August + September Catchall

[hearthebell]

Who: L Lawliet and YOU
What: A somewhat late August catchall, focusing on event stuff but can include CR logs and slice of life! When September's event goes up I'll add prompts for the month in order to save a bit of space. Please feel free to hit me up on discord at ladylazarus#2235 or plurk at LexiL if you want to plot, wildcards are welcome!
When: Throughout August and September
Where: Various place throughout trench

Comments

We Glow So Dim (Early August, OTA)

[hearthebell]

[It’s not uncommon for L to spend time on the beach in the evenings with Lycka, letting his omen dart and play among the waves as though it’s the mind’s way of burning off excess energy. It frees him for more flexible and meditative thinking, he finds, and opens him to the possible answers he never would have expected to see (and therefore, would simply fail to see.

The slightest breeze interrupts the balmy summer night air. He glances up, sensing a shift, compelled by the moon in perhaps the same way as the shifting tides. Out to sea, the waves glow, and it’s more than the moonlight. Silently, following an impulse of caution, he calls Lycka back to shore, squinting at the phenomenon and taking one landbound step closer.

Then, it’s not quite so landbound; his bare feet are in the water, his boots left behind on the shore. It feels different than the previous month’s call of despair toward the water; there’s hope and peace and gentle safety along those glowing paths, seeming separate from Mariana’s uneasy complaints surrounding them. Lycka, reassured and newly confident, dives shallowly to lead the way, chirping encouragement, and the water even feels different on the skin now that L has waded in to submerge himself chest-high.

He takes a deep breath before finding that he doesn’t actually need to. The water doesn’t block his throat or nose, doesn’t cycle through his lungs like water. He holds to Lycka’s dorsal fin and lets her propel their descent; perhaps he arrives first, or you’re there already, sifting through the spoils of the sunken treasure.

He’s hesitant to greet you if there’s existing bad blood, but admittedly, he is difficult to miss with a large, swiftly-moving orca whale omen.]

The Monster Within (mid-August, OTA)

[hearthebell]

[The grapevine in Trench is an odd and often unreliable thing, but L has learned, the hard way, that it’s better to pay close attention to rumors and rumblings. More often than not, there is something to them; more often than not, simply dismissing them as merely rumors and rumblings is a great way to end up maimed or dead.

So he listens, and then starts to observe himself closely for signs of the sickness. He thinks he’s not unaffected, because he simply no longer seems to need sleep at all, but after a few days inspecting himself for grey patches, he comes to believe, with cautious optimism, that it will not progress beyond this point. Ensuing days bolster this impression further, and he begins to breathe easier… but it’s clearly not the case for others, and breathing more easily is something of a barbed boon because it just means he can run for his life a little more effectively.

There almost always comes a point where running no longer works out well, though, and you seem to have reached that point with him, either because you’ve literally pursued him to his limit or a dead end, or because you’re personally close, and just now revealing the extent of your malady to the detective. Whether you’re in a tense and sweaty alleyway after a dogged pursuit or you’re simply sitting together quietly in a safe and otherwise uneventful place, he’ll say something very similar to the one who is losing a battle to their own blood.]

Something can be done, surely. Aside from the option I refuse to even consider.

[In all L’s time in Trench, there’s one notable way he’s managed not to change at all. Murder continues to be off the table for him, whatever the reason.]

[bleedformeplz]

[Rumors is where the stories get interesting, soon those stories tickle the ear, and peak interest. People doing the 'talk', freaking out whether it's their problem or not. It's pretty normal.

Yet. Looking down at her wrist, it's grossing her out. Weird scaly patches slowly creeping and growing over her skin. Her fangs stretching over her lips. No matter how much blood she consumes to transform, the features doesn't phase. There is a trail of bite marks on her right arm, mostly around her wrist. Evidence of blood left on the punctured wound. It's funny when she thinks about. Most of her life, when her quirk manifested, it was labeled as a curse. She didn't see a problem.

