Oshi Returns

//--GM
Daniel slowly regains his senses an hour or so later to find Oshi sitting cross-legged with her sword in her lap and Mandy crouching nearby surrounded by a halo of cast-off candy bar wrappers.

"'Morning," Mandy says, her eyes flicking from Daniel to Oshi. She points a candy bar at Daniel. "You hungry?"

You feel tired, dirty, slightly sticky, and more than a little constipated: not bad for 4-6 days of heavy drug use, all in all. The gunk around your eyes and mouth (and in your hair, you soon discover) suggests enough "blissful" days of drooling on yourself have passed that Mandy got bored with cleaning you up at some point. Everything is much too bright, even with just a dirty bulb for light. Your brain starts up like an old vinyl 78 with the record player set to play 33LPs, but after a minute or two, you and the world will be at the same speed... you hope.

//--Daniel
With concentration Daniel pushes himself up onto his elbows and slowly shakes his head. "Mm. Water, please. 'N a towel or something." He nods at Oshi; the edges of his mouth tense a little in what might be a brief smile of greeting. "Sorry. Thought I might be up before you got back."

//--Oshi
Oshi looks down at Daniel, a brief look of disappointment on her face. "Hello Daniel. I have been waiting for you."

//--Daniel
Daniel nods again and gets himself mostly seated upright, enough to start stretching his obviously stiff neck. "Sorry," he repeats.

Very carefully he gets to his feet and takes the water bottle Mandy hands him. He staggers off to a broken, half-boarded window to rinse out his mouth, drink some, and take a stab at washing his face. This takes him a surprisingly (or perhaps not surprisingly) long time.

He returns looking pained, but slightly less crusty.

//--Oshi
"I wish to know what you have found," Oshi says looking up at Daniel, still sitting cross legged on the floor.

//--Daniel
Daniel looks sideways at her. "Uh... what I've found about what?"

Using the wall to stabilize himself, he kneels over his pack and starts hunting through it.

//--Oshi
"I thought you wanted to see me, that you'd discovered something of value." Oshi says watching Daniel carefully. "Why did you wish me to find you here otherwise?"

//--Daniel
His face contorts a little, like something passing by. He keeps looking in the pack and not finding whatever he's trying to find. "I promised I'd wait for you. But then, I couldn't wait... there... I..." He stops. "If you needed me to take you whereever you're going next, I wanted you to be able to find me."

//--Oshi
"I have questions before I can move on. Questions about the nature of these worlds we travel through." Oshi pauses, collecting her thoughts. "How do I know if the man I hunt is the true killer of my brother, or merely a reflection? How do I find the true one? Why have I not aged since my brother's death? Years have passed, yet I remain the same." Oshi pauses again. "Those questions will do for now."

//--Daniel
"Ah. I actually did find something, then." Daniel wipes his dry eyes with the back of his wrist. He blinks stupidly at the recalcitrant backpack, and then glances around for Mandy. "Can we... walk and talk? I have got to find a proper bathroom. And a shower."

"The problem is, shadows kill, too. They are based on the same person, with the same motivations, and so your brother could have many true killers. Alternatively, the 'true' Brand might not even know he's been killed. In fact, according to Random the 'true' Brand is himself dead, but the universe keeps making more of him, and without lots and lots of proof of his wrongdoing, no one will do a thing about it." His expression is flat, weighted with concern but completely unable to share it at this moment.

"As for your... condition, Random said your brother was one of them, one of them from Amber, which means you are as well. There's something about you, about the story you represent, that is best expressed by the way you are now. It'll be that way unless something changes fundamentally in you.

"And as to who killed him, I guess you could blame Brand. Or you could blame whichever of them is his father or mother, for not claiming him and making him 'safe.' Or you could blame Random, who took his loyalty to the point of death, without ever mentioning that his own life was not truly at risk."

In this speech, Daniel, for the first time you can recall him in mentioning Random's name, seems to have no emotion about it.

//--Oshi
Oshi takes this all in. Her face is as blank, or even more so, than Daniel's. "I thought that I was being punished, for not finding my brother's killer. That I would be... this age until I died if I did not honor my oath." She pauses in thought for a second, her eyes are unfocused as if she is deep in thought.

