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theairlock2017-02-26 11:49 am
airlockedmods) wrote in theairlock2017-02-26 11:49 am
week 3
[Come week 3 of the Champion Excellence Program the high-flying feelings that came with the dodgeball game last week has dissipated, especially after the...everything that was that trial. Satan Mask sure was a thing that happened.
Just like last week, right on the dot at 7 am, the mechanical woman's voice chimes to awaken the remaining champions on Sunday morning. After the initial wake-up call though there's a new message tacked on:]
Congratulations, Champions! By surviving your second trial, you have unlocked the third floor of the ship. A new mini map has been added to your P.I.P.! To access the second floor please stand on the teleporter and select the floor you wish to be teleported to.
[And again the Champions are awakened they have regained one new memory from the ones they've lost. Starting again on Sunday, as well, Jamie and Bolton will be back to their usual office hours in their usual locations.]
[ooc: welcome to week 3, everyone! Check-in has begun and don't forget to submit your memory regains!]
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Thomasin looks like she's been through hell, and there's Bolton by her. He sees red for a hot moment before he launches himself at frankly startling speed with a yell. Right at Bolton. Fist-first.]
GET AWAY FROM HER!
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wait no not in front of the tiny puritan
Luckily Bolton is fast on the PIP draw because he aims and taps the same button and whoops Shadow all that momentum's there but your trajectory is being redirected.
Into the wall next to the espresso bar.]
Hey, calm down there Cujo, I didn't do anything!
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[ Too late, Shadow did.
Thomasin runs toward him, slamming the hot chocolate cup onto the floor without even thinking of it when she goes to push herself up. It doesn't break or spill, but the contents do slosh all over her skirt, which I guess is a contributing factor to why she's in the shower later. She puts herself between the two of them and will help... Shadow up... if he's not embedded in the wall. There are fresh tears in her eyes. Her voice, however, is low and pleading, since even though she's talking to the both of them Shadow is the one she's looking at. ]
Please, stop.
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He nurses his knuckles
&knucklesand shakes said stars out of his eyes.]If you touch...one hair...on her head...
[But Thomasin's low voice stops him from completing the threat. To look at her for a moment through dizzied eyes, just for a moment, she almost looks like--]
...Sorry.
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I'm heading to the library.
[For his office hours. He goes to leave the cafeteria, then turns back for one last thing.]
Thomasin, if you want to talk about it I'll be at my office hours.
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Can you walk?
[ Also, literally how can he walk after that? ]
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I'll...be fine. [Maybe not gonna object to staying here a little while longer.]
I thought he'd done something to...upset you.
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[ Well good, because shes crouching down to maintain some degree of eye contact! She may not be panicking, but it's still hard to focus. Her soul feels untethered from her body. But looking Shadow over for any damages, from a respectable distance, helps with that a little.
He's so small, even if he is video game durable. What if he had struck Bolton? What if she had been made to watch another good person die because of her? ]
Thus did he find me, [ she finally says. ] I think... he wanted to help. I don't know why.
[ Her gaze shifts to the floor. }
There is a witch in the wood.
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Surprisingly, helpful!Bolton goes by without comment. Because witches.]
You saw it? In your...[He hates straight up calling them memories, but what else are they?] dream?
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I saw her doings. [ She's still looking down. It makes this easier. ] I never told you... my brother, Caleb. We went out to the wood together. He would have gone alone, but I caught him. I made him let me along. Mother would have bound me out in service to some family upon the morning... he was doing it for me. Father had laid traps in secret, and he thought if we brought back game, for food, they would relent.
We found a goodly catch and were on our way when Fowler -- our dog -- sighted a hare. He went a-running after it like a beast possessed, and Caleb after him. I told him not to go, but he did, and the horse threw me--
When I told you of the witch, that was all I remembered. You already listened to so much, I...
[ Now she looks back up. Although her face is glazed with tears from uglycrying, her eyes are dry now, and distant. She cannot stop herself from continuing, trancelike, with the story. ]
Now I remember. I woke far from the spot I fell, and all of them gone away. Mother and Father were calling. I went to them and found my way out of the wood.
Caleb followed the hare. He met the witch.
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[He's not normally one to initiate a physical connection, but she looks so far away. He puts a hand (the uninjured one) on one of hers, just in case she needs a tether back to the present.]
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'Tis known that a witch may send her spirit out to do what evil she will, whilst her body lies as though asleep. They go about unseen, or in the shape of some animal. Oft they are hares.
I saw that same hare in the goat-shed the night before. [ There's no real way to be sure that it's the same hare, which is why she didn't mention it a week ago, but now she feels certain of it. ] Any natural beast should have fled at the sight of me. She only sat there and watched. Why else should Burt go wild just as Caleb left? How else could I have woken at the edge of the wood? She always meant to part us.
