Meet Your True Constituency

Participants:

delilah_icon.gif rickham_icon.gif

Scene Title Meet Your True Constituency
Synopsis In the aftermath of the attack on the Ferrymen, two unlikely souls meet up and find their own way home.
Date August 26, 2009

Staten Island


The chaos of the night has since turned into a waiting game for Delilah. She knows very well that she could not hope to catch the escaping trucks even if she was a Kenyan runner. And so, as a result of staying behind to poison everything about Marx, the teenager has missed her ride out, and simply huddled down in a crouch near where the big man has fallen. He is bloody from wounds, though what seems to have killed him was certainly not those. He is frozen in death, frozen in a writhing pose, his eyes wide, mouth open, foam and blood dribbling from the sides. His hands lie out, reaching for air across the kitchen floor, and his spine arched, feet splayed. The veins in his skin are still protruding harshly, making his face an unflattering shade of puce.

Delilah does not dare make a sound, fearful for if there are still operatives poring over the grounds. So, she waits, crouched in her white floral dress and looking absolutely out of place in the middle of the ramshackle kitchen. Her skin has a sheen to it, though not garish, but not the look of perspiration. Her left forearm has a long, shallow gash down the side, and she has found an old dishtowel to wrap it with; it is stained in that straight line, dark red.

It's been quiet for nearly twenty minutes, since Delilah huddled herself down in that kitchen. The pop of small arms fire has stopped entirely, replaced by the whistle of a strong wind coming in thorugh bullet holes in the walls, the noise of sea birds crying far overhead; the sound carrying thorugh blown out windows.

It's only in this silence when Delilah finally hears footsteps, heavy and plodding footsteps, moving through the building. Floorboards creak and groan, broken glass crunches underfoot, and occasionally something in an adjacent room that was precariously balancing from the fight topples over with a clatter.

The footsteps draw closer now, nearer to the kitchen and the teen huddled up in it. She can heard the thudding footfalls like thunder over the sounds of her own breathing, over the fizzling pop of the foam in Marx's mouth as it drools down onto the floor. The footsteps crow closer, and closer, nearing the door to the kitchen as they stop short of the entrance; there's no sound of a voice, nothing. Then, after a moment's consideration, the looming figure starts to walk in trough the doorway.

There is enough time in that small frame for Delilah to regain her bearings, relatively, and though she lost her gun in the madness, there are always other means.

She is still, silent, very softly breathing; and huddled into the corner beside the doorway once she begins to hear the crunching, plodding, very calculated footsteps. They must be back looking for stragglers- there is no other reason someone would come in here; and for a minute or so, Dee steels herself as best she can to be mobbed once the footfalls reach the kitchen. The thudding noises creep closer- and pause before the doorframe. Delilah holds her breath even as the figure takes a step forward and into the room.

There is no caterwaul of Kung Fu proportion when the redhead moves, a flash of white dress, red hair, and stainless steel skillet. Delilah swings it with all her strength, sidelong at her perceived enemy's face with eyes half closed. It's like tennis, right? Right? SERVE.

Clang!

The resounding noise sounds more like a bell ringing than someone's face caving in. When the skillet strikes solid metal, it shatters thanks to the weakening of its metal frame from the strange sea algea and mold growing over the steel, the same moss that destroyed so many guns in the fight; the same metal that has Allen Rickham limping like a wounded dog away from the strike.

Delilah's seen his face before — admittedly not quite like this however. Holding up one dark, pitted iron hand to shield himself the way an ordinary person would, the living man of metal looks like he has seen better days. one of his arms is cradled to his side like a wounded wing, rust present over much of its surface where he's rolled up his tattered sleeve to reveal that same algae that Mage had conjures eating away at his body.

There's a fearful look in his hematite eyes, in such an inconguent way that a wounded bear might look sheepish despite still being able to eat most things alive. Seeing the redhead and the shattered skillet, Rickam's metal eyes slide shut, and his shoulders slouch as he seems to relax some. "You…" He never did catch her name.

