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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A little bit.

[It pinches at the corners of his eyes; it creases them into points, the memories of every test he had to endure, every pill he had to swallow, every night he spent awake screaming at the walls until they told him that he had to be quiet or they'd have to make him be quiet.]

[They sedated him, sometimes. When it got really bad. When it was at its worst. Had to up his dosage, just to calm him down.]

They said it was to help me.

[She's just a kid, the same that he was. She's just a kid. Like Chara. Like Frisk. Like Chip. Like Max. Like so many fucking dozens of others on this godforsaken island, who have come to accept cruelty as commonplace because that's just the kind of life they've been raised to accept.]

[She's just a goddamned kid.]

[Over these few months here, he's extended far more hands, initiated far more contact, than is really typical for him, or ever has been. Maybe it has to do with people whose needs are greater than his.]
[Maybe it has to do with feeling safe.]
I know. I know, it's the scariest thing in the world. Feeling this alone. Feeling like you're just...you're just someone else's experiment.

[He means it. God, but he means it.]

[And he holds out a hand with the palm up, if she needs it.]

[That elicits a look from her. One of shock because while she gathered that he understood, and found comfort in that, the word experiment hits close to home. He doesn't just understand. It's not an empathetic connection-it's not him trying to make sense of her vague, childish responses because their situations were similar. He was there. Might as well have been in this room with her, stacking blocks and watching kids get rolled out by doctors who barely spared you a second look. Because you were there for one reason only and it wasn't to live or to be a kid. It was to be a tool. An experiment. A catalyst that may or may not live to see the future scientists were trying to create.

He gets it.

She doesn't say anything in response, unable to ask why he was there and what they were using him for. Those are memories that may be bubbling on the surface, but she doesn't want to be the one to bring them up.]

It's okay. It was-for someone like me it was supposed to be like that.

[But it doesn't feel okay. Whatever words come out of her mouth, whatever vague confession she made in that moment, is absolutely betrayed by her clammy, shaking hand when she grabs his. This place scares her some. The fact there are other worlds, where people went through similar experiments, scares her more.]

Do you want to hide with me?

[Sure, it's a dreamworld, but she can find a hiding place for the two of them. No problem. Absolutely. Let's look away from this shared nightmare and chill behind a log.]

[For someone else's sake? For the good of some other world, some other person? Hell if he knows. At this point, it feels like it'd be an imposition to ask, to pry. He's already seen far more of someone else's life, someone else's private life, than he deserves to.]

[She's shaking when she grabs hold. There's a tremor in her fingertips and a tremble to the words - a sure sign that her conviction in what she's saying isn't really her conviction at all. They're someone else's words, placed into her mouth, issued to her so she could parrot them back. Didn't matter if she believed it. It just mattered that she could adhere to it, and not cause trouble.]

[There's a step up here, in some ways, compared to his old room. You have places to hide.]

[The lift to the corner of his mouth is a little too strained to count as a smile, but it's there.]

Yeah. Yeah, okay.

You play hide and seek a lot, huh?

I liked to hide, but they always found me.

[Hiding from doctors didn't count for much when they knew every hiding spot and lured her out with with medicine. With food. With cat dolls or simply by grabbing her before she could disappear under the bed.

Then it became a matter of hiding from ghosts. Hiding from the scary world she chose to explore because it was far preferable to the lab she had grown up in.

She squeezes his hand, pulls herself up to her feet without releasing her grip on him, ready to wander the heck away from here. Goodbye memory, she can run from you too.]

Taako and Lup play hide and seek. It's fun with them.

Yeah.

[It's said so quietly that it's barely audible, just a breathed-out rasp of a word. People always...find you. No matter how you hide, there's no escaping who and what you are. Crouching in the Rosswood back trails, hiding behind trees, kicking up leaf litter as though that might obscure your footprints when the doctors realized you'd gone again.]

[They always found him, too.]

[He lets her lead him along. He's used to letting children lead, while he follows.]

You live with the elves?

[The response is quiet and if not for her looking back to check on him, she would've missed it.

Even so, it doesn't surprise her. There's too much he understands and hiding from people who may or may not want to hurt you wouldn't be an exception. She squeezes his hand once, guides him over to a nearby log that won't do much to hide either of them, but she moves behind it all the same. With her back to the memory that has long since vanished, she sits on the ground and waits for him to do the same.]

Yes, they let me be with them.

[It's been great, honestly. Who would've thought adults could be so nice?]

You can play with us next time.

