[meme] test drive

[citycouncil]

A bit late. Sorry, folks!

Tag into this post with characters you're thinking of apping to the game (characters who are not currently in-game or currently reserved by someone else). It can be just a tag, a brief EP, whatever you want. You can be new to the game, or simply want to test out a fresh pup. Tag each other with these characters or those already in game, and have fun.

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[echokeeper]

Norah lets out a soft huff of a laugh at that. "In a manner of speaking," she says. "I suppose you could say I've become part of the locality, through no choice of mine." She gives the girl a considering look. She seems to be sizing her up, or keeping an eye out for something. It's difficult to tell if this is good caution on the part of a child meeting a stranger, or something else.

"My name is Norah," she says after a moment, then hesitates. Does this girl know she's dead? She's a little bit translucent right now, so she may as well cross that line first: "I am a ghost."

[roadside_rose]

Through no choice of mine, the other ghost says, and Rose thinks: shit. She's been trapped before — drawn into an abandoned truck stop like a moth to a flame and locked in a Seal of Solomon — but she's yet to find any telltale arcane marks here. And while the twilight has plenty of ghost towns that would happily ensnare more residents for themselves, this is the daylight. A daylight town shouldn't be able to hold any ghost with enough sense to recognize that they're being held in the first place.

But Norah here seems sensible. And it sounds like she's been stuck here for a while.

"I'm Rose." Despite her own impatience for details, she does manage a wry smile over the unnecessary clarification. "And... yeah, I figured." Nothing wrong with being a little translucent if you're not the kind of ghost that regularly passes itself off as the living, but it's not exactly subtle. "Can't say I know what kind of ghost you are," she adds, figuring she might as well lay a few cards on the table. It doesn't seem likely that another ghost is the mastermind behind whatever the hell is going on here, and one of the first rules the twilight teaches you is that lies are for the living, not the dead. "I'm a hitcher, so I know you're not a road ghost, but that doesn't narrow it down much."

[echokeeper]

Rose's matter-of-fact acknowledgment earns a wry, somewhat relieved smirk which all too quickly shifts into an expression of dull bewilderment as Norah finds herself bombarded with details and questions she could not have anticipated. How she detests finding herself on the back foot in such matters, for how often it seems to happen.

"What kind...?" she blurts rather stupidly. "I was not aware there were different kinds, but then, I suppose I haven't met very many others. I am the ghost of myself. I have a haunting place but I am now free to leave it if I wish. Does that help?" She tries to temper her tone between mildly arch indignation and genuine curiosity, one eyebrow raised.

[roadside_rose]

Her eyebrows creep up a little at Norah's snippy response. At first, the ignorance surprises her more than the defensiveness, but 'haunting place' does provide a little clarity. If any kind of ghost can fairly claim ignorance to what's going on in the rest of the twilight, it's a house-haunter. They don't get out much. And they skew close enough to homesteaders for more mobile ghosts (especially the ones that want to stay mobile) to keep a respectable distance.

They don't get out period, actually, which makes Norah's newfound freedom both interesting and potentially alarming. "You can leave?" Rose asks, sounding about as dumbfounded as Norah did a moment ago. It doesn't sound like said haunting-place was destroyed (a word which only means anything in the daylight, anyway), and it takes Rose a dragging second to imagine another reason why a house-haunter might find herself suddenly at liberty to wander. Her expression darkens. "Shit. Were you exorcised?"

[echokeeper]

It is interesting — and indeed, telling — that Rose seems to take Norah's freedom of movement as a bad thing. As something that should disturb Norah herself, perhaps. The question, though, can only make her chuckle dryly.

"Certainly not," she says, "though I did chance to meet a self-described exorcist. That was surprising." She gives Rose a look, as if to tell her not to get any ideas. "He was only interested in sharing his company, and bringing me music to listen to. It got quite dull and lonely before I found myself able to move freely. Which I accomplished by pure accident. I had not been able to leave, and then I simply left. It was a bit overwhelming, but has made things much pleasanter for me in the long run. I take it that is not something you expected to hear?" She raises an eyebrow, halfway challenging the girl to make more wild guesses as to the details of her existence.

[roadside_rose]

"I guess bringing you music does sound nicer than trapping you in a Seal of Solomon and flaying you to the edge of nonexistence before putting you back together so they can do it all over again," Rose snaps back. Yeah, it's an asshole thing to say, but it would take a house-haunter to be so goddamn sheltered as to cozy up to a fucking exorcist, of all people. Norah has no idea what the living are capable of when they have the time and motivation.

"And no, it's not something I expected to hear. The twilight has rules. Or it did the last time I checked." She scowls, really not liking how little those rules seem to be coming into play here.

[echokeeper]

Norah opens and shuts her mouth quickly, her eyes widening at the sudden escalation. She had been annoyed, and rather trying to provoke some sort of reaction, if she's really honest with herself. It was childish, and she probably deserves the vitriol to some degree. But she hadn't anticipated it to come with quite so much severity. It takes her a moment to recover, simply staring at the girl. She stays silent a little longer than is strictly comfortable, in fact, wanting as much to let things cool as she does to get her words exactly right.

"I do know how matters stand where you come from," she says carefully, "but I believe it is a safe assumption to say we do not hail from the same sets of rules. I did not believe there was any such thing as an exorcist where I come from, apart from charlatans plying their trade to the gullible. The man I met is not from my world, and it certainly doesn't sound as if he's from yours, either. I also did not believe in ghosts, until I became one. I was the only one I knew for a long time. No one ever told me there were rules. And now, each new ghost I have met seems to have an entirely unique experience to go along with it."

She fixes Rose with a steady look. "I am sorry to be the one to tell you, but you have been waylaid. This is not the world you know. There are new rules, and you shall have to learn them as I did."