Perhaps against her best interest in looking tough, Delilah yelps when the skillet shatters into pieces when it rebounds; the handle still in her hand has bounced away from him with her still attached, and so the resulting movement is Dee hopping slightly on one foot after it, surprised enough to go off balance as well.

Still dripping with something, she jerks her head up to look at the metal man with an equally surprised look on her face. "Oh-" Wow. He is …made of metal? "-sir." And as this comes out with a rush of breath, the girl notices with knitted brows the way he is holding himself, and the algae that seems to have grown up on everything, including his arm.

Delilah drops the handle with a hard plastic clatter. "I'm sorry, I thought you were…" She doesn't finish, instead opting to look over to the dead man on the other side of the room.

That's right where Allen's head turns; his eyes might be focused on the corpse, but the pupilless hematite stare does little to show direction. "It's alright, it hasn't spread to my head yet." Yet. It's a worrisome notion. Allen brings his metal fingers to rub at his nose and mouth, scraping steel sounds soft as he walks the rest of the way into the kitchen, letting his focus shift to Delilah rather than the corpse.

"They're all gone." His eyes lid partially, "everyone." Delilah can see a flicker of light through Rickham's midsection where a hole goes straight through his torso. "The trucks left, they had to. I held off the rest of Humanis First as they were making their escape. I think it's just me and you…" Rubbing his fingers together, Rickham looks down at the algae spreading on his arm, softening and pitting the metal. "Do— you know what this is?" He looks up to her, brows creased like pressed metal.

For about a half second, she thinks he means gone as in dead, and fear flickers over her with a shudder. He mends the accidental misleading, thankfully. Delilah shifts a bit as Rickham moves further into the kitchen, examining his arm. "One of the older ladies with us, I guess she made fungi or something. I'm not sure. My gun got scrapped…" And now she is noticing the hole going through him. The redhead lets out a tiny gasp, suddenly right in front of the President Elect with her hands on his midsection, fingers squared around the bullethole's entrance.

"Gawd blimey, you've got a big hole in you-" Personal space? What is that?

The grimace on Rickham's face is part amused, part awkward as he lightly — carefully — like handling something very delicate and brittle, moves Delilah's hand away from him. He seems anxious, as if he might accidentally break her if he isn't careful. "Whatever it is," his hollow voice resonates thorugh the metal of his throat, "//it's makimg me brittle. One of my legs is being— I don't know. But bullets should bounce off me, not break through me like I'm glass."

Metal fingers pull away from Delilah's hand carefully, and he looks towards one of the blown out windows to the courtyard beyond; bodies littering it. "We should get out of here, get somewhere safe…" his brows crease together, head turning back towards Delilah. "Do you know a blonde girl named Abby? Short," he waves his hand in the air, "polite, southern accent? She's a healer, and— " Rockham covers the hole in his abdomen with his rusting hand. "I think I'm going to need to go see her— this isn't going to go away when I turn back."

It is probably best that he moves her hand away from the spot, or else she probably would have tried to stick her finger in the bullethole too, just to doublecheck that it wasn't a trick. Thankfully for Rickham, it only remains a thought flitting around her head. When their hands come away from each other, a thread of liquid something comes off dripping, attached to his fingers and her palm. Not sticky, really, but it seems to cling, quite viscous in look.

"Oh, oops, ew." This comes before he asks about Abby, and she wipes her hand off on her dress, a fruitless effort due to her still worked up brain. "Abby- she can't heal anymore. Some mess-up a while back. Someone else has it." For a moment, she seems skeptical. "But I don't see why he wouldn't help you… can you walk well?" Out of habit, both of her hands reach out to take Rickham by the elbows, the hand going for his mouldy arm making a bold attempt to take it up for gentle inspection. Manhandling at its finest.

There's something of a wry look on Rickham's usually stoic face, worn lines from age creased in an expression of mixed uncertainty and bemisement as Delilah wipes off that strange fluid from his hand. He doesn't ask because if it's not an ability and just a skin condition he'll feel terrible. "I can, but I can't run." The notion that he can run in his metallic form is something like wondering how a rhinoscerous builds up speed when it moves. "I'm worried if I put too much strain on the leg it'll shatter. Then— " he cuts himself off, moving with a limp towards one of the windows, poking his head out fearless of potential gunfire as he looks down one side of the courtyard to another, then ducks back in.

