I’ll be retreating to Dyster for a time while I ride out some more extreme physical transformations. Would you mind tending to my cat while I’m away? (I do have a backup pet-sitter if you are unavailable.)
You are welcome to anything in the fridge. The milk should be within date. Bread and jerky are in the pantry.
(He proceeds to leave complicated instructions for finding his spare key- he’s not just leaving it under the mat, for anyone to find.)
(Inside, there is a parcel addressed to Abigail on the kitchen table. Inside of that is a white rabbit fur, along with a note specifying that he would like to take her to a tailor at some point in the future to get her measurements, and a rough sketch of a fur lined, multi-pocketed vest.)
Thank you. I appreciate your assistance and concern.
[Mouse, the kitten Tarkin took in a month ago has certainly grown since Abigail last saw her curled up in his pocket. She’s energetic, playful, but her eyesight is poor and Abigail by now has seen her bump into table legs multiple times, squeaking softly with each collision.]
xxx
[On the fourth day the apartment door opens, not to the hallway it leads to, but to a drab grey room, stained with dry blood. Tarkin enters hurriedly, shutting the door behind him, once he’s maneuvered his lower body inside.
[He no longer feels that same queasy rush when he looks down at himself but he finds movement- or thinking about movement, observing himself, to be thoroughly surreal. He can feel his lower body drag against the floor as his new legs propell him forward in waves of motion.]
[He did his best to clean himself of blood, not wanting to track it through his space, but a portion has dried onto his skin and chiton.]
[When he sees Abigail his first instinct is to preserve his modesty- he is carrying his pants under his arm after all and his shirt is torn. Logically he knows there isn’t anything to see- he examined himself as best he could without a mirror- but it hardly keeps him from feeling exposed, and as his body curls, spirals on itself defensively he tries to retain his composure.]
[ Abigail had been taking advantage of the fact that she could come over here while he was gone - it was a lot nicer than her own basic, tiny apartment. She springs to her feet when she sees Tarkin, the cat jumping out of her lap, and she stares at him in a mix of shock and concern. She didn't know what she'd been expecting in regard to his changes, but it was difficult to see the humanity there now. ]
(It looks very bad so this is probably not as reassuring as he intends.)
[There’s a distressed hissing noise coming from...somewhere, from him, he realizes. Not from his mouth, clearly. From his...lower body? He holds his breath for a moment, it stops. He exhales, it starts again, fainter...]
[He looks down, runs his palm over his side and feels it, faint puffs of air, like he’s a machine with vents. Spiracles. The hissing fades off as he calms down, and begins to unfurl from the tight spiral he wrapped himself in.]
“My lungs now occupy my lower body.” [He takes note of this with a soft dry voice, and it’s hard to tell if it’s a private observation or is also meant for Abigail’s benefit by way of explanation. Grounding himself, he turns his attention back to her with a thin, shaky smile.]
“The pain stopped some time ago, it’s just all rather disorienting…” [He gestures with a casual wave of his hand and trails off. Mouse is squinting at him nervously.]
“I’ll just tiddy myself up a bit and put the kettle on, half a moment…”
[ She takes a few tentative steps toward him, though she doesn't close the entire distance between them in case he refuses her help - and, she has to admit, because she's a little unnerved as she tries to get used to his new form. ]
[ Abigail's been deliberately trying to avoid him, the pain of gaining and losing a father so quickly, knowing it was all fake but still having real feelings, being too much for her to process.
There's a lump in her throat as she sees his message pop up, and it takes her a while to open it. ]
okay. want me to feed the cat?
[ It feels like business as usual, as though the 'other' Ryslig had never happened at all. ]
[ She stares at that one for a while before replying, trying to read into the connotations of him trusting her, wondering if the false life they'd had was making this as hard on him as it is on her. ]
it's not an inconvenience. you're only one floor above me anyway. and mouse knows me already.
[Worry does not suit him, but the memory of Wil’s manic anxiety sticks to his skin like sweat. Wil was a nail-biter, he reminds himself. And Tarkin once paced the bridges of ships that could raze this city to the ground in less than an hour.]
I was unaware if you had any planned engagements.
[What he truly knows of this Abigail feels alarmingly small in comparison. It could fill a thimble. At the moment all that comes to mind the plans they made in another life.]
[These are intrinsic animal feelings with clear origin, fear, paternal sentimentality, perhaps even the instincts of the creature he resembles. Knowing that doesn’t dull the feeling.]
