ph_logs | [Post Canon Update Open Log] Wasteland, Baby!

[Post Canon Update Open Log] Wasteland, Baby!

The Day That We Watched The Death of the Sun [ Blackwood Brews ]

It's a rainy morning when Blackwood Brews reopens, brass keys jangling loudly as Martin pulls them from his pocket. It's strange to be back here. There's this constant feeling that there's another shoe waiting to drop. A phantom Sword of Damocles. Pumpkin Hollow is far from perfect, certainly, but it's that familiar imperfect, predictable and comparatively easy. But after everything that he and Jon endured for... however long, Martin's already forgotten what Jon said it was aside from it feeling far too short... Some of those worlds within the world, they felt so... real. Dreamlike and permanent, like they'd been there forever. The sick village comes to mind. Not to mention that dreadful house.

The scent of tea leaves snaps Martin from his introspection. There's a bit of dust. He should get that cleaned up before Jon gets here with the pastry order from Max.

Water boils as rain falls outside. Dishes are washed, tea sets prepared. The dark wood and bookshelf-lined walls of the shop feel cozy under the rainy sky.

Martin almost doesn't notice as someone finally enters once the shop is open.

He startles lightly, snapped out of his stupor as the bell on the door rings. "Oh--- Hello there! Welcome in! Have a seat wherever you like. Can I get anything started for you?"

The Cloud & The Cold & Those Jeans You Have On [ Morning Fog ]

Sometimes, in the very, very early morning, the fog will be much thicker than usual as it rolls in off the shoreline.

A figure stands on the beach, in the very thick of it, silhouette almost obscured despite its size. A Thermos-like flask in hand, Martin gazes out at the sea.

He came here to be alone. Mornings on the shore are quiet if you stand far away enough from the marina. Between the distance and the effects of his Lonely fog, the far-off shouting of the crew of the Mipha's Grace as they load up their ship for the day sounds almost unreachably distant, like the echo of another world. A world of people and gatherings, so otherworldly to Martin's solitude.

During their apocalyptic hike and their stay at the safehouse, Jon and Martin were separated meaningfully... maybe twice? In all that time that felt like years, just a few brief moments apart. And Martin loves Jon more than anything or anyone, but a thing like him... Well, he's always needed a healthy dose of solitude to think straight, and he won't find that at the cottage or at the tea shop.

But maybe occasionally it won't hurt to be interrupted, to be kept from sinking too deep. Either by a friend or a fellow seeker of a moment's peace in a loud and busy world.

You Gaze Unafraid as They Sob from the City Ruins
[Closed to Jon]

As things slowly start easing back to normal, Martin and Jon spend fewer and fewer days laid up in bed, dead to the world. But every so often, they take a day to themselves to just be.

Martin has been almost ghost-like, his own struggles to reconnect with this world drawing the Lonely to him in noticeable but largely innocuous ways. (Aside from a bit of fog in the house, but what can you do.) Jon is woken on a lazy morning not by hands and a lover's voice, but the phantom of a kiss to the forehead, the cloying smell of bacon being cooked, and the sound of the ocean through a window that was not open the night before. Traces of Martin's presence.

Jon will find the other man out on the patio, breakfast laid out on their garden table overlooking the bluffs. "Morning," Martin murmurs, smiling with a warmth reserved only for Jon these days. "Hope I didn't wake you too early."

code

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

Daisy doesn't so much walk in as she does burst in like a wet dog from the rain, all drowned with floppy hair on account of her general stubborn refusal to use umbrellas. Or hoods.

She sags with a tangible relief when she sees him. "Thank christ, you are back."

The odds of someone having broken into the shop were slim but not zero.

It's not long before his first customer shows up, Shen Qingqiu glowing ever so slightly as he dismisses the rain from his umbrella and the rest of his person with a little spell. "Martin!" The tone of his voice, the look on his face, they all betray how relieved, how pleased he is to see his friend back again, in this place he's meant to be.

...And then he notices what else Martin brought back with him and his demeanor immediately changes to concern, hastily approaching the counter to take his hand and check his pulse. "Oh, Martin," he sighs. "Xiongdi. Are you well? Did Sims come back with you?"

