TEST DRIVE MEME #04

[nextnightmods]

TEST DRIVE MEME #04

Hello and welcome to the The Next Night's test drive meme for October-November! Thanks for your interest in this GPSL! In an effort to streamline our application process and avoid future confusion between incoming and existing players, we do not have a reservation period. Applications will be judged on a first-come, first-served basis.

While you're here...

• Take a look at our rules and faq pages to familiarize yourself with The Next Night.


• Next Night currently operates on a rolling app system, meaning you can app whenever you are ready! There is a player cap of 60 players. The taken page reflects the current number of players.


• TDM threads can become game canon if both players wish. If the situation isn't something that could happen in-game, you're free to chalk it up to some strange hallucination, a shared dream, or other mysterious circumstance.


• Note that top-leveling is not limited to new characters! If current players wish to post a starter, they are welcome to do so. They are welcome to make posts in the main comms for TDM events as well. Please note, however, that actual plot clues or happenings will not occur in TDM prompts.


• If you plan to apply, please keep in mind that we do require at least one sample thread on the application to be from our TDM (though it doesn't need to be the current TDM).


• You're welcome to use the provided prompts or come up with something on your own, but we do ask that all threads take place in our game's setting.


• As we no longer plan to have a bimonthly game-wide HMD meme, we require that all new applications going forward must have a HMD post somewhere on the journal and we will ask for this as part of the application process.

Thank you again, and we hope you'll choose to join us!

log prompts

TRICK OR TREAT. TW: GORE

For reasons unknown, the spirits of Beacon seem to love spooky season. And as October slowly pulls down the temperature, a few spirits get right into the swing of spooky. It's never too soon to celebrate Halloween!

Some of the celebrations are obviously a treat for residents. Spirits will leave festive surprises at doorways, under pillows, in drawers and under beds. What kind of surprise? Well, it depends. Candy is a staple, though it's not likely to be any kind anyone's ever heard of. McMillain's Candy Earlobes, anyone? Other things like pumpkins, spiced drinks, intricately cut and carved masks could be hidden around.

Less playful and more disturbing are the spirits determined to provide tricks. They're just as likely to slip something somewhere unexpected, but the item in question is a lot less fun and festive. Things like broken glass, bloody teeth, and locks of hair. Definitely not what anyone was expecting when they slipped into bed, or glanced under a table.

That's not all, either — some little tricksters seem determined to give a fright, hiding any place dark enough to hide them. And in a place that's always dark, that's practically anywhere you look. The spirit will pop out from your closet, under your bed, around the corner, inside the drawer you left something in, even falling in front of you from nowhere with an ear-piercing scream.

Last but not least, the pranksters have managed to leave trick supplies around the shops and the rest of town. Perhaps a blanket that only leaves you colder, a salve that burns instead of heals, canned food that makes the pit in your stomach a little deeper. It seems any trick item is bound to have the reverse effect of what was intended — and much like Cinderella, they will disappear without warning.

SCREAM IN THE DEAD OF NIGHT TW: BODY HORROR

Out in the dark, it's hard to note at first... vines curving down the streets, up walls, along paths. Eventually, the massive influx of pumpkins is impossible to ignore, as they dot and litter and scatter all over everything. And no amount of clipping or pruning seems to help, the determined plants will just grow back and in deeper fervor.

It seems fairly innocent at first, even nicely festive. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to last, as the plants don't seem to be particularly friendly. The pumpkins seem to have faces, when you look out of the corner of your eye. It's like they're staring, watching — but investigating doesn't show anything but a normal plant. Strange...

When the moon is high in the sky over Beacon, vines snag at feet and ankles. At first it seems a natural consequence of overgrowth, but as the vines tighten and drag into a vice, it seems more intentional. Spirits made of vines come to life, and they are determined to draw anyone they can catch into their fold. Smothering in vines and lives, the plants attempting to trickle into mouths and under skin. Slipping, sliding, slithering. Slowly taking a person over until nothing is left behind and all are one, combined. Without fire around to combat them, strength and anything sharp might be your only hope of breaking free. Or failing that, someone close enough to hear you scream before the vines curling around your throat kill the sound in your throat.

DEARLY DEPARTED.

Bonfire Square and its surroundings have once again become a temporary cemetery. The walkways, the open spaces, the riverbank, even perhaps the trees themselves now bear memorials the people who once died and now reside here. Some are shrines, others simple markers; perhaps yours is a grand mausoleum. Some have names and dates, some may not, but each is distinct. And as you walk past, you are drawn to them - drawn to place a small gift or token, or one of the last late-blooming flowers growing under the trees. In fact, the compulsion to visit these graves and leave something behind is awfully hard to resist.

