Her Majesty's tears and the pauper's blood

[sweetmotherofgod]

CHARACTERS: Heather Mason (plus demon) and OTA
LOCATION: the oxygen garden, the kitchen, or just strolling the corridors looking for... stuff
WARNINGS: bad manners, bad language, and possible violence (prearranged she is not going to attack anyone)
SUMMARY: Heather hasn't been out and about much this jump, and when she has she's been with Tillman and probably engaged in what looked like pretty intense conversation or trying to hold his hand under the table at breakfast without anyone noticing. Now it's what passes for the wee small hours and she's out unattended for the first time since the jump.
NOTES: Please feel free to grab any of the locations I mentioned or throw in your own! I promised a few people demon interaction, so this is for anyone who wants some :D I'm also cool with prose or action so pick your favourite and I'll follow.


It's been a rough couple of months. That's probably why Heather's been acting a little out of sorts. She's made and lost a dear friend in the space of a jump. Perhaps it's missing Kitten's fashion advice that means she's ditched her own clothes for the Tranquility jumpsuit again, although why she's accessorizing with dogtags instead of her usual ever-present locket is anyone's guess.

But now it's late – or early, depending on your perspective – and she's out and messing with things. Wandering the corridors looking for something to do. In the kitchens with a slight curl to her lip, poking packets of alleged food. In the garden, staring at a patch of dark red flowers she'd been tending near obsessively and looking like she's contemplating ripping them up.

She's obviously bored. Why not say hi?

Comments

[sweetmotherofgod]

Felt like a big one, yeah.

[She wraps her hands around the mug, turns to lean back against the counter. If she was doing this for anyone else she'd start slow, subtle. But Heather is not subtle, and as much as she likes the man she seems to consider him naive. So she takes a chance and doesn't bother easing either of them into it.]

I was in a park. Back home, on Earth, I guess. It was daytime, but then it started to get dark. Not like the sun was setting, but like streetlights going out. Just - bam, one more dark patch and the rest got a bit dimmer.

[She snaps her fingers on the bam, sharp and illustrative.]

But it was like the lights were taking the air too, you know? Every time a light went out it was harder to breathe until it was all dark and I couldn't breathe at all.

But the creepiest bit was the birds. They were just falling out of the sky. Little wings broken and stuff. I mean, I'm not one of those chicks that cries over nature shows, but I couldn't help them. It pretty much sucked.

[zooms]

[ His keen, watchful expression says it all: Heather's words have already caught him up entirely. Naive isn't quite the right word but Hotspur is certainly quick to believe everything she tells him; he's invested so much faith in his dreams already that it hardly seems strange at all to extend that faith to other's. He nods slowly as she talks, attentive yet troubled by the possible allegories that lay in what she laid out... and one particular facet felt especially troublesome.

Suffocation.

It doesn't take much to bring back that surge of fear that pushes up through his heart and consumes his chest with a cold blanket of dread. Suddenly dry-mouthed it takes a moment for Hotspur to swallow and clear his throat. ]

Have you had it before? This dream, I mean.

[sweetmotherofgod]

[She nods, blows across the surface of the mug and watches the curl of steam, seemingly oblivious to Hotspur's dismay.

And not oblivious at all.]

Yeah. At first it was kind of fuzzy? But I'm getting it more frequently, and it's getting worse each time. Clearer. I dunno, maybe it just seems worse because I know what's coming now.

Hence, tea. I don't really wanna go back to sleep.

[She stops, makes the kind of face Heather would make if she nerded out and said hence where someone could hear it. Just a young woman barely out of her teens trying to reconcile a troubled past and doomed future with wanting to make friends, right?]

[zooms]

No, no. I would completely feel the same way. [ His words are quiet, reassuring, and genuine. If those dreams had been his? He wouldn't sleep a wink. Not if the threat of reliving a lonely, airless death was waiting for him as soon as he drifted off. ]

Those birds though... [ Another problematic symbol, as far as Hotspur's concerned. He shifts a little and drops his dogtags to clatter quietly against his chest as he turns his hands to rolling up one of the sleeves of his jumpsuit. He shows her his forearm - opposite to the one bearing his OPR-001-060 tattoo - and the tattoos it bears: seven black birds silhouetted against the pale white of his skin tumbling around in mid-flight. ] See these? Where I come from birds are like souls. Y'know, symbolism and all that. [ A pause, then apologetically he adds: ] Back home I know people who would say those birds falling out of the sky were a bad sign....

[ And Hotspur would be one of those people, yes.]

[sweetmotherofgod]

Seven for a secret never to be told.

[ It's quiet, said absently and to herself as she watches Hotspur's arm with a frown. ]

Sorry. Sure I'm freaky enough right now without talking to myself in the bargain.

Birds as souls, huh? I guess that makes sense. With the flying, like... a link between earth and heaven.

[ She pulls her gaze away from his arm, back to his face, and gives him a crooked, worried little smile. ]

I gotta tell ya, that's not too comforting.

[zooms]

[ He shoves the sleeve back down his arm with an expression that still seems acutely apologetic. ]

Sorry, sorry. I know that's not what you want to hear. [ His hands keep moving as he toys with the hem of his sleeve. ]

But there are plenty of people who wouldn't pay attention to these kinds of things. It'd better that you know better, at least? [ There's something a little bit sadly hopeful in his expression as he watches her keenly, as if hoping to see some kind of admission that yes, Heather does believe in the power of foresight and symbols and dreams. ]

And you aren't freaky, I promise. [ He adds softly as an afterthought. ] Just - unique.

[sweetmotherofgod]

[Heather does, if grudgingly. She's seen too many unlikely coincidences not to. The thing riding her, though? She thinks that if you have a vision something put it there to fuck with you.]

No, it's fine. I don't... I don't always get this stuff on my own. Being creepy doesn't make it any less useful, 'specially if it turns out to mean something.

[she fidgets with her own sleeve, a very deliberate 'unconscious' mirroring of his motion, flashes him a smile on unique]

Back when we first talked, you said you'd help. If I needed it. I can count on you, right? If I figure this out in time?

[zooms]

[ Heather's question leaves him quiet as he casts his memory back to their conversation. It had been odd - odd and worrying - and even at the time Hotspur wasn't entirely sure what he was promising to help her with. Destroying a god - even a terrible one - wasn't something that Hotspur could ever claim to understand.

Still, even now he nods. Firmly and without any trace of reluctance or hesitation. ]

Of course.

[ There are no 'buts' - no matter how much he'd like to add 'but only as long as you don't ask me to kill a god'. No prerequisites or caveats. ]

You'd only need to say.