the best medicine (closed)

[blap]

Who: Rhys and "Jack"
Where: An unnecessarily posh room in a Leithian hospital
When: W4D1(ish)
Summary: Tim's a really nice guy and is here to visit Rhys out of the kindness of his heaNo just kidding he's doing it for Jack.
Restrictions/Warnings: idk but Rhys sucks. Tim sucks. Tim is pretending to be Jack who sucks.

[ It blows him away every time: Leith is so bright, so clean. He can even taste it in the air. Even in a plague-ridden hospital, of all places, and at this point Tim decides he should stop breathing so deeply.

Actually reaching Rhys Kendry turned out to be laughably simple once Angel got done working her magic—which wouldn't have been possible, of course, without Rhys's inadvertent cooperation. The poor, dumb douche. Tim spent the whole commute grumbling inwardly about his task, memory soured by their previous (and only) encounter.

But now that he's here, door gliding open in silence, pesky compassion wins him over just a little bit. Rhys looks like hell. ]

Knock knock, kiddo.

Comments

[rhygret]

[ Yeah this poor, dumb douche is actually not doing all that great and he'd appreciate some sympathy here for his suffering. As well as a visitor who isn't Handsome goddamn Jack because he's been hallucinating his melting, talking posters down for an hour. They started out harmless, just resting on what seemed like every surface possible. Then they'd started talking about his 'exploits', then talking to him, and the cherry on top of it all had been their melting and falling from the ceiling.

Does Tim have any idea how disorienting it is to see hallucinations through one eye and reality through another? Because it's awful and paranoia-inducing to the point where Rhys has left his cybernetic eye on now in constant scanning mode, the circuitry lit up brightly as he pulls his hands away from his face.

He's sitting up in bed but looks like he could collapse at any moment. He pale but flushed with fever, eyes sunken from fatigue, and most tellingly his perfectly coiffed and gelled hair now just flops every which way as his gaze snaps up to Tim--and he groans in misery. ]

Noooohohohooo.... Not you, anyone but you.

[ He's had enough of you!! ]

[blap]

[ wow fucin rude

Not that he can entirely blame Rhys. Tim knows better than most that Jack is a... handful even when you're not deathly ill, but there's a job to be done and Tim's not getting paid to poke his head in and then leave Rhys in relative peace. ]

Ouch. Cupcake! Is that any way to greet your best pal? By which I mean me? [ :| ] Jack? I mean, heh, duh, of course it's me, who else would it be? Besides me...

[ Oh man okay full disclosure Tim really doesn't like the social missions. Can't he just like, zap a guy with a laser and call it a day?

Ugh, this poor guy. Like yeah, he knows he's a douche and all, but having Jack's full attention on you, especially when he wants something, is. It really is a lot.

Tim heaves a sigh that he saves at the last minute by exaggerating it to the point of arrogance as he takes a seat at Rhys's bedside. ]

Look, Rhysie, I get it. Better than you'll ever know, actually. But what kind of guy would I be if I came all the way to Leith and didn't even pop in to say hi, how ya doin'?

So... hi! How ya doin'? [ Without waiting. ] Cuz you look like hot buttered crap, buuuut I mean, looks aren't everything.

[rhygret]

[ Well, at least it's not the "I conquered and tamed Pandora, opened a Vault, and then became a sex god wanna check out my office it'll give you a major stiffy" spiel he's been getting from the half-melted posters littered about the floor and walls now. Most of his hallucinations have fallen from the ceiling so at least that's mostly clear now, but that really doesn't help him when a life-sized version is apparently here to harass him even more insistently.

The worst part is this one even shows up in his cybernetic eye, which means...

Wait. ]

Are you...real? Like really here, right now? Because Iyeee...have been seeing lots. Of you. [ Someone end his misery. ] --People, that is. All day, and not a lot of them have been real s-so I'm just gonna...scan you. Yeah.

[ Just to make sure. Better safe than sorry right? Don't mind this suddenly-glowing blue eye of his Tim, you probably show up like regular Jack. ]

[blap]

[ Tim leans heavily against the back of his chair as though nonchalance might be able to spoof the scan. Forgot about that thing. s w e a t s. ]

Again with the eye! Just what kinda hardware are you packin' there, string bean?

[ Oh. Well, that's. Uncomfortable. Uh.

"Jack" coughs. ]

A-Anyway yeah look, I'm real, okay? Check it out.

[ A gentle poke to Rhys's temple, just to the side of his port. Probably gentler than Jack would've been, but the guy's hallucinating, for crying out loud. Tim's not a complete dick, he just plays one on TV. ]

Now what's your little doohickey say, huh? Is—is it pickin' up how totally awesome I am?

[rhygret]

[ Of course he goes for the temple port. It's not over sensitive or painful to the touch like every Rhack fic would have you believe, but the fact that it's what looks like Jack doing it...triggers something. For a brief moment the hospital room is gone, the white walls replaced with a blue so deep it almost looks black. Red lights flash and blare overhead, some sort of...warning? Quarantine? And he gets the sense that he's just made a terrible mistake.

Jack's beside him, only he's blue, telling him Don't do it princess-- There's a woman there too, but it's all flashes until the blue Jack reaches out just like Tim does now and touches his port--and suddenly it's like every synapse in his brain is firing at once. ]

Ghhrhgh-- [ Both his eye and the port flicker with the blue light of activation for a brief moment, but there's none of the actual discomfort from the...memory? Hallucination? Whatever that was, but Rhys quickly bats Tim's hand away (albeit weakly). ]

Don't...do that, alright? I'm fine, I'm...

[ ...Looking at an entirely different read-out from the one he originally took of Jack, actually? It's weird. But glitches out after a moment, and shows him the original.

Rhys swallows. ]

Okay, s-so...you're real. [ That comes out more awkward and weak than he'd intended. ] Why...a-are you here, exactly? I'm--sick, you know? You could catch this.