mintly | box | 6/3 aka the raven reunion clusterfuck | gansey, ronan, adam, noah

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box | 6/3 aka the raven reunion clusterfuck | gansey, ronan, adam, noah

[gansey practically leaps off the train when they can finally disembark, his heart pounding with excitement and fear. of course, just about everyone else is doing the exact same thing, which goes a way to thwart his ability to find his friends. other people who are obviously familiar with each other mill around the cars, so gansey finally moves a bit away from them, and then goes about things the very old fashioned way.

shouting.

at least that distinctive tone of his carries.]

Ronan! Parrish! Noah! Over here!

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[He catches sight of the epipen, feels a surge of gratitude. Ronan is looking after Gansey, because of course he is. That's their job. Adam has to do his own part.

The hug wasn't bad, but it was too much for Adam, and he can think more clearly now that Noah's not hanging off him. He pulls himself up straight, answers Noah's question.]

Find supplies. There's no food in those cars, I'm sure we're all hungry. After that... I'm not sure. I'm trying to figure out what we can do, but our options are limited.

[Think of a way out of this, Ronan had asked, but what can they do if there's no way out?]

We'll have to split up and get back on the trains when they leave. It doesn't seem like we have a choice.

[Ronan eyes Adam for a moment, as if he wants to say something but he's not quite sure if it's the appropriate time. It's true though, that their first priority should be survival, and that means supplies. He curses himself for not trying to dream of more things, objects that they can disperse among themselves, but he'd had no idea that they'd be stopping so soon, no idea if they'd even be reunited at all.

Adam had told him to lay low, but he doesn't want to cower back when he could be making their survival easier.]

Supplies first. Before we get back on, leave me a list of shit you guys think might be necessary- important things. I'll have them by next time.

[There's a pause, and Ronan glances back toward the cars for a moment, uneasy. He'd told Adam that his car was devoid of any significant furniture he could use to hide his spoils, but saying that now feels- cowardly, maybe. If they need things, he'll make sure they get them, end of story.]

[gansey shakes his head, clearly unhappy with the idea of ronan using his abilities too much.]

We don't know where the lines are here, if we're even near one--unless you do, Parrish, in which case feel free to correct me--and being subtle wouldn't hurt. Let's see what we can find before we start draining our resources.

Like Adam said, food first, and then anything that'd be useful camping--matches, utility knives, rope, et cetera. If you grab canned food, don't forget something to open it with. Let's try to find something for Ronan to sleep on. Does anyone else not have a bed?

[gansey starts out slow, but gradually gains steam as he slips into his leader-y spot. by the end it almost sounds like he has a plan.]

Edited 2015-06-02 21:01 (UTC)

[Noah listens to his friends plan with rapt attention. Part of it is he is used to being the listener, part of it is that... his attention to What People Need has been so long limited to placing Living in front of People it's easy to forget how complicated existing is in the context of himself even without your soul decaying around you.

Cabeswater is still with Adam. Noah can feel it this close to him, feel that that's what the feeling of it was earlier. Beyond that...

He's never been on another ley line. Would he even know if it was there if it wasn't 'his'?]

My train car has some beds. Not enough but some... and showers and bathrooms.

It's a moot point, we don't seem to be stopping anywhere long enough to do any sort of ley line work.

[He remembers what Cabeswater had shown him once, a network of ley lines everywhere. But though Adam thinks he can feel them in the back of his mind, he doesn't have the time to scry for them, not really. Not when the train they're on will be far away from anything he finds before he can do anything about it.

But Cabeswater is there in his head. It's a comforting presence, probably the only thing that's kept him from being utterly terrified.]

Ronan can take what he needs. But we should be subtle.

[This last part is mostly for Noah, since he's talked to both Gansey and Ronan already. But it does well to repeat it.]

We don't know why we're here. It doesn't seem to have anything to do with ley lines, Cabeswater, the Greywaren, or Glendower, but we still ought to keep things to ourselves. Just in case.

[Adam knows that Ronan doesn't lie, and that Gansey has never really had a problem announcing his love affair with a dead Welsh king to the world. And of course, Noah can't entirely control his ghostly abilities - and Adam can't always control how Cabeswater affects him. But they can try, at least. Just in case.]

[Ronan is thinking the same thing that Adam is, but with a bit more of a cynical flair: in this situation, they're all so fucking bad at keeping their secrets that they might as well just light some fireworks and announce what they are to the world now. It had been slightly simpler back home, when all of their time was spent solely around one another, but locked in train cars with strangers... Ronan isn't sure that any of them will be able to keep what they are under wraps when their secrets are so invasive and violent.

Except Gansey, maybe. But even then, Ronan can't be sure that he won't go off and start talking about his King to the first person in the car to listen. They've been trapped with those strangers for two days already, and even Gansey must be running out of small talk.

