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| Scene Title | Daidō Shōi, Part VI |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | Delilah and Else, on the road to recovery, discover the presence of a familiar stranger in their midst at the hospital… |
| Date | April 8, 2010 |
"Bloody hell you sank my battleship."
It's a hospital, not a prison.
"Well tha's what, six fuckin' games in a row?" Diffuse gray light shines through the wide bay windows of the Coler-Goldwater Memorial Hospital's day room. Dozens of round canary yellow tables surrounded by colorful carnation red chairs decorate the otherwise white room. Filmy buttercup colored curtains give an almost sunny hue to the otherwise drab light out the windows. In the light of one of those large windows, a pair of young women in this Isolation wing of the hospital sit opposite each other, a plastic board game with a high middle barrier situated between them.
Else Kjelstrom is looking better these days, after what may well have been a brush with death under Ferrymen care. Seated on the edge of her chair, one leg crossed over the other and pajama pants looking a bit more dignified than an open hospital gown, she quietly considers her styrofoam cup of orange juice while staring at the game of Battleship.
"You wan' t'try your 'and at like, connect four or some'fin?" Else has always had a difficult to place accent, and it was nothing but garbled jibberish when she was sick. Even though her stringy blonde hair is still plastered to her cheeks, the dark circles under her eyes make her look a bit like a junkie and she's lost weight she didn't have to lose, she's at least clear when she speaks.
"Maybe, uh, i'unno 'ow t'play chess, thinkin' on it." It's not quite British accent, not quite American. It maybe some pastiche of accents; does that even happen? Maybe it's Finnish? Kjelstrom sounds Scandinavian, right?
Kjelstrom is Swedish!
Being stuck at the hospital, it has given the two girls lots more time to get to be familiar; for better or for worse is to be decided, but Delilah seemed to take to her while at the Den. Because it was them that got taken in at the sweep, perhaps Dee feels an obligation to have been there. At this point, however, it is not so much obligation as it is prior familiarity, no matter how little there was. They seemed to be six degrees from one another until the flu.
"Anything's fine, if you wanna change. I always liked Pictionary, myself. Not that I'm an artist." What's that? A sheep? Looks like a *beep*. The redhead seated across from her is dressed similarly, with the same sickly look to her features; some could have argued that Lilah could have done with losing a couple pounds, but if you were to ask her she would probably tell you that she feels gangly when she is lighter. Plus, boys like to hold onto things- but that's neither here nor there.
"All we ever do is draw cocks when we play pictionary," Else notes in a bubbly laugh with a snort at the end, so very unbecoming. Covering her mouth with one hand, she shakes her head and slants an askance look with those dark brown eyes of hers to the nurse across the room, then back to Delilah. "'Cept for tha' one time y'drew me a Rooster. Think a'almost lost m'breath laughin'." Cracking a smile, Else leans back into her chair, raises one knee to rest her heel on the edge of the seat and wraps her arms around the leg.
"A'just want t'get outside again, out in the snow, doin' things. Ain't never felt as much alive as a'did workin' for…" Else's dark brows crease together, "Well, helpin' out 'round the meadows. A'gotta' say though, actually bein' in a hospital's done won'ners for me though. Pretty much thought a'was goin' t'die for a while there. Seein' all sortsv'e things, an' a've been on a bunch'a drugs b'fore a'got clean too… those were th' wors'."
Huffing out a sigh, Else's eyes alight towards the ceiling, and in her silence the distant sound of other hospital patients coughing and wheezing fills that quiet with a background noise of sickness and malaise. "Y'think s'ever gonna' get sunny again?"
Delilah sets about snickering from the get-go. "We're women that've been couped up for weeks and weeks- of course that's what we're gonna draw." Phalli with hats, with wings, with spots and bells that ding-a-ling-ling. "I'm kind of glad nobody fought about letting us go. You needed to leave- I don't doubt that. None of us are really capable of what a hospital does for someone."
