She offers a perk of a smile, genuine, sweet, at Revi's last comment. "Hey, thanks..." It doesn't take a split second for El to get the reference. Her grandparents were librarians, and her walls are stacked with their legacy. "The things in this place take waaaaaaaay too much interest in us to be Elder Gods. I'm figuring something more like Lost." Yeah, they get lost over here. new episodes, too. TV on Shokushu is another one of those weird eccentricities. No news, no sports, no weather. None of the channels match up to anything the girls are familiar with, ten of them, and half of these seem to play porn non-stop. Other than that, anime, cartoons, cooking, a bizarre and twisted joke on the psyches of the girls. One in particular seems to only play Lost, The Prisoner, and Survivor on loop. Needless to say, El's paranoid. Paranoid about a lot of things, but, this... She thinks they might be hiding subliminal messages, hypnotic symbols, in the video. Maybe she's been reading too much Philip K. Dick, or maybe she's just smart enough. "I doubt we'll get any explanation whatsoever. We'll end up sold to shieks, or fuck... cut into little sex bits on camera for a $9.99 download. You ever seen 8MM?" Shivering, the blanket pulled tight around her. She shakes her head, trying to shake off the thought. "You're alright, Revi."

"Heh, thanks. You're not bad yourself, anyone who can manage to scrounge weed in any capacity here gets points in my book. It was back alley Brooklyn when I smoked up last, I think." And yeah, the TV is weird. Revi doesn't watch a whole ton of it, she always gets a prickly feeling on the back of her neck when the idiot box is on, like it captures just as much imagery as it spits out.

"And you're probably right. We'll never know what the fuck they're up to here.. there's gotta be -something-, someone or some group of someones went to a lot of trouble to set this little sanctuary up, there's got to be money in it somewhere for someone though, all this expense and shit doesn't make sense otherwise. If we were gonna be set up as sex slaves, there're easier ways to do it, you know? This is like... like that shitty anime they show late nights on TV, on that one channel." Tentacle monsters galore! "And if we were gonna get the snuff treatment, t'be honest, we'd have more students disappearing instead of coming back traumatized. Least they can't kill us, seems like." There's a slow roll of shoulders in a languid shrug, and a long sigh leaves her lips, rolling her neck to crack it. "Strange fuckin' place, either way."

She backs off the edge just a little bit, to pull her knees up to her chin. She readjusts the blanket shawl to drape over her legs too. She takes a final long drag of that cigarette before stabbing it out on the rooftop, tucking the short back behind her ear - the tobacco will be retrieved and recycled later. "Oh, hell yeah. Palms are getting greased somewhere. Lots of somewheres. But whoever's spending the money, I mean, there's no way they're hoping to make a profit." as she nibbles on her lower lip. "My guess is, we've got 'til graduation, and then we're just meat." A shake of her head, she brushes a blue-black bang out of her face. Her nose is wrinkled. "But I don't know if I wanna talk about this anymore."

Revi rests her face on her palm, elbow on her knee, leaned over a bit. Index finger taps the side of her face, and she shivers a little - her legs are practically bare - she's in cutoff shorts after all - but at least her upper half is warm with that jacket she's wearing. "Who knows." She rolls that shrug again, all they can do is stick it out until then, really. There's really no way off of this island, she should know, she's tried.

"An' yeah, it's a little grim. Heh. So why'd you really drag me up here, El?"

There was obviously something. Those dark eyes, almost black, slant over to look at the petite girl, giving her a questioning, casual look. Not much in this place would surprise her any more - if Elise spontaneously transformed in to an eighty-tentacled demon with rape on its mind, Revi would probably just shake her head and sigh at this point, it'd figure.

"I thought I was just being friendly and sharing my cigarette with a fellow, beleaguered student." Lashes batting as she reads Revi's face for a response. It's only a second before her face cracks into a grin. Okay, so that gambit's down. "I mean, I lured you up here hoping we could break out the dildos and butt plugs?" Okay, no luck with that one either. She can barely even finish saying it without cracking up. That grin's threatening to split her face in half. "Okay, so maybe I figured I can use you." And maybe we could be friends? This place does things to your psyche, and with her only friend just suddenly absent, El's honestly just plain lonely.... Eyes slick and sharp, reading Revi down to the helices.

It's funny... about six months ago, she probably would've just slugged the girl and been done with it. Interesting how excessive rape'll mellow you some. The first statement gets a flat look, the second a flatter - but there's humor tinged in there, she likes this girl, she's a little more grounded than most she's met here thus far. "Least you're honest. Eventually."