[ She'd done her best to hole herself away in her apartment after coming back from the other Ryslig, her solitude taking the edge off losing her other life and family for a while, until it got too much all over again. ]
[Tarkin hasn’t spoken to Bile since they briefly clashed around the time of last year’s circus incident. Odd, he hadn’t felt any particular shame during or in the immediate aftermath of the event. Now his feelings have become decidedly negative. The knowledge that his mind was influenced by Javert’s actions...it’s violating in a way he doesn’t wish to linger on.]
[A less confident person would feel a little ridiculous for not noticing, but it's hard for Lila to feel as though she's to blame here. After all, the majority of the apartments in the 38-8 are vacant anyway. She knew there was another resident on the seventh floor, but she never thought about what that person might be like. The noise and the lived-in-ness of the eighth floor draws her like a magnet; this one is empty, endless, lonely, a place she goes through to get downstairs and that's more or less it. If she can avoid it, she doesn't go down the hall at all.]
[But then she sees the other shade — a girl, around her age or maybe a little older, drifting towards the elevator. A month ago, she would have been more repelled by other shades than fascinated, but now that she's met Regulus it doesn't feel like as nasty a thought. There's something to be learned here. And then again, maybe she's just curious.]
[That's why she walks from her living room through the wall into 703, then 705. She doesn't know where the occupied apartment is, so it's pure luck that she hits something lived-in by the third unit. It isn't so much that she enters like she owns the place as that she stops in her path once she's through the wall into 707 as if she's inspecting a new investment.]
[ Abigail doesn't notice her at first. It's never occurred to her that other shades might phase straight through the wall, and her initial reaction is pure alarm that another monster has taken the opportunity to break in and take what few possessions she has here.
The intruder looks so self-assured, though, that Abigail just observes her curiously for a moment. ]
[Hm. When Abigail speaks, she turns to look at her, arms folding over her chest. There's a gash across her throat, the remnant of a scar in her physical form glowing white. Something in her soul was too stubborn to let go of it, even in this featureless form.]
I'm exactly where I intend to be, if that's what you mean.
[So: in Abigail's apartment. Obviously this was intentional. She leans in close to peer at the other shade, walks a quarter-circle to observe her from another angle.]
You're never at the group shit, [she concludes, tipping her chin up.] The apartment stuff. The grills and . . . whatever. Or at least I don't see you. I didn't even know there was another shade here.
[ The scar on her neck is mirrored by Abigail's own, a sharp white line that slashes grotesquely across her throat, leaving nothing to the imagination as to how Abigail acquired it. She stares at Lila, her discomfort obvious at essentially seeing a mirror image of herself. ]
I didn't see it in the rules anywhere that we were required to socialise.
[ Honestly, she just feels uncomfortable making small talk in large groups. ]
(He proceeds with the address of a building that he feels is particularly stupid and garish. He moves the possibility of weed- it’s a drug but like *barely* to the back burner for now.)
When he gets there he’s wearing the raincoat he got from Haftesal for splash protection. Large paint brushes stick out of his blazer pockets and he’s carrying two buckets of paint, white and red. Good for visibility. He sets them down and puts his hands on his hips thoughtfully.
“So like do you want to graffito the joint with slogans and figures or splash paint around abstract style?”
[ She doesn't need any protective gear herself, being made of shadow, though she's a little intrigued that he's thought ahead there, wondering exactly how messy this is going to get. ]
It’s been awhile since Harry has seen Abigail as a shade. He glances briefly over her. Shades are…weird. They’re cool.
CONCEPTUALIZATION - (Like someone cut a piece of midnight from the sky.)
They’re also lonely. Like 3am in an empty bed.
Harry steps back and looks at the building. He can’t see great in the dark, but the gears are turning in his head.
RHETORIC - (Big letters! Words!)
CONCEPTUALIZATION - (Basically, you can both fly- if Abigail needs a boost she’s super light. You should take full advantage to treat this building like a canvas.)
“Could do both, make something that really pops…”
He stretches his wings.
“I can do this thing with wind? Could probably make paint dry faster. If we splash some stuff around. Then we could write on it. Slogans, poetry, fuck-words. Whatever.”
[ She likes the sound of that. Far more interesting than just painting a smiley face on the wall or something, which is all that had occurred to her. While Abigail considers herself to be a creative person, it's far easier for her to focus on the intricate detials, like sketching the tiny veins on a leaf. To have such a big canvas is a little daunting to her and she admires how Harry is able to take it all in and think outside of the box in how to approach it. ]
CONCEPTUALIZATION - (You’ve laid down a foundation for her to build something of her own on top.) He grins. Maybe this is what being a teacher felt like. It feels important. He feels invigorated, excited. He starts babbling more.
