come_sailaway | I want God to come and take me home [OPEN]

Entry tags:

I want God to come and take me home [OPEN]

Who: You and... Siffleur?
When: 3-days after the end of the Oct expedition, into November
Where: Daisy's cabin, various places around the ship
Warnings: Gore, body horror, cosmic horror, self-harm, CPTSD/trauma, etc.

1. who am I supposed to be? (Closed to Daisy)

It’s common for Siffleur to show up in the room after expeditions, his body dragged in by Friday sometime in the night and left to finish waking up. They’ve got a system by now - he wakes up, grabs his emergency clothes, and takes off. It’s fairly predictable and simple.

Today, Siffleur starts breathing like usual. His body twitches as he’s on the edge of waking up. Then spasms. And then, with a terrible crunching sound, his ribcage splits wide open and blood splatters over the walls and furnishing. The split doesn’t stop there, quickly spreading up his throat and skull, his face opening like a book until even the bone splits and his pink throbbing brain is on full display. His eyes roll and slither, no longer held in sockets, and his lower-half kicks and twists as it splits in two as well. All of him folds open, and keeps opening, keeps turning until his insides are outside, his organs sliding out of the cavity, his intestines writhing and crawling and still, he keeps turning.

Until finally, with one last wet crunch, all of him inverts again and from the gorey mess on the bed comes flesh - hands and arms and a torso, a whole body birthed from the mess that was Siffleur. It’s an old woman with white hair, scars all over her, and missing toes on one foot. She’s somehow sound asleep despite it all - despite the entrails sliding inside of her unseen back, until the only trace remaining of all of that chaos is the blood still flecked everywhere, and the puddle underneath her.

The woman’s chest rises and falls a few times, and her eyes slowly open.

2. the illusion that you feel is real (Assorted - Open)

There is a stranger on board the ship. She gives a wide berth to people, carrying a nervous and somewhat frantic energy as she ducks out of corridors instead of sharing them, or quickly puts a table or shelf between herself and whoever has come in. She’s older, weighed down by layers of clothing taken from the Tommy Bahamas, but she wears no shoes as she pads silently wherever she goes.

A select few who have the ability to see what others can’t will notice there’s something in her skull, a long sharp sliver of something that glows with a sickly deadlight, an oily shimmering sheen that flickers. Looking at it directly for too long causes an awful headache to form right behind the eyes. She sometimes swats at it, though her hands always go through it.

Occasionally, she’ll stay in one place and not scurry off when others come near. This is mostly at the buffet or bar, where she’ll guard her food or the bottle of vodka she’s drinking from. Occasionally, she has a book in front of her instead - the book Siffleur almost always seems to be writing in. The page she’s on is blank and nothing appears, no matter how much she glares at it.

Anyone who does approach her will get a wary look if they’re a stranger, or a more nervous look if they’re someone who knows Siffleur - and who knows her. She’s older than those who met her in dreams will remember her being, but her voice will be much the same as she tries to fend off the inevitable questions with a- “I don’t know how I got here.”

3. I survived. I speak, I breathe, I'm incomplete (Sports Deck - Open)

Despite how apprehensive she is, despite how much she shrinks in on herself, that’s not her only mood.

As those unfortunate souls who come up to the sports deck will find, emotional regulation is not something she’s capable of. In fact, some poor soul’s first introduction is likely to be of the woman muttering furiously to herself while drawing intricate ritual circles on the deck with sharpies taken from Sundries, her irritation quickly and violently boiling over into screaming, full-body tantrums. She howls and thrashes, slamming her hands and face against the deck, contorting her body and clawing at herself until she draws blood, until she exhausts herself enough that she has no choice but to be calm as she lies on the deck, panting while her wounds slowly heal.

And when she’s calm enough, she starts over, trying desperately to finish a SOS call that can go nowhere.

4. Does anyone ever get this right? (Wildcard - any prompts welcome, DM me if you have any questions)

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Daisy's own yellow eyes flick towards the places the woman's fingers gouge at flesh and her own digits flex in a subconscious echo. That's a trick she knows well. The number of times she's carved so deep into herself as to nearly hit bone, just to cut through a panic attack or feel a little more real...

"Yeah, uh— he sort of. Split open? Turned— inside out. And then here you were. Gnarly stuff, which is saying something coming from me." She frowns. "You were in his— head. Alright." That's new to her, but why the fuck not. "So is he— is he in yours now?"

"Fuck." She mutters again, pressing her palms against her eyes now that she's not afraid of Daisy anymore. "Oh fuck, he- fuck fuck fuck. But I didn't- I didn't want this, I wasn't- but he-"

Daisy's got a more pressing point for her to focus on over 'who's responsible for this', and that's contacting Siffleur. She yanks her hands away. "He might be, he- t-that makes the... the most sense. It's... fuck, we changed places, we changed places-"

"I need to find the b-book." She goes to stand, but as the pile of clothes shifts off of her, she realizes again how naked and vulnerable she is. The woman quickly crouches back down, then turns with a desperation to the spare shelf - the one that Siffleur always put something on. There's a dress there, and she grabs it and yanks it on.

