Early morning.

[flint_garou]

No, it's not safe. It's not safe.

20 July, 2012
The moon is in the waxing New (Ragabash) Moon phase (11% full).

Not many people are out yet, but a skinny, tired-looking teen makes his way along the sidewalks, along the edges of buildings and occasionally kicking a car. Flint's walking in the general direction of the tenement, slowly, looking a good bit more of a mess for the hour. There's blood on his pants, too, and his left arm is folded in front of him and pressed against his side, held carefully as he walks.

Slug walks down the street from the direction of the tenement building, his sunglasses riding up on top of his head. The Gnawer boy wanders along with a small paper bag in one hand, likely from one of the local donut stores. He stops near the mouth of an alley and takes out his cigarettes, coaxing one to life with a battered zippo.

Flint is preoccupied to say the least, or simply not paying attention to where he's going when he nears Slug.

Slug snaps his lighter shut and comes up puffing away at his smoke, just as Flint draws near. He blinks once, then studies the boy carefully for a few seconds before piping up. "Flint?" He calls quietly, not sounding entirely sure.

The young Glass Walker turns at the mention of his name, looks at Slug for a moment, and there's clearly recognition, as well as guilt and panic that wash across the boy's face. For all that the moon is new, the teen's as skittish as if it were big, and Flint uses his free arm to cradle the injured one.

Slug takes a step forward to meet the Walker, regarding him curiously. He gives him a brief once over, then whistles and asks. "Aren't you a bit young to be getting into bar fights, or… Whatever it was you've been up to? You alright?"

Flint looks over at Slug, and flinches. "Just, I just. I just need, need… to. To go home," Flint says. His voice is pained, uncertain, overwhelmed.

Slug smiles around the cigarette filter held between his lips, and turns back towards the way he'd come. "I'll walk you home, was just gonna turn back anyways." He clears his throat, still giving flint the occasional look of dubious curiosity. "Hope whatever kept you up all night was fun."

Flint gets half a block or so, before he has to pause, breathing heavily. He shakes his head at the Gnawer, and then reaches into his pocket. When it comes out again, the boy's hand is clenched into a fist, around a closed, bloodied pocketknife. "I, I… home," he repeats, almost pleading. "I'm sorry."

Slug doesn't make much chit chat on the way up the street. He merely puffs away at his cigarette, perhaps waiting for Flint to break the silence between them. When they stop and Flint brings out the knife, the Gnawer flicks his cigarette into the street and turns to face Flint. "The blood ain't somethin' that gets my notice, but… That is. You'a… Uh, alright?"

Flint just clenches the knife tightly, as though it's a comfort object, then takes a step, another step towards the tenement. "Blood?" he asks. The teen's more cooperative than he is responsive, at this point, but withdrawn and quiet.

Slug reaches out to put a hand upon Flint's shoulder and gently leads him towards the tenement, moving a bit faster than before. The Gnawer's eye busily scans the streets around them, making sure they're not followed.

The galliard is, more or less easily led until they get to the tenement, though he flinches and pulls away from the touch a few times. When they're inside, he looks between Slug, and the stairs, but goes for the couch instead. "Don't make me shift," he says, that same quiet tone from before.

Slug walks over towards the elevator once they're both inside and slaps at the door button a few times. He then turns and leans against the nearby wall, regarding Flint warily. "Well." The Gnawer says, clearing his throat. "Right now I'd rather make you come up to my place, so, y'know. We can talk without getting the good furniture all bloody."

Flint looks at the elevator and pauses, then turns. He's still compliant and dazed, almost obedient. "I, okay. Okay," he says.

Slug steps back into the elevator when it arrives and gestures for Flint to follow, lingering near the button panel.

Inside the elevator, the knife is dropped into his pocket, the boy's attention turning to his arm, then the elevator. Flint is silent, sullen almost.

Slug spends the short ride in silence, and doesn't a thing when they reach the second floor hall. He just gestures for Flint to follow and leads him a few doors down, glancing back over his shoulder ever so often. The Ragabash throws open his door for Flint and waves him in, lingering near the entrance. "Congrats. You're the first company I've had in like, a month."

Flint nods, looking around when they're inside, and looks at Slug, and then moves over to sit down, somewhere, on the floor. There's a shudder to his shoulders, a harsh breath in as Flint wraps his hand around the makeshift bandage on his arm.

