aftr_stories | [MU] - FEELING LIKE A GHOST (PART II)

[MU] - FEELING LIKE A GHOST (PART II)

"No, no...no!"

The Storyteller's voice cuts through the inkdrop-dark, frantic and scrambling. A distant blot of campfire gutters in the far distance - far from where you are. The disorientation of the week preceding this one has translated into Mu, and everything is hopelessly out of place. The Storyteller sounds muffled, clearly addressing someone or something else, their voice cushioned by the uniform, void-like night.

"Stop it. Stop it! I wasn't gone for very long at all. You can't behave for two weeks? You have to make it all...all...wrong? I can't keep this up - not with what I've had to do since returning - !"

Gradually, however, the shadowy campsite solidifies into being. Or...a semblance of it does, in any case. Four glistening pyres rear out from the shadows, each glowing a different color. The strange material that domes them almost resembles worked steel, forming different patterns against their multicolored backdrops.

[ ♆ ] The first glows a deep crimson, kicking scarlet embers into the dream-night air. Its pit sphere portrays a crowd of people in silhouette, heads bowed in genuflection - paying homage to some looping, many-coiled shape in the sky above.

[ ♆ ] The second glows a deep orange. Its pit sphere is worked into the shape of a looming mountain, with what might be some sort of village or ruin sprawled at its base.

[ ♆ ] The third's flames are a rich green. Its designs are most abstract; the starburst patterns that swirl across the metallic composition of its fire pit sphere could be explosions, maybe...or something else entirely.

[ ♆ ] The fourth pyre is one bearing host to golden flames, amber sparks sprayed out from behind the shape of a set of scales nestled among a flurry of birdlike shapes.

Beside each pyre is heaped a pile of sticks, colored to correspond to their respective flames. The Storyteller sounds agitated when they manage to speak again:

"Will you let them at least make the choice I left to gave them?" When there is no response, they sigh. "If you can hear me...I can't make it clearer than that, at the moment. Pick one. Pick one, quickly, and try to get out before it decides to make things worse! Just add a stick to whichever one looks best to you!"

Unfortunately, whether you abstain from voting or make your choice, that's not all there is to this night...

Tonight's Storytelling, further warped by Mu's capricious nature, will likely feel familiar to those of you who were with us in December of the year prior. Only this time, you don't get much choice in what kind of story you're telling...or, indeed, any choice in the matter at all. As you wake by the Storytelling campfire, Mu shifts to form three separate events from your character's present - which is to say, within one full year of their current canonpoint - 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.

While the initial setting will be familiar for oldcomers, and newcomers will recognize it from the introduction they received in their dreams, things will be far more similar to the memory share that occurred in December. All memories must be from within one year of your character's canonpoint. For questions, please refer to our OOC event post!

Even those who prefer not to voice their stories aloud are not safe this time around. The memory does not need to be willingly recalled in essence in order for Mu will shift to accommodate it in full.

Just like the last time this happened, all memories will be worth two offerings each, as if in compensation. So at least there's that!

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[Was this Connor? It looked like Connor in the vision and in many ways the boy in the vision acted like Connor, the same tells, the same lack of wanting to talk about anything approaching how he felt.

But in other ways... Shion found it hard to imagine Connor this comfortable with anybody. Were they seeing another Connor? From a different world?

Or was it just that Connor had once been... More comfortable around people. Or would be, Shion's own images were things that hadn't even happened to him so this could be similar.

But Shion knows enough about Connor to know that he has no future, not on his own world anyways.

On this world, on another world. But unless Shion has been misunderstanding everything Ceej has ever said- his own is not one he can return to.

He sits just staring at Connor for a while, a thousand theories, thoughts and worries swirling through his mind. But Ceej is right there, he probably doesn't want to talk about this... It was probably kinder to pretend none of this was happening. But that would just...

They couldn't keep just not talking about anything that made them feel awkward. Even if this vision showed just how much Connor did not want to talk about anything...

Shion had to stop being a coward.] Is that something you remember?

[Connor's been staring off into the distance, not quite looking at anything. He remembers this, but not like this. Not with this clarity. Not without a filter of unreality that made it seem more like something he imagined than something that really happened.

