2020-11-12 - Sharing Is Caring

Sparrow's social life isn't what it once was. There have been fewer and fewer nights at the local bars and clubs than there had been, but it's easy enough to justify that with school starting up, with this semester being more challenging than the last, when anyone wonders. Surely, it has nothing to do with the fact that she's got no time and energy left to deal with other people's veil-skewed perception of her. Just too much schoolwork. And, well, a hot boyfriend she can stay in with most nights. Except Halloween. How could these two not go out on Halloween. Not that the party she dragged him to was all that great, but it was away from Gray Harbor and full of free booze. And there was a sorta rush to trying to get their costumes back on straight when they disappeared for a bit there in the middle.

All of which is to say that it's not at all unusual for Sparrow to find herself at the Offshore Account on one of Rhys' nights off with a bag of thai food in hand. What might be out of the ordinary is the volume of food she's brought over, but maybe she's planning on staying for a couple of days, banking on leftovers. Or maybe she's stoned. It may well be both. Her eyes give her away, dilated and slightly bloodshot, though the underlying dopiness of her smile might be a tell, too. A nice buzz for a Netflix and chill kinda night. Except that maybe that's not quite the kind of night this is shaping up to be, given that she murmurs a, "We need to talk," between greeting kisses, the weight of those words potentially distracting from all the affection.

Alas, this year there's no comic store for them to attempt to come up with a pair of costumes to sweep all three of last year's categories in one go, but a passable party's not a bad option. Certainly they had to go do something for Halloween, indeed, and if it wasn't an amazing time, it was at least a good one. If they can't have fun at a party full of free booze and the occasional private nook, they might as well pack it in, right?

If the idea is to stay for a couple of days, that's probably fine with Rhys. Chances are there's at least a change of clothes along with the toothbrush in there somewhere for just such an occasion. And if she's stoned... well, did she bring enough for the whole class? He probably has something somewhere if she didn't, but one way or another there's likely some available source of chill. And certainly of Netflix. He's entirely on board with that being the kind of night it's shaping up to be, so it is a bit of a warning flag when those words show up. Rather than acknowledge it, he murmurs back, "We always talk. People can't shut us up," before the following kiss.

Sparrow did bring enough for everybody. It just wouldn't be fair otherwise, and she does care about fairness. Nevermind that being stoned right now isn't entirely her fault. She can still share. Her pot, yes, and all of this thai food. But after a little bit of kissing, please? With a happy hum, she murmurs, "I can shut you up," before going back in for more. As if she's lost track of whatever it was she thought they needed to talk about. At least for a little while, for the span of a good half-a-minute of making out. Which is about how long it takes for the idea to float back into circulation. It's an important one, persistent, unwilling to fuck off for too long, even when good make-outs are at stake. "Right." Focus, Phil! You can do it. Her face scrunches as she puts a bit of safety distance between herself and Rhys, knowing full damned well that she's currently of a very handsy mindset that's due to lead them astray in short order if she doesn't. How long's it been since she's seen him? A day? Two!? She's starving!

And focused. On something other than his lips. Like that wall over there. Right. "So, uhm. I talked with Mac, and. Evidently?" Okay. It's easier to focus on the story now that she's started it, brown-eyed attention recentering on Rhys, brows arched high and drawn in with a degree of concern. "Team Douchebag has been collecting evidence on you, Joey and Felix. Pretty condemning evidence. That nobody knows that Mac has, and. She's gonna need to report her progress to somebody soon." Total buzzkill. "She doesn't know what to do. I thought maybe you might."

Kissing first, yes. Rhys gives a brief, wicked grin at her assertion, retorting "Prove it," and then allowing her to do so by way of more kissing. He doesn't need to be affected by the haze that's caught the sparklier portion of town for making out a while to seem like a stellar idea, nor to get a bit handsy himself, and he gives her a mock pout when she pulls away.

There's something a little sharper in his eyes, though; he hasn't forgotten that always-ominous phrasing, and he watches attentively as she forces that focus. It seems unlikely to be the traditional relationshippy issue, given the greeting, but there are other things... And that is decidedly one of them. His brows lift at the mention of 'condemning evidence', and he reaches out for her hand -- the one not full of bags -- to draw her further into the boat, toward the couch. This is a sitting down sort of discussion.

"How can she be sure they didn't fake it?" he asks as he settles, "What kind of thing is it claiming? And where was it found?" First things first.

Sparrow's order of operations is all mucked up today, by normal functioning human standards. It's a challenge to remember the basics like getting comfy and setting down dinner when her brain's capable of holding only two priorities: kiss Rhys and talk. Really, those are pretty clearly the right priorities, but with a little help, she can manage the rest. Her hand squeezes his, thoughts threatening to trail off along a tactile tangent as they head toward the couch... until he follows up with questions. That helps. She sets the food down before she joins him, popping her sneakers off so that she can pull her feet up onto the cushions, legs folded as she turns toward him. "She found it on that PS4 that got nearly fried in the blast. It's what she was able to salvage. Data pieced together. Evidently, a lot of it. You tied to financial records. Joey to, uh. I mean. She didn't outright say it, but. I'm guessing murder. Multiple. Whatever she's got on Felix is worse." With a shrug of her shoulders, she adds, "You have to ask her how she's sure it's not fake, but I'mma guess quantity. Quality. Verifiable data encryption or... something?" Look, she's a chem nerd, not a computer nerd. "I don't wanna see you or Joey get hurt by this, Rhys. I don't think she does either."