Delilah starts to pick the little pegs out of the Battleship board, sorting them out to presumably put away. "If they ever find out why its doing this, yeah. It's obviously not nature on its own. If it is, anyone north of the Mason-Dixon's gonna be screwed." The clattering sound of pegs comes with her opinion on the matter. Then, she hums. "The sun will come out, tomorrow…"
"I wouldn't bet'cher bottom dollar yet," Else adds in lyrical note, even if it sounds hoarse from all the coughing she's been doing. "You know, a'kind've like all this sickness for one reason though, I ain't picked up a pencil and started goin' all googly-eyed in a long while. It's… sort've a relief, not havin' t'worry 'bout some catastophe bein' figured out in the lyrics of a song or somethin'. That Catherine girl gets so worked up 'bout it, she's like a top tha' jus' keeps spinnin' and runs on nothin' but pure crazy." Else waggles her brows at that, watching Delilah picking up the pegs from the board, moving to the the same, tiny little gray plastic ships all going into the bins noisily at the side.
It's around then that the doors to the day room open, accompanied by the creak of a wheelchair rolling in with a hydration IV bag hung from a stand on one side. The nurse pushing the wheelchair is is escorting a somewhat round-faced young asian man, his long, dark hair hanging loose at his shoulders, a tiny patch of black below his lower lip.
"Now, maybe a little sunlight'll do you good, alright?" The nurse can't help but try to smile, reaching down to pull some locks of his hair from his face. Tiredly, the slouching, dark-haired man halfway lids his eyes and looks up blearily to the nurse, sweat clinging to his brow. He looks sick, terribly so.
"Does…" Else slants a dark-eyed look over to that long-haired Japanese man hunched over in the wheelchair. "Does that guy look familiar t'you?" One black brow goes up, brown eyes angling to look awkwardly at Delilah as Else bites down on her lower lip.
"I hear that. Woulda come in handy to squid that guy that beat me up back in March, but at the same time I'm kinda relieved that I haven't done it to anyone for a long time." Delilah pauses. Does Else even know what she did? Hm. While she is considering this, her eyes are drawn to the door when it opens wide to the squeaking melody of wheels. The last handful of pegs is dropped into the box while she looks over. After a moment of this, Delilah seems to have completely paused- like someone took a remote to her, nearly. Her hand edges back, only to be cradled by its twin, fingers flexing nervously over knuckles.
"I think- wait-" Delilah doesn't lean in, but she is very quiet, brown eyes roaming to find the locations of any of the staff in the day room while still trying to look as if she is engaging Else exclusively. "I- am pretty sure know about him. If they did- he- wouldn't be here-" Should she go over to check on him? Are the nurses supposed to be watching if anyone does? Oh no.
Slouching to one side, that patient in the wheelchair looks woozy, eyes half lidded and head bobbing forward tiredly. Delilah's reaction has Else tensing, her back straight and shoulders hunching forward as she leans against the table, folding the battleship board closed and lofting those brows up worriedly. "Dee," her voice is a bit hissed, "wha's wrong, you recognize 'im? Swear t'god I've seen 'im somewhere b'fore but I can't remember where from." A nervous flick of brown eyes goes back to the dark-haired man in the wheelchair, then back to Delilah.
"S'he one've us?" Else's long and bony fingers curl against her palms, and the blonde leans in just a little further over the table, sliding that bent knee forward again so both of her slippered feet are flat on the floor. "I ain't seen you look all flabbergasted like tha' since you got talkin' about when tha' ginger boy you're all 'bout got his ginger back. This ain't quite the same though."
"No, it's kinda the same. In that uncertain sort of way." Delilah tries to compose herself in front of Else, making sure to put everything away while she watches out of the corner of her eyes. "He's not really one of us, but… he's helped." That is as much as Dee can really say without making Else get too excited, right? The redhead looks back over to the man in the wheelchair, lolling dejectedly in his fever. Now that she is feeling a little better, it does not strike her as odd that she feels the Dire Need to mother him. Al was around to stop her last time. Else's there, but there is little question into whether she'd stop Dee from doing anything.
