Logs:Just as sin came into the world through one man, and death came through sin, and so death spread to all because all have sinned

Just as sin came into the world through one man, and death came through sin, and so death spread to all because all have sinned
Dramatis Personae Kitty, Leo, Marinov, Hive
In Absentia	2021-10-15 << Fully derabified over here. >>
Location <PRV> Kitty and Marinov's Apartment {Cathaus} - Lower East Side
This high ceiling, fourth floor apartment is on its way to being well lived in. The walls are a light cream colour, the spotless hardwood floors stained a rich red-brown. The door opens into the living room, always bright with natural light coming in the windows or the glow of the twin pink rock salt lamps nestled on the one of the sills. Small succulents and other resilient, cat-safe houseplants dot the windowsills and nearby surfaces – one on the low coffee table between the faux-leather couch and the television mounted on the wall, another on a ladder bookshelf squeezed into a corner. There are no rugs, nothing that can collect fur, but the couch and floor are both covered in pillows. On the wall opposite the television, there is a framed poster of the Cat’s Eye Nebula from an astrophysics conference. To the left of this space is a small kitchen, just large enough to fit two people in it, if one of them can walk through other people. To the right is a small hallway, leading to the washroom and two bedrooms. One of the bedroom doors has a small blue mezuzah on the doorframe, held in place with wall putty. A few items are set out on the coffee table on a tray: a large bottle of gatorade (blue flavour), some tea, some water. In addition, there are some now cooled off dumplings set out, as well as other snacks just in case none of the rest is sufficient or satisfactory. Despite their attempt to play the role of an admirable host, Marinov's agitated energy is not too difficult to detect, with the way their tail flicks about and their ears flick around to every little thing. They are currently sitting on a pillow, pulled from the couch, a cup of tea cupped between both of their hands. "... is there anything else I can get either of you? Blanket, painkillers, live reading of some twitter drama?" Their tail flicks up, twitches a couple of times and then thumps against the floor. Marinov wears a silky forest green kosovorotka with sky coloured patterns down the shoulder and around their neck, wrists and waist, and a pleated cream coloured skirt, which they spend some effort fussing with. Sprawled out across two-thirds of the couch, Kitty continues to languish under a bedsheet (cherry blossom print, from her room) and a damp towel on her forehead (white and blue striped, from the kitchen). The shivering has stopped, finally, and over the previous night she did manage to sleep in short increments. Still, sprawled out here in a sweat drenched blue tank top and grey sweatpants, Kitty does not look good. But she is, finally, after two days of hallucinations and falling through floors, mostly lucid and and primarily solid. "Ooo. Painkillers. Do you think if I phase some Tylenol directly into my stomach it will still work?" she asks her attendants, eyeing the gatorade with suspicion. "I know the hydero- hidropho- hydrophobeen-- the fear of water thing is a symptom but I think if I drink anything I will throw up." She doesn't sound good either -- the hydrophobia has dried out her voice to a scratchy, raspy echo of her usual bright mezzo. Leo has been an anxious presence in the living room for some time now, more rumpled now than many hours ago when he arrived in diagonally color-blocked button-down, black on the upper left and hunter green on the lower right, with jaunty upturned cuffs and a spread collar, cigarette-cut black jeans, black socks, his black ankle boots left by the door. The bulk of his conversation for a while taken up primarily by apologizing, for needing food, got taking the food that's offered, for taking up space on one of the cushions on the floor, perhaps just for existing. Apologizing for the rabies, at this late juncture, well. Maybe it just seems inadequate or maybe if he amasses enough smaller apologies it will salve the real issue, here? This strategy hasn't seemed to ease his anxiety much, though, to be fair, he doesn't seem that much more ill at ease than he ever does, perched far too upright on the pillow, fingers fluttering in ceaseless-restless fidget at a corner edge of the pillow he sits upon, a half-finished plate of dumplings in front of him. He considers the question, frowns. "... probably? Maybe faster if it's crushed. What," he asks after this, equal parts curious and polite, "is happening on the Twitters." "Colin Powell died today, which is kind of funny," says Marinov, as they glance towards their phone, though the screen is still off. "Pretty quiet on the drama front, which is... disappointing. I love a good drama." They pause and then scowl, "so long as I am not involved." They shake their head and look towards Kitty, "Considering how the sink looks pretty abstract right now with shit stuck in there at all angles, I don't think I am gonna encourage that." Their