Rhys settles in next to her as she curls her legs up, and slides an arm around her shoulders. This is all very normal. One might kind of hope for him to be shocked by the answer of what's in there, but there's no big reaction, just a lift of the brows. Then a thoughtful look, as though he's turning this over in his head.

"You don't think she does, or you're sure she doesn't?" It's an important distinction, or it may be. "'cause the simplest way to handle the progress report situation is probably, the thing was just too fried to salvage any data. It's a shame they managed to destroy it. We'll just never know what they were trying to do." He's still thinking about all this, though, and there might be a sense of something niggling at him he hasn't quite pinned down yet. Maybe a couple things. Regardless, the arm around her gives a gentle squeeze, hand at her shoulder. "Thanks for letting me know, cariad. I'd rather not see us get hurt by it either, if we've got a choice." Almost a joke! Almost.

Sparrow lifts a hand as she tilts in toward Rhys enough to plop her head heavily on his shoulder. And then pivot a bit to really rest against him, stretch out a little. Like the sitting up normally was just a ploy to get them right here. As if she needed a ploy for that. Her hand wobbles in answer to his question, which surely isn't a good sign. "Pretty sure she wants you to stay clean, but." She tilts a look up at him, her serious expression rendered somewhat less so for the upside down perspective. "Think whatever she found on Joey's got her a bit uncertain, though. I mean. I vouched for him. Which I think helps? But Felix..?" Her head turns so she can look at him more directly. "I get the feeling she's not gonna be able to let that one go." There's a lot more worry tangled up behind that, but it's taking its time coming out, her fear more easily expressed in the way she reaches up to squeeze his hand, to hold it.

No, it's not a good sign. "Well, she's gonna have to figure out how," Rhys says a bit more flatly than usual, and sighs. The hand gets a squeeze back, and he leans into her a little more.

"There's an old joke that if you're gonna have crime, it should at least be organized. Thing is, it's not entirely wrong. A city's a kind of ecosystem. And if you take out the apex predators, what you end up with isn't safety, it's proliferation of the smaller ones, and a spot for something else that eats those to move in. You get a power vacuum. And like they say, nature abhors a vacuum."

He shifts position a little, just enough that he can look more directly at her. It's a more serious expression than usual. "You know that's what they're trying to do with this, right? The assholes who burnt down her shop, Bax's trailer, started shootouts in parking garages? They want to take out the native fauna. Step into the space. And what was there already may not be pretty, but it was balanced. Gray Harbor's just a profit opportunity to them. It's home to us."

A tiny pause, focus shifting into the middle distance somewhere past her for a beat. "...I have a thought on what we could try to do here. But it needs her on board."

"I know," is spoken with the soft sincerity of someone who really does genuinely share that belief. Sparrow's lived here her whole life and, while things might be weird, they haven't been this overtly violence, serial killers aside, in recent memory. People she cares about are getting hurt. And she knows who's to blame. Vaguely. Those assholes. "And I mean, they did burn down her shop, so. It's not like she doesn't agree about how bad they are. It's just... yeah. The power vacuum thing." There might've been a few thoughts between points A and B that didn't get voiced, but she doesn't seem to notice. While Rhys contemplates that empty point, she closes in, disrupting his line of sight so that she can steal a quick kiss. "Whatcha thinking?"

Rhys blinks with mild surprise when his unfocused gaze suddenly has something a lot closer to focus on, but the kiss is easily stolen and then swiftly stolen back. It does help that she understands; there's a hint of tension that releases when she makes that fairly clear. He could probably stand to be affected by the glimmer-weed-cloud as far as that goes, but on the other had, it might make considering their options somewhat trickier. At least the options that don't involve getting back to making out, and possibly pizza.

"The simplest thing should still be just saying it didn't work, unless there's factors I don't know in here," he says, "but alternatively, and keeping in mind I haven't had time to think it all through... at the risk of using up my whole cliche ration for the day in under five minutes, turnabout is fair play." A flicker of the grin for the first time, brief but there.

"The way they've acted with this machine, it's been more as though they wanted to hide information than obtain it. Trying to get hold of it, trying to destroy it when they couldn't. So what if the information she found in the drive was similar, but about them? It'd need research. It'd need talents in hacking I definitely don't have. But I do have some names, and I might know where to start looking."

