Ghoul likes to present himself as a total hardass, at the very least, but sometimes...
Sometimes, things refuse to work out for him. Case in point, his current supply run with Party. It's nothing special. Just a small, mundane swap meet at a dilapidated gas station that deals more dust than fuel at this point. They've found diamonds in the rough before, so it's worth a peek- and this is one of the few stations with a BLi-brand vending machine out back. Those are always handy. Kobra hadn't come along on this particular trip, but, fuck. Ghoul's seen him raid the things plenty of times.
Convinced that he had everything under control, he'd waved Party inside and gotten to work.
With there being no witnesses, there's no telling how, exactly, he's ended up knelt in the dirt in front of the machine with his arm literally inside of it, but one thing's embarrassingly clear after a moment of observation.
He's stuck. And properly ashamed.
By the time he hears footsteps approaching, he's in a pose of utter defeat. Trapped arm awkwardly jammed up inside the dispenser, shoulders slumped, forehead pressed sadly against the front display panel of the machine. It's a pathetic sight, he knows, and he doesn't want to hear about it. His free hand quickly raises, held in an unmistakable stop signal. "Don't say a fuckin' word. Just fix it."
These swaps are the kind of gamble they need out here. Most of them turn up very little, but Party knows what to look for and it's always worth the look, even if it takes them gas to get to them and this one's a little closer to the city than he really likes to get.
This meet in particular is a wash. He picks up a few little things, but there's really nothing special. He tosses everything in the trunk and comes around back to find Ghoul.
Instead of words, he uses his eyebrows to express what a monumentally stupid thing it is that he's currently witnessing.
Then he kicks Ghoul's foot and tilts his head to the side. He's really not going to make this no words thing work out in Ghoul's favor.
He sighs, long and slow, letting his arm drop lifelessly back down to his side. He doesn't even want to look at Party, honestly. He can feel the judgement being shot his way. All Ghoul wants to do is close his eyes and keep his head pressed against the machine's paneling, looking much like a sulking kid in a particularly bad time out.
He avoids acknowledging Party any further for a while, either steeling himself for the upcoming shitstorm or wondering how much bribery this is going to take to keep it all hush-hush, but he does eventually peel his face away from the plastic and turn to look at him once and for all.
...And, yep, that's pretty much the expression Ghoul imagined would be on his face. He crinkles up his nose. "Shut up." The words don't even have to come out of Party's mouth. That look says it all. "It's complicated."
With a snort, Party kneels down in the dirt and starts to jostle Ghoul's arm. Someone else might be gentle, but Party's version of gentle involves at least a few harsh pulls. Truthfully, Party only half remembers how to be gentle with anyone anymore.
"It ain't complicated and you don't gotta make excuses. I'm sure you and this vending machine'll be real happy together. Mozel tov, motherfucker."
As he tries to inspect the machine, he winds up half on top of Ghoul without much care for personal space. It's almost like Ghoul and the vending machine are just one big item he needs to fix. He's straddling Ghoul's thighs and jostling him with his shoulder in his haste to move his fingers along Ghoul's arm where it disappears into the machine.
"It is complicated... It happened fast," he grumbles under his breath.
Ghoul glowers, first up at Party and then down where his arm disappears in to the mouth of the beast. "No. I hate this piece of shit, I want a divorce." But not if that divorce means having his shoulder yanked out of socket. After a couple of solid tugs, Ghoul is beginning to suspect amputation is Party's goal.
Or maybe crawling up in to the machine himself is the goal. It's hard to tell what he's going for with that weird as fuck position. "What're you even- ow?!" Things are getting kind of cramped, both in Ghoul's lap and inside the machine's chute. Something bends not quite in the right way as he attempts to scoot out of the way for Party, which is entirely his own fault, but he takes out his frustration by slugging Party in the leg with his free hand and dumping the blame on him anyway. "Yank on somethin' one more time! And get out of there before you get fuckin' stuck too!"
"Stop bein' a baby." If anything, he just settles more of his weight on Ghoul and yanks harder to prove a point.
