simulsimul | another thing; w/ fafnirs and skeletonenigma; cw for suicide talk

Car planet. Of course. Why not.

[Ghastly repeats this and resists the urge to put his face in his hands.]

Are there a lot of those?

[He can't facepalm, anyway, he apparently has to take the phone from Skulduggery. There is a very definite grump in his face, even though he sees and knows that tilt, as he takes the phone, winces, and puts it to his ear.]

Hello, Grand Mage, what a pleasant surprise to get your call.

[The reactions are worth it. No amusement shows on Kratos's face, but he's taking some subtle personal pleasure in this, really.]

No. Only one. And not an engine such as Skulduggery's Bentley, no.

[Corrival starts off, as he does, strident.]

You are talking to a bloody angel.

[Look, even he can push his sense of reality only so far.]

What, exactly, are you and that sack of bones you call a best friend planning to do with the bloody angel?!

Edited (typo) 2018-06-25 08:11 (UTC)

[It's a little satisfying, hearing the Grand Mage's raised voice and not bearing the brunt of it. Skulduggery is, however, magnanimous enough not to give any indication of that.

Valkyrie's still fixated on space.] How is it a car planet if it doesn't have an engine? Is it a real planet? Like Saturn or Neptune?

[Ghastly holds the phone a little bit away from his ear until Corrival stops being, ah, strident.]

[Skulduggery gets a dirty look anyway.]

I had nothing to do with this, Grand Mage. Skulduggery decided to give him a tour and brought him to see me. I was thinking of maybe giving him tea, if the pot on the counter hasn't over-steeped by now.

[Deciding utter bland mundanity is the way to go here.]

[Ah, the literal sort. Raine might like this girl. ... Or perhaps not: depending on what she plans to do with the power in her.]

No. It's only a comet; but I had no other words to describe it to Skulduggery.

[That communication sounds horribly awkward.]

I can always leave, if it would make things that much easier.

[It just seems a waste. Audible through the line comes a Grand Mageal squawk.]

THE HELL YOU WILL.

[A pause.]

Bespoke, did I just yell at an angel?

[No other words to describe it to Skulduggery. Valkyrie's forcibly reminded of the fact that Kratos learned a whole language in one night, and he's not human, and -- more than that -- he's alien. That was the one thing Skulduggery always said didn't exist, was aliens. And leprechauns. And unicorns.

So help her, if they run into a unicorn...]

But you have an Irish accent.

[Bluntly, and a little helplessly. Who learned a language so completely in 24 hours that they even picked up the accent?

Skulduggery, meanwhile, speaks to Ghastly.] Will you tell Corrival he just yelled at an angel? Using, moreover, a concept one would think traditional angels take offence at? I don't think he's thinking very clearly.

[Skulduggery hums in thought, and turns to Kratos.]

Have you come across hell in your studies?

Why can't you take the phone? You can tell Corrival off, he can yell at you, I can be not involved...

[Ghastly sighs. Puts the phone properly to his ear again.]

You just yelled at an angel, Grand Mage. About hell. Would you like to yell at a skeleton instead? I know where you can find one.

[The angel gets tea. He's a much better houseguest. Ghastly is officially rescinding tea from everyone else.]

Yes, that's true. I learned my pronunciation from Skulduggery, and he has an Irish accent.

[It's copy for copy, not fluid; Kratos is aware of how the crystal's encoding works. Variances will be introduced once he's been more exposed to them. But at the question, Kratos glances at Skulduggery.]

Yes, I remember it; heaven, hell. It was in the book.

[He reaches for the picture book, and flips through until he finds a page on good and evil, heaven and hell, and other such dichotomies. He can't help but wrinkle his nose at the angels floating in the golden sky, opposite the red-black pit and its inhabitants.]

Though I haven't met many demons who look like that.

[Corrival does not immediately answer Ghastly, primarily because Kratos's deep voice had carried.]

... Bespoke, did the angel just confirm the existence of demons?

I can't take the phone because Corrival asked for you, remember? Like it or not, Ghastly, you're our translator today.

You're like a computer.

[When Valkyrie gets hold of an old bone, she doesn't stop chewing it until she gets her answers. Don't mind her.

When Skulduggery speaks again, there's a tightness in his voice.] Although, given the precarious nature of our political state, perhaps we should hang up now and go speak to Corrival later. Anyone can listen in on a phone call.

Hang on, no, wait -- demons?

I don't like it, and I'm resigning.

[Ghastly considers his options. Considers how much he doesn't want to have to deal with Corrival later, and how much he wants Skulduggery to take the heat for this.]

