❪ introlog: #6 ❫ city of secrets

[natha]

You've spent the last few days on Thesa Station, taking in the knowledge that your world is no more. Now, the time to put all your survival training into practice has arrived: El Nysa needs you, and you're here to help the planet thrive. Are you ready? THE DESCENT     All refugees on the station are called to the hangar, where a large-scale teleporter awaits. Simply step onto the space between the arrays and wait; everyone will be sent down to the planet together. Before they depart, all refugees will be given a cold weather survival kit with warm clothing, rations, and bedding. The arrays build into a brilliant wash of light, creating a column that travels all the way from Thesa Station to the surface of El Nysa, teleporting the refugees to the planet on an aurora. Once on the planet's surface, refugees receive one last message from Darma. It has been a long, perilous year for you, refugees. And yet we must ask you to brave further peril. Within Nadril are the secrets to how poor Ysverai's revival was hidden from our sight and how this disaster has come to our star. Find the first refugee from beyond this planet, a man named Magda. He will not speak to us, for much has come between us, but to you… If you prove yourselves, he may be willing to answer your questions. We beseech you, for there is a veil over Nadril that hides all within from us. There may yet be more untold dangers waiting to befall this planet. For the good of all who make this world home, we ask you to lend us your aid. There is yet one more favor we would ask of you. In warding off the Storm's encroachment, the physical aspect of ourselves that you call Thesa Station was damaged. We must remain to continue repairs to El Nysa and to deal with Ysverai, but there should be suitable technology within Nadril that could be used for spare parts. If you have the chance to find it and can return it to us, it would hasten— Darma's message crackles with static, another image overlaying hers — her broadcast is cut off and replaced with another. A more sullen and alien voice takes Darma’s place, overlapping on itself in an ominous reveal. It has been a long, perilous year for you, refugees. And yet you’ve only just arrived here. To say I’m not disappointed in your… generation would be to lie, and I am nothing if not an honest creature. But I suppose these have been unusual circumstances. You must ask yourself this — are you only here as Darma's lapdogs? I can assure you, it's not worth being on the Natha's leash. With time, that will be something you'll have to learn for yourself. If you're so determined to come find Nadril, then follow the path north, and you'll find the border. What awaits you is revelation, if you're up to the challenge. A FROZEN LAND     The refugees land on a literally frozen world, both in temperature and time. Curls of icy wind hold swirls of snow aloft and an uncanny silence is broken only by the crunch of hoarfrost underfoot. Only Darma's protection allows the refugees to move through this frozen world — and movement is very necessary. Bitter cold sneaks through even the thickest clothing and without warning, a snowstorm rises: unnaturally quickly, a wall of white howls directly in the refugee's path. Bizarrely, the way back is perfectly calm; it's obvious that this storm is no product of nature. Magda's challenge becomes clear: the only way to Nadril lies through this storm. Visibility within the storm is near zero, the whiteout hiding any landmarks from view and making navigation near impossible. The only guidance refugees have is a sporadic path of faint, greenish lights, easily lost in the raging storm. Refugees need all the survival skills they practiced on Thesa Station to survive, for getting lost alone is a death sentence. Luckily, those separated from the group can happen upon guiding lights Magda has planted throughout the tundra. These blue-white sparks cause frostbite if handled recklessly, but they also serve as directional anchors, turning into ghostly flames that lead lost souls back to the path to Nadril. The trek through the storm will be no mean feat and will last for the better part of three days. By the time the refugees reach Nadril's gate, most will find themselves exhausted and running on fumes. As the snowstorm dies away and a gap in the glittering forcefield around the city opens to usher the refugees inside, it's clear that Nadril is a different beast. A WARM(?) WELCOME     I. Despite the unforgiving journey, entering Nadril is painless. Once inside, characters will be greeted by their predecessors: the original refugees who made this advanced city. They'll immediately be offered medical attention, as well as warm cider and blankets. But it's obvious that the Nadril citizens prefer higher tech to fend off the weather: they also offer wristlets and ear cuffs that that double as mittens and earmuffs by creating warm bubbles of air. The earrings also feature a few quality of life programs, such as timed alarms and thought-to-speech messaging. However, both programs are in beta stages so it's not unusual for a stray thought to accidentally slip through or an alarm to accidentally ring at an inopportune time. II. Refugees are offered free lodging in a large, crystalline building crafted from ice. Despite the coarse building material, the ice is unmelting and surprisingly well-insulated, and the beds are as warm and cozy. The rooms are, however, small. The sleeping