"I will just have to kill them all then."

She nods to herself then looks up a Daniel, and before he can say anything one way or the other about her decision she says: "If you will excuse me for a moment Daniel, I need some time to myself. Please continue on to your shower. I will be close by." With that she turns and hurries back the way you came.

//--Daniel
Oshi faintly hears Daniel say, "Ah, fuck."

After a brief consult with Mandy he'll shout after her the location where they're going.

//--GM
The three of you were able to call a cab, which deposited you - for a suitably outrageous fare - at a seedy motel some distance farther out of town. Daniel gave Mandy enough money to rent a double room (rather than go up in his profoundly bedraggled state and perhaps draw pointless attention). Once the three of you were inside, Daniel immediately claimed the shower and Mandy went to the snack machine outside.

When Daniel is done, Oshi is waiting quietly. Mandy is sitting at the battered writing table in the corner, trying to look busy reshuffling the contents of her backpack, her eyes flicking nervously toward Oshi every so often.

//--Oshi
Oshi looks up at Daniel as he re-enters the room but does not move. "You may rest if you need to, Daniel. I will stand watch."

//--Daniel
Daniel shakes his head to Oshi's offer. "If I lie back down, I'll want another hit. I've got to keep busy, huh? So, where do you need to go from here?"

//--Oshi
"I need to find Brand. The true one. Perhaps ending his life will weaken the others. Perhaps I will find his death is enough to honor my oath." Oshi stands and packs as she talks, putting her sword and teddy into her backpack.

//--Daniel
Daniel glances at Mandy briefly, then looks back at Oshi. "If Random is right, there are things you might need to do first to make his death 'stick.' I don't understand it completely, but in this I don't have reason to disbelieve him. You could talk..." Daniel clearly can't bring himself to say 'to Random,' but he pushes on after a pause, "you could talk to Gerard, or one of the others not associated with Brand's faction. I could take you close enough to go in."

//--Oshi
Oshi nods, and puts her pack on. She steps up to Daniel and looks into his eyes. "Will you bring me to meet Gerard?"

//--Daniel
There is a certain dullness in his eyes, a lack of anger but also of will. He does not want to do this thing, but will not deny her.

Daniel nods. "I can get a note to him, sure. Or get you into Amber." He shrugs like it's just a thing he can do, no big deal. "The trip sucks."

//--Oshi
Oshi reaches up and takes Daniels hand in both of hers. "If it is too much I will understand Daniel. You have done much for me already, if you do not wish to go further I will find my own way."

//--GM
Which leads to the question: what road to Gerard? Trump (and from which set), Shifting (which is a two-day proposition, minimum, from this Shadow), or by some unforeseen third means? {*laughter, puzzlement, and unexplained glee*}

//--Daniel
He shakes his head. "It's okay. I just have to figure out the best way to bring you. We have some options, but I think Random made off with his Trump deck." Daniel pats his coat pocket, checking. He looks surprised a second, pulls out a hefty deck of cards and says, "I guess he didn't manage it. But he still continues with, "I think I'd rather take you, in any case. It's, like, a couple of days?"

He looks up at Mandy, "You want out of here? There are a lot of places out there better than this hell-hole."

//--Mandy
"So you're going to 'take me away from all this?'" she says, somewhat ironically, gesturing toward the stained and peeling wallpaper. Suddenly smiling, "As long as you can afford me, I can afford to be gone." She glances at Oshi before adding, "You blew through my stash, though. No more 'candy' from this machine. That okay?"

//--Daniel
Daniel looks between Oshi and Mandy, contemplating the time passed and the historic-sized supply of product he'd seen Mandy with earlier. But again, he shrugs. "What I meant was, do you want out, permanent. Just an offer. I can drop you off places with reasonable probability of decent employment. But you couldn't get back here from there. I dunno if that'd appeal to you. Personally I figure it's a good offer, but I don't have other connections here, so it isn't hard for me to leave."

//--Oshi
"I think," Oshi says looking directly at Mandy. "Daniel is right. It would be better for you else where. This place is poison."

//--Mandy
"Well... why don't I see what kind of places you're talking about, and then decide for myself if I need to leave Basin City behind for good."

