aftr_stories | [MU] - DECEMBER STORYTELLING / MEMORY SHARE

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[MU] - DECEMBER STORYTELLING / MEMORY SHARE

Something is wrong.

This may not very well be obvious, at first. The Storyteller is not present to put forth yet another diatribe, informative or apologetic, and the backdrop of guttering flame and sandy campfire is as present as ever...albeit briefly.

Those who tell their stories will start to notice something...odd taking place. Indeed, no matter how they intend to begin their tale, the land of Mu will immediately start to warp to accommodate it, or something utterly unlike it, until storytellers and listeners alike may find themselves in an exact recreation of a seemingly random memory, in the most stark and painstaking of detail. There is no altering the memory, nor is there any preventing it once it's begun to play - you will simply have to witness memories that are not your own this go around.

Furthermore, stories that take place in worlds other than LifeAftr will be, frankly, inevitable. Those memories, too, will be recreated, to be relived by the teller and lived by the listener.

It is time, once more, for you to tell a story...with a slight twist! This is, in fact, our first player plot, as provided by Dragon! The initial setting will be familiar for oldcomers, and newcomers will recognize it from the introduction they received in their dreams.

Yet for this Storytelling only, people can imagine whatever stories they wish, from both their homes and their time on LifeAftr, as long as they don't mind the fact that others will be reliving those stories in the form of an impromptu memory share.

Even those who prefer not to voice their stories aloud are not safe this time around. If the memory is recalled in essence, Mu will shift to accommodate it in full.

There is, however, a benefit to this: those who venture memories to be relived will receive both a befuddled apology from the Storyteller, who will assert that this was most definitely not meant to happen (they're the Storyteller, not the Rememberer!), as well as a tired promise that the relived memories will be worth two offerings each, as if in compensation.

Not that it counts for much, probably.

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[Was it cold?]

[...it was, in a sense. They lost the feeling millimeter by millimeter, slow and agonizing, because they'd continued to fight for every inch of the way. They were not in the spirit of giving up, and they'd not given up, even if it ate at them in a slow creep. It took longer, and for no reason, they know; they could have just as easily closed their dark eyes and let it all fade. The result would have been the same.]

[But it was not in their nature.]

a better world

[One untainted by corruption, and untouched by the Immortal Cell.]

[They pray, in that moment. Petition the jackal, the Storyteller, the wolf goddess with the coat of snow - to any god with the power to hear them - ]

[Never let that corruption touch the people here. Never.]

people are kind

[That's a sentiment she can agree with-people are kind. The people here are. Adults don't use the kids for experiments or shove them into rooms until they're needed. They don't hurt others. Not purposefully or without remorse. Their hearts shine so vividly, even without her empathy to guide her.

Drifter's heart is one of the brightest.]

You're kind too.

[It's why they deserve to be surrounded by all these good people. Why they deserved a life that didn't end with them painfully laying against a rock, bleeding and-

It's an image that'll stick with her for a long time. They didn't deserve that. But neither did the kids in the lab, sometimes she thinks she doesn't either.

A better world they had written out.

She can agree with that too.]

Your good heart makes this place better. I'm happy you're here.

[It makes no sense - that they could, singularly, somehow lighten the weight of this world via their presence alone.]

[Is it possible to be grateful for the fate of things, the way they all transpired and unspooled in regards to their own life - doomed to never crawl out of the depths of the dark, the Judgment that claimed them - if it meant that this would be the next stage in their journey? In the world of their home, perhaps they would always be doomed.]

[Here, their story is not over. It has not ended. It continues.]

[They...continue.]

and yours
yours as well

[They don't need to say that to her. They don't understand that she used to know what was inside a person's heart by looking at them. It's weak here. Barely makes a dent in the people around her and she's had to rely on her own context, her own thoughts and feelings about everyone instead.

But she knows hearts. And she knows her own doesn't shine even a fraction as bright as Drifter's, but it feels good to hear all the same. Brings a smile to her face when she thought it would be too difficult to manage with their death fresh in her mind.]

