Number 6 becomes Patient 0 [Open/Mingle]

[be_seeing_you]

Who: Number 6 & OPEN
What: As explained in this OOC post Number 6 got the flu as a regain and he's in a sharing mood. This is 100% opt-in.
When: Starting March 6, thru the month of March
Where All over, indicated in starters
Warnings: Sickness, all things that having the flu entails. This is magic flu that is incurable but only lasts for exactly one week. Let's keep it light and not have anyone die, and also please do not have the flu spread into memories, keep it contained to the ship.

For everyone's convenience, feel free to use this post as a mingle. I'm going to turn off tracking so you can post your toplevels here as much as you desire. There's no posting time-limit.




Get comfy in your robe and have a cuppa tea. It's going to be a long week.

Comments

[saltwaterlungs]

"It's meant to help clear out your sinuses and everything," with a gesture towards her nose just in case he's foggy on what that means. Darcy folds her hands in her lap as he coughs, concerned obviously but also with some exciting news to tell him.

"You know how there's all those cracks in the ship, ehn? I... found one that leads back to Lyon. To just, like, a regular day there. It's up on the sports deck if you... want to come see it with me, when you're better?"

[prince_of_beasts]

It hadn't occurred to Dimitri that they might find their way into their own memories. And it's only a wave of dizziness from the fever that keeps him from bolting to search for Fhirdiad.

Fuck. Fuck --

He swallows a sob. It's not like his face can get much messier. It's been lodged in his mind for some time now, more strongly than ever with the cracks opening up, that he doesn't fully know his fellow passengers -- he only knows them, and they only know him, as captives, stolen from home, family, purpose, from anything familiar, from everything they know and understand.

"I'd like that," he croaks. "I'd like that very much."

[saltwaterlungs]

Darcy reaches to take his hand, rubbing a thumb over his knuckles.

"There's a zoo, and the basilica, and the library- and you can finally get to actually try some of the food I've been telling you about. It's... just how I remember it. I never thought I'd see it again."

[prince_of_beasts]

Dimitri nods. It's all he can manage. The sickness has clogged up his throat and the inside of his head; he's too congested to cry, and too gross to lean on Darcy, or do anything but sort of ... ooze into the handful of tissues he's jammed against his face. He's so homesick it hurts, so constantly he'd almost managed to forget it, but Darcy's fondness provides somehow simultaneous relief-by-proxy and fresh, tearing agony.

He sniffles. "T-tell me more about it?"

[saltwaterlungs]

"Where to start? What part? The old buildings? The cobblestones? I didn't need a map. I haven't been there in a year, and I didn't need to ask directions once. I still knew where everything was. I don't belong anywhere else, ehn? It's home."

It's the only place she'll ever really call home.

"But most of it I want you to see for yourself. As far as I can tell the memory goes for at least a day, so we'll have plenty of time."

[prince_of_beasts]

"Mmh." Dimitri shuts his eyes. Fuck, he misses Fhirdiad.

"I haven't found. Any of mine. But if I do -- " Several sneezes, and then another round of coughing. " ... I hade beig sick."

[saltwaterlungs]

"I'll let you know if I run into one of yours," she offers, reaching to pat at his back.

"Do you want me to see if there's cough syrup in the infirmary?"

[prince_of_beasts]

"Thag you." Dimitri sniffles. "Yedz please."

He takes another pull of his tea. The peppermint rattles down his spine, but it's certainly clearing his sinuses. At least the steam helps.

Dimitri giggles soggily. "D'you want to know -- why I reacted to the cake?"

[saltwaterlungs]

"I would like to know why Dedue nearly killed me for poisoning you, yes," she jokes back, even if she's unsure of what he's finding funny.

[prince_of_beasts]

"He wouldn't," Dimitri protests. Probably. "Don' tell him but," he pauses to sneeze again, "I couldn't tasde anything for -- about five years. Since it happened. An' then on my birthday it cabe back."

That is, just a day or two before the fateful cake incident.

[saltwaterlungs]

There's the slightest attempt of trying to stifle her laughter that is crushed like an ant beneath an avalanche.

"IS THIS WHY YOU ATE THE FUCKING BOUILLON CUBES???" she shrieks, a hand half over her mouth, "MON FRANGIN- THEY'RE SUPER SALTY!"

Both hands clamped over her mouth as she tries to rein herself back in.

[prince_of_beasts]

"They looked like biscuits!" Dimitri complains. It's hard to sniff indignantly when he's sniffling anyway. "I did realize they were too hard!" Beat. "And too small for hardtack."

[saltwaterlungs]

"This is actually going to kill me to keep from him," Darcy says when she finally manages to regulate her breathing, "it will actually kill me. You know he's been trying to work out what food you like for ages, right?"

[prince_of_beasts]

Dimitri pauses, then groans. "Of course he has, that explains some -- nnngh." He buries his face in his hands. "I thought it would come back! And by the time I realized it wouldn't, and how much it mattered, it was too late to admit I'd been lying," he whines. "I'll tell him, I just need to find the right time ... "

[saltwaterlungs]

"Before the next excursion where we get kitchens," Darcy pokes at his shoulder, "and we're working out what you like before then so I can give him hints. Other than 'cheese' and 'crunchy shit'."

And bouillon cubes, but she's already teased him about that, and she can exercise some restraint.

[prince_of_beasts]

"Good luck. I'be been trying, but I can't get much more specific than 'yes'." Dimitri blows his nose again. "D'you know Bash? He's helpig. But it seems having it back doesn't mean that id works."

[saltwaterlungs]

"Oh yeah, I know Bash. He's nice. Kind of intimidating, but nice."

Cus y'know. Cool older goth.

"That just means we need to build up your palate. Get you to taste a bunch of different shit," she adds, and is it really surprising that Darcy treats a sense of taste like working out any other muscle?

[prince_of_beasts]

Dimitri blinks. "Intimidating?" He'd found Bash about at intimidating as a fluffy bunny. Though there'd been that display at the carnival ... Dimitri's hardly in a position to judge anyone for hidden (violent) depths.

"I've tried at the cheese shop." He scrunches his nose at Darcy preemptively. "Don't laugh at me."

[saltwaterlungs]

"I'm not," or if she is, only a little. It's endearing. She's come to know Dimitri's fussiness with the same fondness and familiarity as she knows his fighting style, his eating habits being one of the many parts of him that she has committed to memory. There's a small swelling of fondness in her chest, and she wishes quietly as she always does that being in everyone's company was this easy and felt this good.

"It's a good place to start- did you find anything you like?"