player plot | when my time comes around, pt. 5

[cozen]

WHO: Everyone!
WHAT: Everything's fine and we're going to have feelings about it.
WHEN: August 15 9:49
WHERE: Primarily the Gallows! But potentially anywhere.
NOTES: We made it! You are all free of my tyrannical plot grasp! There is a final OOC post with some notes + space for plotting here.

This is a timeline where, some mild chaos aside, things for the last month have carried on as normal. Riftwatch hasn't lost anyone at all. There were no funerals. The work continued. The late afternoon of August 15 may find people at their desks, in the midst of meetings or debriefs, in the library, in the sparring yard. Or maybe afield, seeing to errands or meetings or missions somewhere else in Thedas. Maybe, if they are particularly unlucky, they are deep in conversation with an ally or embroiled in combat with an enemy agent at the precise moment when the magical connection between two realities closes and the diverging timelines snap together into one existence.

At that moment, everyone forgets what it is they were just doing. Instead they remember what they might have been doing in the world where a third of Riftwatch's number was lost, despite their hands suddenly occupied with the normal business of handling pens or swords or books they don't recall picking up.

For the always-living, it may feel as though they have been magically transported somewhere new mid-thought. For the dead—the formerly dead, the might-have-been dead—it will feel as though they have just woken up. Perhaps they'll have a vague sense of a dream they now can't recall, in between their last conscious moment amid the blood and screams in Granitefell and awakening just now in a quieter world, or perhaps they'll have a sense of nothing at all.

For a few hours, the worse world will be the only one anyone can remember. Over time, memories of the other world—the only one that really exists now—will filter in, competitive with other memories in a way that might require everyone to double or triple check whether they wrote a letter or completed a mission in that timeline or this one. But the memories of death and dying will never fade into anything less real.

Comments

[laruetheday]

Still seems like Abby is simplifying a really weird and complicated situation, buuut Clarisse lets it slide. It's not like she owes Ellie her life story or anything.

"No." Okay, wait. "I mean, probably somewhere, but I don't know about them. I feel like people only find out about those weird cults after they all drink poison or something."

Also, by the way, it's her. She's the one in the fucked up cult.

[notathreat]

Ellie gives Abby a doubtful look, but doesn't push. She's curious, but it's not like Abby has to tell her.

Instead, Ellie turns a sideways glance on Clarisse. She already knows how she feels about the whole demigods and how they treat their kids thing. So.

"What do you mean, they all drink poison?"

[armd]

Why are you both doubting her that's literally the explanation.

Whatever.

"Eugh, like a death cult? They're so weird."

[laruetheday]

Clarisse doesn't pick up on the little glance from Ellie, just shrugs.

"Yeah, I guess? Like the ones who thought they'd ascend from their bodies and end up in space or something." Don't ask for details, she doesn't have them. "I don't really know about cults. I have enough weird shit to deal with already without throwing in that kind of nonsense."

[notathreat]

"Oh shit, is this about the kool-aid thing? Did your world have the kool-aid thing?"

Sorry, Ellie's choosing chaos.

[laruetheday]

"Different cult," Clarisse says, "but yeah, we had that one too."

Those are like the only two she knows about, actually. Besides the Manson Family.

[armd]

The kool-aid thing...

"I don't wanna know," Abby decides. "Would you rather... never have to eat again, never have to sleep again, or never get sick again."

[laruetheday]

Clarisse flaps a hand a little dismissively. "I already never get sick." This girl has never had a cold in her life.

"That's a hard one, though. Never have to sleep again, I guess. So I could get more stuff done." It would be convenient never having to eat, but she likes food. Plus it takes way less time to eat breakfast than it does to sleep through a whole night, so...

[notathreat]

Ellie actually has to think about that one, but she's very distracted by Clarisse having never been sick because... yeah, she hasn't. Weird.

"Sleep, yeah. I'd say food, but when you're actually hungry and you have food to eat, it's great."

[armd]

"True."

She's side-eyeing Clarisse for having never been sick before. Guessing that's another demi-god perk? Lucky. She adds, "I'd never sleep again too. And read every book in the world."

[laruetheday]

Don't look at her weird for having a robust immune system, man.

Clarisse chuckles. "Okay, nerd." Imagine reading for fun... pfft.

She settles back against her pillow for a minute, thinking, then: "Would you rather get one gold coin every time you compliment someone or ten gold coins every time you insult someone? And it can't be fake," she adds. "You have to mean it."

[notathreat]

"A nerd with a point," Ellie says, raising her eyebrows. Sorry Clarisse, there's two of them.

"Ten coins for insults. Obviously."

She'll insult people for free.

[armd]

"Ten coins for insults," she says, hot on the heels of Ellie, "Is that even a real question?"

Give her ten gold. Right now,

[laruetheday]

"Oh, we got a couple badasses over here," Clarisse says, putting on a ridiculous voice. "You guys got the easy question."

She knows they'll ask, so she doesn't let either of them say anything before continuing: "Would you rather have Cotton Eye Joe blast at high volume every time you have an orgasm, orrrr never be able to have an orgasm again."

[notathreat]

"You're the one who gave us the easy question," Ellie protests, reaching out to put her socked foot against Clarisse's thigh and give her a push. She hasn't yet laid down with her, still kinda awkwardly hovering with half her ass on the desk, but she's getting there.

"And obviously Cotton Eyed Joe. Sorry, Clarisse."

[armd]

"Oh my god," Abby splutters, chuckling, "You suck." This question. She shakes her head, frowns, says, "No Cotton Eyed Joe."

Come what may.

Or... not come. As the case may be.

[laruetheday]

"I wasn't sure you guys would know the song."

Meanwhile, Clarisse is giving Abby the most pitying look, trying not to laugh. She settles for a pffft sound with her lips and shakes her head.

"Don't be sorry," she adds, to Ellie. "I'd pick the same."

[notathreat]

Ellie gives Clarisse a broad smile back. Yep. That's her girl.

"Man, you need to have better sex," Ellie mutters in Abby's direction.

[armd]

Gross.

"It's not even about that. Everybody would know it was happening. Or think you were having sex to Cotton Eyed Joe."

How embarrassing.

[laruetheday]

"Yeah." That's why the choice sucks so much, Abby!

Clarisse shrugs a shoulder. "I'd just own it."

[notathreat]

"Okay, but imagine if it were the whole Gallows. Any time you hear that song off in the distance..."

Torturing Abby with this is infinitely funny.

[armd]

Abby makes a funny sound, cross between a chuckle and something truly dismayed.

"Yeah, that's why I'm choosing no. You have to respect my choice."

[laruetheday]

Clarisse snorts, rolling onto her side so she can look at Abby. "Like you guys respected my choice to never wear socks?" But there's affection in her voice.

Also, it was just Ellie who gave her shit about the socks, to be fair.

[notathreat]

"Look, I'm just introducing factors that might effect your answer."

She's just ignoring that she's the one who gave her shit about the socks too, so.

[armd]

"Uh huh. And that's why you two are together, because you're perfect for each other." (Derogatory.)