“Yeah! God, there was this girl that did aerostatic graffito- graffito written on the ground so uh, the coalition airships flying over the city would see them-”
This is how Harry tends to talk about Revachol. The basics, that it was his home city occupied by a foreign power, have come across in his anecdotes. It’s not exactly a detail he lingers on. Not indifferent, but not exactly passionate. Just a fact about his hometown. Something he’s connected to but also has little hands on memory of.
“And it was mixed with heavy fuel. Super flammable. When the words went up in flames it was so striking. If we could do that on a building. Without burning it down. That’d be fucking disco, right?”
He looks wistful for a moment before turning back to her. He starts prying the can lid off with his talons, squinting in concentration.
“This is going to be fucking awesome though, even if it isn’t on fire. Fire burns out fast. It can burn and leave marks but it can’t really last.”
That sounds amazing. I wish I could have seen it. [ She looks up at the building, trying to imagine the words on fire on the side of it. ] It would be perfect to write pro-Fog messages, if we can find a way to do it without burning it all down.
He beams. The crest on his head bounces playfully.
“We'd just really need to iron out the not burning down buildings part first. Bad for PR. No one will pay attention to the Fog words because they'll be all like 'ooh Harry and Abigail burnt a building down.' Message totally lost in the weeds. People won’t even care how cool burning letters looked, either.”
[This takes place on the same day he is making preparations for Reira's arrival at his office.]
You are excused from the office today, Mademoiselle. I shall forward files for you to reconcile and resolve, as well as evidence to catalogue. You may use the libraries and offices in my home at Dyster to your liking.
Do not mind the decor. It has been refinished lately to an absurd degree.
[ Abigail's become good at reading in between the lines - he wants her out of there. Maybe it's something personal he doesn't want her involved in, or maybe something dangerous. Either way, she knows better than to argue with him. ]
Got it. But be careful. If you need backup with anything, just call me.
[ She knows he won't, but she has to make the offer anyway. ]
[the handwriting on the neatly folded letter delivered to Abigail's address is unique, to say the least]
Hi-ho, Abigail, How is my favorite poltergeist? My apologies for not writing sooner: you know how things have been! I'm turning into a simulacrum, which is feeling like I got the long straw: no bloody mess, no death, just a lot of pain and a few physical tics. When you've been through weeks of MI5 torture, this is child's play.
Anyways, I am working on setting up a little social circle. Making friends. Warden Javert is surprisingly easy to work with! But I've yet to meet someone who knows a good deal about how the magic of this place works. If you know anyone like-minded who would be up to sharing some secrets for a cut of what I bring in, I'd owe you a favor, and dinner.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
< wilhuff >
Abigail,
I’ll be retreating to Dyster for a time while I ride out some more extreme physical transformations. Would you mind tending to my cat while I’m away? (I do have a backup pet-sitter if you are unavailable.)
You are welcome to anything in the fridge. The milk should be within date. Bread and jerky are in the pantry.
(He proceeds to leave complicated instructions for finding his spare key- he’s not just leaving it under the mat, for anyone to find.)
(Inside, there is a parcel addressed to Abigail on the kitchen table. Inside of that is a white rabbit fur, along with a note specifying that he would like to take her to a tailor at some point in the future to get her measurements, and a rough sketch of a fur lined, multi-pocketed vest.)
<antlered>
[ It feels good that he's asked her, but she's also glad to have somewhere to hang out other than her own dilapidated apartment for a few days. ]
I hope you'll be okay.
[ She's even more touched by the fur, and wants to repay him somehow for his kindness and for looking out for her. ]
no subject
Thank you. I appreciate your assistance and concern.
[Mouse, the kitten Tarkin took in a month ago has certainly grown since Abigail last saw her curled up in his pocket. She’s energetic, playful, but her eyesight is poor and Abigail by now has seen her bump into table legs multiple times, squeaking softly with each collision.]xxx
[On the fourth day the apartment door opens, not to the hallway it leads to, but to a drab grey room, stained with dry blood. Tarkin enters hurriedly, shutting the door behind him, once he’s maneuvered his lower body inside.
[He no longer feels that same queasy rush when he looks down at himself but he finds movement- or thinking about movement, observing himself, to be thoroughly surreal. He can feel his lower body drag against the floor as his new legs propell him forward in waves of motion.]
[He did his best to clean himself of blood, not wanting to track it through his space, but a portion has dried onto his skin and chiton.]
[When he sees Abigail his first instinct is to preserve his modesty- he is carrying his pants under his arm after all and his shirt is torn. Logically he knows there isn’t anything to see- he examined himself as best he could without a mirror- but it hardly keeps him from feeling exposed, and as his body curls, spirals on itself defensively he tries to retain his composure.]