eyes then move towards the seemingly suspicious bottle of sports drink, then towards Leo, "You know how long it takes to be able to drink after you--" They make a movement like pulling a rope. "What do you mean the sink what did I do to the sink?" Kitty says, one hand already disappeared into her abdominal cavity to test the possibilities. She squeezes something experimentally -- "Nope, I think that's an ovary." Her hand re-emerges and she sits up, pushing her back against one arm of the couch and pulling the sheet up around her. Looks over at the kitchen, sees the state of the sink (knives in the basin at all angles, a pan clipped into the backsplash), and winces. "Ah. I see what I did to the sink. I hope -- " this is to Leo, with a faint flush of the cheeks that is either embarrassment or the last vestiges of her fever, "-- you missed the worst of my crazy." Leo huffs out a soft breath through his nose. "It would have been really funny if someone bombed him," he volunteers quietly. His eyes flick to the kitchen at the mention of the sink, but only quickly. They drop away quickly, too, a deep flush in his cheeks. "I haven't," he says, only a little stilted, made a habit of giving a lot of people rabies, I don't..." He quiets. Bows his head, presses his lips together. Apologetically after this: "I am sorry. Most of the people I have made sick before, I did not get the same chance to be with. While they healed. I'm also -- learning. I'm -- very sorry. That is not more reassuring." "It would have been more poetic, and the Twitter discourse would have been a lot more spicy," Marinov says in distracted agreement, their bewildered eyes fixed on Kitty, wide at witnessing her-- possibly??-- squeezing an ovary. Their attention snaps back towards Leo, though the alert wide-eyed expression does not actually fade. Their tail thumps again against the floor. "Oh. Oh yeah, I guess you wouldn't really watch people get better from rabies, yeah? I just wanted to figure out if maybe we've got to like. Find a way to get one of those," they make a vague squeezing motion in the air, "water bags people get hooked up to." "I don't need a saline drip!" As if to prove it, Kitty grabs the gatorade bottle, pops the cap open -- and just kind of holds it uncomfortably for a moment before putting it down again, looking nauseated. "Yet." She takes the towel (fallen from her forehead to her lap when she sat up) and wipes some sweat off her neck. Bundles herself more into her sheet. "I'm glad you're here, I think you're very reassuring. Both of you -- one can unrabies me, the other can smell rabies. Seems like a winning team, to me." Sitting up seems to have taken a lot of energy -- Kitty leans her head against the back of the sofa, looking from roommate to guest with bloodshot eyes. Her gaze lands on Leo, and she bites her (chapped, dry) lip. "Plus, I think? I owe you an apology." Leo's eyes have gone a little wider. He almost meets Kitty's gaze, but can't quite manage it. "I -- gave you rabies, I think that apology -- probably needs to aim the other direction." He's just looking down at his hands, though. Fidgeting now with his spoon, dragging it through his dumpling sauce. "I can get an IV drip. The Mongrels --" His knee is starting to bounce, quick and jittery. "The clinic, I help them sometimes. I'm sure Ion would let us borrow -- dehydration is no joke." There's a quiet ripple throughout all the minds in the room, soft and at first hard to quite notice what has changed -- a keener awareness of each other, more in tune with what the others around are doing and thinking and feeling; Hive has compartmentalized his network to some degree but it only goes so far, now. It becomes clearer when he speaks, a soft whisper of many overlapping voices that surface in all their minds at once. << ... need to borrow Leo. >> The sense of urgency that fills them is barely tamped down, something cold and sick and just this side of panic buried under it. << We're not gonna die, are we? >> "Oh, yeah, Ion could--" Marinov's senses start to focus, to try and hone in on this sudden change, but soon enough a foreign familiarity sets in and, while they continue to keep the area mapped with their enhanced senses, the level of that alertness fades. The sense of urgency does nothing to quell their general sense of agitation; anxiety about Kitty's state, a mix of gratitude with a splash of restrained anger for Leo. They answer out loud, despite not needing to, "The fuck? What's happening?" While their words are ambiguous, their intent is to ask what specifically required borrowing Leo, with a creeping dread living beneath the query. “And I blindsided you on movie night. Which was also bad!” Kitty seems sure on this point — the spread of Hive through their minds carries this certainty forward, one of the few certain points in Kitty’s mind. Most of her memories and feelings of the last few days are lost in a fog of hallucination and exhaustion, surrounded by guilt of knowing that she missed something important while being sick. It takes her longer that usual to recognize the touch of a telepath (<<thought we weren’t hearing things anymore>><<is this real>>) — she anchors to Marinov’s speech (<<real real real>>) as proof the voice in her head isn’t just in her head. Hive’s request is met with an immediate instinctual <<'no'>>, surging with guilt (from movie night) and comfort (from his presence) and anger (for the rabies) and just a touch of desire (for him to stay near). Hive’s urgency tempers the maelstrom down after a moment. << Not dying anymore>> comes grudgingly. <<Fully derabified over here.