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singillppl2024-04-06 07:44 pm
singmod) wrote in singillppl2024-04-06 07:44 pm
Entry tags:
April 2024 Test Drive Meme
APRIL 2024 TDM
PROMPT ONE — ARRIVAL: METHUSELAH'S FEAST: Yet another new group of arrivals find themselves lost in the frozen wilds and vulnerable to the dangers of nature. With luck, they make it to the town of Milton, and to a friendly face offering food, warmth and shelter — not to mention the fact they are not the first to come here.
PROMPT TWO — FROM FROTH-CORRUPTED LUNGS: The heavy fog plaguing the Northern Territories takes a far more deadly and sinister turn.
PROMPT THREE — SHARP CLAWS, YAWNING MAWS: Interlopers come face to face with another native animal to the Northern Territories stalking the rockier areas — and unfortunately, these feline beasts have also been warped by the Aurora.
ARRIVAL: METHUSELAH'S FEAST
WHEN: Mid-month.
WHERE: Milton, Milton Outskirts.
CONTENT WARNINGS: potential animal attacks, potential injuries, potential cold injuries/hyperthermia risk.
'You are the Interloper. You are not part of nature’s design.'
It’s the last thing you hear. A dark, deep voice. Impossibly ancient. You feel afraid. Maybe you’re dreaming, maybe you’re wide awake. You saw the lights, and then your world went dark. But you hear it in the blackness, you won’t forget those words.
You awaken. You are not where you were before. It’s different for everyone, there doesn’t seem to be much of a pattern in where you find yourself. You may open your eyes to find yourself in a cold, dim and dank cabin. The air is stale, dust hangs in the rays of weak sunlight that shine through the tiny windows. Someone lived here once, but they aren’t to be found. You look around, it seems like no one has been here in several weeks, maybe longer. The fire is stone cold, the dishes in the sink are mouldy — it's possible the place has been ransacked, as if they've gone through the drawers and cupboards looking for something. It is quiet. The wood creaks around you. Or perhaps you may awaken to find yourself shivering in the yawning maw of a cave, the freezing stone below you. Or maybe you’re unfortunate enough to sit up to find yourself lying in the snow, in the middle of the wilderness. Snow lies thick around you. It’s freezing out. You haven’t felt a cold like this before in your entire life. Cruel and biting. You have no idea where you are, and what’s worse — you are completely alone.
You may feel different, too. Any powers or magics you may have feel... absent. Disconnected. Things that may not have affected you previously now do. Something in you has changed.
You know you can’t stay where you are. You’ll need to move, try to work out where you are and how you came to be here. So you walk, head out into the unknown, in hope of finding a trail or a road. Interlopers who arrive during the month of April will find themselves waking up in a world filled with freezing cold fog, cold enough that it will feel as if your skin is burning. A kind of cold that will not shake easily. It will be easy to get lost in the fog. Best hope there's someone out here that might come across you to help you find your way.
Soon enough, you'll be able to find a path to town. A little more worse for wear, but alive. It’s here you may find someone else in the same boat as yourself, equally freezing and confused — battered from the journey. You’ll both need to keep going. It won’t be easy. You hear howls of wolves around you, and the terrain is difficult: slips and falls are likely. You’re completely vulnerable out here in the open.
Or it’s possible you may come across someone else here. Someone who looks far better prepared to deal with the freezing cold and frozen landscape, out hunting or gathering. They’ll likely offer help and get you into town. However, for the unlucky ones who don’t come across anyone, you’ll carry on until you smell it through the fog: the scent of smoke that seems to cling in the still air. Fire. Not just one, but several perhaps. Civilization...?
Follow it, and soon enough the way you’ve taken will certainly become a path or road. Unfolding before you in the foggy mountainous forests, you’ll see the most welcome of sights, even if it may appear a little eerie in the half-light gloom: a small mining town tucked up in the valley. Battered, rusted road signs will direct to “MILTON, POP. 947”. You’re almost there, you keep going, and it looks like other people have had the same idea as you. In fact, you’ll hear the muffled sounds of life. People! In the town!
As you head into the outskirts and then further into town, you’ll find it’s a little easier to walk but the cold has gripped you hard. You’ll find the buildings, both shops and homes, some are dark and lifeless, some of them are boarded up, some of them are occupied. People are going about their business, or stood watching from their tiny porches of their small, timber homes. For a town this big, there doesn’t seem to be many people. Several dozen at most, but no more. Some of them will direct you to the Community Hall, tell you to head there — you've been expected.
Towards the center of town, you’ll find the building where many people seem to gather: a community hall, by the looks of it. You’ll find more and more people all drawn to this place, each and every one of them in the same position as yourself (and your companion, if you’ve found one). Some are in worse states than others: some are bloodied, nursing bite wounds or cuts; others might have some other kind of injury sustained in the journey here from falls. Everyone looks as though they could faint from the cold at any second, damp and shivering.
