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 Posted: Wed Apr 28, 2010 2:31 am
Who: Doucette and Lucia
Where: The Cemetery
When: After dark, bring a flashlight
Weather: Not a cloud in the sky, good star counting weather
A cemetery during the day is hardly what one would call bustling, but the night in comparison, well, it's usually as silent as the grave. Pun not intended. Besides the rare possibility of a few goths getting their kicks sneaking around and pretending their in the middle of a blood sacrifice, a cemetery is a pretty nice place to kick back and enjoy some quiet time. And that's where one would have found Doucette on this particular clear night.
Just a bit away from the graves (for the Irish woman was far from disrespectful) she'd laid out a small blanket and pulled off her boots to better relax. Lounging back on her little slope of land - chosen for it's almost recliner like qualities - Doe tucked her hands behind her head and stared up at the stars. She could go on for hours like that with the dark abyss of the night and the bright spots of light reflecting off blue eyes that seemed to drink it all in.
And she did stay like that for a while.
When her eyes began to lid slowly and heavily she thought it might just be time to pack it in and head back home and so she stood and stretched out her less than lengthy limbs before turning to tug her boots back on and roll up the blanket. Before she could get to the blanket (but after her boots kept her feet from getting frostbite on the cold ground) Doucette thought she caught the glimpse of something drifting between the headstones.
Her eyes narrowed for a better look. Please God, don't let them want another blood sacrifice, she thought, remembering the last time she'd interrupted some of the bigger fanatics.
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Posted: Thu Apr 29, 2010 4:55 pm
Now that Lucia was allowed to go out alone, she had been taking advantage of the opportunities. She didn’t want to make Zul come to Yuu’s grandmother’s grave with her – so she made some excuse. She realized she was probably pushing Zul away from her because she was afraid of hurting him, but it wasn’t like her fear wasn’t justified. It just felt so good to be able to depend on him, and that just wasn’t good.
So the Kitten had visited the grave of the woman after whom she had been named. In the pictures of Nana Lucia, she looked so classy. In addition to completely restoring all of her energy, she liked visiting Lucia’s house, as she liked to imagine it. Or maybe that was just that Dickenson poem she had read.
The frei had been floating towards the grave in the cemetery for 30 seconds before she realized it. Spirits. Looking around frantically, the Kitten noticed a few lurking by other graves. One blocked her path towards Nana Lucia, probably completely by coincidence, but it cause the raevan to streak off towards a direction in which there were absolutely no souls.
Maybe she couldn’t deal with it. She had forgotten about the souls. The spirits. She did not want to be put in a position where she could be possessed again. She would take the long way to get to the grave, and if she needed to Lucia decided she would go home without visiting Lucia.
The purple glow beneath her lit up her path. Her eyes, in the dim moonlight, were the same shade of purple they displayed in the day. The Kitten was jittery, looking all around. There was a woman, lying on a blanket—in a graveyard. Some people were just weird, floating towards her area while avoiding her too.
Humans were odd, she thought, immediately regretting the thought with the memory if the humans she had killed. Looking at the ground, the frei began floating away from Doucette.
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Posted: Thu Apr 29, 2010 5:15 pm
Doucette fretted for a moment as the person seemed to drift away from her just as soon as she'd taken notice of them. At a longer glance she noticed they seemed to carry some kind of purple flashlight with them. Oh great. That just reeked of gothy activities.
The Irish woman was on the balls of her feet, ready to hit the road and get away before they was anything disturbing about to happen, but she paused. Where were the others? Of the rituals she'd read about (or unfortunately partially witnessed) there had always been more people around, others helping or hoping to be part of it. Why was this person alone?
And wasn't she an adult? Doe scolded herself for not taking more adult-like actions. If there was grave-robbing occuring then she wanted to try and stop it. Maybe though she should just call the cops now and be done with it? She could leave and not think any more of it.
But how was that fair to the person with the purple light if they were as innocently enjoying the silence as she was?
Doe frowned at her internal struggles before stepping a bit closer and calling out, "Oi! Whot are ya doin out here?" Fear made the accent come out heavy, covering the quiver in her tone. Crap. Ever since she'd been introduced to this lab she was finding herself in too many situations which made her accent apparent.
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Posted: Fri Apr 30, 2010 6:29 pm
Oh s**t she saw me. Lucia cringed internally at the heavy accent and harsh way that she was called to. Her soft white ears went back as she paused in her avoidance. The black-haired frei slowly turned to face the Irishwoman who harshly called out to her.
