{In which I lurk [open]

[Jules Kaitou]

Cage, cage, cage, the bird in the cage...

The stupid nursery rhyme that had been caught in Jules's head the past few days had given no sign of abating although he'd sung it to himself a million times over -- wasn't that the way you were supposed to get rid of earworm songs? It wasn't working, and the man currently making his way through all manner of brambly flora was getting sincerely pissed off.

When, when will you come out?

It wasn't so much the song that bothered him. Albeit it was really creepy, and it was supposed to have come from an old tale involving a high courtesan... either way, he didn't really like it, but it was the fact that it wasn't coming out that forced him to cringe as he walked on, trying to find any sign of a clearing or something he could just sit and strum under. TickTock, in all her pearlescent black glory, was slung across his shoulder, the strap a neon green bandoleer against the subtle gray of his military coat, and she was just about begging to be played.

And just his luck, every square inch of this damned forest was covered in thorns.

In the evening of the dawn...

Presently, he stopped moving and took a look around. There was nothing out of the ordinary; it seemed a normal Saturday morning, the sky a clear blue and the air comfortably chill. Shrubs... lots and lots of shrubs, though. Stupid shrubs. Most of them had thorns that had snagged on his clothes as he'd walked through, and were it not for the fact he was wearing some substantial combat boots, he knew his legs might've bore more holes than swiss cheese at this point.

...the crane and the turtle fell...

Goddamnit, that song would just not quit. Groaning, Jules began to move again, kicking off a branch that had caught against the side of his messenger bag. Ten, fifteen minutes, and he hadn't found a good spot to sit down. Ye Gods, Nature was fucking stupid sometimes. With this admission of defeat, the senior gave up and settled for just stomping a few stringy little weeds out of the base of an equally stringy little tree and plopping himself down between its roots before sliding TickTock from over his shoulder. It didn't take long for him to settle into a comfortable rhythm, admiring the way his notes echoed across the empty of his surroundings. The tune was all too familiar to him... and with his fingers sliding across the strings in an almost blatantly aggressive way, he seemed to want to drive it out of the body of the guitar propped across his knee.

...who's behind you now?

[Reece Williams]

Hippos. Pink hippos. Flying pink hippos. The ones that could go 300 hundred miles per hour. They beat any street racer. Doesn't matter what car you drive. You can't beat those d**n hippos.

And Reece told himself that over and over again.

Maybe I should buy myself a hippo.

He was walking trough the forest, a joint in one hand, the other in his pocket. His eyes were dilated. That was the fourth joint he had today. And the only thing on his mind was the hippos, and his joint. He had on military boots, black shorts, and no shirt. His legs were getting a little ripped up, not enough to bleed, but still marks.

How much were they again?

He took a long drag and let the smoke slide out of his nose. He walked in further, jumping over fallen logs, and forest sh*t. The birds were so loud. "SHUTUP!!!!"

God d**n birds. Only 500 bucks?

He stopped walking as he came across, someone or something. It was a hippo. In reality it was another log. He stopped and stared at it. It was in his way. "Move you stupid hippo!" Yet it didn't move. He walked around it and muttered curse words to himself.

Okay, maybe I don't want one.

He continued to walk and came upon a person. He blinked. Hippos were gone. Boy with guitar was there. He stared at him for a few moments standing there. He wondered if he should beat the sh*t out of him. No reason really. He was bored and didn't feel like buying a hippo. He smiled a little. He felt nothing. No longer could he really think. "You're hot," he told him. Why? He was on weed. That and other things. The boy was good looking, but he probably would never had told him that if he was clean.

[Jules Kaitou]

"Fuck."

Jules's impromptu imprecation rang out loud and clear, sending a few birds roosting in a nearby tree to take off, a string snapping under the careless exertion of force. Instantly popping the wounded finger into his mouth, he set TickTock down in favor of trying to take the edge off the insubstantial cut now twining down his right index finger. Fucking nature. Fucking bad luck. Fucking boring Saturdays. When did it ever end?

The senior currently lapping up the excess red tang of blood from the side of his finger snapped to attention upon hearing vague movement not far off, eyeing the general direction with apprehension. As far as he knew, there were very few people around here who frequented this place -- and now, a small bead of blood collecting on his finger again, he understood exactly why... but even as Reece emerged, he simply kept his eyes trained on the other, forgoing running for the time being.

You're hot.

Okay, so he hadn't expected that. Innocuously arching an eyebrow, Jules slid his guitar back into his lap and averted his eyes, at a loss for what to do. He might not have particularly cared about people, but he wasn't going to let a classmate walk around in what could barely be considered decent. A moment of consideration for what he'd say passed: finally, voice low, he brought his glare back up to Reece.

"And you're... incredibly stoned."

[Reece Williams]

Reece couldn't help but giggle a little. So what if he was stoned. he looked around to make sure that he was talking to him, not one of the hippos. Then he pointed to himself. "Am I?" He walked up to a tree and sat down next to it. He let his back rest against it. He sighed. He wanted to find a nice place to sit, but he was too afraid of the hippos attacking him.

He was sitting butterfly style, which was, awkward. He took another drag. "There's a hippo behind you," he told him monotone. No emotion what so ever in his voice. They seemed to bewitch the mind, those hippos. "They only attack you when you wear a shirt. So you better watch out." When ever he wore a shirt when he was high, they would come running at him. It was annoying, and running a mile because he forgot to take off his damn shirt was annoying as hell.

