I Did Not Give The Last One A Title, And I'm Sticking To The Motif Damn It

Chapter 4

You have had entirely too much soup since you have been here.

Your desire to eat soup is one that you do not understand. Apparently, it aligns with what you should be eating, according to what you can find on the subject in various medical journals. Nothing heavy until your body gets used to food again; all the broth you drank the next day was so diluted you barely tasted the chicken. You have promoted yourself to proper chicken soup with rice recently— good rice, since you have time. It is the kind you used to eat back home. When you cooked it back in your apartment— no need to hide out underground if nobody would logically want to camp outside— you started crying from the smell, you think. You must have because you had wiped your eyes with tomato and lemon juice on your fingers and had rushed to a tap to clear the angry liquid out. You had then cried at the tap at the sight of yourself; you have cried quite a bit since going back to your apartment.

You have chosen to believe that that had more to do with starvation than stress.

You are baffled, frankly, that you have yet to get sick of the stuff after eating it for so long. You stare at the liquid in its metal container, fingers hovering over your keyboard, pondering this. You suppose anything and everything tastes good to you. Maybe this is when you should try to acclimate yourself to foods you have previously hated. Maybe you will like them if you just eat a lot of them now. Maybe something good can come from this whole thing. Maybe.

You briefly feel your soul leave your body at a tap on your shoulder. "How is it?"

"Fine." You try to slow your breathing. "It's good. It's soup," you smile, "so it's hardly anything, really."

Donnie nods, shakes his head. "Yeah." He clears his throat. "Stupid question. May I see your hand?"

You glance down at it on instinct. The scars seem almost to glare at you, and you shrink away from them, ever the coward. "Why?"

"I'm making something." He shows a lump of what looks like rags. "I don't know what size your hand is, though."

You close your device, offering the appendage to him. "What will it do?"

"The device?" He pulls up a stool and sets a tin of needles on the counter. "In theory, a lot of things. Could you spread your fingers?"

You do. "Such as?"

He slips the rag carefully over your hand— it looks like a glove. "Well," he picks up one of the needles carefully, "a taser, for one."

"You're putting a taser in a glove?"

He smiles shyly. "I'd sure like to."

Your eyes shift to focus on a diagram hanging from the wall. "Who would it shock?"

"So long as you don't shower with it or anything? Presumably anyone you can wrap your hands around." Carefully, he starts to tighten the material. "Based on the prototype I made, it shouldn't hurt the user."

"Shouldn't?"

He slides one of the needles into the fabric, keeping it in place. "Under the assumption that your skin and my skin are equally good conductors, then the worst you'll feel is a static shock."

"Under the assumption."

"I'd rather not test how conductive your skin is." He handles your hand as if it too is prone to breaking. "How's your soup?"

You smile weakly. "I've had a couple cups so far. Better without all the water.

"I'd hope so."

You look down at your hand. "You don't have to be so careful, you know."