The Kitten slowly floated through the maze of headstones over to the red-head. ”I was going to visit my great-grandmother’s grave” she said plainly. It was easier to explain it that way than try to explain about her guardian and that she was named after Yuu’s grandmother.
She wasn’t used to getting stopped by strangers in the graveyard, but she didn’t often visit here after dark. ”Can I help you?”
The frei bit her lip. She didn’t want to get into anything crazy. She should just keep walking. But she stopped.
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Posted: Sun May 02, 2010 9:43 pm
Oh thank god. Doucette breathed out as the girl replied to her question. Visiting her grandmother's grave, that's innocent enough for any normal respects. But that was where the normality ended. Closer, Doucette could see that the girl was not holding a flashlight, but actually the source of the purple glow. The girl was a Raevan. How exactly had the red head never come across these beings before? Was she suddenly more active in the community or was the course of fate simply shifting to help her further comprehend her own new position in the world.
"That's lovely, Doe said with a smile, her accent falling back so she sounded relaxed and normal. If she'd known the purple woman had thought her harsh she would have done better to be softer for her sake, but fear can make anyone different.
The Irish woman hesitated, a bit confused. Wasn't she the one that was stepping up, being the adult and attempting to handle the situation? And yet here was this forlorn looking lady asking if she could be of any help to her.
"Oh, sorry, no! I was just worried there were some kids in here destroying things. Not the first time it would happen, wouldn't be the last." A sigh escaped her, thinking of how people could be so inconsiderate to the obvious suffering of those that visit the permanent home of those they loved.
It made Doucette think about her own grandparents, also passed along, on her father's side. "Do...do you mind if I join you?" she asked on a whim. Her own family wasn't buried where she could find them, but she felt overwhelmingly like paying respects to loved ones.
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Posted: Wed May 05, 2010 7:19 pm
The woman, it seemed, wasn’t surprised by her half-body. Maybe she was wasted or high, maybe she had met a raevan before. But as her harsh accent faded to a lighter one, with only hints of her heritage, the kitten allowed herself to relax a little. The wind picked up slightly as the dark-haired frei watched the woman’s reaction. She was unsure, she noted silently, if she needed any help.
The frei breathed in sharply when the woman mentioned vandals. ”Are you serious?!” she asked incredulously. ”Why would anyone want to do that?” Lucia looked around at the span of granite and marble headstones. Each one took time to make. Each one was picked out so carefully by loved ones. The engraving was so personal. Even if it was just a name, it was what the man or woman or child was called. It was how they lived their life. It might reflect a marriage or a life lived single.
Lucia couldn’t imagine anyone ever wanting to destroy or vandalize a grave.
And then the woman asked to join her. To Nana Lucia’s. The Kitten bit her lip. Gaining strength, especially by Nana Lucia’s grave, was always very personal to her. But she didn’t have to try too hard. Maybe she would be able to. The image of the girl she had murdered after smoking those drugs. She looked back at the Irishwoman before her. ”Okay,” she said softly, studying her. ”I’m Lucia.”
The frei held out her hand for the woman to take and began leading the way past a few graves towards Yuu’s grandmother. ”Have you met a raevan before?" or are you high or something and not aware that I’m only a halfbody.
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Posted: Thu May 06, 2010 7:00 pm
Doucette frowned and shook her head, reaching up to rub at her ear in a semi-nervous fashion before dropping her hand down once more. "I'm sorry to say that I am," she replied sadly, her eyes gazing around the headstones and landing upon the one where the kid had been supposedly 'summoning his god' by grinding cockroaches against the grave maker. It was disheartening, and not only because someone's sacred resting place was being defiled, but also because that kid had clearly not had a proper upbringing.
"I guess people like that enjoy stuff like that," the red head replied eventually with a sigh and a shrug as they began making their way through the quiet graveyard. "You should be careful if you come out here a lot. Graves bring the best and the worst out of people."
Doe grinned and took Lucia's hand, the Irish woman giving a little nod of her red curls, "My name is Doucette, but it's so much easier to just call me Doe." The gal hadn't the foggiest why her mother hadn't given her some poshed up tradtional Irish name, but the years of questioning such a choice were long behind her now and her only current worries were people remembering how to pronounce it without calling her 'Duckette' instead.