So after a few moments of pause where Delilah tries to make herself look vaguely piteous and merciful, she lifts herself to rested feet, shuffling over to where Hiro sits in his wheelchair. In his vision it is probably just the view of slippers, her pants, part of her gown- until she crouches there in front of his knees, hands bold in finding a clasp around one of his.
That +2 Charisma hair-do seems to have paid off! Well- that, or perhaps Delilah's non-verbal appearance has another reason behind it.
"Dee," Else practically hisses as the redhead gets up and saunters over towards where she's found a focus for compassion in a disheveled looking man in a wheelchair. Getting up slowly from her chair, Else looks over her shoulder towards one of the nurses, who's watching Delilah and the wheelchair bound man. Huffing out a breath, Else's slippered feet starts carrying her over to the pair, but she doesn't arrive in time to hear;
"Char… lie?" Brown eyes level up at Delilah, and a smile form on Hiro Nakamura's lips as he tiredly reaches out a hand for Delilah, but seems to just be grabbing at the air. "Your… your hair looks so… curly." A wheezing, wet laugh slips past Hiro's lips, that outstretched hand recoiled to cover his mouth as he starts coughing. Else comes up behind the wheelchair right then, standing on her toes and leaning over the back of the chair, blonde hair swept to one side and hanging over a single eye and down the side of her face.
"Dee what're you doing the nurses look like a flock of hungry bloody raptors now." It's not too much of an exaggeration on Else's part, the two nurses on call are talking to each other, perking their heads up and watching the interaction with Hiro, more so now that he's coughing.
Delilah doesn't know much about Hiro Nakamura, so for now he is treated the same as she might treat someone else under such a state. She does not correct him, but she does not enforce the thought that she is someone that he knows. It's probably better to let it slide- let him figure it out if his brain allows. Her hands remain clasped like a locket around the one he isn't using to mask his coughing, even as Else comes over to try and dissuade her mothering him.
"It's fine, Else. Settle down before you piss yourself silly. I'm just being nice." Delilah's voice is soft, but firm. It always tends to be. There are always other motives, even now. She's not quite sure what they are, other than the potential need to protect him from behind pigeonholed, or from being found out. How long has he been sick? There's no real way to tell, not being a doctor.
Wrinkling her nose, Else stares intently at Delilah for a minute then moves down to the other side of the wheelchair, crouching at Hiro's other side and looking up at him with a worried expression. "He's got 'imself a heck've a fever from the looks of it, all googly-eyed an' that." Reaching up to lay a hand on one of Hiro's, it's only that touch that elicits a look from the young man, watching Else carefully before a frown plays on the corners of his mouth.
"I… am so sorry…" Hiro intones gravely if not a bit blearily as he looks down to the blonde woman. "So… so sorry." His hand squeezes hers, and Else's expression becomes one of uncertainty as her dark brown eyes flick back up to Delilah, a look of abject confusion on her face, not truly sure what to do. It's only when the sound of clicking heels approaches that Else's eyes dart from Hiro over to nurse Thurgood as she approaches.
"Miss Trafford, Miss Kjelstrom," she pronounces if Ka-Jellstrom, and it's so very incorrect in that thick Brooklyn accent she has, "do you two happen to know our John Doe here?" Nurse Thurgood lifts up her penciled in brows, cherry red lips pursed. "He was brough in here a couple of weeks ago during one of the sweeps for the sick, poor fellow was sleeping in someone's garage." There's a huff of a sigh as the nurse shakes her head. "Do you two recognize him?"
"I don't." Delilah is very good at lying to adults, as she mixes it with the truth. She's done it far too much to not know what she'll get away with. "I just thought he looked so awful- I had to come over." There's a thickly dribbled maternal vibe coming off of her that is very truthful about this part. And it really is true! Really! She's probably done the same to various other people while in the day room, though chances are that most of them had pried her off for one reason or another. The better she gets, the more she thinks she's able to do her own nursing. Much to the chagrin of the actual nurses, most likely.