Now, this, she didn't ask for. So. This is a curse. She's hiding her abomination under her sleeves and leggings, anything to help blend with the crowd while doing her best to fool the public. People cover themselves all the time, to avoid blood contact. She listens closely more to the rumors, how others lift the curse, piecing the information together, something she's good at.

Two options she gathers, blood transfusion or death. She hasn't experienced death yet, suppose. While she quietly sits somewhere safe, weighing on her options, gnawing her wrist away, L's voice jolts her body, startling her.]

Geeze, you scared me!

[How did she miss him? Was he reading her mind? She slips her wrist under her garment.]

And your pick-up line sucks.

[hearthebell]

Oh... you think that I'm propositioning you.

[He says so as though he's noticed a fly on her shoulder, or seen a mildly interesting headline on his communicator.]

I'm no vigilante or samaritan, but... the public good is of some interest to me. Hiding it won't make it go away, you know.

[bleedformeplz]

[Well then, when he said it like that, Himiko arched an eyebrow and gagged enough her jaw could drop under her. Her tongue stuck out for a moment disgusted with the imagination L painted in her mind, thanks. The guy posed as a creep. He looked like a total mess, like he crawled from some hole. Is he walking bare feet? Perhaps he has a quirk? Minus the blood power. Her expression was enough to justify his comment. Yuck! No comment. Let's move on please.

Maybe other people would have walked away and avoid eye contact the way he approached. Perhaps that was the best idea, but what he said next perked her interest enough. Himiko scoffed as she turned herself away from him uninterested and bored. Her palms pressed hard on her laps tensing her muscles and back upright. Was she nervous, no... possibly scared of herself. Most of her life in the Trench she enjoyed it thus far. Why curse her? Just... WHY.

After a good moment, she sighed, her topaz eyes focused on her feet and knees, but remained alert.]

So, you're a boy scout.

[Like hell she'd trust him right there. One thing Himiko learned from being on the run for long, never outright trust people. He was right, she can't hide it. Each moment she could feel the nerves in her arms waking and spreading, like when your leg falls asleep. Not that bad, but it was there, taunting her.]

Looking to sell some cookies or something?

[He could hear the sarcasm dripping with boredom.]

[hearthebell]

[Unfortunately for L's charisma check, in most situations he reads as absolutely creepy. It's like the scent of cigarette smoke, clinging tenaciously to hair and clothes in spite of efforts to banish it through airing or washing, just an aura of off-putting to stand in the way of forging new friendships.]

I've... never been called that.

[Honestly, he hasn't. He didn't clean up well enough for that even when he was the right age for boy scouts.]

And anyone giving me cookies would know they'd disappear, and not because I was selling them. I saw your skin before you pulled your sleeve down, you know... there's no point deflecting.

Lavish Desires (Closed to Dabi)

[hearthebell]

[There are still, somehow, quiet moments when it comes to being a detective. Restocking panic rooms probably qualify, and L’s not actually bored as he stacks the sealed cans on a shelf in one of his safe houses. It’s meditative, somehow, somewhat cathartic even.

All of that changes as there’s a shift in the atmosphere, and a rushing deluge that knocks him backward as he starts to scramble up the ladder. Lycka rams the trap door for him, but the leverage is wrong, and the space is filling swiftly.

He realizes that this is, plausibly, a way that he could die, trapped in a cellar and drowning alongside canned corn and beans.]

[burnitblack]

[water. ugh. not his favorite thing. his quirk still works underwater even if it doesn't go very far for obvious reasons, but he's never really liked slogging through wetness and then having to dry everything out. the flooding below him is far more easily managed when he can simply fly above it and not give a shit.

but somehow, within all of that, the banging sound is what gets his attention. arresting his motion, he drops from the skies, blasting once in a quick burst right above the roof, and alights on it. listens. and yeah, there's that banging again.

it only takes a few seconds for him to figure out where it's coming from. the cellar. someone's inside. and the water's rising. well don't it suck for them he's not a hero.

dabi descends to the cellar door, watching it jerk with each pound.]