[In the end he reaches over, shoves the phone at Skulduggery, and 'accidentally' ends the call while doing so. This is definitely now Skulduggery's fault.]

We can talk to Corrival later. In person.

[Where he can be distracted by the angel.]

Wait a m--

[Kratos watches Ghastly hang up with understated bemusement and amusement.]

You believe it's safe for me to go to the seat of your government for that?

[The phone rings. So does Ghastly's landline. So does Valkyrie's phone. Kratos is impressed by the versatility of their communication devices.]

Yes, demons. You've none here?

[Valkyrie holds her phone pointedly up to Skulduggery and Ghastly, looking and sounding exasperated.] Really?

I think... [Skulduggery ignores Valkyrie completely.] ... that anyone hearing rumours of angels would be looking for someone with obvious wings. Having said that, there's no chance you can turn invisible, is there?

[It's not a serious question, unless the answer is yes, I can turn invisible, which Skulduggery doubts. So, rather than wait for an answer, he strides over to Ghastly's landline and answers the phone.] You know that was Ghastly's fault, I hope.

[Valkyrie pockets her own phone and rounds on Kratos.] If you're talking about the red horned kind with pitchforks, no. Do you mean actual demons from hell?

Corrival can come here. [With a stubborn sort of clench to his jaw. Ghastly is doubling down on this, mostly because he has already done it and cannot un-hang up the phone.]

[It does, however, end in what he wanted: Skulduggery on the phone with Corrival. So... not the worst outcome. Probably. For Kratos:]

There are things that people would probably be justified in calling demons, at least. Not technically correct, but close enough?

That depends on your definition of invisible.

[He can turn into light, but hasn't really experimented with staying like that, it's true. Still, most people can't see light dissolved, even if the process of it could be a bit bright.]

I DON'T CARE WHOSE FAULT IT IS, PLEASANT, I'M COMING OVER THERE TO VISIT MY OLD FRIEND AND YOU CAN SHOW ME WHAT YOU'VE GOT HIDING IN HIS BACK ROOM.

[Kratos nods, very slightly, at Valkyrie.]

Niflheim. It's -- a place outside of your own, but there is nothing there but demons and terror.

[And occasionally the shades of fallen angels. He speaks of it grimly, as would one who knows.]

[... Or unless the answer is 'that depends on your definition of invisible'. Skulduggery gives Kratos a look, but decides to file the question away for another time, in the face of Corrival's shouting.

He doesn't like it when Corrival shouts. Not because it shames or guilts him in any way, but because it happens rarely despite how bull-headed Corrival can be. His level-headed objectivity is one of the things Skulduggery respects about him. If he's shouting, either things are worse than Skulduggery thought, or the stress of being Grand Mage is tremendous.]

I'm not going to change your mind, am I. Alright. We'll wait here for you. Try to be a little calmer when you see him, he's very easily frightened.

[For all that Kratos's tone talking about Niflheim is sobering and unnerving, Valkyrie can't help laughing. Easily frightened. Sure. Next to Kratos, Valkyrie's the one easily frightened. Corrival sure can shout.]

In the midst of all this, there's the tinkling of a bell at the shop door.]

[Ghastly is beginning to wonder if hanging up was the wisest idea. He hasn't heard Corrival yell like that in... quite a while. ... And yet he's still glad Skulduggery is the one dealing with it, as this is all Skulduggery's fault.]

Are we talking about the same angel?

[You know what? He's just... not going to address the Niflheim thing. He doesn't like the sound of any of that, and also there's someone coming in, and that's not a great combined recipe.]

--Excuse me a moment.

[Ghastly delicately steps around everyone else to go see if the person at the door should be offered tea or polite refusals. Or impolite refusals.]

[No one directs another question at Kratos, which is perhaps just as well, because somewhere between Valkyrie's laughter and Ghastly's disbelief, Kratos stiffens. He straightens up, all geniality dropping away into granite sternness, and he turns automatically towards the door in response to that time-threaded mana waiting.

[Kratos, this is Saracen Rue. We fought in the war together.

[One more time: you don't remember anything beyond what I'm doing in this room here?

[Spirits. Spirits, that is -- that is not a good sensation. At all. For all the seal and Origin's power, Kratos had not previously remembered events two days before they occurred.]

Edited (add thot) 2018-10-20 03:37 (UTC)

[Skulduggery notices. Whoever's come in, they have Kratos's undivided attention. It could be a good thing, or even an irrelevant thing, but Skulduggery's rarely that lucky. Which makes it all the more confusing when the voice he hears out on the shop floor belongs to the most nonthreatening person he can think of.

