bigapplesauce | and on this casket's back sits a little lonely ghost [open to multiple]

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and on this casket's back sits a little lonely ghost [open to multiple]

He can feel Tim leaving him, waking up, and he tries to follow. He doesn't know how. This is all new territory, following someone from one plane of existence to another. He tries to visualize himself holding onto Tim's hand. It's embarrassing but it works.

He thinks it works.

He feels different.

The world feels familiar - not the empty void he'd been inhabiting, but the world, solid and real, tangible. He's here. He's back.

He still feels like he's looking at it through glass, though. He looks down at his hands, which are - sort of there, at least, he knows they're there. He can almost see them. Except not quite.

"Oh come on," he mutters, and no sound comes out. He knows he's spoken but he can't quite hear it. He tries to lay a hand on his own arm and he feels a buzz of static as his fingers pass through himself. Oh, god.

He's a fucking ghost.

This is not quite what he had in mind. He knows it's not what Tim had in mind.

It's better than nothing.

He takes a moment to try and figure out where he is. He finds that he can move, not exactly by walking, but sort of drifting along the ground. He accidentally passes through someone, who shivers violently and looks thoroughly spooked for a few seconds. He is unable to get anyone's attention, or interact with anything.

He has to get to Tim somehow, but he can't really take a train, can he? He's not even sure what part of the city he's in.

So he rambles. After a while he finds it's easier to just move through walls than to try to go about things the normal way. Shortly after that revelation he starts picking up the very bizarre skill of moving up through a building, in and out of offices and apartments.

Travel is easy, but communication is nearly impossible.

He searches, having nothing else he can do, for someone he knows.

[[Jay is wandering all over kingdom come today so if you want your character to have a weird ghost encounter, pick a location and we'll see what happens. It's going to be super hard to notice him if you don't have any kind of telepathic/other helpful powers, but that's okay, we can do short shenanigan threads if you're into that. A quick little ghost encounter! Hey, maybe Jay can overhear some awkward dialogue or embarrassing secrets. Maybe he'll accidentally figure out how to knock something off a counter and then go nuts trying to do it again. The sky is the limit. Have fun!]]

UPDATE: as often happens with this kind of thing we have Jay on a pretty tight schedule now. The Balladeer meets him around lunchtime, and then the line of Rush/Iman - Daniel - Greta gets set into motion sometime after. Greta will be taking Jay back to his building in the late afternoon. If you want to meet him when he's out and about it'll now have to be prior to lunch or snuck in between lunch and his adventure through the former ROMAC apartments. There is still plenty of room in there for nonsense, it just won't be able to lead to Jay actually getting home. SHENANIGANS!

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He watches this guy, noting his bruised cheek, as he tries to soothe his dog. Maybe this isn't worth it. He doesn't want to follow someone around tormenting their dog.

But at the same time the dog knows he's there. That's more than he's had all day.

"It's okay," he says softly, trying to match the guy's tone.

The dog hushes, it seems a little sulkily, still looking up in Jay's general direction.

The dog quiets with a restive grumble, regarding what appears to be an empty patch of air with fixed concentration.

Rush tracks the trajectory of its gaze before standing, pivoting smoothly, setting down the leash as he walks directly into the collection of air molecules that are, as far as he can tell, the source of some sort of untold canine-related agitation.

A chill coalesces into the center of his chest cavity, his blood congealing to ice.

Rush steps back, and air density returns to its typical viscosity and temperature.

The dog whines.

Rush extends an arm into the ostensibly empty space with steady trepidation, fingers opening, palm up, as if testing for metaphysical or metaphorical rain.

Jay stares, fascinated and daring to be a little hopeful, as the man straightens up, looks toward him, and then-

-and then walks deliberately into him holy shit. Jay lets out a metaphysical yelp, a noise fortuitously lost in the ether, and windmills awkwardly back. Nooooo. No. Not cool, dude.

"Fuck," he blurts noiselessly. The man has noted the chill that everyone seems to feel whenever Jay makes his off-brand contact, and now seems to be testing, reaching out toward him. Jay hesitates, staring dubiously at his hand, and then reaches back with his.

Can he take it?

He cannot.

His fingers pass buzzingly through the man's and he yanks his hand back as best he can. Speed is not exactly a trait he possesses anymore. Or if it is he has not learned how to master it.