quarters house two people, and are some cross between an igloo and a capsule hotel. Though built for efficiency over comfort, all rooms are also outfitted with the latest Nadril AI, RoboAlfred, or Ralf for short. This helpful program is installed in practically all the furnishings: the closet tells guests to bundle up, the bathroom sink reminds them to brush their teeth, and the mirror offers helpful fashion tips. Ralf's personality matrix still needs polish, though: it may very well insult your clothes and passively-aggressively question your lifestyle choices for the entire stay. III. Though not as advanced as Thesa Station, the colony has technology far beyond the rest of the continent, such as rudimentary AIs and mechanical transportation. Nadril's skyline is a point of pride — refugees can take a (literal) lightrail that gives an aerial view of the colony, which is hewn almost entirely from ice and rock. Despite its tech, Nadril is much more sparsely populated than Olympia and Wyver, and its residents stay near a central hub: a Natha refugee drop ship, Central, which has crashed and long embedded itself into the earth. Central is similar to an older, smaller, grounded model of Thesa Station, in functional order with round-the-clock solar power. Within Central are lounges similar to ones on the Station, though many of the damaged areas have been converted. They include repair stations, different wings dedicated to science, botany, astrology, and mechanics, and a research and history facility, which has a smattering of technology from planets beyond El Nysa — including your own. The staff here don't mind if anything is sampled and studied, but objects cannot be taken from the labs. IV. On the outskirts of the central hub, many will find several curious looking bots with insect-like wings perched about high traffic walkways. Simply passing the bots will cause a dizzying flash before a series of photos print out. Upon closer inspection, people will find that these images reflect stills taken from their home worlds as they remember it. Unfortunately, these photos only last a couple of hours at best. At that time, they will revert back to regular pictures of the refugees. People will be encouraged to share these images of their worlds. The residents of Nadril comprehend the value of remembering one's origins, and will be pleased to see that people still hold memories of old homes close to them. RECREATION IN NADRIL     I. Small, mechanical creatures scampering through the city are a common sight. Ask anyone, and they’ll tell you that they come from a shop called Paws About Town. They’re very useful, as companions, gophers, and couriers (though the more mischievous will note that they’re just small enough to keep tabs on people without being noticed). Premade robotic pets are available on display inside the shop. They come in all shapes, but small sizes; one may be able to find robots that even look like miniature creatures from their homeworld. These are a part of a new, highly customizable line with programmable personalities. Customers have the chance to take pets for a one-day trial run. Those who don’t know how to program may want to enlist more knowledgeable aid, but the pets come with instructional pamphlets for basic personality traits such as obedience, helpfulness, playfulness, and bloodthirst. For returns, the switch to wipe the robot's personality to a blank slate is on the back of its neck, right between a switch to invert all traits, and a switch to have them learn by observing. Try not to press the wrong switch — you might wind up with a pet with a mind of its own! II. A. The Frosty Tap Cantina is a thriving hub of activity, but one of the major draws is the self-service bar: molecular mixology is wildly popular here. Playing with drink compositions can be a game in and of itself, and newcomers to the cantina will find that the bartender — a cheerful woman with lilac skin and three eyes — is always happy to give them a few tips on how to use the wide array of tools within reach of the barstools. All manner of drinks are possible — from glowing, layered cocktails, to clear drinks with colored, spherical bubbles and vividly-colored shots that give off their own smoke. There's a nightly contest in the cantina for the most creative drink created by a team — this may be as good a time as any to partner up with someone and see what can you come up with. Winner gets all their drinks for the night free! And, hey, even if you don't win, you get to drink whatever you make. The well-lubricated patrons of the bar are eager to challenge anyone nearby to a different sort of drinking game… Just how well can you hold your liquor? B. Holo-screens in the cantina are nearly always broadcasting some match or another of a game that looks very much like hockey, albeit played with sticks that light up and a puck that changes shape from time to time. Colonists here merely refer to the game as "the sport," and one of their favored pastimes is betting. However, they don't use currency — they wager dares. Nadril colonists are a tough, weathered lot, and they prefer to speak with actions over silver. Colonists will urge the refugees to take part as well. Common dares range from the ridiculous (lead a sing-a-long, attempt to make someone with a poker face smile) to the suggestive (kiss the person in the cantina you find most attractive, strip off a piece of clothing), to the outright reckless (venture out into the snow for