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Still, it's all enough to distress her, so he has to take that seriously.]
cw child death kind of, emetophobia also kind of, spoilers for the witch, everything
He came back that night. He was naked and cold as death -- he could hardly stand. We did what we could for him while he was fainted away and planned to make for the village with what corn we might save, to pay the doctor. At dawn the nanny-goat I milked brought forth blood from her teats -- the twins saw it. And while we were at our harvesting, he started to scream.
[ She can't explain anything else without being honest about her own wickedness, so she swallows hard, eyes closed, before plunging ahead. ]
I think she watched us all the time we were building, and planting, and speaking. I know not how long she waited. But she knew of Caleb's lies, and mine. He said he and Father had gone a-searching for apples when they laid the traps. At the brook I told him how I'd craved of one. When he was in his fits, he cried of his sins and she what this to him. He saith that she set her creatures upon him, that she desired his blood and kneaded and pinched him. He was raving. But I saw him choke and writhe like an animal, and how she stopped his mouth up with his own tongue until Father -- unstopped it with his knife.
[ She squeezes his hand harder than one might think possible, coming from her, trying not to go all the way back to what she saw. Don't underestimate them goat-milking fingers. ]
He bled, and then he -- he brought up an apple from his gorge. 'Twas then the twins began to call me a witch.
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Yo he saw her throw those dodgeballs, he has no doubts about her strength okay.]
They called you a witch?! But you didn't do any of that! It was all...hn. Coincidence. Just coincidence. You're their sister; they know you. They can't think you would do something like that to family.
Someone else did that, to make him stark raving mad. Someone else made him choke.
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[ Without the pressure of her father, pushing her to come up with a reason why this is happening without incriminating herself, her immediate response to the twins is more charitable. She doesn't go immediately to the thought that the witchcraft taking place on the farm comes from them, though the half-buried idea continues to fester, and instead remembers the real fear she saw in Mercy's face when she pushed her to the ground. ]
Ever since Sam, the twins have been unbiddable. They spend all the day singing songs about that goat and running wild, and I taking the blame of it. Mercy was a-playing at being the witch of the wood, saying I let her take Sam. She had no idea of what she spoke, and she'd not heed Caleb nor I. So I told her I was the witch what stole him, to quiet her... but I was cruel. She rebuked me at the first, and I kept at it til she was truly affrighted. I told her I'd witch her and Jonas if she said a word, that I signed the Devil's book and could vanish any thing I wished. Naught more would have come of it if that had been the end, but then Caleb disappeared.
[ Will he understand what she means, even a little? Her face is drawn with guilt. ]
I would never hurt them. I but wanted her to stop. And now they believe all I said, and Mother too. Perchance they shall see me hang for it.
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The children were being insufferable. You snapped to make Mercy stop being cruel about what happened, and that would have been that except that--Caleb happened, with the hare. And you unconscious and moved in the woods. And then what happened to him later, after what you'd said about the apple...
But it wasn't you. As family, they should trust that. You didn't cause any of it to happen, no matter what you may have said or thought. If there is a witch haunting you, it seems to have taken a liking to you.
...Maybe your other memories might see a better ending to all this.
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Would that they will. Or that she had tormented me too, just as them.
... I have been weak here, Shadow. I fall into sin, and betray mine own base will with doubts. 'Tis different among those of my faith, in my time. We cannot know who is good and who evil, even among kindred, and question not the work of God nor Satan. When the twins dissembled and rolled on the floor like beasts, and would not pray, only I knew it for a lie. Father might hear me, and stop this, but he is the only one.
[ She seems to finally realize she's holding onto Shadow way, way too tightly, and lets go. ]
Thy hand... [ w h o o p s ] You cannot endanger yourself for my sake. I won't abide it.
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It's her letting go, and her subsequent words, that get him to react.]
I can, and I will if I must. If he were to ever do something to hurt you, I would find out about it. I may not succeed in hurting him right back, but I'd damn well try.
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[ She looks frantic and opens her mouth to continue, then shuts it. She juts her chin forward defiantly. ]
I cannot stop thee from doing as thou wilt. Be then not surprised when I risk the same for thy sake.
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[ She pouts, but goes back to the matter at hand, which is his hand. Do you get it. Do you get it now. ]
Kurumi must still have her bandages. If there were only some means of making a salve or a poultice...
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It...really is fine if it happens, Thomasin. You don't have to fret so much. [He's got half a mind to explain why that is, but it would...probably sound bad so let's not.]
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[ She sniffs and wipes her eyes with her sleeve, which is gross, then just leans forward to hug him -- not too hard this time, but tightly. Guess what: she can hold a hedgehog. He's like the size of one of those novelty giant stuffed animals you get at a fair, so the whole image is very bizarre, but heartfelt! ]
Thank you, Shadow.
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!!!
!]
...You're welcome.
[He's not sure what for! Since she's been scolding him a little about taking any pain dished out. He'll at least half-hug her back with a good hand on her back. Avert your eyes or you might get cavities.]