bigapplesauce | Entries tagged with character: greta baker

The snowball fight with Greta and Iman has revitalized Jack. It's December, and by all rights this is his season. He just needs to get his head back in the game; he knows for a fact that Manhattan can be tons of fun in a snowstorm. Now's the time to start, too -- with a little luck and a little nudge to the clouds here and there he could stretch a Tuesday night flurry into a Wednesday snow day.

The few people who can see Jack might catch glimpses of him hurtling through the sky late in the afternoon of December 3, whooping up a storm. Literally whooping up a storm, it turns out; aside from all the joyous yelling there's a definite chill in the air as clouds form and snow starts to fall, slowly blanketing the city in fluffy white.

Or…not so slowly. Jack's standing atop a low-rise building, surveying his work, when he realizes that something isn't right. The gentle but steady snowfall is picking up now, and a harsh gust of wind makes him clutch at his cane as it nearly knocks him off the rooftop. It only gets worse from there: as the afternoon wears on the clouds continue to gather and darken, the wind goes from a few gusts to a constant howling force battering against the city, and the snowfall comes so thick and fast that one can't even see across the street. By morning the city will be at a standstill, buried under the snow.

[And thus starts the Snow Day event! Due to the severity of the weather, characters will be unable to completely ignore this event, but anyone with a decent stock of supplies can simply wait it out at home. Otherwise, feel free to have the power go out at your character's residence, strand them on the wrong side of the city, etc. The weather will warm up throughout December 4 (April 18-21 in real time), leaving tons of slush for the next several IC days.

Please feel free to use this post for threads or to make your own. All threads that take place during the event should be tagged "event: snow day".]

Current Date: December 3-4

andhiswife

It's getting colder. Snuggling beneath a blanket with Iman used to feel like something they could just get away with as summer's heat subsided. Now, it's more or less the default. Not that she's complaining - far from it, and she shifts a bit closer to Iman as if in defiance of that entirely hypothetical accusation - but it does serve as a reminder that winter is well on its way, and Greta's fairly certain her current wardrobe is not going to suffice. It's already dipped below freezing a few times. Before too long, it'll start properly snowing. She'll need a heavier coat, and boots - things she can't just knit for herself.

She also might be toying with the idea of trying jeans.

Thusfar, it's been an internal debate. Part of her is mortified by the thought of wearing something so unladylike, but she's less and less inclined to listen to any part of her that still measures things against the yardstick of her own universe. She won't be going back, so why should she trouble herself over what the villagers would think? Women in Manhattan can wear whatever they like. She could wear whatever she likes. She could start dressing for the century she's in, not the one she came from.

Well. She could, if she had the first clue where to begin.

Greta pauses her current knitting project - a scarf for the Balladeer - then glances sidelong at Iman. "How are you for winter clothes?" she asks, her tone as casual as she can make it.

Current Date: December 1st, 2013

singthesong

Steven is finally gone, and the Balladeer is alone with himself.

He needed this. He hates to be alone, but he needed this. For days the knowledge (and lack thereof) of what he's done has been crawling under his skin like a physical itch - the one assassin he should be most familiar with, and all he knows is what Greta relayed to him second-hand, from a search somebody did on their cell phone. It's funny. It's really very funny.

One way or another, he ought to know everything about this lost assassination. Either it's his job, or it's his. So once he's alone, he takes himself to a library and gets out every reasonable book he can find, plus a few documentaries on DVD. There seems to be a lot of ridiculous conspiracy theories surrounding the whole thing; sadly, he can't quite convince himself any of them could be true. If Lee Harvey Oswald was a patsy, the Balladeer would never have any connection with him at all.

(The stop at the liquor store is an afterthought, a whim built on memories of a thousand morose drinking sessions he never joined. He wonders bitterly if Sam would laugh, and buys whiskey the man could never afford.)

