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 Posted: Sat Jul 01, 2017 5:16 am
Before he could even begin retrieving his personal belongings and moving them to a safe place or discussing with Harrison what the ******** they were going to do next, Rep had to deal with his most precious possessions. They were too important even to be stored in the hoard, as far away as it was and too dangerous to be anywhere else but under his care.
The damage from the attack hadn't hurt the heavy chest, reinforced as it was with any number of additions Rep himself had bolted onto it, extra locks and extra hinges here and there, at most it had been scratched, but at the moment it was practically a safe and even contained a miniature one inside which lay a a watch.
He opened the chest carefully, unwrapping the book inside from its shirt he'd wrapped it in. He felt it was kind of appropriate he'd wrapped it in a green one, a football top which he'd brought with him to the island. It was intact.
Knowing he couldn't keep the stuff here with the walls breached and him not there the whole time, he decided for the time being to take it all to the bar, which had protective wards and along the way see if he could speak to someone he wanted to talk to about everything which had happened to them all.
Thanks to hunter strength he barely even registered the weight of the thing as he took the long way to the bar around the island and stopped by the tree which had grown there, setting the sealed box down to sit on.
"I dunno if you can even ******** hear me." he said grimly. "But if you can, I want to talk. I want to know why me."
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Posted: Sat Jul 01, 2017 7:11 pm
It seemed almost ridiculous in context, Rep, the three, the book. While stranger events had happened last month - there was still no response. He might have remembered something, something that Dorothy had hinted at, but her offer and insinuation had been vague at best.
And then, from his angle, Rep could see down below closer to where the roots of the tree extended just barely to the shoreline, Samuel. He hadn't seemed to notice Rep yet, instead, pacing along the roots of the tree and muttering to himself while holding what looked like his favourite mobile tablet. Definitely yet another stranger event.
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Posted: Sun Jul 02, 2017 3:29 am
Rep didn't entirely expect anything to be that easy, but after all the events in his life he'd decided at times to give blind faith a chance. He wasn't too crestfallen that it hadn't worked out and instead just enjoyed the breeze as it blew in off the ocean and the sound of the tree rustling in the wind.
He tensed a little when he spotted Sam, finding himself suddenly rather curious about what the guy was up to. Knowing Death division it could have been anything from routine monitoring of growth to something far more sinister. Normally he'd leave well enough alone, bothering people veering into the realm of touching s**t but today he cared less than usual.
Hefting the box up in his arms he made his way down to where the other man was.
"Looking for something?" he asked helpfully.
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Posted: Sun Jul 02, 2017 4:47 pm
Getting close to Sam, Rep could definitely see that the tablet was monitoring the tree, it had some symbols that looked like the universal ones used to measure growth and decay of artifacts, out of all things. The entire screen lit with bright points.
"Just the usual," he said, not even bothering to feign any surprise, if there was some. He sighed, and put it away, proving perhaps that it was all just a ruse "What do you want, Rep?"
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Posted: Sun Jul 02, 2017 5:00 pm
Rep set the box down again and sat on it like some sort of hoarder leprechaun. "I figure you already think I'm crazy." he said. "So it wouldn't be too surprising to hear I came here looking for Mask. Creation or whatever it's called. My kid from the ******** up waking dream we all just had. Crazy right?"
He sighed. "Probably just a bit desperate, like, that feeling, the feeling of having had kids, of having known them as they grew up and then suddenly nothing. It leaves a hole in you a hole I can't ******** deal with very well right now. I just wanted to ask him why, why do it to us and to me."
"Maybe it's just vengeance because I have his book."
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Posted: Sun Jul 02, 2017 6:24 pm
Sam just stared for a long second. Then-
"Okay, hold on, you're going a mile a minute here. First of all put that-" he gestured towards the book, looking clearly uncomfortable with it - "Put that away, someone's going to see that. Second, I wasn't part of your escapade remember? Just in case you suffered a severe case of forgot the everything, I was one of the people left actually guarding the base when it was infested with horsemen, you're welcome. I'm sorry whatever you went through, but I don't think I can help you with this."
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Posted: Sun Jul 02, 2017 6:30 pm
Rep sighed and did as he was asked but still stayed perched atop the chest like a guard dog. "Fine. And it's all right, I wouldn't expect you to help me with it. I'll get over it, I was just being optimistic about my chances of finding who I was looking for."
He gave Sam a slightly softer look. "Man I bet that was ******** chaos to witness. Thankless job eh?"
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Posted: Sun Jul 02, 2017 6:47 pm
He sighed again, but it wasn't resentful, more an exhale. "I knew what I was signing up for when it happened. I'm sorry I got defensive there, just sometimes I don't know you know? A small island, very few places to go, seeing the same people, it can cause a lot of problems, and some people think the person to blame is anyone other than themselves."