The door opens, and you’re greeted by the gnarled, wizened face of an elderly man, dressed in thick furs. He has a kind face, but looks sad. He smiles warmly despite the sadness in him, and with pity, ushering you in with haste.
“Another batch of poor souls from the wilds, this fog has made it so difficult.” he nods gravely. No, this is not the first time that this has happened. “I am Methuselah. I welcome you Newcomer, although I’m sorry for how you’ve come to find yourself here. The lights are changing things, bringing more of you here. Come, we must get you warm and fed. Mother Nature has not been kind.”
The room is dim, lit only by natural daylight through the windows. A roaring fire sits at one end of the huge hall. It crackles, bright and cheerful... and warm. Even as big as this place is, the room is pleasantly warm. You’ll also find basic cots set up down one side of the hall, and while it seems there's a few people already living here, there's enough space for those in need of them. There's places to rest for a moment and get your bearings, or just trying to recover from the cold. Down the other side are tables and chairs, and long tables laden with food, drinks and bottled water similar to one might find at a soup kitchen. Once again, Methuselah offers a feast, aided by some of the other Interlopers.
There are canisters with hot herbal teas and perhaps a rare canister of coffee, along with soup and stew and trays of charred deer and rabbit meats, plus some grilled fish, instant mashed potatoes, and tinned vegetables. It’s very basic, but it’s hot and filling. A feast. The old man has been busy. And Methuselah will continue to busy himself, still; there is plenty to do. He will fetch blankets, tend to wounds, serve food and drinks. He does not have much time to talk. More and more people seem to be coming in from the cold. He will not stop to sit and rest until everyone is seen to, taking up a place by the fire to gaze silently into its flames. He is very troubled, thoughtful. Much has been happening. The others from town will eventually trail in too, to eat and warm themselves, and search among the new faces.
He will encourage newcomers to get warm and eat, and when they are ready to — they can explore the town and find one of the many empty homes to call their own. He will not speak much, his mood is... low, mournful. But perhaps you might be able to get some answers from those fellow arrivals who’ve been in this place for some time now.
FROM FROTH-CORRUPTED LUNGS
WHEN: The month of April.
WHERE: Everywhere.
CONTENT WARNINGS: supernatural/extreme weather; poisonous fog; potential respiratory/lung-related illness/injury; potential burn injuries; themes of peril
A thick fog has descended onto the Northern Territories as April comes, often difficult to navigate in and a kind of cloying damp that often brings a certain kind of wicked chill to Interlopers out travelling in it. The kind that sinks in one’s bones and takes too long to be chased away with heat and dry clothes. Sometimes, it feels almost suffocating, like it’s exhausting to be out in it — as if one might feel more like they’re underwater than on dry land, struggling to breathe if they’re out in it for too long.
It’s certainly a miserable affair for those in this world, the cold was bad enough without this.
And certainly, it can get even worse.
Maybe it’s a trick of the light, the strange thickness of the fog in the pale Spring light, but you notice in certain patches there’s… an almost green tint to the fog. You don’t have time to look at it for long. It descends upon you with a fluid steadiness, silent in its approach.
To touch the fog with bare skin, a hand, even the exposed face — you will be met with a sudden burning pain, far different to the biting cold pain of the rest of the fog. As soon as the green fog comes into contact with you, it slowly begins to burn at you — searing away at any flesh, a slow and terrible experience.
To breathe it in will be an even worse experience: it will feel as if one is slowly inhaling tiny fragments of glass, and each breath will be painful and suffocating. Coughing up blood is likely, and being out in it for too long will bring a slow, agonising death of suffocation.
Heading indoors is the best bet to ensure survival, with plugging up any doors and windows or drafty spaces to ensure the fog doesn’t seep inside. After that, it seems like the only thing you can do is wait it out. Hopefully you're stuck inside with a friendly face, and somewhere with a fire. Otherwise, it's going to be a bad time trapped inside waiting it out. The fog will eventually dissipate, and all that Interlopers will be able to see is the usual cold fog — but that could take hours of waiting.
Burns to the skin can be treated with typical medical care, and bathing the wounds will cleanse them of any lingering poison, but Interlopers should take care of signs of infection in the days afterwards. For those who suffer from inhalation of this green fog, Methuselah will direct them to Reishi mushrooms — known for their antibiotic healing properties and can be found in abundance in the world. Interlopers will find that breathing in the steam from boiling and steeping these mushrooms in water will soothe their lungs and help in the healing process.
SHARP CLAWS, YAWNING MAWS
WHEN: April, onwards.
WHERE: Milton wilds; Milton Mines (Lakeside Entrance) area; The Ravine area.
CONTENT WARNINGS: animal attacks, altered wildlife, gore, possible character injury/death, possible animal injury/death.
Certain kinds of wildcats are native to Canada and thus the Northern Territories. They are elusive animals, often keeping to themselves and have largely gone unseen by the Interlopers during their time here in this world. But the world is changing, and it has long been understood that wildlife has been altered due to the Aurora’s influence — particularly with wolves. Unfortunately, these solitary and evasive felines will not remain this way for long.