Once again the woman was nodding along with the girl's words. "I have, though you're the first girl I've met. I wonder if they are all as lovely as you. All the male Raevan's I've met have seemed very...aloof." Doucette mentally pointed out that at least all the others had been in fairly good spirits, but you can't expect a girl visiting a grave to be a bundle of sunshine and sweetness afterall.
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Posted: Tue May 18, 2010 6:36 pm
The kitten frowned slightly as Doucette reaffirmed her statement of vandals. Who would enjoy breaking apart what people often spent so much time and money selecting? "I don't get how people can like doing that…" she looked around for any current vandals, but luckily (maybe for them), she didn't see any in this area.
Nodding at the woman's warning, the frei smiled as she introduced herself. "People sometimes call me 'Lou-sh.' I think it's just being lazy because all it cuts off is a 'ya,' but who knows why people get nicknames." She had nicknames for a lot of people, but most of them were cuter than long elegant names. Like Melisande. She was called Pasha often. And Lucia called her Meli mostly.
The frei blushed at the 'lovely' comment. It was nice to not be seen as a monster. "Some of the raevans can be cranky, but some are really nice. I guess it’s the same way with humans."
Lucia led them to Nana Lucia's grave.
Lucia Soto
February 6, 1918
January 30, 2000
"Death is not a foe
But an inevitable adventure."
"This is my guardian's grandmother's grave." The headstone was made of a white smooth granite. The lettering was delicately carved into the stone.
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Posted: Fri May 21, 2010 8:49 pm
Doucette shook her bouncy curls with a similar frown to Lucia's, "No, I cannot understand how people could do such a thing either." If her grandparents had graves to be buried in then she would be furious to find someone had disregarded as someplace sacred and instead used it for their own disgusting designs.
She was happy to see the raeven smile and it warmed her own features as her lips tugged into a reflective grin. The girl was so lovely when she smiled, but surely she had a reason for being down, and it wasn't Doucette's place to start putting pokers into nerves where they didn't belong. "Loush? That's a very strange nickname I think. Lucia sounds much nicer...but of course we like to give nicknames to those we like so I'm sure they have a special reason for calling you Loush."
The raevan's words brought a laugh to her lips, but she kept it low so as not to disrespect the quiet atmosphere graveyards invoked, "Cranky, that's a good way to put it. But you're very right, everyone has different personalities. Have you met many of the others?"
When they neared and stopped in front of the granite headstone Doe grew silent and looked at the monument with a sort of sad longing. Her parents had decided not to have a physical location for her grandparents remains, and it made her heart ache to think that she couldn't go somewhere like Lucia could. It was almost like she was missing a bit of closure not knowing where her loved one's spirits rested.
"To live through so many years...I bet she told great stories." Perhaps Lucia had heard some, perhaps not. It was very hard to tell how old raevans were, and she didn't want to insult by guessing wrong at her age.
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Posted: Tue May 25, 2010 10:19 pm
”I-umm—wouldn’t know. She had been here for a while when I was born. But my guardian did say I’m headstrong, just like her. She was my first connection to Yuurei, so I’m kind of drawn here pretty often.” The frei smiled at Doe.
”I always figured that if she was special enough for me to be named after her, then she must have been amazing.” The logic was a little backwards, Lucia knew now. But that had been her initial draw to the location. She had a connection to this woman who had been gone over eight years before she had been born.
The Kitten floated up to the stone and ran her fingers along each of the letters as she always did when she visited a grave. Usually it was to eat, but in front of this woman she really didn’t want to be so…personal.
”Umm, what were you doing in the graveyard?” She just realized she had never asked. It seemed important now. What if SHE was one of those grave destroyers? Or worse?! A grave robber?! A NECROPHILIAC!!!! And she had just lead this crazy woman to Nana Lucia’s grave.
Lucia’s eyes locked on her, now suspicious.
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Posted: Wed Jun 02, 2010 5:15 am
Doucette, so far unaware that Raevan don't eat like humans despite their lack of stomachs, wouldn't have even realized that Lucia would have fed from the area. Had she known however, she likely would have agreed it was a bit of a personal thing and offered to leave the kitten alone for a moment.
Regardless actually, the redhead was feeling a bit nervous. It had been a good idea in her head to feel close to a grave marker, and to have someone's memories fill in for her own for a while, but now Doe was feeling like the spot might be a bit too on the private side. She didn't want to be budging in on the poor girl's solace.
The Irish woman did her best to look like Lucia could ask her to leave at any moment, but since she'd invited herself along she wasn't sure how she could really vocalize the offer without sounding contradictory.
