PLAYER PLOT | Forgetti Catchall, now in the right comm

[wythersake]

WHO: Ennaris Tavane, Julius, Bastien, Viktor, Clarisse La Rue + OTA
WHAT: Strangers arrive at the Gallows.
WHEN: A week in Haring.
WHERE: The Gallows / elsewhere
NOTES: Check out this OOC Post for details.

This is a catchall post for threads with or about the forgotten characters plot. Feel free to thread about it elsewhere as well!

• OOC Info
• Rookery Post

 

Comments

julius

[laruetheday]

Swept up in the drama of whatever's going on with Cedric, Clarisse doesn't really clock that Julius is gone until it's too late to do anything about it. It's only after she's back on the dock, soaked, shivering, and in pain, that she realizes. It doesn't exactly help her mood.

They don't let them into the Gallows, of course. The dockside apartments are offered instead, while their friends and colleagues try and figure out whether they're the shittiest Venatori spies in the world. Clarisse paces around near the entrance, fuming. She needs to get in there. She has to.

So when Julius makes his reappearance, he doesn't get far before she stops him.

"Where have you been?"

[overharrowed]

It is deeply unusual to see Julius shaken. (Not unheard of; those who can remember impressions of the timeline where he was one of the few survivors of Granitefell may have an inkling. Even so.)

"I said I was going..." He'd been about to say home, but that snags at something when he's not sure he's ever called it that out loud before. Now doesn't seem like the time to start. Instead, he amends to, "I was going to let Mme de Cedoux and the Commander know I was well, since we'd been out of touch. Given that I was told to meet the rest of you here, I assume you're not going to be surprised at the lack of welcome I received."

He's getting a grip on himself and, oddly, Clarisse's rude tone is sort of helping. Someone has to work the problem instead of losing their head. Still, he's not fully there yet, so freshly off of where he's been and what he's seen.

[laruetheday]

Normally Clarisse might see how rattled Julius is and curb her own behavior accordingly, but today that doesn't happen. Because she's freaking out, too, and it's becoming obvious that none of them, not even Julius or Bastien (where the fuck is Bastien, anyway?) know how to fix this.

"Cedric decided to take it on himself to keep us from getting to the Gallows," she says. "It would have been nice to have, I don't know, backup."

On second glance, Clarisse does look like there was some kind of... scuffle at the docks. There's a bruise already darkening on one cheek, and her hair has a telltale waviness to it, like she got it wet and then let it air dry again without brushing.

"I didn't start it," she adds, sensing that might be Julius's first question.

[overharrowed]

"I didn't assume you had." It was easy to picture his own reunion manque going violently sideways, with a few variables slightly different.

(In a world where he was less upset himself, there might have been an attempt at a joke about Templars and guarding entryways. But he can't manage it just now.)

"I told you where I was going, and when we parted ways, none of us knew anything was wrong other than the sending crystal malfunction. Was anyone injured seriously?" Not to dismiss the black eye, but she's in good enough shape to be on her feet and berating him, so. Worse than that, presumably.

[laruetheday]

"Ugh! I know!"

That's what's so annoying. She can't really blame Julius for this. Or anybody, really, because to do that they'd have to know what's happening, and it's obvious they don't. Not knowing is freaking Clarisse out, and freaking out makes Clarisse start yelling at people.

She stops pacing in front of Julius and rubs her hands down her face, one palm over each cheek.

"And no, no one got seriously hurt, but... What do we do now? They're not going to let us in. Especially not now that I fought somebody!" The rise of anxiety in her voice makes it apparent that this specific thought has just occurred to her.

[overharrowed]

"Presumably they're going to talk, so we have some time to think. In our favor is the fact that if we were all lying, we'd presumably come up with absolutely anything more plausible than the frustratingly vague truth." She can almost see him compartmentalizing in real time. "Which means, based on what we know of our colleagues, they've got a couple of ways to potentially work the problem. Assume we're mad, which still raises a variety of questions they'll need us around to answer. Or assume we believe what we say. In the latter case, that doesn't meant they'll believe our story is true, necessarily, but it still puts them in the position where they'll have to keep talking to us. I would be shocked if they landed on 'shut the door and ask no more questions.'"

He doesn't pace, but it's a near thing, his gaze abstracted as he thinks.

"They can't solve the mystery of who we are without us. And I can't imagine they're going to be content with not knowing. So even if it's uncomfortable while they're suspicious, I suspect we wind up in the Gallows within a day or two. Possibly under guard or with our movements restricted, but not just left out here indefinitely." He can't know, of course; none of them can. But he's working through who will be making decisions and how he knows they think. The intial dust-up won't help, but he doesn't believe it will change the ultimate outcome.