A Terrible Thought

Samir
Somewhere between mid-afternoon and sundown Elijah gets a text message from a number he's never encountered before. The perks of knowing the Mercurial Elite.

Hey Elijah. It's Samir. I never gave you your shit last month. Discuss?

Elijah
He's sitting on his couch right now. There are books on the coffee table and writing on the wall where he, again, spent his time trying to piece through the inner workings of ars whateverthefuck and prime. Forces and prime. HIs brain was not processing Latin, or really english, but then there was a text.

He looked down.

"Oh, shit, right!"

Super lame, Samir. Totes leaving you a bad review, how dare you almost die and forget to give me shit. LOL.

Samir
Three minutes pass before he receives a response.

"0/10, would not buy from again."

And then:

Do you want a refund, or do you want to meet up so I can give you the latest book drop-off in the world, or do you want me to just send it to you? Or some other nebulous fourth option I'm not thinking of?

Elijah
He laughs, looks at his text messages and puts the phone down. Stares at the ceiling before the phone vibrates again. He picks it up, rolls over.

"What're you laughing at?" Jenn called from the back bedroom.
"Dude I met," Elijah replied.
"Are you bringing him home?"
"I don't think so?"
"Lame," Jenn called back, then got back to her painting.

Post sucks in my building, I'm pretty sure my neighbor takes my mail as some part of a weird Helga Pataki-esque shrine to the people who live in my apartment.

I'm down for a late drop. I could buy you beer or vegan beer.





Samir
What the hell is vegan beer?

And then:

Actually let me try something. Are you near a mailbox or a cabinet or something in that general category of container type things?

Elijah
Vegan beer is like regular beer but it costs $3 more

Elijah read the next text message and got up, meandering over to the refrigerator. He opens it, listening the the little gasp of its frosty depths being invaded by warm air. He shuts it.

I have a fridge with nothing in it. That work?

Samir
Yeah that works. Hold please.

--

first roll:

[corr 2/mind 1: WHERE YOU AT SON. base diff 5, -1 for practiced rote, -1 unique focus.]

Dice: 2 d10 TN3 (7, 9) ( success x 2 )

Samir
[LATE SPHERE ADDITION: needs matter to find the fridge. pretend dorn added matter.]

Samir
second roll:

[corr/matter 2: APPORTATE BITCHES. i'm being a twink and counting this as coincidental bc he's casting from his sanctum even tho idk if it would be considered coincidental on elijah's end or not. base diff 5, -1 for taking his time, -1 for quint.]

Dice: 2 d10 TN3 (5, 8) ( success x 3 ) [WP]

Samir
A few minutes pass. Then Elijah receives another text message.

Okay open your fridge.

When he does Elijah finds amidst the nothing a small spray bottle of Mrs. Meyer's lemon verbena Clean Day spray with a note taped onto it:

Did it work?

Elijah
[Singy singy]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 4, 4, 5, 9) ( success x 1 )

Elijah
"The hardest button to buttooooooon," he half sings. He's not trying, it doesn't sound terribly good, but then again neither do the White Stripes.
"Staaaaaaaaap," Jenn yells from her room.
"The hardest button to buttoooon WHOA-OHHH!"
"IsweartogodIwillendyou!"

Which made Elijah erupt into laughter. Maybe the closest he gets to maniacal. The phone vibrates again, and he opens the fridge. Looks at the bottle and takes it out. Elijah cocks his head to the side and checks to see how much is left in the bottle. It goes under the kitchen counter.

Could you have tried a hot pocket or something? Lemon verbena is the shit, though. Hard choice. 




Samir
Hot Pockets are triggering for me, okay?

A beat.

Doing it for real this time. Don't go anywhere.

--

[DOING IT AGAIN but no quint this time. i swear to god if you botch this...]

Dice: 2 d10 TN4 (8, 8) ( success x 2 )

Samir
After a few more minutes he receives another text:

Check your shit, yo.

This time when he opens the refrigerator Elijah finds a small orange vial with a black A Sharpied onto the white lid and another small orange vial with a black E Sharpied onto the lid. And another note:

Sorry I bled on your shirt. Don't worry about the beer.

Elijah
Never forget. #HotPocketHell

He leans against the fridge, expects to feel something different but, really, he can't distinguish Samir's resonance from the standard feeling of a refrigerator, or perhaps he wasn't supposed to feel it at all.

Vibrate. Check. Open door.

"Oooh," he says, pleasantly surprised and it was off to stick his newly found goods in hispantry next to the pill bottles for all of the medication he was supposed to be taking but didn't because his diagnosis seemed to have changed. Even if you can break reality to your whims, saying that you hear a voice that continually tells you that you're going to die so live is probably still going to make you sound delusional.

Shit happens, I've been going through a lot of shirts recently. Hella lame.

Samir
There's an app for that.

Ah, reality hacker humor. He probably does have a rote for that.

That's the last Elijah hears from his buddy this afternoon.