spaceguy | (no subject)

It didn't hurt that badly. Couldn't have.

And Guy definitely isn't smiling, at Jasper's reaction. He pops off a shrug at Jasper's question, pointing somewhere due south.

Hopefully they'll hit a stream sometime in the next few hours. Guy's water supply is getting low.

Oh - right.

Guy stops, setting his pack on the ground, and reaches into a pocket sewn into the lining. He pulls out a small, flat rectangle, and passes it over to Jasper, careful not to drop it. The second he takes himself, hooking it onto a pocket.

"That's super helpful," Jasper teases. "You really know how to inspire confidence in a guy, you know that?"

He takes the little device from Guy, handling it delicately as he asks, "What's this?" Though a few more seconds of looking at it, and he can see the little numbers on the readout, the color coded bars...

"Oh, cool. Like a geiger counter, right? Where'd you get - never mind," he cuts himself off. He doesn't think Guy would answer him even if that wasn't a stupidly invasive thing to ask. Obviously this dude has some dark and mysterious past and shit, and just as obviously, he doesn't wanna talk about it.

Instead he smiles a little, tucking the counter into his own pocket. "Thanks, man. This'll probably help a lot. Y'know, staying alive."

And staying alive would be the plan.

Guy heads off into the forest, hands tucked into the pockets of his jacket.

He doesn't know how he'll be able to feed them. He has enough trouble with himself, finding fish and plants that're undamaged by radiation. With two --

Then again, Jasper's wish to talk might be helpful.

If Guy can also teach him how to shut up.

They walk in silence for a while, because Jasper can't think of anything to say, and he's getting a little tired of hearing his own voice. And if he's tired of it, man, Guy must be dying.

He's favoring his right leg a little too much, but fuck, his left is still really tight. Jumping and climbing through the woods probably isn't doing him any favors either.

But hey, in for a penny in for a pound, or whatever; and even though his leg hurts and he doesn't know where the hell they're going, this is still so much better than the camp.

Jasper winces a little bit, stepping over a fallen branch, but he keeps walking.

After about an hour of walking (maybe three miles, Guy thinks, but probably less) he notices Jasper's limp.

And sighs. Because he really should have picked up on that sooner.

He halts, setting the pack on the ground, and pushes Jasper back, so he's sitting on a log. Crouches before Jasper's left leg, and runs a hand up his calf, sending a questioning glance up Jasper's way.

"Hey - whoa - what?" Jasper flails a little, until he settles on the log, and he doesn't have too long to react to that before Guy bends down and slides his hand gently up his calf.

He's not blushing. That's stupid.

"It's okay," Jasper says, "I mean, it's just a really old injury; I've had it for freaking years. I'm used to it." He's kind of babbling, but Guy still isn't moving, so he keeps talking. "There's not anything you can do, I don't think. I mean, you can touch it, if you like, but..."

And Jasper's totally not blushing now, no way, but he does feel kind of embarrassed.

"It's fine," he shrugs. "Don't worry about it."

And - there, Guy's located the scar tissue, and, yeah, probably that muscle that's having the problems. He digs in, hard, with his thumb, in a way that's probably at least a little painful to Jasper. And again; pressure, release, pressure, release. Basic, but effective.

Come to think of it, it might be nice to have someone to take care of.

And there, that should do it. Should help, at least, since there's a low supply of readily available ibuprofen, and there's no way Guy's using any of it until one of them gets a real injury.

He stands, offering his hand to Jasper, to help him get up.

"Ah, ah... ow!" Jasper cries out a little, because that fucking hurts more than he thought it would; but with each movement of Guy's hand, it gets a little better. After a minute or so, the rhythmic press and release feels pretty good. Jasper sighs reflexively when Guy stops, almost disappointed.

He stretches his leg experimentally, and damn, Guy has the magic touch or something; Jasper really didn't think he'd be able to do anything for it. "Wow, that actually feels a lot better."

Guy's hand is right there, and Jasper takes it, letting Guy help him to his feet. He tests his weight on his left leg, and it's amazing the difference. He could probably walk for the whole rest of the day, and...

And he's still holding Guy's hand. Shit, that's awkward. He lets go of it, shoving his own hands into his pockets, dropping his eyes.

