Cole's Journey: Lock & Key

[Laraqua]

Show,Cole aims to kill fairly regularly so in his forays I imagine he's stabbed someone before. Its the sound a person makes when their lung has been punctured and is filling with blood while the person is still trying to breathe.

There's no disruptions or other trouble as Cole heads back up the stairs. The water is refreshing after such dry and dusty work as Cole has been going through. In truth, it's been awhile since he's eaten and the water bottle makes him feel both hungry and thirsty. The rest of that water bottle looks mighty fine. The stoners wouldn't know if he drank it all and tossed it aside. They wouldn't even know if he'd found it.

[Garrett]

Ah the girls sick I really should leave her some I glug down half the bottle before I reach the apartment, intending to give the rest to her, eat some food, and go back to looting the apartment.
OOC- alright got it. By the way Cole is still keeping an eye for that woman who clubbed him.

[Laraqua]

Show,there's no sign of the woman thus far other than the photograph. Did [b]Cole[/b] take the photograph with him?

After a few knocks, the man opens the door and looks at him with a smile. "Hey, water! That's great. Momoko's over there on the couch."

Momoko lays on the couch, the back of one hand pressed against her forehead. She looks up weakly at Cole's approach. "Oh.... Hey."

[Garrett]

OOC-Yeah he did.

"Hey." I say emotionlessly dropping the water bottle(sealed) on her before grabbing the bag of pretzels from earlier and immediately turning around to leave. Over his shoulder he calls out. "I'm gonna keep looking for supplies." Once more emotionlessly, scolding himself mentally for wasting water on someone else when he himself was thirsty.

[Laraqua]

No one complains when he takes the pretzels.

"Thank you," whispers Momoko weakly.

"That's good, man, I was starting to ... worry about her," says the man. "Been awhile since we had any water and all the food we got is salty. Can't go out there. Dangerous."

[Garrett]

I stop in my tracks as he says that. I have had plenty of women but never really had a relationship with one since Mary, but I did know that men had an obligation to protect and provide for their women. And this guy making an excuse for why he wasn't doing it made me mad, though I didn't show this. Instead I turn to him "Yeah well you might want to get over that as soon as your heads together you're helping me." I say harshly before I leave.

[Laraqua]

Cole steps out into the hallway. He's already searched this building and other than the metal thing in the soiled toilet bowl and the safe there wasn't really anything here. Actually, that wasn't true. He hadn't searched the room he'd woken up in for signs of who that woman was.

Show,Mary's his sister, isn't it?

[Garrett]

OOC- Yeah I intended earlier that he would go back to search the room he woke up in. Sorry I guess I didn't make that clear. And yeah Mary was his little sister.

[Laraqua]

This apartment is a little dirtier and a whole lot more dilapidated than the other ones though he hadn't really noticed it before. The paint is bubbled and peeling like there was a great heat in here but there's no sign that anything had been burned. The couch has a few springs visible beneath the threadbare cloth. There are books on the coffee table that seem to be about contract law and government regulations. There's a travel bag slung by the window that has a laptop in it that's password protected when he opens it up (Computers needed to unlock it) and a horribly tear stained printed out email on a letter whose ink has faded in time:

C........................

I can't bel............................................ure that you could at leas...atch her on vaca.................ow she's.........ned.
I'm so angr................ould..ill yo...........t you've done to our poo....eet daughter. A................nted was for her mother
to give a d.......................spen.....................hy couldn't you......at? Why couldn...........................

She's only.........................sted yo........................usted you......atch her.

Did she ca..........................ask: "M........................tch me.......!" Did she?

Did you ig.............................sweet.........................eth............mportant to do........................................
watching..............................eno..........................n a st...............while she's sw....................e."

Well at lea..............................how m.......e.matte....

Regards,

Your griev.....ex-hus...nd.

P.S. Tha......a......king lot.

Perhaps the full email is on the password protected laptop.