He goes home and spends the day reading. At some point, he opens a bottle. He meant to eat something with it - that helps, right? - but instead he ends up putting one of the documentaries on to watch. He just needs to know.

He loses track of time.

Current Date: November 26, 2013

singthesong

Morning dawns in a strange fog.

The Balladeer can't even remember getting out of bed, but he finds himself standing in the hall. He's already dressed, too...it takes a few seconds for him to register that as odd. He stares down at his sleeve. When did that happen? How did that happen? You might stumble tired out of bed, but it seems strange to have lost the entire process of getting ready. That can't be right. It can't be; something's not right with him. Thinking feels like swimming through molasses, like forcing his way through darkness into a time where he's not meant to be. It reminds him of his attempted escape, before he fell right into the Rift instead.

Is he getting sick again?

He sways a little on his feet, and squints hard at the wall with the effort of focusing. Should he just go back to bed? Sleep suddenly sounds very nice; he could sleep for a year. But after a second, he remembers - Steven lives here now. The kid will worry if he just doesn't see him all morning. It's not like him to sleep so much. At the least, he needs to find him and tell him that busking's off for today. Then he'll go back to bed.

The Balladeer nods in agreement with his own plan, and promptly regrets the movement as his vision blurs. The floor lurches beneath him. He catches the wall and takes a few deep breaths to steady himself. In and out, in and out. Okay. That's fine, no big deal. He's still standing. He's okay.

He shuffles into the apartment's little kitchen area. From the outside, it's obvious that he's not all there right now. His eyes are glassy, and he blinks at Steven in apparent confusion for a few seconds before speaking. "Hey, um..."

He can't remember what he meant to say. So instead he furrows his brow at Steven, as if expecting the answer to appear any second now.

Current Date: November 22, 2013

andhiswife

Greta is standing just outside Iman's door, fist raised to knock, when she comes back to herself with an internal jolt and an external sway, as if someone had given her a light shove. Ruckus is by her side, the dog's warm weight pressing against her knee. How did they get here?

No. That's a foolish question. She remembers, of course she remembers, and so what if it's in pieces?

She remembers the sound the dog made, the way the creature rushed from one end of the apartment to the other and shoved her nose into any place small enough for a little girl to hide, circling and circling until Greta dropped to the floor and pulled her into her lap and made her stop, just stop.

She remembers pulling on her coat with promises of a walk, her tone almost normal, but her hands shaking. She remembers clipping the leash on and deliberately turning her back on the abandoned toys and crayon-scrawled wall.

~~Four lost in three months. Maybe she's still Cursed, after all.~~

She remembers crossing the Park at a brisk march, Ruckus keeping pace with her head low and her eyes wide and her ears tucked back. She doesn't remember consciously deciding to walk to Iman's apartment, but where else would she go, really, and how else could she get there with a dog in tow?

She remembers counting her paces, not as she did before, but a steady, one-two-three-four, one-two-three-four, keeping tempo with a melody that stubbornly refused to reveal itself. She remembers trying not to think, and she guesses she must have succeeded.

She realizes, now, that she didn't remember to text.

And now she's knocked, and she doesn't even know if Iman is home. She must look a mess, hair in disarray thanks to the wind, face flushed, and she's absolutely boiling underneath her coat. She fumbles at the buttons with one hand, the other still clinging to the leash. When Iman opens the door, she drops her hand as if she's been caught out, relief and embarrassment washing through her and temporarily, mercifully obscuring everything else.

"I'm sorry," she says. "I didn't even tell you we were coming. Are--are you busy?" Her stomach knots, because of course she is - one of the only reasons they were spending today apart was because Iman had things to take care of, here: chores that had been neglected during the time she was away.

The other reason… the other reason is gone. Greta presses her lips together in a thin line and swallows past the lump in her throat, waiting - wishing, for the first time since the Witch blasted their front door off its hinges - to just be told what to do.

