victory_road | [Closed] [Backdated]

Henry is fucking blitzed. He's gone. He has had too much of the Terrible Slop and now he is laying on the floor, on his back, with his Poke'gear resting on his face. He can hear his friends talking around him. He can hear music from somewhere else in the dorm.

And he is full of love for them.

But there is something missing, and perhaps, it is the tiniest pang of jealousy. It's a human thing to feel. And so, in a low husky voice like one might expect from a man who had been crawling through the desert for a year, Henry abruptly says,

"I haven't slept with anyone in ten years..."

Scar is returning from his second pee break of the night, courtesy of The Sauce. He looms over Henry. He wants to express some sort of solidarity for the man in his plight. He wants to help. Somewhere, the wires of this earnest wish split and tangle and cross until the final product that emerges from his looming, frowning face is:

"I am very good at that. Not sleeping with anyone."

Henry turns his head to the sound of his friend's voice. The Poke'Gear remains on his face. Henry croakes, "Scar..."

When Henry turns his beleaguered gaze upon Scar, his towering stature is haloed by the stark dorm room light overhead such that his face is nearly swallowed in shadow. It's almost enough that the damning smears of lipstick all over his mouth are drowned out, but. Not quite.

"Henry," the Angel Joker responds.

Edited 2024-08-15 04:33 (UTC)

He stares sightlessly, obscured by his Poke'Gear, and his face is ancient and pained. They are brothers in this moment. Henry does not see the lipstick, but he knows that it is there.

He begins to speak in his quiet, dry voice.

"The last time...was a girl I had gone on a couple of dates with... We met up at a sushi place. I took her back to my apartment and then...she never picked up the phone after that. Maybe it was the vibes...in the apartment. The man in the walls... And that was it....before I was plunged into the psycho sexual nightmare of the Otherworld. It was ten years ago. It was four months ago. I'm not the same person I was."

He takes a long breath and lets out a rattling sigh.

I am...so sick...to death. I need...to bone. Someone."

Scar doesn't understand two thirds of what Henry is talking about. Maybe three quarters, given a certain... term.

"Bone..."

God's vengeance made flesh mulls over the term. He passes his judgement:

"Crass."

Then, what he thinks passes for words of comfort:

"One cannot die of celibacy, torturous though it may be."

Henry is still for a moment. Then, he turns his face away from Scar and, with Herculean effort, rolls over so that he is face down. He then lets out a long, mournful sound into the carpet.

Scar stares as his disciple wallows in his logrolling misery.

He tries again.

"Love does not always conquer all, Henry."

In fact, it usually makes things! A whole lot worse! And Scar isn't considering boning in any context other than The Loving Kind. Because there is no other kind, as far as he is concerned. No kind that matters for anything, anyway. No kind that might ease Henry's suffering.

"But it can be fickle in its return."

Henry lays on the floor and he listens to this and something sparks in his chest. It's almost...anger? No. Not anger. Frustration? Maybe. He can't listen to this. He can't listen to this from the man who is fucking a woman named LUST.

"LeAve MeE alOne." Henry says into the carpet.

Scar fails to see his privilege in this predicament. The remnants of various claw marks and bullet holes scattered across his body are testament to just how many death-defying steps were taken in between "not fucking a woman named Lust" and "fucking a woman named Lust."

However, he can read when his advice is not wanted.

So, he nods.

And he settles down with his back against the base of the couch. His body feels heavy. Being upright is more trouble than it is worth.

Edited 2024-08-15 05:39 (UTC)

Henry is then alone in his damnation. And he just kind of lays there, face-down on his Poke'Gear. A thing he isn't aware of is that his face has managed to turn on the recording feature. So that whole conversation lives on his Poke'Gear forever now.

It all becomes too much. He's do drunk. He's so, so drunk. A high, thin whine escapes him.

Henry's woes have not gone unheard... even in the thick haze of BJ's Sinister Concoction, Heather feels a little guilty that Henry is now a perpetual fifth wheel in this house.

"Heyyyy... don't cry..."

She slides off the bed, awkwardly, and places a comforting hand on Henry's head.

"You'll meet somebody, you jus' gotta... gotta put yourself outthere..."

In her mind, she is caressing his hair with gentle yet emphatic emotion, pouring unspoken apologies for not thinking about his feelings this whole time into each tender stroke.

In reality she is awkwardly plapping her hand against his head like a toddler petting a dog for the first time.

FIVE BILLION BOYFRIENDS AND/OR GIRLFRIENDS, OK????

