Chapter Text
We have lingered in the chambers of the sea
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown
Till human voices wake us, and we drown.
The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock - T. S. Eliot.
--
JAMROCK NORTH - The fading light of the late afternoon traces faint gold lines along the eaves, gates, fences and windowsills of the buildings in Jamrock North. Lingers on the powerlines strung from roof to roof and pole to pole. A whisper of snow in the air, whipping along trees on the sidewalk with their bare branches, swirling above the perpetual traffic jam of Motorway 8/81. Sounds of whirring motor carriages and beeping transports rise high above the concrete.
Outside a repurposed silk mill with a domed roof and green desk lamps in every cubicle, a couple of police officers stand next to two idling motor carriages. Finishing up the tail end of a long and tiring conversation, after a long and tiring day.
ENDURANCE [Easy: Success] - Long and, some might say, harrowing week. The longest you’ve ever experienced.
DRAMA [Trivial: Success] - Not that you can remember if you’ve had worse, my liege. But they don’t need to know that.
YOU - “Uh, one last thing. Can someone tell me where I live? I mean - I know it’s on Main and Perdition, but I…”
RHETORIC [Medium: Success] - Wouldn’t know the door even if it was right in front of you.
YOU - You trail off meaningfully, casting a hopeful look at Minot. She seems the most sympathetic.
VOLITION [Easy: Success] - You really shouldn’t have called her the Horse-Faced Woman. Maybe get her some flowers next time.
LOGIC [Medium: Success] - Once you figure out where the florist is. After you figure out where you live. Then we’ll get her flowers.
PRECINCT 41 - Standing in front of you, half-lit in the white halogen light of the motor carriage outside the Precinct garage door, Satellite Officer Jean Vicquenare pinches the bridge of his nose and sighs. Loudly. The light catches on the edges of his messy black hair, the tired lines on his profile.
JEAN VICQUEMARE - “Oh for fuck’s sake. You live on number 12A. You’ve got a spare key in your locker here for when you… you know.”
SUGGESTION [Medium: Failure] - Lose your keys after drinking?
EMPATHY [Easy: Success] - Need to be checked up on?
HALF-LIGHT [Trivial: Success] - To see if you’re still alive.
PAIN THRESHOLD [Medium: Success] - It was a small mercy from him that he did not finish his sentence.
JUDIT MINOT - Minot had disappeared and now reappears with a flash of silver jangling in her hand. She passes the keys to you and does not look you in the eye.
Item gained: House keys
JUDIT MINOT - “Here you go, officer. Do you need someone to accompany you there?”
PERCEPTION (Sight) [Medium: Success] - Patrol Officer Minot gives Satellite Officer Vicquemare a subtle but firm nudge with the toe of her boot. He rolls his eyes in response but does not protest otherwise.
ESPRIT DES CORPS [Challenging: Success] - He’d go with you, if you asked. The grumbling is part of his aesthetic. She would have too. They all would.
KIM KITSURAGI - The lieutenant coughs quietly. He had also come back to Precinct 41 after picking up his Kineema from outside the Whirling-in-Rags.
ESPRIT DES CORPS [Medium: Success] - Ostensibly to make sure all the paperwork was in order. But also to make sure you got seen by the station lazareth. He was concerned that you had torn some of your stitches.
PAIN THRESHOLD [Trivial: Success] - He was right.
KIM KITSURAGI - “I believe the lieutenant-yefrietor’s address is on the way back for me. I can drop him off.”
YOU -
- [Volition: Legendary] (Lie.) “I’m a big boy, I don’t need a lift.”
- “Thanks Kim, that would be great.”
- [Ask Jean instead.]
PAIN THRESHOLD [Trivial: Success] - Your leg really, really hurts. The stitches had been reinforced by Gottlieb, and he was *not* exactly gentle. The measly drouamine dose you’ve been prescribed is not even close to being enough. The thought of having to limp all the way back to a home you barely remember, alone, is almost too much to tolerate.
VOLITION [Legendary: Failure] - Useless. Completely and utterly useless. You can’t do anything on your own, can you? Like a big, useless baby. A baby with a drinking problem and mutton chops who drove his own motor carriage into the ocean and has no other choice but to limp home on foot.