"Tell me you ain't holdin' onto anything in there." He'd like to think Ghoul's smarter than that, but having basically raised Kobra, he's used to expecting feats of stupidity at the worst times. "If you're holdin' anything, you let go now and we'll just pretend I saved your arm and get on with our day."
Of course they both know he's lying and he'll never let Ghoul forget this no matter what.
A baby. How rude. He thinks he's handling this pretty well considering his arm is already sore, falling asleep, and being handled with the good ol' caveman technique. He grits his teeth after that last yank, making a weird, quiet growly sort of noise in his throat.
The expression on his face quickly goes completely blank, though, before he levels Party with a dead stare. "You kiddin' me? How stupid d'you think I am?" Okay, no, bad question to ask right now. Ghoul realizes he doesn't want an answer to that one, and begins speaking again before Party gets a chance to say something sassy. "Ain't got anything in my hand, okay?"
To demonstrate, he flaps it around inside the belly of the machine. There's nothing to see, of course, but there's a soft thumping sound for a couple seconds before Ghoul flinches and quits. "There's- I dunno, a trap door or some shit. I can push up but it bites down if I pull back."
"Okay." There's a lot of choice comments Party could make right now, but he's itching to not be trapped here first. It's not like he could bolt and leave Ghoul here if something went down. They'd both be pinned in.
"Stay still." He says as if he's giving Ghoul much of a choice.
Carefully, he slips his hand up into the hole to the trap mechanism. He pushes at it carefully with the tips of his fingers. "Feelin' any slack in there yet?"
He wants to fire back with a snappy comeback, but he's got nothing. Instead he sighs and does what he's told, staring gloomily down at the dirt while Party snakes his own hand in to places it shouldn't be.
At first, he doesn't feel anything. He's halfway to saying as much- but Party's on the right track. After a few more seconds, Ghoul perks up. "Hold on, I can get it right there." He should let Party loosen it up a bit more, but god damnit, Ghoul is done now. The fit is still tight around the bones of his wrist, but if he twists his hand just so, it gives him barely enough slack to wrench free.
It's not really a pretty process. The lower portion of his arm is an irritated red and a tad scraped up after he tears it out of the dispenser. And the way he fumbles backwards with the momentum is... less than graceful.
But, once he spreads out on his back and takes a calming breath, he finds himself in a much better mood. "Well. Look who saved the day."
Party's leaning just enough on Ghoul that he loses his balance and falls on top of him, which is really just fine. It's not like he's worried about Ghoul's personal space or anything.
The scrapes he's a little worried about, though. Pain's just pain, but he's always got to be wary of infection out in the zones. It's not like they have an easy supply of meds. Getting them is almost more life-risking than just hoping your body will fight it off on its own. He's got some grain alcohol in the trunk of the car that was supposed to be for drinking, but is now for disinfecting apparently.
"You better think more before you go cramming your arm into stuff next time." He looms over Ghoul, not quite ready to let him up yet.
"Gotta do something stupid every once in a while. You're cute when you play hero." Ghoul aims a devilish grin up at him. Yeah, maybe if he makes it about Party instead of his own temporary lack of judgement, it'll cut down a little on the embarrassment.
Which would do no good if Party spreads the story, he realizes.
All of a sudden, the playful look on his face melts away to something much more grave. His sore hand flexes a time or two before both arms reach up, fingers digging in to the material of Party's jacket as Ghoul grips his shoulders firmly and gives him a light jostle. "Listen, for real. This shit stays between us, you hear me? No gossip."
He puckers his lips at Ghoul when he gets called cute. That alone is going to get some teasing, because it's not every day that someone just lets him play hero like that without any resistance.
Then Ghoul has to go and ruin it and all it does is make Party smirk. "What'll you give my cute ass for my silence, baby?"
Here it goes. Negotiations. Ghoul pulls his arms back again, crossing them over his chest while he stares up at Party thoughtfully. "Name your price." It's easier (and possibly safer) to make him outline his own terms, but on the other hand...
Oh. Oh, yeah. Party's overwhelmed with the possibilities. Testing boundaries is practically a hobby for him and he's not even sure where to start with this.
"Anything I want?"
He grins down at Ghoul like the cat that caught the canary, like Ghoul is his next meal and he's been fucking starving.
