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on an island in between there and here | open | feb
Who: Miles Upshur (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
upshore); Kitty Callahan (thaumatophage); Alex Conklin (saintoflangley); Deon Wilson (craftlife); Beckett Mariner (starfleetashell) and.....you?
What: February Follies
When: February
Where: Throughout the island
Warning(s): Overall repercussions and ramifications from the dream event - and its consequences - but Alex's are specifically warned for in his open.
Kitty | can i help is there something to do i need to do something (open)
Spring is...in the process of springing, and Kitty's got a breath of the old spring madness or whatever it could be. She knows there's a holiday around now, back home, but she doesn't remember a lot about it. Instead of focusing on what she can't remember, she finishes her work at Salazar Farm and the Ranch with a little bit more manic energy than she usually does.
It's especially bad after Rambo comes back; she's flitting around and slipping in the melting snow and mud, jumping in puddles. Careful, she might slip and barrel into you - or cover you in mud!
She's also still working on her whittling, and will periodically ask you for your opinion if she knows you.
"Whatd'ya think?" she asks, holding out what might be a dog and might be a cow.
(Careful though. If you take out a knife of your own even just to help, she's going to get very quiet and very still very quickly. Unusually so.)
Alex | and it's somehow like we're at a costume party, and for a second you are not yourself (open) [unmedicated bipolar disorder, unintentional (?)/passive self harm]
If Alex had been somehow more chipper after the two weeks of the Visitor Center being in town, this most recent spate of fuckery has done the opposite. Whatever lightening there had been in his spirit, in his attitude, it was gone. Maybe it was due to having every fear and bad memory happening all at once and put on display, or maybe it was because there was something he'd been shown and it was something that he couldn't believe he would be allowed to haveso he wouldn't allow himself to believe it and that as they said was that.
His limp is more pronounced. Maybe it's the cold weather making his joints stiff. Maybe he's not bothering to strap his prosthetic properly because some part of him - a large part, really - thinks that he deserves to suffer, that Saint Alex should be a martyr. And maybe it's psychosomatic. And maybe it's all of the above.
(We'd need a psychiatrist to unpack all that, his psychiatrist...andhe's not here.)
It's not unusual that he's grumpy (kind of his default state), but he's withdrawn now, too, an animal in pain retreating to its den to lick its wounds. It's over, it's done, and it's locked away.
Enough now.
Enough.
If he knows you, he'll probably ask, as casually as he can: "Do you recommend a particular pharmacist or chemist?"
Deon | ........soooooo i'm back to shoppers (open)
Deon has brought his wares (dead things) to town to sell. It's probably good for him to stop being quite so insular, he thinks to himself, so once he's in town and sold his dead things, he starts to poke around. Now that he's been out of the Fog's influence for so long, he's not afraid of himself anymore. He's not worried about suddenly having a burst of hunger that leads him to messily devour the closest person. (They all come back quickly, unlike the humans of Ryslig, but he'd still feel awful.)
But he's still not good with cold. He sneezes, and loses his footing, stumbling into someone with his still-beanpole-ish body, all wings and tail and robotic arm...
...and then there's a little shiver-hiccup motion and quite suddenly there is a winged caracal at their feet.
"Ah! Sorry! Sorry!"
He's never transformed out of embarrassment before. Much to consider.
Miles | you are freaking out, and it is freaking ME out, and we are all FREAKING đź‘Ź THE FUCK đź‘Ź OUTđź‘Ź (open)
The nightmare world has been therapeutic for one of us here on Marrow Isle - or, at least, therapeutic after a sort. Thanks to a little dreamwalk with Chris Freeman, Miles is getting in touch with his darker side. Which is to say: the Walrider.
He's off in the woods - just in case, safety first! - whenever he can carve out a moment to do so. Daytime, nighttime...nighttime's easier in some ways, because he can't see it and that makes it easier to not think about it. But he still has to think about it to do what he's doing. 'Cause if he's got the damn thing whether he likes it or not, so he may as well learn to use it.
"Fuck!" Easier said than done; pulling nanites out of your very body and being able to do something with them is not as easy as Billy Hope had made it look. And it hurts! A lot! There's no blood as the nanites slip between his cells, but it feels like there should be.
He looks like he's meditating, seated cross-legged on the ground, and sometimes there's a little dark haze hovering over his skin for a moment before it sinks back into his skin and he swears. He smells like sweat and metal and an echo of blood. There's a Hattrem nearby - Lady is his safety buddy, by which he means that she is going to psychically (and physically) slap the absolute shit out of him if he gets out of control.
Safety first, kids!!!
Mariner | where the river meets the sea (open)
Mariner's an archaeologist, but she finds herself strolling by the harbor more and more frequently. It reminds her of the Bay, in its own way, and she'd been taught to sail when she was a kid. Still knew how, even. The great thing about the holodeck is that you can do whatever you want whenever you want, and that includes sailing the Risan sea just for the hell of it.
