come_sailaway | I Was Looking for a Breath of Life

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I Was Looking for a Breath of Life

Who: Valdis and Open!
What: New Arrival tries to cope with being dropped into a new place after a massive bloodbath
When: November
Where: All over
Warnings: Headaches, grumpiness, will warn if it gets worse than that.

1) Arrival: Her head screamed at her, sharp pain cutting into her vision with every breath. Eyes closed tightly, Valdis does her best to breathe. The heavy death in the air, filled with lingering desperation and trauma tightened her chest. Of all the times to fall into a new world, it would be just after a massacre. With her head in her hands, her black hair hiding her face, she leaned against the railing of the walkway, trying to drown out the pain. This was definitely where it all happened. The pain was worse here.
"Haven't felt this bad since the last war," she muttered. "How many people died?"

2) Revelations: Valdis worked her way through the ship, avoiding her cabin as much as possible, seeking to memorize the layout of the ship and maximize her ability to move quickly should it be necessary. The Void is silent, a fact she should be grateful for, and in some ways, very much is. But now the silence is simply silence, and the feeling that the dead are around every corner sits in her gut. She can’t see them, except maybe flitting out of the corner of her eyes from time to time, but she can sense that they aren’t alone. Footsteps sounded from behind her, she’d been so focused on the dead that she hadn’t paid attention to the living. She turns around, hand on the hilt of the rather impressive sword hanging on her hip.

"Hello?"

3)Buffet: Without the ability to draw on the dead, Valdis must find something to soothe the very human feeling of hunger. She’d known the feeling from home, before her memories had begun to return, but now she found it highly annoying.

“What’s the best thing here?”

Second Week of November and Onwards

4) Library: Valdis has finally taken Erin's advice and found the black binder in the library. She is not thrilled with what she's reading and the tension is visible in her usually elegant jawline and the glowing red in her eyes. Fear isn't found anywhere in her demeanor or soul, but rather a thoughtful, yet tense, aura radiates from where she sits. She's so focused that almost anyone not touched by death could approach without her noticing. If they are touched by death, she may react poorly, so tread carefully.

5) Hurikane: She can't get drunk, but she sure is trying her best with pure vodka and whatever else she can find that's strong. She's not even really trying to taste it, just downing it as fast as the invisible bartender can deliver, and exhausting her healing abilities as she goes. It's still not enough to even give her a buzz though. Disappointing.

6)Wildcard round: Your turn!

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"Yes, he speaks highly of you."

Though looking at him, Pratt doesn't seem like much...in fact, she's almost convinced she could push him over with little resistance. His following words are far from reassuring regarding his 'catatonic' state, so she's withholding judgement on the threat level.

"Where did you serve?"

"Hope County, Montana." A pause before he continues, "That's gonna mean nothing if you're not from Earth. Pretty sure the past few people I've met have been from fucking space."

Which, admittedly, is extremely cool. But does make talking about where they're from really awkward.

"What about you? Who uh.. who are you?"

"Ah, Los Angeles, California. So I am indeed familiar with Montana," she replies, "Before all this...I was a detective for the LAPD."

Before Demons, Gods and Angels started messing with her life. Before this forsaken vessel's captain had kidnapped her.

"My name is Valdis."

"Oh fucking sick." He breathes a sigh of relief, being the only cop on the ship fucking sucks. He's not an authority figure, no matter what his uniform proclaims. "Good, awesome. I had to explain forests to someone once and I don't think my sanity has ever recovered. I'd say it's nice to meet you but uh, considering where we are... that's kinda a fucked thing to say."

His relief is almost tangible, but she has no intention of protecting and serving anyone but herself for the moment.

"I supposed I never thought about people not knowing what a forest is," she says, vaguely amused by the thought. "And yes, it's not an ideal place to find oneself."

For once, she considers her situation back home to be better than this place., despite the murderous archdemons and her pack.

"May I ask how you found yourself in such poor health?"

"Uh." He looks down at himself, "Well this is cuz I tried to kill a guy who was possessing my best friend."

He holds up his arm, a very prominent human bite wound that's only partially healed taking up a fair chunk of it. Pickles straight up tried to take him down a piece at a time.

"And I haven't slept or eaten much in the past month because it's been a fucking hellstorm. Though I never look healthy, I died after being tortured and starved for a few months so I'm just kinda... stuck looking like that."

Rubbing his thumb over the bridge of his nose, "This had just fucking healed too."

She pauses, trying to process that information in a manner that could be described as respectful instead of disgust. Humans were so terrible to each other that, not for the first time, she wonders why Creation prefers them.