Current Date: November 15, 2013

etherthief

She tells herself this is fine, she doesn't need to run, and probably shouldn't because who knows what condition she's really in after being in the rift so long, but she's barely out the door before she figures she should stop lying to herself and she breaks into a sprint. She doesn't want to get on a fucking train and she can't run the whole damn way, so she runs until she spots an unoccupied cab and flags it down with breathless gusto.

She feels like she's going to throw up.

Once she's in the back of the cab, once she's blurted out the address she still remembers, she fumbles out her phone and scrolls back through the texts that all came at once. It's too much, all of it. They might as well be in another language. They start off so normal, become so desperate, and then something else. It's awful. She feels like she's watching Greta's heart break.

I wish, Greta had finished one message.

You wish what?

What does she 'finally understand'?

Iman rocks feverishly, turning her phone over and over in her hands. She stares out the window hard enough to break the glass.

And then it pulls up, and she gives the driver an absurd tip and stumbles out.

Greta's there. She can see her just inside the front door. Iman hears herself make a sound she didn't expect, a little whimper. She's there, waiting. Their eyes meet. She runs.

Current Date: November 10th

singthesong

Iman is gone.

The Balladeer found out yesterday, and spent most of the rest of the day with Greta. The poor woman - she's taking it hard. He and Gabriel had done what they could, but he suspects it wasn't enough. The two of them were close, in ways he's not entirely sure he grasps. He never really got to know Iman very well, did he? He regrets that.

As the night wore on, eventually they had both left. That stung; he was worried about her. But he'd promised to return in the morning at least.

And so he has, rising early as usual and going to knock on her door. Lily's staying somewhere else for now, and he's not too worried about waking Greta. Did she even sleep last night?

Current Date: November 1

andhiswife

It's not like Iman to ignore her. She's given Greta space before, left her be, but never ignored her outright. Not on purpose, anyway. But too much time has passed since her texts for Greta to convince herself that Iman is just napping or doing chores or absorbed in some project or other. There must be some other reason she's gone quiet, and none of the potential causes that Greta can think of bring her any comfort.

She's ill. She's injured herself, somehow. The Devil has lost patience with her. Something terrible must have happened, because only something terrible would keep Iman from acknowledging her.

Greta makes her way to Iman's building. There are costumed people on the streets - some sort of festival, she's been given to understand. The sight of them does nothing for her growing conviction that everything has gone wrong, that something has been broken beyond repair.

What if she is just ignoring her? What if she knows, and is trying to find some way to let her down gently? That fear, more than any of the others, is what has her stomach in knots. It's hard enough for her to even acknowledge what she wants, let alone dream of asking for it. She certainly doesn't expect anything more than what she already has.

Well, if they have to--to talk about... that... then they will. The thought makes her flush with utter humiliation, but she thinks she could bear that conversation better than she can bear all this uncertainty.

She knocks on Iman's door, but doesn't announce herself, lips pressed together as she strains to hear any sound from inside. There is nothing, even after she knocks again. Even after she quietly says, "Iman?"

The door opens beneath her hand before she makes any conscious decision to try it.

Greta knows the apartment is empty the moment she steps inside, the door swinging shut behind her. Despite that, despite the feeling that she is trespassing in this place she's visited so many times, she steps forward to check each room. The bathroom light is on, an ostensible sign of life that fails to reassure her. She can't stand the faint hum of the florescent bulb; she turns it off with an unsteady, impulsive swat, then flinches back as if the light switch might retaliate.

She finds Iman's phone on the bedside table. For a few moments, she just stares at it; then, she reaches forward to press the home button. She expects the screen to light up with half a dozen text alerts, but it doesn't light up at all. The battery is dead, and the glossy black screen is flecked with dust.

No. No, no.

By the time she stumbles back out into the living room, she's trembling too much to do anything with her own phone except fumble it onto the carpet. It's too far away, now; if she bends to retrieve it she might not be able to get back up again. Out of options, out of desperation, she prays.