Nice place. Ya mind if I take a look around while ya busy down there?

[hearthebell]

[Through the rushing water that's closing in around him and leaving him with an increasingly small pocket of air to draw from, L thinks he can hear a voice. Does it sound taunting, sarcastic, even familiar?

It doesn't matter. The great detective has come to that place he hates the very most in all possible worlds: one of desperation. It could be a cannibal killer up there and he'd take it, gladly, over drowning like a rat in a cage.]

The trap door!

[He chokes it out past a mouthful of water that splashes against his face. His ladder has been dislodged; there's nothing he can brace against and he holds onto Lycka, who seems torn between rushing for help and remaining at his side. Ironically for someone with an orca whale omen, he's not a strong swimmer, has never truly had reason to be.]

You may be standing on it! Get the trap door!

[It may also be jammed, or something may have fallen on it, or the lock may have latched with the shaking force of the water. Either way, it's not accessible to him, at this moment, to his great detriment.]

[burnitblack]

[taunting and sarcastic? hell yes. each jump of the door's latch is one more encouragement to ponder over what he wants to do. not sure who's down there, though the voice is somewhat familiar. dabi wades through the water curling around his ankles and then promptly stomps one foot atop the trap door, making it very obvious that he's standing on it.

obvious that this life is in his hands.]

Found it.

[mocking him? yep. dabi pushes the door with his foot a few times, glancing to the lock that's lodged in place. nothing he'd have a problem getting through, either by burning it open or simply unlocking the latch. could take some time to explore the flooding house and lift a few things... or he could let this trapped idiot out and have a favor to call in later...

that one sounds better.]

Ya owe me for this. Get away from the door.

[waiting for the vocal agreement and/or sounds of someone swimming away, dabi gives the person a few seconds to abscond from the vicinity before extending his hand towards the door. FWOOM!! blue fire blasts through wood and metal, crashing into the flooding cellar like a flamethrower fired straight down. water hisses and evaporates quickly from the intense heat before the fire cuts off, leaving the smoldering remains of the trap door barely holding onto the frame.]

[hearthebell]

[The sound of the stomping is hateful, in a way. Hopeful, too, if that mockery can find a way to cease.

He tries to voice his desperation, let him know in spite of what's obvious, but the water is nearly to his ceiling, now. He's gasping, he's choking; he's seeing darkness...

...and then light. Lycka pulls him away from the door as it's blown apart, and he winds up half-conscious on his orca whale's back as she surfaces, prioritizing his access to air.]

Case: The Homey Casket (Closed to Nico and D)

[hearthebell]

[Sometimes, there’s no money or prestige on the line; something a situation is just strange, to the point where it’s impossible for it to defy notice. The truly curious value all of these situations equally, but give the third a priority if one must be given.

L, being truly curious, is creeping around Crenshaw where he saw a large coffin-like object relocated at the beginning of the month. Now, he happens to have come across it more directly.

He finds, rather quickly, that it is much bigger on the inside.]

[distant_one]

[D doesn't usually spend much time inside the coffin. It's uncomfortable for him in more ways than one, but he does use the house it's sitting inside.

He would have just ignored it as he usually does, but he catches the smell of someone very unfamiliar.

It leads to the coffin, the lid of which is opened. The inside of the coffin is a gothic tower several stories tall. It's always a mild but warm summer day inside and the gardens surrounding the tower are always in bloom.

The only person who sleeps there is Nico, but he's had another guest off and on this month. Other people have been there, but this is the first uninvited guest D has had.]

I apologize for my lateness

[umbraportation]

[ As the one long-term resident, Nico spends a good portion of his day away from the coffin. Whether that time is spent at the Sanctuary or out at the Outpost, he usually returns at dark. Sometimes making a pit stop during the day, but it isn't a scheduled thing.

