Daily Dose

[Ash]

Pain.

In the silence of peace, only one thing could grip the soul so violently that it would rip Jakob out of the freedom of his dreams.

He flung his body up from the bed, his left hand grabbing his left thigh with a scream of surprise; or at least what was left of his leg… Jakob’s leg was missing from the knee down. Currently, the prosthetic was buried in various packages of junk food that littered his single roomed apartment. Try as he might, however, he knew it was pointless. Rubbing the heavily damaged nub would not soothe it.

This was primarily because the pain was all in the Prime’s head. It has been far long enough for even phantom pains to dissolve away, and yet it consumed him the way it had long ago, in the apartment buildings of Russia…

His not-so-fond memory was interrupted by the stinging rays of the afternoon sun piercing through the bamboo blinds in his cheap apartment. He winced at the bright light and tried to put up his left arm in his defense, only for nothing to come block it. Instead, the jagged nub of his arm’s prosthetic plug in waved around at his naked shoulder.

Jakob frowned at this and fell back into the holy bed. Not that it was sacred to him in any way. Between nights of him thrashing about in his terror filled dreams, days wasted away by him just lying there while high, or the - while rare - occasional romp with someone in his bed has left the mattress full of holes and the top in shred leaving the fluff free to cling to his various implant ports. He sometimes had to pull the stuffing out of the layers of jagged parts. Today was not one of those days.

His fleshy hand comes over his eyes and he rubs the bridge of his nose, eyes closed and his thoughts going back to the dream he’d been having. He wondered if it meant anything, only not to care about what it could mean. He just liked the pretty colors and the funny feeling of flying. Especially in his stomach.

The otherwise normal human rolled over and reached over to the side table. On it was all kinds of pill bottles and injection pens, as well as some loose pills in bags. All colors of the rainbow were displayed in the tiny bags, looking more like grab-bags of candies at a party. Jakob took a random one, broke it open by ripping the zip-lock top off, and dumped the magical mixture into his mouth, dry swallowing the whole load. He tosses the bag to the win and grabbed a fully loaded and prep pen-jection of Bliss, one of his last couple doses, and stabs the needle into the inner right thigh. All without batting an eye. He discards the needle in the same fashion as the back then he rolled back over and waited for the painkillers to kick in.

His breathing slowing down while he stared up at the ceiling while time ticked away...

[Ash]

In his sleep, Jakob dreamed of the wings once more but felt the wind beneath them give out when a loud noise broke the undisturbed silence of his room. He woke up with a start, grabbing the edge of this side table as he pushed himself up off the bed with the one hand. It was a moment adrenaline because as soon as he realized what he’d manage he fell face-first onto the bare mattress below him. His heart raced as he lay there in almost silence. His alarm beside his bed was playing some Russian band. Jakob recognized it as something of ‘classical’ but that was relative to his time.

The noise that had spurred him back to life had been the female singer screaming into the microphone. ‘LISTEN! Stop, before it’s too late! I’ve already followed you into the abyss. There where your Dead Stars shine and blind the sun!’ Jakob’s mind converted the words into meaning.

How fitting the song was for him, and how terrible the meaning was lost on his brain that was already swimming in painkillers. The ‘rapper’ began his spiel about being a man on his own and how he would never be different than a ‘Crowd of One’. It was a lazy rap, fitting for the current listener who was unconsciously wondering if there was a reason he’d set the alarm or if he could simply fall back to sleep. Only for the woman to scream at him once more.

“Oh-kay, oh-kay.” He replied to his apparently past self. Jakob’s accent was thick, dripping with the pureblood of a Russian whose second language was English. He learned it after waking up in America with no money, home, memory, and missing half his limbs. It was broken at best and butchered at worse. He was just in the habit of always using it. He very rarely needed Russian anymore. “I vonder if she is... How you say: Milyy?” He questioned, swinging the one leg over the edge of the bed and sitting up. His intact hand scratching his dirty gray locks.

He did this long enough to forget what he was thinking about, and doing for that matter.

A moment later he jerked up. “Oh. Yes…” He said, remembering he apparently had plans. He leaned over with rocky balance and ran his right hand through the various loose parchments the fast food joints used to cover his meals with and pawed for something of importance. Finally, his hand touched cold metal. His face lit up with child-like joy as he scooped up the leg by its ankle joint and yanked it out of the mess on his floor with a grin.