YOU - “I’m sorry you have to babysit me, Kim.”
-1 Morale
KIM KITSURAGI - The tiniest of grimaces flit across the lieutenant’s face.
“It’s no trouble, detective. Let’s go.”
SUGGESTION [Medium: Failure] - It *is* trouble for him. Look at that expression. He hates you. He hates being around you more than he has to.
ESPRIT DES CORPS [Challenging: Success]- "That self-flagellation again," the lieutenant thinks. "That can’t be healthy."
EMPATHY [Medium: Success] - He’s the only one who knows the extent of your injuries. Intimately. More intimately, arguably, than anybody who wasn’t a trained medical professional should have to.
The wide-eyed panic in the lieutenant’s eyes as he crouched over you, both hands urgently holding in your insides as you bled out on the black leather and the pavement beneath. Blood flecked glasses. The fear clawing at your throat as the slim white shadow loomed behind. Your blood all over him, on his clothes, slippery on the gun you pushed towards him. The sound of a single gunshot. Darkness.
YOU - You come back into your body as the Kineema abruptly crests over a speed-bump and wince as your shoulder protests in agony, extremely loudly.
KIM KITSURAGI - The lieutenant looks over at you sharply. “Hold on, detective. We are almost there.” He is tense, almost hunched over the steering wheel. His fingers tap a silent rhythm on the stick shift.
EMPATHY [Medium: Failure] - There is a hint of an apology in his voice. You can’t fathom for the life of yourself why. Probably for the bumpy road, which isn’t his fault anyway.
COUPRIS KINEEMA - Just as sleek and well-loved on the inside as it is on the outside, the Coupris Kineema rumbles reassuringly beneath you as the streets pass by. The sound that once pulled you bodily from your alcohol-induced amnesiac stupor and into the waking world was now a strange comfort. You feel shrouded from the outside world, enveloped in the falling night in the safety of the vehicle’s chassis and Kim’s presence. The radio is notably silent.
PERCEPTION (Smell) [Trivial: Success] - Kim’s pine needle aftershave, motor oil and leather treatment solution, and notes of a citrusy air freshener. Blessedly free of any remnants of eau de week-old-corpse.
YOU - “Was the smell bad before?”
KIM KITSURAGI - “Hmm?” The lieutenant has been watching you out of the corner of his eye. “Oh, when I took the body to Processing? No, it was okay, all things considered. It had been bagged and fridged, which helped a lot.” The corner of his mouth lifts in a small, wry smile.
ESPRIT DES CORPS [Easy: Success] - “The deranged Ice Bear Fridge did help, in the end,” the lieutenant thinks. Not that he would admit that to you, or anybody else. The risk of becoming Ice Bear Cop was simply too great.
THE APARTMENT - Your apartment, up two flights of unforgiving concrete stairs, with exposed red brick showing under a crumbling, splotchy grey facade.
PAIN THRESHOLD [Easy: Success] - Your leg screamed at you with every slow, agonising step, while the lieutenant quietly followed, always just one step behind you.
REACTION SPEED [Trivial: Success] - Just in case.
THE APARTMENT - A single, watery yellow light at the landing. The hallway and stairwell all plastered with peeling advertisements and faded concert posters, loudly boasting slogans such as !!JIM’S ELECTRONICS CLEARANCE SALE - ALL STOCK MUST GO!! and !!24-HOUR PLUMBER - FOR ALL OF YOUR LATE NIGHT BLOCKED TOILET NEEDS!!
THE APARTMENT - Your door is a faded red like the rest. A scuffed up doormat sits in front, lopsided and forlorn.
YOU - I wonder if I ever knew my neighbours.
SHIVERS - Down the hallway, the muted sound of the radio and water falling on tiles accompanies a man’s impassioned and incomprehensible shower song. Across the hall, a woman bends over a colossal pot of steaming gumbo, carefully stirring as her children chatter on the dining room table - she’s worried she’s made dinner too spicy for toddlers. A young woman sits in front of a mirror, wrapped in a floral dressing gown, blow drying her hair and experimentally prodding at the acne on her face.