It's like a tent on her body, and she has to cross the shoulder straps over her head just to get it to stay up - and not slip off her shoulders. And then, just as she feels determination, she feels that flood of terror take her again and she hunches down in a squat and shivers.

Yeah, Daisy kinda knows that switch flip too.

"Gonna guess this book's back in his den in the store? No one'll be out there messing with it at least. People know better. We can go grab it in a minute."

Simple and direct. She doesn't understand the mechanics of what's going on here with Siffleur and his mom, but what she does know are the ways she hated people handling her when she was all shaken up. There's nothing worse than being treated like some fragile broken thing.

"Need any more layers and you can take some of my clothes. The jackets should work."

The moment Daisy says 'we', the relief just flows through her. She nods, and manages to pull herself upright again. Even as her heart beats frantically in her chest, even as she feels the urge to turn into something that's all sharp teeth and claws, she manages to pick from the clothes on the ground, layering herself with two more jackets. It helps, and she nods to Daisy, letting out a shuddering breath.

"Y-yes, okay. Okay, let's go. It's... it's under the cash registers." The safest place. No one looks underneath the Tommy Bahama's check-out tills, and they never really change. Her hand twist in the outer-most jacket and she makes herself walk to the door and open it. And quietly, she whispers a "Thank you" to Daisy, not able to look at her as she steps through the threshold into a place she's only ever walked in memories.

Daisy pushes up from crouching to follow after her, catching the door as she steps out and shutting it behind them.

"Smart," she says, as it clicks shut. She's still in her tank and shorts from sleeping, but she never really has cared about that. It's hardly all that different from what she wears for the weather around here, anyway. "So the book's— how you communicate? Something like that?"

For a moment, she swings her head back and forth, looking for any sign of other people around. But... it's just her and Daisy. She she nods, and starts to lead the way. "Yes. It's... spirit writing. He p-puts his hand to the paper and I can guide it b-by writing in his mind. I usually go to a restaurant w-we used to go to, and I'll- I'll write that way. Easier to talk. I can... I t-take my time, and I can be... coherent."

Her hands pull the jacket tight around her, and she huffs softly. "A-and when he gets tired of me n-nagging about the ship's p-power reserves, he can shut the book."

No body sharing or body hopping incidence she's ever heard of maps to this. It stands apart from anything Daisy's heard of happening in her twenty-plus years of supernatural experiences, but then of course so did many of those things she has seen, the first time around.

"Handy when you're living in someone's head, I suppose." She keeps pace, ears pricked to pay attention to their surroundings as they always are. "Sounds like you're more worried about the power than some other passengers."

Herself, admittedly, included. She's put no consideration into the power situation. Either it gets sorted, or it doesn't, and though she's clawed her way up from passive suicidality to a passive desire to live, passive is still the operative words.

She lets out an exasperated huff, glancing back at Daisy with some relief that someone here has actually noticed and paid attention. "It's b-bad enough with Siffleur but I... expect it f-from him. He's always b-been avoidant - my fault. W-way he sees it, either it'll be fixed by other p-people, or it won't. I... did what I c-could. Made him speak with F-friday, gave her my notes... which she probably threw away instantly. The Captain's c-checked out, and who knows w-what she thinks. We could fix this, we c-could fuel..."

A loud sigh and she trembles slightly for a long moment, putting one hand on the wall of the ship to take a breath. "Doesn't m-matter. I'm not- I'm not a passenger, like the rest of y-you. I did w-what I could, now I just... I need to g-get back."

And get back quickly. Every moment she's out here is terrifying. And though Daisy's presence is helping a lot, she can't glue herself to Daisy's side. Maybe most importantly, this isn't her body. She doesn't have a body like this anymore. It feels ugly to have so much blood and flesh again, after finally being free of it...

"Mm. Said to Siffleur once that in my day, we'd already have the ship back to full power. But we were all bitter bastards. Wouldn't be for any worthwhile reason."

Everything would have just gotten worse, she's sure of that. And that's not even going back over the reality that they would never have made the choice that caused this at all.

"Anyway, even if you're not a passenger the normal way, you've got your son to worry about. So. Makes sense to me," she continues with a shrug. "If you manage to talk to him. You think that'll help? Getting back, I mean."

She laughs softly, bitterly. "H-hah, your group would have, and I would h-have fit in with them there. I was awful in my y-youth, terrible and ever so creative. Even now, that- that awful bit is in me, always, t-thinking about how much power I could m-make with a potato peeler and s-someone delicate."

Her hands twist in Daisy's jackets and she bites her lower lip. "I... I don't know. But it- it has to. If I c-can talk to him, we can figure it out. F-figure out why I'm- why I'm here and he's not. It doesn't m-make sense, I don't- I don't want to be here!"

The rush of energy stops her dead in her track and her hands keep tightening into fists. She breathes in deep and pushes the worst of it away. She has to keep it together. Just for a little while.

