You make me really, really good at makin' bad decisions

[decohere]

Who: Ava & friends
What: comfort & impromptu meeting
Where: room 114
When: February 16th (after Daisy's killing spree) & 17th
Warnings: pretty bad feels, death and bad spooky ship happenings

i. Seven texts and two missed calls
(ota)

Ava's still covered in 6's blood when she returns to their shared bedroom, and she listlessly sits at the edge of the immaculately made bed that had been a tangle of sheets when she left in a rush not even an hour before. Cradling both of their phones in trembling hands, she stares blankly at the wall and fights the desire to crawl inside it to escape having to process what she just did. But he managed to make it through the day after Christmas without her. He'll be back tomorrow, unbroken, and it will all be fine. Until the next tragedy that neither of them will be strong enough to survive.

It's early. She should still be sleeping. It's early and she doesn't want to disturb anyone else. It's early and that means she has almost a full day before 6 will come back.

She intends to remain this way, alone with her misery because she's hardly the only one dealing with messy carnage. But news spreads quickly around the ship.


ii. Know I can't ignore 'em all
(semi-closed to Valdis & Crabb)

As much relief 6's resurrection brings, as much comfort she finds in waking beside him and the reassurances they whisper, Ava knows that's barely a scratch on the increasingly cracking glass of her psyche. Trapped between knowing too much and far too little, wanting to do more and feeling as if she's probably already done too much damage. There's secrets she knows and so few she can trust, and time and options seem to be crumbling away.
Ava's almost paralyzed by the uncertainty, filling page after page in her notebook of details she knows, theories she has, and an absolute lack of solutions. But there's one page in particular she keeps coming back to, labeled only with little stars rather than spelling out the forbidden. It's hard not to obsess when she's aware that there's something lurking in her mind and Fio's that has the potential to destroy reality, and... and there's a knock at the door that's enough to shake it from her thoughts, as Ava quickly covers the notebook with her pillow and goes to answer.

iii. Said that I'm gonna be sleepin' at mine
(ota wildcard, hmu or just come at me)

Comments

i

[makesomedeals]

Max doesn't know what's happened, the hellhound's howl had gotten a roll of his eyes rather than any sort of actual reaction. There are too many dogs, wolves, and werewolves on this ship for him to pay it any mind. He'd gotten a few glimpses of Ava trudging through the halls, very much like the ghost of her namesake. Though he could almost swear that he could see blood on her.

But by the time he turns the corner down to the cabins she's gone, likely back in her room having not needed to use the door like the rest of the plebs on this ship. He almost leaves her be, but there's something... wrong about the way she was walking. Lifeless and strange.

He knocks on the door, "Ava?"

[decohere]

He's seen her an undignified mess enough times now that Ava trusts that Maximilien won't think any less of her for all her disgusting human weakness, but she still hesitates when she opens the door, staring out at him with a vulnerable expression and indeed covered in blood without any sign of injury of her own.

But leaves enough room for him to come into the room, as much invitation as she can provide at the moment because she's not sure she can properly form words without something else escaping instead.

[makesomedeals]

He's not sure what he's expecting when she opens the door, but seeing her listless and covered in blood certainly isn't it, regardless of what he thought he'd seen out of the periphery of his vision. This feels different than her in her suit in the laundry room singing the Billy Bass song and eventually asking for bread. And it's different than when she'd come back after being severed in half by a wall by someone that she should have been able to trust.

For all her optimism and attempts to figure out the ship and befriend people, it's certainly not repaying her kindness.

He slips inside, quietly, looking at her rather than the surroundings, "What happened?"

[decohere]

Ava takes a steadying breath, or at least the intention of one, but it's slightly strangled.

"Something got Peter," she responds, clutching his blood-splattered phone in her blood-soaked hand to her blood-streaked chest. "Didn't have the decency to kill him. So I had to.... I had to."

[makesomedeals]

Oh. Oh.

