LIGHTNING AND THE THUNDER

Kendall made an incredulous little noise in the back of her throat.  “Should I be concerned about these delusions of yours, or have you just already replenished your stash of tiny alcohols?”

“That noise did you no favors, by the way. Hey, I’m not delusional, also shh you’re not supposed to know about the tiny alcohol stash, remember? Also in this business there is nothing wrong with keeping liquid courage in a drawer.” She grinned, patting Kendall’s shoulder. “You. Are. Adorable. Just accept it.” 

“Give me twenty minutes,” Mac said, breezing into Marissa’s room and collapsing at the foot of her bed. “Jack wore me out.” Acrobatic sex notwithstanding, she’d forgotten how exhausting it was to churn through paperwork; and nothing sapped her energy quite like mind-numbing boredom. Rolling over onto her stomach, she reached out to pull open the bottom drawer of her friend’s desk in search of her alleged booze. “What the fuck’s got your panties in a bunch?” she asked, eyes widening with glee as she snatched up a bottle of rum.

“Fuck Jack, and fuck the wait too. You’re getting soft.” She knew in a sense, it could rile Mac up. Not that Marissa had ever considered sex with Mac....alright that was a lie. She’d considered it since the great Powerpoint presentation of 2017 when questionable slides were involved, concurrently. She’d never admit to it, though. Hell, she’d still be fighting the urge but if she had to look at the security feeds to make sure the cameras were in working order and ping which ones weren’t, or look at another camera’s circuit board tonight she was going to flip a table. Glancing over, she grabbed the bottle. “Hey. Mine.” she said, before giving her friend a look. “Why the hell are you questioning free sex. Hands outta my booze drawer.” 

“Ah dammit.” 

“Fuck Jack. I’m pretty sure his abs are nice. Marry Bailey and protect him from this cruel world. 

And kill Ash because why the fuck not?” 

“I’m sorry; that’s just how justice works-”

“what did you just call me?”

“I’m no expert in justice but I’m pretty sure it’s not.” 

“...I’ll give into her overwhelming fantasies and the Powerpoint of 2017 and fuck Mac. I’ll marry the absolutely adorable little thing that is Kendall and...Bailey just seems too pure and sweet for this world I feel like it’d be a mercy killing.” 

“Well...I’d said before I’d fuck Wyatt, but I’d also marry Wyatt so there’s that. Fuck Rory, even if he’s like a brother and I’m sure I’ve already almost killed Leland before so why not just put the poor guy out of his misery already?” 

“Oh god.”

“Well...fuck Wyatt. You don’t get a reason as to why. Marry Rory, because he’s the sweetest and this way he gets all the boxes and crayons he can write insulting things to other people with...and that leaves killing Mac.

Kendall’s grin widened at Marissa’s expression, the other’s clear chagrin only adding to her amusement.  “Yeah, sounds like Leland.”  At the accusation though, she pressed a hand to her chest in mock offense.  “Me?  Spying?  No, I’m just…attentive.”  She really hadn’t been spying, but it was always fun to play up her own troublesome nature.  “For real though, it was actually the closed door that caught my attention.  I was walking by and spotted that and-” then waited ten minutes to see if a reason for the sudden privacy would be forthcoming.  “-He walked out before I moved on.”

“Yes you, spying.” Marissa chuckled. “Alright we’ll go with attentive. Still how long did you stand outside the door to see what was happening before you moved onto whatever you did next?” There was a smirk on her face though, signaling she meant no harm, didn’t mind the invasion. She never did, when it came to some of the detainees for some reason. Not all, but a select few, Kendall being one of them. “Honestly I’m surprised he’s actually still walking around alive. But if he drops dead remember you know nothing, you saw nothing, nothing happened.” 

Kendall chuckled.  “I’ll give you that.”  Remembering how Alaska’s autumn chill had coated where the fishnet tights left her legs exposed on her walk over, she could see the sense in wearing something warm and comfy.  Though on the other hand, what place did sense have in a halloween costume.

“Not what I came over her to bother you about, though.” With a wicked grin, she changed topics.  “Did you actually slice Leland open the other day?  Like, right there on the desk?”  Her tone was somewhere half way between disbelief and admiration.  “That’s pretty fucking metal.”

“And what did you come to bother me about?” She asked before the topic dropped. Oh God, why did she have to keep being reminded of Leland? Even if the guy was still standing. Taking a long hard sip of her drink, Marissa nodded. “Yeah.” she admitted. “I mean he didn’t give me much of a choice. I told him I could do it and next thing I know he’s sitting on the desk with his shirt off like ‘cool let’s do it right now’. Before I know it there’s a flashlight between my teeth and a knife in my hand cutting into his chest. Wait a minute, did you spy on that? Because I could’ve sworn I shut the door.” 

Mac’s eyes widened with interest at Marissa’s admission, starting to think that she needed to visit her friend in the geek department more often. “You got any Johnny Walker in your illicit desk drawer?” she asked as she reached for the other’s cup. Her grin widened with amusement as she gave her friend a sympathetic slap on the back, lifting the drink to take a deep swig before handing it back. “Dunno what it is, but it’ll put hair on your chest,” she teased.

Expression souring at the mention of the US Marshals, she turned away to snag a drink from one of the tables for herself. “I’m on some bullshit employee improvement plan. Whatever the fuck that is.” She made an impatient gesture, clearly frustrated. “I get results. I don’t know why they’re complaining.”

Her mind flashed back to when she had to perform amateur surgery on Leland, how quickly the small stash of Johnny Walker disappeared after she made sure he wasn’t going to drop dead on her and she sent him on his way. “Not anymore.” Oh, how quickly that stash had disappeared once she’d locked the office door and threw all the evidence in an old small box, shoving it into a drawer. 

“Is the one at home too big?” Atreus asked, trying to imagine what kind of person would steal from someone just to regift it back to them. Then again, some of the people he’d met since arriving at Belmont made that not entirely unbelievable. 

His face broke into a grin, always a sucker for a compliment. “Chippendale.” He nodded towards where Bailey was across the room dressed as a giant chipmunk. “Which is what that geezer was supposed to be, too.” 

“This is going to make me sound like an absolute nerd, but which one? I’ve got three. One’s too small though.” It sounded worse coming out of her mouth. Well, there was a fact to prove to everyone what a nerd the facility electrician was. 

“Ah...I wondered where his costume idea came from.” She glanced in Bailey’s direction. “Though, I can see the mix-up. The real question is why the hell was a Chip costume in that damn closet” 

Tommie shrugged, “even you’d be surprised by how resourceful people tend to get in here.” Even without the looming celebration of Halloween she’d seen plenty of people go wild to create any kind of entertainment. Hell, even she had her own way of staving off maddening boredom by filling every possible moment with thinking about the story she’d write once she left. “Ah, I wouldn’t put it too high on your priority list. I doubt the intent behind building any of the entertaining facilities this place has was for us to be allowed to actually use them. I bet there’s a reason the wiring is fucked.”

“I’m never all that surprised. Everyone’s pretty resourceful. Though I thought that just extended with their need of getting things from me” Not with the payoffs she usually received. She stopped being surprised around her six month mark. After four years, she wasn’t even sure why she was surprised now. “Only reason I’d mark it high on priority was so you guys had another place to hide shit that they wouldn’t think of looking. Hell I might’ve even fucked up the wiring my first month here. There’s no telling whether the wiring was always fucked or if I probably did it at one point.”  She’d screwed so many things up, she should’ve started taking bets.