#2

[rank1]

Passengers: Travis Touchdown and YOU!
Location: The Mess Hall
Date: 1/26
Summary: Someone was a naughty boy :(
Warnings: Swearing, etc.



Travis Touchdown spends six hours shackled to a mess hall table. It's his own fault, really. He didn't have to punch Rhys. He didn't have to shitstir, or 1v1 a warden. He also didn't have to double down on any of it.

But he did.

1. Noisy Asshole

So here's Travis, handcuffed to a table leg and pulling at the manacle like a rabid dog, shouting fuckhead this and fucking bastard that, with little detours into you don’t even know who I am and you think this is a game to me? I’m dead fucking serious bro!

If it was on Twitter, it'd go viral. If Travis had a communicator, he'd be broadcasting it himself.

2. Clever Asshole

After yelling like an asshole gets him hoarse, he settles on trying to get himself out by more mechanical means: lock picking. He doesn’t have a lock pick. It wouldn't necessarily help anyway, considering the make of these things, but it’s a good way to kill five minutes. If he pores over long enough, maybe he'll find a weakness. When that fails, another five minutes get wasted on trying to will himself into being double jointed, but try as he might, his hand doesn’t fit through. He considers gnawing his thumb off, and at one point experimentally tests the meat of the crux of his thumb with his teeth. Hey, if that cave spelunker guy could be trapped for over a hundred hours and still have the nuts to saw off his own arm, what’s a mere thumb to a sane guy? But he ultimately decides against it: he needs that thumb to grip things, man.

"Maybe this is why that fuckhead has a robot arm," Travis says to himself, making no effort to keep his voice down. "He cut it off to get out of being shackled to a table like a goddamn dog!"

3. Artistic Asshole

When his throat feels a little less like he’s been choking down chicken bones, he entertains himself by rapping. It’s an original poem about how wardens are shit. It’s not very good but he doesn’t care. It’s his art and if you don’t like it, you try writing your own and see how well you do.

4. Hungry Asshole :(

“I’m so fucking bored,” he announces to whoever comes by. “And hungry!”

Being within fifty feet of a food dispenser is worse torture than being a public display. What can he say, he’s used to looking cool in public, and he's lost track of how long he's been trapped here. Probably days. (It's been four hours.) This is the only time his resting bitch face relaxes into something vaguely woe is me — a mid thirties man with an empty stomach is little more than a baby.

5. Free Asshole

(Not that way, perverts, what do you think this is, Duplicity? Unless... ;) )

The spirit is strong, but the body is tired. Travis, sat on the floor and leaning against the table leg, his own legs stretched out wide. His shoulders sag, and his manacled wrist is an ugly purple. Don’t feel too bad: he chose to yank and yank and yank at the cuff instead of patiently leaving it be.

“This is only strengthening my resolve, you know!" he protests. "You gotta let me go!”

Very impressive pitch from a man minutes away from simply laying on the floor.

Comments

1. lets fuckn gooooo /clown music blasts in the background

[smugreport]

[ Rhys hadn't intended to go and search out Travis (not yet anyway) when he was heading in the direction of the mess hall for a snack, and he certainly hadn't thought his next encounter with him would be so...opportunistic and in his favor. But hey, don't look a gift skag in the mouth right?

In from Travis's peripherals walks Rhys, bandaged and a little bruised, but free. Unlike some people. (Also in a fresh shirt!) ]

Well well well, look who it is![ Feigned surprise, as if he couldn't hear Travis yelling from all the way down the hall. ] Looks like somebody is being punished for their crimes of being a total fucking maniac.

How's it going down there? Pretty bad? Great!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xK46OmqEb7w

[rank1]

[Great! This asshole! Travis stops shouting, but he's pissed off anyway, leant forward, ready to go.]

Come closer, chickenshit, so we can kiss and make up!

[He raises a hand to flip the bird but he's stopped by the manacle. Whoops.]

