2019-09-30 - Starve A Fever

That's a big boulder. A huge boulder. A boulder easily the size of a two-story house.

That's Itzhak, pushing it up a steep hill. 'Mountain' is possibly more accurate, a sharp slope of granite peaking into the sky. Itzhak has his shoulder against the enormous stone, bare bleeding feet digging into the rocks of the slope. He's wearing nothing but a hospital gown, and that's barely hanging on by one sleeve. It's filthy and getting bloody as his shoulder is scraped up and his hands are scraped up and his everything is scraped up. He's sweating and swearing and pushing that mother of a boulder up that hill.

Ignacio finds himself chained neck-deep in a pool of sweet, clear water. A pomegranate tree grows from the bank, with a grapevine wound around it. A cluster of fat grapes dangles juuuust out of reach. He's thirsty and hungry, thirstier and hungrier than it seems like he could physically tolerate, but he can't reach the grapes. If he tries for the water, it shrinks away from his mouth.

Ignacio tries reaching for the grapes above. Muscles burn and ache as arm extends overhead. Hopping on the good leg is getting him nowhere breaking a sweat. He tries to stoop and he water goes lower. He stoops again and it goes lower still. He sits and i even recedes. "It-Z? You done with that cause I can use some help." He flops back in the water to pay down to drink it and he pond goes dry leaving him with mud on his lips. Sitting upright again o wipe his face off he pauses, scowls and starts swearing.

(ANGRY SPANISH!!!)

The water leaps away from Ignacio's face, hovering until he gives up, then coyly splashes around him again up to his neck. Those grapes smell amazing, sweet and tangy, the globes just a touch baked from the sun, hanging so, so, so close. So close he can almost taste them.

Itzhak looks around, scowling in helpless fury. "Th'fuck you doin' here?" he growls. "This's my dream." He turns back to his cruel lover, the boulder, pushing. Pushing. Pushing. Slowly it rolls as Itzhak toils at it with all his strength. Every tendon and muscle on him is visible straining underneath his skin. The hospital gown drags in the dust.

Ignacio sits there in the water, "Suffering. That is exactly the fuck I am doing... RIGHTHEREANDNOT... suffering you stooge." He splashes the water up and it even veers away from his face. He can't reach and eventually flops ack in eh water. Wincing he asks, "Fuck, hermano, how long we been doing this?! Why are we here?"

"Forever," Itzhak says through gritted teeth. "Forever we been doin' this, but. If I can just. Get. This fershtunken rock. To the top. I can stop." The boulder grinds uphill, popping lesser rocks to dust under its weight. "Everything. Will be okay. Once I get it to the fucking top..."

The boulder hitches, slewing to the side. "No!" Itzhak grabs it, flinging his weight on it. "No no no no!"

All his strength can't stop it. The boulder breaks free from him and tumbles with earthshaking, graceful bounds allll the way back down the mountain, coming to a sliding halt. Itzhak screams after it in blood-chilling rage. "FUCK YOU! YOU FUCKING BITCH!"

None of which matters. He has to trudge back down after the boulder. At the foot of the hill, he flops next to Ignacio's pool on his back, his chest heaving.

Ignacio lays there in the damn undrinkable pond just giving up and embracin the futility. With a sigh he murmurs, "Yeah, man, keep swearing at it." In the driest tone he has in total support he encouages, "Lemme know when it starts helping. I believe in you." Pausing he looks over and waits for Itzhak to throw the rock onto him and drown him in teh pond. well at least then he'll get a drink of watr, right? Finally he asks, "ITZHAK...Just...a moment."

"Fuck you too, de Santos, you loudmouth prick," Itzhak groans, one arm flopped over his eyes. "...What?" He moves his arm just enough to glare at Iggy with one eye. Fury and hate and blind, bulling determination is in that eye of his. Rationality is out of office, please leave a message and Itzhak will delete it without listening.

Ignacio murmurs, "Yeah, love you too, Hermano..." Because cussing someone out is familial affection right?? He sighs and swishes his arms in the water letting them float. He's got a cunning plan here. He looks to Itzhak as if to silently ask if he's done? Can he talk now? Cool. Good. Casual inquiry follows, "What are you trying to do? Specifically. Bolder. Hill. Right? ...why? What then?"