He frowns.]

I'd rather have a weapon than a bed. There's cats in my car too. [Ronan punctuates this with a glance toward the sky, where Chainsaw is still happily flying above them.] But yeah, whatever.

[There's a pause, and Ronan regards Noah curiously, as if still assessing the real-ness of him.

Without much warning, he reaches out and gives the other boy a firm shove. Not to cause pain, not enough force to knock him down, but just simply seeing how solid he is. He looks solid. Too solid. It's disconcerting.]

[they're all terrible at secrets, really. but the longer gansey stayed on that car, the easier it was to withdraw into himself, to just read through his journal over and over looking for new clues, or stare out the window at the blurry scenery. the closer they'd gotten to glendower, the less gansey wanted to share it. his purpose was already slipping through his fingers and into the control of his friends, who are all so much more than he is.

he doesn't say any of this, of course, because it's hardly important right now.]

How bad is arrow girl going to freak out if you show up with a weapon? Because you might prefer it, but I'd prefer you not getting hurt while we don't have any access to medical facilities. That goes for everyone. Once we get back on the train, we can't watch each other's backs anymore.

[this is a gansey they should all recognize, the one who would rather plan than risk.

noah's solidity is proven by the fact that the shove rocks him back into gansey, who sways and looks at ronan like he understands. noah being so real and also holding onto him like a lost child leaves gansey feeling particularly odd. they aren't both meant to be alive at the same time, but here they are.]

[Noah squeezes Gansey just a little tighter as doubts plague his friend's mind, however briefly. Who but their own king could drive them ever forward?

Noah squeaks when he is shoved into Gansey, gentle as it may be. And then he attempts to shove Ronan back, with predictable results.]

Do we know how long until we stop again?

[Adam chooses to ignore the impending Noah-Ronan slapfight. Might as well let them get it out of their systems. He still remembers the oddness, the weight and reality of Noah's body. He could touch things as a ghost, could interact, but somehow it wasn't the same. It never quite felt real, and now it does.]

Impossible to say until it's happened a few more times. It was only a couple of days, this time, but for all we know it could be weeks until we stop again.

[And he doesn't like that thought at all. Adam may often think of himself as alone, but - this is different. This is something else.]

We should get whatever we can now, and assume we won't be stopping again for awhile, just in case.

[He's shoved back, but the pressure behind it is flimsy, like being pushed by a gust of wind. Ronan manages a smirk then and resists the urge to show Noah what a real shove looks like, instead taking note of Gansey's thoughts and what Adam is saying. Makes sense, even if it doesn't particularly bode well. They need supplies, that much is true.]

Then what are we fucking around here for? Let's go.

[Ronan turns away and shoves his hands in his pockets, bumping his shoulder up against Adam as he starts to move off for the odd campsites. It's a silent gesture, a request to follow him, to talk when they get a moment alone.

Could be nothing, and he doesn't want to alarm Gansey or Noah if it is, but Adam is connected to Cabeswater and Ronan dreams about it, so the sooner they can both figure out what it's doing, the better. The sooner they can talk about it, the easier it will be to present it to the other two.]

[gansey doesn't want to split up, but he has to admit it's the smartest way to do the most scavenging in the least amount of time, so he nods. besides, he didn't miss that nudge, and gansey always feels mildly annoyed when they start talking over his head in latin. if ronan doesn't want him to know, better to just not know.]

Noah and I will go look through this place, you and Adam check out that one.

[he doesn't even try to detach noah before heading off in the direction he'd pointed.]

[He gets the message, Ronan wants to talk to him about something - probably something important, or he wouldn't bother. But more important is - ]

Let's meet right back here when we're done.

[Because if they're rushed back onto the trains and he's not able to see them again first, well, that's just asking for even more things to be worried about. Plus, they'll need to go through their supplies.

Then he turns and follows Ronan, speeding his steps to catch up.]

What's on your mind, Lynch?

[Ronan is looking up toward the sky, where Chainsaw is freely flapping away. She notes his movement and dives back toward the grass, landing a few paces ahead of them with a soft croon. She hops along for a moment or two before quickly getting overwhelmed by all the feet thundering around the place for supplies and returning to her normal perch on Ronan's shoulder.

He glances toward Adam at the question, hands still idly in his pockets as they make their way toward one of the houses.]

You can still feel it, right? Cabeswater. [Ronan shrugs, kicking at a tuft of grass and uprooting it from the ground.] I was there the other night.

Yeah. It's still there. I know we're nowhere near it, but...

[He shrugs. It's hard to explain, mostly because Adam really has no idea how it works, but Cabeswater still feels as close as it ever did. It's a physical place that's far away, but it's also inside his head. No matter how far Adam goes, it's still right there with him. It's part of him, and he belongs to it.