Current Date: October 31, 2013

spiritofwinter

It's been a few days since Jack was suddenly transported from Queenstown to Manhattan without an explanation. He knows people who can do that kind of stuff, but he didn't see any magic portals when it happened. More worryingly, the season is all wrong, autumn when the northern hemisphere should be in the throes of late spring.

Most worryingly, he can't leave. As in the wind won't work with him when he tries to fly away from the island of Manhattan, buffeting him back in instead of carrying him where he wants to go. As in not knowing how he can get back to anyone who might have answers for him -- the Man in the Moon isn't any more talkative than he's ever been, and Jack doesn't have any way of contacting the guardians when he can't fly to the North Pole...and when Sandy doesn't show up at bedtime. That's the part that came as the worst blow: he'd sat up through the entire first night waiting to see the dream sand, sure he could go to his friend and find out what was happening and why he's suddenly here instead of back in New Zealand, and whether he really did lose a year when it happened (the newspapers say it's 2013, and while he's pretty sure it was 2012 the last time he checked, once a couple centuries go by the years all blur together).

He's lonely here without anyone who can see him, and he's a little scared all the time from not knowing what brought him here or what's keeping him in and the other guardians out. Lonely isn't new, but it still hurts after things had been so good for a little while. Now that it's been a few days without any hint of what he should be doing to fix whatever happened, he's coping with it the same way he always has, if with less joyful abandon than before. It's cold enough for a little snow, which means it's cold enough to send people slipping on the ice -- and cold enough for a game of Snowballs From Nowhere. If there's one good thing about being unseen, it's the look on people's faces when he beans someone with a snowball and they can't figure out where it came from. He's been at it a while, and it's actually working to take his mind off of things, for now, to judge by his laughter when he lands a snowball right on the back of a random woman's neck.

[OOC: While this post is for introducing Jack to Greta, please feel free to assume he's lobbed snowballs at any characters who can't see him yet.]

[cw references to character death in comments]

Current Date: October 29, 2013

singthesong

Well, that got out of hand.

The Balladeer doesn't return to bed that night. He putters around the apartment instead, trying to while away the time until morning. It's rare that he spends so much time here - most days he wanders around the city until dark. Unfortunately, that means he hasn't really left himself much to do. Not much that won't wake the neighbors, at least. So he just bundles up on the couch and tries not to kick himself too much as he watches the light break outside.

These things do happen, after all. How was he to know it would all head south like that?

The dreams where he loses himself are the worst. He can still faintly remember the mindset he'd slipped into: cold and alien, caring for nothing. Yeeeeah, he definitely owes some apologies around here.

He knows Greta's an early riser, so once he figures she's probably up he gets dressed and walks down the hall to rap on her door. He can text Gabriel, but he'd rather speak with her.

Current Date: October 23, 2013

andhiswife

It's not that she's been avoiding Iman, exactly. Greta's had good reason to leave her be - several good reasons.

Lilly would be the big one. The child has kept Greta busier than she has been since before ROMAC's fall. She might not be quite as demanding as the twins, at least. She's old enough to entertain herself (though what she tends to find 'entertaining' are the sorts of things that leave large messes behind). It's her limited vocabulary and almost nonexistent manners that have presented the biggest challenge. Granted, they've both been improving, especially since the dog arrived (she even got Lilly to submit to a bath after coaxing an unenthusiastic but cooperative Ruckus into the tub, first), but she still has a long way to go.

All things considered, there might not have been much point in reaching out to Iman before now. Lilly hadn't been ready to meet her, and Greta hadn't been willing to push the girl back to Aziraphale for minding while she visited Iman on her own. They'd needed time to settle in, and for Greta to get a better sense of what she's dealing with, before worrying about anyone else.