Martin smiles awkwardly as he registers the identity of his customer.

"Oh! M-morning, Daisy, you're looking." Wet. "Busy. Were you--- checking in on the shop?"

Feels incredibly weird to talk to her like this. Having watched her die, having seen the thing she became. But Martin still puts Earl Grey leaves and lavender buds into a strainer, like muscle memory. He doesn't even think about it.

"Been walking by to check since it went quiet." She wipes her face and at least shakes her hair out in the doorway, rather than after stepping fully inside. Really not unlike a wet dog shaking itself out, but a little less messy. "Been a few people leaving and not coming back."

Being her, she doesn't say that she was worried that would happen to him and Jon, but it's the implication.

"Ah. Yeah, I remember. It was usually people who hadn't been here long, but sometimes..."

Martin had certainly heard plenty of town gossip from the shop. The chief constable, the owner of Baker Ranch, Gerry's ex-boyfriend... Apparently Dahlia's ex-boyfriend too, but that happened before Martin was here. And maybe also Crichton's?? What is it about ex-boyfriends? Too bad it can't happen to Jon's.

"We actually were specifically asked by Mortanne to go home and come back. Apparently we're going to be... needed. The way we are now. So." He shrugs. "Doesn't seem like we were gone long. It's still spring. Maybe a week, yeah?"

"Thereabouts," Daisy confirms with a sideways nod, finally reaching the counter and leaning against it. "Didn't realise she could just... ask you to go back. S'pose it sort of makes sense."

She doesn't exactly have to guess what they had to go back and live through. Not that she ever told Martin that, even if she did finally get around to telling Jon.

"...the apocalypse. Right?"

"Y...yeah." The word sounds like Martin had to force it out of himself. Like the first sound got caught in his chest and the rest had to be pushed out. "Daisy, I'm--- sorry we couldn't help you. After what you did for Jon when Trevor and Julia came, I--- I know Jon wanted to help you. He likes to pretend he's this unreadable enigma, but."

Martin sets her cup of tea down in front of her, along with one of those itty-bitty pitchers filled with milk. His hands withdraw quickly so that he can fidget. Not in an anxious way, necessarily, just to help him think.

"Well, I owe you one."

"Killing me was helping me," Daisy says, voice a touch softer than usual but still firm all the same. The kind of tone she gets when she's the one explaining something difficult that she knows to be true. Subtle as it is. "I didn't live it. Not— the real version."

Nightmares. Ugh. It still makes her shudder to think about.

"I just got the tapes. But I heard enough. At that point, killing me was the best thing any of you could've done for me." She wraps her hands around the cup. Sighs. "...still sorry I put you all through it. 'sira still doesn't know."

"Water under the bridge," Martin assures her. "Glad you didn't stick to leaving me alone forever, by the way. I was, ah. Well, I was a real prick there for a while. I still am, honestly, I'm just better at keeping it buttoned up." The end of the sentence dissolves slightly into awkward laughter.

"Shen Qingqiu! God, I feel like I haven't seen you in--- like a year!" As soon as his friend is satisfied with the fact that he indeed has a pulse, Martin pulls him into a bear hug. "Christ, it's good to be back. Yeah, Jon's here! He'll be out in a bit, he's dusting his office aggressively."

"Hey. You're talking to the biggest bitch in the Met," she jokes dryly, waving him off. "You were all in your fog and whatever grand plan you had going on. I had arguments with Melanie just as bad. You should've seen her when she heard I signed the contract."

She shakes her head, takes a drink from the tea and exhales again. "Won't pretend it wasn't awkward being yelled out of the room, mind. Pretty funny you turning up here the first time not knowing though."

"Don't open the lemon green canister," says a voice from around ankle height. "I put my mice in there."

At his feet sits a bright pink cat, idly grooming one paw without a care in the world.

(Luckily, if Martin does open the canister labeled LEMON GREEN, he'll only find a bunch of toy mice Nimona's been slowly nicking from the pet store.)