There's really no way to explain that without sounding insane.]

I figured you must be able to still reach it, too, if you could make that epipen. Did it... talk to you?

Couldn't make out what it was saying.

[Chainsaw presses the crest of her head against his cheek. Ronan's thin mouth twists into a frown- one more contemplative than it the warning it usually is when he looks like that. He's gotten the hang of dreaming for the most part, but the truth of it, how it works is still foreign enough for him to be set on edge when something is wrong with it.

He takes his hands out of his pockets and tugs at his leather bracelets, unable to stop moving, even when he's already moving.]

Look, it's- faded. Not quite like it was when K drained it, but like it's like... [he searches for the words, not sure how to explain it.] -like I got a bad signal. Solid enough when I could focus on it, but not quite all aligned. I had to really concentrate to get that thing for Gansey.

[A pause. Ronan has never talked much about exactly what happens in his dreams, he's never told Adam or the others about the orphan-looking girl, so telling Adam that she wasn't there won't mean much to him. She's not always there, even when he's at home. It might not mean anything, but he can't help but wonder if it does. Ronan isn't exactly worried about this development- he can still take things, Cabeswater is still there- but he's cautious, and curious to know if it has something to do with being abducted onto what is apparently a murder train.]

Do you get that too? Or is it just like it always is for you?

[Ronan's fidgeting is reassuring. Noah might be alive now, and they might have all been kidnapped and stuck on a train going who knows where, but Ronan is still Ronan. And judging from earlier, Gansey is still Gansey - and so long as those things are still true, Adam finds himself comforted. He's not on his own here.]

It's farther away. Maybe that's why it's faded for you. You've never tried to dream outside of Henrietta, right?

[It's the most obvious explanation. Adam's not sure it's the right explanation, but without anything else to go on, it's the best guess they have. Ronan interacts with Cabeswater differently than Adam, he always has. It makes sense that this would be different, too.]

It's the same as it always is for me, but Cabeswater is - a part of me now.

[It's odd talking about it. He knows it's often odd for the others to think about, too.]

It's right there in the back of my mind.

That's probably it.

[That's not it- at least, he doesn't think it is. It doesn't feel right to him, but what does he know? Ronan has only dreamed once since coming here. Maybe it's a one-time thing, maybe they are just too far away. He won't know until he investigates a little further, and he can't do that while they're out here scavenging.

He looks back toward where the other two boys are, considering things. There's no point in alarming everyone if nothing is wrong, so he doesn't push the issue further.]

C'mon, I think it's a bad idea to leave those two alone for too long.

[Which is true, especially when they don't know so many other people on the train. There's no guarantee that someone won't try to shoot someone else over a can of food or something, right? Everything is fucking crazy. They were supposedly splitting up, but fuck that- Ronan doesn't really think there's much in the place that they're supposed to be checking out anyway.]

[gansey is surprised to hear familiar strides entering the building behind him, and he turns around to see ronan and adam catching up to them without much thought for noah limpeted to his side. he tries to catch ronan's eye, asking a silent question.]

Nothing worth taking? We've found some food, so let's pillage while the pillaging is good.

[It was Ronan's idea to split up, so when Ronan changes his mind and decides to reunite the group, Adam just rolls his eyes and follows. He'd rather stay near them anyway. Soon enough they'll be separated again, and he'll be alone with his own thoughts. A familiar place, but not always a comforting one.]

Food first, then everything else, I'd say. Maybe we can find some mint for you, Gansey.

[Adam doesn't really need anything in particular - he's used to not having stuff, so anything beyond the basics isn't something he sees as necessary. Still, better to make sure they're stocked up. Who knows when they'll get another chance.]

[It sounds like enough of a plan to him. Though this isn't the first time that Ronan has found himself with nothing but the clothes on his back, it's not quite something that's easy to get used to. Ronan nods toward one of the caches, his eyes narrowed slightly at the people mulling about it.]

They're coming out with food. We should look there first.

Works for me. Let's get moving, we don't actually know how long we'll be here.

[and gansey is pretty sure that he, personally, has a lot of packing to do so that his beloved idiot friends don't end up abandoning hygiene entirely by the time they see each other again.]

[Gansey, be reasonable. They're much more likely to abandon sleep and proper nutrition first.

Noah does not remain ENTIRELY attached to Gansey, sometimes he only holds on to Gansey's shirt and is otherwise on his own. Every now and again he bravely lets go entirely and drifts close by like an adoring satellite. ~~The role of Blue will be played by Richard C Gansey III this evening.~~

Noah has forgotten what is necessary for food anyway. Considering Gansey and Ronan live off of pizza and gelato half the time can you blame him? He picks up a can of something as soon as they get in the door. A dropped can of fruit cocktail, it looks like. His brow furrows, worried.]

They wouldn't leave us behind, would they?

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