"So." Slug says once they're both in, closing the door behind him. He flicks the deadbolt shut, then sits down on the floor with his back against the door. "Something bad happened."

The teen looks over at Slug, shakes his head. "I," he responds. "I, did." Flint spends another long moment visibly struggling, rage, overwhelmed, and even though he's usually quiet, he's quite clearly not entirely himself. The makeshift bandage is clawed at with one hand.

"Kill someone?" Slug asks, his tone muted. "I took you away from the cameras 'cause that shit's everywhere. You were walking on autopilot, like someone that just came walkin' out a battlefield."

Flint shakes his head and looks at his arm again. "Mine," he explains, struggling for words. "I, to me. The, I did." He pauses, falls to his knees, looks away from Slug now. The struggle continues, evident, the boy's shoulders tense and drawn.

Slug gradually stands up when the boy's behaviour grows stranger and stranger, eying him a bit warily. The Ragabash's hackles would be raising, if he had them in this form. He takes a half step forward, but thinks better of it. He watches Flint with growing unease writ across his face, his brow furrowing.

Flint's fingers twine in the makeshift bandage again, and he pauses, seems to calm himself. "I…" Eventually, the struggle begins again, and the Walker shifts to glabro, running fingers over the area that heals. Two significantly sized cuts to the boy's forearm heal as he kneels there.

"Dude." Slug murmurs not long after the Walker shifts into Glabro, eying his wounds skeptically. He cautiously starts to wander over, like a bird hopping up to a kill that's still being fed upon. He stops a good five feet away from Flint, not wanting to approach any further. "I'd ask if you're ok, but… "

Flint settles where he's seated, and looks up at Slug. The expression continues to be one of guilt, and well. Flint's Not Okay, but he's having equal difficulty articulating why he isn't. "Slug-rhya?" he eventually asks. "I. I wasn't going to and then I did," he explains.

"Yeeeah… Well." Slug reaches into his pocket for his smokes again. He deliberately picks through the pack for a particular cigarette, then brings it to life as quickly as he's able. As a cloud of smoke blossoms around his head, he takes a few careful steps forward and attempts to settle in beside Flint. "Well, there ain't no one better in this place to confess to than me." He murmurs.

The boy's a bit skittish, jumpy, but doesn't back up. His fingernails dig into his arm, and then he looks over. Flint takes a breath. "I, it's stupid, I did it and, I. Promised I wouldn't." The words are slow, hesitant. "Rina asked, I. I knew I… wasn't. Safe. I."

Slug puffs up good and plenty while Flint's speaking, surrounding the two of them in a thin veil of smoke. He's careful not to blow any directly at Flint, but the boy will inevitably end up breathing it in as it circulates about. "Chill, man. Chill. It's safe here, y'know? Safe. Ain't no one here but the two of us, and I don't really do the 'judging' thing."

Flint shakes his head from side to side, and that pocketknife gets pulled out, closed into his hand. It's bloody, but the blood, by the circumstances, probably belongs to the cliath. "Not safe," he insists.

Slug snaps his fingers, then reaches out and gives Flint's shoulder a gentle touch. "Buddy, you're here with me. You're about as safe as you're going to get outside of a bank vault. I'm a 'Rhya', so you know I'm right."

Flint's shoulders are tense, drawn, and don't give at all at the touch. He looks at the Fostern, though. "I. I thought, Rina having the. Knife would, would. Help, enough. It… it didn't, it didn't." The guilt in his voice is coupled with hurt.

Slug gradually works Flint into a pseudo-hug, gingerly pulling him in so they're resting side to side with his arm carefully set around Flint's shoulders. "Hey, man. Hey. Do me a favor? Can you just… Breathe deep for a minute? Nice big breaths, man. You need to get some air, it'll make you feel better."

Flint nods, slowly, and there's compliance, a bit of calm coming, before he pulls away from the touch. "Trying. It… too much," is the next explanation, only a little bit less coherent than Flint's usual methods of communication.

Slug lets Flint slip away from his arm without a fight. The Gnawer boy lets it drop down into his lap, and afterward, he leans forward with a breathy sigh and shakes his head. "Hey." He says, after a second or two. "You wanna get cleaned up? Might make you feel better if you weren't wearin' yer blood."

Flint tightens his grip on the pocketknife, and the expression on the galliard's face is decidedly dark. And equally unpleasant, even as Flint shifts back down to homid. "No," he says, quietly, one thumb running along where cuts had just been. "Roof?"