The sea's got kind of a call to it, like the stars do. But the stars here are static and alien and out of her reach.
"Y'know...it'd be ironic if I pivoted to boats," she muses to the three-legged Purrloin perched on her shoulder. "What'd'you think, Boimy J?"
Boimler Jr., the Purrloin, lets out a little 'nya!' of...probably agreement.
"Sooooo......what's a gal gotta do to get her hands on a boat?"
All/Wildcard | for the love of god, stop bringing toilet paper to the lions club
[Just throw something at me! Dealer's choice!]
upshore); Kitty Callahan (thaumatophage); Alex Conklin (saintoflangley); Deon Wilson (craftlife); Beckett Mariner (starfleetashell) and.....you?What: February Follies
When: February
Where: Throughout the island
Warning(s): Overall repercussions and ramifications from the dream event - and its consequences - but Alex's are specifically warned for in his open.
Kitty | can i help is there something to do i need to do something (open)
Spring is...in the process of springing, and Kitty's got a breath of the old spring madness or whatever it could be. She knows there's a holiday around now, back home, but she doesn't remember a lot about it. Instead of focusing on what she can't remember, she finishes her work at Salazar Farm and the Ranch with a little bit more manic energy than she usually does.
It's especially bad after Rambo comes back; she's flitting around and slipping in the melting snow and mud, jumping in puddles. Careful, she might slip and barrel into you - or cover you in mud!
She's also still working on her whittling, and will periodically ask you for your opinion if she knows you.
"Whatd'ya think?" she asks, holding out what might be a dog and might be a cow.
(Careful though. If you take out a knife of your own even just to help, she's going to get very quiet and very still very quickly. Unusually so.)
Alex | and it's somehow like we're at a costume party, and for a second you are not yourself (open) [unmedicated bipolar disorder, unintentional (?)/passive self harm]
If Alex had been somehow more chipper after the two weeks of the Visitor Center being in town, this most recent spate of fuckery has done the opposite. Whatever lightening there had been in his spirit, in his attitude, it was gone. Maybe it was due to having every fear and bad memory happening all at once and put on display, or maybe it was because there was something he'd been shown and it was something that he couldn't believe he would be allowed to have
His limp is more pronounced. Maybe it's the cold weather making his joints stiff. Maybe he's not bothering to strap his prosthetic properly because some part of him - a large part, really - thinks that he deserves to suffer, that Saint Alex should be a martyr. And maybe it's psychosomatic. And maybe it's all of the above.
(We'd need a psychiatrist to unpack all that, his psychiatrist...and
It's not unusual that he's grumpy (kind of his default state), but he's withdrawn now, too, an animal in pain retreating to its den to lick its wounds. It's over, it's done, and it's locked away.
Enough.
If he knows you, he'll probably ask, as casually as he can: "Do you recommend a particular pharmacist or chemist?"
Deon | ........soooooo i'm back to shoppers (open)
Deon has brought his wares (dead things) to town to sell. It's probably good for him to stop being quite so insular, he thinks to himself, so once he's in town and sold his dead things, he starts to poke around. Now that he's been out of the Fog's influence for so long, he's not afraid of himself anymore. He's not worried about suddenly having a burst of hunger that leads him to messily devour the closest person. (They all come back quickly, unlike the humans of Ryslig, but he'd still feel awful.)
But he's still not good with cold. He sneezes, and loses his footing, stumbling into someone with his still-beanpole-ish body, all wings and tail and robotic arm...
...and then there's a little shiver-hiccup motion and quite suddenly there is a winged caracal at their feet.
"Ah! Sorry! Sorry!"
He's never transformed out of embarrassment before. Much to consider.
Miles | you are freaking out, and it is freaking ME out, and we are all FREAKING đź‘Ź THE FUCK đź‘Ź OUTđź‘Ź (open)
The nightmare world has been therapeutic for one of us here on Marrow Isle - or, at least, therapeutic after a sort. Thanks to a little dreamwalk with Chris Freeman, Miles is getting in touch with his darker side. Which is to say: the Walrider.
He's off in the woods - just in case, safety first! - whenever he can carve out a moment to do so. Daytime, nighttime...nighttime's easier in some ways, because he can't see it and that makes it easier to not think about it. But he still has to think about it to do what he's doing. 'Cause if he's got the damn thing whether he likes it or not, so he may as well learn to use it.
"Fuck!" Easier said than done; pulling nanites out of your very body and being able to do something with them is not as easy as Billy Hope had made it look. And it hurts! A lot! There's no blood as the nanites slip between his cells, but it feels like there should be.
He looks like he's meditating, seated cross-legged on the ground, and sometimes there's a little dark haze hovering over his skin for a moment before it sinks back into his skin and he swears. He smells like sweat and metal and an echo of blood. There's a Hattrem nearby - Lady is his safety buddy, by which he means that she is going to psychically (and physically) slap the absolute shit out of him if he gets out of control.