"Alright, you should sit down for a moment." He tentatively reaches out to helpfully guide her to the edge of the bed so she can perch there, letting her clutch that phone to herself like a lifeline. "Someone on the ship? A passenger? I'm not sure who has any quarrel with him."

Other than Maximilien himself, but not so much that he'd leave him dying on the ground. That's reserved for people like Ebalon and Rich.

"But that doesn't matter right now." Because he doesn't care about Peter, and he does care about Ava. "Focus on anything else, when he comes back you can go hunt this person down together. I'm sure he'll make it terribly romantic. He seems the type to put a rose between his teeth or somesuch."

[decohere]

She'd have sat right there on the floor if not for Max carefully guiding her toward the bed instead.

His voice is calming in its familiarity, even as so much of it washes over her. She has to retrace the words in her mind to find meaning in them. "I don't know..." Ava shakes her head. "Something with claws. Ripped him up... Broke him." She stares down at the phone in her hand.

Focus on something else, he suggests. "Too bad there are no roses..."

[makesomedeals]

"I'm sure we can find one for the occasion. Or make some, I'm fairly certain you can fold paper into flowers much like those cranes I've seen people make." He sits next to her, eyeing her with concern. Claws. He mentally sorts through all the passengers, discarding Siffleur as his first thought because she'd say it was the cougar if it was him. And Siffleur might play with his food, but in the end he killed them to eat them, he wouldn't leave the man there to suffer.

He's not sure who fits that description, though so many on the boat can shapeshift it could be anyone. A problem for later, and when Peter comes back he can simply tell them what happened.

"It'll be alright, eventually. Though I know hearing that doesn't help, it's nevertheless true."

[decohere]

She's folded plenty of little flowers for the memorial, and so many of those cranes, one after another out of the pages of Battle Royale. Her fingers still know all the different folds she's mastered through trial and error and badly processed grief until she was able to make something that looked nice enough.

"There's paper in the drawer," she says sadly, and makes no move to go get it.

She rubs at a spot of blood on the phone, just smears it across the screen. "I know, that's why I had to do it. So that it will be alright. That feels... messed up, doesn't it? That if I hadn't..."

[makesomedeals]

He looks over at the drawer as if he can telepathically open it without moving from where he's sitting. Never has he had to be jealous of something Klaus can do, and he hates that. How dare whoever did this to Peter put him in this situation. He's going to eviscerate them when he finds out who it is.

"This is where if I had something profound to say about the right thing being the hardest, I would monologue about it. But unfortunately I do not. In reality something are just... awful. Meaningless and terrible. And all we do is persevere because giving up is even worse."

[decohere]

Unfortunately she is unaware of Maximilien's however brief jealousy over magic, or else it would give her something to smile about. Because that's how she ended up with her own ability to fly, the lowgrade developing into obsessive envy over Skulduggery's.

"I don't want to give up," she assures Max despite how defeated she looks. Because there had been the months she'd been more than ready to, and she knows she'd never have made it to where she is now if she had given in. "But I'm... tired of everything being such a struggle. I'm not sure what else I'm even supposed to do anymore. I try to enjoy what I have here. The experiences, the people that I care about," she bumps against him to let him know that certainly includes him. "But nothing ever seems... enough."

[makesomedeals]

"I think you're trying to quantify a feeling, and those aren't things that can be measured against any sort of metric." Though considering how he thinks about things, he attempts to quantify everything. He can't help it though, it's how he's programmed.

"I agree though. And it's getting worse. I'm not sure if it's simply a product of being here for so long, or the constantly changing passengers, but it seems more difficult to simply exist now. Perhaps it's the increase in people, or the type of people. There are a certain sort that seem to persist longer than others. And unfortunately the highest percentage are obnoxious teenagers. Every one of them should really count as three."

