If You're The Party, I'll Be Your Poison

That night I woke up in a cold sweat. At first I thought it had something to do with a nightmare but then the shivering started. My body felt off and I couldn’t control my movements so I mustered what was left of my strength and dragged myself into the living room where Poison was knocked out on the couch. He was sprawled with half his body hanging over the side, his wild red hair all over the place and his mouth slightly opened as he breathed. With a shaking hand I nudged his shoulder and he sat up quickly, eyes bleary but alert.

“What?” he demanded, his voice cracking.

I opened my mouth to reply but I couldn’t bring myself to speak. Poison watched me for a second before comprehending what was going on. He jumped up and scooped me up into his arms. He tripped a few times as he carried me toward Fun Ghoul’s room and slammed his fist against the door.

“Ghoul! Get the fuck up!” he hammered on it until the younger man appeared, his dark hair a mess as well and a pencil behind his ear.

“What.”

“It’s starting.”

“About damn time,” Ghoul muttered and Poison carried me into the dark room.

“Put her on my bed, I have an extra cot,” he instructed and Poison did as he was told, dumping me on top of the rumpled covers of Fun Ghoul’s bed. I let my eyes drift closed as my body continued to shiver. I felt someone’s hand on my forehead but I didn’t strain myself to see whom it was or listen to the conversation. I didn’t have the strength to open my eyes to see who was speaking. I know they had a whispered conversation and then one of them left.

The hours dragged by in a blur of shivering, vomiting and sweating. I couldn’t move. My arms and legs were so weak I had to be carried around if I wanted to use the bathroom. Poison refused to let me eat solid foods and Ghoul constantly forced water and canned soup down my throat. I lost track of how long I stayed holed up in Ghoul’s room before I began to regain my strength. If I wasn’t being sick, I was curled up in the fetal position crying as memories bombarded my ailing mind.

I remembered my brother, my mother and father. Although most of the memories of the war were fuzzy or I didn’t remember at all I still pined for my brother and spent my time grieving the man I’d lost and never really known.
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When I could walk around on my own again Fun Ghoul decided it was time to kick me out of his room.

“Can you pee by yourself yet?” he’d grumbled as I paged through a magazine I found under his bed.

“Yes.”

“Then go back to Poison’s room. I want my bed back.” He glared at me and tossed his ray gun on the cluttered desk in the corner. His room was an explosion of all things weaponry. Wires and different gadgets cluttered his desk and the walls were home to books, posters of various bands and stolen street signs.

“Fine, but if anything happens to me it’s on you.”

He stuck his tongue out at me as I climbed off his bed and headed toward the stairs.

“I’m taking your magazine too, jerk!” I called over my shoulder and he responded with a flip of his middle finger.

“It’s an old issue. I’ll survive.”

“Ignore him, he just hates sleeping on that nasty ass cot. He’s been unbearable since you got sick.” Kobra mumbled when I entered the living room. He had his sunglasses on and a bass guitar on his lap. It looked old and beat up and one of the strings had snapped but he continued to pluck the strings absently.

“I didn’t know you could play an instrument.”

“We all can.” He shrugged.

“Oh.” I moved across the room and sat in the armchair by the bathroom. Kobra watched me so I flashed a smile and folded my hands in my lap. “So, I think I remember a little more about… well about me.”

He cocked his head to the side and nodded. “Must be nice to have all those meds out of your system.”

I nodded. “Yeah. There’s so much in me that I’ve never even known about my family and myself. I mean, even my personality is new. It’s strange.”

He plucked out a few notes on his bass and didn’t look at me. “My name is short for Revenge. I’m sure Poison told you that already.” I piped up and he nodded.

“My father was apart of the Reaper gang at the beginning of the war. Scarecrow caught him. I don’t remember how. But I remember feeling terrified and trapped….”

Kobra stopped playing to look at me and I let my memories take over. Every feeling I’d had as a little girl watching my father be beaten and tortured trying to protect my mother. The storm outside lighting up the house as Korse himself dragged him onto our front lawn and exterminated him as an example.

Tears pricked my eyes and I looked at Kobra. He was staring at me with his mouth slightly open. He’d pushed his sunglasses up on the top of his head and I finally got to see his eyes. They were a warm light brown with flecks of blue and green. He blinked a few times when I stopped talking and he pushed the glasses back over his face.

“I’m sorry you had to go through that,” he muttered.

“Yeah.”

“And on top of that losing your brother. I can’t imagine the world without my brother.”

“You have a brother?” He nodded.

“Poison. You couldn’t tell he’s my blood?”

And then I took the time to actually look at him. I could see the subtle similarities. The way they both kind of spoke out of the corner of their mouths, Poison more so than Kobra, their facial structure, although Poison’s was smoother than Kobra’s it was no surprise that they shared blood. Just looking at Kobra I couldn’t help but think about Daniel. He didn’t share a single feature similar to Kobra or Poison but just remembering the sibling bond we’d shared, however weakened by the meds, made my heart ache.

“Hey, you okay?” he waved a hand in my face and I forced a smile.

“Yeah.”

“Poison and Jet Star should be back soon. He’ll be happy to know you’re up and moving again.”

I nodded and he watched me for a second. I wanted to know where they went when they weren’t here. They always came back filthy and sweaty and sometimes so energized they couldn’t sit still. Sometimes they brought back supplies and sometimes they came back with a little less ammo than they left with. But whenever they came back they always came to check on me and make sure I was okay.

