hellescapee | tlv inbox

Hello, petal, there's someone worried about your stalker-y inmate admirer. Came to me with his concerns. Care to discuss it over tea?

About the Cat King? [He shouldn't be surprised that he's causing problems, but causing problems about him in particular is something else. Edwin sighs, supposing his book will have to wait.]

Very well. I don't really have any place here for tea, although you're welcome to bring some. Or I can meet you somewhere else?

My place, then. Deck three, cabin nine. No need to knock, just come on in. I'll be expecting you.

All right.

[It doesn't take him long to get there and, as advised, Edwin doesn't knock, he simply walks through the still closed door and into the room beyond.]

What as the Cat King been doing?

[Norton is seated on the settee with a tea display which includes two cups of tea. He's fairly sure ghosts don't drink tea, but it's for the ritual of hospitality as much as to drink, and if it turns out that Edwin is a type of ghost who can drink tea, Norton won't be caught unprepared.]

It's not so much what he's done--stalkery behaviour aside--as what he might do. To you, or to anyone else he perceives as an obstacle in his desire to have you. Am I correct in assuming you don't want to be courted by him?

[The tea set does take him back and Edwin pauses, staring at it and Norton. He considers it, clearly weighing it up, then carefully moves to take a seat. He doesn't take the cup but the fact that there is one is... oddly comforting.]

I should apologise, it's been rather a long time since I've sat down for tea with anyone and I'm afraid I was more focused on the other matter. It was rude of me to simply walk in without knocking.

[He's glad at least to have shown some decorum in that moment, because the question Norton asks very quickly undoes that work. Edwin pulls back, looking rather scandalised by it.]

No I do not! I don't know what he's been saying, but I am not... [His lips thin into a tight line and he quickly recalls what Hanna had said. That it wasn't as much of a concern here.]

I... have only just started to... consider such things. But not with the Cat King, no matter what he might be suggesting.

[Norton loosely flicks his hand in dismissal of the need for an apology.]

I invited you to walk in without knocking. No need to stand on formality.

[He notices that initial denial and tentative disclosure.]

Just to lay all the cards on the table as it were, I'm a homosexual so I'll not judge you for whatever things you may have started to recently consider. So...tell me about the Cat King. The person who expressed concern about the situation didn't provide any details.

[His eyes widen and Edwin shoots Norton a surprised look, somewhere between feeling further shock at the incredibly blunt disclosure and a sort of jealousy that he could be so free about such matters. He's not entirely certain how he feels about it, so is rather grateful that Norton doesn't try to push the topic any further.]

Well... [He clears his throat and attempts to focus properly, not paying attention to the questions rising in his mind.]

I'm not certain there is much to tell. He is a Cat King from Port Townsend and he was rather annoyed by my using a minor spell on a cat to gain information. He... suggested I could make amends by making him happy and when I declined, he ensured I was trapped in the town until I had counted all of the cats. A way to keep me there, close to him, he said.

He's a powerful magical creature who does whatever he likes in the moment. I'm certain his fixation will eventually pass and he'll find something else to pursue.

Sounds as if he needs to learn to take the answer "no" a little more gracefully. Maybe learn courtship techniques that don't involve trapping people.

[He bites his lip in thought for a moment and then continues.]

Sorry if this question is indelicate, but can a ghost even...do that? What the Cat King wants from you? What I mean is, I'm trying to assess what kind of threat he might be, which is hard to do since sometimes people don't seem like a threat until suddenly they are, but it could be a good-ish sign that he didn't really do whatever he liked with you, but I don't know if that was restraint on his part or because you'd just phase through the floor and vanish or something like that.

Can I-- [Technically speaking, Edwin knows that he shouldn't be able to blush, but his body is a reflection of his memory and his will and he remembers what embarrassment feels like enough for his cheeks to colour.]

I've never thought about it, if you must know. From a purely theoretical standpoint, then it would be possible, however ghosts don't really feel things like you do.

[To illustrate his point, he reaches out to pick up the teacup.]

I can interact with it, but it's only pressure. I cannot feel the heat, or the texture of the china. If I were to drink it, it would be like sand.

[He sets the cup down again and straightens it.]

But I could phase through the floor and leave. I doubt very much that the Cat King will have power to keep a warden in place here.