The wildcats tend to stick to the more mountainous areas of the Northern Territories: Milton’s outskirts being a primary example of this, but also the sheltered and rocky passage Interlopers must take if they are to travel through the mines and down the train tracks that lead into Lakeside. It is here in particular that they make their appearance with the recent footfall between the areas.
For newer Interlopers, it is a frightening sight. For some Interlopers who have been in this world for some time, it is an all too familiar sight to behold but no less terrifying. These beasts are warped by the Aurora and are far bigger and faster than any usual wildcat, with huge, hulking bodies, elongated fangs and unlike wolves: they can climb. Green, glowing smoke curls from their bodies and eyes, a kind of electrical current rippling over their coats with a strange shimmer. They lurk from above and wait for the opportune moment to strike — a far more silent and deadly attack than the wolf packs of last year. But if you’re paying attention, you might be able to spot them before they make their move.
These altered beasts will come no more than three at a time, but will usually attack alone. They will work with a frenzied determination to bring you down and make you their next meal. Cats, after all, are obligate carnivores. They will enjoy giving chase, and running will be the worst thing to do in dealing with them. It is best to stand your ground and try to fight back this way.
They are frightened of flames, and loud noises from gunfire or flares will keep them at a distance — but it’ll take a decent amount of ammunition to take them down, much like their canine counterparts Interlopers already encountered. Taking one down will be no small feat, but there will likely be the reward of a thick, warm pelt for those interested.
FAQs
1. Arrival threads can be treated as game canon.
2. Items characters have brought from home can be found either strewn around them when they awaken, or in the community hall — as if someone left them out for them to collect. Methuselah will not know how they got there, and will be quite bemused by the happenings.
3. Reminder that all characters are now depowered upon arrival. They can choose not to notice it at first, or can immediately sense something is different about them.
4. If asked any personal questions, Methuselah will smile and say "Oh, you don't want to know about an old man like me. But I have lived all over in these parts for all my life." He will be more concerned with trying to help Newcomers, and is genuinely concerned for them and their well-being. Other Interlopers will say much of the same — there's little to know about him.
5. More information about Milton can be found here.
1. Skin open to the elements is at the most risk of being burned, so it's best to wrap up/cover any bare skin. Covered skin would eventually burn if Interlopers spent enough time in the fog to have their clothes saturated by the damp.
2. Breathing in the fog is the most pressing issue for everyone as a whole. The green fog can affect Interlopers who don't breathe.
1. Bobcat, Canada Lynx, and Cougar are the three kinds of wildcat native to Canada. Due to the Aurora's influence, these wildcats are bigger, faster and stronger than typical wildcats — with Cougars being the largest of the three.
2. Killing them is difficult, but not impossible. Scaring them will be far easier to accomplish than killing them.
3. Wildcat activity will continue onwards from April, but will reduce with the Interlopers' efforts to fight them back.
4. Wildcat is technically edible. But not advised due to parasites. Characters are still welcome to harvest the wildcats they kill, however.
no subject
She does, certainly, although none of his names have slipped easily past her lips since she arrived here. Not much about home has; a handful of people know the name Waverly, a more select group would recognize the name Willa. Little calls her Miss Earp without having any idea of the bloody history which follows that name like an especially loyal but unwanted hound.
There's no possibility of looking anywhere but his face, even as she clocks the rusty red smudges on his fingers, the white towel falling to the floor. He looks a little more weathered than she remembers, but then again, she must, too. Someone moves past them and brings a waft of his scent with them; she breathes in, smells the clean snap of fresh snow, the slightly acrid warmth of tobacco smoke. Cotton, warmed from laying close to the skin. He looks to her arm, asks that question, tacks little dove at the end of it like he just saw her yesterday, easy as if this were the kitchen of the homestead. Her throat works. "Ran into a bunch of asshole hippies with rifles and annoyingly good aim. It's fine, it's— "
It's the furthest thing from fine it could be. All of this is, has been; she's been profoundly alone since arriving and even after winning the good will of some of the people here — she's befriended some, grown even closer with others, she has people here but she hasn't had home. She hasn't had Waverly or Dolls and she hasn't had him. No one here knows her the way Doc does; no one here can look at her the way he's looking at her now, like he's seeing beneath skin and bone to the truth of her beneath and she takes the last two steps in a rush, her good arm curving around him as she presses herself to him, less an embrace than avalanche, a sudden and inexorable, inevitable break in the invisible barrier that had kept her back. She's simply abiding by gravity's laws when her cheek comes up against his chest and her eyes squeeze shut. "Doc. You're here."