Do you want to play a fun game?

yes

[Of course they do. She hardly has to ask at all. A sad memory cannot be discarded, but it can be set aside to make way for better times. The months they have spent on this island, with her, have been...]

[Almost every day has been infinitely better than any singular event or stretch of time they can recall from the world they left behind. The pain in their body will never truly ease, but the pain in their soul - that burden has lightened by increments. It feels as though it lightens now, just by looking at her.]

[It's at their yes she lets go of their hands and ambles through the area. She's looking for the perfect spot, holding up her hands to gauge something unseen around her, and moving to another section of this dreamworld just as quick.

When she finds an area suitable for whatever dumb adventure she's about to take them on, she stops and keeps to one spot. Come over Driftybean, she's already starting the game.]

This is how you play.

[Both hands raised into the air, she hooks her thumbs together and looks to the ground.

See?? It looks like a butterfly!! It's shadow puppet time, my friend.]

[They study the shape closely. After a few moments, it finally registers - they see! It's a butterfly, imprinted in the shape of a silhouette across the sand. That's clever. The Drifter looks to their own hands, glove-wrapped and slightly pointed at the tips. It should not be so difficult to form shapes with their hands, so that the shadows look like something of their own.]

[They have never done this before. It's slow and clumsy, but eventually they manage a very basic, very simple shadow: a dog, pointed snout and parted jaws and upright ears.]

a god

[Unable to be still for more than 15 seconds at a time, she moves closer to them and their god-doggo. She makes the butterfly hover and flap its wings over the doggy shape, until she has another idea.

A god huh?

She looks to their hand, copying the placement of their fingers up until the pointed ears-she makes hers flop over. Tries to round her fingers to make the face smaller until it vaguely resembles a rabbit. She wiggles her fingers to make the ears move back and forth.

She did her best okay??? This is a hard game.]

A storyteller.

[Another god! All they need is a third dog, and they'll have a complete trifecta. The Storyteller, the white wolf, and the black jackal. How lucky they are, truly, to have been granted insight into the lives of three separate deities.]

[The Drifter must disassemble their dog to cup their fingers in a smile, but the iconography lives on in both their hearts. And in the physical realm, make no mistake.]

many gods watching over us

[How can they be upset at the ending their story took, when they have been blessed with the presence of so many holy creatures?]

[Ren's only knowledge of godly support stems from the one that finds her medicine, but if there are more that Drifter knows about, she takes comfort in it all the same. Many? That's fine. The one she knows has a kind heart and she's sure the rest do as well.

She copies their gesture, as usual, when something occurs to her. An image from her world she didn't see clearly before and only thinks about now that her mind has wandered to games and making Drifter happy-things she likes to do.]

Can I hold your hand?

[It's a small request with an ulterior motive!! Trust her?? Y/N]

[...]

[Again, they must wonder...why. Why would she want to do such a thing? What benefit would that yield, for her? They are not contagious, they know, but they are not generally a creature that people wish to hold onto, and be near. Their memories, the phantom sting of flung stones and chittering outrage, is a solemn reminder of that.]

[But then...]

[But then, she has called them "pretty."]
[But then, she has showed them how to weave flowers into chains.]
[But then, she is extraordinary, in so many ways.]

[The Drifter nods, and holds out their hand.]

[Yes.]

[The second they reach out to her, she looks to their hand like it's a treasure she desperately wants to smuggle into her bag. That's how happy she is.

It had been something childish she found out early on. On days where she could play for particularly long periods of time, because her stomach was full and she had energy to burn in spades. Those rare days she would amble around, looking at everything she could find. Playing with anything she could get her hands on. Sometimes making little nonsensical games of her own with only her hands because she couldn't find a treasure before dark.

And that little half 'c' reminds her something from those days. She saw it in old books where people posed for invisible cameras and discovered she could do it too. Maybe during a riveting game of shadow puppets.]