Not that she hasn't been worrying, anyway. Their last conversation - if you could even call it that - consisted of Iman objecting to the idea of her taking Lilly in, and Greta brushing her off as if her opinion didn't even matter. Never mind that Iman offered to bring Greta home with her, an offer that doesn't necessarily extend to any children Greta might take in. Never mind that she can't even excuse the whole thing as temporary when Lilly's in the same unfortunate boat as herself. She had no business taking in a child without at least talking with Iman about what it might mean for both of them. Yet, here they are.

What if Iman doesn't like her? What if Lilly doesn't like Iman? What if it doesn't matter? Even the most charming child in the world would be more responsibility than Iman signed on for, and she'd have every right to declare it 'too much,' and… and be done with it all.

She doesn't know what she'll do if that happens.

At least Iman seems to respond well to the only somewhat desperate invitation Greta works up the nerve to send her. This might not be so bad. Still, she impresses upon both Lilly and Ruckus that they're to be on their best behavior (it feels a bit silly, dropping into a crouch and addressing them both, not least of all because Ruckus listens with as much solemn, close attention as Lilly does - if not more). Iman is a dear friend, and they'll ~~hopefully~~ probably be seeing a lot of her, and this is important.

And then she makes tea, because she needs to do something besides anxiously pace while she awaits Iman's arrival. When the knock finally comes, Greta swipes her palms nervously down her skirt and makes a deliberate effort to not hustle too quickly over to the door. Ruckus lets out a quiet cough, more acknowledgment than alarm, and sits down next to Lilly as Greta swings the door open.

"Hello," she says, her smile a little anxious, but warm. It really is good to see Iman again. Her arms twitch in an aborted move to hug her before it occurs to her that Lilly might find it alarming, so she steps back instead, ducking her head sheepishly. "Come in, please."

Door shut, she turns to her charges. "Lilly, this is Iman, the friend I told you about." She raises her eyebrows meaningfully. "Iman, this is Lilly. And Ruckus," she adds, prompting the dog to open her mouth in a broad, relaxed grin.

Current Date: October 16th, 2013

andhiswife

The practical, sensible part of her knows this might not be a good idea. It's too sudden, too quick, too much responsibility striking like a bolt of lightning out of a clear blue sky. Greta's still raw and aching, the Witch's blunt exposition and the Balladeer's more gentle but no less horrible refrain replaying themselves in her mind with exhausting regularity. She shouldn't even be alive; what business does she have taking in a child? Especially one who, from the sounds of things, might as well have been raised by wolves?

Well. She doesn't have any business, full stop. That's rather been the problem, these past few days. Waiting to go home had been her chief occupation, and there's no point in that, anymore. If she doesn't find some way to fill the hours, all the loving support her friends can offer won't be enough to keep her from going mad. She needs to do something.

She can do this.

Her apartment was already neat as a pin, and it's been livened up with some art supplies and a few toys. It's not enough for the long term - the child will need far more if Greta's going to care for her indefinitely - but she thought it best not to jar the girl with an overwhelming display. Aziraphale only asked for help, after all; it would be rash of her to act as if it was a given that Lilly would be staying here forever. Maybe she'll only end up watching the child for a few days. Maybe Lilly won't even like it here.

Greta really hopes she does, though. Now that a potential purpose has been dangled in front of her nose, she can't help but grasp at it. And if she's a little too eager, well, that's better than the numbing fog she's been drifting through of late.

How refreshing, to want something she can actually have.

She looks around the apartment, as if to give the furniture an opportunity to object to the impending visitor. Then she picks up her phone and texts Aziraphale one last time.

Current Date: October 10th, 2013

andhiswife

Greta wakes when she strikes the floor. She lies there for a few moments, winded and disoriented, hardly able to recognize her own apartment from this angle.

(She doesn't want this to be her apartment. She doesn't want this to be all she has.)

It was all lies. It had to be. She fell, but she didn't--she's alive, and if she hadn't landed in Manhattan she'd--she'd remember. Wouldn't she? Maybe it wasn't even really the Witch, but a figment of her own imagination, some Witch-shaped conglomeration of all her worst fears about what might be happening in her absence. The real Witch would have been able to give her real answers, not a few awful details and a shrug.

