lostcarnival | [semi-closed] that's just something people say

After how the day has gone, when Ginko steps into his assigned room for the night, it would be pretty damn hard for him to be more relieved to see his adopted sister. The way they were all pushed through processing barely allowed him to catch glimpses of his co-workers in line, with no chance of actually speaking to them.

So, now, he hurries the rest of the way into the room as soon as he sees her from the doorway, his tail flicking anxiously against the floor.

“--Tanyuu! Are you alright?”

She turns in surprise when she hears Ginko, and relief floods through her at the sight of him. She'd caught glimpses throughout the day, but barely enough to be really sure he was alright.

Or as alright as any of them could be.

She starts to move towards him, but the front edge of the open 'sole' on her suit catches on the floor and she 'stumbles' before catching herself. "I'd be better if they'd just let my tail remain free! This is ridiculous, I keep losing my balance because of it!"

It's a petty, minor grievance, but it's easier to focus on that than...anything else.

Ginko reaches out on reflex, ready to try and catch her in the moment before she catches herself, then relaxes again. "--I can see that. Apparently they feel pretty strongly about covering everything here. Or... you know, most of everything."

His own tail gives a quick flick, fully free - but, you know. He doesn't move on it, so that's a little less important in his case.

She grumbles and carefully slithers the rest of the way over, coiling up in a lazy heap and flopping down on herself.

"I suppose my body is more of a foot by their standards. Ugh." She wrinkles her nose, waving vaguely in the air. "It's clearly not anything regarding modesty they care about, considering that examination they gave us."

With Tanyuu settling down, Ginko goes ahead and sits on a bed, the end of his tail coiling around one ankle. "Right... I hope that didn't bother you too much."

It might seem like a small thing given their situation, but that just makes him want all the more for each individual part of it to be as non-horrible for his sister as possible.

She looks over to Ginko and frowns, reaching for his hand to squeeze gently. "No more than the rest of this has. What about you?"

Ginko gives a small shake of his head. "Same here. Not like the invasion of privacy is the worst thing about this, right?"

Ha ha ha. It's funny because they're trapped in a place where they're just straight-up not viewed as people, apparently.

She lets out a bitter snort of laughter, sighing and resting her chin on crossed arms.

"Hah, to say the least. Why worry about that when you can complain about being treated like lab rats or denied any right of agency?"

"Mm-hm. All kinds of things to complain about." It would almost be funny if it didn't suck so much.

"Like these." He tries to pull at the collar of his weird... onesie thing, but can't really get a grip on it. "Seriously, I know you've got it way worse than me, here, but I don't see why they've got us in these at all."

Ginko is pretty pleased with how he’s done, after the first two days of work. He’s been as good as ever at staying focused, finishing tasks put in front of him - and, in that way, putting everything else out of his mind. Ignoring the uncertainty of their situation, their sterile and uncaring surroundings, not thinking too much about the check-ups where some poking and prodding gets uncomfortably close to his empty eye socket. He guesses he should just be glad they haven’t actually decided to take a closer look at that.

It gets a little harder when they’re sent to their cells to rest for the night. That first hour can be filled with conversation, particularly when he’s been lucky enough to be placed with Joker - however strange, if not exactly uncomfortable, it might be to be in such close quarters with him.

Eventually, though, as they quiet down - and, eventually, Ginko suspects Joker is asleep - actively distracting himself becomes less of a possibility. So he tries to wipe his thoughts away entirely, to focus on nothing and push back the creeping, almost painful dread in his chest, but it’s more insistent now than it had been the last couple nights, threading into his lungs and down his spine. He only distantly notices that he’s shaking, and pulls his limbs and tail in close, trying to take up as little space as possible while he waits for it to stop.

If only it were so easy to fall asleep.

Joker knows it will claim him soon enough, even if the reason exactly how eludes him. Drugs? Magic? Their suits? He hasn't the faintest. It might matter, in that it might matter to them getting out of here, if there's even a remote chance that they can... but he can't bring himself to really care about it right now. Whatever it is out of any of those options, or ones that he hasn't even been able to think about yet, then it's not him that will be able to help with them.

Rather, he's quiet because there's only so much that can be said before the conversation begins to take a dark and hopeless turn. Being split in two was an eye opener in a few ways, he can be grateful for that much at least. It helps him just... keep track of thing. But the silence is hardly better, he reflects, staring at blank whiteness. Although there is one thing to give credit to the silence for...

It makes it easier to tell when a rather tall and large body is knocking against thing while shaking.

If Ginko isn't too lost in his own head, the only warning he'll get is the sound of blankets shifting, and then Joker is crawling into his own bunk. "Alright, hold still."

The movement and sound come just as Ginko has started to lift a hand to his mouth, wondering, vaguely, if his breathing has gotten harsh enough to risk Joker hearing the change. When Joker speaks, though, he freezes in place - except for that damned shaking - and it takes him a moment to get his voice to come out so he can respond.

"Sorry. Did I... I wake you up?"

"Wasn't sleepin'." Were these beds made for two people? They sure as hell weren't. In Joker's opinion, it's practically debatable if they were even made for a single person, but this is what they've been given. At least he's light, now, light for flight, light for flexibility. Hopefully that's enough as he starts to make himself comfortable on top of Ginko.

...The space is also now full of feathers. Whether that improves or worsens things has yet to be seen.

"And I know ya weren't either." He can still feel him shaking like the rails of an oncoming train.

"Oh. Too bad." Since, you know, for one thing it means Joker isn't getting rest he's going to need tomorrow, and, for another, it means he has to deal with... with whatever this is. Whatever is still making Ginko's breaths come short and shallow. At least Joker is, somehow, light enough not to make it worse. It's a little rough being crammed into this tight of a space, but he doesn't know that it's actually worse than being down here by himself.

