Slums apartment #1089: Jousts Pad

[[LEON] Joust]

The apartment wasn't anything fancy. In fact it was quite the opposite. A simple 3 room apartment with just what Joust needed to survive. There was a matress and a wardrobe in the bedroom, the living area with a built in kitchen had the basics. A table, with a single chair, a counter at the kitchen, a fridge and a bunch of cupboards. And the closest thing to a stove in the joint was a portable hot plate Joust had connected to the wall socket near the fridge. The third room was her bathroom, which contained a toilet, a shower, and a sink pretty much. Not the fanciest joint but most of Jousts money went to suppling her habit.

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Continued from here.

Joust entered the apartment room, leaving the door open, but making no real motion for the person to come in. She figured the door was enough. Joust was walking towards the bathroom of her small apartment, stripping her clothes off along the way but she did stop at her pants for a moment. Long enough to look at the individual, to see if he had entered and shut the door. No matter what the case she would just point to the single char in the room.

"Wait." She said, before continuing into the bathroom so that she could get herself cleaned properly. She didn't have to worry about anyone stealing from her place. Her most 'prized' possession in the apartment was just the hot plate anyway, and no one was really going to steal that. Still, a few minutes after she had disapeared into the bathroom, leaving her clothes strewn about her apartment, the water could be heard running as Joust began to shower, cleaning herself.

[wanderer]

When the door was left open after Joust walked in Eric followed after a second and closed the door behind him. He turned to see Joust half stripped and pointing at a chair, telling him to wait. He nodded and moved to the chair, carefully observing to make sure that there wasn't anything like needles left over from Joust shooting up Heroin or something like that. Once he saw that there wasn't he sat, taking a careful look around the place. Once he did that he saw that the room was quite spartan in decoration and furnishing. It also wasn't too messy, not that it could be with the little there was in the room. The only thing that lay on the floor were the cloths that Joust had just discarded.

As he heard the shower running, Eric closed his eyes. He wasn't going to sleep, he couldn't in this sort of situation, but he was focusing on his Qi. An aura of cold surrounded him as he focused on reaching into the reserve of energy within himself. The edges of his body would seem to flicker as his essence tried to erase his presence from the surrounding area. It was a simple exercise he did to practice utilizing his aura and strengthening it. He would continue to do so until Joust left the shower or spoke to him while she was cleaning herself up, whichever came first.

[[LEON] Joust]

Joust remained in the shower, silent as the water trickled over her body. It felt good to get wet, and clean. She stayed in the waters flow for a good ten minutes until she finally, reluctantly turned off the water. Grabbing her towel off the shower rail, she opened the door of her apartment without hesitation, crossing the living room whilst drying herself. Paying her visitor no mind whilst she entered her bedroom. It would be a few more minutes until Joust reemerged into the living room. She was wearing her only other set of clothes, army green cargo pants with a long sleeved black top. Apon reentering her living room, she stood at the edge of her bedroom door, and began her interogation.

"Alright, got a name squire?" She said, now that she had had a chance to shower and clean up, she felt a lot better and more self confidant, no longer in the weak and shitty mood she had been in before. She remained at her bedroom door, waiting for a response.

[wanderer]

Eric's eyes opened when he heard the sound of the bathroom door open. As Joust walked across the room, Eric watched quietly and unabashed. He made not of the scars that covered Joust's torso, arms, and legs along with the slightly emancipated thinness that probably came from her drug abuse. His Qi cut off as he figured that it wouldn't be conductive to the conversation to be fading into and out of existence in front of the other person. A few minutes later his companion emerged from the bedroom fully dressed and Eric stood. He didn't see another chair in the apartment so he moved away from the one he had been sitting on and motioned that Joust could have it if she wanted. For now he leaned against the wall.

"Eric Sidel" The name probably meant nothing to her, meant nothing to a lot of people. He was a fairly skilled fighter in his own right, but he was more skilled in staying silent and unseen. "And you?" Since he had now introduced himself it was only fair that he asked the same question. Though he was certain he could find the information elsewhere if he needed too. "You said you have a few questions about myself I believe. I assume we're going to do a one for one exchange. You ask one question and I answer honestly and then I ask a question and you do the same." It was the simplest way for Eric to get the information he wanted and probably the fastest. Though he considered asking a few others afterward for other things he was curious about.

[[LEON] Joust]

Joust didn't move from her position, her eyes following the individual before her as he moved to another spot in the room. She was even listening completely now.