Victory. It would be the first of many today!

Jakob held his prosthetic in the air for a moment, amused with its limp lifeless flopping after he shook it. A bark of laughter escaped his cracked lips, then he put it in place. It was impractical for him to keep taking the two body parts off before sleeping, but internally he thought the two would get scuffed up in his sleep. Or maybe he was secretly worried they would become sentient during the night and would have a harder time killing him if they were buried under all the burger joint wrappers.

Next, the stoned man reached into the patchwork blanket bundles and as if he were psychic pulled out a screwdriver from one of the various holes in his mattress. He stabbed at the simple leg a couple times before realizing something important. He needed both hands to fixate the leg, he has put them on backwards once more. “Oh…” His single word broke the silence, his voice sounding tired.

Though silence was not the right word either. The female singer was still demanding he listen to her, still insisting that he needed to stop, and still chasing him into the abyss.

Anyone else might find this dance frustrating, but Jakob was either too high to care or naturally thought hunting his limbs down was amusing. Putting the leg down on the bed and rolling the opposite way onto his belly, the Russian reached under the pile of clothes he needlessly had. In theory, he would have left his arm there. Unless he didn’t, then he could have left it across the room on his dresser - in the same way, you leave your keys next to the door for when you are leaving.

He found nothing in the pile, and when he looked over at the dresser near the door he only found his crowbar carefully slapped against the wall where it seemed only to be held up by magic as there were no hooks for it to hang from. Jakob frowned, how would he get to the bathroom now?

A moment later, using the walls and what was on the walls to hop to the closet sized bathroom he flicked the light on. With the fluorescent lights illuminating his toilet he found a peculiar sight. His plunger had been left in the toilet, the handle standing tall like morning wood after a wet dream. “Vhat is dat doing there?” He questioned out loud, but only the man he was in the past would know. He hopped over and took it by the horn and giving it a light tug. He frowned once more as he realized it had a stronger grip on the bowl than he anticipated… He gives it a harder pull, and another, until his out of balanced body was almost falling to get the thing out.

He must have plunged it with his strong hand. That meant he’d need his strong hand to get it out.

Jakob stared at the plunger a bit longer, like he was still thinking about what to do, finally, he made up his mind that he had no idea where his strong arm was and decided to take care of business anyway. He stared at the plunger’s handle while he took a piss, shaking his head. When he flushed it he was hopeful that the pressure would release it, but it only sucked it harder.

He really needed to find his arm.

With no idea where to start, Jakob opened the shower door only to find nothing but a half-empty bottle of soap. He frowned again. If it wasn’t on the dresser, and it wasn’t in the pile of clothes, then where could it have gone? Did it finally become sentient and instead of killing him, it went out to find an easier target?

Inspiration shot through his brain and the man’s body stiffened. He jumped to the left just slightly and yanked open the medicine cabinet door. Immediately the red metallic arm fell out of the selfless cabinet and into the sink, denting the metal of the sink in the process. Jakob’s smile was of pure delight as he took it in hand and left the bathroom to go put it on. The plunger’s wooden handle still sticking straight out of the toilet.

It took the usual 10 minutes to force the arm into the right position, a second person would drop that time into mere seconds but Jakob lacked friends. It was also the most painful experience a man doped on Bliss could experience and made Jakob reach for another dose of pills. The nerves of the arm and the implant had to reconnect, making it not only impractical but also stupid to keep taking them off. He swallowed another dose of pills before he awkwardly used the screwdriver to secure the arm.

The star on the side flashed to let anyone watching know that it was functional and connected. He then used both hands to position the leg part, then one to support while the other screwed it into place.

Victory! It would be the first of many!

Wait... De je vu…

With limbs intact, he could get dressed. Finding clothes to wear was much easier than finding his arm. Reaching back in the pile he found a pair of pants and a shirt, both were wrinkle ridden and had a faint pre-worn odor to them, but he pulled the garments on regardless.

Without warning, his dull gray eyes light up and he looked glad to realize something. “Cute. Dat is the word!” He nodded triumphantly.

Another victory!

