come_sailaway | i'm running low on serotonin ( july catchall, ota )

Who: clarke griffin + you
When: all of july
Where: throughout the ship
Summary: fitness, reading trashy fiction, unfortunate lies & even less fortunate truths, murderboarding, angst, sigil shenanigans, and more!
Warnings: blood probably. perpetual cw: the 100. will update as necessary

i. early to mid-month out and abouts ( all over )

( this is to be the month of self growth. sure, clarke still inevitably hunches her shoulders to brace against whatever new curve ball may be thrown their way. she half expects the rain to turn from water to acid at a moments notice, or this to be the lead up to another monstrous storm sent their way from a god less reasonable than pirate jenny. she is constantly, perpetually waiting for all the food onboard the ship to disappear, or else the faucets to stop working. if the air circulating throughout the ship suddenly turned noxious and they all fell to their knees choking on their own blood, she wouldn't really be surprised. and if someone snapped and went on a killing rampage, well. that'd actually make the most sense, being most in line with the captain's insistence he needn't do much to worsen their circumstances — they'd inevitably do it for him.

but she can't just sit still in the bowels of her cabin, occasionally chat with ruby, and just wait. so, begrudgingly — because this feels a lot like accepting that this is her life now — she sets about a routine. all for the benefit of the fight, but still seemingly banal. from july 1st - 14th, you can find clarke a number of places.

up on the sports deck, running laps to the point of exhaustion in the pouring rain. also in any given stairwell, bolting between levels of the ship (and potentially eating shit on a descent, gravity and momentum don't mix well). otherwise, in the gym absolutely failing at pull-ups, but stubbornly reaching up to grasp the bar again and again and again until her hands blister. likewise, if you're anywhere around publicly practicing martial arts, hand to hand, or close quarter weapon combat, congrats, you've got an audience now. clarke will stop virtually whatever she's doing to very obviously stare for a few moments — curiosity mixing with some sort of envy, but then folding back in on itself to become dread. that was a skill she'd never learned, always relying on environmental factors to get a leg up, or guns. and the more time they spend on this ship, the more people who show up, the more trials they're put through, the more it feels like at some point she will have to learn.

at the same time but on the opposite end of fitness, catch her reading a bunch. self prescribed homework after they've caught on to the captain's unoriginality and reliance on old world books and movies. she'll be spending a lot of time in the library, tucked away at a table with a whole stack of random fiction genres in front of her, one book splayed open with her right hand in the crease, and a stack of paper and pens at her left hand to take notes on. most notably she's probably reading some science fiction, high fantasy, or a classic like an off-brand version of the box car children.

the library surroundings get a bit suffocating after a while, so she may curl up on a couch in the lobby to read the rough equivalent of flowers for algernon, or else laying on her belly across the stage of bellona theatre to deadeye at the disjointedly written, all too real apocalyptic horror of the road. and of course, no meal is complete without a cup of orange juice and flowers in the attic.

there really aren't words to describe how much she hates this portion of the research.

more towards the middle of the month, there may be an occasional sketch break — phone open to sneakily taken pictures, and painfully recreating the sigils she'd broken into ebalon's room to rifle through. this is more a secretive indulgence, clarke most likely posts up in tauva or else some back corner of playback thinking no one she knows incredibly well will come looking for her there. if stumbled upon, she's quick to slip the notebook closed. no poker for her, she's underaged, but this poker face though... at least n=in this venture she's probably so invested she's forgotten to eat or drink for two or more hours, and can lie of her own accord. )

ii. early to mid-month curse shenanigans ( wherever you want )

( there's a distinct lack of bloodshed and no sign up sheet for another expedition, but it's still apparent from pretty early on that something's wrong. it literally took one conversation where she'd let wanheda slip through her teeth to someone she'd really rather not have mentioned it to yet for clarke to try to guard her tongue. not that it does any good, she's not figured out the connection to water and, yanno, humans sorta need water to survive. sometimes in the depths of study, she might have forgotten to eat or drink for a while and thus speaks unimpeded, but working out in the rain is still a daily occurrence. freely accessible clean ("clean") drinking water along with the varieties of tea, soda, and juice the ship has to offer has been one of the few things clarke's enjoyed taking advantage of after coming from a resource bleak world. and showers — oh god, she's come to love showers — are novel and thoroughly enjoyed. so let's open up the lines to chaos and some unwilling truths or ridiculous lies falling from her lips before she ever realizes.

some ice breaker truth options:

a. you may ask "hey clarke, how you doing?" and be answered in turn with blunt honesty —) Awfully, actually.

( b. or cheerily greet her with "what's new?" ) I really miss my mom.

( or c. "hey, you doing okay?" ) No, I could really use a hug.

( and for d., lies — specify and hit up this prompt to get a specifically tailored fabrication. )

iii. mid- to late month ( mostly cabin 108, maybe skulking about )

( and as brute honesty usually does, it gets to be too much. overwhelming, leaving her feeling too vulnerable in the face of too many unknowns. going into each new conversation feels like rolling the dice as to if she's going to ruin a relationship without a filter to gentle her thoughts, or else a game of poker where each hand lost could lead to someone she'd really rather not knowing her weaknesses.

