#tongowheel

[stapcs]

 ❛  ━ i'm fine ... ❜ exhausted , it was the thinnest lie she could tell. lie wasn't the right word , she was fine overall; a little beaten & bruised , but that was par for the course. work took her away constantly and sometimes not only was it simply just not something she could disclose ... it was a matter of not wanting to worry anyone. ( earth to christine , disappearing without a word definitely worries people ) . she tightens her grip on her phone while her other hand keeps the icepack on her temple.  ❛ i - i'm working a case. you know how that goes . ❜ there's a hollow laugh that follows the statement; careful, booth, you're letting your cracks show. her entire body ached, but she signed up for that. chasing bad guys was known to do a number on somebody & it touched her that zack was worried enough to reach out.

 ❛ sorry i didn't call, but sometimes it's such a quick turnaround on travel that there simply is no time.   ❜ she sighs, only wincing slightly when she adjusted her position.  ❛ but to, y'know, actually answer your question ... i'm somewhere in washington state. should be home in a couple of days, i can tell you all about it then, zackironi. ❜

@tongowheel , zack addy : where are you ?  nobody’s heard from you .

[zeveth]

@tongowheel / siraba said "i know how easy it is for a person to lose herself in the galaxy."

her head feels heavy. she gives in and clunks it rather pathetically against siraba's shoulder. "y-eah..." her voice comes out tight, and it hurts. she tries to swallow it away, but it still feels like a cracked desert. squeezing her eyes shut, she pinches half-heartedly at the dull ache behind their sockets. "thank you. i... it is a big galaxy, isn't it?" her shoulders jolt with a silent laugh. stability doesn't always come like it used to. "i never quite... realised that, before."

[guttersniper]

@tongowheel said: it’s life. you can miss it if you don’t open your eyes.

deep space nine.

he wants -- after that comes to him like a slap to the face -- to get down from this bar stool and leave. the fuck does he know? that would only seem petulant, though. cowardly. therefore, he stays firmly rooted. a frown paints itself onto his features, shuttering them momentarily in some imbalanced commingling of frustration and disappointment. 

his left hand fidgets with the straw in the drink in front of him, suddenly losing his appetite, or whatever it is he’d conjured up for the sake of playing at normal, like his body worked like everyone else’s, and hadn’t experienced years of stress and undernourishment. 

the tension doesn’t quite fade, but shifts in its nature, away from irked expression and toward some uncomfortable, raw and bloodied truth.

“ but i -- “ he shouldn’t be talking to quark about this, for -- for prophets’ sake. “ it’s just, sometimes, when i can’t sleep, “ which is often, “ i wonder why i was the one that -- actually got a chance to have one. “ a pause, for a slightly dizzying moment in which mutt realizes what he’s just said. 

he takes three bites in quick succession, finishes off the drink, and avoids looking up from his plate. 

[guttersniper]

@tongowheel said: there are too many ways to get into serious trouble here.

deep space nine.

the din within quark’s is always overwhelming. he’d had to train himself -- force himself -- to acclimate to it. the constant chatter, the drunken patrons, the hypnotizing sounds of multiple simultaneous rounds of dabo and tongo, the mesmerizing lights, the enticing menu items. all part of the business. 

thoutania, at least, hadn’t been so flashy. 

“ mm. “ it’s all he gives her, at first. he’s taken a break at her insistence. quark would call it slacking off, especially since he’d made him wear something of nog’s when he’d taken over his shifts for him. (being told you can’t make me look bad, and him responding you don’t need any of my help with that.) 

his boots press against the edge of the table in front of him. reclined back, his chair’s front legs hover above the ground. “ way i see it, if you try too hard to stay out of trouble, it’ll only find you quicker, and that’s worse. “

[guttersniper]

@tongowheel said: i’ll miss you. / when nog goes off to starfleet academy :(

deep space nine.

his brow knits, leaving him looking, unbeknownst to him, entirely too much like sisko for a few seconds. it isn’t often that nog -- in all his endless puffed-chest and swaggering bravado, something mutt knows is an act, more oft than not -- allows himself to appear vulnerable. 

he understands. perhaps better than anyone, even if most the situations they’ve found themselves in that taught them to never expose the softness of their bellies are as wide apart from each other as the station and everything on the other side of the wormhole. 

“ you’ll live. “ it sounds needlessly callous, something he’s sure nog knows he’s capable of being, but the expression that takes over his initial reaction signifies that he’s only teasing. something rare in and of itself, but nog’s his friend. he supposes he can make an exception. “ think of it: you have bragging rights over me. you got to earth before i did. “

it wouldn’t be a stretch to say he somehow softens further, voice lowering as if to share a secret. or, maybe, he doesn’t want nog to be able to pinpoint his own sadness at being separated. “ i’ll watch after jake, your dad, too, and keep your uncle in line. “ 

[zeveth]

@tongowheel / ilo ve youuu lalalalaa

“Vampires in Venice, Ushaan Duel on Andoria, Nova Scotian Scuba Diving, Triple-Oh Seven... Oh, don’t you have anything interesting, Quark? Anything new?”

She’s looking directly at Frisax and leaning, lazy, against the bar, fixing him with a smug gaze that says the mistake was thoroughly purposeful. While he sputters, she retrieves a small, amber data rod from her pocket and holds it to the light, glancing meaningfully at Siraba.

“Because I have. Quark? Give us three hours in holosuite five, won’t you? I’ve acquired a program I simply must share with my girlfriend.”

[guttersniper]

@tongowheel​ said: put this on before you catch your death.

anne with an e.

she says it like he has a choice, and he maneuvers his arms with her holding it out for him from behind. he pops the collar once the rain jacket is on him. call it something of a habit. apparently, judging by the adjustments made to the length of the sleeves and body, he’s grown some since he was last here. it doesn’t feel like it, it never does. he tries not to let it bother him, especially when he saw jake absolutely shoot up, and even nog, for a little bit there -- and it’s such a juvenile grudge that he nearly laughs at the fact it came from him.

the last time he was here ... that had been before the war, and it seems so long ago.

“ -- s’it look good? “

[guttersniper]

@tongowheel​ said: honesty isn’t actually a policy, though, is it?

anne with an e.

a pause, and mutt chews his lower lip, then seems to straighten up his spine, as though resolved to some freshly made decision. deadpan: “ well, no. it’s a noun. “