"The coast seems clear," he looks Delilah up and down for a moment, that wryness turning into discomfort as he finally takes time to focus on how young she is, and what she's had to go through. "My son's around your age," Rickham finally says as he begins limping towards the door he had come through, "wanted to play basketball all his life… I think he's somewhere up in Anchorage, Alaska now…" It's an odd segue, but any form of conversation beats silence. Though, he should be talking about other things, and the erratic track of his mind brings him to focus on that afterwards.

"He." It's stated flatly, for clarity. "Do you think he could come find us if we got away from here?" Rickham's standing in the living room now, pulling crooked blinds riddled with bullet holes aside to check the street. "Do you have a phone?"

She can't help herself. When he mentions that his son is around her age, Delilah can't help but let out a cheeky little quip in the midst of everything. "'Round my age? He single?" That's one way to break the ice, Deedee. "Well, alright, keep limpin'." It's best to not have him shatter a leg. The girl pauses as he goes to the living room to check the blinds, slowly stepping after him into the room, wary of any other noises. "I have a phone somewhere, I just hope it didn't get all fucked up." When she says this, one hand goes up to pull down on the front of her dress, fingers dipping inward in search for her cellphone. "…I was on another bit of house business an hour ago…I think we should be spiffy if we went there."

Making his way to the door, Rickham nudges it open with one hand, stepping out onto the street outside of the building, a cool breeze blowng in and sending a decaying shell casing rattling across broken pavement. Allen's brows furrow, head turning to look back at Delilah. He nods, creakingly, signaling that the coast is clear as he steps out onto the road. "He was engaged once, right out of highschool. I told him it was a bad idea, he didn't listen— they never made it to the wedding."

There's a frown, creased metal lips downturning as he looks back at Delilah. "I think you're probably too nice for him. He only seems to like girls who treat him like garbage…" Spoken like a true overprotective parent. "This place, how far is it from here?" Clunking footfalls take Allen out into the middle of the road, flakes of rust falling out of one of his pant legs as he walks. "I hate to play the part of the tinman from the Wizard of Oz," he looks back over his shoulder at Dorothy, "but I think I'm either going to fall apart or rust into one big ball of dust if we don't get away from this algae soon."

"As long as nobody pops out of the bushes when we get out of here, we should be okay to sneak off…" Delilah mutters, catching up rather quickly to Rickham's side and peering around the edge of him much like a kitten with ankles. "Oy, out of school?" She tuts once after saying this hushed, shaking her head in agreeing disapproval.

The phone, free from its bra dimension, is held up in front of her and given an examination. "It looks okay." Dee looks up as he starts to parallel himself to the Tin Man, finger pressing at the power button on her phone to test it. "It's okay, I'll find you some nice WD-40 and we'll squeak you right up… The house isn't far, I guess it is sort of a halfway house for that compound? I'm not sure."

Belatedly, as she follows alongside him- "My Toto is …eighty kilos worth of Toto."

Glancing over his shoulder, Rickham takes one last look back at the building; no time to even bury the dead. He turns back, shaking his head slowly as he walks with a clink-clank-clunk limp, giving Delilah a puzzled look as she mentions— ah— his head dips into a nod, a smile crossing his face. "I never was much for dogs," he admits crookedly, "I'm allergic, if you can believe that. Turn into solid iron, and I'm bested by pet dander."

Glancing at the phone, then ahead to the road as he walks along the broken yellow line down the middle, Rickhham checks the condition of the algae on his arm, some of it brown and flaking off with the rust that sloughs off from him. "I can't believe there's an ability like this.." he starts to mumble to himself, before looking back over at Delilah. "My— My name's Allen, by the way." Not that he truly needs an introduction, but at the very least it's polite of him. "I've seen you around before but— I've sort've just been a house guest who doesn't talk these last few months."