A fact she hates and loves in equal measure. She'd give anything to see him go, so long as he'd be going back home, but even so her grip on the back of his vest is iron as a closed beartrap. The last thing she wants is for him to be here. The last thing she wants is to let him go.
no subject
"I've got you, love," he murmurs-assures-promises as he embraces her in a way she might not allow herself to even if she wasn't injured. "S'alright now." Well, that remains to be seen, but what is a man to say? He knows nothing of this place and what it has inflicted upon these people. He might struggle to bear his heart and his soul fully to her, but he doesn't know that she's been here longer than a foul night, doesn't distrust or harbour any doubt that she is who she appears to be.
Brushing chapped lips against her forehead, he wraps his arms around her, careful to slip his hand under and around her injured arm so as to not cause her any more grief. Taking in a deep breath, he freely dispenses some comforting rubs up and down her back before sliding his hand up into her hair, giving the back of her head a few pats as she listens to the wild gallop of his heartbeat pounding away in his chest.
'tis not quite what he thought he would be doing tonight, holding her, two small steps short of slow dancing in the gathering hall. But he knows only too well how painfully brief the good times can last, and he's not looking this wildest and rarest of mustangs of a gift that he's managed to lasso anywhere except to make sure that they don't inadvertently end up too close to the fire.
no subject
He'd been so fearful of dying that he'd made a deal to stave it off indefinitely — that's what she's thinking as she listens to his heart run rampant in his chest. He can't be here, where death lurks around every corner. Not the lingering dissolution of tuberculosis, but death sudden and bloody at the jaws of a wolf, or sudden and cold in the glance of the Darkwalker, a thing none of them yet understand. He touches her tenderly, his hand warm at her back, in her hair, curved against her head, his lips gentle at her forehead and she's too astonished at his sudden appearance to realize: he's never touched her this way before. Nowhere in their abrupt assignation in the woods had this gentleness made itself known.
Her brow flickers under the brush of his lips; her eyes squeeze tighter before she forces herself to pull away. Not fully — her good hand comes to rest on his chest, and her arm is bent between them — but enough to meet his eyes, her own careful under that still-pintucked brow. "Are you okay?"
For the first time, she looks him over, head to toe, checking. Looking for wounds, for torn clothing, for any sign of him standing any less easily than he ever does. "Didn't run into any wolves, any weird fog, that sort of shit?"
no subject
"Perfectly." Perfectly pretending to be okay, that is, but he will get there he thinks, once he gets the lay of the land. Although when he finds out that she can't remember all that time they had spent together after their brief tryst in amidst the trees, he is most certainly not going to be okay.
He rubs her arm again, tries to assuage her of all those worries that have her eyes roaming every part of his body that she can see.
"Hadn't noticed," he lies, smooth-talking his way out of her concern as he briefly brushes the backs of his curled fingers against her cheek, again affectionate in a way she might not remember him being capable of. She doesn't feel too cold to the touch, but it won't do them any harm to linger by the fire a little longer. There may be wolves at the door. Fog too. And maybe gun-toting... hippies? But he doesn't want her worrying about anything that they can work together to keep at bay.
"You must have had quite a day. You oughta put some food in you. And coffee."
no subject
The last time she saw him, she blew him off, too scared of the possibility that what they had could actually have been more than one desperate roll in the woods together. He'd shown up and she'd taken flight like a flock of startled birds. There've been times, here, when she's been alone in her little cabin in the middle of the night, the other side of the bed she'd claimed for herself cold and empty, when she'd regretted that kneejerk reaction, the way she sideslipped any possibility of... anything more. She'd thought about it a lot. How he looked, what he said. How he carefully stayed back from her once she made her call.
A gesture like this, as simple as his knuckles lightly brushing over her cheek, was never part of the equation. There's a heartbeat where she leans into it, toward him, a flower desperate for sunlight, before she laughs, awkward, and steps back, her glance cutting to the side. "A day, yeah... Doc, I've been here six months."
Six months where she hasn't seen anyone from home, until now, and as much as she wants to press herself back into his arms... well, it's not like anything between them has changed, since then. She's still drawn to him like iron filings to a magnet. She's still wary of anything beyond a romp in the woods. "There's stuff going on here that would make Bobo shit his pants."
It's not impossible that he could have made it here unscathed, but she glances over him again, anyway, the way a man in the desert might continually glance at a mirage of an oasis. Knowing it's out of reach; wanting it anyway. "I've got food and coffee back at my cabin. We can talk better there... if this goddamn fog doesn't keep us all crammed in here."
no subject
Suddenly the invitation to her home - one he would have accepted without hesitation and let one thing happen after another the way they so often happen between them - feels like a suffocating trap he is too claustrophobic to walk into. He saw her only yesterday. And they have hardly made any mention of Bobo since her mercy and her grace compelled her to shoot him in the head.
He can put himself in her boots for a brief moment. Six months of not having seen him. And nary any other familiar face in sight, so. Perhaps alone all this time. And too stubborn, too prideful to ask for help until she can't do without it, the way all the Earps are wont to be.
He can sympathise. But he wasn't born yesterday. She might feel and smell and sound like Wynonna. Maybe she even is Wynonna. But she's not... yesterday's Wynonna. His Wynonna, if that even makes sense at all. Lord knows she would never let him call her that out loud.