As soon as he sees that grin, Ghoul feels a sinking sensation in his stomach. What the fuck has he done. He knows better, but he can't take it back now. Or can he.
"Maybe," he says cautiously. It's not too late for some degree of damage control. "I get two veto calls."
Party can definitely come up with at least three worthwhile things that will piss Ghoul off.
"Yeah, okay." He leans down to kiss Ghoul's forehead with a loud, smacking sound and then he pushes himself up to his feet. "C'mon. Been sittin' in one place too long as it is."
He bends just enough to offer Ghoul a hand up. It's one thing to be still in a place they've secured, but there are strangers here and a patrol could come through any time. It's best to keep moving in unknown territory.
"Two vetoes and then you gotta do the third thing, so you better use 'em smart."
Well, fuck. Party agreed to that easily enough. Now Ghoul regrets not pushing for three vetoes. Deal's already been sealed with a kiss and everything, though, which Ghoul waves away with a quick fan of his hand.
Once Party offers to help him off the ground he strains upwards until he's got his fingers clamped around his wrist. "I don't have to use a veto at all, y'know. You could maybe just not ask for weird shit." As soon as he's upright again, he starts making his way back towards the car, brushing the dust off himself as he goes.
"My requests ain't weird. You ever think you're maybe just a little delicate?" He laughs as he saunters after Ghoul, steps wide enough to catch up, but not rushed.
As he reaches to his pocket for the keys, he takes a second to run his fingers over his ray gun. It's a solid presence at his hip that's a comfort in the face of all the things out here that could kill them. Feeling pinned down, even for a minute, makes him itch like he's been rolling around in an anthill or something.
He clicks his tongue, shooting a slightly miffed look over his shoulder while Party's still lagging behind. "Delicate, my ass."
When Party pulls up beside him, it's just in time for Ghoul to catch a glimpse of him petting at his gun. He steals a quick look at his face, quietly watching for a couple steps, then he knocks against Party's side lightly with his elbow. Just enough pressure to bring him back down to earth, before he gets lost in the hundreds of hypothetical scenarios based around everything that could go wrong out here.
He'll be all right once they get in the car, Ghoul figures, but it can't hurt to provide a little extra distraction. "You find anything good inside?"
For all his quick thoughts and paranoid fears, Party's never been good at picking up on anyone's subtleties enough to realize that Ghoul can pick up on his train of thought, but he bumps back, a bit less gently than Ghoul had bumped him.
"Got a few cans of Pup and some other basic shit. Nothin' too exciting." His hand goes for the driver's side door as they walk up to it, but then he stops. "Do we gotta disinfect any of that?"
Ghoul must be pleased with the reaction he gets. He splits off from Party's side without fuss, walking an arc around the front of the car (because he is, apparently, forbidden from sliding across the hood anymore) as he makes his way to the passenger side.
While he goes along, he answers with a chipper, "Nope," a little too quickly and stuffs the hand in question in to his pocket, as if hiding it from sight will make Party forget about it.
If Party doesn't look convinced, it's only because he isn't. He'll check Ghoul's hand when they get somewhere private, because he'll be damned if he's letting Ghoul die from a stupid infection because he's too proud to let Party tease him a little.
"Just get in the car." The idiot is implied as he climbs into his own seat.
Ghoul doesn't respond verbally, but he does give Party a weird little self-satisfied sneer over the top of the car like he thinks he's won or something. He flings the door open and settles in to the front seat soon after Party climbs in, privately excited about getting to ride shotgun all day long. It's the small things in life.
Once he's in, the seatbelt, if it's even still there anymore, naturally gets absolutely none of his attention. Rather, he pulls the door shut and then leans over towards the driver's side, poking two of his fingertips in beneath Party's ribs. "You know what you wanna ask for yet? I feel like shooting somethin' down."
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keepcruising2016-11-15 05:39 pm
no subject
Sometimes, things refuse to work out for him. Case in point, his current supply run with Party. It's nothing special. Just a small, mundane swap meet at a dilapidated gas station that deals more dust than fuel at this point. They've found diamonds in the rough before, so it's worth a peek- and this is one of the few stations with a BLi-brand vending machine out back. Those are always handy. Kobra hadn't come along on this particular trip, but, fuck. Ghoul's seen him raid the things plenty of times.
