03-20-2025, 04:10 PM
Only seconds prior, Near announced, out loud, for Jude’s benefit, that he is getting the fuck out of Dodge. I’m moving, he said. Still, “Don’t move” registers instantly as a threat aimed at him, jabbing as it does into some poorly protected nerve that is primed and waiting for Jude to transition from mild irritant into genuine hazard. An inevitability.
So there’s the old adrenaline spike, the unconsidered decision to choose fight over flight, wrapping him up before the possibility of any other interpretation has a chance to occur. And it’s not like the adrenaline magically drains away as soon as he recalls the concept of context. He’s stuck in overclock, the pulse behind his ear ticktickticking and he has to wrestle himself down from the urge to snarl some form of fuck off, which he is now murkily aware might not fit.
“What?” he fumbles, gone clumsy with the sincerest of disconcertion.
(Dumbasses say what?)
“Like … now?”
So there’s the old adrenaline spike, the unconsidered decision to choose fight over flight, wrapping him up before the possibility of any other interpretation has a chance to occur. And it’s not like the adrenaline magically drains away as soon as he recalls the concept of context. He’s stuck in overclock, the pulse behind his ear ticktickticking and he has to wrestle himself down from the urge to snarl some form of fuck off, which he is now murkily aware might not fit.
“What?” he fumbles, gone clumsy with the sincerest of disconcertion.
(Dumbasses say what?)
“Like … now?”