SHIVERS - YOU MAY NOT KNOW THEM NOW, BUT I HAVE KNOWN EVERY SINGLE ONE OF YOU. ALL OF YOUR LITTLE SECRETS, YOUR LOVES AND YOUR HATES. THEY WILL BE SAFE WITH ME.
KIM KITSURAGI - Leaning his shoulder into the doorframe, the lieutenant is waiting for you to put the key in. You had feebly suggested that it was fine if Kim just dropped you off at the front door - suggestions that were swiftly and vehemently crushed by the lieutenant’s raised eyebrow.
AUTHORITY [Heroic: Failure] - Brother, you never stood a chance. Best to get going while the going’s good.
RHETORIC [Trivial: Failure] - What does that even *mean*?
HAND/EYE COORDINATION [Easy: Success] - Your body remembers what your brain has so successfully obliterated. The grooves of the key are familiar on your fingertips. The key slides into the lock on the first attempt, and muscle memory tells you to twist the doorknob as you turn the key. Like clockwork, your muscle memory kicks in again as you feel for the light switch on the right side of the wall, and flick it on.
SHIVERS - SHE DIDN’T LIVE HERE. SHE NEVER SAW IT LIKE THIS.
DRAMA [Trivial: Success] - And she never will.
YOUR APARTMENT - It looked, quite frankly, like a ghost has been living here. A very angry, drunk ghost. There are piles of clothing on the ground, draped over the single chair in the cramped apartment. A dinged up wardrobe, a lonely chest of drawers - both stuffed to the brim with crumpled clothes. A battered bookcase, half empty, next to a pile of moving boxes still waiting, years later, to be unpacked.
INLAND EMPIRE [Medium: Success] - Not because you’ve just moved here recently, but because there simply wasn’t enough room in this tiny shithole to put all of your knicknacks. Belongings from a past life, a stranger you haven’t met.
EMPATHY [Trivial: Success] - No space or the motivation to find any space.
KIM KITSURAGI - The lieutenant scans the room, taking it in. Noting the singular chair, the scuffed dining table, the naked hanging lightbulb. And then, in quick succession, the clean floor, the lack of dirty plates in the sink. The absence of empty bottles. The empty trashcan.
PERCEPTION (Sight) [Easy: Success] - There is a neat stack of bottles of water and non-prescription painkillers on the table, next to some newly purchased packages of bandages.
ESPRIT DES CORPS [Legendary: Success] - They’ve been here. Satellite Officer Jean Vicquemare, surveying your shitty flat with the grim determination of someone about to walk onto a crime scene for the first time, black trash bags in hand. “Fucking hell, shitkid,” he muttered. “This place looks like a fucking tip.” Behind him, Patrol Officer Judit Minot stood on her tip-toes to get a better look at the apartment. In her arms, a small box of medical supplies - partly purchased, partly wheedled out of Nix Gottlieb at the Precinct 41 infirmary. Paralysed by his worry for you and caught between his fear of what he might find if he had come to see you at the Whirling-in-Rags after news of you being shot had reached the Precinct - and the guilt of *not* coming to see you, Jean Vicquemare chose the third, admittedly least impactful option.
KIM KITSURAGI - “Well,” the lieutenant’s voice is even. “I’m glad your Precinct did look out for you, just not in the way we had expected.”
HALF-LIGHT [Medium: Success] - Not in the way that mattered, right then.
KIM KITSURAGI - The lieutenant helps you hobble over to sit at the edge of your nondescript grey couch and take another tab of drouamine, as instructed. He briskly double checks that your stitches and bandages are still safely in place. In the warm orange light of your apartment, you admire the shift of Kim’s shoulders beneath the orange nylon of his jacket as he checks you over, his clever hands moving you, shifting, gently prodding. The lean musculature of his legs. The elegant line of his neck. The sliver of pale skin between where his gloves end and his jacket sleeves begin. He’s -
EMPATHY [Trivial: Success] - So beautiful.
HALF-LIGHT [Trivial: Success] - A sleek, lithe physical weapon.
ELECTROCHEMISTRY [Trivial: Success] - OH BABY DO WE WANT TO LICK HIS WRISTS! PUT THOSE FINGERS IN YOUR MOUTH.
You - Wait, why? Why do I want to do that?
ELECTROCHEMISTRY [Medium: Failure] - You *know* why.