“Why vas I wanting to say ‘cute’?” He asked himself, but the silence of the room didn’t answer. He frowned and scratched his head again. The thick dirty locks ruffled naturally, but he could not recall his earlier thoughts. He shrugged it off and stood, pushing his feet into the shoes at his bed’s side without even thinking about whether they were his or not. It would not be the first time Jakob had collected shoes that were not his. He fished out a plain belt, looped it through his pants, and buckled it just tight enough. Ready to go, he grabbed his key ring from the floor which held the only two keys he owned - his apartment and mailbox keys - and snatched his crowbar off the wall before leaving as if there was something that needed his attention

But there was nothing. He simply exited the building and began to walk down the street, attaching the crowbar to his leg via magnetic grip. After just half a block, he started to crave popcorn.

[Ash]

There was no mistaking it, Jakob was hungry. It was a hunger that punched him in the stomach and kept kicking when he was on the ground. Not the literal ground, that would be embarrassingly silly. He was thinking figuratively. It was just comparable. It was also not the hungriest he’s been in his life, but it was bad enough to admit that it felt pretty close.

He managed to swallow that down with another pill from his pocket. As to what it was going to do for him, he had no idea. He just thought it might help his hunger pains to have something swimming in his system.

He walked on the sidewalk with purpose but had no true purpose honestly. He has been in need of something for a long while, especially since his funds and fuel was low. He’s been lazily lounging in his bed for the past few months. It’s been great, but even a drug addicted Russian can only entertain himself for so long.

Jakob stopped in his tracks and looked around. “What drugs?” He asked, no one in particular.

He spotted a figure walking casually about looking at his phone from across the street. The figure didn’t even notice he was being watched, and Jakob just shrugged and went on his way again.

His non-metal hand moved up into his hair and pushed it out of his face, only for it to fall back in it. It was shaggy, gray, and needed a good wash. He looked down at his grease covered hand, stared at it for half a block before wiping it on his pants and pocketing it. He didn’t think about it, but he really needed to get his life back together. If only for a slight improvement in appearance. What he did think about was how he could get moving again.

What can a one arm man do? Besides scar the local children by shaking his arm nub at them and screaming ‘Don’t do drugs kids!!’ at them. This, by the way, was Jakob’s favorite charity work. He loved kids, he might have made a good father at some point in his life. He vaguely remembers the sweetest little girl from his life before Omniverse. Her name was Evelyn. He loved her with everything he had. She was too shy to share her feelings, but maybe she gave a damn about him. Yeah?

The human stopped abruptly again, looking around. There was an unmistakable scent of popcorn in the air. It was salt and butter, and cheddar. Maybe caramel, but his nose didn’t work so well with sweet things. At least not caramel.

He turned to face the road, looking both ways he crossed it and headed straight down a creepy alley of many in Tier 4.

When the stoned figure surfaced once more he was staring at a large semi with its front end V’d around a lamp pole. The door was flung open and the driver nowhere in sight. He couldn’t smell gas, so he approached it. Across the trailer was the logo for some kind of carnival themed snack company. It advertised popcorn, cotton candy, pretzels, animal crackers, and more. There was a little damage done where the cab and the trailer met, but Jakob found nothing more than cosmetic.

Curious now, he moved over to the cab, climbing in and turning the keys that remain. It roared to life and then settled on a deep purr. Jakob’s face lit up once more. He buckled up - safety first - and closed the door before easing the rig out of its predicament. The loud beeping of a truck this size backing up screeching out for anyone in the city to hear

He just freed the front from the extremely dented pole when he heard screaming from an overweight man in a ball cap. He tried to flag the current driver down, even taking the cap off to show off his balding spot at the top of his head. Jakob knew he should stop and see what a frantic man had to say, but he also knew by the same logo on the guy’s hat that it was the previous driver of the rig. It was a hard debate, but he finally put the rig in neutral and while holding on the break he opened the window before hanging halfway out to see what the man had to say.

“Dobroye utro!” He switched to Russian. This brought confusion and desperation into the driver’s face. Jakob remained as impassive as ever.

“I-I don’t understand.” The man said, then shook his head as violently as he could. “N-Nevermind! What are you doing with my truck!!?”

“Kakiye?” The drugged Russian followed up, acting like he didn’t understand.

“What?” The driver asked back, helplessly.

“YA khochu Popkorn!” Jakob explained, then pointed to the hat. “Mogu li ya poluchit' eto?”

The man’s face lit up as he heard ‘popcorn’. Then the kid pointed to his hat. “Yes!” The man responded, thinking they were finally communicating.

“I chto?” Jakob asked, pointing back to the trailer. Cutting the man off before he could say much more than yes.

