Open RP

[greatoldjohn]

[art courtesy of otterbiscuits @ tumblr]

text audio video prose action prompt etc.

Comments

[greenzone]

"Yeah, duh, I already know your names. Kind of thought that was obvious." She's the same kind of clipped Arthur was when he told them to shut up. A prolonged shiver interrupts her, but after a second, she adds, "I don't think I am but I don't even know what this t-time is."

She reaches out of her coat cocoon to fiddle with the sparse but unfamiliar controls on the dash, briefly and accidentally turning on the radio before she finds the heat. She turns it up full bore, then holds up her hand and wriggles her fingers, showing the black ring around her middle one. "Glance at me so John can see it. The ring."

It's dull, looks metallic, and Willa is very careful not to look at the symbols carved across it. They're not the King in Yellow's mark, exactly, but they're incomplete versions, inlaid with purplish-black sand that seems to shift like mist. It gives off an inescapable feeling of a place John knows, knows but hasn't seen in lifetimes. Not as himself, anyway.

[lestercraft]

The sudden burst of static makes Arthur flinch, and automatically he goes to slap his hand to the controls to slap Willa away. Though he can't complain when he misses and she manages to turn the heat on. He hadn't even realised the car had any: Larson really was fucking rich.

(Still no seatbelts, but that's a Willa concern.)

"Well right now it's 1934. I-I think," he adds, quiet in his uncertainty. "Maybe '35, b-but still."

But he supposes he can spare a quick glance in her direction for their sake. "John?"

[greatoldjohn]

He almost yells, but Arthur just got startled by the static and he doesn't want the car going off the road. So he grumbles a little-

[Keep your eyes on the road, please. This isn't an easy drive.]

And after a few moments, he'll admit-

[She has a ring on with... that has things I don't know how she'd obtain. She doesn't-

I don't think she's working with the King. There's... almost like a haze around such people. She doesn't have it.]

[greenzone]

"Of course I'm not working for the King." The absolute indignation in her feathery voice, how dare. She wants so much to swat back at Arthur's hand but experience and worry curb the impulse.

God, what the fuck is going on. She's in 1935, they don't know who she is, Arthur is covered in blood, and John is out a body again. If she weren't a bit in shock she would be freaking out more profoundly, but as it is, the numbness is working in her favor.

Willa pulls her hand back into the coats and draws them up higher until they're over her head like a hood. "W-we were all working for this... person, being, whatever who just called himself the Admiral. Themself. I don't know. We were on this--Jesus if you don't remember I'm going to sound absolutely insane."

[lestercraft]

"Right, yes," is the idle murnur John gets as Arthur turns his eyes back to the road. He keeps his right hand on the wheel, but John's steering. It's mostly just comfort, so he can feel where the car is turning.

He listens to Willa with as much patience as he has the capacity for, but honestly it's not much.

"Miss Willa, if you're aware of who we are, then I'm sure you must know at least some of what's happened to us. Your being from the future is..." He flexes his fingers with a shrug. "Unusual, certainly. But it can't be as mad as some of the stuff we've told you."

[greenzone]

"It's not Miss Willa," she says softly, pulling the coats even tighter. She shudders, wishing it would hurry up and get warmer in the car. "It's just Willa."

God, her brain feels like it's been left in a freezer, which maybe it kind of has. "I don't think I'm from your future. I mean, I'm from the future. Not... I think I'm from your past? The Barge is kind of outside of time and... stuff." The world is doing that sideways tilt thing again. She closes her eyes to try and focus, only half-noticing the shivers any more.

"Dad," it's plaintive, and she muzzily corrects herself. "Uncle Arthur. ...What was I saying?"

Right. "We were on the Barge, that's the only name it has that I know, a living ship, where people-- There's wardens and inmates and we were wardens."

[lestercraft]

Arthur flinches again. John was fine, Uncle John was... insane, but Dad--

It's lucky he's not actually steering or they definitely would have slid off the road.

[greatoldjohn]

John is driving and thankfully is a little more even-keeled when Arthur is a wreck (aka the last day or so). He keeps his hand steady and he keeps his voice soft inside Arthur's mind.

[Arthur, do you think she might be sick from the cold? The things she's saying...]

[greenzone]

"I'm okay." It's more rote and less confident at the moment. She can't pull the coats any tighter. Her fingers and face feel like they're starting to burn in the warm air from the heater. She's fine. It's fine. She's going to be okay, and she's going to get these two back to the Barge somehow, and they'll be fine too.