[decohere]

"The type of people..." Ava looks down, knows she hasn't been too good at seeking out new arrivals, actively avoids most of them. "Sometimes it's easy to feel disconnected. From the complete population turnover. We've been here nearly a year, and I barely recognize any of the faces anymore. It's like a constant... dreadful reminder. Thousands of years of this, and I can see why... the Captain barely cares, views us all as disposable. But I don't want to feel that way. Peter and you and Fio... you're everything to me." She swallows roughly.

"And then things like this happen, and I realize there's nothing I can even do to protect anyone. I feel so. Useless."

[makesomedeals]

"I wonder how any of us will be in even a decade, it's been nearly a year for me already and I believe there's only twelve who still remain from when I first arrived. I imagine even less for you. And there were at least seventy-five passengers, perhaps more." His hit-list had nearly that many entries anyway. He had stopped maintaining that because it seemed pointless after a while with so many people coming and going, and only served as a reminder how transitive their existence is.

"He might perceive us as disposable, but we don't. And he's dependent on our emotions and existence so realistically how we see it is what matters. He might control reality, but he doesn't control how we interact with it."

[decohere]

She does a brief mental count of everyone still here from when she arrived. She's not even close to most of them, knows they're mostly in the opposite camp of how to handle their captivity. And yet there is always a twinge of relief whenever she sees them around still, confirmation they haven't lost yet another. That it is possible to survive this long.

"I don't even keep track anymore. I used to. Everyone's rooms, their known associates, what sorts of powers and abilities they have, their beliefs and motivations..." made it easier to predict how any of them were likely to react to any sort of emergency situation or conflict. "Now there's people who... I don't even know their names." She doesn't have the energy to keep up with it all.

She looks at Max, studying his face. He might not have the facial features required for most expressions, but she's gotten quite good at reading his and Skulduggery's more subtle ones. "Does this feel worth it, to you? Would you have preferred never to have experienced any of this...?"

[makesomedeals]

"I did too. I had a list of everyone, but after a while it seemed pointless." What's a villain to do when his nemesis leaves, who's he supposed to banter with or scoff at? Without Ebalon around it didn't seem important to know who he'd kill first if it came down to it. Right now probably Jeff since Rich is gone but he's honestly not sure.

Oh, hitting him with the hard questions. "It's hard for me to know what I would prefer, it's difficult to imagine a lack of something I didn't have to begin with. But, I..." hn. Yes okay he hates this. "I'd likely prefer to have been here for a while. I did get to shoot a few people, and made Ebalon bleed so... that was probably worth it."

And made some friends. That too.

[decohere]

She's just going to stare at him expectantly until he adds her to the reasons why it's worth it.

... C'mon Max, you can do it.

[makesomedeals]

Ava is a monster and should be ashamed of herself.

He sees that look, he feels that look. It's nice to not have expressions, but his eyes give him away as he sighs and looks over at her.

"And I've met people I never would have gotten close to otherwise. You for example. I've..." Why does he have to have all the emotions? What possessed the people who created him to give him the capacity for embarrassment? He'd like a refund. "I've never had a friend before now. And I likely never would have back in my world. Should I return there, I'd actually know what I was missing out on. I'm not sure I could handle that."

His voice is very soft as he continues, "And I'd miss you."

[decohere]

She feels no shame whatsoever, gives a satisfied little hum at his acknowledgment. As awful as she feels, she needed that reassurance that all of this still matters. Ava turns her head slightly so he can pretend not to see as she swipes at her eyes.

"I'd miss you too, Max," she whispers in response. "It's hard for me to imagine a future where you're not in it. If I ended back in my own world..." she trails off, because she really doesn't want to imagine how empty and lost she'd feel.

[makesomedeals]

He makes an annoyed whirring noise at having to admit that out loud. With actual words. Where anyone (the walls) could have overheard him!

"I don't think any of us would be happy going back to our worlds alone. With the memory of this place that we would be unable to share with anyone ever. Who would believe this? Who would understand? I think that the people trying desperately to return to their lives need to seriously think about that - even if they could return, they're not the same person anymore."