The reaction is delayed and tentative, incongruous to the all-encompassing riming of the oxygen in his lungs, little more than a fleeting tingle of contact interspersed with the stabbing immediacy of ice once again entering his blood.

Rush snaps his hand back and evaluates the patch of air with open apprehension. Perhaps an entity of some kind. An anomaly, possibly. Properties unique to this particular stretch of space, or manufactured by some incorporeal organism, something with little means of communication other than a brief, arctic touch.

Ice, and all of its distillate potential, gray, unyielding serac spilling to pierce the sky.

He torques the scope of his thoughts to something less liable to incite a compensatory biological reaction over which he will have little control. He stoops to retrieve the leash and turns the dog around with a gentle tug, taking an unerring route to the building formerly owned by ROMAC.

Jay feels himself deflate. Was that it? Is that all he's gonna get from this one?

He shuffles after him wearily, wanting at least to see where he'll go. The dog doesn't seem to like that, constantly, glancing back or making soft little huffing noises, so Jay tries to keep a reasonable distance without losing them entirely, a very difficult thing to pull off.

He's almost relieved when the man reaches the building and starts going in. Buildings have been a lot easier to move through. He floats in through the front doors, waits by the elevator bay, and watches the numbers for the man's floor. He's already determined he can't ride an elevator - the box just passes on up and leaves him behind in the shaft. Which is why he can't ride a goddamn train, either.

He counts the floors as he lets himself drift up, and he gets up just in time to see the man having a confrontation of some kind with a woman in the hall. Curious and having nothing else to occupy his attention, he drifts closer.

It takes him somewhat longer than the average allotment of time to become aware of the secondary presence outside his door, occupied as he is with the recovering of his keys from his pocket with one hand whilst actively coaxing the dog along with the other - all of which requires more effort than he feels is necessary, given the dog's uniformly unsettled air that has pervaded long past the nameless encounter on the street below.

Keys retrieved, dog disquieted, inevitable encounter looming, Rush fixes Asadi with a cool look.

"Can I help you," he snaps.

She returns his predictably chilly greeting with a wry smirk, which is fucking impressive considering the pang she feels at the sight of that shiner she gave him.

"What, is that no longer your all-important imperative?" She gestures to her dead arm. "Let's get back on track, shall we? Did you get a chance to root through my shit yet?"

"I was under the impression I wasn't allowed," he says mildly, opening the door with a rattle of keys against wood. He drops the leash to permit the dog to trot in freely, which it does as predicted, and enters with a minimum of acknowledgement to either party. The door hangs open in implicit invitation. "Was that not the deal you procured at my expense?"

The dog pads to the center of the room and whines again. Without need for redirection or breaking his stride, Rush drags a bag of commercially adequate dog food and aliquots a fair portion into the dog's bowl before tipping the bag upright with the toe of his foot.

"On the contrary, I gave you express permission," she says, stepping in after him. She follows the dog and plops down on the floor beside him as he eats slowly. She motions at her bag, still in its place where she left it two days ago. "Give it here. Lucifer doesn't care what you do as long as it's not 'talk back to Lucifer'. He'll probably like having you around if you prove yourself useful, i.e. fix me up. Who knows, he might be impressed by you puffing up your tail at the Rift, too."

The dog jerks up sharply, lets out a growl and a bark, causing Iman to jump slightly. She looks at the animal, perplexed, and reaches out to stroke his back. "Shhh, shh. Hey, it's okay. No Satan here. No talking cats, either. I assume."

She gives a cursory glance around, but the coast seems clear. The dog is still staring fixedly at nothing. Iman pets him a little longer and looks up at Rush. "What's with him?"

Rush turns away with an understated eye-roll before returning the appropriated bag, the assortment of vaguely mechanical parts within clanking subtly with each movement.

"Quiet," he says to the dog, shooting it a firm glare. The dog continues to staunchly ignore him, ears and nose trembling as it attempts to sense something that, as far as he can see, is not actually there.

Assuming nothing followed them.

Rush rakes the space with his eyes, the dog's persistent unease edging into the stiffness of his stance.

"There was something in our way, earlier," he informs Asadi tersely without looking at her. "Incorporeal or nonphysical - I thought it was perhaps an unforeseen element of the space we occupied at the time."

He watches Sampson's tail still in his periphery.

