InsaneJournal

Current location:	home
Current mood:	happy
Current music:	"The Dirty Glass" - Dropkick Murphys
Entry tags:	snip, twwd

TWWD - what else?
Bits and bobs. Fun fact; my Open Office spell-checker doesn't recognise the word "popsicle".


Sorelia first (after Ivan has snapped at her for being too loud):

The heavy, inky clouds spanned the narrow sky above their heads, stretching between the sharp-edged roofs, and Sorelia peered up at them as she hurried onwards. Faint traces of green marred the perfect blackness of them, low and choking and seeming to almost crawl over the rooftops. The air's all wrong, too. The air in the city was always a bit stale, tasting of exhaust fumes and plastic and half a dozen other things; just a little bit unpleasant, but something about it had changed. Now, there was a weight to it, a nameless thing that settled in the back of her throat, making it hard to breathe.

It's like... the air is afraid to move.

Ivan snarled something from further down the street, and she lengthened her stride to catch up with him, coughing as she went. She caught up just as he stepped into the narrow street leading to the river, and breathed out a silent sigh of relief. Empty streets or not, this is real creepy. The name of this narrow street escaped her, and the sign that should have been there had fallen off the wall, leaving only a slightly brighter rectangle on the brick. That, too, creeped her out, and she stepped carefully closer to Ivan - despite his snarling and his flat, colourless eyes, he was blessedly real; she could handle him.

"And I'm too old to be jumping at shadows," she mumbled, but she made sure she spoke too quietly to be heard.

Perhaps he heard her anyway, because he gave her yet another one of those looks, and it was all she could do to keep from sticking out her tongue at him. It was just a little thing, and the streets still scared her, but she was prepared to cling to it for the sake of her peace of mind. Like a limpet.





And Ivan (but of course, Sorelia can't help but butt in):

They were halfway down the new street when he heard something. The sound was small, there one moment and gone the next, but it stabbed into his skull like a nail. He went cold all over. Somewhere, something had snapped - and a quick look told him that neither one of them had stepped on anything. Just a small thing - like a popsicle stick breaking beneath some careless child's shoe - but it was wrong, and damn it, his hands were shaking again. Cursing under his breath, he looked around for the source of the sound, but saw nothing but empty cafés and abandoned shopping carts and the garish neon lights of the tobacconists on the corner.

".... Wait here." He didn't bother to wait for her reply.

The little bell above the door chimed brokenly when he shoved the door open and stepped inside. There was a box of colourful lottery tickets on the counter, some of them crunching underfoot as he passed by, and someone had scattered a handful of coins on the floor. Must have left in a hurry. Propping the shotgun up on his shoulder, he reached across, blindly snatching a packet of cigarettes and a lighter. Biting down on the first one and lighting it, hands trembling so badly that he could barely hold the lighter still, he took a deep breath and let it back out, watching the smoke swirl in the still air.

Pretty. Ivan took another drag and raised a hand, watching as the trembles lessened until they were barely visible at all. ... Better take another packet, just to be sure.

"Quiet, secretive and a thief? Just my luck - at this rate, you'll turn out to be a mass murderer." Despite the cut of her words, Sorelia sounded drily amused as she leaned in the doorway. "And you're violent, too."

"Zemolchi," he snapped, and spat an unintentional smoke ring. If it wasn't for this cigarette, I'd show her "mass-murderer".

"I don't speak your crazy language, and that's a disgusting habit anyhow." She waved her hand, dispersing the smoke ring, and then jerked a thumb over her shoulder. "This lazy pace don't get us nowhere. We're in a hurry, remember?"

Ivan made a noise in the back of his throat and picked a few more packets off the shelf behind the counter. Better take the lot, if this is what it'll be like. He stuffed two packs in his pockets - crumpling them around the bullets - and then tossed the others to Sorelia who, after a bit of fumbling, actually managed to catch them. She flipped them over and looked at them, one eyebrow rising.

"Cobra? Well, damn - I thought you'd live up to the clichés and smoke Lucky Strikes, or something."

"Just bring them," he said, in no mood for an argument. The trembles in his hands had gone away, as had the itch in the back of his throat - all thanks to the cigarette. Bless its little nicotine heart.

"Aye aye, captain," she said and gave him a mock-salute. "I'll keep your poison-sticks safe, I promise."

Stepping past her and out through the door again, Ivan took a deep drag of the cigarette and inspected the street. It was an utter mess, and the few patchy street lights didn't reveal much of anything other than more detritus. So... where did the sound come from? At least there was nothing on this street big enough to hide one of those monstrous dogs. Sorelia, still fiddling with the bag, stepped up beside him.

"We're still only about halfway," she said, finishing and crossing her arms over her chest. "And I don't know about you, but I'm getting tired. Let's hurry up and get there already."

"... Yeah."



They get along beautifully, don't they? :P