Safety first, kids!!!
Mariner | where the river meets the sea (open)
Mariner's an archaeologist, but she finds herself strolling by the harbor more and more frequently. It reminds her of the Bay, in its own way, and she'd been taught to sail when she was a kid. Still knew how, even. The great thing about the holodeck is that you can do whatever you want whenever you want, and that includes sailing the Risan sea just for the hell of it.
The sea's got kind of a call to it, like the stars do. But the stars here are static and alien and out of her reach.
"Y'know...it'd be ironic if I pivoted to boats," she muses to the three-legged Purrloin perched on her shoulder. "What'd'you think, Boimy J?"
Boimler Jr., the Purrloin, lets out a little 'nya!' of...probably agreement.
"Sooooo......what's a gal gotta do to get her hands on a boat?"
All/Wildcard | for the love of god, stop bringing toilet paper to the lions club
[Just throw something at me! Dealer's choice!]
........soooooo i'm back to shoppers
In a place so strange, you learn to seek out the familiar. In coffee, in vocation. Who can blame her? No spaceship corridors to traverse? Simple, take a job in a mineshaft. No freighter crew to share her breakfast with? No problem, the coffee's still here.
Regardless, no amount of latte or underground busywork normalizes the weird shit she's seen.
And this is no different.
A shoulder throttles into her. Ripley's untouched cup of coffee hits the ground in a steamy splat. She staggers a step or two, whirling to bite the face of whoever's--
Whoever...?
Who the hell?
She finds her accidental perpetrator on the ground, although his voice certainly doesn't match the form he's taken, nor does it match what she expects to find.
Of all the things to expect, this isn't it; a cat of some kind, fitted with wings and a thorn tail, speaking human words. Ripley's brow creases. She stoops down to meet the feline's eyes, the way a child might gawk at insects under a rock.
"...I could'a sworn you were bigger a second ago."
where the river meets the sea
"Is there any harm in askin' the sailors? Maybe they'd let you come 'long."
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"Michelle?" he says, bewildered, and then corrects himself. "Ms. -- Ms. Bradley?" Even after everything, even now that he is an abomination of magic and science and is at this moment a fucked-up-looking cat, he still has the be-deferential-she's-your-boss instinct.
(Well, not too deferential. He has defied her orders before. Multiple times. And the last time she saw him, he'd seen Chappie on TV robbing that armored car and run out of the fucking office like his hair had been on fire.
Did she know what had happened to him? Had she seen...?)
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"Who? Ah, my name's Ellen. Ellen Ripley... I'm new here, so... You must be thinking of someone else."
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He lets out a long breath. "Right, sorry. You, ah. You're the dead spit of someone I know. Knew. Um, excuse me a moment." He does something that looks a little like a hop combined with a sneeze, and quite suddenly there's a six-foot-two beanpole of a catboy picking himself up off the ground, dusting himself off with his bright orange robotic left arm.
"Dreadfully sorry about all that," he says, his tone rueful, his tail curling around his leg. "Here, let me buy you another coffee. It's the least I can do, really."
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Her accent is, notably, not Irish -- it's a heavy Appalachian twang. Then again, the mountain range is landlocked, so it could be believable that her only experience with the sea was after relocating.
"But I'm used to it now. Suppose a body can get used t' most anything."
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"Wow."
She never intends to be rude, but he's such an odd combination Ripley can't help but stare. Scans him up and down with an intensity that may seem eerily similar to his aforementioned boss. "I think I liked you better as a cat."
She rests a hand on her hip, finds it easier to project anger onto him in this form.
"Right, you owe me. I don't bust my ass just to waste my earnings."
Turning on her heel, she starts back toward the cafe, waving him along.
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All of which is to say: Mariner's not thrown at all.
"Well, yeah, you can probably get used to just about anything, but do you have to," Mariner says. "I got used to getting thrown in the brig, which, you know, whatever, but I don't know if I'd want to get used to freezing my tits off just for fun."
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Both, probably.
He's used to being looked at like a freak, so that's nothing too beyond the pale. He's gotten used to being a freak.
"Right," he says when they get back into the cafe. "You take your coffee black, I think? Or did I miss something?" One thing about being a cat - you have a powerful nose. He hadn't smelled cream or sugar, but he hadn't really been trying to. And coffee all on its own was strong.
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Just... peculiar.
Together they squeeze back into the cafe, heads ducked to avoid the door. She feels the brush of feathery wings every so often. Hears the flick of his tail.
Low cafe chatter sounds around them, coffee-smell hitting like a punch to the face. Ripley crosses arms loosely over her chest and leans toward him. "Black. With sugar."
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Heather snorts. "From experience, I have to say that the tits are pretty firmly attached on a human."
She turns, toward one of the docks, and then gives a beckoning wave to Mariner. "Come on, lets go chat with the sailors. Even if they don't invite you on, maybe they'll have advice to give about one-person sailboats!"