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!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Of course her roommate would feel just as odd as everyone else on this damned ship. She hates it here and she's only been on board a few days. Someday she'll give the captain a piece of her mind, though she's sure he doesn't care. It might make her feel better at least.

"I didn't, did I," she replies, considering her options.

She's going to have to sleep at some point, she hasn't since arriving and that's really not good for anyone's health. Human basics are unfortunately necessary when you can't consume soul energy like a normal Hellhound. She's lived like that for years now, but somehow it's more annoying here.

"I suppose I'm your roommate," Valdis says after a moment of silence, "My name is Valdis."

“Ah! Very pleased to meet you, then.” Palamedes smiles, but there’s a hardness that lingers around his eyes. Valdis wouldn’t strike him as particularly trustworthy under the best of circumstances, and coming off a mont where no one was what they seemed, he has even fewer reasons to let his guard down than he would otherwise.

He puts his hands in his pockets and rocks back on his heels. “And in that case, since we are going to be roommates, after all…what are you Valdis? Because you’re either a walking corpse or something other than human, and if it’s the former, then you are in awfully good shape.”

He's not pleased, if anything, he's wary of her. At least someone is. So far everyone has been far too trusting, if she still lacked a soul, she'd probably be taking advantage of that. Not too late to start. Palamedes jumps straight to the point however, and she can respect people who are direct.

"It embraces you, so I suppose I can't be surprised that you can sense it."

Death.

"Reaper. Grim. Bargest. Black Shuck. Hellhound." She lists off the various names. "Some might call me an Angel of Death, and perhaps I once was. Michael does seem to insist on that."

She smiles.

"And since we're not playing around, what are you?"

Those are a lot of words that don't necessarily mean anything to Palamedes, at least not immediately. She could be a kind of necromancer, she could be something closer to the Emperor, who is sometimes called the Kindly Prince of Death. Or, as is the case with so many of the beings on the Serena Eterna, she might have no parallel in his own universe at all.

"Reaper," he says, talking half to himself. "One who harvests grain, usually wheat, a task traditionally done with a scythe. You're either an assassin or some sort of being who plays a role in the act of death itself. Severing the soul from the body, perhaps?"

He blinks, belatedly realizing that she asked a question of her own. "Oh, I'm just a necromancer. Genetic predisposition gives me the aptitude to manipulate thanergy and thalergy, or death energy and life energy." A wry smile. "Frankly, I don't know how I feel about the idea that death is embracing me, but that's probably what you're picking up on."

Considering his slow reaction, Palamedes must not have the same legends in his world as in her own. Not completely surprising.

"I'm not an assassin, that would imply that I'm human and I am not." She's been an assassin, but it's still an insulting insinuation.

His answer though, she knows this term. If his abilities match those of the stories in her world? Well, the Captain must have a sense of humor to put an Angel of Death in the same room as a necromancer.

"Interesting. So you raise the undead? Without souls I can't imagine they'd be much better than mindless puppets. What purpose does that serve in your world?"

If her interpretation is correct of what he is, she could be wrong as their worlds are very clearly different.

“Well, pardon me,” Palamedes says under his breath when the woman clearly takes umbrage. Then he sighs. Every time, people misunderstand what he means by necromancy. Where do these stories in other universes even come from?

“Not exactly. Well, I have the ability to reanimate dead bodies, though skeletons are much more useful than full corpses. Flesh gets…mucky. As I’m sure you know, being the Angel of Death and all.” Honestly, that’s a hell of a title, not that anyone in the Nine Houses should go around making fun of other people’s titles, given some of the weird ones they’ve come up with. “But servitor skeletons are quite useful, actually. Perfect for conducting routine station maintenance in the vacuum of space, for example. Children of the Sixth House love watching them on the Library’s viewscreens. It’s very entertaining.”

(Spoiler alert: it isn’t actually that entertaining, except when the cords attaching the servitors to the station get tangled or, better yet, when one breaks and they go floating out into the blackness.)

“But as it happens, my abilities are a bit more expansive than that.”

Edited 2022-11-07 02:44 (UTC)

Valdis isn't quite sure there's a major difference between what she said and his counter explanation. Though, she will admit his is a little more detailed and less...sarcastic.

"I wouldn't really know about that aspect of death." If she knew he thought it a title, she'd give him her actual title, it's far more wordy. No, Angel of Death is essentially a species of Angel, and besides they ferry souls to Heaven or Hell and serve Creation. Valdis serves no one.

"My kind are more on the ...soulfullness side of death. Souls and soul energy. The physical body is rather useless to us once it's empty. There's a religious aspect too I suppose..."

She eyes him, "I should hope you can do more than that. The way the aura around you feels, it would be a shame if it was simply puppeteering."

“I’m inclined to agree when it comes to matters of the body,” Palamedes concedes. “Though flesh magic has fascinating medical application, my training has largely focused on the soul as well. It appears we have something in common after all.” He flashes a wry kind of smile, but doesn’t offer much more in the way of further explanation of his skills. Something tells him that it would be useful to hold some things back from the mysterious and powerful Valdis.

“Have you seen the room yet? I can show you, if you like.”

Valdis arches a brow as he fails to elaborate, but makes no mention of it. He's entitled to his secrets just as she is to hers. She doesn't even know all of hers, but she's allowed to have them and share as she sees fit.

"I have notably been avoiding it...and you."

She's not afraid to say it.

"But I suppose I must sleep at some point, so please, lead the way."

Palamedes should probably be insulted, but all he does is smile faintly. “Noted. Well, far be it for me to stop you from finding other accommodations, but if you are looking for a guaranteed comfortable bed, then follow me.”

And with that he turns on his heels. If she follows, she follows. If she doesn’t, that’s her affair.

Not easy to rattle apparently. Her eyes narrow as he turns away. Clearly he's not threatened if he's showing her his back. Bold. Yet, she's really not a threat, or she's trying not to be. A quick eyeroll before she relaxes and follows after him.

"It had better be soft and warm, I've had a murderous headache since arriving."

“I don’t think you will be disappointed. And if they bed doesn’t help, the sundries shop carries a number of minor analgesics.”

Call it confidence or arrogance; the truth is that while Valdis might be the angel of death, she is far from being the most frightening thing on the ship. Besides, they’re going to be sharing a room; if she wants to murder him, she is going to have plenty more opportunities for doing so.

During October’s ghost invasion, Palamedes had painted a ward on the door to Cabin 105 to keep out the angry revenants, but it had been cleaned away at the beginning of the month. He lightly touches the doorframe as he reaches the door, considering the possibility of a more permanent solution. The ghosts might be gone for now, but Pal isn’t letting his guard down.

Inside, the cabin is cleanly divided between controlled chaos on one side and perfect cleanliness on the other. Pal has been without a roommate for a few weeks now, but he has continued to politely keep his messes to himself. His bed is made, but the pile of books on his side table is decidedly unruly; more dramatic still is the murderboard-style collection of post-it notes covering almost every inch of the wall above his bed, charting out every discovery, dead-end, and strange happening aboard the Serena Eterna since he arrived.

“Here we are. Home sweet home.”

Valdis almost snorts at the suggestion of analgesics. Headaches caused by supernatural means don't necessarily react to such things, but it's not an unusual suggestion. She notes his touch on the door, a thoughtful moment that passes quickly enough without a known reason.

The inside of the room is nearly a disaster with an oddly clear line between her side and his. Clearly the studious type based on the books and the map above his bed. Some sort of scholar perhaps? Palamedes doesn't seem like the paranoid or conspiracy theory type, so scholar perhaps made sense.

She breathes in, scenting him, and another. Someone she hasn't met yet but has clearly spent time in this room. She'll remember that scent for later.

"Cozy."

She's not excited to have a roommate, but she walks over to her side of the room, checking it, scenting it. The small closet has copies of what she is wear already inside, which is odd, she supposes she'll need to go find something else if she doesn't want to wear the same things every day. She unhooks the sword from her belt, places it on the bed and pulls off her leather vest.

"I have one rule for now," she says finishing her evaluation, "Don't touch the sword if I happen to leave it in here. I don't know what it will do to you, so just don't touch it."

She assumes the other usual roommate rules don't need to be said out loud.

The sword is pretty impressive. Cam or Gideon would be able to say something intelligent about it, but all Pal can tell is that it’s probably very good for stabbing and slicing people. And honestly, that’s all he needs to know.

“I wouldn’t dare touch someone’s sword without permission,” Palamedes says with a perfectly straight face. “Or anything else that’s yours, for that matter. I’ve had two roommates on the ship so far, and while, sadly, you cannot ask them for references, I like to think they would vouch for me.”

A couple of post-it notes have fallen to the ground, as they sometimes do, and he goes to collect them and return them to where they belong. “In the interest of full disclosure, I have a friend who has been spending a lot of time here whilst I was the room's only occupant,” he says, and let’s not think about the way he oh-so-briefly pauses before saying friend, “but I shall let her know that circumstances have changed and we will endeavor not to disturb you.”

Valdis snorts at his comment and picks up the badge on the bedside table, holding it carefully in her hands, not paying him much attention as he returns the notes to their place. Names and faces of people she would never see again, and really shouldn't care about quickly shoved back into the darkness.

"Just a 'friend'?" Distracted as she is, she still caught that pause and she's still half-heartedly thinking of how to get under his skin. "You're a scholar in addition to animating skeletons based on your books and that impressive map over there...Or at least you don't seem insane enough for the alternative."

“Thank you, I think,” Palamedes says in response to her comment about his sanity or lack thereof, charging right past the question of his relationship with Clarke without so much as a blink. “You are correct, though. Before I showed up here, I was Master Warden of the Library, which is a fancy way of saying I was a scholar with the somewhat ridiculous duty of telling other scholars what to do.”

He waves at his notes. “And as you can see, old habits die hard. We knew so little about the Serena Eterna when the first of us arrived for this particular journey, so gathering information was imperative—I would say it still is. Thankfully, that’s something I’m rather good at.”

"Master Warden? Sounds important."

She glances back at him, dropping the badge onto the bed and grabbing a fresh vest out of the closet. She'll change the blouse later. Valdis zips up the vest, and turns to examine the board from a distance.

"We used similar boards back home. They are quite useful for solving mysteries and murders."

Not that murders really needed solving here.

“It is. I was the youngest person in Sixth House history to ever be given the title.” Palamedes doesn’t sound like he’s bragging, exactly—merely like he is stating facts.

Pal would be inclined to disagree with Valdis’ assessment that murders don’t need solving on the Serena Eterna, but since mind-reading is not within his powers, he merely lifts an eyebrow. “Oh? Who is ‘we’?”

A twinge of pain completely her own crosses through her eyes at his question. Guilt. Sadness. Longing. Things she shouldn't feel for humans, but it's probably impossible to not feel such emotions when she's only recently remembered what she is.

"I led a team back home. We investigated crimes and brought the perpetrators to justice. Or tried to. We had a decent record, but sometimes guilty parties still got their freedom."

Palamedes notices the flicker of emotion in her expression—he is rather good at noticing things, when he puts his mind to it—but he doesn’t comment. Hm. Interesting. “An angel of death who seeks justice. Fascinating. Were you an officer of the law?” he asks. “Or did you and your team work in a more… freelance capacity?”

He holds no particular judgement either way, but he suspects that the answer might tell him something about her character.

"Of the law? I suppose that is what you would call it. But really, I just wanted to use my abilities and get paid to do it."

Not entirely true. Looking back that's what she wanted it to be, but that doesn't mean that's what drove her at the time.

"We were in the midst of hunting a serial killer, but he got to us first. And now I'll never know what happened next."

She shook her head, all vulnerability vanishing despite the ache in the previous statement.

"They are just humans. I suppose I would have lost them eventually anyway."

“I think that’s what everyone wants to do, in one way or another. Do what they’re good at and get paid.” Palamedes sits on the edge of his bed, watching Valdis with an intense gaze and a polite smile. He still hasn’t figured her out, far from it, but he has a good idea that she doesn’t really believe that her dead friends were just humans. “And we humans all know that we will lose many people over the course of our lives, and that someday, if we’re lucky, we will leave someone behind to lose us.” He shrugs. “It doesn’t stop us from caring.”

She shrugs, "Yes, well, I hope they don't mourn too much and I hope they never catch up with him and get themselves killed. Humans are no match for demons."

There's no emotion left, just a matter of fact. She's not sure what he's thinking, his focus appears very contemplative, like she's perhaps another puzzle to solve. Everyone on this ship is complex, so she's sure he's found plenty of other interesting people to analyze.

"Any other questions you wish to ask?"

“Oh, I always have more questions,” Palamedes says brightly, completely missing any intended sarcasm. “But this isn’t meant to be an interrogation. I should be answering your questions, given you have only just arrived.”

She smiles. Completely clueless. Perhaps her roommate is too curious. Though, investigative minds always are.

"Ok, well, tell me a little more about yourself. I know you have a high rank amongst your people. You're a scholar. You can reanimate skeletons. Anything else I should know?"

I Was Looking for a Breath of Life

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