“Yes!” The older man said, nodding his head, smiling to keep up good visuals to help communications. From his perspective, the kid was asking if this stuff belonged to him. Maybe he was just trying to help.

How wrong the man was...

In a flash, Jakob has snatched his hat and slapped it on his own head. Then in his best attempt with such a thick accent, he said, “Thank you!” and drove off. The aging man was having a hard enough time with just dealing with the fact that his hat had been snatched away that he hardly had the chance to do anything about the slowly leaving rig. He cried out and banged on the side of the trailer, but Jakob just pulled the string that honked the horn and kept rolling away with his prize. He did have permission after all~!

He watched from the mirrors as the man finally began to give up, his meaty jog turning to a mere tired out slapping of his feet until the big man was bent over gasping for air and half-heartedly shaking his fist. Jakob laughed with delight as he continued down the road.

Eventually, the silence bored him to tears and he turned the radio on. At first, it assaulted his ears with awful whiny country music, then he turned the knob to drop the volume to a much more tolerable level while his eyes remained on the road. It was his metallic hand that toyed with the buttons and all while somehow managing not to break anything. He came to a station of alternative rock and that was good enough for him.

In his adventure to find good music, he also discovered some chewing gum in the dash and pulled out a piece. Navigating the lower tier of the city-verse was slow already, but with a clunky rig and no real plan on where to take it, Jakob just wandered around for a bit while he unsheathed the candy and popped the strip into his mouth. “Good day.” He announced, nodding to himself.

Translations
"Good morning!"
"What?"
"I want popcorn." ... "Can I have that?"
"And that?"

[Ash]

Jakob felt it was only appropriate to bring the popcorn truck into the next stopping station which he found in the log-book that was wide open beside him in the passenger seat. Without a Dataverse Device, it was hard to pinpoint the location of this place but luckily the rig came with its own GPS kind of thing. Eventually a Secondary would have no sense needing it, but he was thankful.

Speaking of thankful.

While the people at loading docks were thankful to see their shipment of popcorn and other carnival snacks come in, they were utterly shocked by the dent in the front of the massive truck. Jakob had noticed the smoke starting to spill out of the front, and that might have been slightly responsible for the decision to drop the truck off where someone could attend to it.

He backed the rig into the bay with skill and caution, as if he'd done this a million times like any other Secondary would have to. In reality, there was very little that Jakob could not readily drive. He had a knack for it on top of luck, on top of knowing how to manage most types of vehicles. His favorite transportation is frying. Jets. Get him started, and he will not stop. Second on the list? Possibly tanks. Possibly because they are about as clumsy and as tactless as he seems to be.

He might be inclined to put boats third, though he couldn't tell you why. There's no shifting involved like a car, no impressive cockpit's like the jets, nor were they as fun as a tank. But he still liked them. If he did not put boats third, he would put sports cars there. A combination of speed and danger always got the heart pumping, and it was the only thing from his past that he embraced.

Jakob was given a bunch of paperwork to fill out while they set up the receiving end, he scribbled in some nonsense while the man who’d delivered the small stack talked about how hot it was of late. How utterly mad some people can be in the store, and how he’s actually glad to be out here instead of there with so many sales going on. Jakob just nodded and let him keep talking while he finally gave up on random answers and began to doodle a snowman on the page.

Before he could get too curious about what was taking so long, the people inside came out to the apparent manager of the time to get his help on something, the man patted the truck’s door and promised to back after a bit. But when the man left, so did Jakob.

Putting the stolen hat down on the clipboard and the paperwork on the binder full of more paperwork, and grabbed the large bag of caramel popcorn he’d stashed in the cab before coming here. His bright red arm had no trouble at all with the light bag, in fact, it took a lot of control not to just swing it around. Too much control for someone of Jakob’s attention span, but he knew if a man’s jaw could not withstand its strength a bag wouldn’t last. In his normal hand, he held a bunch of another type snack. The fabled crowbar clung to his leg through the gecko grip he installed before coming to the omniverse. While no one was looking, he strolled off the property, whistling a song he’d heard at least three times on the way there.