(Could those details have really come from her own mind, though? Would she ever have imagined Jack...?)

Greta lurches to her feet and pauses, waiting for her head to stop spinning. She needs answers, real ones, not the words of a Witch in a nightmare. It's not yet dawn, but the ambient light of the city is enough for her to find a shawl by. She wraps it around her shoulders, grabs her keys.

Her phone sits on the bedside table. Iman--she'll probably text her as soon as she wakes. But even the thought of sympathy is almost enough to break her. She needs to know if it's true before she can bear to accept anyone's apologies or concern. Even Iman's. Greta presses her lips together, turns her back on the device, and steps barefoot out into the hallway, squinting against the artificial glow.

A minute later, she's outside the Balladeer's door. She lifts a hand, then hesitates for a moment. It's so early. Can she really ask this of him?

She doesn't care. She has to.

Greta knocks.

Current Date: October 7th, 2013

lottawork

He has it.

It had come together unprompted, without the click and slide of a solution slotting easily into place. There is never a click, a common misconception even in the highest echelons of academia - there is never a well-timed stroke of brilliance turned over by some new fragment of insight, simply the give of a problem folding beneath the fierce, continuous, brute force pressure of the uncontained mind. For weeks he has considered it, has become an expert in fields utterly beyond the scope of his specialties or his prolonged interest, and even with the minor distraction of Jackson's spontaneous return to the flesh, he has done little else but attack the set of circumstances without compromise.

The dog is asleep when he exits the building, and he locks his door upon departure, his movements streamlined by the fervent intent of intellectual energy, the strap of his bag taut over his chest as he commits himself to the grueling inadequacies of public transportation.

He knocks immediately upon building entry. He expects Asadi will be waiting for him.

Current Location: Greenwich Village, Iman's apartment
Current Date: October 6th, 2013, around 2am

andhiswife

Greta sets down her phone and twists her hands together. Jay's back. He's back, and he needs her help, and--and he will have it. It feels like the least she can do, after the embarrassing misunderstanding in her dream, and after all the trouble he and Tim have had lately (which doesn't seem to be letting up, from the sound of things). It feels, a little, like penance for the ill treatment she gave another lad who was far younger but not quite so sad. But mostly it feels like the right thing to do, something she can do. Granted, she'll have to see just what sort of shape Tim is in with her own eyes before she makes any promises, but maybe it won't be so bad. Like a--like an oversized infant who only sleeps and never cries. That sounds manageable, right?

She might be a little too invigorated by this sudden rush of people needing her help and asking for it so plainly.

Jay didn't make any mention of needing food, but she has some freshly made apple turnovers, so she wraps up a couple of them and tucks some teabags into the bundle for good measure. He could probably use something sweet - and something he doesn't have to worry about preparing himself, when he has so much else to worry about.

It's not a long journey to their apartment building, but it feels long, and it's hard not to spend all of it fidgeting. Half a block away, she has her phone out, and she nearly walks into a stranger as she texts him to let him know she's arrived. Then she shoulders her bag, absently patting it to make sure the pastries haven't been crushed, and waits.

Current Location: Western Apartments
Current Date: October 3rd, 2013

peacefulexplorer

He sheathes himself in intent and blinding resolve, gathering himself at the peak of all he is. He knows the form and shape of himself intimately, and that of the Rift nearly as much. He has no physical structure here, nothing but the transcendental construction of his being, spun from energy and enlightened matter.

He forms the configuration of his atoms into a point and launches himself toward the great barrier mantled over the city, driving himself into the obstruction with every high-vibrating strand of himself in an ineluctable quantum-entangled internecine of torquing chiral matter and shrieking electromagnetism, resolving into bright streak of light, and then nothing.