>> The mention of movie night pulls a tumult of feelings from Leo -- hurt, a lingering flare of anger, grief -- that he's unable to hide from the others over the current mental connection. His head dips slightly, and out loud all he says is, "You wanted to help him." He's trying not to resent this -- it's hard -- some part of him wants to be kind to the man, not think of him as an impostor, not recoil inwardly at the sight of him but -- but. He still can't quite suppress his incredulity at how Kitty manages it without inward screaming. "I'll ask Ion for an IV," he's starting to say when the question (?) demand (?) comes. << who's dying >> surfaces automatically, a resignation to it; at the same time, the knowledge that Kitty, while still Not Having A Good Time, is at least out of the woods. << What? Where? >> The answer to this comes not in words but in a flutter of sensation. Some part of their shared mind is pulled fully into focus, disjointed and delirious, aching and ravenous, thoughts tinged heavily with the copper-hot feel of blood. The snippets of memory that pull up here are fragmented, chaotic. An altercation on a rooftop, the feel of bone cracking hard against flesh, their fangs sinking into neck. << "No. No. Stop." >> echoing in their thoughts, DJ going limp against their wing. Somewhere more remote, Kitty's teeth against their arm, days of their everpresent hunger growing into something uncontrollable and feral. At the feeling of the scent, feel and flavour of blood, Marinov's eyes flick a bit more animalistic, and they focus momentarily in the middle distance. "Dusk... Fuck. Oh shit." Thoughts of sharp teeth piercing through flesh, a familiar thought, and then of infection passing. A bit of a shiver passes up their spine. "Do you know where he is? Maybe I can help." This last is paired with a feeling of helplessness, a near certainty that their help is not required. There’s a sharp intake of breath from Kitty as Leo’s emotions wash over her — his incredulity, in particular, curls into her head and knocks over part of her perfectly compartmentalized system, sorting out DJ from Dawson despite so much painful overlap. A plea radiates out from her, unspoken, for understanding, that she wanted to help but not at the cost of hurting Leo. That Leo is important to her, can’t he see — — and then they are pulled into recollection. Color drains from Kitty’s face with every fragment, an upwelling of horror making her disbelieve at first. <<not real not real please not real>> (Another memory, from long ago, plays low below the shared one — a young girl, not even a teen yet, surrounded by men and guns, pleading with a fear that echos in Isra’s remembered voice.) She covers her mouth (<<not my mouth not my memory not real>>), hyper aware of each tooth in her gums. In the shared mental space, she combs through the last few days, pulling away fog like cotton candy until the same scene is revealed again to them: a restless, feverish agitation, every muscle tense and wanting to fight, wanting to hunt, wanting to <<grab a bite>> and sink teeth into flesh, then Dusk’s arm in their —her— mouth. A sick roiling in her stomach. <<real real real fuck>> The clatter of dominos onto tile. “You already tried,” Kitty says to Marinov, voice somehow hoarser than it had been. “When you told me to rest, before. If I had —“ her voice fails her. <<should have listened should have listened>> She slumps down against the couch, dragged down by fear and worry and guilt. <<Please come back>> is thought at/of Leo, already taken as given that he is about to leave. Underneath that plea, a heavy feeling that he won’t want to. Leo's breath draws in sharp in tandem with Kitty's, his eyes widening in time with the more feral flicker of Marinov's. "Oh," is all he says, though he's coming through these shared memories with a sinking twist of guilt, of horror, "-- oh." He's already on his feet, already heading for the door to get his shoes, trusting in their mental connection to get him where he needs to go. It's only when one boot is on, the other in hand, that he stops. Swallows. Thinks back across the crunch of bone, the hot feel of blood in (their) Dusk's mouth, the body going slack in their grip. The first question that comes to mind he shoves back with a vengeance, swallows down the bile that rises, too. Asks, very softly, instead, shoving his other boot on, one hand on the doorknob: "... do you know where DJ is?" In the stretch of silence that follows, Hive pushes their network back down, wraps it away into something less distracting. Something less hungry. His own fear still claws at them, though, mingles with their own helplessnesses- and horrors- and guilts. << No, >> comes back, curt and tight. << Let's go. >>