There's an entire summer he doesn't remember very well, because he's pretty sure he only managed to get through it by disassociating the entire way through and even though nobody else would be able to, Connor can tell from which scars are freshest that this is the summer before his senior year. This is during the summer he only kind of remembers in bits and pieces: the burn of oxygen leaving his lungs and not being replaced, tearing pages out of his sketchbook and setting them on fire, reading a single book over and over.

You're so innocent, mi cielito. You're too innocent for this world.

He remembers this, remembers Miguel, but it doesn't seem real. He's spent so long thinking it was just something he'd imagined so often that it became like a memory. That it almost felt like something that happened, but apparently it did.]

I . . . [Connor trails off, not even sure how to word what he should say.] I thought I made that up.

Made it up? [Was that possible? Connor was very imaginative. If this place had tried to pull a memory from him was it possible they had pulled something that wasn't real from his mind to show everyone?

But it seemed to also show futures. Shion's could be explained. He had looked in the mirror after all. He had seen potential futures even if he could remember none of them clearly.

But other people... It couldn't have taken them from their minds.

He has no idea. No theories.] Do... Do you remember anything else around it?

[Do you ever think about what happens when the oceans turn to acid? Like, will humanity survive that?

They'd been friendly at school, because they were biology partners. Because Connor made a stupid joke. He remembers that, remembers being kicked out of Hanover, but he doesn't remember - no, he does. He remembers why he was kicked out, but it's all so blurry that he can't make sense of it.]

He had a birthmark on his neck. [It's apropos of nothing, but it's the only thing Connor can think of to say.] I - he was out and I was so deep in the closet it never would have happened. I don't think he even knew I -

[He doesn't even know how to finish that. He doesn't remember how to finish that.]

I don't know.

Ceej... [It's all the warning Connor gets before Shion takes his hand and presses their foreheads together.] Breathe.

[Shion breathes too. Deep deliberate breaths. Something for Connor to match.

Whilst he breathes he thinks. Connor had forgotten something pretty major, something important. It was unlikely to be natural. More likely the memory had been taken from him.

Shion not understanding what Connor was saying was nothing new. But he's completely lost here. Out where? Why had Connor been in a cupboard? But they were the things Ceej remembered. It wasn't much but it was a start.] A birthmark on his neck. You were in a cupboard, he was outside. It's alright Ceej. Forgetting is terrifying. What didn't he know?

No, I wasn't literally -

[Connor laughs, a little hysterical.

Of course. Of course his stupid ass would inadvertently come out to multiple people only for them to be tripped up by the terminology. It usually doesn't bother him, the inability of other people to understand what he's saying, but here it's . . . How does he explain Miguel if he can't use any of the words he knows?]

What word do you use for this? [He gestures between them, unsure of how to explain the concept of queerness.] For if you're only into people that are the same gender as you? Because that's what he didn't know - at least I thought he didn't.

[Oh, he had taken something too literally again. Shion continues breathing, even as Connor laughs, as he tries to explain, Shion listened, concentrating on trying to understand. He couldn't help Ceej if he didn't understand.] We don't have a word in my world. Or if we did it wasn't one I knew. But... Gladio uses the same words you used in the dream. He explained them.

[It's literally never had to be something Shion has had to explain before. He loved Rat and now he loves Ceej as well. Just like Ignis loved Gladio and Diarmuid loved Waver. He had never had to quantify with words what made that different that Reno loving Elena or Xion's crush on Yu. Was it different? Clearly it mattered in Gladio's world where loving someone of the same gender was frowned upon.

Was that the same in Ceej's world?] So he didn't know you were gay? [He still sounds confused. But that's more... Shion might be bad at this but Connor and Miguel had been in bed in barely any clothes in the vision. Even Shion understands that to be a romantic, sexual thing. How was there any doubt?]

. . . Bi. Pan?

[He's almost talking to himself at this point, because he's having a secondary crisis right now. If he'd make out with Taako, who's technically not human, does that still fall under bi? Is that more of a pan thing? Like, hypothetically if you make out with an elf and you're a human does that just make you into xeno or is that quantifiable in the word you use to describe yourself?