Maybe being crammed up against his boyfriend is actually better than being crammed up against the crushing weight of their near-hopeless situation and his own inability to do anything about it. Joker is, at least, a hell of a lot warmer than the uncaring void.

Ginko squeezes his eyes shut for a moment, lifting his hands to rest blindly on Joker's back. As if that's going to do any good. His breath catches in his throat, like something between his chest and mouth has gotten squeezed shut and clogged up, only allowing the occasional, painful bubble of air through. "Wh-why'd you move?"

As if he's not right on the edge of clinging to Joker as if his life depends on it.

Good, he's reaching out. Even if it's just physically, it's better than nothing at all. Joker relaxes underneath Ginko's touch, taking care to keep his wings out of the way. Fortunate, really that he's so flexible.

"Wanted ta be with ya," he says simply, resting his chin against Ginko's chest. Even like this, he's pretty sure his feet can't reach Ginko's hooves. Despite that fact, he still seems ten times more fragile. "Hey, Ginko? Can ya feel me breathin'?"

Stupid gloves. For once, Ginko finds himself wishing that he had more skin exposed - which is to say, any other than his head and tail. Even just being able to put his hand directly on Joker's sounds really nice right now.

He nods, though the motion is barely perceptible. He's... definitely still focusing more on trying to get himself to stop trembling so much. "Mm-hm. Wh... why?"

"Just follow it, okay?" For all the uncomfortable tightness, wings bent and pressed in awkwardly, he doesn't let that stop him from wiggling a little further up Ginko's chest. Once he's far enough, he nudges his boyfriend's chin with his nose.

"Just follow the sound of my breathin'. In and out. Alright?"

Ginko nods again, and... well, he tries. He really does try, at least for a few seconds, to match his breathing with Joker's.

It almost works, but then there's another of those hitches in his breath, a painful catch, and he winces. "S-Sorry. I don't-- I'll be fine in a few minutes, I think."

Even as Ginko's breath hitches, Joker just reaches up to curve his fingers against that sturdy jaw.

"S'fine, s'fine. Don't worry about it, alright?" There's a pause, before he admits, "S'fine not ta be fine. Ginko, ya don't need ta hold back on my account."

He almost laughs, but it's closer to just a wavering in his already shaky breathing. "Hell of a thing to hear from you." There's a pause, another couple second of trying to steady himself, before he makes a quiet addition. "I can't-- I can't do this. Not... so soon."

If he breaks down already, just from a couple days of this, what's he going to do from here? He can't afford to let himself fall apart, not when nearly the whole damn carnival is struggling to keep themselves together.

"Yeah, well, we both know I'm a great hypocrite," Joker says, his own smile a pinch deprecating and a dash strained. It's a talent he's great at, giving advice to other people that he's absolute bullshit at truly following himself. Maybe that's both their problem.

Well, that, and being stuck in a shitty floating spaceship where they might really not have any hope.

That's honestly the real big problem now, not whatever personal flaws they have, and Joker curls his fingers along Ginko's jaw. "Or what'll happen?" he presses gently, trying to get him to say... anything, really. Anything about his actual thoughts and the negativity bubbled up inside.

Ginko leans into Joker's hand, but he can't quite look at him. His breathing is starting to even out, bit by bit, but it's still shaky.

"I--" Something painfully close to shame bubbles up in his chest, made all the worse by the knowledge of how Joker would probably feel if he knew about that shame. ...And the realization that he's probably not getting out of this without admitting to it.

"We've got... to outlast our time here." Just a quiet repetition of what he'd said before, but... he hopes Joker will get the idea. "We just got here, I can't-- if I already can't handle this, what the hell am I going to do? If I can't handle myself, how am I supposed to..." He swallows hard, hit by another painful catch in his breath.

"This place shouldn't-- it shouldn't be this bad already."

When Ginko's day finally ends, he'll find Herbert already there, on the floor, leaning against the side of the bottom bunk. He's removed his glasses--which are half folded and skittered randomly across the small side table in the cell--to more effectively put his hand over his eyes, fingers threading into his hairline as his head tilts sideways against the bed. His wings are rustled up at side angles and his tail is curled tightly around his lower legs, one knee propped up against his chest.

The only sound he's making is a slightly hoarse purr. Apparently, he kept that from Eden.

Ginko supposes he is, all things considered, doing okay. Sure, he had... a little bit of an emotional breakdown just the previous night, and is a little bit concerned about it happening again, but he feels as alright as could be expected, at least for the moment.

From the look of it, the same absolutely cannot be said about Herbert.

Ginko crouches down in front of him, his tail giving a slight flick. "Are you alright?"

Herbert makes a warbled sound in his throat around the purr and then sort of coughs the purr into stopping.

"What?" he says and looks up sharply, peering at Ginko with his brows furrowed. But Ginko is a really obvious shape: green and white with horns. It's fine. Ginko's safe. "Oh it's you." This is relevant somehow, he just has to determine how, but it's hard. He needs the reagent. He's needed it since he began to inject it, even when he'd become that bird alien and completely lost his dependency. It just isn't the same, trying to function without it.

"Iiit could be worse," he admits. "It has been. I'm not on so high a dose, nooot anymore. I can't w-work like this I can't. Think. Nnmf." Grimacing, he clutches at his head again.

"Withdrawal, again?" Damn. He guesses that was probably inevitable; it seemed unlikely that this place would be willing to let him make more reagent to inject himself with.

"Well, to start with, you should probably get on your actual bed. Do you need help?"

[semi-closed] that's just something people say

TANYUU (NIGHT 1)

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JOKER (NIGHT 3)

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HERBERT (NIGHT 4)

ELEVEN DAYS LATER,

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