"Thanks, uh, yeah. Thank you, Guy."

Guy's hand lingers, in the air, for a second after Jasper lets go, before he drops it.

Time to keep going.

He has to be more sensitive to Jasper, though. Guy is about as physically fit as a person can get, short of being a professional athlete. Granted, he's not used to using that to hike through possibly irradiated forests, but strength translates well regardless. Jasper looks like he's spent most of his life in front of a computer.

It's another few minutes before Guy realizes he actually misses Jasper's talking.

He turns, brushing fingertips against Jasper's throat, his voicebox, wondering if that would get the message across.

It's been a long time since anyone's been nice to Jasper. Well, without wanting something in return and fucking him over sooner rather than later.

That's why Guy's kindness trips him up a little. Why he finds himself so caught up still by the way Guy's hands felt. That's gotta be it.

How long has it been since anyone's touched him, anyway? Getting the shit kicked out of him doesn't really count. Not that Jasper really invited anything else, even before all this.

He's getting lost in thought, following Guy's lead through the woods on some kind of autopilot, thinking about his fucked-up life, and all the shit that got him where he is now, where he doesn't know where he is, but Guy...

He inhales sharply at the touch to his throat (is this guy psychic or something?), and what the hell does that mean? Soft and light, almost a question, and yeah, the way Guy's looking at him, it totally is.

Jasper lets go of the breath he's been holding, and it comes out as kind of a shaky laugh. "You want me to talk?" he asks, incredulous. "Man, nobody ever wants that." He's being pretty self-deprecating, as if he has any other settings, but he's smiling all the same.

Guy shrugs. The journey's a pretty silent one, and it's not like he's going to spend any time talking. And somehow, he doubts that Jasper's run-on monologues are going to bother him.

They might get Jasper out-of-breath, that's true. But they can walk slower.

And besides, Guy already traded away his iPod (with several hours of charge left on it) for an extra knife. It's not like there's anything else to listen to.

He nods, like, okay, go ahead.

"All right man, but you'll be sorry."

But fuck, it's actually kind of hard to think of something to say. There's a lot of stuff he wants to know, but Guy's not gonna answer any questions, no matter how curious Jasper is. He probably wouldn't answer them even if he did talk, so no point in asking. All that would do is annoy them both.

Jasper doesn't want to annoy Guy. Not any more than he already has.

"Damn, and now I've got, like, nothing to say," Jasper mumbles self-consciously. "Thanks again for the, back there, that thing you did. I don't think you're a doctor, 'cause doctors aren't usually so... y'know." He gestures toward Guy, acknowledging his, well, Guyness. "But you've had some kind of training, right?"

He doesn't exactly wait for an answer, since he doesn't expect to get one. "Me, I don't know shit about shit, unless you're interested in what a bunch of old dead guys thought about the human psyche." He shrugs, "Or how to fuckin' flip burgers, neither of which is really relevant nowadays."

Guy shakes his head, to indicate that, indeed, he isn't a doctor. Engineer, yes; astrophysicist, yes. But there's no way to communicate those with nods, even if Guy wanted to.

Which he really, really doesn't.

In fact, he'd rather forget all of that entirely - that is, if those skills don't some day prove completely necessary to keep him alive. He certainly has his education, his experience to thank for his continued existence so far.

He smiles a little, at the last bit. Flipping burgers might come in handy, if Jasper can figure out how to cook meat over a fire.

"I guess I can cook, kind of," Jasper continues, thinking out loud. "Though it's not like we're gonna find a fryer out in the wilderness or anything." He winces a little, really hoping that didn't sound as retarded as he thinks it did.

Jasper likes the idea of trying, though. To cook. He doesn't want Guy feeling like he has to take care of him all the time; like he's just some kind of burden.

"I was a boy scout for like, two years," he volunteers, "and I think I probably remember most of that stuff. Y'know, starting campfires, tying knots, all that shit. And I'm pretty resourceful when I wanna be, so don't go feeling like you have to do all the work here. If there's something you want me to do, just tell - just let me know."

That would be helpful. Division of tasks.

