can't do anymore. Fuck!" She drains the mug and gets up to refill it. "Made you sick," Wendy echoes, very soft. Her brows pinch together, and she pulls her knees tighter beneath her. "But you're okay now." Drops her hands to rest on them, fingers curling down hard, then slowly relaxing. "So he's just -- out there? With the black plague? Is that why they --" She glances briefly back to her phone. "That seems dangerous." "That seems real dangerous," agrees Winona distantly, as she tries to grasp the full implications. "If he has all of them, inside of him, at any time... he could--" Her head turns, sharply, towards the balcony and the world outside and she bites down on her lip some more. "But he wouldn't." Her confident tone is undermined by the addition of her glancing back between her roommates. "Right?" "Yeah, yeah, I'm fine." Polaris waves her free hand dismissively as she pours vodka liberally into the mug. "Jesus, this is Leo we're talking about, of course he wouldn't--" She stops abruptly. "I don't know. I don't know anymore." She runs a hand through her hair--or tries to, it's too tangled and she gives up. "I mean I can't even imagine what they've been doing to him these last few weeks and I can imagine a fucking lot." Returning to her previous spot, she just sinks to the floor this time, staring into her drink. "Maybe he just snapped. I dunno how many times I would have, if..." She glances up at Wendy, then back down. "Or maybe he just did what he had to in that moment and everything's under control and he's not gonna bring back smallpox. I just don't know." "I don't know." Wendy glances to Winona, and then down to her lap, fingers now lacing together. "If they put you in one of those cages again, what would you want to do when you got out? Maybe he..." Now she's lapsing into a brief, tense silence. Looking towards the vodka bottle. "Do you know where he's gone? Is he -- safe, at least?" Winona's expression darkens and her shoulders slump just a touch at Wendy's question, but she does not answer with more than that. "If he had enough control to only--" A shudder passes through her body. "Liquefy the one person, then... he must be able to control things enough." She crosses her arms tightly over her stomach. "I have faith in Leo. I just hope he's going to be alright." Polaris shakes her head. "I mean, he was safe when I left him, but that was before this bullshit alert thing. Now? Who the fuck knows." She sets the mug on the coffee bench between herself and Wendy. "If I drink all that I'll pass the fuck out. *Again*." After a brief silence, she breathes a long and shaky breath out. "I dunno what I have faith in anymore, but...they'll protect him, though. Right?" Wendy opens her mouth. Closes it. Picks up the mug to take a long pull from the vodka. "Well," she says, slowly. "I'm sure they'll try."