"Why use your supplies when we have such a gracious host? Perhaps we can find a quieter corner to speak."
no subject
Wynonna, on the other hand— she hasn't quite mastered the art of keeping her emotions from flickering behind her eyes, shading the corner of her mouth. Confusion, surprise, wariness, cautious longing; they all flutter subtly over her features, shuffling like cards in a deck. "Yeah. Yeah, okay."
If she turns to retrieve food or coffee, will he be gone when she looks around again? Is this just another trick this place is playing on her, like the shadow she'd thought was Willa but turned out only to be herself? But she can't stand here looking at him forever. She tests it by glancing to first one side, then the other, only to reach out and curl her fingers around his arm when she spots a space, a quiet corner tucked away between the fireplace and an old bookshelf. There's even an armchair open, and she pushes into motion, bringing him along with her toward it.
A little push at the end as she lets go of him, and she says: "Sit." She didn't just get here; he can have the comfy chair. "I'll grab some coffee."
no subject
Should shit go sideways he's going to have trouble pulling his Colt out of its holster if he sinks into that chair. But he doesn't want to refuse and make his wariness and distrust of her known, or take his revolver out now and risk setting fire to a rapidly increasingly escalating, uncertain situation. He has to think fast and act cool, be very cautious with his next moves until he can figure out just what the hell is going on.
"Thank you," he replies quietly as he moves to the armchair. With his hands on his hips he turns around to face the open area of the hall, and then slowly starts to unbuckle his gun belt. He can hang it and his revolver up over the backrest at just the right angle so that he has easy enough access without looking like he's prepping himself for a reenactment of the OK Corral.
"Can we smoke in here?" Doc asks when she returns to the armchair. He's not the saddest little puppy she can find in the window, but this old dog is definitely still there right where she told him to sit. "I should like to hear more about the last six months, if you feel so inclined to share." And he's going to need a cigarillo to get through this tale. Coffee alone might not be strong enough.
no subject
March might come out of nowhere to bum a cigarillo, but that's a problem to deal with if it happens, and only then. Wynonna blows out a breath, slouching in her seat. "The last six months, right."
Which pings all wrong even as she says it. He'd been surprised — shocked, hearing that she'd been here that long. Has she not been missing that entire time? "When I got here... I don't know. I thought maybe I was dead. Peacemaker doesn't work right, and there are people here who should be dead. But I'm not so sure, anymore."
She curls her left hand around the warm mug, settling it on her thigh as she watches the steam lift. "The shit that goes on here... there's this house, not far from here. When you went in, the whole thing went up in flames. And it felt real, Doc. I'm talking collapsing floors, smoke inhalation, the works. But it was all just because the ghost of some little kid got scared and kept burning his house down, over and over again."
He'd clung to her and she'd felt his tears just like she'd felt the flames baking the air around them, and then there had been nothing and her arms had been as cold and empty as the house itself. "There were these... shadows. Following people around, sucking the life out of them. And that's without even getting into the wolves, and the weather, and the... whatever the hell it is that scared a bunch of people to death a couple of months ago."
no subject
There's no interjections or questions while she talks. He lights his cigarillo discreetly and smokes like he's in his own armchair or on his own porch, comfortable but somewhat deep in thought. She has most definitely not been missing for the last six months. And he has no recollection of what she's talking about either.
Time is a curious thing. All those one hundred and thirty years had passed so slowly in the well. Sometimes he wished he could simply sleep the years away. Now he's trying to make sense of everything she's telling him, half-baked theories swirling in his head about phantom pyromaniacs and ominous shadow monsters. For a brief moment he even considers going along with what she's telling him. Pretending she'd been gone all this time and they had looked, to no avail. It might have been kinder than the truth.
But the truth will surface eventually. And Doc isn't so certain that the kinder fate would be to hurt her later rather than hurt her now.
"Scared to death?" He scoffs but as he lowers his coffee from his lips, his expression turns serious. He smooths his finger and thumb over his moustache. For now he would rather focus on the immediate problem at hand. "A most vexing place we have found ourselves in indeed. Have you encountered anyone else from Purgatory?"
no subject
He runs his fingers over his mustache and it's such a familiar gesture, one she hasn't seen in so long; the sudden ache it produces under her breastbone is tight as a fist. Regardless of that little huff of breath, he's taking her seriously... but then, Doc usually did. Right, wrong, overreacting; he'd listened to her. Let her vent herself out. He'd watch her with those inscrutable blue eyes, just like he is now, and then he'd work the problem with her... usually. Working his way toward... what was it he'd suggested he could be? A trusted confidante.
She shakes her head at him, finally lifting her coffee for a sip. "No. And I was kind of hoping I wouldn't."
A second's breathing space, before she's rolling her eyes at herself and amending. "Not because I don't want... this place is the worst. It tries to kill us practically every damn day, in new and fun ways. Having someone here, from home, someone I care about..."
