Phil Connors (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
goodweather) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
ph_logs2024-05-07 01:55 am
goodweather) wrote in ph_logs2024-05-07 01:55 am
i heard the thunder [open]
Who: Phil and you!
What: May/June open
When: Late April and through May, probably June too
Where: Around town, the skies over the island, the Library, the hot springs
Warning(s): nudity in the hot springs prompt
but i find i got the question wrong [exploring]
i was trying to run away [around town]
but a voice told me to stay [library]
put the feeling in a song [hot springs] (cw: nudity, artistic nudity painting the link)
wildcard
What: May/June open
When: Late April and through May, probably June too
Where: Around town, the skies over the island, the Library, the hot springs
Warning(s): nudity in the hot springs prompt
but i find i got the question wrong [exploring]
A whole town. A whole island. Imagine that.
It's almost overwhelming, honestly, but Phil figures he may as well start big and wide before getting into the real nitty-gritty of it. So once things are slightly settled, once he has the time, he takes off. It won't be so unusual for people to see his silhouette soaring in the sky. If something fascinating catches his attention on the ground, perhaps he'll come down to check it out; his eyes are fit to see detail miles away, so distance is hardly a problem. Perhaps he'll land near you, or you can find him freshly landed someplace else. This is a lot more flying than he's done in years.
i was trying to run away [around town]
And of course, there's the glory of having more than a couple dozen other people to talk to. Phil makes himself a real neighbor's neighbor; he introduces himself to as many people as he can, he chats up anyone who seems free enough, he wanders place to place in the town, invites people to lunch or a drink or what have you. Sometimes he'll just be sitting around, pleased to be people-watching.
but a voice told me to stay [library]
Ah, weather. His old friend.
He's got to brush up. Get back into the swing of it, you know? And he's got to figure out what sort of currents and forces are acting on the meteorology of the island. Phil schleps down to the Library then, and spends long days tracking down research material for the case: he cross-references reports in the newspaper archives, digs up a scientific textbook on the global climate and its impact on the island, and even fishes up a few academic papers of... uh, dubious helpfulness, but it's fine.
Exhaustion catches him more easily these days than it used to. He's not terribly proud of it, but more than once he dozes off him his chair. Then shakes himself awake, then... dozes off again. At least he's not drooling on the books.
put the feeling in a song [hot springs] (cw: nudity, artistic nudity painting the link)
One of the things he'd spotted from above was, of course, the hot springs. There's even some signage nearby, so this is definitely both a public space and safe to take a dip in. Not saltwater, not chlorinated... jeez, it feels like it's been ages since he's been able to take a proper soak without having to take on some shape that got rid of his feathers. It's a relief. A good place to keep in mind if he has a particularly awful flare, too. (Although getting here would be tricky if he's gotten that bad.)
One day or another, Phil stops up there by himself. Undresses. Sighs a long sigh as he rests in the water. Lounging below the water or up on the grass, anyone is free to encounter him (and his shockingly sculpted figure), although he'll certainly hear you coming.
(And of course, do mind the wedding band he's wearing as a necklace.)
wildcard
[ hit me! ]
no subject
Maybe. Maybe there's nothing special about her and it was all just chance. But everything in her life seems determined to defy that expectation, to make it feel like strings are being pulled behind the scenes that she just can't see.
Ruby's head tilts a touch. "I don't think so? Is there something weird about it? You look maybe about as old as my dad or uncle..."
no subject
He leans back in his chair. “I won’t give you the whole song and dance in the middle of the library unless you want to, but, uh. Long story short? I used to be a real piece of work. I mean, ‘basically didn’t have friends for 20 years’ bad.
“And one day, I just… fell out of time. I was reliving the same day for decades, and I was the only one who ever remembered. It was endless. I broke, a little.” A lot. “Everything I was before failed me, so I had to change. I had to be different, maybe better. So I did that, and it took a long time, and I got good enough at it that the woman who would later be my wife kissed me.”
Phil shrugs. “Then it stopped. All of a sudden. When I fell asleep, it wasn’t today anymore. It was tomorrow.”
no subject
The look of horror that dawns on Ruby's expression is that of someone with the thought that can HAPPEN? echoing around their skull like a thunderclap in a cave. She shakes the expression away as soon as she becomes aware of it, but the sympathetic feeling lingers.
"Gods, that's..." she tries to find a better word for a moment, before letting out a breath and settling on: "insane. I'm sorry. I can't even imagine. Things haven't been— my world isn't great, but at least there there's something to fight."
What are you supposed to do in the face of something so inexplicable and intangible?
(Not that being able to fight has done her much good, but a part of her still feels as if she should be grateful for it. Even as the dark cloud of grief and self-hatred and lingering desire to be someone else, someone better, someone who won't let people down like Ruby Rose has time and time again, hangs over her head.)
no subject
(... still funny, to be believed off of the bat, that those wide eyes don't mean you're insane, but that's insane.)