Convinced that he had everything under control, he'd waved Party inside and gotten to work.
With there being no witnesses, there's no telling how, exactly, he's ended up knelt in the dirt in front of the machine with his arm literally inside of it, but one thing's embarrassingly clear after a moment of observation.
He's stuck. And properly ashamed.
By the time he hears footsteps approaching, he's in a pose of utter defeat. Trapped arm awkwardly jammed up inside the dispenser, shoulders slumped, forehead pressed sadly against the front display panel of the machine. It's a pathetic sight, he knows, and he doesn't want to hear about it. His free hand quickly raises, held in an unmistakable stop signal. "Don't say a fuckin' word. Just fix it."
no subject
This meet in particular is a wash. He picks up a few little things, but there's really nothing special. He tosses everything in the trunk and comes around back to find Ghoul.
Instead of words, he uses his eyebrows to express what a monumentally stupid thing it is that he's currently witnessing.
Then he kicks Ghoul's foot and tilts his head to the side. He's really not going to make this no words thing work out in Ghoul's favor.
no subject
He avoids acknowledging Party any further for a while, either steeling himself for the upcoming shitstorm or wondering how much bribery this is going to take to keep it all hush-hush, but he does eventually peel his face away from the plastic and turn to look at him once and for all.
...And, yep, that's pretty much the expression Ghoul imagined would be on his face. He crinkles up his nose. "Shut up." The words don't even have to come out of Party's mouth. That look says it all. "It's complicated."
no subject
"It ain't complicated and you don't gotta make excuses. I'm sure you and this vending machine'll be real happy together. Mozel tov, motherfucker."
As he tries to inspect the machine, he winds up half on top of Ghoul without much care for personal space. It's almost like Ghoul and the vending machine are just one big item he needs to fix. He's straddling Ghoul's thighs and jostling him with his shoulder in his haste to move his fingers along Ghoul's arm where it disappears into the machine.
no subject
Ghoul glowers, first up at Party and then down where his arm disappears in to the mouth of the beast. "No. I hate this piece of shit, I want a divorce." But not if that divorce means having his shoulder yanked out of socket. After a couple of solid tugs, Ghoul is beginning to suspect amputation is Party's goal.
Or maybe crawling up in to the machine himself is the goal. It's hard to tell what he's going for with that weird as fuck position. "What're you even- ow?!" Things are getting kind of cramped, both in Ghoul's lap and inside the machine's chute. Something bends not quite in the right way as he attempts to scoot out of the way for Party, which is entirely his own fault, but he takes out his frustration by slugging Party in the leg with his free hand and dumping the blame on him anyway. "Yank on somethin' one more time! And get out of there before you get fuckin' stuck too!"
no subject
"Tell me you ain't holdin' onto anything in there." He'd like to think Ghoul's smarter than that, but having basically raised Kobra, he's used to expecting feats of stupidity at the worst times. "If you're holdin' anything, you let go now and we'll just pretend I saved your arm and get on with our day."
Of course they both know he's lying and he'll never let Ghoul forget this no matter what.
no subject
The expression on his face quickly goes completely blank, though, before he levels Party with a dead stare. "You kiddin' me? How stupid d'you think I am?" Okay, no, bad question to ask right now. Ghoul realizes he doesn't want an answer to that one, and begins speaking again before Party gets a chance to say something sassy. "Ain't got anything in my hand, okay?"
To demonstrate, he flaps it around inside the belly of the machine. There's nothing to see, of course, but there's a soft thumping sound for a couple seconds before Ghoul flinches and quits. "There's- I dunno, a trap door or some shit. I can push up but it bites down if I pull back."
That's descriptive. Bravo.
no subject
"Stay still." He says as if he's giving Ghoul much of a choice.