Envy crawls after Heather, motivated both by her moving and also by the extremely weird and alarming noise coming from the space between his friend's face and the floorboards. He oozes automatically into one of his Crouches, although at least his feet are flat on the ground for now.

"Yeah...you could try...Lust's place? Those guys like flirting a lot?"

"Heather...Envy..." Henry speaks into the carpet, into the microphone of his Poke'Gear. He is both calling to them and addressing them as though he didn't expect to see them.

He is feeling so many kind of ways. And now that things are coming out, it's like trying to patch a dam with scotch tape.

"Envyyyyy that's their joooooob," is followed by an involuntary hitch in his throat. "The last....last hooker that talked to me...got killed by dogs."

Lust's dancers are not hookers, but Drunk Henry doesn't care.

Scar doesn't say anything. He doesn't need to. The Glare that comes out when Henry says The H Word expresses more than words possibly could.

Welcome to the other side of 'fucking a woman named Lust.'

Carry on, everyone.

Envy squints.

He does not skip a beat about the killed by dogs he's heard enough about Silent Hill that it makes perfect sense that this would happen in front of Henry the poor wisdom receiving bastard.

"Whaaaat...no s'not. Their job is hot backup dancing 'n they just like flirting. They'd think you were cute."

He pauses, considers.

"Iffff you used better hair conditioner."

"Oh..." Henry's voice warbles a little. He sniffs. He doesn't know if he could keep up with a hot backup dancer. Ten years. He hasn't even tried. Is he...a loser?

He ignores the comment about conditioner because he thinks he is using PERFECTLY adequate hair care products.

"I don't even know what I would say...I've never even gone all the way with a dude..."

His face was starting to get sore from pressing into his Poke'Gear.

Envy corrects the 'H-word' usage before she can-- Heather may not know TONS about Lust's nightclub beyond what she shares in passing, but she does know that nobody there is a hooker.

"We gotta get you out more..."

It's not like she can talk. She was friends with Envy for years before they got together and it was awhile longer still before they worked up to the deed.

But Henry's not a BAD-looking guy! A bit of a slob, sure, but he's cute! In his own special Henry way. And this is the first time he's ever even hinted at being this kind of lonely.

"We gotta... we gotta find someone who'll treat you good."

"I don't...need to get married or anything..." Henry finally lifts his head long enough to tug his Poke'gear out from under his face. He sets it to the side. It continues to record. "I just want...to go on a nice date...with a nice girl...who doesn't get eaten by dogs or...sent walking toward a...a...gyrating blood vortex...hhhhuuhhaahhhhhhhhh...."

Henry rolls a leaky brown eye up to Envy.

"You really think they'd think I was cute? Am I cute, Envy?"

Envy is fully aware that Henry is 100% serious about both the dogs AND the blood vortex. He's pretty sure he even remembers that the blood vortex girl's name starts with an E.

But it is still very very hard not to laugh when Henry tearfully asks him if he's cute. Please appreciate how hard he's trying to not laugh at you friend. He joins Heather in plapping a hand on Henry's shoulder.

"Yeah...yeah sure you are. Heather's right, you jus' gotta go outside."

While Scar has ceased contributing verbally to the conversation, he still is very much paying attention to it. At least, as much as one in such a compromised state reasonably could. He's frowning intently, stare moving between the three of them, processing the difficult mental calculus that the situation has thrust upon him.

That's all any of them will get, if they care to look up at The Biggest Human. His intent glare as he attempts to suss out what, exactly, might help Henry in his predicament.

"Outside...Envy. Envy, the sun gives you cancer, Envy."

But outside also had fresh air and new experiences and new Pokemon to see. Ugh. Envy and Heather are right. If he wants to get anywhere he is going to have to venture into The Unknown and also Lust's Burlesque House.

He turns his head to pop his neck after laying at such an uncomfortable angle for so long. Through his tears he sees Scar looking at him. He cannot read his expression, but he is glad he is there.

Henry forgets he's a person for a moment and sends Scar a slow blink in attempts to communicate.

It's as natural as breathing.

Scar slow blinks back, and thinks absolutely nothing of it.

Henry draws in a short gasp. Tears drip down his cheeks as he stares in an open-mouthed smile at Scar.

He understands!

Edited 2024-08-16 03:35 (UTC)

Envy looks back and forth between Henry and Scar. It's his turn to be completely baffled at whatever had just happened.

Now they can do psychic eye contact too?!

ANYWAY.

"I don't think the sun does that."

He's medieval, Henry. Doesn't know about pogs and doesn't know about the dangers of UV radiation.

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no_ufo_ending - 2024-08-16 05:20 (UTC) - Expand