sixthiterationlogs

Entry tags:

Bang Bang

WHO: Cougar Alvarez
WHERE: Near the Canyon
WHEN: July 11th - Later
OPEN TO: Jake Jensen
WARNINGS: n/a
STATUS: Closed

After establishing a place in a house (one that isn't as alone as he'd expect, thanks to Veronica), Cougar heads out again. There are things he needs to do to feel comfortable in his surroundings and one of them is a weapon. If he can't buy one, then he'll have to make one. He's able to find a few tools in the kitchen of the house. He just needs a knife to start, though an axe would do the job, too. Skirting the canyon walls, Cougar follows the river to look for downed tree branches that are dry, long enough to make the longbow he intends to equip himself with.

Not a rifle, but then, where would he get more ammunition?

He thinks he's alone until he starts to hit closer to town and footsteps send him running into the trees, gracefully ascending a low-hanging one with enough cover to hide in. Because, the thing is, after spending years in close quarters and on missions, you start to understand people's habits and sounds. That sound? Those breaths, those footsteps, they're familiar.

Cougar isn't sure he wants to let himself be hopeful.

The last time he allowed that, twenty-five children boarded a plane to the sound of his promises and then never got to see another day. They are with God now and Cougar is here, waiting until his time is up and he goes to the pit. Hope, hope is on his breath and he waits to see who comes past the path and whether he is actually that lucky or whether his mind is beginning to play tricks on him during the day, too.

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Cougar tips the hat down a little further, wishing the brim would cover him more, but it's the only thing he's got right now. "I climbed out, too," he says, of the fountain. Hope leaps in his chest that he muffles, thinking that maybe this means the rest of them will come soon. "No Clay? Pooch?"

Roque goes unsaid.

"Do you know? Did Max do this to us?" he growls.

He grimaces as he shakes his head, not wanting to snuff out that little spark of hope he can see glinting in Cougar's eye but equally unwilling to lie to him. "Just me, as far as I can tell," he says, shrugging.

He would love it if Clay or Pooch showed up. He'd even take Roque. Aisha. Just anyone else he recognized.

"You think?" He hadn't thought of that. His eyes narrow and his gaze drifts off to over Cougar's shoulder somewhere, the wheels turning in his mind as he thinks the possibility over. "It's possible I suppose, but then why did we show up a week apart? Do you think the others will be here next week? What purpose does it serve him to send us here? And what about all these civilians?" They're mostly hypothetical questions he's posing himself, as Cougar should be able to tell after all these years. "What's his end game?"

"Who knows who they are. Backgrounds." He hates having to be the one to talk. Jensen can usually figure him out and it's been weeks of strangers needing actual words. He forgets that he doesn't need them around Jensen. He gives Jake a raised brow that says they can't consider any civilians as without some connection until they know their backgrounds enough, shrugging because he knows it means a lack of trust.

Maybe this is all just to get them out of the way. They've seen his face, know his voice, and know he has plans. Maybe this is what millions of dollars can buy you, if you're that rich and evil.

Jake's eyebrows nearly shoot up to his hairline when Cougar actually responds to his muttering, shocked out of his groove by the unexpected sound of his teammate's voice.

"Dude." Not that he's complaining, mind. Cougar has a nice voice, even if his English is still halting.

Just how long has he been here, that he's started talking?

He scowls heavily at the reminder that he's talking more than he usually does. The English is difficult and he hates that people get too uncomfortable with long drawn-out silences that he's had to talk. He purses his lips tightly to show his discomfort, yanking the cap lower on his head and nodding for Jensen to follow him back into town.

Best to show him where all the lodgings are.

Jake can't help but bark out a soft laugh at Cougar's disgruntled expression, reaching out to clap him on the shoulder. "It's okay, buddy, you got me here now. You can go back to your strong and silent routine. I know how all the chicas like it."

He follows along without question when Cougar turns away and steps back towards the rest of the town.

"Hey, does this town have a name?"

He shakes his head, not having seen any signs or indications that anyone knows where they are, except that they're nowhere, and that nowhere now has a limited population of unfortunate losers -- two actual Losers, now. He gives a muffled snort at the idea that he's going to spend his time here picking up women, especially when he spends all his time looking for ways out.