a certain amount of time, and no one will judge if you find some company to keep warm). The colonists are unfazed by even the most insane or tawdry of dares — but you'll certainly be called a killjoy for refusing too often! Why not grab a friend and give it a whirl, or challenge a rival to a dare yourself? THE MISSION     I. On the outskirts of Nadril is the communications tower of the old refugees. This is where Magda resides, monitoring Nadril's technological protections, the extent of the Natha’s influence, and running his own personal projects for El Nysa’s technological advancement. It is isolated, filled with research labs and relics of the past refugees who have come to El Nysa — a living mausoleum of worlds swallowed up by the Storm whose peoples have refused to forget where they came from. Crew photos line the walls of the tower: pictures of alien families and friends, the refugees who came to Nadril before you. Each group of photos gradually becomes smaller in number, and the most recent of the pictures are from half a century ago. Magda's picture can be found among the first group of refugees, an unusually small cluster of photos dating back centuries in El Nysa's past. I have been on this planet for nearly two centuries. Life has come, evolved, and collided in an ever expanding culture. But Darma fears interference, and made this place a prison, with she our warden, stifling the growth of the creatures native to this world rather than encouraging them to flourish. She sent you here for answers in her stead because she knows I'll spurn her, and after seeing what that fool Raysc has wrought, I'll give you them — not for Darma's sake, but because I trust after all the Natha have done to you, you'll understand my decision. Mistakes were made, and I won't hide them. You've made it here so there's some mettle to you, and unlike the Orbiters, I'm not interested in hiding the secrets of the dangers we face. I gave Raysc what he needed to keep his actions hidden from Darma's eyes — what he needed to advance the primitive magics the Natha had doomed him to. It was old Natha tech, Darma's very own used against her. Hilarious, isn't it? Raysc learned of Nadril, and like you, braved the snow to find his way here. He proved his worth and his determination, and he spoke of a brighter future, El Nysa coming into its own, its people realizing their true potential, unhindered by the shackles that had been put upon them. I believed him. He had vision — or so I thought. In truth, he was a fool. A madman. He wasted the opportunity I gave him on his petty vengeance. But not everyone on this planet is such an idiot. Surely you lot aren't. The Natha are hiding things from us — about the Storm, about everything. And here in Nadril, we're going to find all those secrets. What's it going to be? Will you help us, or are you going to stay obedient dogs on Darma's leash? Magda isn't too talkative yet; after all, the new flock of refugees may just be here as eyes and ears for the Orbiters. But what he has said leaves you with plenty to talk about, and if you can earn his trust by helping out around Nadril, he doubtless has a great deal more to reveal. II. Central isn't the only Natha ship that made its way to El Nysa — another, crashed just outside Nadril's borders, is little more than a junk heap. It's here that you'll find the spare parts Darma asked you to retrieve for Thesa Station. What remains of the ship's hull serves as a windbreak, and snow has built up against it, turning the piles of old Natha tech inside into something of a snowy morass. Holes in the deck offer would-be scavengers passage to the ship's innards, barely illuminated with flickering lights — the tech is old, but hardy enough to withstand a crash landing, the severe weather, and the passage of centuries. Deep in the wreck are the remains of living quarters, research labs, VR arenas, mecha bays, cafeterias, and a host of other rooms, many of which may seem familiar from Thesa Station, albeit with a decidedly older feel to what remains of the smooth curves and sleek surfaces of the Natha architecture. Most of the ship's systems are damaged and the technology is nonfunctional, but that just means there's plenty of spare parts to be found. The wreck isn't in the best shape, its structural integrity damaged, and the drifting snow threatens to block off exit routes. Be careful while exploring and be sure to bring a partner. As it turns out, Darma isn't the only one interested in the wreck — Magda is also eager to get his hands on Natha technology. In his own way of taking some responsibility for Raysc, he's asking scavengers to bring him parts, muttering about seeing what he can do about Ysverai's curse. Bring him anything that looks useful, and he may have a chance to succeed, though whether he'll be more effective than the Natha Orbiters is up for debate... FINAL OOC NOTES     An AC-eligible thread with a new character as a participant for 2 NADRIL REP POINTS may be submitted from this log. SUBMIT THE THREAD HERE BY AUGUST 5TH, 11:59 PM EST. As always, feel free to create your own prompts and explore the Nadril location page! There are a variety of activities made available, including fishing and cave exploration! Please direct questions to the questions thread below! Thank you! QUICK NAV premise ● faq ● lore ● map ● npcs taken ● atp/emp ● application ● rep/acp calendar ● hiatus/drops ● modbox [ FULL NAVIGATION ] elnysa nysalogs nysaisles nysaooc elnyan