I think it's like this-

[She holds their hand for a moment, squeezes it once because it's okay and begins to use them as a model for this diabolical game. If they allow, she'll shape their entire hand into a 'c' and gently push their thumb down. And then she makes the gesture with her own hand, pressing it against theirs if they let her get that far.

THE END RESULT?? IT'S A HEART ♡]

Two smiles can make that kind of thing.

[A term like arc or c might be more accurate, but heck. They talk in smiles and she can too. NOW SHE CAN MAYBE SHOW THEM OTHER SHAPES LIKE SQUARE AND TRIANGLE. NICE.]

Two smiles make a circle too, but I like this one best.

[The Drifter does not have access to the colloquial slang of "the cutest shit I've ever seen in my goddamn life," but if they did, it would apply. It would apply to exactly this. They let her shape their hands as she wishes, watching bemusedly as she cups everything with a careful precision, and then...]

[It's a heart.]

[Two smiles make...a heart.]

[It's arrestingly simple. It's simple, and in its simplicity, it strips all the excess away.]

2 halves

[Two smiles, one from each party, to form...]

1 whole

The song says that.

[Not in the same way Drifter had, but it's a sentiment she agrees with-hearts and all. Two hands, two smiles, two hearts-it's better like this. Way better. And she had to change their special hand smile into half of this heart, but she hopes they're still happy. That maybe this fun game managed to push away thoughts about their death for a minute. Maybe they'll think about this all night, like she will, and wake in the morning with their fingers in a 'c' shape.

She hopes.

Hand still against theirs, she admires the shadow it makes on the ground, and sorta half sings-]

We are two in one

[Addition is great!! MATH IS POWER!]

Those are the words. I think they liked hearts too.

[Maybe! Who the heck knows. She doesn't!! Who even taught her that song?? A mystery.]

[They don't know the words. They're not very good at songs, or music in general - she remembers, after all, how they had to substitute nice-looking flowers and symbols for musical words, because they lacked the voice to sing along.]

[They don't know the words, but they would like, they think, to learn them, even if they cannot sing them aloud.]

[We are two in one.]

[Two halves, of one whole. Like two smiles, forming a heart.]

can teach the words?

Yes, that's something I can do.

[Of course she can teach them. It's easy enough to sing the words and all it takes is repetition on their end. They'll need to do hum the melody over and over again until it sticks. She's more than happy to help with that.

And she knows a way to assist them. They used a special series of drawings the first time they sang together and she sorta remembers which. She lets go of their hand, kneels down to the ground and starts moving her finger through the dirt as she sings. Which is, oddly enough, the one thing she isn't horrible at.

✿☆✿☆✿☽✿☽✿○✿○✿☆✿○✿☆✿☼✿☁

The terrible doodles look similar, but she attempts to differentiate them with moons, stars, and clouds between the flowers. That's probably how...it works. She did her best.]

Oh round white moon
Oh how beautiful your light is tonight
How truly precious you can be
I look into your eyes and softly touch your hand
Farewell love and tomorrow we will meet again

[THERE'S A SECOND VERSE BUT GOSH. She looks up to see if they've got this part down. This is her favorite song and she wants to teach them the right way!!]

[Slowly, they start to issue the words out across the HUD on their sprite. They cannot sing the way she can, but they can remember the words. They will ensure to commit them to memory, as best as they can, so that they may write them down in the waking world.]

[Or, if they forget, maybe she will teach them again, if it is not too much trouble.]

oh round white moon
oh how beautiful your light is tonight
how truly precious you can be
i look into your eyes and softly touch your hand
farewell love
and tomorrow we will meet again

[She is so freaking proud of them and continues to make her dumb flower doodles in the ground, pretending like that helps in some manner. And if not, it's just fun. Flower sun flower cloud.

These are probably the lyrics they were waiting for and then the song abruptly ends. It likely had more to it, but this is what remains after so many years of being alone. No one could really teach her the rest, if there was more.]

