faderift | boo, motherfucker

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boo, motherfucker

WHO: Church, YOU
WHAT: Forget your local pain in the ass Rifter? See him being a ghost? Holy shit.
WHEN: During Phase 3/Phase 4
WHERE: Around the Gallows
NOTES: Nothing yet

Being quarantined is unfortunate. But necessary. Bad enough he's sick and that people aren't quite sure if it's contagious or not. He doesn't need anyone freaking out, and he'd rather be around the job and around Christine while shit's figured out.

He can't stay with the healers forever if there's not much they can do, but he's around if tests need run, experiments done, blood sweat tears. He's always the first to sign up or volunteer whenever something needs tried. But otherwise he tries to do what jobs he can. Tries to avoid the kitchens after all the nonsense with the frying of everything.

It...becomes harder when people seem to forget he's even around, and sometimes he has to get in someone's way to even get their attention. He sometimes keeps Ponce with him when Christine can't have the pup underfoot, but...slowly, even Ponce doesn't seem to want to be around him, or even growls at him until the dog seems to remember for a little bit.

Things get interesting when he starts to slowly grow incorporeal. A moment of holding a mug, and it clatters to the floor. He pushes a door open only to have his arm go through it and his face hit the wood. It's concerning at first, then elating. This is familiar! This he knows! He's getting back to being the ghost (the AI) he knows--only, it's at random times, uncontrolled, and pairing that with the moments of forgetfulness? Maybe it's not to do with him. Maybe it's just a symptom. Then what does that mean?

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Christine has tried leaving herself notes, she's tied a red string around her finger, and she's even taken to carrying around Prompto's photograph of Church, but nothing has worked to keep the man sticking in her mind for long. Those moments when she remembers, she latches onto, swearing this time he will not be forgotten, but soon enough she's staring at the red string wondering why in the world she tied it there in the first place. It would be unbearable if only she realized what she was doing. As it is, the days go by as they always do, only with the added pressure of trying to figure out this illness coupled with the fact that she now knows Circle mages are suffering their own mystery ailment.

Needless to say, she's stressed, and late into Church's symptoms is when she comes across Ponce, seemingly out by himself in the Gallows' courtyard.

"Ponce! How did you-- I did not bring you-- Did I?" She bends down to scoop up her dog, but in classic stubborn dog form, he scampers away towards a figure nearby. No, not towards a figure. Through a figure's leg. Christine looks up and blinks as if coming out from a fog. A hand instinctively rests on the blue jewel hanging from a delicate chain around her neck.

"I-- Uhh, pardon. Is my dog bothering you?"

Bad enough to see Christine suffering--and now what seems like mages, in general? He has to wonder. Did he do this? No, not specifically him, but this illness. Or did they have it and it spread to them? Someone kept saying something about some unknown Rifter, and he doesn't know what they're talking about. And he also knows what's going on isn't her fault.

Ponce has gotten away from him again, and then she's there, and then Ponce runs through him. Yeah. That fucking figures. The downsides to being a ghost.

Church tries very, very hard not to let her question get the better of him, but she's still got the necklace. And even that doesn't help her. Turning from her to try and scoop up the munchkin is a better alternative, and gives him time to straighten out his expression. The first attempt to nab the pooch ends up in Ponce attempting to nip at a hand that just passes straight through.

The second attempt connects, and though Ponce wiggles, Church gets a hold of him until the tiny beast settles, somewhat.

"Hey, Chris," he finally says, turning back to her with a lackluster smile. Just act normal. Act like everything is normal, and it should be all right. Right? He shifts Ponce. "Lil' guy likes to be slippery. Do you guys do collars and leashes? Cuz we might want a tiny leash for him 'til shit blows over."

Christine's face falls when she hears her name. Of course. The Rifters aren't sticking in anyone's mind for long. How is it that she can remember that much, but not how she knows this one?

"I am sorry," she says, stepping forward to take Ponce from him before the dog can drop through the man's body. "I have a leash for him at home, but I cannot remember bringing him here in the first place." After she has Ponce tucked against her chest, she carefully moves her necklace so he doesn't accidentally claw at it. Funny how she can't remember why this necklace is so precious to her. She stares up at the Rifter's face, trying to figure out how she knows him. He has such striking eyes. How could she ever forget them?

"We know each other..." she begins, fingers smoothing over the blue jewel. "I-- I try so hard to remember, but I know as soon as I look away it will all leave me again." She hopes the opposite is true. The longer she looks at this face, the better chance it will all come back to her, yes? He's so familiar to her.

How honest does he want to be? "I know. I'm sorry. Here." He offers up his hand. Just to be with her a while is better than fading (literally) into obscurity. "If I drop it, I can't help it. It's just a thing that's happening now, I guess. Cuz why the hell not, right?"

Maybe if he's aggressively himself, something will stick?

"How are you doing? Health-wise. I know you enough to know some odd things are happening to you, too."

His hand enters her peripheral vision and instinctively she looks down at it, completely forgetting the face in an instant. Why is there a hand being offered to her? She must know this person. Placing her hand in his, she looks up at him, squinting in deep thought.

"What? Oh, you know that?" Her lips part in surprise because only two people know about her troubles: Sam and Inessa. No one else knows... except someone was there to see it happen to her. Her hand tightens in his, because for the moment it's solid and real.

"Wait-- you--" It's like a fog on a lake rolling back to reveal calm waters. She recalls him so suddenly that she gasps, surging forward and touching his cheek.

"You left me again," she whispers, feeling her chest grow tight with emotion. "Every time I look away, I forget you. It is cruel. Why is this happening?"

To see the slow revelation in her eyes--it hurts. He doesn't think it should hurt, but it does. "I don't know."