"You wanna go up there?" Slug asks, glancing between the Galliard and the door. "I won't stop you, but man… You really look like you should get some sleep."

Flint takes a breath in, and nods. "Kit," he adds, quietly. "Kit, then roof, then… then sleep?" Not, it seems, like Flint can manage to get up by himself. He tries, pushing halfway to his feet, then doesn't get up further.

"You go up to the roof like that and you'll probably fall off, like that one girl… Uh. Can't remember her name." Slug scratches at one of his cheeks, then shakes his head and sighs. "Dude, seriously, go to sleep. Here, in your apartment, on the hallway floor- Anywhere. You're about five seconds away from dropping face first onto the floor."

Flint compensates by shifting back into glabro, and looks at Slug. "I… I need to," he explains, fist closing around the knife, nails digging into his palm. "I need to, it. It's, too much, I can't, I can't. If. Lex said, someone there, if. If I needed to." The emotional state isn't very far off from frenzy, recognisably so and low on willpower, overwhelmed.

Slug lifts up both his hands, his cigarette dangling from between two fingers. It's the universal sign for 'I surrender'. "I can't go up there myself, but… After you're done, y'know, doin' whatever it is you gotta do? Get some rest, man. We can talk again after you get up again." Slug gradually rises up to his feet and stretches out, yawning broadly.

Flint gets a bit of a quizzical look at the ragabash when he says that he can't. "Roof?" he asks, again. "It. Not, allowed, to. I'm not. To go up there, alone. Lex, said."

Slug turns his back on Flint and starts walking towards the door, occasionally glancing back at the Galliard. "You want me to call Rina for you?"

The boy shakes his head, a little, and there's a few steps forward, when the control that the teen's been exerting over his rather volatile mental state comes tumbling down, a wave of guilt in his expression, the way that the pocketknife clatters to the floor, and that's about the only warning that the Gnawer gets before there's a frenzied, angry crinos in the less than open space, and heading straight for him.

Slug is merely halfway to the door when the Walker finally loses his internal struggle. The wary Gnawer is thankfully quick to notice and promptly shifts up himself, spinning in place whilst slipping into his battle skin. The black Crinos does not rush to meet Flint, but sinks down into a squat posture with it's back against the door. It's claws dig into the floor with an audible scratch, leaving deep gouges in the wood.

The younger crinos is a blur of uncontrolled and untempered rage as he launches himself forward, claws and teeth. Requiem's attack is simply for the thing that is now blocking the way between him, and the door, for the first opening.

Black-Light eyes the charging Crinos with a modicum of predatory calm, like a snake staring down a threat. He waits for his perceived opportunity, then strikes, launching himself forward with a monsterous shout. He swings his right arm in a quick backhand directed at the Crinos' face, but the real blow is the left hand. With all the force he can push out of his legs, the Gnawer brings his clawed fist forward in a massive uppercut aimed right at the Walker's snout.

Requiem snarls, enraged and still moving in a blur of forward speed that only makes him meet the uppercut, stumble backwards, and with frenzy-granted ignorance of pain, attempt to charge forward to rake claws across the Gnawer, again.

Black-Light brings up his right arm again to catch the brunt of Requiem's counter attack. The Galliard's claws bite into his forearm and leave him with a streak of dripping wet wounds, but the Gnawer does no more than snarl and growl. The Ragabash continues his assault with brutish mentality, throwing another brutal punch at Requiem's face with his striking arm. He surges forward with the speed that rage grants, aiming to tackle his opponent and pummel him into submission.

The younger garou crumples under one of those pummeling strikes, though there's still struggle left for a moment, and then he's unconscious. And then, not more than a moment longer, Flint's back in his birthform, a bit more scratched than he was, but quite definitely out.

Black-Light barely manages to miss knocking Requiem into the couch, but the coffee table isn't so lucky. The cinderblocks survive, but the wood does not, snapping beneath the brunt of the falling Crinos. Once he goes down, the advancing Crinos halts, then takes a few deep breaths, and gradually sinks down into the form of Homid. He looks around on the floor behind him and finds the cigarette that he dropped. The Gnawer brings it back to his lips and starts puffing, even as he walks over to Flint's unconscious form and slings the boy over his shoulder. The muttering, bleeding Gnawer brings the boy into his bedroom and tosses him onto his bed to sleep off his terrible night, then slinks back out into the living room.