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tw: suicide

[summertimeblues]

[It's slow going, but she relents. There were some sharp seconds in the pause where he sensed impending pain, and he cracked one eye open to keep locked on hers, ready to brace for it. Yet she's giving him the kindness of keeping his bones unbroken, his feet on the ground, and the photographs to his little old self.

Richie inhales thinly, and joins her in fetching them back up. He plucks up the clown picture like he might a spider. Quickly, before the courage fails him. He shoves it into his coat pocket without a second look. Good riddance, bad rubbish, all that jazz.

He can't help the second glance he gives to hers. Why was she throwing this other kid around? Was that part of her purple-man's cruel orders? Was this a first kill?

Shivers wriggle down his spine at the thought, and he lowers his eyes in shame. She hadn't asked for any of that, but it was frightening to imagine all the same.

He peels up a corner of the remainders. Blackness. Pitch black. Richie frowns, lifting further, and as he looks he remembers the moment with the same fogginess as it came to him in dreams.

Seven muddied, bloodied children in the bowels of a sewage labyrinth. Bill is striking a match, lighting them up in slivers. Their backs and legs and the world behind them melts into the sludgey black, but their faces are white-lit and terrified. There is an eighth child ahead of them, but this one sits limp in the muck. Body bloated from rot and water, face half eaten from a tag team of galactic abomination and the rats seen skittering away in the picture, their tails tiny whips of light against the water and stone. His schoolbooks sit equally fattened and moldy to his side like squishy accordians, soaking up Derry's piss and shit for the month or so before Richie and pals found him. Goodnight to Patrick Hockstetter, adieu, adieu.

He doesn't remember what happened in the sewers. Nothing useful. This much had come back to him in dreams, but that was all she wrote.

Richie pries it off the ground with care, and then takes a peek at the last.

His stern face falls. His eyes go watery and an ugly choke gurgles out of him.]

Oh God no...

[Richie pulls it up and off the snow, unable to take his eyes from it. It shakes with him as he huffs and seethes and tries to hold it in, even as his eyes bulge from the horror of the sight.

This is a grown man in a tub (they have the same hair, don't they? The same nose, even if the crows's feet are new and the squiggles of chest hair is alien to Richie). His head lolls back not in peace, but in a desiccated fear. The water has turned pink from the crosses cut into his wrists. On the wall, painted by fingers in slippery blood, is one word:

"IT"]

[godslay]

[ Gamora should likely be more respectful than she is in that moment; while she doesn't take the pictures, she looks over to see what Richie reveals. The second makes as little sense to her as the first, but she does recognize a dead, rotted body (the size of a child, surrounded by children).

(Standing over bodies just as small as her own, pools of blood that soak her bare feet, yellow and blue on her knife and her hands, finding them days later when the jungle heat has bloated the flesh eroded away by the alien maggots burrowed into their skin, and that was her, this was all her, she did this—)

She snaps to attention with the third photograph. She sees the image of the man in the tub, his wrists slashed open, and— is this worse? Better? How does this horror stand up against the scenes in Richie's other photos? Gamora remembers in her childhood, there were some children discovered in similar positions, because some couldn't handle the fear and pain, and rather than wait to be picked off, they—

It's Richie's reaction that alarms her the most, how he can't tear his eyes from the gore, and he chokes on his own air, his own words. ]

Rich.

[ She doesn't say it with the same edge of before, and she doesn't reach out to snatch away the photo; she sets a hand at his forearm, tries to push it down, to break that invisible string tying Richie's eyes to the bloodied corpse. ]

[summertimeblues]

[Gamora's touch draws him out of the shock. It doesn't go away though, it sits high in his throat with a devil's tail tied around his lungs. His eyes meet hers and lock there. His upper lip twitches through the open gape it lies in.

She pushes the picture down. It hardly matters. The pale form is hovering over her face like a fuzzed projection. A voice comes to save him — Johnny Carson. He even paints on a smile and wrestles back the sob that almost came instead. That gets swallowed down. Talking through a break in face usually mends it before the cracks start spreading.]

Well it's been a night, wouldn't you say, Miss Gamora? Time to tuck the kids in, kiss the missus and tell the smoker's lung, "Not today, fella!" Goodnight all, and thanks for tuning in!

[He gives a little laugh. Johnny's, not his own. Then he makes to turn. Gotta get out of dodge.]

