Being Alone

[ownperson]

Who: South and anyone who encounters her
What: South trying to avoid everyone and her problems at once, and failing
Where: Various places on the Rig
When: Several days after South and York's arrivals
Warnings/Notes: None up front

South’s not really used to being alone, not really. Growing up with a twin you can’t shake for trying does that to a person, she supposes. As much as she resents it, resents him, it’s… a difficult adjustment, to make, one made infinitely harder by her lack of anywhere else to turn.

Turns out pissing off everyone you know from home is a poor choice, who’d’ve thunk it, huh?

Dealing with things in a healthy manner isn’t one of South’s strong suits, so rather than doing so she decides the best course of action is to simply avoid anywhere she might encounter her brother or get into another fight with Washington (he’s more than capable of handing her ass to her on a silver platter and she’s getting tired of it, if she’s honest) or have to deal with York (who’s just a pain in the ass, really).

For days, rather than get involved in anything festive or going out of her way to get to know the other New Hires, South spends her time in a few places:

a) On the Top Deck, which she finds supremely uncomfortable thanks to the daytime heat, but it also means most people won’t appear to bother her, so she considers it a fair trade. Sat near the edge, she sits and watches the fucked-up world outside and finds that it is possible to miss home, even when home sucks too.

Of course, it’s not a fool proof plan. When someone does come by and join her, she sighs to herself, but comments, “Weird fucking view, huh?”

b) In the Training Area, where she spends all of her time whaling on punching bags, lifting weights, running, or beating up training droids violently enough to break a couple. She could request her equipment but she’s not training to train, she’s there to exert restless energy and rage without directing it at the poor fucks around her. Easier to focus on the feeling of punching something than on your emotional turmoil!

The sound of someone coming up behind her makes her pivot, fist raised— but she holds back and huffs, instead, rolling her shoulders as her arm falls. “Watch it. Unless you wanna get hit, stay the fuck back.”

c) She wanders the gardens, the once, because even South sometimes needs somewhere relatively quiet to go. She’s not looking for anyone; quite the opposite, really, she just wants to get away from everything else for a while.

Unfortunately for her, she’s not the only one. Fortunately for whoever else she encounters, she’s at her least combative down here and simply says, “Kinda nice in here. Don’t remember the last time I saw so many fuckin’ plants.”

d) The Mess, is one of the few times she can’t get around communing with the group, but even during their shifts there the she tries her best to keep to herself by sitting as close to alone as she physically can. Perched at the ends of tables, not looking anyone in the eye, but occasionally glancing up at the sound of familiar voices before setting her gaze firmly back on her plate.

When someone sits nearby, she rolls her eyes and swallows her mouthful of food. “There’s other open seats, y’know.”

Comments

C

[greyerrant]

"Yes, it is nice here." A man in barely-fitting coveralls turns to her, his pale form splattered with soil and a trowel in his hand. Apparently he'd been doing some gardening before she approached. He is scarred, and holds himself like a warrior, not a laborer, but despite all that, he looks to have been planting some flowers before she got here.

[ownperson]

South gives him a once-over, brow raised, but the look doesn't linger. She makes her observations and then she just folds her arms, leaning her weight back on a heel and looking down at the flowers he's been planting.

"Almost feels outta place, in the middle of all this," she gestures vaguely around at their surroundings, at the rig. "Didn't expect to find anywhere on here that's actually... well, not horrible."

She holds herself like she's always ready for a fight, as if she's always expecting a fight, but otherwise appears relatively relaxed, contrary as that may seem.

[greyerrant]

"Likely some executive took a liking to the place, so they actually invested some currency and energy into making it decent."

He shrugs his shoulders. "As for me, I do not care why, I am just glad it exists so I can garden."

[ownperson]

She pulls a face at the word 'executive'. The corporate side of things here is honestly one of the most unsettling parts of it all. Things relying on the whims of corporate types is never encouraging.

"Didn't even know we were allowed to do things we actually enjoy," she says with a snort, then continues, not sounding much like she buys into her own words, "but guess we gotta be grateful for the good shit."

She shakes her head. She couldn't name any other 'good shit' if she tried.

"I'm uh, South, by the way. Still pretty new around here."

[greyerrant]

"I do not think they realize I take pleasure in it, given that I am primarily martial in focus. Also I think they are concerned I might hurt planker if I see him more often, given that I already broke his face once."

He offers her a spade. "If you would like to plant, or move earth, there is plenty of work to be done. I'm Loken."

D

[credit_not_blame]

"Yes," Stacia agrees cheerfully, "but high school cafeteria rules say the popular girls can sit where ever they want, so here I am."

She gives South her most winning smile.

"I'm Stacia. Are you South Dakota or South Carolina? Since you're not answering the "what's your real name" question."

[ownperson]

South raises a brow and snorts, a sound that balances somewhere between amused and a 'really?'. "And that's you, huh, the popular girl?"

Looks young enough to be exactly that, South figures, which is enough to push down even South's instinctive urge to tell her to fuck off and mind her own business.

