Die Another Day [Post-Death Open Post + some closed]

[be_seeing_you]

Who: Number 6 & YOU
What: Waking up from death after a sliiiight miscalculation
Where: Cabin 113 + Other places around the ship, just going about his day like nothing happened
When: The day after the beach party
Warnings: discussion and depictions of death, trauma, grief



That was unpleasant.

Pain is the last thing he remembers. Pain, and the distant sounds of screams. One of the voices may have been his. The black abyss they'd tipped into was akin to being swallowed whole in a nightmare. Fittingly, when you die in a nightmare you wake up. So too, does Number 6 awaken again at exactly 6:00 am the next morning, safe in bed. But not safe from the memory of the black and the way it scraped at his mind like a dull cheese grater.

He lies there a moment reorienting himself. Above him, the sight of his familiar cabin roof is both sickening and a comfort. He's alive. He's... unharmed? Why does that fact make him furious? He'd hoped, foolishly, that if he did meet death out there on the water it would be the kind that lasts. It would free him from the fate of being tied forever to the Eterna. No such luck. But if he's here then... Arthur! And young Steve! They must be just waking up as well.

There's no time to wallow in his failure. If he must continue to live here, then he may as well get on with it. He should go see how his fellows are doing. He thought he saw a group of people lingering on the beach after the last call went out. Were they planning their own escape, or was there something else going on? The only way to find out is to get out of here and go see for himself.

Number 6 can be found all around the ship, going about his day like he didn't just fall off the edge of the map like a chump. And, no, he really doesn't want to talk about it, thanks very much. (So definitely bring it up to him, wink.) He kicks off this brand new day with his usual routine of training on the sport's deck. Does he seem like he's hitting that punching bag just a little harder than is necessary?

After training and then a long shower, he'll go down to Sand Dollars to order himself a coffee (yes, you heard that right) and a cake. Today, apparently, he's making an exception about his no sugar rule. He'll stay there for an hour, reading a book with an aura radiating off him that threatens violence to anyone that approaches. (But when has anyone let that stop them?)

Full of caffeine and sugar, he'll spend the next part of the day pacing the decks and the promenade, feeling the need to just move and keep moving. During that time, he will realize with dismay that he knows neither Arthur nor Steve's cabin numbers, so he will either have to ask someone else or wait to find them on his own. Mostly, he's choosing the latter.

He finished the book Clara gave him this morning over his coffee, so once the pacing gets too tiring, he tries popping back into the library to find something else. All he ends up doing is staring at the titles without hardly reading them. He's not really in the mood.

Eventually, he will drag himself to the Windjammer for an evening meal. And sit alone. As one does when trying to avoid talking to anyone about their first death experience. He's got himself an entire plate of bangers and mash but he's mostly just pushing it around his plate. He just keeps seeing the black. Over and over. How is he going to sleep tonight? He supposes he will cross that bridge when he comes to it. Which won't be until well after midnight this time. He's got some more pacing on the deck to do first.

But he's fine. Really. He's fine. There's no need for anyone to talk to him about this. Ever.

Comments

[hellonspectacles]

"It's a blessing, then, that I don't know a damn thing about catching criminals," Palamedes says cheerfully. "I can usually figure the killer by page five, but it can be interesting to see how the characters will go about doing so."

Having attempted to be helpful, Pal goes back to rearranging the books. "Juno Zeta. The Library's head archivist. An absolute menace, God love her. Why, does the name mean something to you?" He doesn't think for a moment that Smith knows his Juno Zeta, but the name had clearly sparked something in him.

[be_seeing_you]

"Page five? That's bold." There's a tinge of disbelief that begs for Palamedes to prove it, but it's subtle.

"Not the name itself. The pattern. Every name you've told me so far has a numeric reading. Is that just a coincidence?"

[hellonspectacles]

Palamedes shrugs. "Once you have read a few of them, it's easy to spot the patterns. The 'who' is easy; it's the 'how' that makes things interesting."

"--Oh! Yes, I suppose that would be odd to most people." Very few of them have noticed what Smith has, though; Pal is rather pleased. "There are nine Houses where I come from, and surnames indicate House affiliation. As I'm sure you've guessed, I come from the Sixth House."

[be_seeing_you]

"You enjoy solving puzzles?" He's asking, though the answer seems obvious.

Well, he can rest a little easier knowing his observation wasn't only pure paranoia. "Houses as in family lines? Are you some manner of nobility?"

[hellonspectacles]

“I’m a scholar, Mr. Smith. Sometimes, I think solving puzzles is all I ever do.” But if that’s the case, he sounds cheerful enough about it. So yes: Palamedes very much likes puzzles.

He shakes his head. “Not family lines. Well, in the Sixth’s case, we’re all a bit familial, but that’s a different matter.” Pal smiles a bit at his own joke, but he doesn’t derail the conversation by stopping to explain the Sixth House’s problematic lack of genetic diversity. “Houses are political, social, and geographic entities: each one is stationed on a different planet in the Dominicus system and serves a different role in the Empire. I’m the leader of the Sixth—we call the person in such a position the House heir—though I’m not sure I’d call myself nobility. I just passed an exam.”

[be_seeing_you]

"Different planet?" That is the part that really shocks. He was expecting different continents, countries, not entire planets.

"You have to forgive me. In my time, sending a man to the moon was considered a monumental achievement." He still manages to be staggered by the differences in technology he often encounters in fellow passengers, even now.

"Perhaps nobility is not quite the right descriptor, but as a leader you must certainly be someone of higher status."

[hellonspectacles]

From time to time, Palamedes still forgets just how strange the idea of space travel is to many people on the ship. He waves his hand. “No need to apologize. We all come to the Serena Eterna with our own impossible-to-escape perspectives, don’t we? For me, the very idea of living on Earth sounds remarkable and strange.”

He inclines his head, conceding the point. “We’re meritocratic, but we’re also rather hierarchical, I admit. Telling scholars what to do can be a bit like herding cats, though. They don’t take direction well.”

[be_seeing_you]

He chuffs a laugh. The idea of a world controlled by scholars instead of politicians or royals sounds both charming and nightmarish.

"I suppose the upside may be that any decision made has had laborious research applied to it first?"

[hellonspectacles]

Oh, it is very charming and very nightmarish.

Palamedes smiles slyly. “Oh, indeed, though I don’t think I would always call it an upside. A few years ago, the Oversight Committee did a six month study on whether or not we should change our stationary.”

[be_seeing_you]

"Ah," he says with a smirk. "I had hoped you might have become more efficient with practice. Some things appear to be universal."

[hellonspectacles]

"If the history of the Sixth is anything to go by, I would say that we've only gotten better at paperwork," Palamedes says wryly. "But it's better than the alternative, isn't it? Difficult to keep secrets when there's a form for everything."

[be_seeing_you]

"You would like to think so," Number 6 says in a tone that clearly states he doesn't actually believe it. "Paper trails are only as good as the people leaving them."

[hellonspectacles]

“Fair enough,” says Palamedes, the brightness in his voice a cover for his real feelings. At Canaan House, he had lost his grip on so many things he had once believed to be true, including the basic infallibility of Sixth House records. When your society’s motto is truth over solace in lies, it takes a little time to absorb the fact that it was built on a foundation of falsehoods.

“But the alternative is worse.” That he really does still believe.

[be_seeing_you]

"Yes," he agrees with a sobering nod. "Yes, it is."

He has the good grace to look repentant. He ought to be more careful not to insult a fellow who is--correction: was-- leader of that very governing body he is blindly criticizing.

"Shall I let you return to your reshelving now?"