The black-haired thief grins faintly, shifting to settle her back against an air conditioning unit, lacing long fingers together behind her head. "C'mon then, spit it out. What's your oh-so-devious plan that somehow involves Shokushu's resident Triad hitwoman?"

She reaches by the air-conditioning unit to handle a scoop of pebbles. She bounces them in her hand, retrieving one, turning it over between her fingers. "I don't know. I'd heard your name before, but honestly, it's mostly you're just one of the few girls I've run into here I can stomach talking to." Pebble hurled from her fist into the crowd below. In the mill, a girl turns, a hand moving quickly to her neck. Eyes narrowed, her eyes groom over the rooftops, the sunlight blocking her from seeing anything. "I've got a good thing going, managing contraband, but it's a lot to deal with, juggling classes (which she never goes to), friends (which she doesn't have), and everything else (being incapacitated and raped by monsters). Figured I could use some help. Like, a consigliere or something." She reconsiders. "I mean, I don't mean to come across like that. Just, someone to help out, someone to share the spoils with, you know?" Her eyes are steel. "Maybe we can't get out of here, but by the time graduation hits, I at least want as many chips stacked in my favor as I can manage."[/i]

"Yeah, your name has slipped in to my ears once or twice, too. And consigliere? You've gotta decide if I'm Yakuza, Triad, or Mafia now, first." Revi snickers, but she's interested, that much is pretty clear. She nods her head slowly at that last bit - her petty theft here has been for pretty much the same reasons, she'll have a nice bit of scratch to fence once she makes it back to NYC, and that's what keeps her going - if she starts really, truly believing its utterly hopeless here, she's fucked, as are the rest of them.

"Sounds pretty good."

There's that shrug again. It would give her something to DO, for Christ's sake. That was one of the big problems she had.. she was bored out of her goddamned skull half the time, hence the stint of break-ins, the lockpicking, the freerunning, everything to keep her sane. She attended her classes.. not often, but she was sharp as hell, and none of the professors really seemed to care anyways. Her grades were middling, not great but not awful, she was on track to 'graduate' just fine.. if this were a normal school, but that's neither here nor there.

"And I'm with you on that last bit. When - wishful thinking, right? - we get out of here, might as well have as many things set up as we can."

Truth be told, Revi could use some friendly faces around - for all her 'straight diesel' - she liked that, she'd have to remember that one - stupendous badass exterior, this place could get really, really fucking lonely. And she liked El, thus far.. she was wry, had a fast tongue, and didn't come across as simpering rapebait. All points in her book, really.

"You said contraband.. how do you get paid, though? Money's not worth shit here, do you mostly trade, or what?"

"Guess that's a no on the sex toys." She's lifted herself to her bare feet, dusting gravel and dirt off her knees and butt. She carefully smooths her skirt out, peering in the polish of the AC unit to examine her face, and her smirk. "Money's not worth shit. So far we've been trading in goods, and favors. What we get out of the deal so far isn't the big issue. It's the reputation we've been building. Usually it's asking a girl to steal something here or there, something that will help us cobble together another luxury, but like I said, it's about building trust so far. Once we've got eyes everywhere, we figured we'll start focusing on the real plan. I swear to God, I'm either getting out of this place alive, or I make sure the whole damn place burns to the ground.

She holds the hatch down to the dormitories open. "Anyway, it's freezing up here. I wanna show you something."

"I'm sold."

It's as easy as that, really. Nothing like a vaguely defined sense of purpose to bring Revi around, along with a potential ally and maybe friend, who knows? The thief stretches as she gets to her feet, still shivering a bit from the winter chill, and heads for the door.

"No shit, my tight little ass is getting goosebumps. Lead on, yeah?"

And back they go, in to the student dorms. Revi is immediately relieved when the heat starts to kick in - much better.

She leads Revi down the hallways. It's mid-afternoon, so classes are in full effect. The bell rang when the two of them were on the roof, accounting for the mobs of students shuffling through the courtyard, but now all that's left are the delinquents, and the tardy girls hustling between classes. One of them, in a run, clips El's shoulder. El turns, snarls, is about to say something, but the girl's already almost out of sight. Instead she just rubs at her shoulder, grumbles under her breath. "Bitch...." El's room is right down the block, just about five doors and a corner around from Revi's room. She creaks the door open, letting Revi step through first.