Delilah takes a few seconds to check the knot on the dishtowel still wrapped on her arm, holding out the phone almost gingerly to see if it gets a signal or shorts out. It seems to be going along fine, thankfully. "An ability like that, you say?" She sounds daring, almost, lifting up a hand and unclenching a fist. Her fingers still drip with that translucent muck, and up close it does look like it is on her skin's surface. "I'm a toad girl." Take that, dead mold lady.

"Oho, don't play thick, I know who you are, silly goose. I know you better than you think." Doing the chores gives her a lot of leeway in meeting people without even meeting them. That hand waves passively and returns to Dee's side, eyes moving down to watch her thumb type in a text, all to test the phone and the connection. When that is done, she smiles back up at him. "Delilah."

Glancing over his shoulder, Rickham takes one last look back at the building; no time to even bury the dead. He turns back, shaking his head slowly as he walks with a clink-clank-clunk limp, giving Delilah a puzzled look as she mentions— ah— his head dips into a nod, a smile crossing his face. "I never was much for dogs," he admits crookedly, "I'm allergic, if you can believe that. Turn into solid iron, and I'm bested by pet dander."

Glancing at the phone, then ahead to the road as he walks along the broken yellow line down the middle, Rickhham checks the condition of the algae on his arm, some of it brown and flaking off with the rust that sloughs off from him. "I can't believe there's an ability like this.." he starts to mumble to himself, before looking back over at Delilah. "My— My name's Allen, by the way." Not that he truly needs an introduction, but at the very least it's polite of him. "I've seen you around before but— I've sort've just been a house guest who doesn't talk these last few months."

Delilah takes a few seconds to check the knot on the dishtowel still wrapped on her arm, holding out the phone almost gingerly to see if it gets a signal or shorts out. It seems to be going along fine, thankfully. "An ability like that, you say?" She sounds daring, almost, lifting up a hand and unclenching a fist. Her fingers still drip with that translucent muck, and up close it does look like it is on her skin's surface. "I'm a toad girl." Take that, dead mold lady.

"Oho, don't play thick, I know who you are, silly goose. I know you better than you think." Doing the chores gives her a lot of leeway in meeting people without even meeting them. That hand waves passively and returns to Dee's side, eyes moving down to watch her thumb type in a text, all to test the phone and the connection. When that is done, she smiles back up at him. "Delilah."

Walking along this empty stretch of abandoned Staten Island highway, Rickham's slow, plodding pace is going to make it take hours to get to where they're going. Judging from the awkward cast of his brows and the apologetic way he says, "it's nice to meet you, Delilah" it's clear even he realizes how much he's slowing her down.

"So… you've got an ability, from the sound of it." Toad Girl she so politely put it. "How'd you get caught up in all of this mess, in doing something like what these people," he nods back to the building as he walks, "do instead of going to school or… I don't know, being a normal kid? I've been dealing with my ability since I was twenty-eight, and that was a long time ago," Rickham notes with a smirk, "so I tend not to buy into the idea that just because people have powers, they aren't allowed to lead normal lives."
If she realizes the same thing, she does not show it. Slow or not, she does not seem to mind. But, in exchange, he has to listen to her talk. And talk. And talk some more. "I wouldn't call it a mess- it is messy, but certainly not a mess." Dee replies, quietly but very sure. "I used to be normal. Sort of. It's not quite the same these days, if you manifest something. It's in the open now. So there's a whole new way to have to deal, I guess." She finishes her texting and puts away the phone to where it was hidden before.

"I say 'sort of normal' because my life got complicated fast. Not all of us had smooth sailing, I'm sure you realize… my grandparents died, my home burned down with my family in it, I was shipped here to live with my aunt barely five or six years back, and then the bomb made everything change. We ended up in the pit of East Harlem for years. I had to quit school to go to work, and last fall I manifested this." She holds up her hand a moment before wiping it at her skirt with a sigh. "I got lucky when I met Cat. With her help I was able to get my aunt and cousins out of that hellhole. I'd love to live a totally normal life, mister Rickham, but it is not a luxury that I can afford right now." See, there was a point to the whole 'life story'.

