eenie meenie miney moe

[thesamurai]

Who: Michonne and YOU
Where: around the mansion
When: June 1
Rating: PG-13 maybe? Probably? Or R, we just don't know. WE NOW KNOW.
Summary: Michonne left for a canon update and is back just in time to not be IT.
The Story:

main entrance/foyer/whatever it's called

[She's going to kill Negan. The same way she killed the Governor, she's going to take her katana and run it straight through his heart. And if he kills her first with that fucking bat, she knows Rick will kill him. Bound with her hands behind her back, she subtly glances down the line of all of them on their knees, feeling rage seize in her gut when Negan gets close to Carl. Clenching her jaw, she listens to him go on and on, and she knows, one look at Rick and she knows, someone's going to die. This isn't a joke, this isn't an idle threat. One of them is about to meet the end of a baseball bat wrapped in barbed wire.

The rage fades to fear, something she hasn't felt since Carl was shot in the face, and she's shaking as Negan counts them down, using a child's rhyme to taunt them all. When he points at her with the bat, Michonne looks at him defiantly, but as he picks she closes her eyes, squeezes them shut for a moment, too afraid to see who it is before needing to know. But then she's on her knees in Wonderland, inside the mansion. She knows exactly where she is, and air leaves her lungs in a loud, guttural cry as she pitches forward, hands still tied behind her back, a sob wracking her frame with her forehead touching the ground. Someone's about to die and she's back here. Safe.

Pulling herself together she clumsily stands, taking a deep breath and looking around. One of her locs has been crudely cut from her head, but aside from that (and her restrained hands), she looks about the same as she did when she left. She just needs a little help with the ropes.]

video message sent from the bar (action optional)

[She doesn't go back to her room just yet, instead she goes where she knows people will be, people she can surround herself with and know she's safe. She settles in with tequila, starting a video message. It's recording for a good minute before she finds her words.]

I left. That's the second time it's happened in less than a year. But, I'm back now, and as per usual, nothing good happened, so. You need me, I'm in the bar.

[She wants to see the people she calls friends, family. Right now though, she just can't make it room to room.]

Comments

[thesamurai]

[She does like knowing how long she was gone, and she looks up at him, eyes moving over his face.]

Over a week? Glad I still know your face.

[Michonne takes the glass and in a move that suggests something really shitty is going on, she downs the whole thing before putting the glass down, nudging it back to him.]

I just tried to kill John Winchester. So. My re-arrival could have been better timed.

[radiopalkiller]

[ He smiles, and doesn't say another thing to that, because he knows it'll come out something weird. Because the truth is that he really needed her to, that it means entirely too much to him that she still does. ]

John Winchester, really? [ And then he laughs, because Jesus Christ. ] I'm not so sure about bad timing, he could do with a bit of killing now and then.

[ He wasn't paying attention to his own drink, still not a drop less than before, but he fills her glass back up immediately. ]

Wait, did he do that to your nose? Do you need me to finish the job?

[ He's joking, of course. Well, as of course as it gets as long as she doesn't actually make that request in earnest, because he's good for it. ]

[thesamurai]

Yeah. But I kneed him, hard, where the sun don't shine, so. I probably deserved it.

[She does give a half chuckle at that. Maybe they can all laugh about it someday TOGETHER. She sobers again though, wetting her lips. They have to get to the meat of the conversation sometime, don't they?]

It was just a couple months back home. This guy...calls himself Negan. Looks like John. Looks like his favorite thing to do is play war lord of the apocalypse.

[radiopalkiller]

[ If she's asking him, then John probably deserved that a lot more, but unlike John's balls that joke won't get cracked today, not when her tone shifts like that. And there it is.

Philip drinks, listening. Listening, and realising for the first time how little they've talked about each others' worlds, and that he likes it that way in favour of the here and now that matters, but now- literally right now it leaves him fishing a bit. Unsure what to say, if he should say anything at all.

He fills his own glass back up, tops off hers. ]

So that's the guy who deserves what John got, huh? Take it you're still working on that back home?

[thesamurai]

There's nothing to work on.

[And that's the part of it that guts her: They've already lost. They didn't even know the fight had started, and they lost.]

He's got us. All of us. Tied up, lined up. Execution style. Says he's picking one of us at random to kill. Just to prove a point. I got back right when he picked.

[Time to drink. She doesn't know how they regroup after this, not after the look on Rick's face. She's a fighter, but she doesn't know what's next.]

[radiopalkiller]

Jesus Christ.