When you do, you are drawn into the final moments of the person whose death the shrine marks. You experience it through their own eyes and feel it as if it is your own.

As if this wasn't difficult enough to bear, you realize this must mean somewhere in town your own death is on display. Will you let others visit freely? Will you guard your grave and its secrets? Will you try to destroy it? If you do, another will emerge elsewhere - it soon becomes obvious that trying to remove them is futile. You are, after all, really, permanently dead. No amount of wishing or fighting can change that now.

Feel free to decide how your character's grave, shrine, marker, altar, or other memorial looks, and be sure to describe what others will see when they visit!

network prompts

TEXT PROMPT

At this point, you may have accumulated a lot of treats (so to speak) from the spirits. A few days into this and after the spirits have had some time to learn what the residents of Beacon prefer as far as their offerings go, the network updates with a post:

hello! we have a game if ur interested in more treats. you give three stories: two real, one lie. if someone guesses the lie they get to keep candy. everyone gets candy but the guesser gets more. enjoy!!!

They're good on their word when it comes to this - after you share your two truths and a lie, at least one piece of candy appears at your side. There may be a few more depending on how juicy your stories get, whether or not they are real.

QUICKNAV
comms	|	network • logs • memes • ooc
pages	|	rules • faq • taken • mod contact • player contact • calendar • setting • exploration • item requests • full nav

Comments

Rosinante | OTA

[callada]

Dearly Departed.

Rosinante's grave marker is a simple white cross facing the water of the harbor, placed at the head of a stone plaque bearing the inscription:

Rosinante Donquixote
b. July 15, 1485
May the ocean always guide him.

Leaving an offering yields the following:

[Video link here, skip to 14:00 or so, after the commercial break. If you want a quicker version the relevant manga pages are here, read right to left. I'd recommend you do at least one of the two so the following makes sense as it's mostly introspection rather than rehashing dialogue.]

Rosinante greets Doflamingo with retaliation, as he had wished he could have done for all three - nearly four - of the years he'd spent in his brother's shadow. Three years and some months spent in quiet obedience, meanwhile carefully, secretly noting down every overheard tidbit and copying every stolen document. So when he points his pistol at Doflamingo and speaks his true affiliation with the Marines, he does so clearly, with focus, with pride even though his ribs are broken and his lungs don't seem to be bringing in enough air. It's not a confession. It's an attack, aimed straight at his brother's heart.

(But he feels the need to apologize anyway. Not to Doflamingo but to the child behind him, hidden and silent in the treasure chest. He's a Marine. He's Law's enemy because of this. The Marines participated in genocide and he does not expect to be forgiven, even if he wasn't there in person. How foolish was he, to cling this whole time to someone bound to hate him, and justifiably so? How selfish, to lie just so he could be loved?)

All Doflamingo wants is power. He wants a right-hand man who will grant him immortality so he can conquer throne after throne. He demands answers from Rosinante - where is the fruit? If Law has it, where is Law? Where is the child who will die for him as the third Corazón? The other executives of the Donquixote Family stand passively, probably just as afraid as Rosinante once was. It's funny how in the face of death, he's the only one who will even make an attempt to put an end to the cascade of tragedies his espionage has foretold. The rest just wish to ride Doflamingo's coattails to the top of every palace.

Law isn't one of them. Law will never follow. Rosinante can't stop Doflamingo at this point any more than he could stop those razor-sharp strings from caging the entire island, but he can get Law out safely. If he only ever does one good thing with his whole life, let it be this. And so as Doflamingo carries on, accusing him of being too soft, too weak, he stands with broken, bleeding limbs, pistol ready to fire.

(Sorry, Law. Again. He'd lied to the boy too many times in one day. Told him Doflamingo wouldn't kill him for this, just so the child to sit down and stay hidden in that chest. Tried to make light of things just so Law would remember him smiling and full of love. That was not a lie; he's probably never been so sincere.)

"He is free!" he shouts, spitting in the face of everything Doflamingo wants. There will be no obedience here today and he will not face death sitting down. Nearly four years without a single spoken word to his brother ends in a declaration of Law's liberation from a future of chaos and destruction. This is his will - that Law should live to make his own choices, no matter what they end up being. At least they'll be his own, and not Doffy's.