And yet, things are looking up. After all, he can let someone else talk for him and someone else can take watch half the time. He can get some sleep, now, and maybe even find more food sources. Cougar points to the path they need to take. "Houses," he explains. "Lots." Enough that Jensen can pick the one he wants.

Look, it's not Jake's fault he assumes Cougar is going to want to hit on women here. He hits on women everywhere, seemingly effortlessly, attracting them like a flame attracts desperate moths looking for their own personal Mexican moon.

Cougar getting tail is a constant in whatever ass-end backwards town they find themselves in, he's just going off of past experience.

Jake looks around curiously, far more at ease now that he has Cougar pacing silently at his side, an almost child-like wonder brightening his face as they approach the small bungalows that line the streets. "Hey, these houses are kind of cute in a small-town suburban way. Anyone living in them? Ooh, do you have one of your own?"

He gives Jensen a look that of course he has a house, of course he has shelter. He might be here against his will, but there are plenty of vacant houses. When he comes on his, he gives a nod towards it with his chin, seeing as it's his. He then points to the empty one beside it, clapping Jensen on the back to tell him that he can move in right next door to him.

It will be good to have Jensen so near to him, again.

"It's cute!" He gestures at the little green house with its thick white columns supporting the porch.

When Cougar gestures at the house next door, Jake hesitates for a second, but then ploughs ahead. The house is nice and all, but he doesn't want to go explore that one, he wants to see Cougar's. "Can I see yours?"

Cougar nods his assent, kicking the dirt off his boots as he ascends the few stairs of the porch to head inside, peering around to see if Veronica is still staying with him. He had assented when she'd asked, but he wonders how long before his night terrors and the screams will dive her away. Cougar gestures to the upstairs, giving Jake permission to look around while he settles his things in.

Jake mimics Cougar when it comes to kicking the mud off his shoes, then actually goes as far as to take them off. It's no fun walking around in wet shoes to begin with, but in a man's home?

On second thought, he takes his socks off, too. That way he won't be leaving wet footprints as he goes.

The whole house is furnished, but it's clearly old. Like, Downton Abbey old. He can spot some ancient light switches in the walls, but they don't look safe enough to test, so he leaves them be. There's a small, rinky-dink piano up against one wall, and plates hanging up like pictures, and all the furniture looks delicate and fragile. "...Wow."

He doesn't go upstairs, though, preferring to trail along behind Cougar instead.

Cougar heads to the kitchen to sort through the pieces of wood he had found, seeing which ones will be able to be used for a short bow, seeing as he couldn't find the pieces to make a long one. He doesn't see Veronica, which makes him frown, because he doesn't like to think what trouble she might be finding when everything is still so unmapped.

Glancing over his shoulder, he raises his brow at Jensen's remark, giving him a look that says he can have all this too, next door.

Jake busies himself peering at everything in the kitchen, from all the old-fashioned cooking implements to the crockery to the stove. He whistles, impressed despite himself, at the sheer size of the thing, and turns to gesture at it with his thumb.

Cougar doesn't seem too impressed, instead apparently giving him a look that says duh, they all look like this, even yours. Jake can't lie and say he's not curious about how next door looks, but he's honestly not that bothered with going and checking it out.

"So gimme all the gossip, bro. Who's here? Have you made any friends? Who should I avoid?"

Such a question requires plenty of talking and Jensen knows how he feels about that. He arches his brow as if to say how much he isn't going to give answers, but he thinks he owes him at least a little discussion, given his sudden arrival and how confused he probably is. "Girl, living with me. Veronica," he says. "Teenager."

Jake plops down into one of the chairs in the kitchen, staring dumbly at Cougar when he lets him know that there's a teenager living with him.

"Okay, two things. There're teenagers here? Why?" Not that he thinks Cougar will really have an answer to that, but he likes to ask questions out loud. "Also, you have a teenager living with you? You won't even let me see your apartment! This is unfair, bro."

He shrugs, but what the shrug is in reference to is up to Jensen to decide. Whether it's about him letting Jensen (or any of the team) see his apartment or the teenager part -- when really, it's just a cover-all shrug for both. "Fair," is all he says with a thinly hidden smirk, because driving Jensen to eleven is one of his favourite pastimes.

