retrospec | (no subject)

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(no subject)

So here's the thing…

We have a lot of work left to do. Those of you who ventured down below got a taste of what we're looking at and hopefully that means we can make better preparations. I'm working on opening a new portal based on your energy readings and getting it to stabilize itself so you aren't stuck down there longer than you have to be. May take a few days, but I'm hoping to get a map drawn up, too.

How many of you have been out to Magatus? You might wanna compare notes…the influence started spreading even further. It's better to bring everything and everyone out there back to the city where we can put up forcefields and I can monitor from here.

So what am I saying? I need two teams, a rescue team and an exploration team. Take some time to decide, figure out your skills, organize and arm yourselves. Assignments will go out when you're ready, and when I'm ready.

Oh yeah…and if you're interested in working for me directly? Send me your résumé.

Zee Carlisle
Hiring Manager
Retr

spec Incorporated

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Ha. Cool. And from what I'm hearing, some other people dropped into the Greek underworld in their last trip down to the sixth layer. But, like, not the actual one? Just one built around what most people know about the Greek underworld. Two rivers and a big guard dog. So Hel probably isn't far off.

yeah, that's what the place looked like. hades-flavored recolle, give or take some landmarks. meant to send you pictures of that little excursion.

the dog wasn't bad. just wanted some treats.

Leave it to you to tame Cerberus.

I'm sure I'll be able to get back down there if I really need to, but I don't think I missed much. Kind of looking forward to what's gonna be under Magatus, in the most fucked up way possible. Maybe I'm just antsy.

it was a letdown how easy it was. you should've seen the big guy—would've been a hell of a fun hunt

you really didn't. lot of it was in line with what you told me, just under a different coat of paint. sacrifices, stripping your self away, lost souls, hospital lab. no brain, but the lab was infested.

First off, infested with what, and second did you get what you sacrificed back or am I gonna have to play twenty questions to figure out what you lost?

are you kidding? i took the pain river. i saw what happened to a few other people that went with lethe. right horror movie, that. unless you're talking about me losing my statuesque good looks for a hot minute—those came back, don't you worry.

[Even though it's text, the tone change should be pretty easy to pick up on here.]

honestly, i wish i could tell you what. never seen anything like em. hang on, let me send you a few things. those things are pretty chilling, just warning you

[A few moments later is a series of photos. A few rooms of the dirty abandoned hospital, things getting dingier and darker as the series went on. The last one is one of the monsters, up close and sprawled out dead on the floor. From the angle, what's presumably Freya's hand—covered in smears and rivulets of blood, a slew of bloody bites travelling up the forearm and out of frame—holds the creature's wrist in view, to show it's illegible ID-styled bracelet.]

Jesus shit.

[she definitely wants to keep up that tone shift, talk about how she's glad for her and Pen's sakes that Frey is still hot as hell, but the pictures kind of make that hard.]

Glad you took that thing down, but christ, it looks like it did a fucking number on you first. You feeling okay? Everything healing up all right?

THEY did a number on me. infested, remember? and believe me there were a lot of the bastards.

i was trying to keep them off someone else. that's one my neat little magic powers. i can make a grab at something's attention if it's spitting mad and not focusing too hard, and it worked. not a damn one of them went after lucy.

[No matter how much Freya thinks she's totally over that one August's trauma, it keeps creeping back. She almost doesn't continue, but ultimately does so to spite that reluctance.] i don't remember what happens next all that well. i was fighting em all off and something started happening, or they did something to me. i just remember being so angry i couldn't think. like they each one of those things had personally wronged me or kept me from something i wanted.

then there were none, and i guess i went ballistic on lucy. something about those things really messed up my head

other than that i'm fine. not like i'm a squishy human lightweight still. takes a lot more than that to put down a l'cie

Edited 2019-03-03 19:12 (UTC)

Takes more than that to bring me down, too, but people still worry about me.

Whatever happened, it's just... more of that place messing with your head, you know? It made me forget who I was and lose myself, too. It wants to take away who we are and replace us with whatever it thinks belongs there instead. Or whatever it thinks would be fun to see us do.

I think you know this already, but's not your fault.

touche

[From this point on, though, she's going to directly text Anna to keep from potentially airing other people's dirty laundry publicly.]

sure i know that. it just that trust isn't always logical especially from someone who's already got a truck of issues with it. you know those people i mentioned that said i make them feel safe? she's one of em.

guess i just worry how she's taking it all

[Anna probably knows her well enough to guess how seriously Freya takes this safe feeling thing.]

[probably the smart idea.]

When I came back with my eye missing, she was one of the people who reached out. Gave her as much of a warning as I could about going down there, but I guess we didn't really have a choice this time.

You talk to her about it yet or are you just trying to give it some time first?

time. lucy isn't exactly the huggy-feely sort. i talk more in a given day than she does in a bloody week. lot of the time it's like having a third cat instead of a roommate

[Freya means that affectionately. She honestly, really does.]

I know the type. It's a hell of a lot to take in all at once.

God knows I still haven't finished dealing with everything from my last trip down there yet, but we're never gonna get time to unpack this shit until the war's over.

with how much we've packed up over the last two years, i'm not sure normal life'll wait for us to finish that chore

i take it you feel ready to do this eyepatch swordsmanship thing?

Fuck no I'm not ready, but I'm tired of staying out of things and letting other people get hurt instead.

have you talked to your doctor about big damn hero syndrome?

[Says the one that made herself the main course of an other-reality zombie buffet.]

[oh, bold words, Frey.]

Ha. Talked to A2 about survivor's guilt. That's the same thing, right?

sure, except survivor's guilt wants to be a death wish when it grows up big and strong. you be careful with that

Yeah. I will be. Promise.

Hope you're being careful with it, too.

ha. pretty sure if i picked one up, my last life would materialize to kick my ass if pen didn't first. fang was fighting with everything she had to pry someone out the jaws of a death wish

Good to know(?). I'm just saying, right now only one of us is actually a survivor like that.

People keep falling off the app like this and we might end up needing to expand the definition a little, though.

of what, survivor or death wish?

I mean, both. But you can't tell me that sitting around wondering why you're still allowed to be on the app when everyone you care about has to lose sight of what the world around them really is isn't some kind of survivor's guilt.

Not that it's hitting me like that yet, but, like.

or i could be glad they aren't being tortured by memories of dying young while the rest of us take care of the heavy lifting. when this is all over with we can focus on bringing them round again

not like that stuff hasn't occurred to me before, but letting it run through my head all the time isn't going to get me anywhere. hell it probably will make focusing on what we have to do harder

Yeah, I've got both of those running through my head at once. Real damn party up here.

Sorry, I'm getting in my own head way more than usual lately. I'm not about to go get myself killed trying to keep everyone else safe. Much as I fucking hate agreeing with the genocidal asshole we're all trying to kill before he gets us first, the people who still have the app are strong. We don't all need to be protected.

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