He'd expected the first shot. The second hits as the first is registering still. It's not the first time he's been shot, not even the first time today, but as the third, fourth, and fifth punch right through, all he can hear is the ringing in his ears still. It's good he stood. There was no chance the bullets could go through the wood of the chest. Law should still be safe - poor boy. He surely feels the impact as Rosinante collapses backward onto the hard metal edge of the box and slumps back down against its side, shrouded in feathers while red decorates the snow around him. Doesn't even get to keep his uncomfortable wooden pillow, but it's not the fall back into the snow he notices so much as the sudden absence of tiny, silent fists thumping against his back through the planks.

Whatever is going on out there, he can't see it now. Can't really even hear it. He's tired, and cold, and alone. Nobody will witness his final moments, but he doesn't need that. All he can do is concentrate on staying alive for just one more breath, then another. He has to buy Law a few extra seconds to escape, for each moment he clings to life is another moment where nobody will hear the child who must be running by now. Who hopefully will get far, far away from here so he can live a life free of anyone else's demands. Maybe, with a stroke of luck, Law will even think of him again some day and remember him smiling.

[Feel free to leave offerings in reply to this post if your character comes across it while he's away, or wildcard to find him poking around others' deaths, or while sitting quietly downstairs in The Invincible with a drink and his tablet not far from Law.

Rosinante doesn't bother guarding his grave, but he'll certainly give you a questioning look if he sees you near it.]

[paletteswap]

If Kuai ever cursed, the moment when he first saw the graves appear would have been an acceptable time for it. As it is, he's been giving them a wide berth because he knows what this is, and even if it isn't, he doesn't want to tempt something worse.

A year ago he'd left offerings out of a sense of honor, that remembering the dead was the right thing to do. It wasn't until after he'd left something that he understood the horror of what the spirits were doing to them. Forcing people to relive others deaths, a private experience at the moment where they're most vulnerable.

He'd seen Rosinante's death. And it's not something he wants to relive.

Instead he will avoid the graveyard at all costs, finding the man in the bar of the Invincible, and pouring himself a drink before going to sit nearby. "I take it you've been outside and seen that the graveyard is back?"

[callada]

He looks up when someone approaches close enough with apparent intent to sit at the table, then sets his tablet aside when he sees it's Kuai. There's always a seat available for him.

"Yeah," he sighs. "Ominous, isn't it? Now that we know more about how this place works, it makes me wonder if those visiting spirits thought it was something they should do for us or if there's a green-eye that followed them in."

It does bear some similarities to what happened recently, after all - leave an offering, receive a memory. Maybe they're just trying to reciprocate. Hard to be optimistic about much lately though, with Mary missing.

Bucky/Soldat | OTA

[worthallthis]

I. Trick or Treat

The tricks are leaving Soldat more than a little on edge. Finding a bloody child's t-shirt under the coffee table in the bed and breakfast leaves them cowering in the corner for twenty minutes. Finding a recently-severed tooth in the kitchen of the goddamn Invincible prompts a full, obsessive cleaning that results in lunch being late. Being jumped out at results in a knife outbreak every fucking time, though so far they've managed to pull their strikes and no one has been hurt.

So far, anyway.


II. Dearly Departed

The grave in question is a stone plinth halfway between the church and the bonfire, about waist high, rounded and carved at the top with a star. The name is "Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes", probably confusing to some because a lot of people here won't know who that is, and the inscription reads, "Beloved son and brother, protector and destroyer. 1917 - 2014."

When Soldat finds it, they don't leave for a couple hours, missing their second patrol of the day and the evening class, just sitting in front of it and maybe crying a little. They can see the name written now, apparently, and not freak out. That's something. And they know how old they are, now, at least approximately. And reliving their own death just drove home how far removed they are from the days of the Asset.

They won't stop anyone else from visiting, but they don't put their current name on it anywhere, either.


III. Text

[Soldat isn't really a huge fan of the network, but they're getting better about it, and this is actually kind of cute. Also, good practice: they're not great at lying. Let's try it in text, shall we?]

1. I am either 98 or 99 years old but I can't tell you for sure which one because I don't remember my birthday.
2. I don't like orange juice, but I am pretty sure I used to before. Not sure why I don't anymore.
3. I got my metal arm because I lost the real one in a fight.

III - Text @lady0

[p0isonpink]

It's hard to imagine you losing that badly in a fight, so I'll guess 3.