[godslay]

[ It's a joke. A deflection. It takes her by surprise, leaves her blinking at him, but she realizes what he's doing as he babbles; that smile feels as thin as the paper Gamora tore to shreds that she's abandoned on the ground.

Her hand clamps down on his forearm – not hard, but firm. She's not interested in harming him, but she plants her feet in the snow and holds fast. ]

Rich.

[ Again, but pointed. ]

[summertimeblues]

[No such luck, my man.

That frail grin only grows broader. As if eating more of his face might make it more true. He giggles again, shaking his head as he keeps his gaze low, away from her.]

What? What do you want me to say?

[godslay]

[ That giggle is unsettling, unnerving – if only because this kind of defense is so foreign to Gamora. She's seen Peter try to laugh things off, but it's not this.

What does she want him to say? ]

... Give me the photographs.

[summertimeblues]

[The smile closes. A grimace succeeds it, ugly, angry, pressing back against his teeth like it means to bend them inwards.]

I saw yours by accident.

[godslay]

I know.

[ And there's no venom in her voice now. It's not hard and snappish, no bristling in her posture. ]

I don't want to look at them.

[ ... But she doesn't want him to see them, either.

With the hand not holding onto his forearm, she extends an open palm. ]

[summertimeblues]

[He holds for a moment.

She's a hard woman. A dangerous one. But not to him. Never once has she given him reason to doubt her intentions. And what is there to be gained?

He never wants to see Stan like this again. He never got to see him as a grown man, and now he has and wants to vomit. Richie takes his time but the two pictures do press into Gamora's palm. The first remains stowed in his pocket.]

[godslay]

[ She waits. She doesn't press again or make more demands (yet?), and she gives him that moment to stand there with whatever mess must be twisting him up into knots.

(Because she's right there with him, all tangled and full of a pain she'd thought didn't haunt her step so heavily.)

The photos are set into her palm, and it almost surprises her. Instead of commenting on that itself, she folds the images over – back facing out, concealing the horror inside. And then—

She rips them into half. And then quarters. She clenches the pile of glossy prints in her fist until the shreds are practically indistinguishable from any scrap of trash one might find on the street. ]

The one in your pocket.

[summertimeblues]

[The shreds fall just as prettily as snow. She does a more thorough job now than she'd made of her first attempt, fettered with rage it had been. Richie's eyes follow each flutter of paper. So long, flash of rats, scared kids and long shadows. Adios, ceramic tile and waxen skin, water run rosey and wrists undone. He doesn't breathe much easier, but it helps. A kind gesture to be sure.

She asks for the last photo standing. To this, Richie shakes his head. Illogical, but he can't allow it.]

I can't let you touch it.

[godslay]

[ That's confusing more than it is aggravating. ]

Why?

[ Touch it, rather than see it.

What makes this one different? ]

[summertimeblues]

[His lips fold in, pensive.]

The last time...ah. [He breaks into a smile, just as false as the last, and wipes at his forehead.] You see, no matter how I slice it it's not going to make sense, so will you please humor me and let me burn it myself? I'm taking my zippo to it soon as I've got a good garbage bin to light a fire in.

[godslay]

[ She stares at him with that unwavering look for a few seconds longer—

And then nods. ]

Fine.

[ As long as he's really going to get rid of it. ]

You know you don't have to smile like that.

[ Because it's not convincing anybody. ]

[summertimeblues]

Am I smiling?

[He pats his face. Pulls his hand away in horror.]

Oh no! Oh fiddlesticks! What a terrible predicament! What must I do?! I want to be a normal man again!

[godslay]

[ The moment feels too heavy for Gamora to legitimately smile, especially with the thought of her own photos hovering in the periphery of her mind. But— it's almost there. That absurdity of Richie's, the overblown humor that is just so different – it's amusing more than it is infuriating, as it once would have been. Today, she doesn't smile, but the ghost of it is there. ]

Were you ever normal?

[summertimeblues]

[A bit of absurdity can salvage nearly any situation. She doesn't smile back and he never expects her too. Firing back is playing along well enough. He'll take it.]

Well, normal for me.

[He does flash her a smile of genuine mirth now. It dies shortly after. Still a lot of poison sitting in that gut of his, between Gamora's surgeries, the possible murder of her peers, and the shock of having his own skeletons tap dancing out of his closet.

Richie puts a hand over his eyes one last time. It stays put. His eyes are shut underneath.