Today just so happens to be a day when he came home for a meal instead of getting one elsewhere. The place doesn't have a kitchen, but he isn't much of a cook yet. So he picked a room on the bottom floor of the tower to serve as a prep-dining area.

As he cutting the lettuce, Nico senses the aura of an unfamiliar person. He frowns and glances towards the door. Had D invited someone else to stay? ]

I think we've all been a bit slammed lately! <3

[hearthebell]

[The odd hours that L keeps allow for him to often go unnoticed in places where others keep more reliable routines. That's very hit-or-miss, though; occasionally his timing is inept, as are all things that have any element of luck.

Sometimes, routines change. Sometimes luck runs out.

He hears slicing, but not through flesh. At least one other person is here, and the prudent option exists, L thinks, to make a hasty exit. Perhaps it's the void of purpose and the post-case slump after the Emperor's rather public disgrace, but he decides that he will depart once he knows just a little more, and can justify the reason he came here in the first place with that little piece of succor for his curiosity.

Nico will see the crest and flash of a small mirror, near the floor in the corner of the doorway. It's quickly withdrawn, presumably because its holder observed that the doorway is being watched.]

[distant_one]

[D's footsteps are completely and unnaturally silent, and not even the faintest speck of dust is disturbed by his boots or the hem of his coat. The daylight inside is unnatural, but it should still refuse to hide D nearly as well as he conceals himself as he stalks towards the sound of an unfamiliar heartbeat.

But he doesn't reveal himself right away, instead watching the watcher and waiting to see if he's been noticed or if their intruder is more interested in spying on Nico- who is making lunch from the sound and smell of things.]

AUGUST: The Rookery, Closed to Vi

[hearthebell]

[L should be tired these days but finds that he's just a fount of energy, able to stay up for, so far, four nights on end. He should probably be concerned, but he's actually just thrilled about being able to get so much done.

The Rookery is large, and while he has no shortage of space there are others who live here besides just him and Sansa. He tries to give Vi space, ordinarily, but after the many independent excursions to the shipwrecks, he's somewhat curious about the artifact she retrieved.

He raps softly at the door, which is already slightly ajar, or else he might not have dared.]

Hello? I heard you brought back a statue, and I was hoping to take a closer look.

[faceblocks]

[vi finds herself in the midst of another drawing - it's d again - it's been more of the theme this month - this time he's fighting a beast - the beast itself is partially obscured by the flow of d's hair - by the billow of his coat, and by inky smoke. a nightmare steed looms on the edges, ready to attack the barely visible beast should d need the aid.

so deep in the drawing is she that l's voice startles her - and she blinks, nods, sets her pen aside, waving him in with an inkstained hand.

he'll find the curtains drawn back no matter the hour - so she can look out all three windows whenever she has a mind to - which is often. a pair of beat up cast iron gauntlets hang from a carefully placed hook in the wall, above a a string of lights with paper stars suspended from it. ten paper stars arranged together in various clusters.

another star sits on her desk, along with her many piles of art: clothing, creatures, the suggestion of machinery, and nonsense (it's d.). there are numerous paper frogs (probably a plate of cookies) and a couple pieces of sea statuary. one is a ...blob, really, and the other - the one closest to her is a funny little seahorse with an odd-shaped face. ]

Wha--oh, hey. Yeah. Two of 'em. Take your pick.

[hearthebell]

[D's face is recognizable to L, having seen him in passing and especially notably on a dream walk. He tries not to let it distract him too much, though it's something worth probing later. Perhaps Vi is an admirer, or at least a friend, to dwell so much on his visage. She'd know more than he does about the mysterious, inhuman near-stranger.

His own room isn't decorated at all, a testament to the fact that he seldom appreciates ornaments or style choices in a room. The stars get a passing glance, less than the drawings. The gauntlets get the longest, most lingering look of all, before his dark eyes return promptly enough to his housemate. Better than trying to visually sort through the busy mess on her desk, just now, although he must in order to isolate the two statues.]