[lestercraft]

That answer isn't particularly reassuring, and Arthur lifts his hand to find her; gently groping blindly for her shoulder, and when he finds it pushing her beanie back a little so he can press the back of his hand to Willa's forehead; though with it comes the lingering, unpleasant smell of bodily fluids, something in it utterly foreign to Willa under the rusty tang of blood.

"You're warm," he says, concern unsubtle in his voice. "Hopefully it settles, but if she's been out there for too long we might need to watch for a fever."

[greatoldjohn]

[Should I try to find a road towards the town? Do you think they have a doctor there?]

He's worried about both of them, considering, but this is so far out of the realm of things he knows how to deal with. She's clearly young. He doesn't know what to do with young.

He doesn't want to think about what he did once upon a time.

[greenzone]

Without really thinking about it, she reaches up and takes Arthur's hand gently, turning it over. Her stomach churns a little at the smell. Willa presses Arthur's palm against her too-warm cheek, heedless of any smears left on his skin.

[lestercraft]

His hand is cold, bones jutting out of the flesh like creases in metal, but when she presses his palm against her face, his breath catches in his throat. And he can't hide the way it shudders when he exhales, how his eyes abruptly sting as this delicate, fragile trust is placed in his hand.

She thinks he can protect her. What the fuck is he supposed to do with that?

"Go to sleep, Willa," he mumbles instead, and he tries not to think to hard about it as he moves his thumb, stroking across the soft edge of her cheekbone. "We'll wake you when we get there."

Wherever there ends up being.

[greatoldjohn]

[Arthur?]

He's felt all the things going through Arthur and Arthur, no doubt, has felt the concern and confusion going through him in turn. John doesn't know what's going on, be he knows he's somehow important to this girl and that's...

That's huge. That's amazing and bizarre and it fills him with such hope. And that hope, in turn, makes itself fear and worry soon enough. The deal had been to get Arthur to New York. This is a whole other person. He can ask Arthur to trust him but Willa...

It leaves him troubled, especially seeing how much trust she has in him. In them.

[greenzone]

Willa closes her eyes and keeps them closed, nodding, but barely. Enough for him to feel the motion without moving his hand. Without interrupting that gentle comfort.

"We're going to be okay," she says, soft and insistent. "We're all going to be okay. I don't... know who Larson is, but if we can get back to the Barge, if we all can--we'll be okay. John, you'll get your body back, and Arthur, you'll get your eyes, and..."

Another nod, and she very carefully shifts John and Arthur's belongings enough that she can lean sideways and rest her head on Arthur's shoulder. She's still shivering a little bit, but at least the worst is over, when it comes to getting them to believe her. She thinks. She hopes.

Then she falls asleep.

[lestercraft]

He takes his arm back as Willa adjusts, purely because the position is unsustainable, but then her head is resting on his shoulder and it's just...

God. He hasn't had physical contact with someone who hasn't wanted to kill him in months. He almost can't remember what it's like, to have someone just- touch him, hold his hand or grip him in a hug or just lean on him, and he's not sure now he won't shatter under the weight of that simple, human kindness.

Something tickles down his cheek, and he lifts his hand to wipe the streaks of new tears from his cheeks. Taking a deep breath as he does, trying to rally. Keep it together.

"What's it like, John?" His voice isn't steady but he's going to fucking well pretend it is. "Out there."

[greatoldjohn]

John almost adds to the tears, feeling that relief in his partner, that Arthur is accepting that softness. He'd been so fucking scared down in the mines. So scared watching Arthur in the depths of his rage and pain. This, even more than his choice to save people in the cave, has him relaxing just a little.

John clears his throat.

"Right.

"Addison passes by. Small buildings between the trees… the snow is melting away, already, from the warm day. The buildings here look hollow. Empty pieces, as if reflecting the weather. Just the bones remain. We’re passing a building. The Red Right Hand."

He pauses.

"And the road, it winds between the trees that hug it closely, as if this road were a path carved between a mountain. The town is behind us now. Addison is behind us."

[lestercraft]

"And all that happened here," he murmurs in response.

Only, perhaps not all. Whoever Willa was, was a question that needed answering sooner rather than later. When she wasn't half-feverish and delusionally rambling about magic ships and Uncle John and...