Fuck 'em, Connor. Fuck 'em.]

Queer. [He's too stressed out to have this navelgazing moment right now.] I like . . . whatever, theoretically.

[That he keeps ending up with male-identified beings has no bearing on the fact that he would also make out with Lup, if she wasn't like. A sister? A fun aunt? It'd be kinda weird, is the point.]

It's not. I don't talk about it.

[He's brushing his fingers through his hair nervously, over and over like he doesn't realize he's doing it. Nobody needed more ammunition against him. They didn't need the confirmation that anything they said was true, and he didn't owe it to them.

. . . He doesn't know why he's kept doing it here. Habit, maybe? The lingering fear that anything he's built would crumble if anyone found out? It all seems so small now.]

[He knows bi as well. An equal opportunities flirt like me. Gladio had told him. The other words are new but there's enough context for him to understand Connor's rambling and his hand reaches up to stroke his hair. Still breathing, still trying to be the calm one. To not panic at the idea that someone has messed with Connor's memories. To not give into the rising anger that that thought brings.

Too many people have hurt Connor, but Shion losing control won't help his friend here in the slightest.] I know. [Connor doesn't talk about anything. Nothing important anyways. He hides and dances around and makes jokes. Shion is not surprised he never spoke about this.]

Gladio... He said that in his world being gay or bi was frowned upon. Is it... Is that why you are afraid?

[Is that why he had never told this Miguel?]

Edited 2018-10-25 06:00 (UTC)

It was just another reason for everyone to hate me. [He makes a sound that could almost be a laugh, if it weren't so shaky.] They already had enough of those. I didn't want them to take this one too.

[Your hair's getting long. It looks good on you.]

They'd already taken everything else.

[There was fear of societal rejection behind the decision, maybe, but more important was the obsessive need to hide the things that are most important. His dad went through his emails and his mom went through his room, so he learned how to hide the things they were looking for. Learned how to keep secrets, because people couldn't be trusted.

It's perfectly clear that there's no reason to do that here, and he's gotten better about trusting people enough to occasionally share personal information but there's a reason he died instead of telling anybody his secrets.]

Ceej... [Anger is building in him. He wants to go to Ceej's world, find those that hurt Connor and make them pay. All of them. Tear through his world finding everyone who had added to the pain until it was too much to bare. Until Ceej had died from it. They should pay, should be made to feel as much pain as they had caused.

He closed his eyes, breathing, trying for calm. It would help no one, least of all Ceej if Shion lost his temper. There was no one to hurt here, no one that deserved to be hurt anyways. He took another breath, hand still stroking Ceej's hair despite how much he was shaking.]

People... If you live in the world. Any of the worlds. You get hurt. People hurt you... That's what reality is. [Painful and difficult. But Shion had grown up in the opposite. A perfect world. Nothing bad had ever happened to him. But it had not been real. He had not been real. Just a mere shadow of a person.

Ceej was real. Real in all the messy ways that made a person.] But... Trusting people. That's a choice. It can be hard... [Especially for people like Connor, people who are so used to having walls around themselves. He's so much like Rat in that regard. Hurt so much that his walls are high. Shion understands that now, in a way he never used to.] But it's worth it... For the people who won't hurt you. For the people who won't hate you.

. . . The people who mind don't matter and the people who matter don't mind.

[It's said in the same tone Connor uses whenever he's quoting something. He doesn't attribute it, possibly because he doesn't remember where, exactly, he heard it. Dr. Seuss, maybe? It sounds like a Dr. Seuss thing.]

I - [The words catch on his tongue. He couldn't say them to Miguel, and he can't say them now.] I'm glad you keep me around.

[He would say that he's glad Shion is his friend, but that's . . . It's a little bit to the left of what he actually wants to say. This is closer, but still not quite what he should be saying.]

[He recognises the tone now. When Connor says things that he is quoting instead of saying himself. But he nods, it is accurate. Even if Shion would argue that everyone matters. He understood the sentiment, it was enough.]