Both, if you'd be willing, but only for a few moments each. I've studied some of the old languages in Trench and I've been asking to see the inscriptions on any recovered pieces, if they're even slightly legible.

[faceblocks]

Sure, have at it. There's definitely ...shapes and things there that, yeah ...it makes sense they'd be words. I didn't really think about it too much.

[she shrugs, makes a small smile as if to say maybe stupid of me, i know, but the ocean had been inviting, and adaine's presence (and willingness to accompany her - agreement that this was not a trap) had bolstered her confidence. and dare she say it - so far she'd managed to mostly dodge the random floods, neither the rookery nor ursula's were touched - though that was more likely due to wards, she couldn't overlook it. not when she'd also been unafflicted of the infection that had begin to spread itself through the city, and her vileblood had been almost entirely unaffected by the spikes some others had been seeming to have ...save the incident with the steed. we do not speak about the horse incident. any lingering marks on her face had gone unremarked on - she assumes it will be attributed to a fight, which is not ...wrong.]

I think they might be good luck charms.

[hearthebell]

[L had been formerly confident in his ability to decipher what was legible on sight, but once he actually gets close enough to examine the statues, he instead pulls out his omni and photographs the inscriptions from several different angles.]

Interesting. It bears a resemblance to one of the languages I've studied here... they might share an ancient root. In any case, with what I know at this exact moment, I can probably only make an educated guess about these meanings. Based on morphemes I'm familiar with, the first one is some sort of matriarchal figure... either "queen" or "mother"... and the second is "spirit", "essence," or "death". Did you find these together, or separated between different cabins or even different ships entirely?

EARLY SEPTEMBER: Absolute Immersion

[acidjail]

[ At first, Mercymorn had paid little attention to the rambling book hawkers. It was only when the swirling rumors of what was contained within their covers reached her that she took an interest, which is what led to a vituperative, ultimately fruitless argument with the itinerant librarians.

It left her with no other choice than attempting to track down the dispersed volumes to ensure that certain of them are not read, and she will begin with the dark-haired man she saw slinking away from the bookcart on her first approach. The signature of his heartbeat is her guide, picked out from the thrum of all others with a level of difficulty that only plunges her further into a black mood.

And then he is in sight, perched on a bench next to a bag with a tell-tale dusting of sugar smeared at its mouth to match the glaze at the corner of his, thumbing through his recent acquisition without an evident care in the world for what he might be stumbling across. She marches right up to him, a small, quivering bundle of irritation draped in a dark cloak, thrusting her hand out in preemptive demand. ]

I'll be taking that, thank you - !!

[ She feels as though she stumbles. Some invisible tether at her waist tightens and yanks, dragging her into a burst of color and sensation that tumbles her like a falling meteor dragging through atmosphere until she strikes the shocking termination of the earth. She sways in her seat, slumping over a table, and the silk of her peach dress whispers with the motion as her unbound hair falls around her face, and she knows exactly where this is.

She presses her fingertips hard against the tabletop, jaw tightening as she lifts her head and scans across the lost and the dead seated at this damned, doomed supper. ]

[hearthebell]

[L's gotten more careful with his dreamwalking, but thats's admittedly not much different than a child inching the bead of an abacus the least possible distance so he can justify that yes, it technically has moved.

In fairness to L, just sleeping is boring when there are entire worlds and many people to catch subtle, scouting glimpses of. So long as he avoids one dark and dangerous path, he's safe; so are Shoyo and Paul, and they can just continue their cold war this way until someone flops back off to sea as a squid and fails to return.

Sleeping, however, is something he's gained some level of control over. The daytime is a wholly different animal, frequently beyond his control, and if it needed to wear a face, it might be the one of the surly red-haired woman marching towards him as though he's committed some crime.

He wears an expression of bewilderment that admittedly looks utterly stupid on his odd, pale features. 98% of the time, it gets him out of situations like this because no one gives a fool the time of day, even on predictable days--

And then, he, too, has fallen into what resembles a nighttime foray, but without the typical preamble. There's a ritual to it, usually, folding and composure and locked little refuge that he always departs from. Sometimes he can even watch the dreams come together, guessing through context what he'll see or who he'll become.

The absence of that luxury now is so abrupt that he wonders if he hasn't been bashed in the head and knocked unconscious. The suddenness of the pitch would suggest something along those lines, and memory loss isn't unheard of with concussions. His attacker would have been that red-haired woman, perhaps, or an accomplice... but if that was the case, he really couldn't explain how she's here, at this table... practically on this table.

Eyes that aren't his own widen. He knows some of these faces, and a process of rapid elimination begins.

He knows, anyway and at the very least, that he is not John. Does that spare or guarantee misery?

Someone say my name, he silently wishes, and let it be anyone's but Alecto's. There are stolen chaste kisses, and then there's whatever is thick and stirring and strange-blooded at this dinner table.]

cw: body horror, self-harm

[acidjail]

[ He is not John because he is seated at John's left elbow in the little cluster they've made at the end of the table, he and John and the woman at John's right who looks at him with eyes rimmed in as much despair as intoxication, and she is assuredly drunk. Two young women sit in similar proximity to each other, one minuscule and swaddled in a scrap of near-black indigo, the other a towering milkslick with a golden skeletal arm in the palest fall of lavender gauze. There is no one else, though a scraped plate and a pushed back chair at the far end of the table suggest a departed third.

Mercymorn sits back in her chair, her hands coming up to comb through her tumbling crushed rose gold hair, gleaming in the soft candlelight around them, the same light that does not catch in the true black eyes of God as he looks at L with a smile that does not reach the sad, awful depths inside those luminous rings of plasmic white. ]

It doesn’t hurt anymore—most of the time.

[ God - or John, surely, because this man with mussed hair and rumpled sleeves could not be God.

There is a choice to be made. It must be made very quickly, with minimal information, under circumstances of duress. Mercy feels pins falling loose between her fingers, biting into the webbing between thumb and forefinger, and she pulls the filaments of bone deep into the meat of her palm, beneath the skin. ]

Here's a better toast, Patience...To the Emperor of the Nine Houses. To the Resurrector. To my God.

[ She has always done well under pressure. Now it remains to be seen if the calf-eyed fool who has intruded on this moment can catch a cue as she raises a glass of white wine not yet completely downed. ]

[hearthebell]

[Memories, or an event that has occurred or been written, are not quite as fluid as a dream. There's a balance in those cases, when he's behind the eyes of another as both witness and participant, and he's experienced what happens when he shifts that balance.

To seize control is to remember himself wholly and be able to direct events. To relinquish it is to meld with the role more fully, at the risk of forgetting himself. He's not here to change anything, but to survive and perhaps to learn, so he reasons that relinquishing might be worth the risk.

Patience. Left-hand. Augustine... he lets himself feel the weight of the clothes he wears, the drunkenness that warms his skin, knowledge of the right thing to say and the right way to say it.]

To Emperor John Gaius, the Necrolord Prime!

[He drinks until his glass is empty, though it feels like he shouldn't, like he's had enough, like everyone at this table has had more than enough. That's the point; I see, now.

John was trying to rebuff the toast, saying that he wouldn't drink to himself, that he's not so great, that he's not that much of a narcissist. Really, now?

The woman with the rose-gold hair fiercely agrees, going so far as to say that he's the best man who ever lived, and it feels like a concentrated effort between the two of them to pull a boulder back from a cliff. They're working together on something; this is a diversion.]

I'll drink to that.

[But he can't without more wine. They need more wine; he stands to refill his glass and Mercymorn's.]