"Of course," he says evenly, "I may have been mistaken."

"What?" Iman's eyes take on a bright, interested look, for a moment looking and feeling like she used to before everything got so damn shitty. "What sort of - did it have molecular differentiation from the air, I mean, were you able to define anything about it?" She hoists herself back up, bag and arm parts completely forgotten; she pats the dog once and then reaches up experimentally toward the space he's staring at so intently.

Nothing feels different for a moment and then something - a very light something, not really a gust but a moving sensation, buzzing, tingling, and cold - passes quickly through her fingertips. She snaps her hand back sharply, and it's only a moment before shock resolves into excitement.

"Holy shit," she says rather gleefully.

Edited 2015-07-28 23:36 (UTC)

He makes a poorly-executed, horrendously impractical abortive movement, as if to seize her arm and prevent its vector of motion about ten seconds after the fact.

"Might it be more prudent to forestall your proclivity for self-experimentation given your current condition," he says icily, delivering a significant, sidelong look in her general direction. "The molecular air density seemed slightly increased in addition to significantly cooler in what may have potentially been an adiabatic cooling process and therefore I advise," he continues, his pitch rising in harmony to his escalating exasperation, "that you do not touch it."

"I didn't touch it," she says, rolling her eyes at his typically hypocritical burst of poorly conceived concern. "It touched me."

She pulls her arm back, no longer reaching, and waits, willing the theory to prove itself. And in a moment, as if the anomaly is hesitating, it does: another gentle, tentative swipe through her arm.

"Hah!" she says triumphantly, even though she knows Rush didn't see or feel it happen. "It's aware!"

This is incredible. Is it a new rifty, one that is not like them at all? Is someone reaching to them from beyond the Rift? So many possibilities. She feels energized like she hasn't in days - weeks.

"It reacts to stimuli," he says sourly. "That in and of itself is hardly indicative of life, let alone awareness."

Particularly if they are imposing the Rift as some sort of metric upon this nameless entity or cosmic force, as the idea of the Rift being gradable on any sort of curve is beyond laughable.

The dog barks again, to which Rush responds with low hiss of, "quiet," pinning it with a pointed look. The dog whines.

It becomes clear to him that the dog is no longer looking at the debatably empty space with which Asadi has been interacting.

He follows the line of its gaze.

Rush's eyes shut in an overly long blink as he pinches the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger.

"Fucksake," he says.

The enormous, long-furred cat that has just materialized atop the counter pays little heed to the dog, and less to the two corporeal humans in the room. It's not here for them, after all. They're precisely where they need to be. It's the other one who has gone astray.

After giving the dog a brief, assessing look - it poses no true threat, but it's such a bother being lunged at, and the cat would rather avoid it - it turns its milky gaze toward the anomaly that has everyone so distracted.

Now, now, it scolds him, and only him, its tone passing for gentle with a good deal of success. The thin wraith attempting to pass for Jay might learn a thing or two. It's impolite to spy.

And for a moment there he was almost unable to believe his luck. Not only are they rifties but they are like, scientists or something, ridiculously smart and observant and they know about the cats and they're already, already picking up on his pathetic attempts at communication. He'd been so thrilled when the woman declared him aware, only to have the moment almost instantly ruined by another fucking cat.

He hasn't met this one before, which is good, because every other time he's been around the cats they've been much bigger than him, and this one is huge even when normally proportioned. He recoils sharply, floating backwards and halfway through a wall, having to then flail back out.

"Go away," he says, and he feels as though his hands are pulling into fists, even though that's impossible. "Tim pulled me out. I don't belong to you anymore."

Tough talk. He has no idea if it's true. He's barely 'out', and Tim probably has no idea he succeeded at all. For all he knows this cat is here to collect him, pull him back in. But surely - the Rift already killed him without conversation, surely it can pull him back just as easily?

"Um..." Iman takes a faltering step toward the cat. She'd felt immediate dread when it appeared, and a little bit of fear, too, like maybe they somehow stumbled onto something the cats don't want them to know about - but now it's just ignoring them pointedly. "Can we help you?"

Edited 2015-07-29 00:49 (UTC)

"Fucking excellent," snaps Rush, eyeing the cat with a look of utter disdain. "Was there something you wanted? Some indeterminate and vaguely threatening pronouncement you wanted to impart, perhaps? Then fucking previse our imminent doom and be done with it."