I'm glad to have you around. [He doesn't stop stroking Ceej's hair.] I'm really lucky to have met you.

[Because Ceej has to know that. He spends all his time thinking people are just putting up with him, yet being around Ceej makes Shion smile. He has helped Shion so many times. He doesn't know his own worth and Shion doesn't even know how to begin showing him it. He knows how it is to feel like a burden after all.]

If it takes fighting a god for us to meet, it will have been worth it.

[There's still a sense that Connor's quoting something, maybe, but it's - there is a genuine sentiment under the mask of someone else's words. He still can't figure out how to actually use words to say what he means. He's never been very good at it, even though it should be easy. It should be simple to say three words, and yet he can't bring himself to do it.

He can't even bring himself to ask what they are to each other, beyond "friend." They've probably passed that, at this point, but he doesn't know what that means to Shion. If it's the same thing as what he wants it to mean.]

It is worth it. [Without a doubt, no matter what happened. No matter if things got painful or difficult. He was glad they had met, glad beyond words.

The hand that was not stroking his hair reached down to take Connor's hand.] I wouldn't change it. [Not even the dying or the pain. If that was what it took for Ceej to be here, to not be flinching from Shion's touch. Then it was worth it. Struggle was part of real life after all so as difficult as things were, still were, because Shion knows they need to talk. He needs to follow Gladio's advice and just... say all the words inside his heart.]

Thank you.

. . . It's funny, I finally fucking get it.

[Something has literally been bothering him since Ziziphus and he'd sort of explained it away when he'd realized he did like Shion as something more than a friend. The idea that of course Bliss had inserted someone in as his boyfriend had seemed reasonable in retrospect, because yeah. In his perfect world, he would be out and on meds and happy and well-adjusted. That made sense to him.

What didn't make sense to him was the way it had felt familiar. It felt like a memory: Shion studying with him had been the only thing in the entire dream that wasn't tinged with an edge of wrongness. It felt like it had happened before, easy and comfortable, and that was deeply unsettling to him on a fundamental level. In a weird way, the fact that it hadn't seemed wrong at all had been the thing that screamed something wasn't right.

Now, it's like everything has clicked into place. It felt that way because it was. It was just an echo of being sprawled on Miguel's bed after school, pretending to study but mostly just watching Miguel.]

You do the same thing he used to. You look at me and see who I could be.

[It didn't make much sense, but Shion stayed quiet and let Connor finish. It was hard sometimes, talking when all the feelings inside you wanted to burst out but at the same time seemed to be blocking all the ways that you could say them.

He just continued holding Connor's hand, stroking his hair and eventually Connor spoke again. Was it painful? Did Shion bring back memories, by being similar to Miguel. Hurting Connor, however unintentionally, was not something Shion would ever want to do.]

I see who you are, if people don't see it they are blind.

[It's an echo of what Miguel always used to say. The way he used to touch his fingers to Connor's cheek and say People think you're an asshole because you're innocent and you're trying to protect yourself. The way he was so sincere in his belief that Connor was good.]

. . . Can I kiss you?

[Like most things Connor says that seem to have no lead up, there's a whole internal process going on here: he's not entirely sure how much of his feelings are just being installed over the gaps in his memory like some kind of bizarre bugfix. That's. He doesn't want that to be the case, but he's so, so afraid that's all it is. He's so afraid this is another way his own brain has discovered to screw him over.]

I... [Shion blinked at him. He hadn't been about to ask, because Ceej had just remembered something huge. Remembered someone important to him and after something like that, he might have needed space. Also Gladio had already spoken to him after his story last month, about how he should try not to embarrass Ceej in public.

But if it were Ceej who was asking... That was different. Shion nodded, because the answer was yes. Of course it was, they still hadn't really talked about this. There was so much that was muddled up, especially with the vision of Ceej's past he had just seen and the vision of Shion's future, Nezumi kissing him before walking away, leaving him alone.

But talking is hard and this is so much easier.] Of course you can. [He moves his forehead from Ceej's, but only so he can press his lips to his.]

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[MU] - FEELING LIKE A GHOST (PART II)

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cw: anger and murder thoughts

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