But she knows him, even for just this fleeting moment, and he takes the chance to lay a kiss on her head and hold her closer. Not such that Ponce is uncomfortable, or that she might not see his face.

"I never know what to tell you every time. Some stranger comes up to you and says he's your boyfriend, that'd be really weird, huh? I just...I just try to treat you like a friend. Even the dog forgets who I am. Makes keeping him safe a little hard when he doesn't want to be around me."

And then there's the moments of being a ghost. He can deal with it save for how random it is. If he could summon it up like he used to, before he came here--but now he might truly become a ghost. Dead and gone and forgotten and left to haunt the spaces he used to tread. (What about the guys? How are they holding up without him? Do they miss him? Did they forget him? Did they replace him?)

"I've forgotten so much that the idea that everyone will just forget me too is--y'know, it's pretty scary. But we'll make it through this. We'll get a cure. Just--how are you, though? I just wanna check up on you."

Her hand clutches tightly to his shirt and she repeats to herself over and over to look at his face and remember him. If only she'd thought to write out their story in a journal for the future, then she could keep it with her to read. But now she can't even look down to write on a scrap of paper without forgetting what she was planning to write about him.

"I am sorry. He loves you, you know. We both do." There are times to be practical and times to be sentimental, and this definitely falls under the latter. When all her memories of him slip away like smoke on the wind, she has to speak from her heart in these moments she remembers.

But what happens when his body slips away like smoke on the wind? She would gladly become a ghost too as long as they could be together and know each other. But she's not a Rifter and is still solid. Just one more difference between them that never seemed to matter before, but is now pulling them apart.

And yet, despite all this, he's asking after her. How can she tell him? There's hesitation on her face, but she can recall him saying to her that she can't hide things from him anymore.

"The episodes are growing in frequency," she says. "We think-- I mean, Inessa and I spoke about them. She has them too. As do other mages." She releases a shaky breath. Today shouldn't be about her. Not when Church keeps slipping away. "We think it might involve our phylacteries. But Church, I do not want to talk about that now. I want to be with you as long as I can. Until I pass out from exhaustion. I need to stay with you so I do not lose you."

There are things he knows about mages and things he's less sure of about mages. Back when he was trying to be a nerd in the Skyhold library, he'd come across the term before, phylactery, and what he'd found when he looked it up didn't please him. And now that it came up in this context, it set an icy pit in his stomach.

"You can stay with me and also talk about this, because this scares me. Losing you scares me more than me being lost. And it's stupid if we're both lost, cuz then we can't guide each other home, and why is this all happening right now? We can barely get the city to trust us and shit keeps happening. We don't get a break."

He has to take a breath, because it's definitely fear crowding his mind and his words and all else. "And...you have work to do. Important work. I shouldn't...keep you from it."

"I am scared too. It is why I do not really want to talk about it." Inessa's symptoms are different to Christine's, but all of them combined definitely seems like someone trying to control their bodies via blood magic. And until they can track down their missing phylacteries, they're stuck with their bodies sometimes acting outside their control. Christine gives her head a shake. "With so many working to try and solve this illness, I can afford to take a break. With you." She doesn't want to look back on her life and have regrets, and if she puts off spending time with Church, then he might disappear without her even realizing it. She can't let the last thing she says to him be, "I have important work to do."

"It will be difficult, but you must guide us somewhere and I must look at you the entire way."

"Do you need to see my face or just...keep looking at me in general? Because sometimes you look at me and you...look right through me. Not literally. I mean, at this rate, it'll be literal soon." Gallows humor in the gallows, haha!

"Please do not do that," she says in that all too familiar exasperated tone of hers. "I need to look at your face. I see a hand, a foot, and I forget who you are."

"Okay. Then I'm gonna walk backwards and try really, really hard not to trip on anything. 'Til I hit a chair or something."

Yep. Yep, this is happening. There's gotta be a place to sit that isn't too far that doesn't end with him falling over it. Or falling through it, He can't ask her to watch behind him either. Fuck.

"Do not be ridiculous," she begins, ready to add more, but whoops, he's off, and she purses her lips, following him with Ponce still held against her chest. The dog looks all about them from his perch, wondering why he can't be let go to run around the place.

"I can walk beside you and look up at your face. And you can prevent me from hitting anything."

His feet stop mid-pace. "...You're so smart. You are the smartest girlfriend, and I am the dumb ape man. Okay, keep watching me." Because now he'll actually look where he's going and oh thank god okay here's a room, and it's a room with some chairs, and it--is occupied right now, okay, keep going.

"I can't not be ridiculous. That's the number one thing I am. You know you love me for it."

She huffs out a weak laugh as he speaks, watching him as they move forward, stop, then move on from the room with voices.

"The number one thing? That is a bold claim. Are you not also handsome, brave, and kind?"

"Also all those, yeah." The smile he manages is much more genuine than previous attempts. "But the ridiculousness is definitely number one. Close call with the handsomeness, though, but I think ridic's gotta eek out there. I'm good for morale."

This room? It's quieter. He gives a quick knock. "Hey, this room taken?"

Someone, probably a scout from the outfit, looks up from a map at him, then at Christine, back at him. Wrinkles her nose. But gathers up her map with a sigh. "I'm not cleanin' up after ya, laddie."

"What--" he starts as she eases on by them. "Oh, god, that's not-? Hey, that's not what--!" Aaaaand she's not listening.

"...Anyway, we've got a place to sit, I guess, heh..."

Christine does an irritated tongue click at the scout, and nearly glares at her as she passes Church, but she manages to stay focused on Church and waits until the door closes behind them.

"Honestly, with everything going on, that is what she assumes? I do not even want to know what she thinks the dog is for." Said dog is let down carefully, with Christine getting down on her haunches to release him closer to the floor while her eyes remain fixed on Church's face.

"Help me sit?"

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