Oh twinkling star above, how beautiful yet lonesome.
As sad and lonesome as I am
I reach out, for your hand, We are two and one
Farewell my love until we meet again

oh twinkling star above
how beautiful yet lonesome
as sad and lonesome as i am

[Oh...oh.]

[Lonesome, and then lonesome no longer. No wonder she likes that song, so. It is not only quite beautiful, but it - it is indicative of what the world here has allowed them. Two halves, joining to make a whole. Two and one.]

["Farewell," though.]

[They were never very good at those.]

not good at farewell

[That's how the song goes, is what she almost says. As if the lyrics were impossible to change because someone uttered them once. Their problem with farewell flies over her head . She doesn't get why or the underlying meaning behind what they're saying. She takes the problem literally-maybe it's too many letters? It might be hard to type(??).

Because unlike Drifter, that word comes naturally to her. She said goodbye to the other kids, to some ghosts and even to Seto, once. Not always with words, but she would look at them and think farewell. Goodbye.

And one day, she's going to have to say it to Drifter too.]

Your heart can say that kind of thing on its own. You don't have to write that long word.

[#problemsolver]

[Your heart is meant to say those things on its own. Their heart is weak and failing - can they still say a goodbye that someone will hear and translate and be able to understand? They have failed to bid proper goodbyes where they are owed. They may fail again. The nature of death robs one of the premonition of when a goodbye would be best. Even when it is an inevitability, death is...always sudden.]

[Sudden and inescapable.]

[The Drifter’s hand rests over their chest, briefly, before they can muster a response.]

how

[The how of it beyond her. To explain that complex thought in words makes her pause and fiddle with the fake petals on her barrette, like the small bit of plastic can answer for her. It can't, clearly, because the silence continues on.]

It's-

[Another pause. Frustration begins to show on her face and she looks at her own hands, places one over her heart, and lowers them again.]

I don't know the words and-

[She can't show them, like she could with Seto. There's no way to force her feelings into them.]

I can't show Drifter.

[Hard knock life. But as she sorts through her thoughts, an idea strikes her. One that might show them how it works, in a small way.]

Maybe I can make your heart do it now.

[ARE YOU READY BEAN??? She's got a terrible plan.]

[They cannot claim to have even the remotest understanding of what it is she is implying. But they do have one thing in their favor:]

[Trust.]

[Their heart, after all, is already so fragile and so tired. It continues to beat because it is a resilient creature, even as the pink-tinted sickness eats away at its veins and saps it dry. A little more cannot hurt it any further than it is already hurting. And, in the end, how could someone as gentle as Ren be a detriment to heart as wearied as theirs?]

[There is almost no hesitation, when they nod.]

ok

[It won't do much. She already knows that. But to a child who knows so few words to describe what they want, who relied heavily on powers that no longer exist in full to fill in the gaps where she couldn't, this is all she can think of.

So-

She gives them a hug, if they let her get that far. It's not something she does often. It looks more like an attempt to hide given the way she presses her face into the front of their shirt and clutches part of their cape.]

Is it warm?

[And will this child explain herself? Of course not. Because she is a fool.]

[It's...startling.]

[They'd not expected it. They'd not anticipated that sort of complete embrace, that folding of arms around their middle and the way her fingertips fist into the fabric of their cloak and the front of her face buries into their tunic and it is both startling and...new.]

[Is it warm?]

[...yes.]

[Yes.]

[It is a stirring of a warmth and of gratitude and uncertainty and a great concatenation of things to which they cannot think to put a name, so vibrant is the maelstrom and so unknown is the sensation, but it is enough that they might slowly, gently, rest one gloved hand to the back of her head in an awkward sort of pat.]

yes
it is

[MU] - DECEMBER STORYTELLING / MEMORY SHARE

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this is where we pretend i didnt mess up the lyrics like five tags ago ok?? ok

ITS FINE....ITS FINE

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