[smugreport]

Hahaha yeah, I don't think so.

[ Smug like a fucking cat who got the canary, Rhys pulls out his shiny new replacement commlink, waggling it at Travis before turning it on and looking for something. ]

Y'know, I should really say thanks. Because of you I'm probably getting moved to a private room ah-
There it is! The camera setting. Now lets just choose a filter aaaand

[ He crouches, a safe distance from Travis but close enough to get them both in the shot and takes a selfie. :^) ]

[rank1]

[If Travis didn't already think Rhys was a fuckhead, the selfie shit clinches it. Travis stands there, stock still, staring straight ahead with furrowed brows and bloodshed in his heart. In the photo, his mouth will be half open, because he is saying:]

A private room? What?

[smugreport]

[ Rhys stands proper, nodding approvingly at the picture before he pockets his comm again. You can’t stop his stride he’s unstoppable. ]

Yeah, given how you’re a danger to the well-being of my face and all.

[ And all his other parts! He needs those. ]

Now what did I come in here for originally… ooooh yeah.

[ He veeery casually strolls on over to one of the food dispensers, a spring in his step. ]

[rank1]

Well, your highness, you're welcome for getting you a free upgrade.

[That's right, Rhys! You owe this guy a THANK YOU! Travis will wait for one with waited breath until you're back from getting your meal substitutes!!]

2

[nineteenfortyfive]

Jesus Christ he's loud.

Claire isn't entirely pleased with this guy being left out here, but that's on James. She is curious about him--as to whether he's going to be a prolonged problem when it comes to Rhys--and approaches, hands on her hips.

"Do continue."

[rank1]

Travis is cross-legged on the floor and picking at the handcuff like some sort of deranged monkey trying to figure something out by bashing it against a rock. He cranes his neck to peer up at this chick, eyes narrowed behind his yellow aviators.

"Continue what, grandma?" he replies. "You heard what I said. Chained to this table like a fucking dog!"

[nineteenfortyfive]

"Your tantrum, child." Don't call her grandma. "Isn't this attitude of yours what got you in trouble in the first place?"

[rank1]

"Child?" Travis replies. Somehow this is the most offensive thing he could be called. He lets his manacled wrist fall to his side, distracted. "Listen, just because I'm not pushing sixty doesn't mean I'm a child. I'm in my thirties. If I want to fight someone picking a fight with me, it's my right as a motherfucking adult."

[nineteenfortyfive]

Pushing sixty? Rude.

"You're right. And your adult actions have adult consequences. How do you like them?"

4

[sanctus_dei]

[Theo hears Travis before he ever sees him. He was pretty bored here too, but he didn't feel like it was necessary to yell it out to everyone in the mess hall.

He'd come in to get something to eat and scuttle back to his room with it, but stops when he sees a guy literally cuffed to a table. Must be a new guy, since it wasn't someone he'd seen around the dorms yet.

Theo stands a few feet back from Travis, near the doorway.]

What the hell'd you do.

[He nods a chin to indicate the manacle keeping him in place.]

[rank1]

Me?

[No, Travis, the other guy handcuffed to a table. Yes, you.]

That smug prick Rhys got all pissy with me for recording video in his presence and tried to take my communicator, so I knocked him to the ground. Busted his nose. Some jacked up warden lost his shit!

[sanctus_dei]

Rhys... huh. [Theo thinks it over for a moment. There was an inmate he was talking with when the feed cut out. That must have him.]

That was it? Cuz you were recording him? Seems like an overreaction.

[His tone is a little suspicious. Or maybe Rhys really was that jumpy. Theo wouldn't know. He gives Travis a wide berth, heading over to one of the screens to grab something to eat.]

Did the wardens forget about you, or is this some kinda boring punishment?

[rank1]

Fuck if I know! [Travis jerks at his wrist again. He is mad enough to not care that it hurts like a bitch.] You know how to slip these things? That or if you can unbolt the table from the ground, I'll just...

[Drag it around? Sure.

