[collabin' all day this is a tynehelm creation]<br/><br/>Liliana had followed a few paces behind Viktor as the group left his cubicle, at one point casually dragging her fingertips along the side of the hall, feeling the awkward weight distribution from the loaded-down holster very acutely. She held a piece of dried meat to one side of her mouth, letting her saliva soften the hard leather while Dziecko swallowed, coughed up, and re-swallowed his bite before head-butting her ankles, his flat snout twitching with offense that she had held out on him. The small group separated naturally upon re-entry to the common area, and she moved listlessly to a small, empty couch against the far side of the large room; it had a sort of half-barricade of crates that doubled as seating, sort of vaguely sectioning it off from the largest part of the room.<br/><br/>She wasn’t sure how much time passed, but at some point she became aware of a very direct stare. Her eyes immediately snapped to the observer, pushing his gaze backward with her own intensely flat one. He approached slowly, then dropped onto the unoccupied cushion. “Is that yours?” he asked, jerking his thumb to piglet (who was currently snuffling the boots of a distracted stranger).<br/><br/><span style="font-weight: bold">"Yes.”</span><br/><br/>“What d’you want for it?”<br/><br/>Liliana half-noticed a gaggle of Stalkers moving quickly through the common room, carrying some awkward-looking cargo, but her focus was on the piglet urinating in the far corner of the room onto something that was either an unbundled bedroll or a napping person.<span style="font-weight: bold">"What are you offering.”</span><br/><br/>There was a slightly tense pause, then the man leaned back and crossed his leg over his knee, a smile forming behind his thick goatee as he shook his head in dramatic exasperation. “Could offer you something that packs more of a punch than your little peashooter,” he added, nodding toward the holster on her thigh, the smile fading into a little smirk that said he fancied himself pretty manipulative.<br/><br/>“Do you want this?” she countered blankly.<br/><br/>He looked a vaguely confused and surprised for a moment. “What, the pebble splitter? Of course not. But hey, if you need a few more rounds for it, we could grab a few drinks and talk about how many boxes it would take to – “<br/><br/>“Do you want my ammo for it?”<br/><br/>His voice immediately dropped from manipulative to equal parts irritated, confused and concerned. “Listen, Sunshine, do you understand how bartering works or – “<br/><br/>“Are you Liliana?” This new voice came from a Stalker that had approached from the other side of the room, an unarmed one with an easy air about him.<br/><br/><span style="font-weight: bold">"What is it?”</span>she answered quietly, her eyes looking past the would-be bacon-eater as though he no longer existed.<br/><br/>“Guy was lookin’ for you.” At the look of growing annoyance his comrade’s face, he added, “The big one.” He made a gesture of height not two inches above his own, but the intention was clear enough.<br/><br/>She stood smoothly, glanced to the goatee’d man and murmured,<span style="font-weight: bold">"Excuse me,”</span>before following the other one a few paces away from the couch.  A cursory glance of the easily-visible parts of the room revealed that Rock Hammer wasn’t in it, prompting her to follow up with,<span style="font-weight: bold">"Where did he go?”</span><br/><br/>“End of the hall. Doc’s office.”<br/><br/>An electric current skipped through Liliana, from right to left, and her eyes widened almost imperceptibly. Why did he need a doctor? She was fairly certain a horde of mutant bears would have initiated some form of alarm among the Stalkers, so what had managed to hurt Rock to the point that he sought medical help? Forgetting her manners for a moment and failing to thank the man, the blonde woman broke into a smooth, fast walk down the indicated hallway. She rounded a corner and noticed the giant man standing at the end of the hallway; she quickly noted that he wasn’t cradling his intestines or missing any limbs. A faint semblance of relaxation snaked through her shoulders and she approached at a slower pace.<span style="font-weight: bold">"Are you – “</span><br/><br/>The unmistakable sound of an adult male violently crying hit her just before she crossed the front of the door, turning her head even as she finished the sentence,<span style="font-weight: bold">"… okay?”</span><br/><br/>Even while sobbing, the characteristic rasp of Darren’s voice came through. It made for a truly grating sound, but most of Liliana’s focus was on the doctor – she assumed that was the doctor, anyway, given his medicating and instructing of the few other Stalkers that crowded the room. He could have just some random authoritative person in a bird-mask; regardless, he seemed to know what he was about.<br/><br/>It was confirmed when Viktor promptly heaved into his bucket, though his face looked feverish and eyes disoriented. She was just able to make out the doctor’s succinct summation of options over Darren’s emotional distress, and the faintest shadow of concern flickered in the back of her mind.<br/><br/><br/><br/>There was the sensation of being carried, although it was impossible to discern what was happening around him. Vertigo assailed him, and Darren felt the world begin spinning with uninhibited violence, stopping only once he felt something soft underneath him. He was seated, presumably at the edge of a bed, and abruptly he realized he was still sobbing.<br/><br/>He didn't even know<span style="font-style: italic">why</span>he'd been crying - he remembered something about mushrooms, and then something about furniture flipping over. But his body was in agony, now - the pain brought him back to reality with jarring efficiency, and he recalled the bottle he'd shared with Viktor.<br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic">I guess that's it, then. We're done.