Itzhak stares blankly at Ignacio, breathing hard, dusty sweat coating his long body and clumping in the black curls of his hair. He runs his tongue over his dry lips. "'Cause then I'll be done. Obviously." He looks at the grapes, at the water, at Ignacio's whole situation. "We offended the gods," he muttered. "Thought we could outsmart 'em. Well, joke's on us." He rolls his head to look up at the mountain. "When I get that boulder to the top, then I can rest."

Ignacio listens to this and turns his head to look to Itzhak with a brief pang, "You think we hurt their feelings?" He pauses to really consider this looking back up at the offending fruit. "You ever think about just chillin withthe boulder at teh bottom of the hill? You'd be resting then." He might be missing the main point but there is another to be presented here.

"I guess, but I don't even believe in these stupid gods. Wrong fucking mythology, ya schmucks!" Itzhak hollers at the uncaring sky.

He sits up, tries to wipe himself off with the hospital gown. This has the opposite of the intended effect. He rips it off and flings it away in disgust. Naked and not giving a single bother, he eyes Ignacio. "...That's not the stupidest idea you've ever had," he says grudgingly. The boulder sits there. He eyes it too. Then looks away, back at Iggy.

Experimentally he flops on his belly and reaches into the pond. It doesn't shrink away from him. He can easily plunge his arm into it up to the shoulder.

Ignacio arches an eyebrow as the hospital gown goes flying. "Lack of dinner and a show?" Still he floats as Itzhak goes to battle this with just his wits. He waits. Patiently and when Itzhak finally considers that and he's silent, possibly absorbing the mild victory on having a point s the only fucking sustenance he's getting today. Then the next Igg-tastic question, "Sooooo where'd they get the boulder from? I mean. Why the rock? Why you?"

"Please, I don't have anything you haven't already seen." Itzhak's reaching way down, finding the metal cuff holding Ignacio's wrists, the chain leading to the rocky wall of the pond. He bites his lip, concentrating. "Because," he grunts, yanking Ig's chain, literally, "that's what I'm good for. I'm the strongest one, that's my job."

Nothing happens. Ignacio remains chained. Itzhak mutters, wipes his curly forelock out of his eyes. "...I don't know if I can fix you. You're really, really broken."

"I don't remember complaining or being offended?" His chain is yanked and he floats that a way. This whole situation has him feeling ultimately powerless and Itzhak pointing that out really only highlights it. His eyes fix on the grapes and considers them for a very long time. With a sigh he murmurs, "Maybe it's not?" Looking over to Itzhak he arches an eyebrow, "Maybe that's not your job. Maybe you're not supposed to get the bolder up the hill. Maybe... the configuration I'm trying to be isn't intended for me. Maybe... just maybe?" God it kills him o say it but the fever's got him lucid as hell and he's been thinking on this singularly since he and Finch were attacked in the yard.

"Maybe your job isn't to do everything alone. Maybe it's to help usget where we need to be." His head tilts to the side and with a quick snap he STILL misses grabbing the damn grapes. With a sigh he murmurs, "Maybe get me out of this pond, I help you roll the boulder up the hill and we go get a burger? Maybe the lesson here is we don't have to work alone and we're a couple of assholes that spent like about 30 years trying to do it that way, not doing so great and taking longer than average to learn this."

Yank, yank, yankyankyankyank--nothing happens. Itzhak drops his head onto his arm, his huge schnozz rubbing in the dirt. "I'm so tired." The words come out on a moan. The good news is now he stays still and quiet, while Ignacio talks. He might be listening.

He lifts his head, frowning. That's the thinky face, not the overwhelmed face, not the enraged face. His nose is smudged with dirt. "I did this to myself, though. I fucked up real bad. I can't make you help me roll the damn boulder. It's not your boulder to roll. It's mine." Itzhak props himself up on his elbows, looking over at the boulder, sitting silent and unmoved. Looking up at the mountain, impervious to his rage or pleas. "...If you wanted to help," he says, cautious, feeling his way through, "maybe we could be a team again. Like the old days. You distract 'em. I hit 'em. I wrench. You drive."

Of course, he knows Ig can't drive anymore. Not like he used to. But this is dream logic. 'Driving' isn't literal.