Daisy stalls a few steps ahead of her, turning part-way back to keep her in her eyeline without facing her head-on. Waits, idly rocking back on her heels.

"I never stop hearing the blood." Casually as anything, it's said. Frank and simple. "Might get better at ignoring it, but it never goes away. Got this list in my head of just about everyone. Ranked. Easy prey to satisfying challenges. Some of the people I love most are on the easy end."

Giving into it would be as easy as breathing. Every day she has to make the same choice again, the choice to listen to the quiet instead of the blood. The violent monster exists alongside the traumatised victim, intertwined messily but loosely enough, these days, that she can make that choice.

Daisy sighs.

"One thing at a time, I guess."

A terrible giggle seizes her and she nods, vigorously, violently. But she doesn't tear at herself. She doesn't throw her body on the floor. Nor does she throw herself at Daisy in a flood of flesh and limbs. Because Daisy is right - they always feel the way they do. They always feel it.

But you take it one thing at a time.

She shakes off the worst of the feeling, then starts to move again, grateful that Daisy waited so casually. "One t-thing at a time. That's... that's life. That's life..."

Then, after a long quiet moment, she adds- "Thank g-god there's booze here. I d-don't do well dry. And if h-he's... if he's s-slow to figure out his w-way back, then I... I c-can hold it together, until he does."

"Mm, that's easy enough at least. Watch out for the non-alcoholic versions of stuff. Not sure how well Johnny keeps those separate."

Probably pretty well, it's Johnny, but even so. Daisy doesn't tend to pay much attention to how he organises things, with how little she actually drinks the alcoholic stuff.

"It's funny. Didn't ever even think about how there must be more going on in your world than just werecougars. There's never just one weird thing. There's always more. But I just..." she shrugs. "Might be too used to just. Going with it."

Another of those terrible giggles, the spectre of mania lingering in it. "O-oh that's- that's the j-joke of it all, the punchline. There are no werecougars. J-just me and h-him, and now- now only him. It was- it was e-easier to explain it that way, w-when he was young. I had- I h-had to be sure he could hold the s-shape in his mind. That's the k-key. Two firm shapes. I-if you have them to move between, you'll s-survive. But if there's j-just you, j-just... human?"

Her hands ball up and explode outwards. "Meat. You b-become nothing b-but meat. Churning and bloody. I s-saw many, many people g-go that way. That was m-my fate. B-but. I was smarter."

She tucks her hands back into the borrowed jacket. "You and him, y-you're survivors because you g-go with it, all of it. You k-know better than to be nosy like me. That's- that's vital. I didn't... I didn't learn. Until it was too late."

"...huh." Like that, it suddenly feels so much more familiar to Daisy than just the idea of a world of were-creatures. The call and threat of Flesh. The danger of Looking into something you shouldn't have. "Sounds like a friend of mine. Couldn't leave well enough alone. Wasn't in his nature. Lost his humanity to it."

Jonathan Sims and the perennial case of too nosy for your own good. Not sure she could say he got smarter about it, mind you. He did go and start the apocalypse.

"Then again," she snorts, "so did I. Doesn't always save you. Not getting too nosy. Suppose nothing's foolproof."

She sighs and nods. "Nothing's f-foolproof... we do our best. Especially w-with what we've got."

The Tommy Bahamas feels strange to see. It takes her a moment to realize why - because she's in her shape, not seeing it from Siffleur's point of view, which is only very high up, or very low.

It's hard to keep walking steadily and so her brisk walk becomes a jog as she reaches the till, drags out the book and pen, and quickly slaps it open to a page. She touches her pen to it, waiting for some motion...

The pen is still. It doesn't move in the slightest. Still... Still. She screws her face up but makes herself stay calm - calm as she can anyway. "I-it... it m-might take time..."

Daisy doesn't match her pace fully, as she jogs off, but she's not far behind regardless. She comes up on the other side of the till as the pen fails to move, and leans against the edge on her palms.

"Probably will. It's not been that long and this is new. You're getting used to being out here. He might have to get used to being in there."

It's definitely not reassuring that nothing's happening, but this is all fresh and weird. It being that easy would've been nice, but it's never that easy.

"Y-yes. I... I w-was asleep in h-his mind, until Valdis w-woke me up. It... it m-might take a few h-hours or... or days." She doesn't like to think about 'days'. Doesn't like to think about how she slept for months in his mind...

But Daisy's been good to her, very kind, and she... she knows Jack is here somewhere. "I'll... I'll f-find Jack. He... he might help too. I had n-no one but Siffleur here. And he's- he's got many people."

"Yeah, he's got friends around." A lot more friends than you'd expect a cannibal to have, honestly, but this boat is strange like that. She's still surprised so many people tolerate her. "Well. You know where to find me, yeah? Until this gets sorted."

She's not actually a hard woman to find, so long as she doesn't mind you finding her.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I want God to come and take me home [OPEN]

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject