Week 6: May 6th - 10th

[cartesio]

Sixth Week

Killers and victims, killers and victims. Three of your own have fallen prey to murderous intent last week. Your numbers keep shrinking. Azura has fallen prey to Franciscus in the same night that Olympia betrayed her friend Millium and killed Cian who wound up in the crossfire. At this rate, is there anyone you can trust?

The townspeople's anger burns hotter than ever. Wherever they go, must they live in fear of stumbling on a corpse? They can't live like this. More than ever, the visitors are being shown that they are unwelcome.

Walking outdoors, cold looks are the norm. Shouted profanity isn't unexpected. Barely anybody is willing to still hold a conversation with any visitors.

Even within the motel, there is no feeling of safety any longer. Not only have two people died in this very place, no, now the townspeople also lost their fear of coming inside. While they don't enter private rooms, the daring among them vent their hatred of you by vandalizing the common rooms.

Cartesio has become a menacing place.

In the lobby of the motel there's a few more brochures, and the maps have been updated once again. Don't mind that some of them have been damaged in one of the attacks on the motel.

Links

IC Rules
Guestbook
Room Assignments
Events
Locations
NPCs
Activity Check

Sunday
Monday
Tuesday
Wednesday
Thursday

[Welcome to the sixth week! If you want to contact the Sergeant, please post here!. Also please remember to submit your activity check!]

Comments

[robitussin]

[Her hand closest to the door frame moves up to rest on the wood as she shakes her head, a little more forcefully than necessary.]

I don't need to relax. I'm fine, and I'm calm, okay?

[marmoron]

[This is a very familiar situation, and Keith can't say that he really knows how to navigate this any better. His eyebrow remains raised, but after a moment he breathes out.]

Well I'm not. So I'm going to sit.

[Which he does. He takes a seat on the edge of Katsuki's old bed.]

[robitussin]

[A moment passes, but now it feels strange just standing here, so she sighs and moves to take a spot next to him.]

Does sitting actually help at all?

[marmoron]

Not as much as pacing, but pacing tends to make other people antsy.

[Right elbow propped up on his knees, he leans forward and rests his chin on on his hand.]

Meditating isn't bad either.

[robitussin]

I'm used to people pacing. Have at it if you want.

[She gives a shrug, though.]

Can't say I've ever tried that. I didn't really have much time for it back home.

[marmoron]

Nope, I'm settled now.

[Not that it'd take a lot of effort to get up and start pacing.]

So what did you do with all your free time?

[robitussin]

[She pauses for a long moment, before:]

Right. Free time. That thing that most people are used to.

[marmoron]

[The only reason he isn't sassing back is because he's... actually kind of curious. Wasn't Natalie claiming to mostly be from some mundane life aside from a complicated family situation at home....]

So what are you used to then?

[robitussin]

What am I used to?

[She starts ticking it off on her fingers after a pause.]

Waking up at 6:30 so I can get to the bus by 7:15, starting classes at 8:00 or so, getting out of school around 2:30, leaving swim practice at 4:00, making it home between 4:30 and 5:00, eating dinner, starting piano practice at 6:00 if I’m lucky, then at 8:00, once I've done that and had a chance to shower, going through the several hours of homework that I have for each of my six classes.

[So, the American school system, basically.]

[marmoron]

[....Oooookay then.]

So you swim and play piano in your free time.

[Is what he's getting out of this. Could've just said that, Natalie....]

[robitussin]

[She shakes her head.]

That’s not free time, that’s stuff I do because it’ll look good on a college application.

[marmoron]

What so you hate swimming and piano?

[Fairly certain she does not, in fact, hate piano, but her tone here is throwing him off.]

[robitussin]

No, not at all, but like... You can really like your job, but that doesn’t mean it’s free time when you’re working. You know?

[marmoron]

Fair enough.

[The conversation's a weird one though. Keith's more or less the equivalent of a high school drop out and has had zero thoughts about shit like college applications. It's all so normal, but deeply unrelatable. Kinda worrying really for when the war is over.]

I liked swimming, too.

[robitussin]

[She tilts her head, before nodding.]

Right. I was going to ask why the past tense, but I guess there aren't a lot of pools in the middle of space.

[marmoron]

There was a pool on the castleship, but the pool was on the ceiling for some reason... so basically unusable.

[There's some faint amusement in his voice as he says it, but then...]

But the castleship's gone now so... yeah. No random pools in space.

[robitussin]

...Not sure if I'm more curious about what a castleship is, or why there was a pool on the ceiling. Maybe both?

[She tilts her head, though.]

What happened to it?

[marmoron]

It's exactly what it sounds like. A castle that can double as a spaceship. It was Allura's castle back from before the Galra destroyed the Altean home planet. It was basically a second home for all of us while we were out in space. I couldn't tell you why the pool was on the ceiling -- the Alteans are just... I dunno. Weird.

[There's a sigh.]

As for what happened to it....It's a long story. The Galran emperor had a ship that could enter the rift between realities at will. By doing so, he created pockets of instability that were expanding rapidly and would have wiped out our entire universe. The castleship was the only thing we had that could generate enough gravity to keep those pockets from destabilizing.

So it got destroyed. It's just a small crystal now.

[robitussin]

...That sounds rough.

[But, really:]

I'm glad if it kept you safe, though.

[marmoron]

It was probably harder on the other paladins. I didn't live in the castle with them for as long. Definitely worst for Allura and Coran though. That castleship was the only thing they really had left of Altea.

[But no, it wasn't exactly a great feeling to lose something that felt like a constant from the start of the war. He shrugs, downplaying.]

But anyway...I guess we're gonna have to figure out what it is Gabe wants with the dead.

[robitussin]

Yeah. It sounds... rough.

[It's quite the understatement, and she realizes it, even as she moves on. She frowns.]

...Maybe he's one of them. I mean, apparently he worked with the Sergeant, and whoever he works for, I can't imagine they're very friendly. If he fucked up, they might've killed him.