Ash Holloway
Location: Quarantine (Conference Room)
Skills: N/A
A brief flash of surprise and anger flashed across Ash's features as his head turned sharply to Thalia. His grasp of the Spanish language was actually pretty good. It was his foreign language selection in high school and he continued it as an elective in secondary education. His proficiency continued to improve when he was stationed in South America, and he received one hell of an education in the brutal, conversational aspect of the language because of his involvement with Alicia.
The big cosmic joke on both of them was that Ash really was the kind of guy that her cousin would have
follado por deporte. Maybe it started as sport (who's to say?), but they did have an actual relationship. They were genuinely close. But Ash didn't know that Alicia was this woman's cousin any more than she knew that they were an item once upon a time. Then why did it suddenly strike him, even briefly, on an emotional level? Ash glared at the woman, staring right in her eyes - those oddly familiar, hazel eyes. He raised his hand to point a finger in her general direction, a sort of light gesture to indicate that he'd get back to her later. He was busy at the moment.
There was the tiniest lingering thought to Beatrice's last words to him -
he was weak - indicating the younger soldier. It seemed to be as much of a warning as it was a descriptor. Ash responded with a barely audible agreement,
"Yeah." A person like that made things interesting, and not in a good way. The kind of person who panics at sudden changes or waited until people viewed as enemies (whether they were or not) were unaware or asleep to preemptively attack. The kind of guy that sized up people for a fight before a problem existed. Well, he was given warnings. More than one, from more than one source. What happened past that point was just going to happen.
Ash listened politely to the older man as he spoke, processing new information. A couple of points stood out to him as important. One of which being that the man was a former captive of Eden. He was pretty sure that it checked out, seeing as it was said openly in front of two of his teammates who he knew were part of the raid on Eden. So he was a rescue.
"That means you might recognize someone from there if they came knocking. Good to know." His words were dry, bereft of any bias of inflection one way or another except for his mild but everpresent Virginian accent. He did give an approving nod as Manny pointed out the amputation handiwork with two others of his group.
"Not bad." Though his words did not say it, he was rather impressed. Two limb removals, both alive, no continuing infection as far as he could tell from casual glance. Manny had brought proof with him that he had saved lives.
As to the highly general question about "his story" so far, Ash could not comment with anything very revealing.
"After a while, maybe. That's a lot of ground, and some of it's not so nice." The same could be said of almost anybody these days. If you were alive, chances are you had to do a lot of questionable things to stay that way. Even for a relative Boy Scout like Ash. Or
especially for a Boy Scout like Ash, depending on how one looked at it. Besides, the story of his life might read like a Greek Tragedy if someone put it to paper. He had no difficulties whatsoever throwing his two cents in concerning the issue of Hunter, however:
"I don't think that talking for an evening is going to put much sense in the boy. He's either dealing with something or legitimately has a malfunction. Either way, hard pass." The Captain was a fan of keeping things like this out in the open. In Ash's mind, it was best that the younger man was in the room with him. If he was a threat, he was foremost a threat to him and not someone he cared about. The situation would sort itself out, one way or another.
For the moment, Ash was realizing what was playing on the television back behind him. It sparked a memory of one of the last conversations that he had with Thana, prior to ...everything. He had half a mind to quietly excuse himself and hurl something at the screen, else mention something scathing to the person who put it on. But either option would hardly be fair, with or without context. And it was a really good movie. Luckily, something occurred to divert his attention elsewhere.
Ash almost snapped to attention when Atticus returned, announcing that the additional guest of the establishment had arrived. He held up his hand to politely request that Manny hold off responding for a moment, as he was interested in getting a look at the latest arrival. In the intervening seconds, Ash maintained a solid, emotionless visage and straightened his posture, as a man expecting to either inspect or be inspected. When he saw the older man walk through the door, however, all of that changed.
"Huh..." It was unclear whether it was a question or a quiet laugh. More followed, quickly solving that mystery.
"Heh heh... oh, man. That's just... HA!" He took a confident step or two toward the man,
"You don't call," began Ash with humored sarcasm. His accent was a notably bolder.
"You don't write," he continued,
"And then you just drop by unexpected. Goddamn, Victor; It's good to see y..." He stopped, noting that the man was looking straight past him, over to Jack, Tati, and their baby boy. Ash still held a smile, but it was subdued behind a more dutiful nature. He crossed the distance, careful to stay out of direct line of sight between Victor and those he had been searching for. As he neared the man, Ash extended his hand.
"Come on, Froggy," he said clearly and quietly.
"Almost there. Let's get you to 'em."