"I find it interesting that I manifested the day you won the election. I almost killed someone. And for a while this leaked out of me anytime I would get stressed, scared, go into defense mode, negative emotions… One more reason I am grateful for the people I work with. I had to learn." Delilah says it so lightly, but it is obvious that she thinks about her deadliness on a regular basis. So that is what happened to Marx. Poor Marx.

Nodding his head slowly, Rickham seems thoughtful, eyes closing briefly before his head turns with a creak of rusted metal, focused now on the redhead at his side. "Election…" Rickham growls with a shake of his head. "You know, I think i really could have changed things…" his hematite eyes do not easily show the thousand yard stare he has, but it's there. "Now I'm following advice from a man in my cell phone, and… I don't know, everything's gone to hell, and some days when I wake up I worry it's never going to get better again."

While they're walking, something catches Delilah's attention more so than Allen's; a van. It's been abandoned by the roadside for what looks like weeks, with the dirt on its windshield and the way that the grass has grown up around the tires. But this particular periwinkle van stands out — color-wise — against the drab browns and greens of this stretch of highway. "So… where is it we're going?" Allen asks with a quirk of one metal brow, looking down to flakes of rust he's trailing, "and how far is it?"
She can't help but laugh a little, disbelieving. "A man in your phone…?" Though she has probably read about these things, there is a certain degree of innocence to be kept. "I don't know what to tell you. On one hand you could have never left- or can even go back out there and throw the world for a loop. On the other hand, having a Colossus around is very nice." Delilah smiles and shifts closer, enough to peer up at his face and brush against him all the same.

"I sent a message out to say we're okay. We're heading for the Lighthouse instead now, and it's a bit far, but I think-" The redhead promptly halts mid-sentence, shoes scuffing to a halt as she peers across the road to the strangest van she's really ever seen. Perhaps a lesson about Attention Spans, Delilah bounces into action again after glowering over at the vehicle; she zips away from Rickham with a boldness that probably says something about her lack of practical fear, ending up at the side of the perwinkle van and pressing her forehead up against the driver's side window with the smallest of smacks onto the glass.

Keys shingin in the ignotion and window rolled down enough that Dee could get her arms inside to unlock the door, it's a small victory for appropriation of abandoned goods right here on the roadside. Rickham follows her movement with a crooked smile, something refreshing about her gentle and flitting nature. "I can't go back…" Allen states in that grumbled tone, walking up alongside the van. "They ambushed me with an Evolved test days before I was to take the oath of office. They found out what I'd been hiding, and— it was bad. I was cut a deal, to disappear and step down from office, for the sake of my family and my son. The government threatened to have me— have us all— disappear if I didn't comply. There was a round of tests in the House and Senate too, the Evolved were pulled out. It wasn't put up on the news."

Frowning, Allen's head dips down. "If I go public, they'll do something to my family. So— we were forced to move up to Anchorage, I left them there when a…" The term is clumbsy to him, "a technopath, named R.Ajas found me. He told me I'd be needed, because there was a war coming… he said I had to find some other people on my way to New York, and— he promised he'd look after my family if I helped."

Furrowing his brows, Rickham walks over to the door and tries the handle— locked. He frowns, looking up to Delilah. "I don't really know if he was just being paranoid, or telling the truth, But my walk across the United States— it showed me a lot. Today showed me a lot. I think he might've been right."
"Don't you have any old normal friends in congress? Ones with lionhearts? They could uncover it, stir up a whole crock of shit. It sounds like a load of bollocks to me. That's the kind of thing we can't stand for. The kind of thing we need to shine a big light on. Let the roaches scatter, but we'll spray'em out anyway…" Delilah says this while she is stretching an arm up into the window, tongue between her lips as a valiant effort is made to stretch her fingers down for the lock. Hrrrnngh! "That's why I can't register either. Not that I would. I thought about it, when it all started. But then I found out I would just… disappear." Her chest heaves a bit, shuddering out. Oh, hard to think about, that stuff.

"So I got a tattoo on my neck instead, I find it is just as effective a warning." Pausing in her attempts, Dee lifts the back of her hair to show him the 'biohazard' symbol. Aw, cute little poisonous person.