[ It's a compliment, if a weird one. ]

Text @ Soldier

[worthallthis]

I have lost fights before. But you're right. I actually have no idea how I lost the real one but I don't think it was in a fight.

ii

[policier]

( Javert finds him not too long after class is over. He had to stop to search the house first, hoping beyond reason that he would be there and had merely lost track of time and his patrol. He is not. Javert stalks across the square like a man possessed, making a beeline for the church, and then perhaps the Invincible.

He doesn't get that far. The sight of the grave startles him a bit, but not so much as the sight of Soldat sitting in front of it, distressed and disquieted. Javert doesn't need to ask to know what he has seen. He had felt much the same when he was made to relive his death, and everything that had led up to it. He approaches quietly, saying, )

Had I known they would appear again, perhaps I would've warned you.

( There's a silent apology in his words, and he appears solemn. )

[worthallthis]

[They look up and blink blankly at him a few times. Then they focus finally, and remember that this has happened before, and shake their head faintly.]

How could anyone know. They'd come back.

[They wipe at their face, and unwind their other arm around around their knees, preparing to get up, but not quite there yet.]

II better late than never amirite

[callada]

"Protector and destroyer" is one hell of a description. Rosinante's eye catches on it for a moment before placing the offering down - a pack of cigarettes wrapped in colored paper, almost a proper gift rather than the usual offerings of quartz-banded and colorful polished stones he tends to default to for these, as he did the first time. The stones are nice, and hold plenty of meaning, but he figures with all this going on, he'll offer Soldat a proper pick-me-up. It's also not exactly a signature, but it should be more obvious who came to visit, even if he has chosen to wait until the grave is unattended.

It's not his first time seeing one of Soldat's memories either, obviously. But the person inside that head, before Beacon brought its slow changes, is still pretty alien and feeling that disconnected from himself is almost worse than what actually happens. He knows enough to put together what's going on here - That's Steve, Soldat's friend, the one who saved him before. And knowing that, and seeing how the rest proceeds, makes things far worse than if the death had been a simple fall while fighting an enemy.

Hard stuff. Leaves him thinking a while as he later walks away, though a good amount of that thinking is to do with him and Law, and how a close friendship that seems unbreakable even in death and years apart should still never be taken for granted. Reminds him too that he should be mindful of the fact that all it would take is one clever green-eye to turn them against each other even if temporarily, and that frightens him deeply.

He's not much for socializing outside his tiny and very close circle these days, with Mary's absence making it a little hard to find joy in much at all, but eventually a few days later he does spot Soldat in The Invincible's kitchen yet again, and hesitates a moment before pulling up a seat at the bar rather than heading straight upstairs.

"You get the cigarettes?" It would be a shame if anyone stole a grave offering, but you never know with the forest spirits always hanging around.

Reiju | OTA

[p0isonpink]

1. Dearly Departed

The headstone is well-made, of a clearly expensive slab of stone that, in sufficient light, is a delicate, pearly pink with a subtle, crystalline glimmer. The quality of the stone and the intricate carving fully befit the royal station she held in life.

Princess Reiju of the Vinsmoke Royal Dynasty
Born in Germa Kingdom, North Blue, 1500
Fell in Battle off Whole Cake Island, New World, 1524
Her Father's Pride

However, someone may find something else as well -- for when Reiju comes upon her own headstone, with those final ugly, lying three words on it, she flies into a rage of a sort she would normally control without a second thought. But this place has worked upon her; the safety of being able to express herself, knowing that her father can no longer witness her independence and call her to heel, has weakened somewhat her intense control, and she shatters the headstone she finds in a whirlwind of gunshot-strong kicks, cold and furious as the early winter storm in which she was born. It reappears, and she destroys it again -- so that every day, she has to spend some time hunting for the new appearance of her gravestone, to destroy it over again.

So someone catching a glimpse of a pale pearly gravestone may either find the rubble she leaves behind her, with a few words and phrases still visible on the broken chunks, or they may find the new gravestone that appears over and over, as she can't so easily censor her own story.

And what a story it is.

2. On the network - lady0

Well, this seems like a fun little game, doesn't it? Let's see what everyone does with these.

1. My favorite season is fall.
2. I wanted a sister when I was very little.
3. I've never spent more than a month at a time on land.

1

[callada]

More than once, Rosinante notices her efforts. She is awfully persistent, isn't she? Which means he especially needs to find out what it is she's trying so desperately, and so angrily, to hide. Going to be a bit of a challenge, hunting it down before she does, but he's up for it.