"Ugh, don't remind me," he grumbles, rubbing his face. "I'm retroactively embarrassed about that. No wonder you looked at me weird."

"Wh--- Oh god." Immediately Martin worries that the mice in question are going to be live mice, hurriedly opening the canister and sighing with relief when he sees brightly-colored fabric. "Goodness, you nearly gave me a heart attack! What happened to the tea?"

"Yeah," she snorts. "The weird time stuff never gets less confusing. Only going to get worse for you now, probably. Think you must be ahead of all of us."

With Basira being from before Daisy died, and Melanie being from back when she quit... they're officially the furthest ahead. (Except, of course, for Sam and the other Alice—but this one's not all that aware of their dimensional neighbours.)

A beat. "...what happened? After I died. Didn't get any tapes from after that."

Nimona laughs. "Dunno. It was like that when I broke in."

Or she might have eaten all of it. Either one!

Nimona springs onto the counter, transforming into a fluid river of pink light and reforming as a teenager. She perches there and idly kicks her heels against the base. "You really oughta get better locks if you're gonna vanish on us for so long. Where've you been?"

On the surface, it sounds flippant enough, but the way she's watching Martin betrays a little bit of worry. She likes the guy. There's always been something about him that's -- weirdly familiar, even though their personalities couldn't be more different.

He was checking for much more than the presence of Martin's pulse, but he gives it up with a mental shrug as he's pulled into a deep hug. Oof! Well, Lonely or not, he can't be in too bad shape if he's willing to express affection like that!

"It's been a week or so for me, but with no idea when or if you'd ever come back..." He hugs Martin back, patting one broad shoulder. "You scared me, xiongdi. Don't do that again, okay?"

[Wizard was about as academic a magician as it came. While other practitioners of the art might draw their powers from patrons or natural talent his came from long hours of study and grueling practice. To that end, he derived concentration and focus from the feeling of a study or a well-stocked library as opposed to those more wild mages who seemed to draw energy from being out in nature, but he could not deny that there was a kind of serenity to certain places that defied explanation. It felt like words in a dream, where what they communicate is clear in the moment, but to repeat it or to try putting it into words was as elusive as trying to hold water in your hands. Certain kinds of weather or certain kinds of places had the ability to rejuvinate him more than the most restful of sleeps though, and loathe to admit it as he might be he could see why wildmages clung to places that elicited such a feeling.

The shores of Marrow Isle were such a place for him, and the peaceful calm that could be found there in early mornings or late nights was completely unlike what he'd experienced on the seas of Hydeland. Crashing waves, whirlpools, and Kraken-infested caverns were what awaited those who sought out liesurely beachwalks where he had come from but, while storms and angry waves could still lap at the coast here, he'd found a sort of serenity he'd rarely encountered before as well. The distant sounds of the docks, with the faint ringing of ships bells and the clang of caliper against flagstaff, added that subtle touch of civilization needed for him not to feel cut off from the rest of the world and the fog present on mornings like these added a pleasing combination of mystery and moisture to the air. Constitutionals like these are normally a solitary affair for Wizard, as there's little but the occasional crab for company on the majority of such outings, but the appearance of a figure in the fog both catches him by surprise and informs him that he's not the only one taking in the sea air this morning.]

"Hello?"

[He calls to the figure, not able to make out much beyond an outline.]

"Who's that out in the fog?"

It's a slow stir, but not an unpleasant one; thankfully, Jon's started to get past the stage of their return, where he's woken up to anxious dread, wondering when the other shoe would drop, when the dream would end. Normalcy in the mundane and in the "cursed" aspect of the island have been enough to shake those worries - and what a pleasant surprise that it's the former, this time around.

Peeling himself out of bed, Jon pulls on his robe hanging from the back of the bedroom door, padding slowly out into the world. First, to the kitchen, then, outside, where he finds Martin. His own smile is just as warm, even with the tinges of sleep-haze that cling to his face.

"Not too early at all. I've got to stop being dead to the world eventually, I suppose," he half-jokes, moving to take his own seat. "The entire house smells fantastic, by the way. What all did you make?"