Stacia's the first person to make the connection between her name and the other Freelancers—at least, that the first to do so where South can hear it—and South sighs, dropping her fork.

"There was no South Carolina," she says, answering without answering. Her gaze flicks subconsciously across the room to the tall blonde that she shares half her features with, before flicking away just as quickly. "But it's just South. Nothing else."

[credit_not_blame]

"No one has argued when I've said so, so it must be true," Stacia says, grinning like she's letting South in on a joke. "Besides, I'm cute and can instill terror in grown men, I'm pretty sure that's the definition of a popular girl. Wash almost threw himself off of a bench entirely when I sat down next to him."

Why yes, she did see Wash and South's encounter on the network, and she is absolutely going to try and use that knowledge to get South to like her. She politely busies herself with her utensils and pretends she doesn't see South glancing across the room at the guy who is obviously her brother, with whom South is very obviously not sitting. He and the confrontation with Wash was what had put her onto the 'Dakota or Carolina' question in the first place.

"Just South it is," she says agreeably. "I usually stick to the names people tell me to call them, unless I'm trying to needle them. And even then, it's usually something snappy, like 'Cupcake'."

[ownperson]

The mental image inspired by that anecdote, of hard-ass Washington—who has kicked South's ass no less than twice since she got here—throwing himself away from a teenage girl, is more than enough to get a snicker out of South.

"Now that's something I'd fuckin' pay to see."

She can't argue with that definition of popular girl nor does she feel inclined to, so she doesn't. She just takes a swig of her drink and wipes her mouth, then leans forward against the edge of the table, her food ignored for now.

"Good policy," she says. "Always better to piss people off on purpose than as a side-effect."

That's certainly what she's been doing, much to her own detriment.

A

[fuckcable]

The heat isn't unmanageable, but Ric would agree that it's uncomfortably hot. Climate-controlled utopias have a lot in their favour, compared to this nightmare-scape.

It's not the worst view that he's had since arriving. That would likely be the aliens. But there's something tremendously disturbing about the grey-green cloud in the distance. It bends and swirls, like a cloud should, but the sickly-coloured mass has the cleanest edge that Ric has ever seen in a cloud, and it's the same uniform width despite its twisting shape. It hangs too heavy in the sky.

"At least you're outside." Ric would prefer being on the ground instead of taking a seat atop a mobile work prison, but this is preferable to his quarters. "You gonna tell them the view's too crazy for you?"

[ownperson]

South relaxes a little at the realisation that he’s at least a face she recognises from when she arrived, rather than some other random New Hire who she’d have to deal with introductions and all that shit from. Even better, she didn’t piss this guy off at all; at least, not as far as she could tell.

“Would you believe me if I said I’d seen fuckin’ crazier?” she asks, leaning back on her hands. “Not weirder, nah, this is weird, but...”

She shrugs a little. She doesn’t know where anyone else here has come from, the kind of stuff they’ve seen at home or here. However, she’s spent the majority of her life under the shadow of intergalactic war with aliens and years of it fighting in that war, she’s seen some shit she’d rate higher on the actual crazy scale. Of course, such things are still a much more familiar kind of crazy than what she expects that this place could conjure up, but for now the thought still stands.

[fuckcable]

“Oh yeah,” responds Ric, who has definitely seen crazier as well. This is somewhere around the Skrull invasion of Earth and a sentient living island, but it isn’t a demon dimension (or he hopes it isn’t). “If you hadn’t, you wouldn’t be so pissed about being here. You’d be too busy pissing yourself.”

He doesn’t outright offer to let her vent in his direction, because no one really wants to stick their nose in someone else’s misery, but Ric also doesn’t steer the conversation to safe complaint topics like general life on the Rig. They live in a doorless dormitory. Keeping each other sane is self-preservation when most of the New Hires are mutants or superhumans. “Most New Hires don’t act that spooked by it.”

[ownperson]

South snorts, idly blows a strand of her purple-dyed bangs from her face. "Guess that's true."

She doesn't say anything else for a moment, gaze set on the scenery and her fingertips drumming against the floor. Thinking.

"This shit isn't all that different from what I left. Not the," she gestures out ahead of them, "but the rest of it. Went from one fucked up program pretending everything they're doing is for the good of humanity to another. What're the fucking odds, huh?"

She shakes her head with a humorless chuckle, but she doesn't sound... upset. It's simply a statement of fact. It's just how things are.

"This thing's new, course," she says, tapping her throat. "But yeah, guess I came primed to be pissed instead of freaked."

C

[nyanhat]

Ranulf's actually up in a tree when she comes through, but he jumps down when she speaks, because conversing from the same level seems like the polite thing to do, and most humans he's met don't seem much into tree climbing. He could almost be mistaken for human, from up in the leaves, but once he's more visible, the cat ears and tail clearly toss that right out the window.

"Really? That's a shame. This is about as nice as it gets on the Rig, of course, but it doesn't really hold a candle to home."

Real forests, he misses you.