His only loosely rolling train of thought was derailed by the sound-sensation of the dirt road growing more compact, the tip of the wheels onto asphalt, and he finally puts his hand back on the wheel. "Slow down- where are we?"

[greatoldjohn]

[I think we’re coming to a main road of sorts.]

[greenzone]

Willa sighs quietly, shifting a little to get comfortable. She turns her face toward Arthur's bony shoulder, stirring a moment before being lulled back to sleep by the sounds of their voices. This time when she shivers it's not from the cold--it's a dream, or the start of a dream, and she knows it is one, but she's also pretty sure it isn't one in a way she can't explain.

A city. A ruin of a city, made from dark not-really-stone. A ruin of a city that isn't quite black, seen from above and littered with--broken dolls?

Well, well, well. It's a man's voice. Elastically cheerful in a way that gives Willa the crawls, even in her sleep. It comes from everywhere around her, or it feels like it does. Who invited you?

"Invited me to what?" Her response is somehow silent but definitely audible at the same time. She can't feel her lips move, can't feel anything really.

The dolls aren't dolls, her brain says, but she's not sure what it means.

Always with the curveballs, our Arthur. You've got the mark of a strange god on you, poppet. Who sent you? What's their game? Why oh why can I not tell?

The dolls aren't dolls. What is she trying to tell herself? It feels important.

"Who are you?"

People guessing is half the fun.

The dolls aren't dolls.

Oh.

Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck, oh, god, fuck--

Talk soon, little germ.

Willa flinches awake, clinging suddenly to Arthur's arm as she tries to orient herself.

[lestercraft]

"Fuck-!"

Arthur jolts, and its a good thing John has control of one arm because his hand flies off the wheel with how fast he yanks back against the unexpected tug. "Willa-!"

It's well past midday now - what little sun was in the morning sky has settled into a bright afternoon, the sky filled with puffy clouds as the sun flickers in and out of sight behind the tall buildings of the town - a city, really, a proper one that they've reached, as John looks for somewhere inconspicuous to park the stolen car.

"Jesus- a-are you--" He takes a deep breath, trying to steady himself. "Are you alright?"

[greenzone]

"I was dreaming. Flying over a..." She's pale, sounds as haunted as she looks, and keeps a handful of Arthur's loose shirt in the grip of one hand as she clings to the coats with her other. "There was a city, a dark city full of..."

A tiny shudder. "I thought they were dolls until I got closer. There was a voice, too, and it felt like... whoever it was, they were actually there, but I don't remember what they said."

Willa squints her eyes shut, trying to remember. It makes her head ache to think about it, and she doesn't notice the dot of blood that starts to swell at the base of one nostril, itching at her nose and turning it into a smear.

"Why is it there seems to be only one of you," she says, dazedly, and then blinks a couple of times, coming back to herself. "...Where are we?"

[greatoldjohn]

John is very very quiet for a long moment before he speaks.

[What were the dolls doing?]

It's clear from his tone that he doesn't want to ask this question, but he has a suspicion and it's not a good one.

[ This city is small, certainly a hub of some sort with clusters of buildings on every interconnected street and road but only just barely. The buildings seem as much like those on the outskirts of someplace like Arkham as anything else, just bundled together instead of spread apart. We're passing a building proclaiming itself the 'home of The Knickerbocker News' at the moment, and this street holds a number of businesses. It would be easier to look for what you're looking for, Arthur, than to tell you each one. What do we need? ]

[greenzone]

Her paleness has a flush of anger to it now, though she still looks like she ate old cheese. She feels like she ate old cheese, too, for that matter.

"They weren't dolls," Willa says, very softly. "And they were... dead."

She shivers, then looks at Arthur. He knows better than her what he and John need right now.

[lestercraft]

Arthur's face stays pointed towards the windscreen, his eyes flicking around for John's sake but largely he's just thinking. Willa's information gets put in the back of his mind, for now, something to chew on when they're past the more urgent danger of being caught in a stolen vehicle covered in blood and gore.

"Right now we need to get cleaned up," he says eventually. "We won't get anywhere at all looking like this - I doubt Larson left a change of clothes in here, but maybe there's a coat in the trunk, and we can at least pretend to be presentable when we go shopping properly. We should find a hotel, o-or a motel, maybe, in a town this small. Something with a shower, maybe a bath if we're lucky."