Carefully, he slips his hand up into the hole to the trap mechanism. He pushes at it carefully with the tips of his fingers. "Feelin' any slack in there yet?"
no subject
At first, he doesn't feel anything. He's halfway to saying as much- but Party's on the right track. After a few more seconds, Ghoul perks up. "Hold on, I can get it right there." He should let Party loosen it up a bit more, but god damnit, Ghoul is done now. The fit is still tight around the bones of his wrist, but if he twists his hand just so, it gives him barely enough slack to wrench free.
It's not really a pretty process. The lower portion of his arm is an irritated red and a tad scraped up after he tears it out of the dispenser. And the way he fumbles backwards with the momentum is... less than graceful.
But, once he spreads out on his back and takes a calming breath, he finds himself in a much better mood. "Well. Look who saved the day."
no subject
The scrapes he's a little worried about, though. Pain's just pain, but he's always got to be wary of infection out in the zones. It's not like they have an easy supply of meds. Getting them is almost more life-risking than just hoping your body will fight it off on its own. He's got some grain alcohol in the trunk of the car that was supposed to be for drinking, but is now for disinfecting apparently.
"You better think more before you go cramming your arm into stuff next time." He looms over Ghoul, not quite ready to let him up yet.
no subject
Which would do no good if Party spreads the story, he realizes.
All of a sudden, the playful look on his face melts away to something much more grave. His sore hand flexes a time or two before both arms reach up, fingers digging in to the material of Party's jacket as Ghoul grips his shoulders firmly and gives him a light jostle. "Listen, for real. This shit stays between us, you hear me? No gossip."
no subject
Then Ghoul has to go and ruin it and all it does is make Party smirk. "What'll you give my cute ass for my silence, baby?"
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Party should never be given that much power.
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"Anything I want?"
He grins down at Ghoul like the cat that caught the canary, like Ghoul is his next meal and he's been fucking starving.
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As soon as he sees that grin, Ghoul feels a sinking sensation in his stomach. What the fuck has he done. He knows better, but he can't take it back now. Or can he.
"Maybe," he says cautiously. It's not too late for some degree of damage control. "I get two veto calls."
no subject
"Yeah, okay." He leans down to kiss Ghoul's forehead with a loud, smacking sound and then he pushes himself up to his feet. "C'mon. Been sittin' in one place too long as it is."
He bends just enough to offer Ghoul a hand up. It's one thing to be still in a place they've secured, but there are strangers here and a patrol could come through any time. It's best to keep moving in unknown territory.
"Two vetoes and then you gotta do the third thing, so you better use 'em smart."
no subject
Once Party offers to help him off the ground he strains upwards until he's got his fingers clamped around his wrist. "I don't have to use a veto at all, y'know. You could maybe just not ask for weird shit." As soon as he's upright again, he starts making his way back towards the car, brushing the dust off himself as he goes.
no subject
As he reaches to his pocket for the keys, he takes a second to run his fingers over his ray gun. It's a solid presence at his hip that's a comfort in the face of all the things out here that could kill them. Feeling pinned down, even for a minute, makes him itch like he's been rolling around in an anthill or something.
no subject
When Party pulls up beside him, it's just in time for Ghoul to catch a glimpse of him petting at his gun. He steals a quick look at his face, quietly watching for a couple steps, then he knocks against Party's side lightly with his elbow. Just enough pressure to bring him back down to earth, before he gets lost in the hundreds of hypothetical scenarios based around everything that could go wrong out here.
He'll be all right once they get in the car, Ghoul figures, but it can't hurt to provide a little extra distraction. "You find anything good inside?"
no subject
"Got a few cans of Pup and some other basic shit. Nothin' too exciting." His hand goes for the driver's side door as they walk up to it, but then he stops. "Do we gotta disinfect any of that?"
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While he goes along, he answers with a chipper, "Nope," a little too quickly and stuffs the hand in question in to his pocket, as if hiding it from sight will make Party forget about it.
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"Just get in the car." The idiot is implied as he climbs into his own seat.
no subject
Once he's in, the seatbelt, if it's even still there anymore, naturally gets absolutely none of his attention. Rather, he pulls the door shut and then leans over towards the driver's side, poking two of his fingertips in beneath Party's ribs. "You know what you wanna ask for yet? I feel like shooting somethin' down."