"You think you might be able to- uh- gimme a boost or something? This door is a bit high. I just need an inch or so more." She knows that he is having troubles of his own, with the stuff growing in him, but he is also the only one here. And so Delilah fixes him with pleading brown eyes, hand still up in the slitted window.

Eyeing the car, Rickham furrows his brows and gently nudges Delilah back with one hand. "The old lions are all gone. Ted was the last of them, and— " Rickham's head shakes lsowly, and he brings his metal fist to the window with a ssimple tap enough to send the glass shattering into tiny little chicklet sized pieces of safety glass in the driver's seat. He reaches in, unlocks the door and holds it open, using one metal hand to just brush the tiny glass bits out onto the ground.

"Sometimes I worry that it's going to take something drastic to shake this government back into place. When I listen to the world news, and I hear about things like the Coup in Madagascar, or the mandatory conscriptio of Evolved soldiers in China," Allen moves out of the way a bit further, furrowing his brows at the truck. "Do you think this can hold me?" He asks as an aside.

Delilah immediately puts her hands on her hips, eyebrows knitting at the President Elect, who she is increasingly finding to be more familiar. He is not so much the mystery he used to be, and so Allen now faces the brunt of Delilah as she is. "Oh for pete's sake, now there's no window. You may be an iron man, but that doesn't mean 'Hulk Smash' is always the best answer." She even shakes her finger at him once, tsking and hopping up into the van to investigate. "I would have thought you more subtle."

Dee's ankles hang out of the door as she leans over to find the keys and check the glove compartment for anything. "Vans are constantly underestimated, love. Ever see a Mexican Clown Car? I swear, they could fit a small village in one of these and it'd not even sink…"

Recoiling as if he were made of flimsy paper at Delilah's verbal rebuking, Rickham's metal eyelids scrape open and closed in a slow blink before he looks to the back. "I'll— " he starts his way towards the back of the Van, tugging at the rear doors to find them locked too. At least this time, he waits for Delilah there instead of just ripping them off of their hinges. "I have a bad habit of taking the blunt approach when I'm like this. I'm— " He takes a moment to consider his wors, "I'll try to think things through next time."
"Something drastic, maybe. I hope it doesn't come to that, obviously, as I'm with who I'm with. What we need to handle are these Humanis fuckers in the city. I'd hate to have to use them as a support for the cause. America versus Terrorists, and all-" There is a clunking thud inside the front of the van. "-Ffffuuuuuck, ouch. Erk." There are a few shuffling noises, and eventually she pops open the back doors to look at The Tin Man.

"That's the difference between the Hulk and She-Hulk. She uses her brain. I wonder if that's some sort of gender joke…" Delilah shrugs and makes sure that there is nothing stray in the van, inanimate or otherwise, also pausing to make sure there is also gas in the tank. "But. I think if you just remain conscientious, you should be able to be less- straightforward." Perhaps she knows this from experience in pushing down her own bluntness.

"This thing…" Allen narrows his eyes and looks down at the shag carpeting in the back, "maybe it's good I can't smell anything right now." Experimentally tugging at the sides of the van doors, Rickham pulls himself up into the back of the vehicle with a loud and protesting creak of the shocks from his weight. Grimacing, he looks left, then right, and when the van doesn't fall apart he settles down onto the shag carpeting and leans up against one interior wall. "Can you drive stick?" He looks towards the stick shift with a classy 8-Ball cap on the end of it, right below where fuzzy dice hang from a crooked rear-view mirror along with a tiny disco ball.

Part of him is hoping she says no, the van— it's creepy.
"Of course I can drive a stick, mister President." Delilah says this in a smoldering little voice that should really only stick to 'Happy Birthday' songs. It goes back to the same old lilt in a moment, when the tall redhead checks him in the mirror.

Then, some more examinations of her control panels. "Wow, this van is fucking awesome. Why would someone just leave it here? It's a total party van. I bet they really called it shag carpet for other reasons. I hope it doesn't explode, that would be awful!" Delilah voices this after she settles herself happily into the driver's seat, and about two seconds before cranking the ignition.