When he and Ann Takamaki went strolling down memory lane, he passed off the clown in the picture as nothing more than a nightmare, and she'd bought it. But she was young, and that made all the difference. More likely to fight back effectively, yet more likely to die.

Gamora was not as young. Less likely to be a target, particularly considering her career. She's different. Too hard. It could still kill her if it decided she'd seen too much. He doubts she could kill It. Her lethal capabilities were too squarely in the land of the physical. If It came for her, she'd die relying on them.

He's still covering his face as he speaks.]

Gamora? Would you like to hear a funny story?

[godslay]

[ There's an undeniable flicker of relief that catches her off-guard when she sees Richie finally smile – a familiar smile, one with humor that she's accustomed to from him. But the weight of it all snuffs it out as easily as it had come, and Gamora lets it slide away without trying to recapture that brief lightness. She doesn't poke and prod, and she lets Richie hide his eyes in his hand, lets him breathe as long as he needs to, but—

"Would you like to hear a funny story?"

(She has the sneaking suspicion this story won't be very funny.)

She hesitates (though not from reluctance or disinterest), looking at their surroundings. Out, open, exposed – this doesn't feel like the place.

She reaches out to touch his elbow, ever so gently. ]

Not here.

[ Not in the middle of everything. ]

I want to hear it, but not here.

[summertimeblues]

Right, right. [They are in public after all, and making a downright spectacle of themselves. Richie glances to the side and sees a trio of young girls hurriedly looking away, tapping on their phones. He gives another sour laugh.] Can't take a shit around here without nine people knowing what color.

[He thrusts his hands into his pockets and starts towards a nearby tavern. Gonna need some good liquor to battle this one out. And if he can't get the good, he'll take the strong.

Once they're settled inside and there's a pint poured for each, the pair drop down at dim table in the corner, taking refuge under the din of the reveling regulars. Richie takes a long gulp of his slop before speaking.]

Kee-rist, that's pure motor oil if I ever licked the underside of a Chevy. My tongue's gonna be dead meat by the time we get back to civilization.

[Yet he drinks down another gulp. Slower this time, and looking off to the side. The picture's still in his pocket, eating a hole through the side of his coat and into the meat of his brain. He'll need somewhere private to dispose of it, and he'll do it soon. Just not here.]

All right. So even if I was to keep it sweet and simple, I have to start with Bill and Georgie Denbrough. Bill was my best bud as a kid. 1958, we were about ten? Ten years old for sure. And his little brother George was a pipsqueak still, just six or so and pocket-sized. Cute lil' bugger.

That fall, they found George dead by a sewer drain. His arm had been torn off, and he'd died of either shock or exsanguination not too long after. No one saw what happened, even though it was in the middle of the damn street.

[godslay]

[ A dingy bar and a couple of dubious glasses of alcohol seems to be the cure to the cold and their little public ordeal earlier. Unlike Richie, she isn't immediately downing her booze – but she's also not the one preparing to spill their guts across the table. Her thumb runs along the condensation on the side of her glass, watching the human's face with intensity, focus; her attention is given solely to Richie, aside from the occasional assessment of their surroundings from her periphery.

(She can't help it – always watching her immediate space, checking exits, tracking movement.)

But she doesn't dare interrupt Richie as he starts in on his "funny story."

Boys. Kids. The year means nothing to her, but their age – she can understand that. Young, is what she gathers.

But that tragedy, the gruesomeness of it gives Gamora pause. Her finger stills on the side of her glass, her eyes narrowing ever so slightly.

(Not suspicion, but a wary curiosity.) ]

No one ever found what was responsible?

[summertimeblues]

[Richie smiles wide. It's not the brittle brightness of earlier, or the considerate appreciation of her attention. It's bitter and ugly, and for the brief moment that he locks eyes with her the expression burns in its kilowatt shine.]

They thought they did, after a time. But that's another story, and methinks I've only got the one in me today.

[He shakes his head and carries on, fingers drumming the edge of his pint glass. But the words come easier now. They float on the rise and fall of a narrator on air. He's a natural performer. A skill that helps him hide his soft spots even as he peels back the bandages and bares them wholesale.]

You take it to the next summer and then there's a body count. Every so often some kid will go missing, and only a couple get found. None of them get open casket funerals, if you catch my drift. It's ugly business and us kids have to follow a curfew, folks are calling for the cops to catch the culprit. But there's a real placid feel around town in between the outrage. Life carries on as usual, especially if you're a kid.