He uses silence to his advantage, and dims his lantern using the stone-shaped disguise for it he had purchased from the Night Market all those months ago, hoping that when he finally comes across it, he won't lead her straight to it. Quietly, he thanks his own good fortune when he finds it and kneels, placing the same gifts he had collected the last time this happened - smooth colorful stones, polished by water, where they had fallen from that haunted river into the shallow edge of the lake. The significance of them isn't something he expects anyone else to understand, but they don't need to.

He watches her fight. Comes to understand some of her abilities, which is a pleasant bonus. Watches her - feels her drown, for himself, which is awful and he reels as he comes out of the vision and sits down, noiselessly coughing.

Oh, but he hears footsteps now, too. Damn. Guess he didn't beat her by much.

Will Ingram | OTA

[donttalktome]

Dearly Departed

[Will's memorial is less of a grave and more of... well, it's literally a tree. A very exotic looking tree, by most peoples' standards. It might even be mistaken for just another weird piece of foliage in the forested town if not for the small metal marker among the roots.]

Dr. William Halston Ingram
08862-27

[The numbers don't lend themselves to easy interpretation, and the whole thing is kind of an odd setup, but it stands to reason that it's probably another grave, considering what's happening around town. If you get curious and decide to leave something for an offering near the tree, you'll be thrust into the middle of a dire situation, your thoughts replaced with someone else's.

You knew this was going to happen.

You knew, but of course, no one fucking listens. A part of you hopes they all die. Another part of you is going to make sure of it.

For a moment you just lean against the wall of the corridor, trying to muster what little strength you have left. Every breath— coming quicker now as your system goes into shock— sends sharp jolts through your stomach. The adrenaline is wearing off. You need to move. You push off from the wall, leaving a streak of bright red behind you.

You remember a time when you were much younger, staring down in fascination at your hand with bloody stumps. The pain was deep, down to your guts, less like you'd had two fingers cut off and more like your whole hand was being crushed in a hot vice. This is a lot like that, except your guts are where it starts. You're no medical doctor, but a good grasp of human anatomy tells you that you don't have much time left. Either you get help or you die, and that first one's a long shot. The thought crosses your mind, as you stumble toward the ship's bridge, that if that Martian doctor finds you in time she'll have no choice but to save your life. And if she doesn't, you're dead anyway, so what do you care?

It takes a concentrated effort to get where you're going. Out of instinct, you hold one hand over the holes in your abdomen as if that's going to keep the blood inside. It isn't. You're leaving a trail everywhere you go, even if you can't see it because turning makes you dizzy. When you finally reach the door you're after, you worry for a second that the reader won't take your ID card because of how messy it is now. Thankfully the scanner can see through the gore.

You're trying to focus, but it's impossible not to look out through the bridge's massive windows into the void beyond. Somewhere in the back of your mind, you're sort of glad this view will be the last thing you see. This view will be the last thing you see. The thought hits you like a slap in the face and for a moment you just want to collapse and panic and let the weight of the situation crush you.

Thankfully, your spite is the greater force.

You don't bother with the pilot's chair— if you sit you'll just stop moving. Instead your hands go straight for the console, straight to the task at hand. Whoever did this to you made a huge fucking mistake. Maybe they didn't know you could do this. Serves them right, they'll never see it coming until it's too late. Your fingers move across the touchscreen with practiced muscle memory, and you try to ignore the smudges of red they trace.

You change the ship's course, tipping it down at a slight angle toward the planet it circles. It won't be quick, it'll take some time, but eventually this thing never meant to fly is going to wind up pulled out of orbit. And whoever killed you will likely be vaporized as it slams into the planet's surface. Of course, so will you, but you'll be long dead by then.

It's getting harder to concentrate, harder to remember what to do next. The connections you normally make so quickly seem to have gaps between them, lagging and stuttering like a broken machine. You realize, quite suddenly, that you're sitting on the floor. You don't remember when that happened. The pain is like a choking thing, making your breath shallower and shallower.

Fuck, you're really about to die out here. This is ridiculous. All the things you've survived, all the things you've accomplished, and it doesn't mean anything. Nothing means a damn thing. It's always been a fact of your life that the universe is a cold, vast, and uncaring lack of presence, but it was also home, and now it's turned on you. Your luck's run out. You guess it was bound to happen eventually.

Somehow you manage to finish the job, wresting administrative privileges from the ship's system and locking them behind a door only you can open. You don't really remember the process. You also don't remember when you laid down, but here you are.

And then here you aren't. You fade in and out as your frantic heartbeat starts to slow. At least the pain is fading, and at least you'll be unconscious before long. And at least you know that, with your last act, you took the bastard responsible with you.]