He just makes a walking gesture.]

[sanctus_dei]

Haven't had the pleasure yet. [Theo pokes at the order screen, and the Automat gives me yet another spinach salad piled high with protein on the top. Based on his biometrics, they're trying to get his weight and iron count up. The novelty of the Automat wore off fast when it kept giving him very similar meals.

He mutter under his breath, and takes it over to a table a few over from Travis. Theo eyes him up and down for a minute, weighing his options.]

I dunno. What do I get out of it? Can I trust you?

[He smirks a bit as he pokes idly at the salad. Hard to tell if he's joking or not, but he hasn't gotten up to help yet.]

1

[aposeme]

Volk woke up like five minutes ago. In an ordinary person, you could tell. Unfortunately, Volk perpetually looks like he was just woken up from one nightmare and realized that the real, second nightmare, was life.

He squints at Travis blearily while he waits for the automat to Not give him coffee, Again. (It's like three in the afternoon.)

Oh, its this guy. The one that was going to murder the cult leader.

"What happened."

[rank1]

Travis stops yelling when he sees the Russian guy. Volk. It's Volk, right? Fuck. Maybe he should have camped out at the fucking door. It'd be better than being cuffed to a motherfucking table by Captain No Fun Allowed.

He resumes shouting, vehemently:

"Some dipshit in the dorms picked a fight over the fucking communicators so I knocked him to the ground, and then some fucking powerhouse warden started taking kidney shots until he could drag me off to be on display here!"

[aposeme]

"Oh, right. Rhys."

He saw that but thought it was just some dumb shit. Volk comes over and then just... looks around the room for the person who's like, guarding Travis?

???

"What, is he on bathroom break or something?"

[rank1]

"No! He just fucking ditched me here!"

[aposeme]

"What, for like, how long?"

Because if he's going to smash that chain he really doesn't want the guy to walk in halfway and re-cuff both of them, that'd be fucking dumb.

4;

[spanning]

[Something about this is familiar. Like "take Denji, turn him into a white guy, and multiply his age by two" kind of familiar.

Anyway, Aki has walked by a few times before (wondering why he did this to himself, tbh), but Travis had still been raging at that point. Now that he's calmed down with his woe-is-me shtick, Aki rolls his eyes a little and goes over to the Automat without a word.

When he comes back, he gives Travis a look—you better be hungry enough not to potshot him, dude—and dumps a tray of food unceremoniously in the guy's lap. It's a little precarious with only one arm, but hey. He manages.]

Happy now?

4;

[rank1]

[Travis very much considers going for a potshot –– any warden would deserve it at this point, but he's not actually sure if this guy is a warden, because Travis has done zero homework on the who's-who of the barge in the past twenty-four hours.

His stomach wins handily.

He catches the tray a little clumsily, but hey, who cares if the food gets jumbled? Food is food. At this point he'd eat fucking dog food just to have a full belly. Never in his life would he be cut out for a hunger strike.]

Yes!

[And then, with complete sincerity:]

Itadakimasu.

[spanning]

[Well, that's—jarring.]

Are you actually fluent in Japanese?

[Skeptical, but he actually has no idea what to think of it. Aki is from before the Reign of the Weeb.

But. That shirt......... Denji has never even worn a shirt like that and he's sixteen.

Yeah, Aki is now distracted by his silent need to judge the shirt.]

[rank1]

[Travis manages to sound surprisingly put-together in Japanese, at least technically: this is someone who respects the culture enough to want to get it right. However, he’s an American who will never shed his… well. Americanness.]

Yes. I love Japanese movies. You can’t really appreciate art until you can watch it in its original language.

[Somehow this has never extended to learning German to better appreciate all those 80s Deutschpunk bands he listens to, but hey, there’s only so many hours in the day.

Anyway, he starts shovelling food in his face, largely unbothered by the silent judgment. He knows what he is.

But he’ll ask anyway. In English.

Are you a fan?