[ He doesn't know what to say. He didn't even mean to say that much, but the thought spills to her before he can keep it down. Because- because, Jesus Christ, what do you say to that? What do you say when--

Philip knows that there's something callous in him, deep down. It's hard and cold and it hisses to send all their worlds to hell, as long as they've got Wonderland. It works for him. It shouldn't have to work for others. It's not what he ever wanted for Evie then, it's definitely not what he wants for Michonne now. What he wants- what they deserve are options. Not the feeling that their old life is salted and burnt behind them?

So. So what do you say to that? ]

I can't- say anything good to that. Except that he's not here right now, and that you're not back there anymore. You might not have to be, for a long time.

[thesamurai]

[The good news is, it's not a thing she necessarily expects him to have an answer to, and she takes a deep breath, shifting in her seat and blinking against angry tears; not sad ones, angry as hell, but still, she pushes them back, takes another drink from her glass and enjoys the burn all the way down.]

I closed my eyes. He passed me. I know I'm not the one. But I closed my eyes so I didn't have to know right away who it was. [A coward's move.]

Then I was here again.

[radiopalkiller]

[ He takes a drink, because he's scared he might smile. There's a dead stranger he couldn't give a toss about, and the wonderful knowledge that it's not her at the bloody end of that line. There's a seat occupied by her pain of losing someone close, and he knows that his relief doesn't have a right to take it. There's anger in her eyes, and that is something they can feel together. ]

You're not the one. So you'll be alive when you get back. You'll find a way out.

[ A twitch in his finger. Instinct, that almost makes him reach for the bottle again. He finds her hand instead, and squeezes. ]

You make him pay.

[thesamurai]

[That connection is needed, more than she knew. It grounds her, and Michonne looks him right in the eyes, seeing that he means the words, finding nothing that says these are just platitudes to comfort her. Her fingers lace through his, still holding on.

What she wants, in this moment, isn't really in the bottle. She knew that; she knows that every time. It's such a shift from how she used to feel - lose people, push everyone away, barricade against any other loss. And now she's clinging to Philip like he might disappear right in front of her.]

Can we get outta here? Your room, mine, don't care.

[radiopalkiller]

[ Philip doesn't skip a beat before he stands. He lets her fingers slip away, in case she wants that moment to stay at the bar with more-than-half-emptied bottles, but his hand is held out for her to take, as much or as little as she needs. ]

Yours. Let's get you home.

[ That, he thinks, she needs for sure. A place that's better than the worlds they crawled out from. Something that feels less desolate and despairing to call home than home. ]

[thesamurai]

[Michonne takes his hand, anchoring to him, keeping herself grounded. He's a real, good, tangible person. Walking with him to her room, she gets the door open, not letting go of his hand, tugging him inside with her. She's not ready to be alone, not just yet, but she does pause for a moment.]

You don't have to stay. But if you did...

[She pauses for a beat or two before continuing.]

I'd appreciate it if you did.

[radiopalkiller]

[ That's not even a question. He doesn't let go of her hand. ]

I'm not going anywhere.

[ Philip looks around her room, and tries to remember the day he died. How he took his mind off of it, the pain, the sadness, the anger- except it wasn't like that, was it? There was just something cold that hadn't been there before, and never quite went away afterwards.

Her hand's still warm in his though, so that's a start. ]

Another bottle from the closet? I've had time to think of worse movies while you were gone. Or, and I know that's going to sound really surprising, I can do plain silence pretty well.

[thesamurai]

Bottle and a movie?

[She knows she'll probably fall asleep, but only because he'll be there. She may have been gone, and a lot of shit might have happened, but she still knows if she lets her guard down, he won't let anything happen to her. It's safe to sleep if he's with her.]

[radiopalkiller]

Bottle and a movie.

[ He pauses there, because the next step is letting go of her hand. He does, eventually, and grabs a bottle from the closet. ]

In that case, I was thinking Bowmore and-- [ High quality scotch is easy. Low quality movies too, usually, if the top half of his list didn't include an exorbitant amount of slaughter by bad costume design and worse special effects. And maybe it's not quite the time for that just yet.

Philip grabs a DVD, almost surprised at the sight. Someone did release it from its VHS tape prison, who would have thought. ] --Mac and Me. Now, I haven't actually seen this yet, but I heard that if E.T.'s embarrassing twin brother and a fifteen minute commercial break had a child, then this would be it.

[thesamurai]

[It sounds mindless and like she won't have to put a lot of effort into it, so.]

Mac and Me it is. Your analogy really painted a great damn picture.

[She manages another small hint of a smile before sinking down on her couch, looking around. She needs to redecorate, which is an odd though to have after disappearing and coming back. But she needs color, and everything right now seems pretty beige. But, she'll think about it later.]