“Ah, Abigail. Good afternoon.”
no subject
Oh, my God. Are you all right?
no subject
(It looks very bad so this is probably not as reassuring as he intends.)
[There’s a distressed hissing noise coming from...somewhere, from him, he realizes. Not from his mouth, clearly. From his...lower body? He holds his breath for a moment, it stops. He exhales, it starts again, fainter...]
[He looks down, runs his palm over his side and feels it, faint puffs of air, like he’s a machine with vents. Spiracles. The hissing fades off as he calms down, and begins to unfurl from the tight spiral he wrapped himself in.]
“My lungs now occupy my lower body.” [He takes note of this with a soft dry voice, and it’s hard to tell if it’s a private observation or is also meant for Abigail’s benefit by way of explanation. Grounding himself, he turns his attention back to her with a thin, shaky smile.]
“The pain stopped some time ago, it’s just all rather disorienting…” [He gestures with a casual wave of his hand and trails off. Mouse is squinting at him nervously.]
“I’ll just tiddy myself up a bit and put the kettle on, half a moment…”
no subject
I think you ought to sit down.
<wilhuff> (backdated to the end of March)
And so on.]Are you alright?I’m sorry I dismissed your dreams
Please forgive
I’m relocating to the cabin for a time.
<antlered>
There's a lump in her throat as she sees his message pop up, and it takes her a while to open it. ]
okay. want me to feed the cat?
[ It feels like business as usual, as though the 'other' Ryslig had never happened at all. ]
<tarkin>
If you’re unavailable I do have a sitter. There’s no obligation.
[Mouse likes her more, though. She’s a skittish creature.]<antlered>
[ It would be easier for her if he just outright said he didn't want her around him any more. At least, that's what she tells herself. ]
<wilhuff>
[
I’d prefer familyHe erases that quickly and rubs at his temples, thankful to catch it before sending it.]I’d prefer someond I trust in my home to a stranger any day, but I don’t want to inconvenience you.
<antlered>
it's not an inconvenience. you're only one floor above me anyway. and mouse knows me already.
<wilhuff>
I was unaware if you had any planned engagements.
[What he truly knows of this Abigail feels alarmingly small in comparison. It could fill a thimble. At the moment all that comes to mind the plans they made in another life.][These are intrinsic animal feelings with clear origin, fear, paternal sentimentality, perhaps even the instincts of the creature he resembles. Knowing that doesn’t dull the feeling.]
<antlered>
[ She'd done her best to hole herself away in her apartment after coming back from the other Ryslig, her solitude taking the edge off losing her other life and family for a while, until it got too much all over again. ]
<wilhuff>
How is work?
<antlered>
<wilhuff>
May I ask what you have in mind?
[Tarkin hasn’t spoken to Bile since they briefly clashed around the time of last year’s circus incident. Odd, he hadn’t felt any particular shame during or in the immediate aftermath of the event. Now his feelings have become decidedly negative. The knowledge that his mind was influenced by Javert’s actions...it’s violating in a way he doesn’t wish to linger on.]Re: <wilhuff>
action, june 30.
[A less confident person would feel a little ridiculous for not noticing, but it's hard for Lila to feel as though she's to blame here. After all, the majority of the apartments in the 38-8 are vacant anyway. She knew there was another resident on the seventh floor, but she never thought about what that person might be like. The noise and the lived-in-ness of the eighth floor draws her like a magnet; this one is empty, endless, lonely, a place she goes through to get downstairs and that's more or less it. If she can avoid it, she doesn't go down the hall at all.]
[But then she sees the other shade — a girl, around her age or maybe a little older, drifting towards the elevator. A month ago, she would have been more repelled by other shades than fascinated, but now that she's met Regulus it doesn't feel like as nasty a thought. There's something to be learned here. And then again, maybe she's just curious.]
[That's why she walks from her living room through the wall into 703, then 705. She doesn't know where the occupied apartment is, so it's pure luck that she hits something lived-in by the third unit. It isn't so much that she enters like she owns the place as that she stops in her path once she's through the wall into 707 as if she's inspecting a new investment.]
no subject
The intruder looks so self-assured, though, that Abigail just observes her curiously for a moment. ]
Uh, I think you're in the wrong apartment.
no subject
I'm exactly where I intend to be, if that's what you mean.
[So: in Abigail's apartment. Obviously this was intentional. She leans in close to peer at the other shade, walks a quarter-circle to observe her from another angle.]