Electrostatic discharge bisects the sky in an erratic jolt, feathering into diverging points before realigning into a single incandescent bolt that slams into the ground with the low, juddering impact of two unrelenting forces colliding on a colossal, rising, universal scale.

Bones grind into the approximation of a human skeleton, molecules stitched together to form organs with the churning of heart and veins and brain and lungs, skin wrapped over the assemblage of physiological necessity, all done with the vibrant immediacy of interconversion of energy to matter between seconds.

The transduction of one phase of matter to another.

Energy becomes flesh.

Light becomes bone.

Daniel Jackson returns to earth.
---
He opens his eyes.

It is very dark.

There is a tightness in his chest, and belatedly he realizes it is because he needs to breathe.

He breathes.

He blinks, eyelashes scratching the air that is too crisp and frigid and sharp, prickling the sarcoline membrane of his skin. He opens his hands, pale, spidery blurs printed against the dark matte of cold sky.

He sits up. His sense howl against the sensation, the exertion of muscle, the grating pull and shift of bone, the sensation of grass tickling bare skin nothing short of a unique somatosensory hell.

Hell. That’s a concept that strikes him as vaguely familiar.

Unfortunately, nothing else about this does.

With nothing else to do and with the whole of him aching, as if only now realizing just how incredibly inconvenient and painful the burden of physical existence is, he makes a list of things that he knows.

He is in a field, broad and open and grassy. The trees are distant pinpricks in silhouette. There is the distant rush of objects hurtling laterally through space by way of paved roads. The sky is a canopy of bright-dotted lights, comprised of stars and a glittering, multicolored swathe of metropolitan luminescence. The field is wet, with dew or rain or both. The air is cool. He is breathless, nameless, clothesless.

Nameless?

That’s a bit worrying.

Or maybe he just knows it’s meant to be worrying. Right now, the only emotions he seems to be able to muster are those of budding distress and confusion.

Also, discomfort. He’s shivering, and he has to remind himself to blink and also to breathe, and something about that doesn’t seem quite right because it’s not spectacularly efficient to have to keep reminding himself of those faculties that really should be involuntary, he’s pretty sure, is he sure though, because he’s not entirely certain where all these preconceived notions about his physiology seem to be coming from, and also he would like some clothes.

The thought crystallizes into relief. That’s something he knows. Desire. He wants something. Namely, to be clothed. Kind of right now. Or just soon-ish. That would also work.

Standing is a trial, walking even more so. His body feels fragile, new, possibly newborn if that didn’t make no biological sense whatsoever. He stumbles forward like a poorly-coordinated child, his legs shuddering in protest with each creaking motion.

First, he needs to get out of here.

[ooc: After a month of glow-jellyfish shenanigans and an ill-advised attempt to bullrush the Rift into letting him go, Daniel has descended and is now human again. Rest assured, anyone who finds him WILL find him clothed, as he’ll have recovered some from a dumpster or something by the time he’s wandering the streets of Manhattan. ALSO word of warning - seeing as his brain’s been freshly scrambled, Daniel’s a wee bit amnesiac. Also slightly aphasiatic? He has no idea who he is and he’s not going to be capable of understanding or speaking English until his memories start trickling back.]

Current Location: Central Park, initially; later, down E 90th St
Current Date: October 4th, 2013 (slightly forward-dated)

singthesong

Yesterday, the Balladeer was feeling a little under the weather. But he figured it was probably nothing and went out on his usual rounds anyway.

This was a mistake.

Today he feels like death. He's fairly certain he doesn't actually have cancer, but his throat hurts and his nose is running and he's retreated to the couch to huddle under a blanket. Is this what being sick is like all the time? It's awful! He's got a vague idea that maybe he ought to take some medicine, but there isn't any in the apartment; it hadn't occurred to him to buy any.

He dozes for a while before it occurs to him to ask the network for assistance. They ought to know, right? It wasn't his goal to get anyone to come over and help out, but...well, he hasn't really felt up to making any food today either.