"My name isn't important right now, squire." Joust responded before moving on. She was now going on the question offensive. "What do you know about a certain individual named Ark?" She asked, folding her arms and staring intently at her guest.

[wanderer]

"That's not how this works." Eric said in a calm voice. His hand reached into his pocket and pulled out his pack of cigarette. He lit up one and took a long drag. "You see I don't have to tell you anything I know unless I want too. And I seriously doubt you could force the information out of me." Smoke filled his lungs and he exhaled a small cloud of smoke. "So if you don't play the game, you don't get to find out what you want to find out." He didn't get pushed around by just anyone. There were a few that had been able to do it and Joust wasn't one of them. Both of them lay dead under a mountain of rubble and reinforced concrete.

"So tell me your name or you don't get to know what I do or don't know?" His eyes focused on Joust's. "And make sure it's your full, real name." In his eyes he showed that he wasn't going to bend. He could play this game all day if he had too, or he could pack up and go home if he needed too. He had some cards in his hand that she wanted to see and he doubted that she would let this conversation just die like that.

[[LEON] Joust]

Joust stared at her guest, a clear look of annoyance on her face. She held this look for several moments before finally sighing.

"Fine, you win." Joust finally stated. "Name is Apple Merryweather." It was a lie, of course, but Joust had lied so many times in her life it became easy for her to do so to complete strangers. "Had some real hippie parents." Joust then changed the subject back to her first query. "What do you know about Ark? And no dodging since I answered your question." Jousts tone had turned demanding. She wasn't going to let a lead get away.

[wanderer]

Eric had spent a lot of time in his life being lied too, it came with the nature of the business that he had been a part of for so long. The problem being that Joust was someone that he didn’t know and the usual tells of a person lying were being messed with the drugs that she was taking. Add in the fact that she was use to lying to strangers and it made it very hard to tell if she was lying too him, he couldn’t tell in the usual way. But he also had developed a sort of sixth sense about this sort of thing, a gut feeling of when people were trying to make a fool of him. So the wandering male simply stared Joust in the eye for a few seconds, before pushing off the wall with his shoulder. He walked slowly over to the girl, stopping a mere couple of feet away from her. His own storm blue orbs never leaving hers.

“I know three things that would probably make your search a hell of a lot easier. But you don’t want to play the game do you?” He was going with his gut on this, he wasn’t sure and could be wrong. But considering all he had to go on was his gut and what he knew of Joust’s personality so far he was just going to have to take that risk. “Apple Merryweather isn’t your name. So since you don’t want to cooperate I guess there is no reason for me to stick around. This is where we say goodbye Miss. Merryweather. Look me up some time when you actually want to tell the truth. I might be willing to give you the information then.” He turned and started moving toward the door. Joust now had two choices. She could tell him her real name or she could let him leave. Course if she just let him leave then Eric wouldn’t know for sure if she lied about her name, but that was the risk he was taking.

[[LEON] Joust]

There are two aspects to a lie. The lie itself and carrying out any bluff given. Joust watched as her guest began to leave. She made no move to stop him. Instead, she simply opened her mouth.

"Make sure you close the door on your way out. But do me a favour, if you see Ark, tell him his false conviction buddy is back in town. He'll know." Joust stated. Pushing herself off the doorway she was leaning against and moving to the solitary chair in the room, sitting down and craddling her head in her hands. Her eyes shut tight as if she had a massive headache. In truth, her head was still hurting. But, she cast her bluff, and she wasn't going to back down. The ball was once again in her guests court.

[wanderer]

The only response Joust would hear was the sound of the door opening and closing. Eric didn’t even look back at that point. After closing the door, Eric took a moment to remember the number and memorize how far in the door was as he stepped down the hallway. He moved down the stairs and onto the street where he paused again so he could see where exactly he was. He sighed slightly as he looked around. *This turned into a colossal waste of time.* His head turned and his eyes narrowed menacingly as one of the locals had been sidling up close to him with a hand in their pocket. The junkie probably had a knife or something like that, but he decided that maybe he should leave after he locked eyes with Eric. *At least some of the bastard’s brains were working*

*So what to do now? Fuck it perhaps it’s time to go get some sleep.* That brought a grimace to Eric’s face, he never slept well. The usual reason he slept was he was so tired that he needed too sleep. It had been why he had been out looking for trouble in the city in the first place, to find something to tire himself out. Well that didn’t work out too well and neither had this fact finding mission. *A lose-lose today, fucking great job Eric.*