You - Actually, no, I have no idea what is happening. This has been the recurring theme for the past week, remember?
HALF-LIGHT [Trivial: Success] - Wait, wait, now he’s leaving. He’s abandoning you.
KIM KITSURAGI - Having deemed that you are probably not going to die in your sleep tonight, either from bleeding out of torn stitches or some kind of secondary infection, the lieutenant steps back and heads for the door.
KIM KITSURAGI - “You really should get some rest, detective. I’ll come by again in the next few days, if you are not busy.”
SUGGESTION [Medium: Failure] - He’s being polite. He knows you’re on medical leave and can’t do shit all with how your leg is fucked to hell.
YOU:
- [VOLITION: Legendary] Don’t cry.
- “I don’t know what to do with myself anymore.” [Start crying].
- “Please don’t go.” [Start crying].
- Why the fuck am I like this?
ELECTROCHEMISTRY [Trivial: Success] - I am convinced that this could all be solved if we could kiss the lieutenant.
COMPOSURE [Easy: Success] - Shut it! Please, please don’t get me started right now. We were doing so well.
- [VOLITION: Legendary] Don’t cry.
- “I don’t know what to do with myself.” [Start crying].
- “Please don’t go.” [Start crying].
- [COMPOSURE: Impossible] Kiss him?
VOLITION [Legendary: Failure] - The tears leak from your eyes before you even realise you have started blubbering - fat salty droplets tracking down your cheek and melting into your sideburns.
YOU - "S-sorry," you manage through taking a gulp of air. When you chance a look at the lieutenant's face, his expression is unreadable. Lips pressed tight into a fine line.
ESPRIT DES CORPS [Trivial: Success] - He's bad with talking about feelings, but it pains him to see you apologise. That much is clear. It pains him to see you cry, too.
YOU - It makes you want to apologise for apologising and also for crying so much.
PHYSICAL INSTRUMENT [Challenging: Failure] - Fucking get a *grip* on yourself, Harrister. What are you, some kind of homo?
LOGIC [Formidable: Success] - You’ve only been in the world for around 10 days. Of course you would seek out the only thing that has been a constant for you.
INLAND EMPIRE [Medium: Success] - The only constant in this cold, cruel and confusing world.
ELECTROCHEMISTRY [Trivial: Success] - You’ve imprinted on the lieutenant, haven’t you. Like a baby bird, newly hatched, wet and blind and screeching.
ENCYCLOPEDIA [Medium: Success] - Imprinting is a form of learning in which an animal gains its sense of species identification. Birds do not automatically know what they are when they hatch – they visually imprint on their parents during a critical period of development. After imprinting, they will identify with that species for life.
RHETORIC [Formidable: Failure] - Is this still about how we’re a cockatoo?
KIM KITSURAGI - The lieutenant has grabbed a pen and a piece of paper towel from the kitchenette. "Here," he says, writing something down and handing it to you. "You can call me on this number if you need anything. After I leave."
Item gained: Kim Kitsuragi's Phone Number
PERCEPTION (Sight) [Challenging: Success] - Through the blur of your tears, you can make out a series of numbers written in the lieutenant's confident, sloping script. It's his direct line.
EMPATHY [Formidable: Success] - He worries about leaving you, too.
KIM KITSURAGI - Standing in your doorway, the lieutenant looks *exhausted*.
PAIN THRESHOLD [Trivial: Success] - The two nights he looked after you, all alone and unlooked for in your hotel room at the Whirling-in-Rags. When nobody had come, and it fell on him to clean your wounds, stitch you up, change your dressings, and administer mercurochrome when a secondary bacterial infection arose. Alone, bruised and beaten, while you drifted in and out of consciousness. With no one to look after him.
VOLITION [Easy: Success] - The least you could do for him is let him go home and sleep in his own bed.
YOU - This thought, and the torn off piece of paper towel clutched in your hand grounds you. You dig the heel of your palms into your eyes, wiping them dry, and nod once at the lieutenant.
KIM KITSURAGI - "Goodnight, detective." The door closes quietly, and he is gone.
YOU - Finally, having calmed yourself down, you curl up like an animal in a blanket nest and close your eyes, willing for sleep to come.