Martin lets out a puff of air, brows shooting up. "God, what didn't happen? Uh, let's see... Ah, Jon had to explode Helen. That was interesting. We found Melanie and Georgie, and they were--- shockingly unimpacted by the Fears for various reasons. And they'd accidentally started a cult because of it. Then I got sort of but not really kidnapped by Annabel Cain, who offered us a way to stop the apocalypse, but... at the cost of letting the Fears into other worlds."

At this point, Martin has started a cup of tea for himself.

"We--- decided with Melanie and Georgie and Basira that we were going to spring for it. Jon didn't want to. He--- he didn't want to have that on his conscience, but. We decided. As a group. So..." Martin stumbles over this part, clearly reluctant to relive it as he stirs his tea. "So we were going to do it after a rest, but... Jon slipped out. He killed Elias, and took his place as the... the Pupil of the Eye. With the intention of killing off the world, so that it would starve the Fears to death. But I knew he was up to something, and I followed, and--- by the time I--- Well, it was too late. The others blew the gas main, destroyed the Panopticon, and I... Jon and I died together. And now we're here."

"I went home for a bit," Martin admits. "Came back with some spooky new powers. Jon's are even more intense than mine. But don't worry, we're, ah. Properly dead back home! So we won't be going back again. We're Pumpkin Hollowites for good."

Martin promptly places an extra sweet strawberry tea and a chocolate croissant in front of her. She's regular enough that he knows what she likes.

"Now, I believe I owe you a treat for getting us out of that whole Efrain mess, hmm?"

There's a strange quality to the fog. Thick, low-hanging, and oddly cold, but also starkly isolating. As if standing in it makes every single other point seem vastly further away.

When the Wizard speaks, the fog itself almost seems to recoil at the sound, like a hand reeling away from a hot stove. It's hard to say why it feels that way, as the soupy cloud-cover doesn't rescind or retreat at all. But somehow... there is the overwhelming sense that the weather itself responded to the words with disgust.

The figure looks over. Raises his flask. "Name's Martin," he calls back. A man's voice, light in tone, with an English accent. The fog doesn't react to him. "Don't mind me, though. I'll be no bother."

"Oh, hah, just--- Bacon and eggs, some toast," Martin murmurs. "And tea. Obviously. Your favorite."

English Breakfast, with a Pumpkin Hollow flare. Just a bit of milk and not too much sugar. Just how Jon likes it.

"We never got to do this, in the cabin. Not--- I mean--- There were the first few days, but... Not like this. You know?"

The Lonely has eaten a lot of Martin these days, but there are some people who he couldn't help but miss.

"We didn't know how long it'd be when Mortanne offered. Didn't really get a chance to say goodbye. But--- we're here for good now," Martin assures him. "There's nothing left back home. So. It's here or bust."

Daisy listens quietly, as she can be surprisingly good at doing. Melanie and Georgie being somehow unaffected makes some amount of sense—guess the eye thing paid off, good for her.

She almost wishes the rest of it came as more of a shock than it does. The moment she heard the tapes, she thought that was it for the world—why would there be any undoing it? Why would the Fears leave any way for the world to escape their clutches? That there might have been a way to end it at all is more surprising than the fact the others took to fighting over whether or how to do it. That Jon decided he couldn't stand for it and tried to do his own thing... well, it wouldn't be the first time he acted alone because he knew he'd be stopped otherwise.

She's only alive because of that habit.

"So you are." Of course they are. Together. Matched set. Makes sense. That hesitant and I catches her ear, but she won't ask. Some things are personal. "Gotta be honest. Think if I was there I would've agreed with Jon. Not sure I'd've wanted to see what the world turned into after that kind of— collective trauma. Or what'd happen to those of us connected to the Fears."

Being cut off from the Hunt the first time saved her soul, but it also felt like it broke her in ways she could never have truly recovered from, back home. It's being in these other universes that's let her reclaim her existence. Throwing the entire world into a post-Fear society sounds all well and good until you think too hard about the side effects. Let alone subjecting another world to everything that had happened to theirs.