...he wonders if Jasper saw one of the explosions. Or survived one of the explosions. So long as he got out, after the explosion, he could have survived a blast, maybe as close as ten, fifteen miles, depending on how people panicked afterwards.

No use, really. He can't ask that question.

He falters, for a second. Doesn't think about what he saw, where he was.

Guy goes quiet. Well, quieter; kind of distant, like he's remembering something that happened a long time ago. Something that shook him pretty bad.

"Hey," Jasper says, a little concerned. "What's on your mind?"

Without looking at Jasper, Guy takes a stick, from the ground, and makes a few select curves in the damp earth.

A mushroom cloud.

Like that isn't on everyone's mind.

"Fuck, dude," Jasper sighs, looking at the picture in the dirt. "Tell me about it."

He laughs, a thin nervous sound without much amusement in it. "Sorry, forgot who I was talking to."

He goes quiet too, for a few minutes, thinking about... God, shit that he's really done thinking about, really. It's bad enough that he has to live in the fucking awful present, without thinking of the past he can't change. But his mouth gets away from him, big surprise.

"That was some shit," he says, eloquently. " I mean, I was pretty far away from... any of those, so it took a while for me to get what was going on. Story of my fucking life."

But he did see the unmistakable shape of a mushroom cloud, way off in the distance, and he hadn't even had time to process it before the panicking started.

Pretty far away, huh?

It's been weeks, with no communication network, all major cities disabled, the internet and most power grids collapsed. People don't even know for sure what cities were struck.

Guy does.

He ducks his head, and drops the stick. Continues on his way.

Guy moves on, obviously done with talking about it. Which is, y'know, more than fine with Jasper. He doesn't wanna be living it, let alone talking about it.

They walk in silence for a while longer, while Jasper tries to think of anything more pleasant to say, and Guy thinks about... whatever he's thinking about. Jasper wonders how far they've come. It's kind of hard for him to tell how long they've been at it.

He's starting to get kind of thirsty; probably a sign that he's been yapping too much. And thinking about it, he probably should have grabbed some stuff from the camp before they left. Not that he really had anything useful, anyway.

"How long do you figure we've been walking?" he asks, as much to break the silence as out of actual curiosity. It doesn't really matter how long it's been when they don't have a destination in mind.

Guy perks up.

Not as Jasper's words, but at the sound he's just realized he's been hearing. A river. And up ahead, it seems.

Not for the first time, he wishes that he had a map of the surrounding area; even so, he knows the sound of water when he hears it. He increases his pace, until he bursts out of the trees on the edge of a bluff, a waterfall tumbling down to the river below.

About twelve feet high, Guy decides. Not a stunning vista, but the water's fast-moving, which means relatively clean.

"Hey, wait up!" Jasper calls as Guy takes off. Man, he can really move when he wants to. But now he can hear it, rushing water, and it's really close.

Yeah, it's not the greatest view, really; but it's still somehow awesome.

He turns to Guy, who seems to be analyzing the waterfall. "Do you think it's safe?"

Guy already has his Geiger counter out. Nothing, from this far out; he slips the pack off, setting it on the rock, and turns, climbing down the rock to land, more or less solidly, on the more slippery rocks below.

Here, closer to the water, it still doesn't register anywhere near the danger levels.

Perfect.

He sticks his head under the waterfall, shaking out his hair, and then makes a motion, like he's drinking water, at Jasper. There are empty bottles in the backpack; now is the time to refill them.

Guy shakes his head like a dog or something, water flying everywhere, and Jasper has to laugh because, damn, that looks good. He clambers down the rocks as fast as he can without wiping out, and does the same thing.

Shit, it feels a million times better than it looked. The water is cool, almost cold, and Jasper slicks his hair back from his face, tilting his head back to drink deeply from the waterfall.

Jasper flicks his fingers, sending a playful spray of water in Guy's direction. He's really fucking glad he's here.

Guy half-smiles, flicking some water back in Jasper's.

It's better to have company, he thinks.

Before messing around in the water, he goes back to his pack, opens up the water bottles, and refills them, one by one. It'll be heavy to carry, but better that than thirst.

That done, he reaches in and musses Jasper's hair, water-soaked as it is. It's mischievous and a little too affectionate for the short time that they've known each other, but, somehow, it works.