Current Date: October 1, 2013

etherthief

She's awake.

She sits up, breath catching in her throat, heart hammering, adrenaline flooding her system. It's okay, it didn't happen. Didn't happen. It was just a dream.

The sun's still rising but she doesn't care. She rolls out of bed, falls to her knees and struggles to get up, get dressed, get moving. She wraps her hijab carelessly, bullies her arm into a makeshift sling as she shoves her way out the door. She fumbles with her phone.

I'm getting on the green line, she types out to Greta. Meet me at GCT.

She breaks into a run as soon as she hits the street.

Current Location: Grand Central Terminal, Iman's apartment (Greenwich Village)
Current Date: September 30th

deadeyedchild

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!

Current Location: anywhere!
Current Date: September 29th

andhiswife

Greta tries to put Rush's maddeningly vague texts from her mind once it becomes clear that he has no intention of giving her more than implicitly dire portents of things to come. It almost works, too. She has some baking-related messes to clean up in the kitchen; that ought to be distraction enough.

But her mind isn't on the work, as demonstrated by the fact that her hands complete it all in record time. Ugh. She surveys her gleaming kitchen with a sigh. Sometimes, this Rift Power is a dratted nuisance. Now what is she supposed to do between now and whenever Iman should arrive? Pace?

Well, she decides as she unties her apron with a few unnecessarily vicious tugs, if that's all she can do, then Rush can bloody well watch her do it. She was having a perfectly pleasant day until he decided to ruin it - as if she doesn't fret over Iman enough already - and she doesn't care if her company isn't convenient. What an insufferable man. She practically throws the apron at its hook - it's more an additional annoyance than a surprise when it lands perfectly - and grabs her phone and her keys before heading out.

At least it's a short walk. She doesn't bother to text him a warning, she just raps sharply on his door.

Current Date: September 27th, 2013

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The Big Applesauce

Page Summary

spiritofwinter - A Real Good Storm (Event: Snow Day) (open)
andhiswife - Get in Loser, We're Going Shopping [Closed]
singthesong - History Obliterates [closed]
singthesong - The Edges of the World [closed]
andhiswife - Give and Take [Closed]
etherthief - Only Fools Rush In [closed]
singthesong - And You Need Time
andhiswife - Push Away the Unimaginable [Closed]
spiritofwinter - I never want to see a day that's over forty degrees [closed]
singthesong - Who Spiked the Punch?
andhiswife - Ties that Bind [Closed]
andhiswife - Children Aren't as Simple as We'd Like to Think [Closed]
andhiswife - Witches Can Be Right [Closed]
lottawork - things have gotten closer to the sun [closed]
andhiswife - And your heart is lead, and your stomach stone [closed]
peacefulexplorer - a little resurrection every time I fall [open]
singthesong - I Got a Fever [Greta and then Bee later]
etherthief - find me when you wake up [closed]
deadeyedchild - and on this casket's back sits a little lonely ghost [open to multiple]
andhiswife - Io venni in loco d'ogne luce muto [closed]

Page generated Jun. 5th, 2025 07:47 pm

The Big Applesauce

Entries tagged with character: greta baker

A Real Good Storm (Event: Snow Day) (open)

Get in Loser, We're Going Shopping [Closed]

History Obliterates [closed]

The Edges of the World [closed]

Give and Take [Closed]

Only Fools Rush In [closed]

And You Need Time

Push Away the Unimaginable [Closed]

I never want to see a day that's over forty degrees [closed]

Who Spiked the Punch?

Ties that Bind [Closed]

Children Aren't as Simple as We'd Like to Think [Closed]

Witches Can Be Right [Closed]

things have gotten closer to the sun [closed]

And your heart is lead, and your stomach stone [closed]

a little resurrection every time I fall [open]

I Got a Fever [Greta and then Bee later]

find me when you wake up [closed]

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

Io venni in loco d'ogne luce muto [closed]

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