One day, me and four other boys are building a dam out in the Barrens, a big old reedy spot where the sewage drains to the river that leads out to sea. And we're shooting the shit, smoking and being mighty proud of our work, and Bill steps up and says he gots to tell us something. The kid's got a wicked stutter and he's paler than paper, so we know it's no jokes.

He says that one night, he'd been in George's old room looking through his photo album. When he came to George's last school picture, his baby brother unfroze in the frame and winked. He says that there was blood coming out around the edges, and that he threw the book off and ran away.

[Richie's fingers lace together, propping up his chin.]

None of us know what to say. My home, it's not like any of this, you know? It runs neat and tidy. No aliens, no magic spells, gravity keeps you down and the dead stay dead. You understand? So we think he must have had a bad dream, imagined some things.

But then another kid, Big Ben, he pipes up. He says he saw something that creeped the pants right off him. He'd been walking home alone in the cold of winter and he sees a clown coming over the ice of the canal. It's got balloons and they start floating towards him — against the wind. And when it gets close he realizes the face is off. It's all done up in bandages and dried up like a mummy, and it's calling his name.

So now Eds is getting worked up too. Little Eds says he was crawling around this old wrecked house on Neibolt street, seeing where the hobos took up bed and breakfast under the porch and in the cellar. And a leper jumps out of nowhere — a leper has a disease that makes all the flesh on you rot clean off the bone, and Eddie here is a hypochondriac, can't stand the thought that he might get sick from rolling in mud or scraping knees or any of the normal things a kid might do. And this walking wound starts heckling him. Hey kid, how about a blowjob? I'll do it for a dime, I'll do it any time.

[(The voice comes to him without thought, and that has him pausing a moment. If Eddie were awake and punching back pints with them he'd have shrieked aloud. It's the leper's greasy rasp exactly. Richie has no way to know this for certain, so he can only keep on going.)]

Eds says he made a break for it when the guy made chase, and that the flowers and grass shrivelled up black where it touched them.

By now I'm thinking they're all crazy, and our last man Stan is losing his mind and insisting none of this can be real. But he's going white and we ask if he's seen anything, and he nearly hits full hysteria, which can only mean yes. We don't get to hear his story though. The cops come bust up our dam and we've all gotta go home to momma before we make a bigger ruckus.

And I'm walking home with Bill, and I'm mulling it all over. The strangest thing I'd known was a dream I'd had. I'd day dozed on a bench and the town statue came alive before me, a twenty-foot lumberjack of legend with an axe that's swinging after my heels, telling me he's gonna eat me right up. But at that point, I'm sure that's just a funny dream.

[The crucial phrase being "at that point." Gamora is no dummy, she'll have the gist by now. He looks to her again, face wiped clear of irony and ire.]

So...I ask Bill to show me the photo album.

[godslay]

[ If there's one thing Gamora's good at, it's listening. It used to be a skill applied purely for her own advantage, but it's served her well bonding with others, learning their stories. She's gotten bits and pieces from Peter over bottles of liquor, ramblings from Rocket, reminiscence with Drax. She commits it all to memory when it comes from someone important.

Of the people Gamora's met since waking, Richie is at least closer to important than the other refugees.

(She has such a hard time letting anyone close.)

And now, in this dusty bar, she hangs on every word. That voice, though, of some decrepit leper, almost makes her shudder – but even then, she doesn't interrupt. Bill, Eddie, George, Ben, Stan. She's remembering these names as Richie goes on.

Finally, her eyes flicker down to where Richie's pockets must be under the table. ]

That photograph?

[summertimeblues]

[Her stillness helps. He does feel studied. Not quite clinical, but there's an assessment going on behind the calm dark of her eyes, the immovable line of her lips. Her attention is rapt and mysterious and compels him to crank the gates open another inch, another foot.

Can he trust her? Maybe not with some things. He has no doubt her missives and her training would tell her to ditch his ass if it meant some greater good could be gained. But with this?

Perhaps.

Richie holds her gaze for a moment longer. Then he fishes the photo out of his pocket, careful to only touch the edges as he showcases it between their pints.]

George's school picture was missing. But he collected old timey pictures. There was one of our home town some thirty years prior, just of the street and the canal bridge. And when we looked at it two little boys who had never been there before were coming in the corner, and they looked just like us. That's Bill. [He points to the boy in the sailor suit, hefted by the neck.] That's me. [The bespectacled boy in the cap, caught in a mute scream.] And that's George's face. [The painted, eyeless head atop the clown's shoulders. His fingers never touch the surface.]