//--Daniel
Daniel tilts his head one way and another, considering. "Uh, sure. Okay. I can't promise what schedule we'll be on, but we can stop a couple places, and I'll come back and see what you've decided. Fair enough?"

//--Oshi
Oshi checks her belongs one last time, and then nods once. "I am ready."

//--Mandy
"So long as you don't forget me someplace, yeah, that's fine." Mandy shoulders her pack.

//--Daniel
Daniel gives a smile, full of ghosts. "I won't."

He reshoulders his own pack. "To Amber then, by way of... a couple of places. Duncan's first?" he half-asks Oshi. "I'm thinking we know it's on the way, and my route to Amber's clear from there."

//--Oshi
"It would be a pleasure to see him again." Oshi says with the first genuine smile you've seen in a long time.

//--Daniel
Daniel nods, and says to Mandy, "So, follow close, okay? Sometimes it's a little hard on the stomach." He heads out of the room outside onto the broken tarmac of the hotel's parking lot, and looks around. Seeing a scabby, patchwork fence with weeds growing behind it, he glances back to see that Oshi and Mandy are following, then moves forward and gives a lurching *push*...

//--GM
The fence creaks alarmingly, then parts as if finally giving in to gravity after a long, bitter fight. Daniel leads his "nature hikers" through weeds, tangles, and brambles for several hours before crossing a broad, rough stream of industrial waste polluted with a hint of water and dying insects. Several more hours of uphill hiking through stunted thorn trees and sharp rocks hidden under dripping moss go by before you find a patch of blasted earth clean enough to stop on for a little while to let Mandy catch her breath.

During her fitful nap, you're attacked by a band of hillbilly bikers, a starving pack of wolf-sized hyenas, and a vulture the size of a dwarf-Cessna, but each group in turn is dispatched without too much effort.

Vaguely refreshed - or at least too fed up with the local fauna to stay put any more - you continue your journey, eventually finding your way out of the forest. The upslope becomes a downgrade, but the rocks get progressively sharper, and without that soft slime to cushion any missteps now. Mandy collects a few nasty scrapes on her arms and legs in the hours that follow, but she carries on like a trouper after some basic first aid. "I never really liked these jeans anyway."

The valley levels off at a shattered city. After a brief rush for cover to avoid roving HK drones, you pause for water and candy bars long enough to change Mandy's dressings and get your bearings. It's always hard to tell using Daniel's methods, but you feel like you're just five or six hours from Duncan's now. However, Mandy looks like she's getting close the end of her rope, stamina-wise, and the deep scrape on her left calf is starting to show a little pus.

The Shadow you're currently in looks like one part "Children of Men" refugee camp and two parts "Terminator" after Skynet took over. Good chance to scavenge supplies from dead natives, but also a good chance of getting picked up and picked on by a flying death machine at some point. You've been traveling 16-18 hours with just a few breaks, but you do feel somewhat close to your destination.

//--Oshi
Oshi approaches Daniel and speaks quietly to him so that Mandy can't hear. "I believe we should hold for a short time. I would like to give Mandy a chance to rest and heal. I will go scavange for supplies if you like. That way you can stay here and protect your companion."

//--Daniel
"Yeah, crap. It usually isn't this bad." He thinks back a moment and shrugs. "Then again, sometimes it's worse." Daniel humphs self-deprecatingly. "Yeah, go on out, but please don't go too far. We may decide Mandy'll need to shortcut by Trump. I hate to send her to Amber, but it's not my intention to get her killed going someplace better."

//--GM
After killing several homicidal metal men and hunting around for a bit less than an hour, Oshi is able to get back with six or seven edible MREs, a half-spent first aid kit, and a somewhat time-worn anti-material rifle with a handful of permanent-marker-sized rounds of ammunition. Mandy has slept like a stone the whole time Oshi was gone, but she's not feverish or chilled or otherwise showing signs of a rampant infection. However, her leg is starting to swell. There's some injectable universal antibiotic in the kit, but the directions / cautions are written in gibberish.

//--Oshi
Oshi looks at the antibiotics helplessly. "I could attempt to find a creature who can understand this." She frowns up at Daniel. "But I do not think I will be able to do that quickly. Perhaps we should continue on? Is there any place nearby that would house proper facilities to help your friend?"

//--Daniel
Daniel leans back from examining Mandy's leg and shakes his head, smiling grimly. He pushes himself up to standing. "Uh-uh. No. Fuck." He turns around in the corner of the rubble and looks out the glassless window. He punches the broken frame with his fist hard enough to leave a bloody mark. "FUCK!"

He slides down the wall onto his heels and just sits for a minute with his fingers tangled in his hair. His face, for the brief moment he showed it, was some parts rage and some parts complete loss, an expression wholly foreign to him.

//--Oshi
Oshi approaches Daniel and puts her hands on his shoulders. "Do not worry Daniel."

//--Daniel
He shakes his head. "It's just... You can't... ah, crap." He hangs his head between his knees a second.

//--Oshi
Mandy stirs, roused by Daniel's previous outburst. *mumbling* "Mmmh... time to go yet...?" She licks her lips slowly and clumsily, looking tired and dry-mouthed. "Just gimmie a few more minutes... 'til my feet wake up...." and she starts putting her head down again.

//--Daniel
Daniel looks over at Mandy. His eyes look like his eyelids are made of sandpaper. He sighs and starts fumbling around for his canteen.

//--Oshi
In the course of this distraction, Oshi adds, "I will make this right," and slips away quickly and quietly.

//--Daniel
"Oshi!" Daniel calls after her, but weakly. When she's gone, he pushes himself back up onto his feet, goes over and sits down next to Mandy. He positions her comfortably, with a piece of blanket under her head across his crossed legs. He wakes her up enough to give her water, a bite to eat, and some pain killers.

//--Mandy
Mandy downs all the water you offer, eagerly, but doesn't eat much, and refuses the painkillers altogether. "...Numb enough already..." she mumbles.

//--Daniel
Daniel is a quite decent field medic. Can he tell at all why she's reacting this way? Is there something else wrong besides the oncoming infection in her leg?

//--GM
The infection might be messing with her nervous system, her immune system, or both. Without better equipment, it's hard to say, but you think she has a day or two before this turns into something irreparable.

//--Mandy
After a funny noise that might have been a laugh, she adds, "... Guess I'm not so good at the 'getaway' thing, huh...?" and she starts crying soundlessly, tears running down even as she's gazing up at you like she's somehow betrayed her rescuer.

//--Daniel
Daniel shakes his head. "It's not your fault at all. It's mine." He does not indulge himself by making that sound bitter. "Look, I can get you out of here, but I'd be putting you in the care of strangers, and then it would be... a little difficult for me to get you out. Other choice is, we wait for Oshi and see what she's got up her sleeve."

//--Mandy
She grips your arm with more strength than you expected, like the idea of being handed off to someone else scares the crap out of her. Her voice has been swallowed by the effort of crying, so all she can do is shake her head, presumably saying no to the first option in favor of waiting.

As long as Oshi isn't gone more than a few hours, you think Mandy will be all right for now. The fact that she can still eat is hopeful, although you don't like the odds of her fighting this off without better treatment.

//--Daniel
Daniel's brow furrows in yet further concern. "Hey, hey, now don't worry. It is a last choice. We will wait here for a time, and if we have to move, I've got a place I can get you to. It's just... more of the same or worse between here and there. If Oshi can bypass it somehow, then we should give her that chance."

He lifts her up to rest against him more comfortably and gives her more water if she'll take it. He has his guns near at hand, but for the moment concentrates on allowing Mandy to rest. Getting her through this is... supremely important to him, somehow.

//--Mandy
After more water, Mandy recovers her voice enough to whisper, "Okay." After a half-hearted attempt to wipe the tears from her cheeks, she settles down. At least now you know she still has healthy enough circulation to blush at your close proximity.

//--Daniel
When she's settled, Daniel gives a small "huh" to himself and a half-smile that quirks the right half of his mouth. In a film-noir parody voice, he thinks, "Dames." Just takes one blush to turn a desperate situation into one... fraught with something else. And given where she's from, he doubts leaning up against some guy in jeans and a dirty greatcoat is a typically blush-worthy experience for her. Still smiling, he shakes that thought off, and he, too, half-dozes, still running on soldier-in-the-field alert, but letting his body rest some.

Sitting there, he waits for Oshi.