Logs:New Season, New Episode

New Season, New Episode
Dramatis Personae Hive, Polaris	2021-01-07 "There's some good fucking highlights like holy shit you all are fucking incompetent at coup."
Location <PRV> VL 403 {Geekhaus} - East Village
This is a small, two-bedroom apartment, the living room semi-open to the kitchen and dining area, a single bathroom situated between the doors to the bedrooms. The common areas are beautifully appointed with solid, matching handmade wooden furniture in intricate geometric mosaics. The kitchen table is ringed with coordinated but not identical chairs, two of them modular with low scooped backs, designed with winged bodies in mind. The wide, low coffee table fits neatly into the corner of a modular sectional couch, and the immense television is enthroned in an entertainment center that also houses various consoles and video games. The walls are lined with bookshelves laden with comics, roleplaying supplements, board games, speculative fiction, and a grab-bag of technical texts. The walls in between are adorned with some framed posters of classical science fiction and fantasy media along with a few pieces of gorgeous if unusual original art. Polaris sits cross-legged on the couch, the bowl in front of her on the coffee table mostly empty. She still smells of work -- coffee and pastries and warmth -- in a black fitted tee shirt with two red horseshoe magnets that overlap to form the figure of a heart over a black-and-purple striped long sleeve tee and black jeans. She has the Switch Pro controller in hand and is deftly guiding Zagreus through a room full of rather abstract Elysian foes, though he's not really fighting much, letting the spinning death shield that follows him do the work. "You know this is probably the longest I've gone without checking Twitter in like. Three days? Outside of sleeping and lunch rush." Though, even so saying, her eyes are darting the the phone she'd deliberately set down just out of arm's reach on the coffee table. Hive, on the other hand, curled into the corner of the couch in jeans and a baggy Theta Tau sweatshirt, has been alternating between mechanically scrolling and watching Polaris's progress for quite sometime. "You want me to give you the highlights or you enjoying the break?" This question comes without looking up. "There's some good fucking highlights like holy shit you all are fucking incompetent at coup. I thought it was bad enough Wednesday but it's even worse as we get more details." Polaris's focus drifts from the game and she glances aside to Hive, now. << Godyesplease-- >> is not exactly a fully thought-out request, as intense as it is. Aloud, a bit slower, "That might be good, actually. Like. I do wanna keep up with what's going on? But I don't wanna just keep scrolling I'm so sick of that." << --hard enough not drinking this week as it is... >> She quickly and firmly pushes this thought aside. << Shit shit, okay how many more rooms before Theseus? >> "I mean I think some American are frakking great at coup, but the CIA clearly isn't running this one." "Aiite, so, of the four assholes who died in their shittily-planned attempt at a fascist takeover," Hive is ticking these off on his fingers, "obviously we have contender number one we all heard about who got ganked by the cops -- turns out her last tweet before the storming was 'Nothing will stop us'. Then you have this loser cosplaying like he's going to war," Hive turns his phone briefly to show a picture of a middle-aged man holding up a pair of rifles beside a skinny and over-decorated Christmas tree, "he bought it when he accidentally tased himself in the nutsack and had a heart attack. Fascist number three shows up carrying a Gadsden flag -- boom. Trampled to death." He does set his phone down in his lap now, looking to the screen. "The writers of this season are veering sharp into comedy. No word on the last clown but they got a high bar to top at this point." Polari's eyes go wide and she looks away from the screen again--the room onscreen cleared of enemies by now--at Hive, delighted incredulity written all over her face. "Oh. My. Gosh. Are you serious 'don't tread on me' they went and trod!" She laughs, but the mirth bubbling out of her stutters uncertainly. << Not very Christlike, huh? But it's not like it hurts these motherfuckers, most of them probably want us dead... >> But then she guffaws again. "'Nothing will stop us', guess they didn't teach her how bullets work when she was in the military. And how did the pig get it?" The flighty, giddy sensation