The bathroom contains a shower filled with loose strands of long dark brown hair. Hair so long that it would reach a woman's ankles if it was attached to her head. Perhaps the fibres aren't human but they certainly look like it clogged around the bottom of the shower cubicle. There's a number of used tissues that dot the floor around the toilet. The main bedroom has Cole's spare bullets sitting in an otherwise empty glass vase on the side table. The other bedroom has a number of colouring books whose pages have been stuck to the walls showing a range of drawings that have been pieced together to state:

FinD Me Please I MisseD YoU
But You NeveR Cared To Look
Because You'Re Busy
AlwAys Too BusY
MurdeRing PeopLe For BooKs
MoneY MoneY MoneY
DiD I MatteR To You?
DiD YoU EveR CaRe?
Can'T Care NoW
YoU BurnT ThaT Out Of YoU
You Burnt mY meMorY aLL aWaY

[Garrett]

I stare at the pictures, earnestly trying to convince myself this message has nothing to do with me. Because I knew the only person in my life who could have left it. "Mary..." I say out loud. There's so much shit here, monsters, craters, dead people walking. Could she be here? What would I do if she was? What would she think of me, looking at me know. She's the one who left you, its her fault you like this. I think weakly, trying fruitlessly to replace my woe with anger before turning around, retrieving the laptop and heading back to the stoners. Hoping weakly that one of them knows something about computers. Just before I head out the door a thought occurs to me, before I could stop myself I pull out the laptop and enter 'Mary' into the box.

[Laraqua]

The laptop simply states: You have typed an incorrect USERNAME or PASSWORD. You have 2 more tries.

He returns to the stoner's apartment and heads inside. The man looks over at him. "Momoko's gone to try and sleep off her headache. I think the water helped. Thanks."

[Garrett]

"Yeah sure." I place the laptop on the couch. "Keep an eye on that, I think it's important." It might tell me something about Mary. I go to check out the room with the safe, keeping an eye out for some sort of blunt instrument I could break it open with. I'm going to do that it the metal thing in the toilet doesn't give me some clue.
OOC- Username's already there right?

[Laraqua]

Username is CBrooks.

Etched onto the dog tags is a name Pte. J Hendle and a birthdate 04/05/72.

Even a prybar is unlikely to open the safe.

[Garrett]

I try the birth day digits for the safe code.

[Laraqua]

The safe door clicks and opens to reveal a small backpack just like the one Mary used to drag around with her and hold her most reasured belongings. It's pink and emblazoned with April O'Neill from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles on it with the turtles in the background. It's been so long that Cole can't even remember where she'd found it but he knows it was heres. There's a part of a tyre iron sticking out of the main zipped up section. A quick search finds a mangled copy of every weapon he's ever used to kill or brutally incapacitate / assault someone over the course of his life. At the very bottom is a Lakeside Amusement Park flyer with I WANT A BUNNY written on it in red and a brochure from the Silent Hill Historical Society.

[Garrett]

The cold, logical half of my brain freezes my emotions for a moment, just long enough for me to calmly check if the fire arms in backpack are loaded. Regardless of what the result is I calmly put them back in the backpack, zip it up, and stare for a moment feeling the familiar sensation of tears falling down my cheeks. "Mary...." Just hearing the name out loud through me over the edge. "MARY" I scream as loud as I can in between sobs. Mary's here? Here in this horrible place? No, Mary's dead. You stared at her body for hours you know that. But what if she is alive? I always justified my thieving to her by saying that I wasn't hurting anyone, and that we needed to eat. What I'm doing now is completely different. And she knows what I'm doing? I need to find her, I need to explain myself to her, I have to make her understand and get her out of this terrible place. "WHERE ARE YOU MARY?!"

-assuming their is no response: "Maybe the computer can tell me where she is." I mumble out going back to the stoners room. I try to type in I WANT A BUNNY in the password box.

[Laraqua]

The laptop simply states: You have typed an incorrect USERNAME or PASSWORD. You have 1 more try.

The guns were loaded but the bullets can be seen glimpsed through the dented and cracked barrel. They're rusted and likely dented themselves. They'll be no use to him.

Cole heads into the stoner's room, doubtless not bothering to knock, and the man gets up from his couch.

"Hey, you got anymore...." He pauses, obviously noticing the glitter of tears in Cole's eyes. He drops his gaze, correctly deducing that it's not a good idea to show that he noticed. "What do ya need?"

[Garrett]

"I don't suppose you know some 'magic hacker' way to get into that computer, I only have one more try and it's important I get in." I say simply. As I say this I sit down and carefully read over the brochure and amusement park flier.

[Laraqua]

"Not personally, no," says the man cautiously. "The password's probably around somewhere. You might just need to keep it with you. This place ... it ... it has it's own rules. Someone may be able to get in." He pauses and then thinks to himself. "Actually, I heard over the radio earlier that there was a shout out to two new computer whizzes that've come to town. A brother and sister duo. Charlie and Lily Thompson. Maybe one of them could help you? The radio said they were down at Annie's Bar which is somewhat south from here. Do you have a map?"

[Garrett]

OOC-Do I? If so I have him mark it and head their, if the amusement park is on the way I head their first.