[ownperson]

South does a visible double-take at the ears and tail. Her mouth opens and closes a couple of times as if caught on some sort of exclamation that never quite makes it out, before she remembers that the first New Hire she saw was the Easter Bunny and just decides not to ask.

Shit's weird here. People come from weird places. Maybe it should be concerning how quickly it's become easy to accept this shit, but what energy she has for worrying about things is more than occupied elsewhere.

"Really. Haven't seen anything like it in years," she says with a shrug, casting her eye around the area. "Guessing that's not true for you, uhhh..."

She makes a vague gesture. God, she hates introductions.

[nyanhat]

Shit's indeed weird here, although he puts "weird" more on computers and cameras than on other people's anatomy.

"Ranulf," he supplies. "Do you do the handshake bit, or would you rather skip it? It's all the same to me, really." It's a very human mannerism - one he's picked up, being one of the first laguz to get tapped for diplomacy more often than not, but not one he has any attachment to performing, either.

[ownperson]

"Uh, we can skip it," she says, with a shrug. She's never really been one for formalities like that. "Ranulf. Alright. I'm South. Just South, nothing else."

A clarification that seems to come from nowhere, but arriving on the rig after her brother means she's never sure who knows what around here.

B

[runes_brand]

The man who'd been coming up behind her only raises an eyebrow at her warning.

"Unless you were about to start fucking flailing like an idiot walking into a spider web, you have plenty of room," Brand retorts. South, even irritated, is certainly good enough at what she does to notice that he's absolutely prepared for her to take a swing at him: the right side of his body is turned toward her, minimizing his body target, his knees are loose, and his weight rests on the balls of his feet, which are shoulder-width apart. Clearly someone who knows what he's doing, even if he's an asshole.

[ownperson]

South rolls her eyes and scowls, falling instinctively into a loose defensive stance to mirror his. What a ball of fucking sunshine this guy sounds like (not that she can talk).

"I don't 'flail'. I was talking about you fucking coming up behind me," she says, a little bit breathless. She's clearly been in here a while, sweat sticking her hair to her forehead. "May as well be looking to get fucking punched, doing that."

South's not exactly the paranoid type, usually, but she'd had more people than usual out for her ass since she got here and, well, she didn't exactly get to the recommended amount of time off after the concussion from her last fight. She's more on edge than usual.

[runes_brand]

Brand shrugs one shoulder. "I've been training with people like you since I could walk. If I got punched in that fucking situation, I'd need more practice anyway."

He nods toward the bag she'd been working over, but doesn't look away from her, because he's not a fucking idiot.

"You want to keep whaling on that or do you want to go a few rounds with something that'll hit back?"

He's trying to be friendly right now, since he and Rune have to work with these people. It's a pain in the ass.

[ownperson]

Since he could—? Nope. Not today. Not touching that with a ten foot pole. Not even to see if he's serious or exaggerating.

She eyes Brand. His reactions leave no doubt that he knows how to fight, whenever or wherever he learned. And, if he's not talking out of his ass, he might even be capable of keeping up with her, which would be... helpful. The droids are unsatisfying and her normal training partner—

Well. He's not down here.

"Sure," she says, stretching her arms and wiping her hair from her face. "Hopefully you're not all talk."

D

[infailtration]

York sits directly across from South, beaming at her cheerfully, the picture of innocence as he picks up his fork. Little does South know that this is plan B to get Delta back -- since she didn't hold up her end of things when he went along with her bullshit, he's trying something a little different.

"There are! I still have one working eye, I can see them. But I'm not here for you."

Yes, South, this campaign is annoyance. He's going to ignore you and just talk to his little buddy. Is it better or worse than getting your ass kicked repeatedly?

"How you doing, Delta? She taken you out for any fresh air today?"

[ownperson]

South drops her fork and just stares at him. "Oh, my god. Fuckin'— really? Wait, fresh air? He's a fucking computer chip!"

Delta projects out of the puck dangling around her neck at the sound of York's voice. He still can't respond to external directives, but York isn't ordering him to do anything, he's simply acknowledging his presence.

"This is the first time I have been enabled to project since our last conversation. However, I am otherwise in the same state; that is to say, I am doing 'okay', despite the circumstances. Agent South has been avoiding you and the other Freelancers and I have seen much of the rig that I had not previously as a result."

"Snitch."

[infailtration]

Sorry South, he's completely ignoring you because he knows that'll piss you off the most. 8'D

"At least you're getting to stretch your legs a little. But she needs to give you more enrichment, how would she like to be stuck with someone who doesn't even talk to them?"

Haha. Ha. Haaaa.

Suffer, South.

[ownperson]

South just stares at him, completely deadpan, before rolling her eyes and stuffing a forkful of food into her face, like, aggressively. God. Dammit.

"I believe she is finding her similar experience with Agent North to be frustrating."

South's fist hits the table. "I will fucking shut you down right now I swear to god."

Delta continues, unimpeded: "However, I believe I may be better off not conversing with her more than is necessary. Though, it would be interesting to be able to communicate with some of the other people here on the rig; the other New Hires are quite varied, it seems there would be much to learn from such interaction."