ArchivedLogs:Consideration

Consideration
Dramatis Personae Ion, Scramble	2017-08-08 "Brother I /got/ you."
Location <BOM> The Allspark - Ascension Island
Small and compact in the manner of most cabins on the island, this place is solidly built. Hardwood floors, sturdy log-wood walls, fireplaces in every room. It consists of a small sitting room, a bathroom with claw-footed tub, and two small bedrooms. The furnishing in here is eclectic, to say the least; it looks somewhat as though it has been scavenged piecemeal from what you might find if you did a google search for 'luxury home decor'. There's a plush dark sofa with a round marble-topped coffee table in front of it, a wrought-iron and red-glass side table beside it with a colourful Tiffany lamp on top. A full-sized tiger pelt as a throw-rug in front of the sofa. A large dark-brown leather recliner near the fireplace. Binding most of the room together, though, is the /scorch/ marks, floor and walls and furniture alike permanently rendered a little /crisped/ around the edges. Scramble picks her way through the darkness toward Ion's cabin, guided by a headlamp hanging hanging from around her neck. She's dressed in a red spaghetti strap tank top and black cutoff denim shorts, carrying a six-pack of Yuengling. She squints at the window as she approaches, unable to make out much between the blinding flashes of electrical discharge and the darkness in between. Knocks on the door, hard. Waits. Then just opens it and steps inside. Ion's cabin is just a bit more crispy than usual, an electrical burning smell in the air and new scorch marks in many places. Nothing seems to actually be on fire at the moment, though. Ion is flopped on the tiger-skin rug, dressed in boots and jeans and a plain black undershirt, his denim vest discarded on the couch nearby. "Fff," is the greeting that comes to Scramble. His arm is curled over his eyes; he hasn't removed it to look at you. "You want the power back on you can fuck the fuck off. Kal and Nora already ask." Scramble sits down on the edge of the coffee table. Sets the six-pack down beside her. "Don't give a frak about the power." She picks up a bottle and turns it over in her hands. "If I wanted electricity I could go back to the Commons. Just wanted to check on you. Brought some beer and weed, but we don't have to do shit. I can leave it and go. I can stay and talk. Can also just sit with you. We can get wasted." Her voice is quiet, easy. "It's all you." Silence, from Ion. Not complete silence, really. Slow breathing, quiet crackling from the sparks that dance around him. Eventually he lowers his arm, staring up at the ceiling as he pats down his pockets mechanically. "Fuck." The laughter in his voice here is strained, manic and edged. "I don't got a fucking /light/." Scramble shrugs out of the small satchel hanging over one shoulder and lays its contents out on the coffee table -- a mylar zip pouch, a futuristic-looking metallic pipe, and, indeed, a lighter. "Brother I /got/ you." She shifts down to sit on the floor beside Ion, long legs crossed. Her hands move with methodical ease as she packs a bowl, hardly even looking at it -- she left her headlamp on the coffee table, pointing off at some crazy angle toward the ceiling. Hands Ion the pipe and the lighter. "I got you." Ion's fingers clench and unclench briefly before he rolls upward, propping himself up on an elbow and taking the pipe and lighter from Scramble. He flicks the lighter, staring momentarily at its flame and then tipping it down towards the bowl as he sucks in a hit. He's slow to exhale, slow to pass it back to Scramble. His eyes close as he lies back down, scrunching tightly shut. "What you think gonna happen to the monsterling when I gone? You can get lawyers, right. Make a /proper/ arrangements for that. Who take care on them. Not just leave it up to -- fucking chaos." Scramble braces the heels of her hands on the floor behind her and watches the firelight dancing on the rough-hewn wood of the rafters above. "You can do that, but right now? Jax would be their guardian again. And if he couldn't handle them, you know he'd find someone who could, and you know he'd have all us behind him." Her jaw sets tight. "Anyone who was left." She takes a hit and shakes her head, her earrings flashing in the dim light like miniature moons caught in her hair. Passes the bowl to Ion again. "It's all fucking chaos with or without proper arrangements. But we /family./ We get through it, somehow." "Yeah, shit, Sunshine, he'd do right by them. Find a -- someplace better." This time Ion sits up properly to take the pipe, take a hit. Kind of idly stir the contents of the bowl while he talks. "/Familia/." The word sounds sharper than usual. "{Yeah, we're that. Whatever it means to people.}" He passes Scramble back the pipe, an unpleasant jolt of shock accompanying the transfer. "{Gone to prison to see our sister there. Owl girl, she not doing good. Look close to popping, too.}" "{Well, I can't speak for no one else, but for me it means we take care each other.}" Scramble takes a deep breath. "Didn't expect her to be /enjoying/ her Homeland Security-sponsored vacation, but...she /still/ didn't wanna risk coming out with you?" She grits her teeth, stirs the bowl a bit more thoroughly, and puts the flame to it again. Passes it back. After a while. "Jesus Christ." "She sniping at me that it wasn't a zero-risk plan. Complaining we ain't planned a better rescue. That got less risk -- to her and the kid." Ion's laugh comes brief, sharp. "Yelled at me about the risk that kid gonna see if they born in prison. Yelled at me about maybe they could get tortured and studied in some government program or something." He's flicking the lighter restlessly, holding the pipe without paying it much attention. "Ain't no such thing as a zero-risk prison break," Scramble says philosophically. "Going in to get her, the way she is now? That's more dangerous to /every-frakking-body/, her and her baby included." She goes quiet. Grinds her teeth together. Sucks in a deep breath. Lets it out. "Like you ain't never considered /that/." She looks at Ion long and hard. Stretches out a lanky arm and beckons for him. "C'mere." "No shit. Sentinels shoot her to death, not gonna turn out well for either of them. Not gonna turn out good for anyone come to get her that they shoot, either, but I don't think she think on that much." Ion stops flicking at the lighter, though his fingers close around it tightly. He takes a few deep breaths before sliding over -- kind of a slump as his head thuds down against Scramble's shoulder. Soft and tired: "Fuck."