And after taking a quick look in El's room, you probably get the impression the place is long overdue for a Katrina aid package. It is a WRECK. Not that El's particularly dirty. All her clothes are neatly thrown into a hamper, which, while overflowing, is at least confined to its own little window corner. It's not like she's poor either - the mere depth of .... stuff ... indicates El's utter lack of material wealth. She's a rich girl, but that doesn't help much here, does it? Books overspill from the bookshelf that takes almost a wall: Philip Dick, Lovecraft, Joyce, Pynchon, Rushdie - a DVD shelf equally as swollen. She's got Batman sheets and a big purple comforter. Her laptop is flopped out on the loose beddings. She tosses Revi's blanket over her computer chair. There's another bed in the long corner, stripped down to the mattress. El slips right past it to guide Revi into the closet. Piles of clothing and sheets are tugged out of the way to reveal two large jugs, clear, to reveal the thick and bloody red-purple juice poured into them. "Ta-da!"

Revi, on the other hand, cuts through the sea of students like a shark through minnows - must be that Yakuza rep, right? There wasn't really anyone here who gave her trouble, and a lot of people just went and actively tried to stay out of her way. There's a faint smirk at the thought there, and she shakes her head slightly as the girl smacks in to El's shoulder, just following along.

One eyebrow arcs as she steps through the room - holy god, this girl has a TON of stuff! There's a fast, almost instinctive scan.. hiding places, valuables, exits, type of lock, all the basics. This is reflex to her by now, living in here for so long. She narrows her eyes at the bookshelf full of easy, light reading - not quite - and smiles, a bit. She's distracted from perusing when El steps in to the closet and reveals...

"... Prison wine?"

She blinks, once, surprised. She HAD, at one point, a half-bottle of Jack Daniels that another student had somehow either smuggled in or stolen from faculty, but this.. what a gold mine.

She sprawls across her bed, set under the window, and just settles in spectating. It's like watching a panther set loose in your house, all movements of motive and muscle. It reminds her of a Dickey poem for a second. She leans over her bed, digging behind the bar to pull out a cigar case, held tight in her lap, the top tilted up (She's seen the way this girl eyes her stuff), dropping the cigarette inside. "So, if you know if you take anything from me, I'll have to call the Russians on your ass, right? The Russian mob in Shokushu's pretty fucking brutal. and they use Russian magyar magic and shit." The box is tucked carefully back away.

She rocks forward, to settle into a straddle of the bed's corner. "Something like that, but hopefully not nearly so disgusting.... We've got plenty of things off hand you can't get in a prison."

Revi wanders the room a little bit, just checking things out, aware of Elise's eyes on her as she does so - she doesn't much mind really, she's used to it. There's a slight smile at the hiding place behind the girls bed frame - she nods her approval just slightly, chuckling at the threat of magical Russian gangsters. "I'm quaking in my boots. Don't worry, I'll leave your stuff alone." She grins wryly, snickering a bit. Revi slides hands in to the pockets of her warm jacket, rolling her shoulders slightly as Elise explains the hooch.

"Yeah.. same principle though, I guess. I don't know shit about how to make it, but either way, that's awesome." The thief is impressed. She leans against the other end of the bed, hand still in the pockets of her jacket. "How long's it been brewing for?"

She's .. casual, in a sense. Immediately comfortable in the girl's room, but whether that's a function of her personality meshing with Elise's or whether it stems from her snap-appraisal of the room itself, who can tell. There's a sense of underlying readiness though - this little flare in the back of her mind will shoot up if something is wrong, wrong, wrong, but thus far it hasn't been lit. Elise feels like good people.. by Revi's standards, at least. Points in her favor.

She shrugs, sprawling back on the bed, propped onto her elbows, head rolled back in her shoulders, eyes scoping the ceiling. A glint of metal from her navel. "Not much to it, Revi. It's juice and fruits and sugar and yeast. You don't even really need the yeast, but they had some in the pantry for some of the vegan girls or something, so we figured, why not? One's about a month old, other's about two." She's lost interest in the ceiling, head flopped into the crook of her elbow, eyes roaming her room absently. Once you really start looking at all the stuff in here, you can quickly piece together that most of this isn't El's stuff. The books, the DVD's, they seem at least to be part of a somewhat coherent mode of style, but there's clothes, batteries, beddings, small electronics - some tucked neat and stacked in corners, but many just poking out of boxes, crates, shoved away but still visible, too lazy to organize. "I still need to, like, scoop off the sediment, but it's been fermenting long enough."