fluttering through her sets off distant alarms in the back of her head. << Just been a long week. Just haven't slept enough. Just stress. >> "Just shoved that boot right in there." Hive shakes his head, curling down further and dragging a blanket up over himself. "Eh. Satisfying but way less hilarious, they just cracked his skull with a fire extinguisher. Not nearly so meme worthy." His eyes slant sidelong to Polaris, then back to the screen. "I dunno about just shit, things have been enough hell before the fascist uprising." "Amazing. Perfect. I'll take my dead pig however they come," Polaris declares, reflexively envisioning a cop getting his head graphically caved in with a fire extinguisher, though this one certainly wouldn't have been at the Capitol, wearing an NYPD uniform and Ansel Covey's face. She sucks in a sharp breath and suddenly remembers she needs to actually push buttons to make Zagreus fight. She wants a drink so badly it's a dull, palpable pain diffused through her body. << Yeah, definitely no clubbing tonight. Again. Fuck. I need to find some health. Hah! >> The puff of inward laughter makes it all the way out of her. "I'm not trying to downplay it, I'm just--hoping? I really, really do not need another episode right now." << Probably isn't. I don't cycle this fast. >> Hive sucks in a sharp breath, his shoulders tightening at the image that comes to Polaris's mind. His eyes close, his knuckles tightening into the blanket he's draped around himself. "Yeah. I mean -- yeah. Got hella melatonin if you want it. Weed. Benadryl. Ambien." He slouches further, head pillowed against a thick fold of blanket wadded against the arm of the couch. "... what if it is? Do you..." He hesitates. "I mean, I dunno, you're probably on top of shit, but things have been so fucked up so if -- Dawson and I always had safety plans." His eyes have fixed a little glassily on the screen. "I dunno if you need any kind of. Support." Polaris glances at Hive, but lets the flush of guilt that passes through her go without too much struggle. "Might take you up on all of the above, once I kill good ol' dad again. Except Ambien, that fu--fraks with me bad." << Thank God I don't have a sponsor I have to lie to about using other shit. Yet. >> She sucks in a long breath and lets it back out slowly. "Yeah, I mean I made one but. It was years ago, and Prometheus--" << --fucked me up and I'll never be right again and this is gonna kill me-- >> Another deep, slow breath, but the source of the shred of calm she seizes isn't breathing. "Wendy's always there for me, even when I'm totally failing at Plan. I just hate putting so much on her and I could probably use someone else--" << --to be crazy at-- >> "--who gets it, you know?" "Yeah." Hive swallows. It takes a little too long before he blinks, eases his grip on the folds of the blanket. "Maybe not like I used to get it, but. Yeah." He shifts under his blanket, adjusting just a little to fix the awkward angle of his neck. "None of us are gonna be right again. Doesn't have to kill you, though." "Sorry," Polaris murmurs. "He was just so matter-of-fact about it. It helped, maybe cuz I--it's just like this raw nerve for me. Maybe it was for him too and he just--hid it." << Why did I think it would get better? What kind of terminally optimistic white-ass bullshit... >> She finally just pauses the game. "I know it doesn't. I don't want it to." She steadfastly refuses to give more coherent thought to the powerful sense of irony those words bring. "I probably should make a new plan that like, takes trauma into account. And grief." She makes a face. "And sobriety." "It was hard for him, too. Barely talked about it, when I first met him. Think he had a lot of pressure to hide the crazy, but --" Hive slowly sits up, rearranging the blanket around his shoulders as he does so. "Well." His eyes turn up to the ceiling, his teeth grinding hard, then stopping. "S'not a plan, but I got plenty of practice making no-booze taste great. Think tonight is more caramel apple cider or coconut almond hot chocolate?" Polaris's smile is thin and brittle and gone in a flash. "Guess the sanism fraks us over whether we talk about it or not." << Maybe he found comfort talking to me about it, though. >> She expects the surge of grief this time, sucks in a deep breath, straightens out her hunched shoulders. "What are you talking about, that's an amazing plan. Except for the part where I have to choose between delicious things." The words are glib but there's a numb sort of solace beneath them. "Hot chocolate, please."