He tempers the unrealistic urge to grasp Asadi's functional hand and force her away from approaching the insufferable beast or thing or one consciousness of many, as he feels such a maneuver would be exceedingly unwise given her current view of him, as evidenced by the dull, continuous throb of his cheekbone.

"Fuck off," he says blithely.

The cat's head gives an incremental tilt to one side as it watches Jay's ungainly attempts to move. All of you belong to me, it says, as if reassuring an adopted child that it is just as much a part of the family as anyone else. But you don't belong here, in this place.

Only then does it turn towards the other two, chin dipped and head pulled back in polite bewilderment. Such a mouth that one has. I beg your pardon, it says mildly, in deliberate contrast to Rush's unnecessary aggression. But I'm not talking to you.

There, that's sorted. Back to Jay. They are busy. You are a distraction.

Iman shoots a sharp look at Rush, halfway between vindication and bewilderment. There is something here, something the cat can speak to.

"What is it?" she asks. Maybe something polite will get through. Might not be the right way to phrase it, though. She tries again: "Who are they?"

"But I-" Jay looks from the woman to the cat. "They're trying to help me," he says, hating the pleading note that gets into his voice, or the idea of his voice, desperation mingled with frustration. Are cats going to show up whenever he gets close to being perceived?

Edited 2015-07-29 01:25 (UTC)

That certainly lends a reassessing eye to the entire manner. Rush narrows his eyes at it dubiously. This particular specimen differs vastly from their past experience with the Rift-mandated thing in the recognizable shape of a feline in both appearance and temperament, possibly an indication of the Rift's momentary personal outlook.

"Do you have nothing better to do," he says in scornful disbelief. "The fucking city is populated by anomalies. What makes this one any more notable compared to the rest."

The cat lifts a forepaw and stretches it in Iman's direction as if to say: hold, please. To Jay, it says, They have other work. Important work. It doesn't expect Jay to understand how important - humans are such myopic little things - but he doesn't need the details, regardless. Try elsewhere. They aren't the only ones who might help.

It turns its gaze back to Iman and Rush, tail idly sweeping the counter top. No need to concern yourselves. You have other matters to attend to. A brief, pointed glance at the troublesome arm. I apologize for the distraction.

It rises to all fours, then dips its forequarters in a languid stretch. You're welcome to leave on your own, it tells Jay as it kneads the counter with its paws. Otherwise, I shall have to carry you.

Ugh. How fast can he say no to that tempting offer. Not fast enough. He raises his hands in defeat.

"Fine," he grumbles. "Whatever."

He likes the way the Scottish guy talks to these things, but he suspects he wouldn't if he knew what they were capable of.

He casts a weary, mournful glance at the two strangers and drifts out through the wall.

Iman can't perceive any change, but of course she can't. Doesn't make it any harder to guess what's happened. The cat's gone and scared away the most interesting thing in the room.

"Oh, sure," she mutters. "Can't have anything interesting happen, can we."

It apologizes. Oh, how graceful of it. How accommodating. How deceivingly well-mannered.

Rush hisses once between his teeth as the dog quiets, whatever potential for discovery with an interactive peculiarity dissipating as it apparently dissolves into the fucking ether.

"That's perfect," he says in unveiled disgust, his limited patience with the thing wearing to its absolute nadir. "Truly. Pure dead brilliant."

There are plenty of things to interest you here already, the cat points out with a seemingly infinite reserve of patience. Do some math. Do some science. Read a book. Use your imagination. Honestly, the possibilities are endless.

If nothing else, they could spend a few minutes reflecting on how lucky they are that this particular cat sees no need to banish their implied boredom with something truly and deeply unpleasant.

It pushes its whiskers forward and chuffs at them. Look at how nice it's being. Carry on with your work. We'll be keeping an eye on your progress. It almost makes such scrutiny sound like a compliment.

Then, as abruptly as it appeared, the cat is gone.

Iman huffs loudly, for a moment just staring at the empty space previously occupied by smug cat fuck with immense indignation. Then she looks over at Rush.

"Well," she says drolly. "I don't know about you, but I feel better already."

So much for working on shit that isn't her arm or their issues.

Edited 2015-07-29 02:49 (UTC)

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and on this casket's back sits a little lonely ghost [open to multiple]

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