I understand. It sounds similar to being a pharadyne projection. Nothing quite feels the same when you don't strictly speaking have a body to feel it with.

Something to consider, to prepare yourself for, at some point or another, the Barge might change that temporarily. A flood or a breach. Some dimensional hiccup or another will turn you alive for a week. Or into a platypus for a week. You never know with these things.

Have you been a platypus?

[THAT JUST SEEMS INCREDIBLY SPECIFIC. Turning into animal without warning seemed like it would be unsettling regardless of the kind.]

And these situations... you're saying they're always only a week?

No, I've never been a platypus. Or seen a platypus, come to think of it. Just making a rhetorical point about the odd things Barge interdimensional travel does sometimes. I wouldn't say the situations are always a week, since every once in a while odd blips happen, but most of the time they come in predictable cycles and most of the time last for exactly one week.

[A while after they butt heads up on deck and Cain has had some time to settle from his initial knee-jerk reaction, Edwin will get a brief note in his personal messages.]

It's Alexei.
Admiral doesn't know the difference.
I'm not going by Cain anymore.

[It surprises him and he considers that maybe he'd been wrong in his own initial judgment. He'd expected Cain - Alexei - to consider it a victory and never see him again except in passing. Not an olive branch, even if it's a slim one.

But he's known how much those slim offers could matter at times.]

Alexei then.

Thank you for telling me.

Can I ask why you were Cain?

It's a code name. I was a fighter in the Federated Alliance back home. A soldier.

[He has so many more questions, but he knows this is fragile and Cain has shown once already that he doesn't appreciate prying. He tries to think of what Charles would say and types something about how it must have been difficult but it feels... hollow.]

Would you prefer not to discuss it? I appreciate you reaching out but I don't want you to feel as though you have to share something like that.

[He considers what else to write and eventually gives up, switching over to video as it feels the least he could offer in return.]

I should apologise. I'm... not good with people. I've spent a very long time with no one at all in one of the worst places you can imagine and it's difficult for me to talk to people or think about how they might feel. I'm sorry for pushing you before.

[He didn't expect much to come of it. A little back and forth maybe, before another inevitable disagreement. A switch in format isn't anticipated and when he responds in kind, it's clear enough that Cain is in the library somewhere.

The first thing he does is softly snort.]

Had worse said to me by worse people.

[He shrugs, then the camera view shifts as he... leans the comm against a book, apparently.]

I haven't gone easy on any warden that's been assigned to me. Don't appreciate the whole forced interaction thing. [And he won't apologise for that, not yet at least, but he's still feeling this out and deciding if he's going to.] But yeah, I know what being in a shit place with nobody on your side can do to someone. Don't worry about it.

[He wants to ask about that as well, and with the camera on now, it's clear that Edwin is trying his best not to ask numerous questions. Another time and maybe he'll feel less like this could shatter in an instant if he asked the wrong thing.]

Well I'd prefer not to be one of them. I don't want to be that kind of person.

Or the kind to force any kind of interaction. Being on the receiving end of that is how I died and putting others in that situation isn't something I want for anyone.

[Cain lowers his eyes slightly. He's clearly mulling something over. That Edwin said he died does register, but given more than half the Barge has died (or at least, been told they have) it doesn't strike him as too strange for the moment.]

We can talk. But not 'cause you've been 'assigned' to me.

[Having made his feelings on that quite clear already, he's willing to make a concession, but not willing to be 'wardened' in any way.]

... Can see you're fuckin' dying to ask me something.

[That earns the slightest crack of a smile. It's not fake by any means, but it also is clearly restrained, someone who isn't used to it.]

I technically can't be dying for anything since I'm already a ghost, but I would like to ask any number of things.

But if you'll permit only one, as someone who's curious and not as a warden, I've not heard of the Federated Alliance, but you sound Russian... is that something from your world?

[He tilts his head just slightly. The ghost comment gets a more pointed moment of attention, but he'll come back to that. His accent is mild enough - and his English is good enough, being fully bilingual - that most people don't pick up on his sounding Russian unless they wind him up in some way.]

I'm from Mars. The outpost colonies there are mostly descended from Russian colonists.

[And that has blown a few people's minds, so far.]

The Federated Alliance is Earth military, mostly.