"He's pretty bad, isn't he? He can barely look up at me. Poor guy."
Else's dark brown eyes show a bit of doe-like fear in them, and somehow Delilah's practiced lying seems so much more apt than the hopeless lack of creativity that Else tends to have on her feet in these situations. Swallowing nervously, the blonde stands up straight and offers a nervous smile to the nurse, folding her hands behind her back. "We weren't hurtin' nothin', he just, you know… he does look familiar!" Well, it's the truth.
Nurse Thurgood offers an askance look with pale green eyes over to Else, then back towards Delilah in a scrutinizing stare. "Well, he's… this is probably the best day he's had. The infection's got him pretty good, he's been hallucinating off and on, but we've at least got his temperature under control. I'd hoped a little fresh air might do his head some good. He— doesn't seem to be fully aware of where he is, or even who he is."
There's a roll of the nurse's eyes as she shakes her head. "He keeps saying he is the, oh bother what was it…" her brows furrow frustratedly, "Magnificent Ken Save, or something like that. I was really hoping you two might've known him…"
Delilah squints skeptically when the nurse tries to repeat what he said. She's not sure what she means, but tries to pay attention anyway. "Should we uh- call him John then? Or maybe Ken, if he keeps saying it." For the rest, though, she has a simple half smile. "Yeah, this is about as fresh air as he can get right now, I suppose. Can't exactly take anyone outside." The redhead mutters, in an attempt to get the nurse further off of topic. Inwardly, however, Delilah is wondering when she should try and call someone about him. It's not like she can just not say anything to anyone- well- she can. Until she has to leave herself, maybe it is best that she keep quiet on all fronts.
"I know the both of us have gotten way better since coming here, maybe he will too!" And if Hiro does manage to find his marbles, Dee can be there to tell him to play stupid. Decent plan, in her opinion.
"Kensei," Hiro corrects languidly, waving a hand in the air dismissively, before just blinking a few times in rapid succession and leaning his head into his hands. "Must… must save Charlie from the brain man…" Hiro's brows furrow, head shaking from side to side against his fingertips. Else just furrows her brows at the title, shaking her head before looking up and over Hiro at the nurse.
Nurse Thurgood sighs, noisily and shakes her head as she looks back towards where shed' been conversing with the other nurses. "Well, if you do happen to hear of anyone who knows who he is, could you let someone know? The police haven't gotten back to us with a fingerprint check yet, but I figure it'll only be a matter of time." The nurse's pale eyes settle on Hiro. "I guess he gets to be John or Ken or… whatever until then."
As the nurse turns to leave, Else slants a side-long look to Delilah, one brow raised. "What's a Kensei?" She asks in a whisper, assuming that's some sort've secret Ferrymen code she's not aware of yet.
With the blizzard and everything else going on, Delilah wonders how fast something like a fingerprinting for some 'sick schmuck' would take. Perhaps forever. Right now, Hiro is perhaps at his most safe. Delilah lifts a hand to brush back his tangle of jet black hair, giving Else her very best flat-lipped shrug. Don't ask me!
"You'll save her eventually, Kensei. You can save anyone if you set yourself to it." The redhead there is obviously not Charlie- but maybe it helps that she is supportive. Her words to him only barely reach Else's ears, though. "But for now you've got to get better. Can't save her like this."
Watching Delilah and Hiro, Else runs her tongue over her lips and shifts dark eyes back and forth between the two, then out the curtained window overlooking the snowy north shores of Roosevelt Island. "I don't really think any'a us are fit t'save anyone right now…" she admits in a raspy voice, lips puckering to the side before the blonde turns to look at Delilah.
She had something else to say, but a noisy and explosive sneeze perhaps is affirmation enough for now.