[Because he should get a chance to understand how fun it can be to hide too.]

They smile at you and make your heart feel warm. They do that kind of thing.

[He settles down with his back to the wood. It's cool, facing away from the fire, imaginary as it is. Maybe he'd feel stupider, indulging this, if it didn't tap into an old instinct that still itches at the backs of his lids. If you can't see them, they can't see you. There's something about the cold and the dark and the isolated that, despite the innate terror, is comforting in its familiarity.]

[Instinctively, he glances over his shoulder, sweeping the area. The people here don't care, he's pretty sure, but there's still that tickle of an urge. If anything comes for them - he's big enough to shield her from whatever's around.]

[It's a stupid, stupid thought. There's nothing here.]

[She's a sweet kid. Despite the fact that she's clearly seen some shit, clearly had to live with some shit she didn't deserve, she manages to retain that earnest, unselfish reflex that children who grow up too fast don't always get to keep.]

Sounds like they take real good care of you.

[It feels safer here.

There's no overarching bed to cover them or trees to hide their bodies, but with the hand of someone that understands in her own, it feels better. She notes the way he looks around-it keeps her from having to do it herself and she settles there, relatively relaxed.

Her palms don't feel as clammy anymore and the tension in her body seems to dissipate the second they claim their hiding spot and deem it safe.]

They have good hearts. They're nice to me.

[The elves are so good. Protect them. And then from one potential lab baby to another, she says-]

You should sit by them if it's scary. You'll feel safe if you do.

[It's nice of her to offer. There's something...it's not quite sad, but it pings in his chest with a heaviness he can't wholly ignore, the ease with which she can say something like that, and the way he can know without question that she believes it. It's a childish sort of simplicity, and it's a worldview he doesn't know if he ever owned. If he did, he can't recall.]

[But the choice of words, too, is one that sits with him. You'll feel safe.]

[Feeling safe isn't the same as being it, is it?]

Lup gave me a knife to keep all sorts of, uh...bad things back. [He traded the knife for his last handle of moonshine, but that's a part of the story he doubts a kid needs to hear.]

That's good. Kid like you shouldn't be all alone.

[There won't ever come a time when weird noises don't make her look over her shoulder or wake her in the middle of the night. She relishes in the little comforts she has-a cat, the memory of Seto's warm hand in hers, other pairs of eyes and ears around her to look out for the things she can't see, but she's never been safe. Not in hospital rooms or surrounded by ghosts. She gave up on that long ago.

The knowledge he has a weapon to protect himself is one that will stick with her. He might be another brave person that can fight and defend himself when the world gets too scary for him. She can add that to her list of small comforts as well.]

You can dust with that kind of thing too. That's what she said.

[She raises her arm up and makes a stabbing motion with her hand, though it's apparent she doesn't quite understand the meaning the gesture by the way she wiggles her fingers in the air afterwards. Sup dreamworld.]

...Are you alone here?

[That takes him a minute, to parse what she's implying. Dust - probably she's taken away something other than what he's guessing Lup was using it as a euphemism for. Maybe that's best. But then again, is that really a luxury they can afford here?]

[Fuck it. Even if it isn't, she deserves a shred of innocence in this godforsaken nightmare of an island.]

[I'm never alone, he almost says, but what might be a comforting sentiment for a child without the context of his life is nothing short of absolutely terrifying for him.]

Not really. I've been meeting a lotta people.

You?

Me too.

[He must understand how astounding that is. She thinks he might, as a guy that seems to get her feelings when she wants to hide under beds or behind logs. At least this is a discussion that doesn't make her fingers tremble or her voice shake. She sounds amazed, more than anything.]

Everyone says 'hello' and 'are you hungry?' and 'are you okay?'. They ask you things like that.

[...it is, isn't it?]

[It's kind of a shock, the first time you step outside of it. He was lucky; he got years to acclimatize. Years to pretend he was something other than a freak. He got to act and play like he had a normal life, like he went to a normal school before shipping off to college.]

[So he asks, entirely too serious to be serious, eyebrows lifted:]

And, uh...are you hungry?

[He might not be serious, but she thinks it over before answering, maybe taking it entirely too seriously in turn. And, well. It's a dream. She's not particularly hungry here. Between the elves and Guzma, she's set as far as meals go.]

I have a snack in my shoes.

[But she's not wearing any shoes. Where could they be?? A mystery.]

Are you hungry? Do you want that snack when we wake up?