Bill screamed and put his hand out like he could reach in and stop it. And he nearly did. His fingers punched through the plastic. They turned cream colored like the skin of the people in the picture. They bent at a funny angle, like a reflection in a pool. And when I yanked him back his fingers had been cut near to the bone.

[He holds there. Then, decisively, turns the picture over. The white back seems to glow in the seedy grime-caked lights. Turn me over! I've got so much more to show you! So much more kids, you won't believe your eyes! They'll pop right out of your skull.]

The next week he asked me to come check out that wrecked house with him. He brought his daddy's gun and he was going to put an end to the horror mauling up kids. He wanted to bring justice to George.

[His lips purse. His jaw locks up tight.]

The bullet hit. Bits of its skull came off, but it didn't hurt it. And over the course of the summer, we came to understand that this was a monster that didn't deal in the realm of reality. It's tricks and illusions and magic and all that shit you stop believing in as a grown up. And so the grown ups couldn't see it, couldn't sense it, and even as kids you couldn't see it unless it was coming for you. They might hear it. But only the ones it wants dead get the privilege. And it would do all ages, you bet, meat's meat and a free meal can't be beat. But kids? Kid's fears are easy. They're potent. They're ripe and they're easy. It only comes for the adults when the year of feasting is done. Usually something hateful stirs up around town, like those mists that came in during the riots. Amplifying the hate, whatever ugliness already lives in you. It stirs itself up a massacre, takes its pickings, and then goes to sleep for another twenty seven years, and the people all forget.

[He leans forward, touching two fingers to Gamora's forehead.] It pulls all its shapes from out of here. Whatever you hate the most. Fear the most. Private things you never confessed to anyone. And it makes them flesh and blood, and man's weapons won't do shit all against them. You have to fight like with like — and even that's a gamble. You have to believe the legends about how a silver bullet will kill a werewolf. You have to know in your gut they're true as you let that slug fly, or they're gonna paint wounds on like a decoration and it will still be coming after you. And none of it makes proper sense.

My friend Stan? The only reason he escaped is because he watched birds for a hobby. And when he was locked in the standpipe with it, and he could hear the squishing feet of drowned kids coming down the stairs for him, begging him to come play with him, he began shouting out the names of the birds he watches. Then the door popped open and he could run free. When we went to that house—

[Richie wets his lips, gives another little laugh, ain't it crazy folks? Ain't it wild?] —when it came to us then, it was the werewolf I'd seen in the movie theatre that weekend. It was that shape for me, and it was the clown for Bill. And the only reason we got out, when it was yanking Bill's ankles as I yanked his wrists, trying to wrestle him out the basement window, was because I did a voice. I didn't even think about it. It was ripped out of me and it sounded nothing like what an eleven year old boy could do. And I hollered at it to let go, pretending to be this old Irish cop that farted around town in those days, and it screamed in pain and let go.

We spent the rest of the summer hunting for a way to end it for good. And we thought we did, but...another twenty seven years roll around, and our imagination's all dimmed, we've forgotten everything that happened, we've forgotten each other. But it starts killing again, and we start to recall. It leaves little love notes for us by its new bodies. It left George's school picture by one. It never forgot. And we — I still don't have the full picture. I don't remember the final rules of engagement. I don't remember what we did to make it stop.

[godslay]

[ It's a lot to take in – and that's putting it mildly. Gamora is used to her own shade of unkillable nightmares, of beings with more power than anyone should rightfully have, but this... this is something else.

She only looks away from Richie to examine the photograph, the horror on the little boys' faces, the eyeless monster of a twisted child. She briefly takes note of Richie's younger self, with his big glasses and big teeth, until the picture is turned and the image hidden away to bore holes in the table.

She doesn't pull back when Richie leans in, barely touching her forehead – a vague brush of contact that she allows – with no question or reprimand. It's almost funny how readily she accepts that something like this creature could exist, whatever it is and however it functions, but instead of rejecting it, she wants to know how to deal with it.

Or, well, maybe they don't have to. Maybe that was some mercy of the Storm, that it's banished this monster and left it without a host or home. ]

But it's stopped now.

[ She says this carefully, slowly. ]

It would have been destroyed along with your Earth, wouldn't it?

[summertimeblues]

[To that, he gives a jaunty cant of the head and a whimsical sigh.]

Oh would that it were so!

[One of his radio voices, a Shakespearean knockoff in the vein of a bratty Romeo.]

You know better than to expect reason from the Orbiters. It's sleeping upstairs. Same as your Purple Pappy.