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[gidge]

PICK YOUR POISON
PIC PROMPTS / TFLN / RANDOM SCENARIO
HAN SOLO velocities	BETTY MCRAE bombsheller	RIVER TAM subsulcus	RIVER TAM (AU) comprehender
SIMON TAM vest	BRIA THAREN exulted	NADINE CROSS bridaled	GU JUN-PYO toddler
available on special request: veronica sawyer, benjamin linus, imani, maria deluca, mushu, poseidon, niccolò machiavelli, malik al-sayf, chloe

Comments

[vest]

Simon doesn't smile, either. He does, sometimes, but not now.

"No, I think I've spent too long looking over my shoulder to be that at ease."

He'd had his drink, and he doesn't order another. That's part of being on guard, for him, as much on guard against a threat as it is on guard to help River. He can't do much for her if he's too drunk to give her the proper dose of something, or sleeps too heavy to notice her if she needs him in the middle of the night. She's being healed, though, in ways he never could, which means he's going to have to find some other worry to occupy his mind.

[fogey]

"For what it's worth," he says, slow, "you're more likely to run into other dangers in Chicago."

Not that it's exactly comforting, but...in a way, it can be. Danger that doesn't hate you, specifically, can be something of a relief after needing to be on the run.

[vest]

It is a relief, however small, to know there's not a specific target on his back. Or on River's.

"Yes, I've heard."

A beat.

"River mentioned a unicorn."

This might be an attempt at confirmation, though he can't know that Five wasn't here for that adventure. She'd mentioned it randomly, as far as he could tell, and he'd immediately chalked it down as 'as yet unidentified metaphor' instead of 'true thing to ask about.'

[fogey]

"A what?"

Yeah, he wasn't around for that.

[vest]

"Unicorn. Mythical creature, horse with a single horn on its head..."

He realizes about halfway through that that isn't exactly the explanation Five was probably looking for.

"From what I could gather, it killed someone, except it didn't, and then they sang it to death."

Okay, on this one, he really can't be blamed for putting 'my sister said she fought a unicorn' down under 'crazy.'

[fogey]

He's just giving Simon a long, increasingly exasperated, judgmental look.

Then his eyebrows go up, and he takes another swallow of his drink just to deal with having had to listen to that.

[vest]

Yeah, that's a look Simon is used to.

He actually smiles at that as he looks back down at the bar, but it's bitter and small.

"I'm sure you've noticed my sister has a difficult time communicating. A side-effect." Simon takes a deep breath, sighs outward, and says, "From what I've seen of Chicago so far, either that's exactly what happened or it's a metaphor for something worse that I haven't managed to figure out yet. Maybe for something she doesn't even understand."

River doesn't remember it, because she never lived it, but Simon can't help but think of her cuffed to the floor of the ship's pantry telling him, I don't know what I'm saying, I never know what I'm saying. Remembers the sense some of the things she'd said had made once they found Miranda. He worries.