Despite being made of solid iron, Allen Rickham does wince when that old engine turns over with a hrrr-hrrr-hrrr-vroom of a tired old starter. While he needn't breathe out a sigh of relief, the vestigial effort comes regardless. "I'll admit, I haven't met many girls your age quite like you out here in the city." There's a grimace, and Allen scoots along the flooring carefully, coming to sit at the back of the passenger's and driver's side seats to talk to Dee while she drives.

"I'm sorry you had to do what you did today…" It comes later, once Dee's ground thorugh the rusted gears and got the clunking old van up onto the road, the loud rattle of the exhaust grumbling beneath the van as it takes off down the abandoned highway. "You shouldn't have to— No one should have to do what you did to protect yourself. I'm— sorry." He's taking the state of the country personally. He wanted so much more for it.
The van sounds like it chuckles awake. Maybe it does. Ahh, someone to drive me away! Delilah hunches a bit over the wheel as she lets it come alive for a minute before trying to move it; The van pulls forward, but only a foot at a time. Even Dee winces a it at some scraping noises, but then she realizes it is coming from the direction of her right elbow. She glances back there to see Allen settling down in a good central spot nearby.

"Hah, quite like me?" Not sure how to take that, the rest is simply absorbed as the van meanders away from its port and onto flatter road. "There was a little boy hiding there in the kitchen. Sergei got him out though. That's three people I've killed now." Delilah recites almost distractedly there. "But all because I had to. "I'm not sorry, so you shouldn't be. Protecting myself and others isn't something to have shame about." Her lungs expand, and the tip of her chin extends up an inch. "Nobody should have to do it, but that is how the cookie crumbles."

There's silence for a moment as Allen considers what she says three people. He swallows, tightly, looking up to her as his voice rumbleslike that of a great big cat inside of a tin can. "Have you… talked to anyone about it? Who you've killed." The implication is uncertain at first, with Allen watching the girl's expression before looking down to the flaking rust on his arm. The algae has all but dried up and fallen off, but the damage is done. "Usually when you kill someone, there's a lot of shock that goes with it. Sometimes it can take months to come up, but when it does the guilt and— it's difficult. I knew a police officer who spent months of time in therapy because he had to shoot someone in the line of duty, and they died."

Allen looks down to the shag carpeting, voice humble as he thinks back to what he's done just a short hour ago at the safehouse. "Taking a life shouldn't be something that you get over— not fully." He looks up to Dee, expressions toic but voice tempered with parental concern. "If we lose that ability to empathize with the suffering of others — even if it's people we have no choice but to hurt — it makes us a little less human."

"You're mistaking my attempt at being casual with thinking that I don't care." Her face turns to glance at him, eyes already strained. "I know what it means, Allen." She uses his first name in order to be more personal. "And I still have nightmares about Pinehearst. Probably always will. And about shooting him. I emptied a clip into the bastard. I pay for it, yeah, but if I skulk around about it in front of the world, then I won't be able to do the things I do and others may suffer from that inability. I knew I might have to when I joined the club. I have my friends, my health, and what is left of my family. I find ways to cope."

After a pause, Delilah appears to recognize a rogue street sign and turns onto another road. "I doubt I'll ever get over it. But I can pretend such a thing for the sake of morale, and handle it on my terms. If pretending to not care makes me less normal to someone, then that's just how it is. Until I can actually come to some terms with it, pretending is just as well."

Furrowing his brows, Rickham nods his head slowly, catching the street sign too late and missing what it might have said as it blows by. He anxiously looks out the windows, too hard to see in a moving vehicle with the way he perceives the world. Shifting where he rests, the metallic man's silence is finally broken by words even he doesn't quite expect. "If you ever want to talk about it…" he hesitates, realizing what he's saying, "you can. You know I'll be around, and— I'm not the best sounding board, but I won't ever betray your confidence." In that, at least, he has the Presidential seal of honesty.

Looking ahead down the desolate highway, Rickham's voice turns wistful. "It's a strange world we live in," his head turns towards Delilah. "But… at least we're alive."


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