You're never at the group shit, [she concludes, tipping her chin up.] The apartment stuff. The grills and . . . whatever. Or at least I don't see you. I didn't even know there was another shade here.
no subject
I didn't see it in the rules anywhere that we were required to socialise.
[ Honestly, she just feels uncomfortable making small talk in large groups. ]
<t_sunset>
hey are you okay?
things got pretty crazy out there
<antlered>
<t_sunset>
do you want to break some stuff
…He also has drugs but he’s not going to encourage Abigail to try those. Can ghosts take drugs?i also have paints
we could go to the financial district and really fuck some things up
<antlered>
[ She's been affected by alcohol as a Shade so she assumes drugs would also work, but probably not the best idea! ]
<t_sunset> + action
disco :D
(He proceeds with the address of a building that he feels is particularly stupid and garish. He moves the possibility of weed- it’s a drug but like *barely* to the back burner for now.)When he gets there he’s wearing the raincoat he got from Haftesal for splash protection. Large paint brushes stick out of his blazer pockets and he’s carrying two buckets of paint, white and red. Good for visibility. He sets them down and puts his hands on his hips thoughtfully.
“So like do you want to graffito the joint with slogans and figures or splash paint around abstract style?”
no subject
Either's good with me. Which do you feel like?
no subject
CONCEPTUALIZATION - (Like someone cut a piece of midnight from the sky.)
They’re also lonely. Like 3am in an empty bed.
Harry steps back and looks at the building. He can’t see great in the dark, but the gears are turning in his head.
RHETORIC - (Big letters! Words!)
CONCEPTUALIZATION - (Basically, you can both fly- if Abigail needs a boost she’s super light. You should take full advantage to treat this building like a canvas.)
“Could do both, make something that really pops…”
He stretches his wings.
“I can do this thing with wind? Could probably make paint dry faster. If we splash some stuff around. Then we could write on it. Slogans, poetry, fuck-words. Whatever.”
no subject
Let's go for it.
no subject
CONCEPTUALIZATION - (You’ve laid down a foundation for her to build something of her own on top.)
He grins. Maybe this is what being a teacher felt like. It feels important. He feels invigorated, excited. He starts babbling more.
“Yeah! God, there was this girl that did aerostatic graffito- graffito written on the ground so uh, the coalition airships flying over the city would see them-”
This is how Harry tends to talk about Revachol. The basics, that it was his home city occupied by a foreign power, have come across in his anecdotes. It’s not exactly a detail he lingers on. Not indifferent, but not exactly passionate. Just a fact about his hometown. Something he’s connected to but also has little hands on memory of.
“And it was mixed with heavy fuel. Super flammable. When the words went up in flames it was so striking. If we could do that on a building. Without burning it down. That’d be fucking disco, right?”
He looks wistful for a moment before turning back to her. He starts prying the can lid off with his talons, squinting in concentration.
“This is going to be fucking awesome though, even if it isn’t on fire. Fire burns out fast. It can burn and leave marks but it can’t really last.”
no subject
no subject
He beams. The crest on his head bounces playfully.
“We'd just really need to iron out the not burning down buildings part first. Bad for PR. No one will pay attention to the Fog words because they'll be all like 'ooh Harry and Abigail burnt a building down.' Message totally lost in the weeds. People won’t even care how cool burning letters looked, either.”
no subject
[ It's way too risky and certainly wouldn't work, but Abigail is sorely tempted to try. ]
<PasUnPolicier> Dated July 24th, before the nighttime work shift
You are excused from the office today, Mademoiselle. I shall forward files for you to reconcile and resolve, as well as evidence to catalogue. You may use the libraries and offices in my home at Dyster to your liking.
Do not mind the decor. It has been refinished lately to an absurd degree.
<antlered>
Got it. But be careful. If you need backup with anything, just call me.
[ She knows he won't, but she has to make the offer anyway. ]
<PasUnPolicier>
Don't forget to feed the dog while you are at my home, if you will.
<antlered>
<PasUnPolicier>
Written Letter, 8/30
Hi-ho, Abigail,
How is my favorite poltergeist? My apologies for not writing sooner: you know how things have been! I'm turning into a simulacrum, which is feeling like I got the long straw: no bloody mess, no death, just a lot of pain and a few physical tics. When you've been through weeks of MI5 torture, this is child's play.
Anyways, I am working on setting up a little social circle. Making friends. Warden Javert is surprisingly easy to work with! But I've yet to meet someone who knows a good deal about how the magic of this place works. If you know anyone like-minded who would be up to sharing some secrets for a cut of what I bring in, I'd owe you a favor, and dinner.
Ta,
JM