Two Truths and a Lie

[Oh how fun, a lying contest. This is... probably harmless, although the magic candy is a little disconcerting. The problem is that he knows a lot of people here fairly well by now, so this could be a challenge.]

1. I've never seen a dog in person.
2. I've had two fingers replaced after an accident.
3. I can speak in 14 languages, several of which are non-human.

[Is he also maybe slightly testing to see who saw the grave memory? Perhaps.]

lying is fun | private so other people don't get to cheat answers

[callada]

Do you not have dogs in space? I'd believe you're capable of learning 14 languages but I also think that might be the lie. What if you speak 20?

I want to be wrong because dogs are great. But I'm thinking 3 is your lie.

Here:
1. I started smoking when I was 16
2. I used to want to be a veterinarian
3. The longest I've gone without saying a single word to another person was one year & two months.

@Grandmaster | Text

[paletteswap]

I certainly hope you're not going to eat whatever shows up as a reward for this.

[And he's not going to participate in this because he's a terrible liar and knows it.]

Two Truths and a Lie

[wishformore]

may a stranger may venture a guess?

Pudding | OTA

[flangirl]

Dearly Departed

The marker is enormous, ornate, expensive, garish.

Nearly ten feet tall, carved from alabaster - with no dark flaws, only variegated bright-and-off swirls - stained a bubblegum pink, the gravestone is a full wedding cake atop a Tuscan column for a plinth. The detail is exquisite: roses and candy strings, cheery castle towers, frosting swirls, skulls, crossbones, and bow-laden gazebo all so elegantly and delicately carved it looks as though the cake might collapse under a good press of fingers. In the gazebo, in full wedding dress, stands Pudding, looking sweet, darling, and lovely as on any day anyone in Beacon has ever met her, with a soft smile on her lips.

At the bottom of the plinth is a plaque bearing the inscription, carved deeply and painted in with chocolate-colored enamel:

Pudding Charlotte
June 25 1508 - September 3 1524
35th Daughter, 76th Child
Minister-Elect of Chocolate
Beloved By All Who Knew Her
Stolen On Her Wedding Day

Despite how ostentatious the marker is, any offering at all will do.


Pudding knows which grave is hers from a distance. It would be impossible not to, with that horrible cake.

She doesn't want to approach it, go near it. She doesn't need to relive that again, so starkly and vividly as the other graves where she's left offerings have foisted on her. And how would she destroy something that enormous, hide it, anything? But she has to know, has to know what the others will see. And when she comes up from the memory, the tears on her face are already streaming, and she runs. She doesn't know what to do. Everyone will see.

On the third, the day she finds it, the other inhabitants of the former B&B can find her sobbing in her room, most of the day, off and on.

Afterwards, she makes breakfast in The Invincible every morning as usual, but in bigger, better spreads, every dish tasting like she poured in her entire heart and soul. She can't do anything but this, so this is what she does. Unlike usual, there are no dishes from the fourth to the fourteenth that contain any chocolate whatsoever, and she is much more subdued, much less likely to make conversation, when serving breakfast. Outside the 5am to 9am hours she's cooking, serving, and cleaning up, she tries to make herself impossible to find: home when she's sure no one else would be, out on the beaches as far from the lighted path as she dares to go, and most often, sitting in the still, slightly dirty teacup ride in the dark amusement park, listening to the "ocarina" app on her tablet and quietly singing notes back to herself, and occasionally to the forest spirits who come by in what seem to be attempts to cheer her up.

[policier]

( Javert doesn't linger too close to the graves. He doesn't know if he could stand to experience everyone's deaths again, knowing that he may also have experience their emotions, too. His own had been terrible enough, as have many of the others. He notices her garish marker on his patrols, though, enormous as it is and ostentatiously decorated, and he recognizes the appearance of her statue.

He hears her sobbing, too, when he comes home one evening, but he doesn't know her well enough to do anything about it. How could he comfort her? What could he say? He leaves her be for a few days, seeing her only in passing until he goes to visit her in the Invincible's kitchen one morning. )

This is far too much.

( He says to her, in a way that may have been a little too gruff. He's not used to having so much to eat, especially when it's so carefully and thoughtfully made. There's something else he should probably say, too, but he hesitates. )

[worthallthis]

Soldat spends four hours of the afternoon trying to sleep, buried under blankets in their room. It even lasts for two of those hours, until the sound of someone crying leaks into their dreams and turns them into sorrowful nightmares. Victims of the Asset, children weeping left behind, one of the baby Widows sobbing....