Like, for example, the man slouched in the chair across from her, smoking his cigarillo and conversing in a voice she's only heard lately in dreams. "You have no idea how glad I am to see you. But I hate that you're here. Purgatory might not be safe, but it's a hell of a lot easier to stay alive there than here."
no subject
He's not going to judge the expertise of the doctor here, especially when he doesn't know a thing about anybody here, or how things are run. Stranger things have happened in Purgatory. It's now just another environmental hazard they're going to have to be careful about.
"Of course. And I don't mean to undermine any of 'em. They can take care of themselves just fine. One less person to worry about s'all." He's careful not to include or exclude himself from the list of people she cares about. Difficult as it might be to feel like he can trust her with his life - and he trusts her with so much more - but also know that she doesn't trust him yet. He hasn't considered that, if he was in her shoes, would he want to know what she is keeping from him? The kneejerk answer might be yes, of course. But she might also think he's lying, and he doesn't want to alienate her.
"And I am relieved to see you too." In one piece, no less. "Let's see to it, to make this place a little safer." It's not so simple as to just lock themselves away in a corner of town with a mountain of supplies and never leave. Of course, they might... find interesting and exhausting ways to pass the time, but claustrophobic self-imposed isolation would be the last thing he wants to do. These boots were not made for standing still. But maybe he can help reinforce her living quarters, if she would let him. They can stick together. Lately he's found that there's no use staying alive here if there's no reason to live. He doesn't want to give her false hope that they can just pack up and leave tomorrow, try to head back home, or that they might be able to just figure out what the hell happened and undo all the damage done. But neither giving up nor succumbing to their fears and their new enemies are going to be viable options right now.
Leaning forward in the armchair to be a little closer to her, he forces a tight-lipped smile and tries to ease the worries sitting in the creases of her brows. Would have been easier with a more intimate gesture, but he'll have to hold himself back for now.
"You've already put the fate of the world on your shoulders... Don't add this place and what's happened to the people in it to your burdens."
no subject
She’s heard that from a few people here, but most of them arrived still wearing their uniforms, still following the rules and laws of their own worlds and times. Her mouth presses, quirks, amused, warmth filtering back into her eyes. “Not thinking of picking up a badge again, are you?”
Unlikely, but it feels good to tease him a little, to harken back to his own checkered past; debatable whether the greatest gunslinger in the West actually managed to make the places where those bodies dropped and those showdowns were won safer, but she feels safer having him here… mostly. There’s an element of danger to Doc that simultaneously attracts and unsettles her; when he sits up and forward and leans closer to her, she finds herself leaning closer, too, wondering about the tightness of that smile even as she shakes her head at him. “The people here need help. And they’ve been… it’s better here, than it is in Purgatory. I’ve got… friends. A couple, anyway.”
A word with a wealth of meaning between them; it was one of the last things she’d said to him before she woke up and found herself here. She can still remember the way he’d said friends… sure. They hadn’t had time to figure out what that would look like between the two of them before she came here; she’s had plenty of time to think about it, and has largely chosen not to. What would it help, without him here?
But he’s here now, looking her steadily in the eye, and it’s a whole lot harder to keep from thinking about it. It’s also pretty hard to keep from hearing Little in her head, saying it is never a burden… not for you, but she’s gotten pretty practiced at ignoring that over the last month and a half or so. “But I don’t know how to keep anyone safe here. Yeah, maybe we can storm the assholes who winged me, but the Darkwalker? What are we gonna do, call it out to a showdown at high noon? Doc, nobody’s even seen that thing outside of nightmares.”
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"Errybody everywhere needs help. Can't be on you to help them all." Which is not to say that they ought to be irresponsible and just let the world burn all around them. He's just worried she's been too hard on herself, as usual. It's good to hear that she's made some friends, though. This is far from ideal, but hopefully things have been easier on her with less history, less baggage that she has to deal with here.
"Time was, we didn't deal with all our problems in a showdown at high noon. This was always a last resort," Doc gestures with an open hand tilted towards where his gun is hanging. Oddly enough he hasn't felt compelled to use it talking to her all this time. She hasn't shown any signs of--... not being Wynonna, or whatever it was he might have been expecting. There are some wilder theories swirling in his head like cigarillo smoke that he'll have to entertain later, like time travel or some kind of amnesia or whatever it is this place is doing to them.
"I know it don't mean much to you but this life, this pain, all this killing - it's not what Wyatt would have wanted for you. It certainly wasn't what we-- what I wanted for him, when I gave him that gun." Doc swallows and averts his gaze, trying to mask his little slip of the tongue with a casual turn towards the coffee mug and a quiet sip. He's tried many times to be mindful not to talk about 'we' or 'us' anything. Not with Wynonna and not with Wyatt.