</span><br/><br/>There was faces around him, looking at him with concern - or was it regret? At least one of them looked very much like he was at someone's deathbed, and as Darren faced his own mortality the tears stopped completely. A lonely death, it would be: he had no friends here, with the lone exception of his drinking partner, who was probably already dead. He heard vomiting in the distance, but in the midst of his reflections he thought it sounded beautiful, like a bird in some long forgotten dream.<br/><br/>He jumped, spotting a glass vial; the man holding it was saying something, but the words weren't reaching him. He shook his head, nauseated by the sight of the liquid - more poison, probably, to speed along his passing. A mercy, given the pain he was experiencing, but he was no coward. The bottle came closer, and the man moved to uncork it, but Darren shoved him away, sending him stumbling back over his own feet. Someone seized him by one arm and he blindly flailed, knocking him aside as well as he released a weak, raspy roar of defiance.<br/><br/><br/><br/>Darren’s crying cut off, suddenly enough to snap her attention back to him. He may not have been broken-heartedly sobbing any more, but he certainly didn’t look right; besides being far too pale, he had an unfocused, hazy, absent expression. Sad, maybe? She had seen a flicker of his sad face recently.<br/><br/>The Stalker with the vial tried to tell the scarred man that he was going to have to drink it, that it would help him, but that didn’t stop Darren from reacting as if it were open flame when the man tried to administer it. He shoved away the first helpful fellow, and knocked the second back into one of the improvised IV stands; Liliana could see the stubborn set to his face as he rasped violently at them.<br/><br/>Without really thinking, she strode into the room, one hand snatching the tiny vial from the increasingly-frustrated Stalker before uncorking it with her teeth. One of Darren’s uncoordinated flails sent an arm toward her shoulder, but she slipped around it easily.<br/><br/>Her free hand snaked forward and firmly grabbed his lower jaw, forcing him to face her as she held the small vial up.<span style="font-weight: bold">"Drink it.”</span><br/><br/><br/><br/>Darren blinked, as a familiar face swam into focus. Liliana, the woman who said each word as if she carried a limited supply, had his face in a tight grip. He stared into her eyes, and saw the usual blankness, although behind it was a keen sense of purpose. She wasn't fucking around.<br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic">"Drink it."</span><br/><br/>So she wanted to kill him too - he definitely wasn't the charmer he used to be, but it was still upsetting to see that she supported the ones who wanted him to make a hasty exit from the bleak world they inhabited. Perhaps it was because he'd gotten the checker game he wanted; maybe she believed Darren had accomplished enough, and the time to depart had arrived.<br/><br/>He growled, a low, rumbling sound, and shook his head. His arms he kept at his sides, for even in his current state he wasn't going to attack her. But he kept his mouth firmly shut, staring defiantly back at the emotionless woman. He wasn't going to drink it, and nothing she did had any hope of changing that.<br/><br/><br/><br/>A second passed.<br/><br/>With zero change of expression, Liliana dropped her hand from his jaw to his chest and closed her forefinger and thumb around his right nipple. His unzipped jacket and thin shirt made it a fairly easy target.<br/><br/>She twisted.<span style="font-style: italic">Hard.</span><br/><br/><br/><br/>The mouth that was firmly shut just a moment before opened wide as Darren emitted a high pitched shriek of agony.<br/><br/><br/><br/>The hand not currently clamped around his nipple became a blur as she shoved the entire antidote, glass vial and all, into Darren's open mouth. Trying to minimize his reaction time, she released his nipple and shoved his jaw closed, plastering her palm over his lips as the other clamped shut around his nostrils.<br/><br/>Without breaking eye contact, she slowly commanded him:<span style="font-weight: bold">"Swallow."</span><br/><br/><br/><br/>Her momentum and his own physical instability sent Darren backward; his reluctance when it came to harming her had left him vulnerable, and before he knew it he was on his back, with her on top of him. Her eyes were boring into his, just as they'd been doing the entire time, and this time when he heard her, without conscious thought, he obeyed.<br/><br/>He didn't know why - maybe it was because he could think of worse ways to die, than with an emotionless blonde woman on top of him. It certainly brought back fond, if foggy memories, but whatever the reason, he drank. The vial wedged at the back of his mouth, which may have broken, wouldn't have left him much choice anyway, and when it was finally empty he lurched upward, spitting out most of the glass container.<br/><br/>Liliana was no longer on top of him, which was good, because a moment later he was doubled over, vomiting violently into a bucket someone produced out of thin air. He tasted blood, and felt a sharp sting that told him he'd eaten some glass.<br/><br/><br/><br/>Liliana felt him swallow, her face totally undemonstrative of the vaguely irritated thoughts beneath the surface. She had misjudged the force and ended up far closer than her intention, which in this instance, served only to remind her how many times similar situations had happened in the last few days. Fortunately, she moved quickly after Darren's ingestion and avoided any critical delay between him and the bucket; her eyes flicked to the vial he'd spit out, noticing that it was empty before seeing that it was a bit broken towards the top. Well, his fault. A little glass would probably do less damage than the... whatever they had gotten into.<br/><br/>She turned on her heel, headed back for the door. Of the two Stalkers she passed, one of them was chortling openly, and the other was staring at her with a vaguely concerned expression, his palm over the right side of his chest.