Then they wake up, and someone's still crying. Still kind of sleepy, they stumble out of bed just in socks and sweats, and shuffle across the hall to knock on Pudding's door. "Pudding? You okay, doll?" She's crying. She's probably not okay. After a week and change of having her thoughts dive unexpectedly into their head-- thank god that's over, anyway-- a lot of the lingering fear is gone, but they've still got to just ask, not just assume.

[callada]

Well. That's Pudding's.

Even in the darkness it's visible from quite a distance, lit by every passing lantern around its immense, gaudy edges. It's sort of horrendous. And he pretty much immediately feels bad, since it's not like she seems the type to want something like this. Never struck him as having the ego for it. But her family, well. That's where the egos lie, probably. Certainly the money. Whether her actual final resting place looks anything like this isn't the point - it probably reflects somehow, even just subconsciously, on how she thinks of them, and particularly how she thinks of her mother.

Being that it's so large, it's pretty hard to avoid, not that he was intending to, but it also means there's probably no way to visit this one without at least someone noticing. He at least makes an effort to go when there aren't others immediately nearby, kneels before the plaque to read it, notices how very young she was at the time of his own death, then places his handful of water-polished stones and sits as he's drawn into the vision.

It's hard to stay analytical with all of these, but this one especially. The young man, Sanji, has the same distinctive eyebrow that Reiju has; the marriage is political, and yet Pudding's emotions run so deep. She cares too much about someone whose marriage to her was arranged. Removing his memory - hell of a Devil Fruit power, that one - is an act of kindness, not cruelty, in her mind. He feels her lose someone who showed her kindness, and grieves the loss alongside her.

And after all that, such a mundane end - isn't that just how life is, sometimes? The kindest and strongest of people can still be felled by a mistake. Awful. Unfair.

As he comes out of it, he takes a deep gasp of a breath. He didn't know what to expect, going in, but he didn't anticipate being affected so strongly, and even ends up blotting an eye carefully against his sleeve, trying not to smudge his eyeliner.

It takes him a couple days before he has a chance to say anything, and even then he's not sure he will. Losing Mary at the same time as all of this hasn't made him want much company outside a few people. But the day before Law's birthday he comes downstairs from his room and pulls up a seat at the bar, lights a cigarette, sets his tablet on the bar top, then frowns when it registers just how hard she's working.

"You need a hand with any of that? Looks like you're juggling an awful lot."

[p0isonpink]

There's no way Reiju isn't going to check it out. While she knows from Law that Sanji did get away safely, she still wants more detail -- and while she won't admit it openly, hopes for the chance to get inside Pudding's head a little. She's a creature of such contradictions, and Reiju is curious.

She visits the gravestone late in the evening, leaves her offering, and watches the events unfold.

Afterward, she sits for a while, digesting it all. Pudding's attitude toward Sanji, her mixed feelings, the way her affect and her inner self interact, slippery and changing boundaries...

It's a lot. It's very interesting. But it speaks to her heart much more than she expected.

She's got to talk to Pudding. She heads to the Invincible, wondering if it's late enough that Pudding won't be occupied with either preparing or cleaning up from dinner.

[hndzhn]

Katakuri is out, for once, looking for his sister.

When he wanted to make himself scarce, it was usually only from his mother, and he'd certainly never say he was busying himself in work to avoid her. He didn't need to. Everyone else did the same thing in one way or another.

He only looks for her because he happened to lay eyes on her grave, feeling an odd pang, an atrocious lucidity about their deaths that made him tear away from the grave without an offering. He didn't need to see his sister die. Seeing the grave was enough.

Until he left one anyway, because the nagging sort of sorrow and guilt that hung over him was too much. After having seen her death, really felt it, he'd take that sorrow and guilt any day.

Katakuri finds her in the amusement park, drawn close from the sounds of singing.

"Pudding." a statement, not an unsure probe into the night looking for an answer, "Can I sit with you."

law trafalgar | ota

[countershocks]

dearly departed.