[Edwin was born in 1900, died 1916, and while he's been a ghost until 2024 and seen any number of things that are by and large hidden from the eyes of most humans... people colonising Mars is very much still a far away dream. He looks genuinely surprised and is quickly trying to think how many more questions he might manage to have answered before he runs the risk of Cain shutting him down again.]

I... don't know where to start. I suppose I've come to more or less accept that many people here come from different worlds than I could imagine, but being both so similar and markedly different is fascinating. I wonder if there'd be any way to tell if you're from the future or a different version of Earth entirely?

Who is the military fighting? I imagine there must have been a reason for you to join.

It's the twenty-sixth century where I'm from, so I don't think most people here would be able to tell.

[Aside from a few, like Tendi, whose timeline is so obviously diverged from his own that they can't possibly be from the same one... it's genuinely almost impossible to know.

He sighs, shifting a little in his seat.]

Earth's been at war with an alien race called the Colterons for... eh... a while. [Might as well be as long as Cain's been alive.] They're tryin' to claim Mars as some kind of holy ground but there's no evidence for it. One day they showed up and shot an orbital station out of the sky, and that was it. Not interested in talking. They just want to wipe us out.

Curious how even so far in the future, certain things appear not to be so different after all.

[Even aliens seemed to be acting much as humans had in the past, turning up to take what they felt they deserved despite how it effected others.]

And you grew up in the middle of that?

Yeah. I mean, it's just how things are. When they shot the Frontier down a piece of it nearly fell on my home city.

[He shakes his head with a tiny smirk.]

They think they're better than us, but they're not. Like you said, some things don't change.

[Then the young man leans back in his seat and sighs out slowly. This is not easy, but the kid actually isn't terrible to talk to.]

Look, you wanna try this over again? Get a coffee or something?

I would like that. I should let you know I can't eat or drink anything, but I would like the chance to start over with you.

I'm starting to think perhaps being a warden is a lot different than being a detective.

[He gets up from where he is, tucking a book into his hand as he does and picking the comm device up. It's fine, he can walk and talk.]

Dining hall then. Drinks aren't amazing, but they're hot.

[Then he lets out a soft chuff of air.]

And yeah. You can't work people like you might work a case. Better you learned that early. Some people never fuckin' do.

Cases make more sense. [It's a mutter but loud enough to be heard. Hanna was certainly correct about his attitude and seeing being a warden as solving problems for people, but Edwin feels that isn't his fault.

His route to the dining hall is faster than Cain's - the other man may see Edwin walk towards a large mirror, the connection flickering for a moment and then he's in the dining hall.]

[It is definitely a faster route (and you can bet he's gonna ask about the being dead thing, since it's become infinitely more interesting), and Cain hangs up the line not long after. Still, the Barge isn't enormous, and it doesn't take too long for the man himself to walk into the dining hall with a far less... immediately antagonistic air than he had had about him when approached on the deck.

Amazing what a genuine apology and admission of fault can do for someone's attitude.

He gets a cup of tea before he joins Edwin, sliding into a chair across from him and levelling dark eyes his way.]

So, here we are again.

[And he is, while still guarded, visibly not as hostile.]

Hopefully on slightly better terms. [The fact that Cain - Alexei - had suggested this at all was proof of that at least. Edwin didn't doubt that he wouldn't have gotten a second chance otherwise.]

You said that it's not like cases and I have come to realise that I've... [He struggles a little, clearly not entirely used to admitting this much] ...been going about this the wrong way. But I've never been good at people, even before I spent 70 years in Hell. I'm not certain where to start.

Slightly.

[He makes a small pinching motion with one hand. The tiniest bit. But the fact he's here at all and that he was the one who offered makes it obviously on better terms than before.

Everything he's definitely got questions about - the being dead thing, the Hell thing, the fact he appeared to use a mirror to teleport - are things he keeps to himself for now so he doesn't seem to eager to get familiar.]

Said I don't want a warden and I meant that. Don't think there's a damn thing any of them can do for me and enough have me doubting how they even got the job to make it seem like a joke. [But then he shrugs.] Dealing with you as a person, though? I can do that. And treating other people like they're a mystery you can take apart and solve is gonna be the first way to piss a lot of them right off.

[He pauses to sip his tea.]

And most of 'em won't give a shit if you've been through literal Hell. Especially those of us who ain't here by choice.

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