Meanwhile, out on the shop floor, Saracen is eyeing off the back room and, for the time being, avoiding it. He's not making it obvious that he's avoiding it. Mostly he's just beaming at Ghastly, and if the smile's maybe a little too broad for the situation they're in, he's sure not going to mention it.]

Hey, Ghastly! Long time no see.

Saracen!

[This is the best thing that has happened to Ghastly all day. There's a cheerful smile right back at Saracen. Notably, Saracen is not an angel, is not a yelling Grand Mage, and is not Skulduggery being inscrutable and infuriating. Ghastly's day is better already, probably.]

It's been too long.

[Ghastly gestures at the back room.]

You picked a-- well, not a good time. Not a bad time. A weird time? Skulduggery's here too. He can explain things.

[Yes. That's it. Pass the problem back to Skulduggery.]

[Kratos moves with intent, without truly choosing it, and appears in the doorway just as Ghastly is gesturing to it. His gaze, forbidding, goes directly to Saracen.

[Would it help if I promise not to do it?]

Is this the value of your promises?

[Even if Saracen had not explicitly said the words -- perhaps Kratos should have asked for explicit words. But then, he isn't the one hopping back in time, and manipulating events to avoid such a thing. Such actions steals all control from individuals and places it in Saracen's hands.

[It isn't right. It isn't any more right than what Kratos had done to Aselia.]

Edited 2018-10-20 04:41 (UTC)

[Ghastly's smile is still one of the nicest smiles Saracen's ever seen. It's the genuine grin of someone who's never learned their smiles are charming enough to get them what they want -- none of Erskine's plasticity or Hopeless's quiet pride. Just the ready smile of a happy person. It makes Saracen feel all warm.]

Yeah, I know. Scary angel in the back room. Weird's a good word for it.

[Which is about as far as Saracen gets before Kratos, tall and foreboding, interrupts them.]

Oh, for the love of -- !

[He didn't remember the first few times. He wasn't at Saracen's landing point. Where is the rule. Where is it.

The point he brings up, however much Saracen doesn't want to hear it, however much it's coming from what Saracen has learned is a very biased source, is a valid one. Saracen promised. Not in so many words, but he did. So, with the initial frustration and exasperation expelled, Saracen breathes out long and slow and shakes his head.]

No.

... Starting now?

[He's not asking for permission. He's asking for a truce.]

How did you--

[Ghastly stops himself there. Of course Saracen knows. Why does he actually bother asking at this point.]

[But he looks between angel and Saracen and knows he's missed something, that they're having some kind of conversation Ghastly has missed half of, only when have they had the opportunity to talk? Does Kratos, too, just know things? Is Saracen an angel.]

[...It might explain a few things, but Ghastly refuses to believe in Saracen as any kind of heavenly messenger. Nope. Not happening.]

Would either of you like to explain?

[He's not expecting they will, but he'd really like to know what's going on here.]

[Kratos crosses his arms, his face a flat line and eyes narrowed. It doesn't sound like a concession; and, Kratos has to remind himself, he does not have a duty of care over this world. He does not have a right to dictate what happens in this world.

[So: not concession. Negotiation.]

Terms?

[He suspects, given Skulduggery's reaction and Ghastly's now, that Saracen has not told the people around him what he can do. He also suspects this will be part of the negotiation; but 'starting now' is not precisely a good beginning when Saracen came here expecting Kratos not to remember. He expected to be able to navigate away from the difficulty. That does not bode well.]

[Saracen looks at Ghastly, then back at Kratos. Kratos isn't honestly expecting him to talk frankly about this now, is he? Not without the ability to erase it so Ghastly doesn't remember.

Hang on, he can do it. He just has to find the right words.]

Not for as long as you're here, barring Darquesse-level destruction. Which -- now that I think about it, Darquesse has something to do with the angels, doesn't she?

[The last bit Saracen says to Ghastly, in a politely curious tone instead of his habitual knowing one.]

It would explain how one person manages to destroy the entire world.

[...Saracen, asking like he doesn't know? That's surreal. Ghastly hesitates, then shakes his head.]

No, I don't think so?

[This is accompanied by a hopeful look over at Kratos. Ghastly isn't sure, but he feels like -- generally -- there would be a different sort of devastation if angels were involved. Darquesse brings apocalypse, but not holy fire. Probably.]

What do you mean, not as long as he's here?

[This is, again, about half of a conversation that Ghastly really wishes he had all of.]

another thing; w/ fafnirs and skeletonenigma; cw for suicide talk

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