"But that's sort of... see, I don't think having something to fight would've helped me. And, I mean--I got forced into being a better person, right? The moment I accidentally got someone else to fall in love with me in that one day, it stopped. Who do you think did that? Me? God? An especially ornery magical rodent?"
cw: referenced animal death
There's a quiet little 'heh', though it chokes off strangely as something wrenches in Ruby's chest and she tamps down a swell of emotion. It's not Phil's fault that even the words 'magical rodent' are enough to make her think of Little, crushed beneath Neo's boot for the crime of trying to help her escape the torment.
She breathes in through her nose and tries to let it out subtly in a sigh, steadying herself.
"...I don't know. But I guess— knowing probably wouldn't help much? I mean. What good would knowing do if it's over and there's nothing to do about it."
no subject
“You don’t think? Time and space is apparently open to us, right? You don’t think I should linger on what happened, try to find some being or some reason I got put into a loop to stop being a jerk in the middle of my life? You don’t think I should wonder if I was being punished?”
no subject
"I— think it's probably normal to wonder? But I don't think— dwelling on it only seems like it'd hurt for no gain."
Can you tell how much this kid wouldn't take her own answer to heart for her own problems, here?
no subject
“Why?”
no subject
Not all that long ago, Ruby would've fell into a thoughtful, almost speech-like answer full of hypocrisies in the form of decently-formed emotional insight for someone her age.
Right now, though, all that comes out when she looks at him is, "Why— why?"
no subject
“Yeah. Why? Why does it hurt me?”
no subject
"Because it was out of your control. Or—" inhale, sigh, "because it means putting the blame on yourself. Because it makes you think if you'd done things differently it would never have happened somehow."
Her head drops back. Her hair follows gravity away from her face. "...okay, I think— I think I'm getting the point."
no subject
He doesn't know anything about Ruby or her world or what she's been through, but he knows that much is true. It usually is.
He leans back in his chair. It ruffles the feathers, but whatever, he usually ignores it. "The other thing is that all of those questions ignore the idea that it might not have been anything. I don't think anybody did the loop. I don't think I can. If someone did it to teach me a lesson, then who? How? Why me? There are so much worse assholes out there to pick than some dick from TV. And why didn't they stop when..."
Phil shakes his head. "I'm not gonna claim I can say anything about what you saw when you went home. But the actual getting sent home? Maybe sometimes you end up tripping headfirst into stuff between time and space. I did."
no subject
She's quiet for a moment, the kind of quiet that comes with trying to absorb and process. Maybe she did just trip into something. It's not like she really remembers what happened in the seconds before she was back there on Remnant, standing in the very same place she'd been yanked from at the start.
"...heh. You should've seen how confused everyone was when I suddenly looked like... this," she gestures loosely at herself, at the eyepatch and the longer hair and little signs of time passing. "To me it'd been two years. To them, a second passed. Which— well, I guess you'd know something about how that feels..."
Another breath in and matching sigh. "I barely got to explain. We didn't have a lot of time to waste. Luckily we'd had run-ins with other universes somehow connecting to ours before, so I just... pointed at that and kept moving. That's all we could do. I was back five days and I didn't sleep once."
no subject
"I hope you've at least slept since then."
no subject
It definitely didn't help. Running on no sleep, full of grief and guilt and stress the likes of which no one is built to withstand, it's hardly any wonder Neo and the Cat managed to wear her down so far. The hallucinations were the least of her issues, by the end. Neo's illusions were doing double duty.
"Heh, yeah. I've been sleeping plenty since getting here." More than possibly she should, at times. Some days it really is hard to get out of bed. "Things back home at kind of as bad as they've ever been. We were running on fumes but it was the only option we really had."
no subject
"... Say, uh. Where are you staying now?"
cw: suicidal ideation
"Oh, uh— I'm still in the Oak and Iron. I've never really lived alone and Darcy's only just managed to teach me enough that I can cook without burning stuff, so..." A little shrug.
The reasons run deeper than just that, of course. She could learn the skills needed to live independently, she's perfectly capable despite the holes left by how she grew up, but... the idea of living completely alone terrifies her more than she can say.
Without people nearby, without knowing she can just walk downstairs and find Erin or Darcy or that Darcy and Dimitri have their own rooms here, without knowing that people would notice if she didn't leave her room in too long... she can't say for certain that one bad day wouldn't lead to her spending a long 24 hours dead.
None of this leaves her mouth.
no subject
“Talk to Darcy and Dimitri about it too,” he starts, “but we were thinking about moving into a house of our own, once we saved up enough. Somewhere out in the farmlands where it’s quieter. I don’t think I’d mind having a third.”
no subject
The thing her mind finds easiest to start with is the doubts. The but what if they would minds and but I'd only be a burden on everyones and but why would anyone want to put up with mes and so on, so forth.
She has to wilfully push the thoughts aside, let the only echo that remains be the quiet, "...are you sure?" before she says, "That— that does sound nice. Kind of like home, actually."
Home-home. Patch, the cabin. The world before.