...the lies don't bother her nearly as much. they're just inconvenient, and occasionally embarrassing.

so for a few days between july 15th and 19th, she sequesters herself in her own room. maybe occasionally harassed by someone who cares to come check on her, usually trying to communicate in person with hand gestures and silent shakes of the head, but that tactic is eventually ruined with word vomit no matter how hard she tries. so there's a lot of social hedging here, a little clarke griffin leave of absence except for when she emerges to gather food, or occasionally run the circumference of the sports deck around four am.

but solitude isn't necessarily a bad thing. it's here that she makes the connection between water exposure and the curse enacting. can parse out that it's a coin flip if one was forced to give whole truths or compelled to lie regardless of how small the lie would be. and it's here that she wonders if it could be... weaponized. )

iv. late to end of month ( all over again )

( and thus the game becomes to avoid water while also confirming her hypothesis and testing the boundaries of this curse.

so, end of the month you'll find a rather rumpled, un-showered clarke griffin prowling around the ship again, spray bottle in hand and ready to piss a few people off in the name of answers. she had just been saying how convenient it would be to know everything about a person, the same way friday gets snippets and the captain seemingly knows all when he cares to remember. and, well. here's the chance, right? people are about to get misted in the face with tap water for the greater good.

it's a simple set up. anyone, regardless of if she knows them already or not, will get approached and asked — ) Hey, what's your name?

( and after receiving an answer, surprise squirt squirt to the face. congradulations, you're wet now and again being asked — ) What's your name? ( — so she can gauge if you're telling the truth or a lie. (this isn't an infallible plan; someone could lie the first time, get hit with the truth portion and give a completely different answer the second time, and she'd probably write them off as being cursed to lie. but the kinks can't be worked out in one day. it's still at least a start.)

liars are dismissed, usually without apology.

but those detected to be truthers... again, there's choose your own adventure style options.

a. ) What are you?

( b. ) What have you lived through?

( c. ) How many people have you killed?

( d. ) If you were told to kill people here, would you do it?

( near the end of the month, and i mean like the VERY end of the month, july 29th and onward, she'll figure out showering is still an option provided you wait an hour after. usually does it right before going to sleep so like, if you throw pudding at her, she's rocking that shit in her hair until the next day but is at least mostly clean.

but it's just more of the above, only this time she looks a little less a mess. she has new questions, though. )

( e. ) What's more important to you, immortality or morality?

( f. ) Have you ever been to war?

( g. ) What's the worst thing you've ever done?

v. i wildcard

( y'all know me, easy peasy lemon squeezy. hit me with something not listed here, tweak my starters a bit to suit your needs, or hit me up at inb4circlejerk to plot or ask questions. combine i & ii prompts at will. this post will also be used throughout the month to start closed threads, but all these prompts above are ota. )

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ Mizuki has also learned about this curse fairly early on — turns out crying on your boyfriend counts for the curse, and, uh, it's really weird to hear him say "I hate you" all of a sudden, but, like, he's fine. It was funny, actually, and made him laugh, at least? Mizuki is an Aegir, though, so he's sort of resigned himself to the fact that he has to put up with this curse. If he's outside of water for more than six hours, his skin starts to dry up and become sore and he gets terrible rashes. Anything more than ten hours without water, and…

Well, he'd probably have to be hospitalized, and he doesn't want to worry about anything like that. He's a pretty honest person, anyway, so he's not concerned. And if he's lying? Well, that could also be silly. It's like playing opposite day with your friends, which, sure, might get annoying, but it's better than literally dying, so here we are! When Mizuki finds Clarke around the ship, he's probably not even bothered wiping away the chlorinated water from himself, simply excited to have her company, but she seems a little off. And not just because of water crimes, he hopes?

Her reply to his question gets a slow, dumbfounded blink… two… maybe three before he finally settles his umbrella to hang against his wrist so he has his hands free enough to step forward and wrap his arms around her. Hugs are something he can absolutely provide. He just hopes it'll be good enough for whatever is bothering her. ]

( is it really all that better than dying? ...yes, obviously, but that doesn't change the fact that sometimes spilling your guts unintentionally evokes a strong sense of mortification and vulnerability that makes one wish they could just crawl under a rock and die. and the lies — which clarke hasn't had the... fortune? misfortune of being cursed with? — threw wrenches in otherwise important attempts to extract information from others, which in turn just added to the levels of confusion and frustration already swirling through the general population here.

this is one of the rare manifestations of the curse where she's acutely aware of the fact the words coming out of her mouth are not what had been intended. it's still a bit of a shock, and while mizuki is blinking at her in a slow sort of confusion, clarke's dropped her head and attempted to silently mouth the words i'm fine. she can feel the pull of her lips in opposite directions, and the way they continue moving past two simple words. so instead she tries — )

It's fine. ( hoping the more vague phrasing would work around, and it seems to work but.

mizuki's already going in for a hug, wordless and intent in the way both arms go around her torso and squeeze. two beasts are at war within clarke griffin in that moment: the one that will continue to insist she's fine until the day she dies for real, and the one that acknowledges that's absolutely the whole and entire truth, she needed a hug. some odd sort of craving for positive physical touch, the reminder that not everything on this ship needed to hurt, actual human (to aegir) connection, and just... a moment's peace. a few seconds, before whatever else was coming for them caught up.

she hesitates, unsure of what to do with her hands. this isn't rocket science, but sometimes it's still hard. there's social-emotional hurdles to be vaulted still, her voice is just ten steps ahead. but ultimately clarke will put her arms around his shoulders, and a seconds hesitation more, press her cheek into his hair just above the ear. )

i'm running low on serotonin ( july catchall, ota )

IIc

up to u when in the month this is asdfghjk