[ when one happens upon law's grave, it is a stone marker that would be almost easy to overlook, if it didn't have a strange, yellow-coloured metal somehow embedded into its edges.

in the middle, it reads

LAW WATER D. TRAFALGAR

and underneath, instead of a pretty phrase, date of birth and death... there are carvings. one reads we miss you, captain; another reads your sacrifice won't be in vain; while another is barely legible, but it definitely says traf and then a whole lot of scribbles.

and upon an offering...

the scene happens outside a prison; law in handcuffs, facing a huge man. kaido is speaking: threatening law, telling him that his devil fruit power will be invaluable, that they captured his crew already once, they can do it again, and he'd better cooperate if he wants them to stay alive.

inside law's head, there are calculations running. if he agrees — his crew will be captured, they will be in danger. his power will give kaido an advantage. their plan in wano will be disturbed — the straw hats will stop the plan to rescue him, and it may cost them everything in wano. the kozuki clan will never come back to power. more of them may die. wano's borders won't be opened.

he can be captured, and wait for a rescue, and in the process, ruin their chance of defeating orochi and kaido and freeing wano.

or...

the handcuffs are sealing off his powers; all he can do now is talk.

so he talks. he taunts kaido, calling him weak for having to rely on a warlord's power; he plays up his own importance in all their plans in wano, and in dressrosa, tells him it's because of him that doflamingo was defeated, that kaido no longer has access to the artificial fruits. that it's him who's ruined kaido's plan for his crew... and with him, they'll surely defeat him, too.

it works just as he expects it to. kaido, enraged, transforms, and there's nothing law can do against a dragon.

the moment before kaido's attack hits him, he smiles. the smile remains until his consciousness slips away.

later on, he can be found wandering around, perhaps curious to see others' graves... or at the invincible, drinking coffee like nothing is wrong. ]

[callada]

Rosinante makes a point to visit the new graves, the deaths he hasn't seen, because the more he knows about the people here, the better. So he's initially quite pleased when he spots that glint of metal reflecting the light of his lantern, and heads on over to see whose he has found.

When he kneels down to read it, he wishes he'd missed it. His chest tightens as he runs fingers over the carvings which speak of so much love from the people he left behind. Poor Law shouldn't be here, much as he loves that they can be together again. It still simply doesn't feel right.

Whatever strange force operates within these things reaches out to him and before he realizes what he's doing, he has reached into his shirt and unclasped the little sailboat necklace that Melisandre gave him over a year ago, and is mere inches away from setting it down. He pauses, frowns, then continues and places it at the headstone. Maybe he'll see some of those friends of his. Maybe at least he'll understand more about the world that moved on after he left it.

The latter turns out to be true. Oh, he already disliked Kaido plenty based purely on knowledge of the man's cruel reign in his part of the seas, but as every moment passes, as Law breathes his last, Rosinante's dislike becomes utter loathing. And yet here in Beacon there is nothing he can do.

He pulls back after, and leaves the necklace where it sits. If Law finds this later, he's welcome to keep it - a little memento of the sea they both left behind.

Law himself isn't far, of course - they don't part for long. Rosinante recognizes that particular shade of lantern light from a distance now the way he might recognize a face or a voice, even if it isn't wildly distinct, and walks across the square toward him with shoulders hunched and hands in his pockets.

"I found yours," he says, voice low and a little rough, like he's finding it hard to even say so. "Over by those trees. Thought you should know where it is."

ayato kirishima | tokyo ghoul: re | OTA

[rabbitfeather]

i. trick or treat. gore warning.

( The severed hand Ayato finds is torn at the wrist, like it's been ripped cruelly from whatever poor soul. It's nothing that'll freak him out, but it makes him wonder if there's other ghouls here.

He brandishes the hand at whoever's near, completely nonchalant, blunt affect. )

What do you think did this?

ii. scream in the dead of night.

( Arm bloodied from a pumpkin attacking, he was able to escape from it through use of his kagune.

When he sees someone else having trouble, he's quick to act, kagune forming and shooting projectiles towards it. Maybe one clips the victim's arm ... )

Shit, sorry. Should have warned you.

iii. dearly departed.

( Ayato doesn't know how to feel, looking over his grave. This really is real, huh? It's too drawn-out and detailed to be a dream, too horrifying.

He looks to the person at his right. )

You find yours yet?

iv. two truths and a lie. gore warning.

1.) I ate my sister once.

2.) I have several prison breaks under my belt.

3.) I single-handedly saved all of Japan from a man-eating kaiju.

ii

[worthallthis]

[Said arm is made of metal, so the projectile bounces right off of it. Soldat uses the distraction of the new person and new weapons to plunhe the torch they're carrying into the whole mess, and let it scream and writhe away while it burns.

They look kind of disappointed at the retreating spirit-vines, though, like they expected better from it. Then Ayato gets:]

It's fine. I heard you coming.