Ignacio extends a hand up, pauses and tries to suck the water from his sleeve. DAMN!!! With a sigh he relents to being exhausted and starving. "Well come on in. Rest. Float. The water's pretty nice even if it hates me." Arching an eyebrow he wobbles his head with a grin, "Uhhhh yeah. Yeah it is, genius." Looking up the lucid smile finds Itzhak. "The more we try to do things ourself from some... bullshit noble cause the harder things get. We struggle. We fail. The people that love us-"

His finger flicks water like a sprinkler hitting Itchak as he points to him, "And they do fucking love us. There's different kinds of love man... it hurts to watch us struggle and fail. I know this cause you're like... family. I fucking love you and it pisses me off seeing you go through this shit like you get all pissy-texting shit at me when I'm trying to put myself back in gear." He sighs

Comically he states to no one in particular, "Imagine how much more we'd actually get done if we weren't such obstinate fucks man. Sure it'll be exhausting but we'll be tired and go get ice cream together... maybe honey sauce... waffle bowl..." He whimpers God I'm so damn hungry.

Itzhak squints into the water flick. "Yeah, well, I fucking love you too, asshole." He splashes Ignacio back, but the droplets veer away. Itzhak observes that, grunts. "I hate seeing you go through this." Then he snorts and rolls his eyes, when Ignacio talks about how much more they'd get done if they weren't so much themselves.

He looks up at the grapes. They're right there. Itzhak shuffles to his knees, and reaches over Ignacio's head. Don't mind his junk. He plucks a cluster off the grapevine, tugs a grape free. "Here. Open up." And unceremoniously shoves it into Ignacio's mouth.

These grapes aren't just grapes. They're the grapes the gods themselves grow. The taste of them is unspeakably luscious even to a non-starving mortal.

Ignacio puts up a hand at the veering water and then puts his hand down as it avoids him . His hand slashes down but not before Itzhak stands up to help him. "Yeah I- Ahhhhh thanks." Yup looking down at shins but the hand goes back up. "Careful where you're swinging." The efforts though pay off. As grapes find his face there is a whimper, and tears on his face. There is little in the world that causes more strife than not being able to do things on his own. More echoes of independence lost and starving sated. Hands come up to his mouth to prevent it from trying to escape. His legs pull up as he eats. Shoulders slump and he murmurs, "You're not wasted wine, you are perfect." yeah he's talking to the grapes.

Itzhak keeps feeding Ignacio the grapes. Ignacio's tears he ignores as just something that's happening. Itzhak's done a lot of crying himself lately. He gets it. Iggy's been through a lot, and maybe sometimes having your cranky best friend hand-feed you the grapes you're divinely prevented from reaching is a little overwhelming.

After that, he scoops water in a big rough hand to let Ignacio drink, too. The water is clean and cold, delicious, who needs wine when you've got water like this?

When Ignacio's done eating and drinking, he realizes he can just open the manacles. He's free.

HUMILITY BLOWS! But dammit to not be starving and to be able to move. Hands grab Itzhak's wrists so he can actually just partake of slaking the dehydration. In no danger of being bludgeoned he pulls himself slowly to a stand. He is just... soggy. A wet hand reaches up to slap-pat the side of Itzhak's head with a cackle of triumph, "Haaaa hwe got this! so um... the bolder doe it really need to move to get us out of here or can we just call Lyfticlese or Uberyssus to like... give us a ride out of here? I mean I'm slow but I'll help you get your rocks up." He pauses and rolls his eyes skyward. It's too late. The words are there. He murmurs in Spanish though it's dream so Itzhak can understand clearly, 'How do I get myself into these situations, mama?'

Itzhak grabs Ignacio's wet wrist and wet face, mashing their foreheads together, laughing and maybe a little watering from the eyes himself. "Naishka, ya yutz." He kisses him sloppily on the cheek, overbearing-auntie style. "Don't matter if we're slow. We got all eternity. Might not be quite enough time for you to tell me everything you got to say, though, so you better start talking."

He lets him go, glares at the boulder. "Two against one now, how you like them apples?" And sets his shoulder against it to push.

When Ignacio joins in, and the two of them push in tandem, the Dream fades away.

Start talking? That he can do! But he's hungry so this plan? Oh it's a food plan and he walks with his friend, heedless of his stark condition to tell him all a bout it running his mouth and his half of the bolder up the stupid hill.

He doesn't wake up. He's too tired and his fever too high but he might have turned to the resident of Mallard House checking in on him murmuring something about fruit pies and asking them what the opposite of mini-golf is. Is that mega golf? Turning back over and hugging his tiny trash can he yawns and fades in and out.

Tomorrow he'll find he managed to text Itzhak a simple line: *Next tim we youse a big club 2 get it N the hole. <3
Oh fever drunk texting how we love thee.