The human slipped out without anyone noticing, despite the size of his prize. His pace was casual, his walk with a bit of swag that even he wasn’t aware of, and his direction hopelessly lost. Jakob found himself at the edge of a very steep drop, a curve in the road that was probably far more dangerous than any sane person would sit at. He leaned his slender and unimpressive chest against the guard railing, with no worry at all to be crushed between it and a speeding car. His half-empty bag of popcorn clings to his metallic fingers while his fleshier hand rummaged through it for more. Occasionally the airy popped pieces slip through his fingers or lips and scatter to the breeze that flowed against his pants.

Beside him, a little radio he’s summoned for the sake of company, mostly static came to sooth his bored mind but occasionally some sort of song would flicker through. He was contemplating what to do next, too long has he been static. Anja would be furious that he hasn’t gone out and done some work... If she had been summoned instead of him, Omni would have had something far more active on his hands. She was a gunner, literally. He missed her cooking the most.

Well… The most after the truthfully most thing he missed. Little Eve. He liked her smile, he liked making her laugh. Without her... He has no one to entertain but himself.

The pain of loss ran deep into his heart and threatened to resurface even more painful memories, so he took a big handful of caramel cased popcorn, put it in his mouth, then reached into his pocket where a stash of his quickly depleting Bliss could be found. With the dexterity of a ninja, he slipped it out, twirled it in his fingers, then stabbed himself in the left thigh before pushing the button to administrate the painkiller.

Empty, the needle, not the man(though you could easily describe the man as such), is tossed off the cliff with the rest of the discarded things. Where it would land was up to the laws of gravity and physics, but Jakob no longer needed it.

He took a deep breath of the freshest air available around and then sighed out feeling much better. His pain quickly being forgotten. He goes for another handful before he recognizes the happy voice of someone trying to sell him something. He turns to the crackling radio speaker at his side as he chewed the slightly crunch treats.

“GRAND [static]-OPENING!! Artica [static] Lounge! If you are looking [static] grand [static] place for... [static] ..fun in the snow! Just come to [static] in Frozen Fields!”

The music then began to break in and out of static, but nonetheless was happy and go-lucky. It occurs to Jakob though that he hasn’t been anywhere else… He found his place in Coruscant and has made no effort to explore outside of it. He could already hear a little voice asking ‘why?’ but couldn’t tell you the face the voice belonged to. “Why?” He repeated, taking another handful and chewing through it slowly. He reached in for another bunch, only for the plastic of the bag to finally release from his cold dead metal fingers. Gravity took its share of his stolen popcorn before he could react, especially while high. He squeezed the arm too late, and the weight of the treat dives down the cliff. Pieces of the whole fly free of the clump, he watched the lights flicker across the shiny surface of the bag. The next moment it vanished in the dark.

Jakob stared into the abyss a bit longer, before jerking his head back as if he’d fallen asleep. He looks around, landing on the radio he’d summoned. It was still a mixture of static and music. He grabbed it with his human hand, cupping it and turning it off with one flick of his finger. Next, he shoved it into another set of seemingly endless pockets. With his belongings in place, he stood, turned, and then lifted his thumb.

Moments later, as if summoned by him, a car appears around the bend. It slowed down before coming to a stop. The whole door panel pried open and lifted, inviting him to come in. He stopped at the edge, looking in at a beautiful red-head with a busty chest and head full of voluminous curls. His first response was to offer a half smile, only for it to fall nervously. She smiled crisply at him. “Where you going, hun?”

That was a good question… Then he remembered snow. “I vant to go to Frozen Field’.” He said honestly, or as honestly as he could.

She grinned harder at him. “I’ll take you to the elevator, how’s that?”

“Iz good.” He said, sounding somewhat surprised but very happy despite how slow he was to smile.

The redhead laughed and waved him in.



Moments later, the door opened up again, steam hissing from the locks disengaging. When it was in its proper upright position, Jakob rightfully fell out of it back first with a grunt. When he looked up at the mirror he had her same bright red lipstick all over his lips and neck. He blinked a few times, confused about what happened.

The woman touches her fingers to her lips and blows him a kiss, straightening her top as she commands the door to close. “Good luck, Jakob.” She said, with a giggle.

Bewildered still, confused, Jakob nods and rolls over, getting to his feet just long enough to almost run into a wall before he remembers they’d stopped in a stray alleyway. He touches the bricks before realizing what way he needed to go. The mostly human male follows the wall to the left patting it, then when he had his bearings - but not necessarily his balance - he stumbles towards the elevators of Coruscant that would be responsible for taking him from tier to tier while a hover care revs to life behind him.