Sparrow can help with the weed, surely, if not precisely glamour sparkle smoke clouds. And maybe not pizza, but there is thai take-out getting cold right over there. Munchies haven't broken through into her two priority limit yet, snuggling and scheming still holding rank. For the moment. She nods some shallow agreement for Plan A; easy really does sound good right now. The comment which follows earns a snort of laughter, a lazy mirroring of his grin. Brows pitch upward as he begins to explain, a nod soon to follow. "I mean. I'm not gonna be much help there, but. I think you should talk with Mac. I think she likes you. And she knows I trust you, so." It's a solid foundation for figuring this out. "I just..." She straightens a little, mimicking Rhys' earlier toward, a bit more direct attention paid to him. "I dunno how it happened, that I ended up with so many of you shady fucks in my life, but. I don't want to lose any of you. Not Joey. Not Cris. And definitely, definitely not you. You... I dunno. You just make everything better. Things I already like are better with you. Bad days are better with you. Good days. In betweens. Everything. So. If there's anything I can do?"

"The baddies are always more interesting," Rhys replies to her dunno-how, enough amusement in it to suggest it's unlikely he actually thinks of himself as one, "...And sexier." Brow-waggle. The grin that escapes with it softens into a different kind of smile, then, and he leans over to kiss her forehead. "Everything's better with you, too," he says, quieter. "And if there's things you can do aside from just being you and making the world generally more awesome? Yeah, I'll say. Thanks." And, in fact, he seems to think about it for a moment. "Talking with Mac about it might be easier with you there; I might end up asking you to come along. But either way, yeah, I better have a talk with her." A little knowledge is a dangerous thing. For everyone involved.

Sparrow would surely be the first to protest any suggestion that Rhys is a bad guy... in almost any other situation but this one. When it's coming from his lips, accompanied by that high-cheese brow-waggle? Hard not to acknowledge the inherent sexiness of his high-risk career choices, her grin wide and greedy. Were her reflexes not dulled by her glimmer-cloud high, she might have even managed to redirect that kiss, to meet her lips, but the slight lift of her head only alters the target by an inch, lips connecting closer to the bridge of her nose, a slightly awkward spot that earns a warm laugh. Her, "Yeah," is meant to reciprocate the sentiment rather than express ego, this time, but who knows how that lands. Straightening a little, her eyes open a teensy bit wider, she looks ready... ish to do her part, to brighten this corner of the world.

To that end, realization crosses her expression, and she starts patting at her hips. No. Huh. She leans over to the bag of food, peeking in there, possibly not even hearing Rhys anymore. Out comes a couple containers of thai food... and then a little mini MLP lunchbox. Just what she was looking for! Bright smile returned to Rhys, eyebrows high, she asks, "Hm?" as she shoves the container over at him, its contents a nice strain of lemon haze and her too-pink pipe that sees very infrequent use, given her penchant for hallucinogens. She came prepared. Always. "Oh, uhm. Yeah, of course. Yeah. Tomorrow?"

Whether Rhys takes that 'yeah' as intended or as a flare of ego, it makes the smile spread toward the grin again. Hey, if he didn't enjoy those tendencies in her, they'd never have made it this far, right? For a moment he's probably considering making up for that only-partial-redirection himself, but the look of realization pushes him toward curiosity instead. He watches all this patting without interruption for a few moments, although he does reach out and 'help' where she left off in general pockety and pocket-adjacent areas once she leans to check in the food bag instead.

What she comes up with can't be a total surprise, given a) her current apparent state and b) he knows her, but it still makes him laugh once as he reaches to accept it. "You weren't ever a Girl Scout, right? You would've been a good one," he teases, "There's gotta be some kinda relevant badge here, too. Applied Botany. Specialty Geology. Alternative Baking. Whatever. It'd be amazing for cookie sales. Kinda want some Thin Mints right now and I'm still a hundred percent sober."

It's a good time to lean in and get back to kissing for a few seconds, and when he straightens up again, he agrees, "Yeah. Tomorrow." A night to sleep on the situation's probably a good idea. Maybe checking in with Joey, too. Smoking this might be less of one, admittedly, but he's got himself a Sparrow and all that Thai food getting cold. All these things definitely need dealing with, and they will be. Soon. But first things first.

Sparrow miiiight take a little longer than is strictly necessary searching for that mini lunchbox when Rhys opts to help with the search, and she might, too, lean forward a little bit further in doing so to give his hands more access to all the pockets, especially those in the rear. Ya know, to help him be helpful. Her smile is extra-dopey when she settles back in, so very pleased with herself, not only for what she found and the delight with which it's received, but for all the fondling. Life's good. "I was," she confirms. "For a little while. Not the first Sharing Is Caring badge I've earned." Is that even a badge? Who knows. She says it with confidence. That might be her buzz. Her eyes go wide, all serious, as she begins, "Dude," in answer to his craving for Thin Mints... but then he's leaning in, and cookies just... don't matter as much anymore.

She looks a little blissfully dazed when he draws back, as she tilts in to follow, to tempt, his words breaking the spell. "Tomorrow," as if agreeing to her proposal, the fact that it was hers already forgotten. For now? Bad ideas and thai food seem the very best idea out there. Some movies and making out and sleeping in. What more could a girl possibly want?