"I'm sorry to hear that." She finally replies, "I didn't realize, not after the Demon King spoke so highly of you."

Is it rude to say that? Maybe, but he's kind of a mess.

"Hopefully you will heal up quickly.

"All good. Don't need to be sorry." He scratches the deep scar down the side of his jaw, "He thinks it made me stronger, probably cuz I told him the guy who tortured me said that. Which.. if that was actually the case I'd be a super powered killing machine instead of you know... me. I should be able to levitate and throw lightning bolts or something at this point."

He doesn't seem put out at all being told he's a disaster, he knows. "Thanks. I'll be fine I think. Just need some time ya know. Which we got tons of here, so it'll be all good. You uh.. already gotten the tour? Seen the buffet?"

She knows she doesn't need to be sorry, but he's so sad looking that part of her, the part that used to sleep, feels it would be kinder to put him out of his misery. But even that won't help from what she's learned. Is it cruel to think like that? She's not human, so human emotions shouldn't belong to her.

"I've seen a few things. Met Nobunaga at the Buffet. Met Erin near where that 'party' happened. Saw the theater, wandered a bit more. I've been avoiding my roommate as long as possible."

Still trying to get the lay of the land though.

"Who's your roommate? You didn't get stuck with like... Eridan did you? Though he might be better than mine who I think is probably a serial killer." He juts his jaw out thinking about that, because he has no room to talk.

"I dunno who Erin is. Or well I've probably met them and forgot." A shrug, "I do that. So sorry in advance if I see you in three hours and introduce myself again. But I've been here like six months so I've met most of 'em."

"No. Room 105." It had a weird aura coming from it, a feeling she didn't quite trust.

"I'm not sure who Eridan is, but I suspect everyone on the Serena Eterna has killed at least once." If not more. "Even before coming aboard. And from what I hear, well, the killing simply continues on the whim of the Captain."

Has she understood correctly?

"And don't worry about it, I'm sure you have many who come and go."

He tries to recall if he knows who's in 105, fails, and shakes his head, "Dunno. I'm at the other end in 141. One of my neighbors is a dog, so pretty much lucked out there."

And he means that literally.

"There's a difference between being a murderer or killing people and being a serial killer. Also pretty sure he's the pentagram of blood and candles sort of dude. Fucking weirdo." Considering all their conversations end in fights he legitimately has no idea if that guy is a killer, or even what his name is. They're real good at communication.

"I don't think the Captain gives a shit if we kill each other honestly. He needs emotions and you don't really feel emotions when you're dead. So like... probably better ways to get that. We only had the one deathmatch, before my time, and he didn't do it again. So I dunno."

A dog for a neighbor. She wonders if it's the Druid Nobunaga mentioned or something else. Probably a bit too nuanced for Pratt.

"Your roommate does sound frightening." Not really, but trying to be nice. "I haven't spoken with the captain yet. Is he generally easy to meet? Worth talking to? Or should I just do my best to ignore him?"

She still needs to go check out that book in the library that Erin mentioned/

"Frightening?" He furrows his brow at that. "Nah he's just a freaky weirdo. I've seen worse shit."

As for the Captain, "So I've talked to him a few times, and he's always been fine? He pretty much acts like he's just some guy, granted some guy that could probably vaporize us, but just a dude. But almost everyone else I've talked to who's talked to him said he was a complete fucking jackass. So I guess it depends on what you ask him? And I think it's worth it, me and Steven found out a bunch of shit from him directly like months before it became common knowledge."

He rolls his eyes and gives a little huff, "I tried to tell people but no one wanted to believe the crazy guy so.... Whatever. It's all in the library now."

Having recently been dealing with a serial killer who turned out to be demon, Valdis isn't so sure she's interested in meeting Pratt's roommate, even if he is 'just a weird guy', and Pratt's idea of 'weird shit' is essentially torture and death, so he's potentially not the best judge of things.

His information on the captain is of far more interest to her and she listens carefully. "What did he tell you that no one believed?"

She could go look it up in the libary. Perhaps it is in that book that Erin mentioned.

He sighs, looking up at the ceiling briefly, "Don't freak out on me when I tell you this shit okay? I've had a fucking terrible month and I don't wanna crush all these chips if you attack me and I fall on it."

Because of course his concern is the snacks and not himself. He also doesn't want to have to stab someone who just arrived on the ship if they come at him. He's very tired.

"You can't go home. We weren't taken from our worlds, we were copied so you're not even gone. You're still there doing your thing, while this version of you is an entirely new instance of yourself. Which means you can't go back, because you're already there and meeting yourself will blow up reality. Or well, not blow up reality it'll just be really bad, but that sounds way cooler. Also this version of you would vaporize." He is greatly paraphrasing the more scientific and emotionless explanation he'd gotten from the Captain and from the following information sharing meeting. "Unless you're dead, like me. I could probably go back since it's not like I can meet my corpse. But I'll probably give everyone who knows who I am a heart attack so... still not a good idea. And my buddy is stuck here since he's still alive there. Feel like I'm gonna end up on his gator ranch in Florida as the weird guy who lives in the shed and keeps the chickens to feed that gators. Well on my way to becoming Freddy instead of Jason so suck on that Pickles."

He seems quite concerned and almost sure she's going to blow things out of proportion, but she listens with a sort of detachment then blows out a breath when he finishes.

"Well, that is quite the reveal. I can see why people would be upset by it."

She's not exactly one of them.

"So....we just start a new life here? Figure out how to function and best serve our new god?"

She hates gods, but she's not exactly going to try to kill one, or be their friend. But there has to be some perks somewhere. At least no archdemon is chasing her here.

"Yeah it sucks for people who were holding out hope they could go home. People with kids and families and stuff. Steven and I are both dead back home so we sorta went: oh. And left it at that. Not like we wanna go back to being dead." The Captain hadn't been specific on if them going back would work or not, just that anyone who went to their own world where they still existed would vanish because they're a copy and there can't be two at once.

"Doesn't mean we have to get complacent, we can still try and figure out how to leave, you'd just have to go somewhere else. Like there's a whole ass multiverse out there. We can maybe pick a different reality and go there. Or if you like yours you just need one like three feet to the left, where you don't already exist. Pretty sure it's an infinite probability thing. Though we could maybe convince the captain to sail the boat into some brave new world that isn't a pocket dimension like this one."

"Oh, I have no intention of being complacent. I'm just gathering as much information as I can. One thing I don't understand is why? Why copy us and bring us here? How much control does he actually have?"

Someone powerful enough to create this place, and bring them here has to have a reason. Gods don't actually just do things only for kicks and giggles. She could be wrong though, there's always a first.

"Power source. We're like... batteries. Charge him up for whatever magic shit he does. And people keep saying he doesn't pick and choose, that he just pulls people out at random. I asked him if it's like loot boxes and he wouldn't answer so I think that means I'm right. He's hoping for that mythic pull." Pratt pauses because, maybe he already has it? Is that why they get camping and the diner when the crew with Pickles got endless murder islands?

He's gonna go peer at every passenger to try and figure out who it is. His bet is on Ava.

Valdis listens carefully. If he's pulling loot boxes, he likely has several 'mythic' pulls, but that depends on what powers he's drawing on.

"I see." He has a weird look on his face, like he's thinking very hard about what he just told her. "Well I can't say I like the idea of being a battery, but...what happens if someone runs out of energy?"

"They get sucked into the ship I guess. You know how the restaurants just bring you food? Beds get made? Invisible bartender makes you a drink? That's them. 'Cept I guess they don't even know they're doing it, they're kinda in some sort of uh... stasis? Like a void of being a person." He frowns because he knows he's doing a shit job of explaining it, but that's because he's also done a shit job of understanding it in the first place.

"Probably have to ask someone who had that happen to them. The times I died weren't like that."

A void of being a person. She wonders if it is anything like Oblivion, where the souls go when they are taken by the Void, to be broken down and consumed for energy. But...these ghosts are still around in some sentient form, so different if that is indeed the case.

"Are they capable of talking?" She asks, still not quite sure of all the details of what went down before she arrived.

"Not the ones that are back in the ship. But the people who got possessed basically got swapped with 'em for a month. So they know what it's like in there. Course that whole experience, you know... fucking sucked for them so I dunno if they'll want to talk about it. Maybe in a few months though... I dunno I'm the wrong person to figure out when trauma gets better."

Though admittedly he's gotten significantly better since being here, so maybe he does have some idea about it.

"But you'll deff wanna check out the library, I think that's where the skeleton is keeping the binder. UH.. skull uhm... dig something. Skelling... no wait... Skulduggery. That's the one. He's keeping all the info there."

Switched places, no wonder there is so much lingering pain and trauma in the air. Something like that doesn't fade overnight, it takes months, if not years. What's the point of all of it? The cursed god is putting them through this on purpose according to Pratt. Using them like batteries. So why the added suffering? What did he gain from that?

She's jolted out of her head when he mentions the binder that Erin had told her about. Skulduggery. What a strange name, no wonder Pratt had mistaken it for the word skeleton.

"I see, I'll have to go check it out. Hopefully it will answer more questions than it asks."

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