003 ★ this place is so cold and i just wanna come home

[comfortablyerect]

WHO: Tim Gutterson
WHERE: Canyon wall, the woods, House 52
WHEN: March 20th
OPEN TO: OTA
WARNINGS: Firefly stings, so accompanying paranoia and, in Tim's case, PTSD
STATUS: Open!

---

Canyon wall

Tim is not a mountain climber. Canyon climber?

Kentucky, the lands he's grown so used to, the place he undoubtedly calls home, is all rolling fields and farmland. They have their dips and their valleys and, in some places, climbing, rocking terrain, but nothing worthy of being called a mountain, and certainly nothing worth any sort of challenge. And Afghanistan had it's cliff sides, high places overlooking small villages, which is where Tim spent a bulk of his time at war, but that's not the same as a steep, vertical wall of hard rock.

Still. He's felt increasingly more trapped here as the days have ticked by, and he can only go so long without doing something about it. This, all in all, seems like a better option than trying to force his way back into the depths of the fountain. Always go up, forward, never back.

He's got no climbing gear to speak of, and this is probably an incredibly stupid attempt. But instead of approaching the wall directly, he chooses to give himself a leg up by scaling a nearby tree first, hoping to find better foot and hand holds higher up the wall. He begins shimmying up the tree, and has just grabbed onto the lowest viable branch when the first firefly comes around. He's seen them before now, of course, around the village and on his trek through the woods. It strikes him as odd, seeing as it's the middle of the day, and his experience with fireflies has always been at night, catching them in jars as a child.

This place is fucking weird. He hoists himself up onto the branch, and a few more fireflies come out, and then a handful more, and Tim's just beginning to think the word swarm when the first one stings him.

Fireflies don't sting, he thinks, just as a second one stings him, and then a whole bunch more come out of somewhere, nowhere, everywhere, and he literally bails out of the tree, landing and rolling like he's eighteen and in bootcamp again, as opposed to thirty and frequently waking up with a sore back. It's all muscle memory, though, and he sticks the landing wonderfully, knowing he's definitely going to feel it in his muscles the next morning.


House 52

It's nearly evening by the time Tim makes his way out of the woods, having to spend far too much time shaking off the fireflies and losing their trail before making it to the village. He feels warm all over, just a tiny bit dizzy, but he chalks it up to the physical exertion of sprinting through the woods to escape a swarm of fireflies.

This is not what he expected his life to be after the war but — here he is.

He moves through the village, the sun beginning to sink behind the trees, and the fireflies seem to be everywhere. More than usual? It seems like it. It seems like the blinking green insects are appearing more frequently, hovering particularly close to the fountain, their numbers actively growing with each step Tim takes. He has to be imagining it. There weren't this many a few days ago, and the weather hasn't changed enough to bring in more, he thinks. They certainly can't be growing in number that fast.

Something familiar has snaked into system, twisting around his very bones and taking root there. He recognizes it for what it is — paranoia, sharp and dark and and ever-growing, absolutely unshakable. This is how he was for months and months and months after coming back stateside. Feeling like the very walls in his home were watching him, feeling like every person who looked at him for a second too long was going to strike. Feeling trapped and suffocated with the ghosts of the lives he took infecting his dreams and his life and reminding him who he was, what he's done, every time he turned around.

This is just the beginning. He makes his way quickly through the village, avoiding the swarms of fireflies the best he can. But by the time he reaches his house, the fever has exhausted him, slowing him down enough that he sits on the porch steps, resting his head against the railing.

He's tired, but he can't close his eyes. Exhausted, but he won't sleep. Because his skin crawls like there's bugs beneath the surface, like his veins are full of gasoline and he's just lit a match. Because he's trapped here, and he'll never get out, and he's sure — so sure — that this is where he's going to die.


[ ooc: feel free to also find him in the woods, either before or after the firefly stings! ]

Comments

[thecatinahat]

"You're not cooking me any food," is Cougar's swift response, leaning over a little to pluck at one of the cabinets to peer inside, finding more of the same things that they have in their house, which is pretty much what he expected to find, so it's not very interesting, but what is interesting is the way that Tim's been acting.

He gives him a very long and pointed look when Tim isn't heading to the bedroom to rest. "You should get to bed," he warns, the unspoken 'before I put you there' lingering in his tone.

[comfortablyerect]

"Damn right I'm not," Tim mumbles, still working his way around the living room. He wishes there were more light, but he makes due with what little moonlight manages to peek through the windows. He could always build a fire in the fireplace, but he doesn't think he can sit still long enough for that. Instead, he peers behind the couch and the chairs, and beneath end tables and into closets. He hates that he doesn't have a weapon, but he can certainly work with his fists if needed.

Tim makes a scathing noise, giving Cougar a pointed withering look over his shoulder. "What are you, my mother? I'm fine."

He's not fine, but that's beside the point. He's busy.

[thecatinahat]

Cougar's still worried, of course, but he doesn't want to let it show. After all, he can't go getting a reputation for being overly worried enough to let it show on his face, because then people will know just how soft he can be, inside. He heads inside and follows, arching a brow to say that he might not be his mother, but that tone isn't appreciated. "You're not," is his blunt reply, shaking his head at Tim.

"For now, call me friend and mother, because I'm not leaving you," he says, knowing Jake will take care of things at home. "Not until you seem more lucid."

[comfortablyerect]

Cougar's become like a shadow, not letting Tim wander too far away unsupervised. It reminds him of when he'd had to shadow Raylan, how the man managed to give him the slip despite Tim's best efforts. Most of what Raylan did annoyed him, but that had actually angered him a bit. That was his job, and the other had bee bent on making it difficult.

Vaguely, he wonders if he could give Cougar the slip, too. Not that he has anywhere to go, really. No real purpose beyond checking his house for threats.

"I am perfectly fuckin' lucid," Tim states, while kneeling down to peer beneath the couch.

[thecatinahat]

"You attack everyone when you're perfectly fucking lucid," he mimics, but his accent wrecks some of the mimicry and Cougar ends up shooting Tim a look that says he doesn't believe him, at all, giving him an incredulous look at what Tim's doing. "Get up, you can't crawl under there," he says, not grabbing at Tim's shoulder, but he wants to.

He drops onto the couch to make it sink a little lower, giving Tim a pointed look. "I'm going to put my feet on your back, if you don't go to bed."

[comfortablyerect]

"Maybe," Tim says back, and he pointedly ignores every look Cougar sends his way. He's busy. He has to be certain that there's nobody else in the house before he can settle down. Not that he's going to be doing much settling tonight. Probably, he's going to sit with his back to a wall and a weapon of sorts in his hand, waiting for something to happen. It's a miracle this hasn't turned into a full blown PTSD episode for him. It could be much worse, really.

"I'm not tryin' to crawl anywhere." He sounds exasperated, looking up to where Cougar's dropped himself onto the couch. For a second, he swears there's something darker and more malicious looming in the other man's expression but he blinks once, twice, and it's gone. "You're lookin' to get yourself hit again, aren't you?"

[thecatinahat]

Cougar shrugs casually, like he's just hanging out with a friend and not worried about the man suddenly turning on him because he's going crazy, the way Cougar is when he wakes up from a bad dream. He knows very well the damage that can be done because he's done it, which means he ought to act more concerned, but that would require him to not be a smug asshole, sometimes.

He waits for him to get up, as patient as he can. "You know how I don't get hit and you start getting better? You go to bed," he says, a little sharper.

[comfortablyerect]

Tim climbs to his feet, but he doesn't head for the bedroom. He's busied himself with checking the kitchen now that Cougar isn't occupying it, looking inside cabinets and in the pantry. One hand clenches and unclenches at his side, an anxious movement born out of heightened paranoia and his lack of a firearm. He would feel much better, he thinks, if he just had a gun on him. Even one without any ammo. Just the weight and feel of it would bring him some measure of peace.

But not enough, probably.

"You can't make me go to bed," Tim says flatly. "I'm an adult."

[thecatinahat]

Cougar mutters 'a very stupid adult' in Spanish under his breath as he settles on the couch, leaning forward to press his elbows against his knees, giving the man a look that clearly says what he thinks about his behaviour right now. "So, what? You stay up until you pass out? Because you don't look good, not even for a handsome man," he informs him, gesturing to all the signs of what appear to be this paranoid, strange fever he's nursing.

"Go to bed," he says again, harder this time.

[comfortablyerect]

Tim catches the mutter, if only barely, and chooses to ignore it. Much like the way he ignores what the other man says next, even the handsome man part. Though, in the back of his mind, he hopes he remembers that part tomorrow morning, or whenever this feverish paranoia wears off. The very least he can do with it is tease Cougar with it later.

He pulls open the door to the ice box, peering inside at it's emptiness. Nobody in there either. Good. He turns back towards Cougar, giving the other man a flat look.

"If you want me to go to bed, you're gonna have to physically manhandle me there. And I'm not gonna promise I won't hit you again if you try."

[thecatinahat]

Cougar doesn't feel like being hit a third time, but his patience is starting to wear thin. The trouble is that he doesn't want to leave, because it would be a bad idea to leave a man like Tim to wander when he's paranoid like this. If he's not going to go to bed, the least Cougar can do is stand in the doorway and block his escape (though he hasn't exactly blocked off the windows), but he just stares right back, as if challenging him.

"Fine, keep looking all over. You missed a spot in the cupboard," he deadpans, as if something could fit in that small space.

[comfortablyerect]

Tim hesitates. Cougar's fucking with him, obviously. The cupboard is too small to fit a person, even if said person were a small child. Checking would be stupid, and a waste of time, and would probably just prove whatever point Cougar's trying to make. Unease creeps up his spine, curling around his neck and suffocating him. He can't leave it unchecked. It's stupid, it's so stupid, and yet he reaches for it anyway, and pulls the door open to peer inside.

It's empty, of course. And suddenly, he feels tired. The fever sweeps over him again, leaving him feeling weak and chilled. He sighs heavily, leaning back against the counter just to keep himself upright. Cougar's right — he needs to lay down. He hates that Cougar's right.

[thecatinahat]

Cougar just gives him a pointed look when he starts rummaging through the cupboards, his face filled with 'I told you so', not that he's not enjoying this privately, in the kind of way where he'll never tell Tim that, unless he ends up getting revenge at some point in the future. He's on his feet easily, offering an arm out to him to support him if he chooses to go do the smart thing and listen to Cougar's advice (finally).

"Come on," he says, voice low and rough. "Bed."

[comfortablyerect]

He hates everything about this. How weak his legs feel beneath him, how the shadows in the corners appear to be creeping out further, trying to curl around him. How Cougar's at this side nearly as soon as he sags against the counter, offering physical support like he's a fucking invalid. He supposes he is, but he certainly doesn't like being treated as such.

He's tempted to shove Cougar's arm away just on principle, but as he goes to do so, to room sweeps dizzingly around him at the movement, and he ends up using it as the support it's meant to be instead. Fuck.

"You comin' with me?" He asks, and he'd like to think that if he were a little more lucid, he wouldn't be flirting with the other man. But that's probably not the case.

[thecatinahat]

"Not unless my boyfriend suddenly decided he likes threesomes," is his reply, calm enough even though there's a hint of reprimand in his words, mainly because he doesn't think that he'd expected blatant flirting while under the influence of bugs, but here he is. That's not enough to drive him off, though, and he settles Tim into his bed, ending up staying after all, even if it's in the corner of the room instead, where he tips his hat just low enough to cover his face.

"Maybe when you wake, you will be better," he offers, even if his platitude is devoid of the hopeful optimistic tone it needs. He's not so good at that tone, unfortunately.

[comfortablyerect]

Tim laughs. It's hilarious and ironic and awful that the first and only person he hits on here is not only spoken for, but that he also does it while under the influence of some crazy firefly bites. At least it's easy to brush off this way, to sweep under the rug and pretend it was just some bullshit hallucination stuff. Even if it's not. Even if he'd admire Cougar's arms and shoulders and the lilt of his accent anyway.

He heaves a sigh as he all but falls into the uncomfortable bed, pulling the blankets around him, cold despite the heat of his fever. "You don't have to stay here," he mutters. "I'll be fine."

[thecatinahat]

"I'm not leaving," Cougar tells him, "so get used to me," he adds, because he's still convinced that Tim is going to sneak out in the middle of the night to go start looking under rocks for whatever mischievous gnomes or things he thinks might be doing this. On the one hand, it's frustrating, of course.

On the other, if Cougar got bit, he has a feeling there might have been some actual injuries, so it's a good thing that he hadn't been. "Rest, I have your six."

[comfortablyerect]

Tim doesn't even know if he could pull himself out of bed at this point, feeling a little too weak to do much more than throw an arm over his face. If he could, though — if he could muster up the strength, there's a high chance that he'd try and go off and do something. Everything in him is telling him to fight the fever, fight the weakness, fight whoever gets in his way. But his body won't listen, and so he lays there, breathing, trying to fight off sleep as long as possible.

"Thank you." It's mumbled, barely audible at all, but it's there. Even if he might not remember it in the morning.