"Now maybe this 'Darkwalker' fellow ain't someone you bring your best bottle of 'shine over to and try to parlay. Maybe nobody is ever gon' be safe. But if you can make sleeping and eating and lowering your guard from time to time work with a trailer park full of revenants in your backyard, you can make it work here."
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Far better than she does, that's for sure. She's never been the Wyatt Earp scholar Waverly is; never got the heir's lessons from her daddy before he died. Wyatt Earp might be her blood relation, but he's always felt as far from her and her life as anyone else in those dusty old books, those sepia-toned memories. "Whatever Wyatt wanted for me? For Waverly, for Willa? It went out the door the second he got saddled with the curse."
How, why, she still doesn't know. Waverly doesn't know. If Ward Earp knew, he went to the grave not telling any of them... except Willa, maybe. "And that's maybe the only good thing about this place. There's no revs, no Earp curse... hell, most of the people here don't even know who Wyatt Earp is. My last name means nothing to them."
He turns to his coffee, giving her a moment where she's not meeting those keen eyes with her own, giving her a moment to sit back and collect herself. His presence here can't solve the problems she's faced since she arrived — not all of them, anyway, and it complicates a hell of a lot more — but seeing him sitting there, laconic and as at home as he might be perched on a bale of hay in the barn at the homestead, sipping at his coffee as cool as you please, salves something deep and raw in her chest. "And we could only lower our guard at home because the homestead happened to be built on that... ammonite stuff. Ammolite. Whatever."
Dolls is the science nerd, not her. "But speaking of 'shine—"
She rummages in the pocket of her coat, produces a small flask that she tosses over to him. "It's pine. It's the worst. But it does the trick."
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"I don't think either of us would mind a bit of anonymity." At least until he gets a better idea of what he's dealing with. Sure, he enjoys being the Doc Holliday, but not if it bumps him all the way up some asshole's to-murder list.
His eyebrows cock like a loaded gun at the bounty in his lap before a slow, small smile tugs at the corner of his lips. Almost easy to lose that subtle curl beneath the moustache.
"A most gracious gift. Thank you kindly." Beggars can't be choosers. He won't fault her for a poorly tasting brew when the alternative is nothing. "I happen to know a 'tried and true' recipe for this... 'bathtub gin', I believe it is called these days. The kind that won't make you go blind. Although I can't say we ever stayed anywhere long enough to distill anything in an actual bathtub. Nor is it the most exciting use for one."
A bit of casual joking, casual flirting never hurt anyone. Even if they are up shit creek with nary a paddle to be found.
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He's helped her. He's also helped Bobo. It wasn't all that long ago that they found what was left of Levi, a shivering wreck of what was once a man left like so much detritus in the tangled undergrowth of the woods by the Triangle's edge. Doc is an expert in meaningful glances offered hand in hand with reassuring words; Doc is a professional gambler and a stony-eyed killer with tongue full of lies. Which Doc she's got here, offering her his support, she doesn't know. The one thing she can be sure of is that he'll do what he needs to put himself into a winning position. That she's willing to bet on, as sure a thing as looking down at a hand of cards and finding a royal flush.
She doesn't blame him for it, not anymore. But it's something to keep in mind, especially when the corner of his lips are tucking into his cheeks, a half-hidden smile she hasn't seen in way too long. He always did have a smile that could turn knees to jelly and make a girl forget all her best intentions. Her own lips twitch, one dimple pressing into her cheek with the quirk of her own mouth in response. "Without hot running water, it'd probably be a lot more exciting than usual."
Not a prospect she's against, exactly. On occasion, she's taken the time to heat enough water for an actual bath, instead of hiking all the way out to the hot springs, and it doesn't take much of an idle suggestion from him for her to be thinking about the big clawfoot tub she barely uses in her cabin. "The gin's probably a better idea. More popular, too."
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"You can't be distilling anything in your own makeshift home. Fumes and fire hazards do not a safe, humble abode make. But an abandoned cabin nearby will suit our needs just fine. I'll see to it - after everything is tended to here." He might not know anybody else here, might not appear much like he gives a shit most of the time, but she knows him to be a better man than that. Certainly he is a liar, a killer, a thief. The kind of man who knows that being able to do the right thing is a privilege only few can afford to squander. The kind of man who would likely survive this, against the odds, and teeter dangerously between selfish and uncaring. None of this is in dispute.
Nevertheless he is also a doctor, a lover, a protector. He won't apologise for his transgressions. Life gave him a metric ton of lemons. He can't be faulted for having been a bitter cynic, putting in a half-assed effort to man his splintering, bullet hole-ridden, weathered signaged lemonade stand. But all men bury their sins as well as they can under the tilt and tip and brim of their hat, and all sinners make for good and bad men alike. These days, he can afford to look out for others, whether or not that buys him any goodwill at all. She had said the people here need help, and it costs him nothing to be kind. It wouldn't do after all to be the only two people left standing in this god forsaken patch of snow, with no way of returning on their own.