[In the shoes she isn't wearing? Yeah, okay. That's fair. He huffs softly, part snort and part laugh, and something in his chest eases by increments.]

[Kids. They should never feel the way he remembers feeling.]

Nah, kid. It's okay. Mostly I'm glad you're okay. Y'know?

[She does know, if only because she's looking at him the same way. He's lived for a long time, so there must be something good in him that she lacks-whether it's in his heart or body or some combination of the two. It's difficult not to worry about him though.]

I'm okay. This kind of thing makes me happy.

[She squeezes his hand again, for just a second.]

Is this something you like too?

[Something he likes?]

[God, when was...the last time someone even asked him that? When was the last time he allowed circumstances to align so that someone felt like they could? He...has to think about that one, for a minute. For a really long minute.]

[Eventually, though, he squeezes her hand back, an incremental increase in pressure, along with almost a smile.]

...music.

I like music.

[The gentle squeeze is enough to ease her worries and seeing his face relax-that's nice.

It shouldn't surprise her there's another trait they have in common-music. She likes to hum little melodies to herself and can only imagine he likes to do the same. It's the method she's most familiar with and it doesn't occur to her there are other ways to enjoy music.]

You can sing right now-I'll listen to your song.

[SHE'S EXCITED]

I don’t...I don’t know any...

[Old melodies he picked out on the mess of instruments he hoarded over time, now lost in a bitter rush of gasoline like the rest of the compartmentalized pieces of a life that wasn’t really his at at all. Snippets of songs he heard on the radio, worked out by ear, and played over and over until he could play them by memory.]

[But that was kind of a long time ago.]

I haven’t played in a while.

Edited 2018-01-11 23:26 (UTC)

[Played.

She knows instruments, in the vaguest sense of the word, and a few come to mind now. Their names are lost to her, but she remembers seeing old toys in homes. In books. They're supposed to make music if you know how to play them. She didn't come across many that weren't intended to be toys from the beginning. The few she did were rusted, destroyed and unable to make any kind of noise.]

You know how to sing with your hands?

[And to demonstrate, she uses her free to pretend like she's wiggling her fingers over piano keys.]

That's the kind of music you like?

[Educate this dumbass, Tim.]

["Sing with your hands." That's...god, it's cute. It's the kind of thing he'd expect a kid to say, equipped with just enough words to get the meaning across but without having learned the specifics. How the hell she's managed to hold onto a childhood when it feels like his was utterly ripped away early on might just be indicative of her own ability to see things in a far brighter light than he ever could.]

Playing instruments, yeah. Stuff like guitars, or banjos. Y'know...they've got strings, and stuff?

[He mimes strumming a guitar with one hand, albeit feeling faintly ridiculous as he does it.]

[Placing the name with the actual instrument is difficult-with strings? It's a fuzzy memory and she copies his movement to see if muscle memory can make up where she so clearly lacks. It doesn't work. Nothing definitive is popping up.]

I can find strings.

[That's step one. Probably. Maybe he can play with those taped against a tree? Or something else? She's trying.]

Can you play with that?

It, uh...wouldn't sound real great.

[Damn. Maybe he should ask the Storyteller for something...]

[Stupid, right? Stupid. The focus is on survival here, not playing an instrument that he hasn't had time to sit down and play in months. Who's to say he'd even remember it? It probably wouldn't last very long, with the elements being as they are; the wood would get warped, the strings would fall out of tune, and there'd be no point. Who'd even wanna listen to some dumbass who doesn't know how to play properly, who hasn't played in months, who's years out of a music theory major he never got around to completing?]

[Who, aside from maybe...a kid, who doesn't know any better?]

Tell you what. I'll see if I can ask for one down the line, and I can show you.

Okay!

[Is it possible for one person to be excited? Clearly it is. She's practically bursting with happiness.

Also she might rob someone's home. Not great, but she's doing her best to assist this guy. It's something that makes him happy and she's going to Find It. Her treasure hunting skills will be put to the ultimate test or she'll help him in the form of magic wishes to get this banjo-guitar-whatever with strings. Whichever comes first.]

Can you play for Seto too? He would like that. It would make him very happy.

Don't think I know a Seto. He here with you?

[He means more "here" on the island than in a vaguer sense, but she talks about him like he is here. There's no reason to believe that he wouldn't be. Lots of kids are here, after all - assuming he is a kid.]

[Truth be told, Tim is making a lot of terrible assumptions here.]

[MU] - DECEMBER STORYTELLING / MEMORY SHARE

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