He started to hum some made up song to himself. he took another drag. He looked around, his eyes couldn't stay still. Truthfully, he had no idea what was in the joint. His friend made it, and he added some random sh*t in there. He couldn't really think about something for a long time, so it kinda went out of his mind. Then he remembered the boy again. "Oh, be carefull, they can fly as well. They tend to hit 300 miles per hour in less then, well, two seconds."

[Jules Kaitou]

Wow.

Jules was stuck.

With someone who was completely out of it.

In a forest.

This has to be a first, he thought with an eyeroll, slinging TickTock back over his shoulder and rising to his feet. Hippos? That had to be the single most out-there thing the brunet had heard all week, and that was after sitting in a class with a substitute teacher who'd thought Versailles was in Britain. It didn't help much that he didn't really recognize Reece enough to be certain of whether they even attended the same school or not; indeed, he lingered in his standing position for a little while before actively trying to figure out what to do, listening to him ramble on about... er... something.

His damn finger still hurt, too.

"How lucid are you?" he queried, monotonous, as if he really didn't care... because Jules didn't particularly feel he was going to get an answer anyway and instead sighed, stepping forward and roughly drawing Reece's arms over his neck and making a move to hoist the other over his shoulder. If the shorter man asked, he'd explain, but there was no way in hell Jules was leaving him out in the open like this, especially considering he was half-naked and therefore ill-suited to the terrain.

And if this didn't work... well... he didn't really need good karma anyway.

[Reece Williams]

Reece, who had finally stopped seeing hippos, didn't know how to answer that. "Let's just say I understand what you are saying...." He was going to add more. it would have gone something like, 'and then it goes out the window'. He smiled a little as he got closer, but then he got too close. Reece's eyes widened when the boy began to pick him up. "No don't!" Reece didn't like it. Well, he was always...paranoid. Even when he was on something.

He pulled away from Jules. "Don't.." He back up and tripped. "Owwwie." Then he started to back away crawling back wards, still facing the other boy. He didn't trust him, nor did he even know his name. Not only that, he liked waking up in the forest. Then he would just go back to the school, like nothing happened. He could feel he dirt nd weeds, scratching against his bare back.

He stopped, about ten feet from when he had started. Well, there was another tree in the way. AND he had dropped his joint. Lovely. He cussed and sighed. Even if the stranger had had good intentions, there was a slim chance Reece would trust them. He stuck out his tongue. He probably would have done something more rational..but for some reason he felt like acting like a little kid.

[Jules Kaitou]

Jules stopped, blinked, shrugged. The plume of earthy-smelling smoke rising from where the other'd dropped his... whatever-that-was swirling in a telltale flag, prompting the larger of the two to nonchalantly slide his boot over to it and stamp it out. Pyromania wasn't his game... and even if the chances of setting a forest fire with something as insubstantial as a joint were slim to none, Jules wasn't going to take that chance. Call it Jules's own brand of paranoia if you will, but fire and his hair just didn't mix well in his head, especially since hairspray was supposed to be... like... flammable or something.

"...Get a shirt on," he managed after a moment, now feeling quite lost again as to what to do. Ignoring him seemed impossible, and leaving him here was out of the question...

Rawr. Conundrums.

[Reece Williams]

Reece stuck his tongue out again. "Oh yeah, I'm going to pull one of those out of my ass. Does it look like I have a shirt? Even if I did, hell no." He pulled his knees up to his chest. He always started seeing hippos when he did.

Meanie.

"Who are you? Even though I'm probably not going to remember." He smiled stupidly and said, "I'm R." Then he rfrowned and a serious look came over his face. He moved the londer piece out of his eyes so he could look at the other properly. "You must be really important, if you think you can order me around.."

[Jules Kaitou]

"Oh, I am."

In spite of the overall ickiness of this impromptu semi-first-meeting, tapping the newly-identified "R" lightly with the toe of his boot, some muscle in the side of Jules's face creaked, dragged, inched millimeter by millimeter into the barest, most minute hint of a half-smirk. It'd been quite a long time since anyone had ever made even vague hints at his self-important attitude, and with the way this kid was shooting back at him, Jules figured it'd probably just get more interesting. Presently, he sat down beside "R" and looked at him for a long moment, the 'smile' gone, and then returned his eyes to the random... grossness of the forest.

"You're going to hurt later," he muttered, dodging the name question altogether. "And if you get some horrible poison of explody pain, and die out here writhing and screaming from lack of medical attention, it's not going to be my fault."

His mouth clapped shut the moment after the last syllable had left his throat; a hazy memory of the last time he'd joked morbidly with someone came unbidden in his head and he rolled his eyes, sincerely regretting that. People were just so d**n touchy sometimes.

Please, for the love of God, let this kid have a sense of humor. Please.

[Reece Williams]

If R wasn't high, he probably would have grabbed the boot and twisted. It was so tempting. His reflexes at the moment were slow. He just watched and listened. He realized the boy wasn't going to answer his question. He sighed. That really wasn't threatening, especially since Reece always carried a dagger with him. He shot him a small glare. It only lasted for a second. And plus, he sat down next to him, which obviously meant he meant no harm. Or did it?

"If you didn't want to tell me your name, youcouldhaveatleastmadeoneup." Reece was unable to talk clearly. He didn't care though, he didn't plan on saying much anyways. He turned his head so he could look at him better. Slightly more interested now that he decided not to answer his question. The name. He was surprised he hadn't asked why he called himself R. He would tell you when he was high..maybe when he wasn't. It depended on how he was feeling.