Thalia Carmichael
Location: Quarantine (Conference Room)
Skills: N/A
Thalia felt like a spectator. Everything that was going on around her seemed to bob to and fro, fro and to, and she was like a random kid at a birthday party in a bowling alley that no one was paying any particular attention to. As long as she pushed the ball down the lane when it was her turn, it didn't look like anyone cared what she was doing. So there she sat, still sideeyeing the Captain with coolly fierce exterior despite the fact that she figured that she had gone too far with the "sport-fucking" comment. Thalia did feel a certain sense of relief that it was met with a literal and figurative finger wag instead of escalating. She had been serious when she had told Alexander that full attention being off of them was preferable for her, given the situation.
Originally, the goal was to open conversation with Ash. She had questions about her family and the Fairburn girls. Barring that, slip into the people from Newnan, though her more recent dip away from social skills was making the possibility of a more or less decent first impression more of a chore that it really should have been. Okay, now wasn't a great time, either. Eventually she was going to get that man alone, but right now just wasn't happening. And Mugsy seemed to be holding himself together better, even dropping into the middle of an ongoing conversation. Hell, he was better at it than she was just then. He was going to be okay.
Thalia gave a light slap to Alexander's knee with her remaining hand and gave him a little nod.
"Hey, I'm going to see what's up with the TV, 'k? Gimmie a yell if yah need something." With that, she rose from her seat and began to make her way over to the chairs and recliners around the film at hand,
The Princess Bride. Thalia smiled. It wasn't much, but it was real and infectious, and reminded her that once upon a time, far back before the Zeds were eating the living, even before she knew her biological father or what half of her family was, Thalia was a little girl from Massachusetts who liked cute stories like this. Especially this one. It was a classic. And it had everything: Fencing, fighting, torture, revenge, giants, monsters, chases, escapes, true love, miracles... For that matter, she remembered that she really liked My Little Pony, too.
"Hey guys," she said, keeping her words brief so as not to overextend. Anyone looking in her direction would see her setting a hand on the back of a nearby chair, staring at the scene unfolding on the television. Fine, no problem. If she couldn't immediately get in with the Newnan people, then she would probably have more luck with the crazy ones over here.
"Princess Bride... awesome." Again, attention was shifted heavily away from herself as the new guy was brought in. Wow. Just wow. This place had more rapid-fire emotional ups and downs than a 1980s telenovella. She was sticking with the TV crew for now.
Hank Wright
Location: Quarantine (Conference Room)
Skills: N/A
gruffly inquired Hank, propping his hands behind his head in a manner that suggested clear repose.
"I'm not the Lord High Commander of the TV, no matter how awesome that job title sounds. Don't worry (and I know that dig was because you're so concerned with my feelings there, Sportacus), if Erica puts on something boring or unmasculine or a little too "Made For TV Lifetime Original Movie" - which definitely counts as both boring and unmasculine, but I digress - then I'll be more than happy to sit alone with my thoughts and give the back of my eyelids a good, hard stare for an hour or two. Just remember: The louder I snore, the more I like the movie." He gave Nigel a quick thumbs-up before replacing his hand back behind his head.
"Okay there, buddy? Okay... Now hush, I wanna see if Peter Falk ever gets that kid to shut the hell up and let him read the damn book, already." But speaking of Erica, Hank caught the air of sympathy for Nigel having to room with he and Wayne for the foreseeable. He gave a derisive smirk in her direction but reserved a continued rant for a later, indeterminate time. So much as they, as a group, didn't have the best of personality meshing and technically didn't have that solid of a beginning, they all had been in each other's company for the past few months now. They had opportunity to go their separate ways a few times, but for whatever reason stuck it out together, all the way here from the Okefenokee Swamp, of all places. Yeah, it was hard living with each other, but he trusted the people around him to cover his back, just as they (hopefully) trusted him to defend them solidly with a garden spade. Ok, he
was pretty good with that shovel, being truthful. But still...
As Thalia approached, and immediately thereafter the explosion of movement and happy from elsewhere in the room, Hank took the moment to remain reserved. Let the people have their moment without comment or involvement. It looked like they needed a dose of whatever joy came from the man's presence. Hank was an asshole, as he would tell you, but not a
fucking asshole. To Thalia, he just waved at a seat and said,
"Yeah, yeah. Sit, don't sit. Damn good movie. You know, for a love story. Eh... Hank, Wayne, Erica, Sportacus." He gave the basest of introductions before turning his attention back to the TV. There was a moment going on behind them all that he wanted absolutely nothing to do with.