He studied Rep for a long second, and for a moment his features seemed even more unrecognizable than usual. What did Sam look like again? - was it the eyes or the nose, or maybe just the tattoo around his neck that made any sense of his existence at all. "Okay, humour me for a moment and say I wanted to help out on your ah, problem. What did you mean by this kid dream thing? "
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Posted: Sun Jul 02, 2017 6:58 pm
"Nae bother." said Rep, waving off the need for an apology, he understood people got tetchy, after all he himself was so often one of the most tetchy and irritable people around. Someone snapping at him wasn't the end of the world and someone being defensive simply made him let up a bit. "And it can be cabin fevery too with the same people."
Rep felt the moment of uncertainty but as always attributed it to himself and his own instability and uncertainty, did he really know anyone?
"We all had a weird ******** dream, I think it was something to do with Destruction, it was some other world, the dusk or something, everyone was horsemen and like, they'd always been horsemen." It sounded ridiculous to say it now in the cold light of day but so much of it still seemed so close by.
"I had some kids there. Three of them. That other me loved the s**t out of those ******** kids and they were mine, in a world where it was even possible." He sighed. "Thing is though. One of them was creation. I know it was, I'd recognise that little s**t anywhere. He had a Mask, I'd named him Mask even. It might not have been.." and he inclined his head to the tree. ".. it might just have been some other dream, some other figment of it all, someone who never existed at all."
He sighed. "Maybe I just want to know that he did."
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Posted: Sun Jul 02, 2017 11:34 pm
Sam pursed his lips together, taking all of it relatively seriously. "Are you sure it's this tree and not for example, a tree?" He looked a little more uncomfortable again, and then a little quieter- "There's more than one."
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Posted: Sun Jul 02, 2017 11:42 pm
Rep looked confused by this for a moment, evidently never having considered that there were multiple trees before. His kneejerk response was to assume that Sam at first was making fun of him, implying that it could have been any old forest tree he'd dreamed about, but the other man's tone and response made him think it was more serious than that.
"Really?" he asked. "So it might have been another one, another part?" This was surprising to him and at the same time he oddly found himself a little disappointed by this, how was he meant to find mask again if he was some other fragment impossibly far away? You didn't find legacies who didn't want to be found. He wasn't sure he'd ever properly found excalibur or if protection had simply found him.
"I didn't know that was even the case." he said with a shrug. "Maybe it was another tree then. Got no chance of finding it though." And there was an oddly hostile and bitter part of him who wondered if O still had him, a sudden spike of anger and desire for vengeance accompanying that thought.
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Posted: Mon Jul 03, 2017 4:40 pm
He was just as reluctant to pursue the topic and there was the feeling that Sam had said a little too much, whether Rep caught it or not. "No one legacy is truly complete, most of them have various forms," he began vaguely, "If you really want to find something, it probably isn't far-"
And suddenly he stopped talking entirely and stared at a focal point behind Rep, both eyebrows raised. "...Your book is running away."
And it was - sometime, somehow, between the gaps of conversation, Rep's book had started to what looked like float away, weaving the most ridiculously jagged path across the sand. It would have been even more ridiculous if there weren't footprints belonging to something that couldn't quite be seen running the identical trajectory as well.
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Posted: Mon Jul 03, 2017 5:06 pm
Rep wanted to ask more but found himself drawn by the very urgent matter at hand. He probably shouldn't have brought it near the tree he thought, there was only so much you could do with a normal chest to keep magical s**t in.
"Get back here!" he barked, seeming pretty unphased by the invisible thief and pretty certain who it was. He didn't have time to grab the rest of his stuff as he broke into a flat out run chasing it down as hurriedly as he could. "I swear to ******** you little s**t, what did I tell you about the book!"
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Posted: Mon Jul 03, 2017 6:38 pm
Where the shoreline hit sudden jungle, Rep could see a child-sized shadow now, holding the book, suddenly looping upwards, and then scuttling up a tree branch, where it now kept the book dangled in one arm. A shadow-shaped head tilted to look at him.
"Mine," it said, and then clutched the book a little together wrapped in shadow arms.
Sam eventually caught up to Rep, but he hadn't said anything yet, just looking up at the tree and frowning deeply.
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Posted: Mon Jul 03, 2017 6:44 pm
"Look, I don't know who the ******** it is." Rep said, out of breath and distressed about losing anything he'd considered part of his hoard. "Even if it's yours you shouldn't have it I think. I don't know why but you shouldnae."
He sighed. "So how about you come down and give me it, I cannot be ******** chopping down trees to get you out of them."
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