"That offer to your cabin still stand? If it's safe enough to leave, of course." He's about done with his coffee, and she's keeping up his pace. They haven't received any last minute stragglers, although he might make a quick round just in case. Casually scope out everyone else here.
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Still, it's good to have people here. She'd learned that the hard way, sitting alone in her cabin with the fire out and the door swinging lazily open. This place will kill them more likely than not, but they're harder to kill when they stand together. She finishes her coffee and nods at him, at his question. "Yeah. It's a little bit of a walk from here, but not bad."
Not like the homestead, far-flung out on the prairie. She'd picked a place tucked among the trees; defensible, easy to heat and maintain, and far enough from the town that she could have her own space. And even with a potential new living space in Lakeside, it gives her options. Right now, for example, it gives her the option of somewhere to speak with Doc alone, where she won't have to worry about curious interlopers looking for gossip. And while the prospect of being alone with him for the first time in six months sends her stomach into squiggling knots of nerves, there's relief there, too.
Coffee finished, she rises to her feet, looks out the window. "Looks like the fog's blown off for now. Better get going before it rolls in again."
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"I will see you at the door." He wouldn't dally and give the fog the opportunity to come charging back in, but he can't leave everything lying around the way he had it without taking two minutes to at least tidy up a little bit and make sure they leave nothing behind.
The march to her humble abode is fairly uneventful and he doesn't slow them down by trying to talk on the way. When he gets there he does a quick round of the perimeter and takes mental note of some of the things he would like to do to improve the heat retention and general safety of her place.
Not that it seems like the snow will let up anytime soon to make it easy on them to do home improvement works.
Knocking the snow off his boots before he enters, he leaves them standing inside by the doorway and casts his wandering gaze around the interior.
"A quaint little place you have built for yourself," he softly remarks as he removes his hat and pads inside quietly. It's not luxurious by any stretch of the imagination but it is unlikely that either of them are used to luxury. Besides, she probably didn't think she'd be here as long as she already has been. People who don't plan on sticking around long don't prioritise decor.
"You could be safer staying with the rest. Not comfortable with company?"
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While he'd walked around, studying the outside of the building, she'd busied herself with putting more wood in the stove, and slow warmth begins to fill the cabin. "You know me. The lone-est of wolves."
Except she hasn't been: not here, and not at home. She's found some people here, ones she wants to protect, to spend her days with, and it's not such an alien feeling as it used to be. Not after months with Waverly and Dolls and Doc at her side, working more or less together. She'd fooled herself for a long time that she didn't need anyone else, but the curse, this place, they've both made her out to be as much a liar as he ever has been.
Illustrating this point, that she does in fact occasionally need others, is the slight struggle she has with removing her jacket. She hadn't put her right arm into it, but it still takes some maneuvering to get the damn thing off her shoulders and left arm so she can hang it on the back of a chair at the kitchen table. Similarly difficult is loosening the buckle of her gunbelt, but — unlike the jacket — that isn't something she's keen to ask for his help with. She already has plenty of all-too-clear memories of the last time he got his fingers on her belt, on the button of the jeans beneath it. "Besides, if I had a roommate, I couldn't exactly have just brought you back with me without warning, could I?"
Consider: it's a small cabin. The bed there tucked against the wall is the only one she's got.
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"Why not," he drawls as he steps in dangerously close to her, making himself comfortable in her personal space, almost daring her to take a step back or pass some trite, flippant comment thinly veiling her discomfort, barely enough space between their hearts that she can unconsciously breathe him in and remind herself of what his presence and his warmth feels and smells and tastes like.
She might not have asked for help but he would spare her the indignity of struggling and flailing around awkwardly. Steady hands rub over her shoulders and glide around her waist to help divest her of her jacket and gunbelt, blazing an invisible hot trail across her cool skin. Where he might have once let his hands wander playfully over the curve of her ass, he's notably very restrained with only his nimble fingers plucking deftly at buckles and buttons.
And then he's out of her face, out of her bubble as he makes sure everything she's planning on taking off (for now) is hanging within easy access.
"I would take you to the end of the world if that was where you wanted to go. Brought you anywhere unannounced. With or without other company present." And he well knows the risks of doing that. She isn't exactly the most inconspicuous or polite of companions he's had over his agonisingly long years. Still, the heart wants what it wants. Yes he is selfish, yes he isn't perfect, but his is an undying kind of devotion. And he isn't ashamed to admit as much.
"Last I checked a pack of wolves tend to survive longer than the lone one," he points out quietly, flashing her a smile that doesn't quite reach his eyes. "But I wouldn't dare assume. A great many things can change in a hundred years or two."
He too finds a vacant hook for his own jacket, gunbelt and hat, gives it a testing tug before hanging up all his cowboy accoutrements. Wouldn't want to tear a hole in the wall from unloading all his burdens now.
"Might I be able to do anything for you around here tonight?" Other things she might have been struggling with without both arms at her disposal. He can be a fairly domesticated gunslinger, all things considered. And keeping them both busy is far easier than talking, isn't it?