Logs:Jail Support

Jail Support
Dramatis Personae Jax, Ryan
In Absentia Hive, Rasheed	2024-11-09 "Weird fucking coincidence, but I'm your biggest fan."
Location <NYC> Rikers Island
The waiting room here is ugly and harsh, much like the rest of the facilities. Late at night it manages to grow even more of a bleak-and-despairing atmosphere than at other hours. There's a woman at the desk in tears as she argues with the dispassionate officer on duty. A pair of young men half-asleep and slouched exhausted into adjacent plastic bucket chairs. Ryan is restless, kind of jittery in his own seat -- in another lifetime he'd almost assuredly be pacing the room. In this one, he's just sitting, unassuming in black kilt interspersed with purplepinkblue panels and a red and black button-down, one hand clutching tight to both his crutches and the other scrolling restlessly through his messages. His eyes dart restlessly up every time the doors open. A skinny young girl is released for an exhausted and joyless reunion with her waiting brothers. A few cops go in and out. One starts to come over -- "Holy shit, are you --" but perhaps as the rest of this sentence (or the daggers Ryan is glaring) catches up with him he decides against asking for an autograph and heads out. Ryan's fidgeting gets worse. It's another several prison workers, another couple ex-prisoners, before the prison obligingly dispenses the one Ryan has been waiting for. Jax looks like he could do with Ryan's crutches himself, shuffling slow and kind of unsteady. He's back in the corduroys and button-down he was arrested in, face far too pale, and his very sotto voce humming (kind of a meaningless prr-prr-prr of a sound) is grey-washed with a dull anxiety and less dull twinges of pain. The anxiety eases off a few ticks when he spies Ryan, and he redirects his shuffling. His expression has been fairly blank but as he comes closer his eye is widening, and his voice has an uptick excitement (mirrored in psionic register by an uptight of warm amusement): "Ohmygosh are you Ryan Black? You're my favorite." Ryan pushes himself to his feet. One of his crutches clatters back to the ground; he's leaning into the other, his free arm lifting to pull Jax in for a fierce hug. He doesn't let go for several long breaths, pressing a kiss to the top of Jax's head. "Weird fucking coincidence," doesn't sound at all muffled, despite this, "but I'm your biggest fan." He pulls back, squeezing Jax's hand before letting go. "C'mon." He's somewhat awkwardly shuffling the tip of one crutch beneath the head of the fallen one so that he can nudge it up back into his hand. "We wait around here too damn long they'll invent something else to arrest you for." "Biggest's a tall claim, you got no idea how many marriage offers I get every time I go to prison. My fan mail spikes." Jax takes the crutch, offering Ryan his arm for that hand instead. He starts towards the exit, a careful deliberateness in his steps as much for his own sake as for Ryan's. "Honestly I got no idea why they changed their mind on this but I ain't 'bout to go countin' teeth." "I don't want to burst your bubble but at least half those are me just trying to keep your spirits up. I've gotten real practiced at all different handwritings." Ryan hooks his arm through Jax's, only too grateful for the care as he pulls himself along. "Story 'bout your Mojo trip got out, I think they kept you too much longer they'd just look like damn fools. Again. Causing a little fervor, though, spiking whole new alien-invasion anxieties." He reaches to tap the automatic door opener as they are heading out. "I'll be shocked if y'all don't get someone haranguing you sooner or later to pick your brain about that nightmare. Matter of interplanetary security, now." "Oh, gosh." Jax's steps hitch, and there's a spike of grief shot bright through his words. He ducks his head as they head out into the night. "That's gonna be a fun recounting." His head shakes, and he's squinting blearily into the darkness, then just tensing when he can't actually see well enough to find Ryan's car. "I miss anything else -- and don't say the election, that much filtered down." Ryan shuts his mouth up tight, though only for a second. "I was going to say the season finale of OMitB. You got no idea the restraint I have, I didn't watch it without you." He's steering them across the parking lot, digging in his pocket to beep his sporty little convertible open. He's disengaging from Jax's side so that he can open the door for his friend. "Oh! Someone wrecked the Swords lil Nazi bar so it hasn't all been bad news." "Gosh but y'really do love me." Jax slips into the passenger seat. He digs his phone out of his small bag of personal belongings, getting a charger out of the glove compartment so that he can plug it in. "Huh. If it was anyone we know --" Though now he's frowning down at his phone. "Keep it to yourself till I chuck this in the East River, I guess." Not that he's doing so just yet, just grimacing to himself as his phone starts to load his many unread messages. "-- so tempting not to replace it." Ryan takes back his other crutch so that he can make his way to the other side of the vehicle. He sets both in the back seat before he gets in. "Why would I even ask, I can enjoy some exciting news without --" For an instant there's a flutter of upset riffling through his words, and he reaches over quick to snatch the phone from Jax. "Waitdon't --" There's a distinct humming coming from Ryan's hand, a thrum that can be felt out to where Jax is sitting. It's followed by a crackling; the phone screen has shattered, and judging by the shifting noises coming from the case, quite a bit of what's inside has shattered along with it. "Sorry, sorry. I -- You just got out, you shouldn't be finding out from a damn --" He rubs at his temple. "Hive's sick. Again. And --" He drops the broken phone into an empty cupholder. "Dr. Toure was killed. Like -- the night before his surgery. It's -- not looking good." Jax doesn't attempt to stop this theft, though he is twitching, a little startled at the abruptness. He's regarding the broken phone with a twinge of vague amusement. "... or jus' spare me the littering, that's --" The news stalls these words. His hands fold tight in his lap, and his attempt at very careful breathing still can't entirely silence the anguish that washes over Ryan with each quiet breath. "-- sorry," the fact that this is whispered also does not spare Ryan the emotional battering. "Let's just go --" His brows pinch, hands folding and unfolding. He pulls his seatbelt on, and there's a helpless hollowness to it when he finishes kind of flatly: "... home." Ryan just shakes his head, and starts the car. "You figure out where that is these days, I'll take you there."