Maybe he's just curious how long it will take for Jensen to decide if a teenager gets to stay, then why not him as well?

"And people accuse me of taking in strays," he mutters, pouting about Cougar choosing some teenage girl over him, even though he knows that's illogical, as he wasn't here when Cougar arrived and maybe she needed lots of help? Maybe she was hurt. Cougar's the field medic out of all of them, maybe he felt like he needed to look after her because she was injured and pathetic and sad and his dormant paternal urges had come rising up to the fore and he'd made a snap decision without thinking about it.

That's why Cougar needs him around. Jake makes the snap decisions without thinking about it, and Cougar can shake his head at him and tell him he's being an idiot just by raising his eyebrows.

"Well. If you let some teenage runaway come live with you, then I think I qualify as well. I'm a teenage runaway too, you know."

"Demasiadas arrugas que ser joven," Cougar mutters with a slightly taunting lift of his brow, gesturing with his fingers to the lines on Jensen's forehead that anyone could see without any binocs at all. He thinks about Jensen's request and shrugs, like he's had time to think it over and now he's accepting (as if he hadn't already decided Jensen is living with him the minute he'd locked eyes on him; making Jensen's life easy isn't half as fun).

"Will be noisy, at night," he says, quieter, aware of what happens with both of them, after Bolivia.

"You leave my wrinkles out of this!" he exclaims, clapping a hand over his forehead and glaring. "They make me look distinguished."

Cougar's a dick. But he's his dick. Wait, that...is not the point. "Fine. I was a teenage runaway. I was sixteen when I enlisted, you know. I had to lie on my form and forge Julie's signature to do it, but I did. I'm pretty sure that qualifies me for teenage runaway status. So there." He sticks out his tongue for emphasis, because he's secretly five years old.

He's the one who's shrugging now, something softer and sad settling over his face at the change in Cougar's tone. "What's new?" Nightmares are something Jake is familiar with. "That's more a concern for your wayward charge, you know."

Cougar tips his head back and forth to say that no, Jensen's wrinkles make him look old. Then again, it's not like he has more than one. He raises his brow when Jensen keeps talking, the runaway story something he's heard before, but one that he never likes to hear. "She doesn't know," he says darkly. "Nights have been okay, so far." That, or he's been quiet enough by using a pillow to muffle the worst of it that Veronica hasn't figured it out.

He gestures for Jensen to follow him. "Come. See your room."

He whistles lowly under his breath when Cougar tells him that this Veronica girl doesn't know he has night terrors, looking skeptical. "Well, she's gonna know about them real fast," he points out, his eyebrows lifting. "Have you at least warned her about them?"

A few days of quiet nightmares or managing to sleep lightly enough not to have them isn't going last for much longer, and if this girl is going to live with them, she's going to have to know what she's getting into.

"Oh yeah? I get my own room? Sweet!"

He shakes his head, because he doesn't like to talk about things in the first place and telling a near-stranger that he has night terrors that send him screaming isn't something he wants to do. "She will figure it out," he says darkly, watching Jensen explore the upstairs.

"Here," he says, for the bedroom closest to Cougar's. "Use this."

"Bro." He shakes his head too, despairing. Does nobody in their unit know how to communicate but him? Well, yes. That's why he's so vital. Cougar is damn lucky Jake is around to translate for him. "If you don't tell her, I will."

The room is small, and sparsely furnished. There's a bed against one wall, a small desk up against the window, and a small dresser up against the other wall. One door leads into what he assumes is a closet, but he ignores it for now. It's plain, and old-fashioned, but he's had to bunk down in a leaky shack in the jungle for weeks at a time, so honestly, it might as well have been a palace. "S'cute!"

Cougar's aggravated face is a message that Jensen can do all the telling he likes, but the day that Cougar willingly talks about that is the day that the sky falls down. He leans his weight against the wall behind him as Jensen inspects it. Compared to what they're used to living in, it's practically a palace and it might be helping in keeping the night terrors at bay.

"I'm just there," he says, to the door and jutting his thumb to the right. "In the room with the fireplace."

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