But then again...

"Though, probably only if I didn't remember here or the ship. Seen plenty of signs the Fears exist elsewhere anyway. Doubt letting them go changed much in the end."

She sighs. Drinks.

"...sorry, though. Can't have been easy. Any of it."

"I-- don't want to go 'round about it again," Martin mutters.

There were perfectly legitimate reasons why they'd chosen what they had. Because the lives of all those people were worth trying to save. Because there was no guarantee that any other world would have an apocalypse. Because even in their own world, the amount of people who ever experienced the Fears was small enough that you had to be in special circumstances to have heard of them at all.

"The most important part was that we agreed. Jon was the only one not on the same page, and---- and it backfired, for him to go against the group. But it's done now, and--- according to Mortanne, it was all meant to happen. To bring us back here, stronger, so that we could help. This is our home now, for good, and we agreed to go back, end that story, and then come home."

Unable to look at Daisy for the moment, Martin glares into his teacup. "...I wondered if us just... dying early would have saved anyone. Mortanne told me no. That the Web, and Elias--- Magnus. Would just try again. Or the universe would just pause eternally in our absence. Hard to believe we were that vital."

Daisy raises a single hand in silent acknowledgement, not enough investment in the debate to turn it into a whole thing. Hard to fully imagine herself there with them, having that argument, without knowing every step of the way that led them there. Hard to even know for sure her opinion would stay the same.

(In the end, she wasn't ever meant to make it that far in the first place. She believes that wholeheartedly.)

"Mm. I can believe it. Or— I can believe either answer. The way things went. Magnus' and the Web's plans. It made you important. Made all your choices tangle you up in the fate of the world. Maybe if Jon had said no in the coma, Magnus would've just started over. But he'd've had a harder time, I think. Would've had to clean the board. He'd invested too much in the pieces he had."

Who was left, that would make for a good replacement Archivist? His only surviving backups were Martin, Melanie and Basira who all already distrusted his every word.

"So. Maybe that was the way it was always 'meant' to go." She snorts, lets her head sag against her own shoulder. "So far as anything's 'meant' to be anything. Dunno. Can't imagine my part in it ending any other way."

A breath. "This is home, now. For me too."

She instantly perks up. "Sweet! I was gonna say," she declares, snatching up the scone. "You're the last place I had to hit up with the whole 'I did kinda save the town and kill a major demon, hint hint' speech."

CHOMP.

With her mouth full, "Bummer about you two being super dead though. So what kind of creepy powers did you get? On a scale of spooky ghost to chainsaw-wielding maniac."

[Inclement weather ordinarily has a peculiarly welcoming feeling for Wizard, giving much the same sensation as being the first to rediscover some long-neglected trinket or find a well-worn tome in its feeling of embracing something rejected. That feeling had been as present as ever thanks to the gloomy weather that hung across the island, but the feeling of the fog had felt keenly different in the moments after he'd called out.

The unknown brings with it a feeling of foreboding fore many people, certainly, but Sylus was drawn to that rather than turned away so the idea that a mysterious silhouette would make him feel off like that was a strange one. Fleeting as it was, though, he dismissed the passing impression and focused on man speaking with him.]

"On the contrary!"

[Wizard calls back.]

"It's a pleasant surprise to find another person out here. Many of my little expeditions end up with nothing but sand for company."

[Drawing closer, he raises his hand in greeting and returns the introduction.]

"A pleasure Martin. I'm Sylus, though most everyone simply calls me Wizard. You out here taking in the sea air as well, or are you heading someplace particular?"

"Oh...well, it's the same for me," Shen Qingqiu points out gently. "Even if I wanted to go back, it would just make a big mess even messier. And I've been dead in my original world for years by now, so...much better to just stay here and start a new life, I think."

And then he smiles, patting Martin's shoulder. "It'll be nice to live so close to such a fine tea shop."

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

[Post Canon Update Open Log] Wasteland, Baby!

blackwood brews

Blackwood Brews

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

blackwood brews

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

Morning Fog

You Gaze Unafraid as They Sob from the City Ruins

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject