Rep was fine with fighting, facing down nearly certain death on a daily basis had become the new definition of normal for him. He wasn't really afraid, even knowing perfectly well how dangerous Cael and Circe could be.
At least until the shadows appeared and he found himself face to face with the thing he ******** hated most of ********." he yelled, his voice a lot more shrill than he meant it, and he froze up, backing away, scrambling away from the thing as fast as he could. He couldn't even think of fighting back, all he could think about was the huge looming nightmare that had taken up his entire ********. STOP."
In almost immediate reaction, the snake contorted, rippled, black spikes jutting down from it-
- as it split into two identical snakes.
The first immediately snapped at him fangs bared, poisonous, and then a memory -
- That mission. There had been snakes then, when they had died on that specific mission, when they had sacrificed themselves to make sure of the others could make it out-
- "Rep!" Sam bodily shoved Rep out of the way, both of them stopping dangerously close towards the outer edge of the platform. "Snap out of it, swap with me!"
Before he could react to that, Sam shoved him again, and then in front of Rep was just an oversized tree, that grew branches and branches and branches, oddly stationary from the center. From the corner of Rep's eye he could perhaps see that Oz and Mark were having no such luck, though the former at least was still on the offensive.
That unusual, shrill noise only got louder, and there was an even louder crack. The platform underneath them, was beginning to crumble.
Baneful
4 damage from snek. TREE HP: 5 BOSS HP: I FORGOT SCROLL UP
Rep remembered it far too vividly, the mission which had seemed like so much fun at the time. It had been five years, five ******** years and he was still so weak and so afraid. He hadn't been able to deal with any of it. They'd told them all, so fresh and naive that it had been just to retrieve weapons tablets from some ill ******** fated party before them. He'd heard murmurings in the aftermath it had been for something else, an artifact, because of course it ******** hard been.
And they'd died, they'd died and he remembered their gravestones, still visited them every year when he visited the others and left flowers.
They'd waited and waited for their guides to come back, but no one ever had, and so went most of his nightmares in the time afterwards, sometimes it was his mother, sometimes it was them, in all of the situations he was alone.
Snakes had gotten tangled up in that concept, something fatal, something inorexable, coming to take away everything that was good, their venom impossible to fight off with a blade, sapping him of everything he was. The terror was absolute.
It was only when Sam interrupted him that he snapped out of it long enough to focus on the tree instead, Tracey finally becoming someone he could hear.
<> he said sharply.
< do it William.>>
And it was enough, enough to use his axe for what axes were best at, leaping forward to try and strike at it.
HP: 56/60 DMG: 6
Zoobey
Posted: Sat Dec 02, 2017 3:17 pm
The tree instantaneously shattered into hundreds of fragments- and Rep felt an unusual sensation-
- A rejection -
- As if the shattered pieces were repelled by him. It bought him a little bit of time to assess the situation - Mark had slipped, and he was hanging to the precipice of the tower, struggling to pull himself up. Sam had moved to help Oz and was shouting something from the other side -
- A giant spider still roamed around, and it was growing more limbs now, much, more than just eight limbs -
- And that shrill noise was beginning to squeeze into his mind, just on the precipice of hurting as the shape of a shadow, massive and curved, swing right into him-
- White.
The room again, and it was just Rep and a shorter shape.
"Hi Rep," said a kid, a teenager even, that looked suspiciously a lot like the division lead. In his arms was a rather impressively oversized glass jar. "I'm sorry I don't have much time to explain, but I think I - or this memory at least - was left here to wait for you."
And then he held the jar, just a seemingly empty open jar, out to Rep.
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Posted: Sat Dec 02, 2017 3:37 pm
Rep's first instinct when everything shattered and there was a glimmer of clarity was to run in the direction of Mark, where he held on for dear life. It was an automatic response, an unthinking reflex to help his companions.
But he didn't reach him before once again he took a blow from the weapon and everything went white.
At first he was confused, frantic and afraid, but it settled and warmed into a smile at the sight in front of him, familiar and permitted closer to his normally guarded self than most.
"There's never enough time." he said, just a little bit sadly to the teenager, giving him a fond smirk as he took the jar.
"Thanks." he said.
Zoobey
Posted: Sat Dec 02, 2017 4:43 pm
But the moment the jar was relinquished, the memory simply faded-
- and Rep remembered. After the Amazon, after the lighthouse, it hadn't just been him or Lucky or Gale or Sam. When they faced off against the tree, it hadn't just been him either, and the whole debacle at the bar, the aftermath, the items, the watch-
-"That item was not yours to give," she said, taking the teen's hand gently as they walked down a long, empty corridor, "He will want it back later."
The kid was quiet for a moment. "I think I understand now. I'm not him, am I?"
"No," she said, and smiled gently. "But you know why-"
"I-" the kid trailed off, expression serious, deep in thought. "I..."
*
"Get out" And then he was older, in his early twenties perhaps, "I don't need you. I reject you."
She waited patiently, unflinching as items - books, furniture, constructs - were thrown around the room. It looked like a relatively modest room with old and peeling wallpaper, furnished almost to the point of clutter. Several books lay on a table, others on a bookshelf. A small collection of of postcards were on that desk too, all various locations, and the walls were covered in posters: Asia, Europe, Africa, South America.
"Of course," she said politely, immediately bowing out from this room -his room. "I am patient."
The memory shifted and the next was the same room. Some things were missing though, a couple of posters, several postcards, a few books. He was seated on the bed, and was quiet now.
"You're still angry at me," she smiled, and tried to extend one hand towards his shoulder-
- Which he immediately slapped away. "I'm not mad at you," he said, turning around to face her, "I'm furious. You wont let me wake up, you wont let me leave this - is this even supposed to be my room? You wont-"
The memory shifted again and the same room. The wallpaper was gone, all the posters, the books, the desk. When she arrived, he was just staring quietly out the window into the white space beyond.
"Are you still upset?" She tried, sitting next to the bed beside him, all smiles. "I am patient."
"I know," he said, "I know what you're doing."
"Are you scared?"
"No, just disappointed. I think I-"
The memory again. The room. Just an empty bookshelf and a bed. There was no window.
Her again. "Hello," she said quietly, and leaned over to kiss his forehead, gently. "Are you still upset at me?"
He didn't respond at first, just looking up at her, and then blinked a couple of times, as if confused. "I don't think so. Am I?"
"Are you still angry?"
"Yes," he confessed, "But I don't remember why."
*
And then the kid holding her hand finally arrived at the room and it was just white and nothing else.
"You are mine," she said, even as he took one long look at the room. "This is all mine."
Immediately, Rep was back in the fray of chaos, and he was holding the jar, and his ears were ringing. Everything seemed to move in slow motion for a long second-
-"Rep what the hell?" Sam said, swatting the last of the spider legs in place. "You had that the entire time?"
And where the jar should have been was an ornate pocket watch, the face currently covered with an ornate hourglass design.
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Posted: Sat Dec 02, 2017 5:05 pm
Rep had felt a friendliness and warmth toward the teenager in front of him that he couldn't place, even noting the resemblance to his lead it hadn't mattered. He just couldn't remember why, or think why the usual suspicion and hostility didn't apply.
And then he knew, the memories slamming back into place with a bittersweet combination of joy and grief. He remembered the trials and tribulations but moreover the fondness he'd felt for Carl and how it hadn't mattered that he went from one danger to the next because protecting him had felt like having a meaning.
As he arrived back into chaos from the unnatural stillness it was with the memory of the room and an anger that was almost vicarious. He took the indignation and the stubbornness and in that instant made it his own. The man in the memory might have lost the reason for his fury and fight, but Rep would ******** remember for him, carrying it close to him. It made him more determined than he'd ever been that Circe wouldn't count him as hers, driving home the terrible and chilling danger she represented.
It had been one thing to think that simply not being interested in what she had to offer would be enough, it was another to realise that she was so powerful she could technically do whatever she wanted, she wasn't some cartoonish movie vampire bound by arbitrary rules.
And yet she was a necessary evil, weren't they all really?
He held the watch tightly. "Aye. Carl had it."
And for some reason it brought forth a spike of emotion in him just to say that particular name out loud.
But there were other priorities not forgotten even in the wake of all he'd seen. "Is Mark all right?"
Zoobey
Posted: Sun Dec 03, 2017 3:45 pm
"Nah, he got kicked out," Sam said casually, pointing his weapon towards the target that was visibly, circling them. "Can you use the artifact already I'm getting ants-"
- And then Sam's head, almost comically, went rolling to the ground before dissolving, the body remaining a second longer.
She was there. Her, and what remained of the Death lead, and it was impossible to tear away from the shadows - there were shadows everywhere around them now, until form was nearly impossible to discern, until all Rep could see was-
- A warm comforting person who believed, actually believed in Rep, and then two crystallized hands-
- Bodies floating up from the Sahara, covered in insects-
- And then crying. That broken, familiar crying. It was definitely Jordan, he knew that, and then oddly enough, Harrison was there too.
And there was Rep's body, washed up on the beach, pale and horrific. His face was torn apart, open, something had picked at it and his skin and there was nobody else on that beach but them -
"Rep," she said, and the shadows took the form of a familiar woman, clad in a long black dress. "If you give me the watch, I will make this all go away."
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Posted: Sun Dec 03, 2017 4:04 pm
It was a relief to know that Mark was out, it was one less person to worry about in the madness he found himself in.
But he couldn't help Sam, and once again the man was brutally murdered in front of his eyes, making him wince and nausea rise up in him. He had thought once that it would get easier the more death you saw, but it never did. He still had nightmares about the mall and about the other grail infected people who might have been fine, who might have been saved if he'd been better.
But he could only be who he was.
The memories pulled him under and it was almost unbearable, he'd witnessed so many things, so many people who'd believed in him only to fall, leaving him an inadequate bearer for their memory, the one thing that persisted.
The vision of his own death twisted a dagger of grief in him only for the pain evident in Jordan and Harrison. He didn't mourn his twisted body even a little and barely found it disturbing. Only the pain it caused hurt him.
He felt like he was coming up for air as there was a break in the deluge, as he was able to speak, reeling from a whirlwind of emotion still.
"Make what go away?" he said angrily. "Memories? Things that I won't ******** let happen again?" He felt the desire to cry surging up in him and nestling as a lump in his throat. He swallowed against it and wouldn't let it prevail. "This ******** thing was given to me. ME. It belongs to me and it was ******** given to me by someone I had almost ******** forgotten."
"If you want it. Take it." he said. "And stop pretending I have a ******** choice."
Posted: Sun Dec 03, 2017 4:52 pm
"With your permission," she said-
- And the shadows were upon him and Rep was in the center of the maelstorm and there was only spinning inky darkness, and her, clasping one cold hand against his. For a moment he felt nothing and then-
-White. It looked a little like the white room and a little like the Death division office. Seated on a desk was Rep's lead, now looking as he always did. There was nothing stacked on the table and even the chair Rep was now seated on was bare.
There was just silence as Caelius looked at absolutely nothing on the desk and then looked up, finally. "For ******** sake," he said, looking straight at Rep, incredibly annoyed. "Open the goddamned watch."
And not for the first or second or even third time, Rep was in the maelstorm again and she hand her hand on the watch as well.
Baneful
You may roll an attack dice if you wish (any number above miss =successful disengage) !
The cold blackness to Rep should have been terrifying, but instead it felt somehow familiar, close to Tracey who was all chill darkness and cold talons. He wasn't scared of the darkness, but he was always scared of what could happen. He refused to become the reason for Harrison and Jordan's pain, so he tried to resist, but how could you even begin to resist what you didn't understand?
And then, in a flash of very direct command he had an answer, and for Rep following orders was the easiest ******** thing in the world. The rest of the time he bumbled through life hoping vainly that what he was doing wasn't the worst possible ******** thing. But orders were fine, orders were good, and he would fight to the absolute death to follow them.
With clear direction about what he was going to do, he twisted away from her with every bit of strength he had and tried to open up the watch before the distance between them could be closed all over again.
Posted: Mon Dec 04, 2017 12:47 am
At first the watch simply refused. The hinge was fastened shut - it held on with an unusual supernatural power even as she stepped out from the void, long black hair billowing to become it.
The closer she got, the more the memories began to escalate wildly out of control. It wasn't just the memory, it was the loss and ultimately the fear behind them. It was all his fears congealed into one mass, and Rep's heart again began to pick up, adrenaline surging, as if someone was telling him to hurry. A step closer and he could see her arms outstretched again towards him, could feel them grasp around him already, and could hear her say something - an unclear word - it didn't matter -
At the very last possible moment, the watch snapped open.
And then everything simple stopped.
Click.
Rep was back in the office again, but it wasn't the Inception office as Sam had so eloquently put it. This felt a little more fleshed out, a little more real, and put together the way Rep remembered it, his desk, his papers, and all. Mark was sleeping on his own desk, printer still printing away a massive paper pile underneath him, Oz was repainting his nails and Sam and the Death lead were discussing something in mostly hushed tones.
In Rep's hands was still the watch, now open.
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Posted: Mon Dec 04, 2017 1:19 am
It was unbearable, the memories - and there were so many of them - almost threatening to defeat him, the pain and the loss everything he’d tried to run from for his whole life. But he had an order and to him it was what mattered most of all.
Even so it looked like he wouldn’t make it on time as she drew nearer and nearer to him, hands outstretched.
The watch opened.
Breathless even though he appeared to be back and fine, he took in his surroundings and stood, making his way over to where Cael snd Sam were talking.
“Er, Sir.” He said anxiously. “I think this might be important.” He held the watch up but he didn’t hand it over.
Posted: Wed Dec 06, 2017 2:50 am
Like some large cat, the Death lead didn't exactly say anything, but he watched Rep quite evenly. Sam was shifting uncomfortably, as if he knew something too, and after a long moment, Caelius held out his hand. "If you would return my artifact."
But it wasn't said said in any menacing manner, and surprisingly, a lot quieter than usual.
If Rep turned to look at Sam, he was trying his best to look anywhere but at Rep.
Baneful
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Posted: Wed Dec 06, 2017 3:58 am
Rep didn't hand over the watch. "I said important." he said. "Not yours. It was given to me so it's mine."
He was also aware of Cael's usual tone, peppered with swearing and impatient comments, not the tone he was currently being addressed in. "If you want it, I want to know what the ******** you want it for, especially if it's not Cael I'm ******** talking to."
"Clue me in on what the ******** we are dealing with, what this is and why and for once I'll make an informed decision if I'm going to give it to you or not. I'm tired of always being ******** jerked around."
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