On the other hand, it was nice, seeing the woman's grave, hearing Lucia talk about someone even if she hadn't ever met her. Doucette was in the same boat.
It was wrapped in these thoughts that Doe was startled out of when Lucia turned the suspicious question upon her. "Oh, I was counting stars," she said lamely, waving a hand off in the direction of her blanket propped against one of the trees on a hill. "It's...soothing."
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Posted: Fri Jun 04, 2010 1:22 pm
Lucia’s suspicion melted away as she looked from Doe to the blanket and back again. Since she wasn’t going to eat, there was no reason to linger by Nana Lucia’s grave. The frei’s shinning purple eyes glanced up at the sky. Counting stars? She looked up at the mass of white pin points in the sky and just imagined how many there could be. It seemed like it would be monotonous.
But Doe said it was soothing. Well Lucia could use some soothing at the moment. The Kitten smiled at the woman and cocked her ears to the side a little. ”Can we try it?”
She often sat on the edge of the cliff with Zul and watched the moon and the water. The waves would roll in and she’d just lean against him or have her arm tucked in his. And they’d talk or sit silently. Maybe she could suggest counting stars if it was something she liked doing.
”There’s so many stars,” she said looking up at the sky. ”Have you ever counted them all?”
She glanced over at Doe. ”How high have you ever gotten?”
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Posted: Sat Jun 05, 2010 4:45 am
The redhead gave the kitten a wide grin before she shook her head and sent her curls bouncing. "Not a chance. There's way too many of them to count I think. Even in my life I'd never get all the way!" Doucette playfully threw her hands up like a mother disgusted with one of her children, "Plus, they're always moving! How can you tell if you've counted one the night before or not?"
Well, not like the stars were moving like mexican jumping beans all over the night sky, but in their own stealthy way they were making their journey through the dark and could only be found in the same location at various times of the year. That was one of the things Doe loved about the stars, you were never looking at the same thing twice. The moon is constant, the stars are devious.
"Oh, hmm...maybe a few hundred? I never count too high I suppose. It should always be relaxing, never tedious. I'm not challenging myself to count more each time." It was more like counting sheep. How far could you get before your brain was too relaxed to go further? Doucette had trouble sleeping on nights when the clouds were too thick or the city too glaring to count the winking little lights.
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Posted: Thu Jul 01, 2010 1:08 pm
Any trepidation that Lucia had felt was gone when Doucette told her that. ”Wait..Moving?! The stars move?” Her eyes snapped upwards to look, as if trying to catch them in the act. That seemed preposterous.
Astronomy books in Yuu’s library never interested her. She always liked reading about things closer to her. But now that she was over her fear of heights, she could fly with the stars. Sort of. They were always out of reach, but she could fly above the clouds.
Lucia gave one last glance at Nana Lucia’s headstone and then turned to Doe.
”Can we try counting? I could use some relaxing.” She smiled sadly, not going to explain why, but it always lingered on her mind.
The Kitten sighed softly and looked up. It would be nice to live up there if it wasn’t so cold. Thoughts about the sky made her think about the last time she was flying in it. When she attacked Rivener.
The frei blinked a few times, trying to forget, for now at least. Maybe the stars wouldn’t help her.
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Posted: Wed Aug 25, 2010 2:37 am
Doucette laughed lightly at the kitten's sudden outburst, and she nodded along easily to the question as she pointed up at the stars and explained. "Well, most of them do look like they never move. They are just plain white dots, and who can tell the difference between those?" The Irish woman rolled her eyes as if to say, Stars are so fickle. "But certain stars make pictures, like bears and fish in the sky. So people who watch these pictures, began to notice that over time, especially varying by seasons, there would be different positions of their picture in the sky. It has to do with the way the Earth rotates and the fact that everything in the galaxy moves."
Ok, she hadn't planned on sounding that scientific, and to be honest, if she was quizzed any further she'd probably disappoint because Doe was no master of the skies or anything. What little she knew, she'd just informed the Raevan.
"Of course we can," Doucette replied, before noticing the mournful expression on Lucia's face when she looked up at them. Perhaps it wasn't the best idea. Or perhaps it would be a way for the girl to cheer up. The woman felt a bit hopeless attempting to ferret out which scenario would be better, especially what with not wanting to butt into her personal business to find out what was wrong at all. "You know what else is relaxing? Hunting for four leaf clovers. I don't have a flashlight, but I think the moon is bright enough."
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