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[handleyourshit]

  


This is Rosita.  I'll hit you back when I can.

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[hippie_ninja]

"I guess I am," he admits. "Or was. I just... Don't want you to think it wouldn't matter if something happened to you. You're-"

But she's probably had this talk before. "It matters. So we all three need to be careful."

[handleyourshit]

She watches him, the quiet taper where words fail him or he changes his mind about what he was going to say. About what needs to be said.

She already loved him. She lets herself feel it, lets it bleed into her expression, something tender and visceral and achingly loyal.

"We're badasses, J. We're the best our communities have to offer. But we're both used to being the front line, and making snap decisions for ourselves because people are depending on us." And that was necessary. That was what it took to survive back home: the willingness to trust a group of strangers without anyone's permission, or to pick their way alone amongst walkers to get to a building that might have nothing or might have everything they need for the next month.

"We all need to reassess."

[hippie_ninja]

He can feel that same feeling echoed in his own expression, a simple but vibrant kind of love he'd never really been able to have in the old world.

"What do you think that looks like? We check in with each other more?"

[handleyourshit]

"We don't fuck around with... Well, any nonhumans, but especially anything that has to do with the virus. A virus." She makes sure to keep her voice calm because this isn't an attack on Drake specifically or Jesus's decision to trust him. It's much less rational and much more deep seated than that:

"Even if one of us doesn't think it's important. We've all suffered too much because of it. We're not reasonable about it. It's easier to think straight if we're not surprised by it, even if there's genuinely no risk. Does that sound like something we can agree on?"

[hippie_ninja]

"Vampires count," he says, a fervent note in his voice surprising him. "They may not be as contagious as the virus but they're just as dangerous in other ways. So we stay in contact when we mess around with them. Okay?"

[handleyourshit]

"Okay," she agrees, even though she could argue that both she and Carver have been up front about dealing with vampires - it won't get them anywhere because they were all behaving the same way and anyway she can hear that this is along the same vein for Jesus that she's talking about for all of them. Something fear and defense based that triggers fight or flight regardless of need. Something merciless and decisive.

If they're aware of it though, they can plan around it. "What else?"

[hippie_ninja]

He thinks, but he's always been a scout, always been second in command even when he was forced to lead.

"I think that's the main thing for me. We communicate. I'll be better about it."

[handleyourshit]

"About things or people with the community," she clarifies - because that's what it is, even though it's still just a weather and time damaged building on a stretch of empty land right now. "Or with any viruses, vampires, and other nonhumans. And be fair. Even if you know I'm not going to like something, you have to give me that chance, and I have to give you the same. It's a right we have as a group."

A beat. "I'll make sure Carver understands, too."

[hippie_ninja]

He nods. "I've been up front about everything else. John's powers, Scott's powers. Jean."

It isn't hard for him to communicate, but the scout side of him leads him to jump into things first sometimes, like it does for her. If they can stick to this maybe they can find a better way of doing things.

[handleyourshit]

"I need to know what you do know about how the virus Drake had affected him. I need to know what to watch for if Duplicity pulls some bullshit again."

She'll never forgive the city for invoking Abraham like it did. Even if she could have learned to live here in contentment, she'll never forget how it used him against her and if she had no other reason to want to cripple it given half a chance, that alone would be enough.

[hippie_ninja]

"Well, they turn all white. Albino white, their hair, their eyes are red-rimmed. They eat food, but they need brains to keep the virus from fully taking over. When it does they're more like walkers and they can't come back from it." He drinks the last of his bourbon.

"But I'm saying all this from memory. You should talk to Drake to get the full scope of it. I'm probably missing things I didn't fully understand, like how different brains can affect them."

[handleyourshit]

"I'm surprised you didn't ask." Why this has kicked Rosita and obviously Carver so hard in the fragile places the virus carved out in their emotional landscapes, but not Jesus; why the vampirism bothers him more than it does them.

"Do you want him involved in the community?"

[hippie_ninja]

"Yeah, I do." He's bringing people in, but not all of them are for the farmstead. Drake, though, and K are.

[handleyourshit]

"Then we need to know."

Others might be able to budge on this and she hopes that someday, it feels as ridiculous to her as it might to those people.

Not them though, and not today.

[hippie_ninja]

"You can give me a list of exact questions you want answered, or you can talk to him. However you want to do it." He'll get the answers she wants.

"But we also need to know what Grayson can do."

[handleyourshit]

"You know all the same things I do to watch out for. How to tell when someone's been bitten or the infection is ramping up, what the timeline is. What we need to know to get out of the way in time if his virus shows up here for whatever reason, however it might."

She still trusts Jesus. She doesn't need to do it herself.

The follow up is only fair then and she nods.

"I'll talk to Carver."

[hippie_ninja]

He nods; he'll get all that information.

"I can talk to Grayson. I probably should... Dominants and submissives are just going to be a part of our lives of we all keep working together, and I want us to."

[handleyourshit]

"Same rule for you though: you tell me when you do, and we meet up after," she says after a moment of considering telling him to leave it with her. She wants his thoughts on it. She wants his eyes on it.

"I'm still undecided about Jacob and Dinah." Speaking of pairings.

[hippie_ninja]

He slips some money into the till he still needs to count, and pours them another round. He's feeling a little looser now, a little warmer with alcohol. They aren't fighting now, he can relax.

"Undecided about being paired, or bringing them to the farm?"

[handleyourshit]

"The contracts are fine," she can say readily. The second part is harder, though not by much.

"And obviously if there's an emergency that's different. But I'm not sure I want to bring them in on the property."

[hippie_ninja]

Jesus ran Hilltop as a sort of actual sanctuary, taking in people Alexandria sent away, so he takes this in with a small frown. "What has you doubting them?"

[handleyourshit]

"I don't know Dinah very well. I don't know how she'd react to... any of it, yet," she admits. Dinah is a city kid through and through, like so many of them were. She also just hasn't seen her in a real emergency yet.

"And Jacob - he has his own things going that I don't get to know about. When he's done with me, just seems easier to me if we both take our secrets with us."

[hippie_ninja]

They're fair points. He won't argue for or against them coming, the farm idea is still in its infancy and they need to get it settled before they start packing more people in. He knows that.

"When he's done with you?" He echoes. "What if he wants to stay with you? I...really don't think he'll ever go back to Vrenille."

[handleyourshit]

She finishes the second half of her drink, and nudges the empty glass back towards him across the bar.

"Why not?" she asks, first.

[hippie_ninja]

He hesitates, and takes a moment to fill her drink while he thinks how to explain. "Vrenille doesn't seem very interested in giving him that chance. Their relationship had complications I think Vrenille doesn't want to navigate again."