“You can ask, you know,” Kobra nudged me with a crooked smile.

“Huh?”

“You can ask us questions. We’re not gonna bite. I know you’re curious.”

“Oh.” It took me a second to process and then my curiosity kicked in and I resettled myself beside him on the couch. I crossed my legs and leaned forward toward him. “So, where do you guys go when you leave?”

Kobra chuckled and shrugged. “Everywhere. Sometimes we search abandoned places for supplies or we check out Drac activity in the Zones. Just depends on the info we get and the day.”

“So you do go out and do the stuff the papers say.”

“Yeah, BL/ind just exaggerates. We’re not evil, like they make us out to be. We just want to live free and fast and have fun. Not be programmed to what Better Living wants us to be.”

He plucked a few more notes on his bass and Fun Ghoul poked his head around his bedroom door. We both looked up and he motioned toward the door.

“They’re back.”

Kobra nodded and Ghoul disappeared back into his room. Before we could react Jet Star burst into the room with Poison draped over his shoulder. We both jumped up to let Jet lay him on the couch and Kobra tossed his bass aside.

“What happened?” I demanded as Poison groaned, his hair covering his face. My nurse’s instincts kicked in so I went into checking him over automatically. Jet stepped back and leaned on the back of the couch as I pushed the mane of red from Poison’s face to be greeted with half his face covered in blood. “Jet!”

“We were just scouting for Dracs. Dr. D told us there was some activity in Zone Four so we went to check it out. We got jumped and Poison was grazed by one of those retro pistols. Here.” He held out the bullet casing that was smashed like it’d been lodged in a wall.

“My Dad used to carry one of these,” I mumbled and tossed the shell onto the coffee table. “Get Ghoul, I need his kit.”

“Frank!” Jet shouted and Ghoul reappeared from his room.

“Yo!”

“We need your kit.”

“On it!” he disappeared and then rushed into the room and tossed me the duffle bag full of supplies. I got to work, taking a wipe to his forehead to clear the area. Poison groaned again, and squinted up at me. He had a gash through his eyebrow that was oozing into his eye and his usually pearly white teeth were tinted red.

“Do any of your teeth feel loose?” I asked and pried his mouth open.

He giggled and shook his head so I checked for any major damage to his jaw before returning my attention to his eye. I gathered the supplies I needed and set to work first dabbing some peroxide onto a cotton ball and dabbing it on the gash.

“Fucking hell!” Poison hissed and the other guys laughed. I ignored them and kept going, sterilizing the needle and thread to sew up his face. He winced when I poked him and let out a few more choice words before I tied it up and cut the string.

“There, all done.” I sat back and he sat up.

“Fuck, I can feel it swelling already,” he grumbled, letting his hair fall over his face. “Thanks though.”

“Here, use this,” Jet moved to the kitchen and dug around in the freezer. He tossed a bag of ice at me and I pressed it to Poison’s face. He moaned with relief and thanked me again.

That night I made dinner for the boys out of some food I found around their makeshift kitchen. Poison forced me to eat more soup claiming he didn’t want me to get sick from switching to solid food too quick so I sat glaring at him in the corner sipping tomato soup from a chipped mug with the BLI’s mascot Mouse Cat on the side. After dinner the boys dispersed to their rooms so I took the time to clean up after them. Ghoul and Poison lingered in the kitchen playing cards while I scrubbed down the counter and appliances. By the time I was finished it was nearing midnight.

“Well, I’m going to bed. Don’t make a mess while I’m sleeping,” I yawned and stretched and Ghoul waved his hand at me. Poison looked up from his cards.

“I’m gonna hit the hay too. Ghoul, we’ll pick this up later.”

“Fuck, man. Come on!” Ghoul whined but Poison ignored him.

He followed me into his bedroom and closed the door gently behind us. At first I thought nothing of it and went about my business, digging around in his closet for the sweatpants and old shirt he’d lent me for pajamas and he went about kicking his boots off behind me. I heard them thump to the floor and froze when he climbed into his bed.

“You’re not sleeping on the couch.” I turned to him and he stretched out under the covers. He’d taken his shirt and pants off, the clothes a rumpled pile on the floor beside his boots. My cheeks burned and he rested his hands behind his head.

“It’s fucking freezing on the couch and I like my bed. I didn’t think it’d be an issue.”

“Oh, um… no I was just observing… I guess.” My fingers began to tremble as I pulled my shirt over my head and quickly replaced it with the sleep shirt. Thankfully it fell to mid thigh so I slipped my pants off and pulled the sweatpants on quickly. When I turned back to the bed Poison was sprawled out, his eyes closed. Carefully I lifted the blankets on my side and slid in, curling up as far away from him as possible without falling off the side.

“I’m not gonna bite you,” Poison muttered, making me jump and he curled up beside me. His body heat warmed me instantly but my muscles froze. He laughed and tugged the blankets up over my shoulders and I felt him drape his arm around me. His breath was hot on the back of my neck through my hair and he chuckled softly, his voice low.

“Relax, Rev, it’s warmer like this I’m not trying to do anything shady.”

“Try wearing clothes then,” I grumbled and he laughed.

“I am wearing clothes,” he rubbed his leg against mine. “See?”

“Ass.” I grumbled.

He kept laughing until the room got quiet and he fell back to sleep, his arm still resting loosely at my waist and his head tucked close at the base of my neck. I fell asleep to the sound of his slow breathing, the steady breeze of his breath on the back of my neck warming my skin until I passed out.