[network] @TW; Video; Day 12 [open, cw for corpses and horrible]

[maskintape]

My voice is back.

[ Though for those who've heard Tim's voice before, it sounds much more hoarse than usual. Still, any voice is better than no voice! ]

I'm gonna - [cough cough] - I'm going to upload a video in a second. Some stuff I found yesterday. Kids shouldn't watch it. People who're already - you know, already freaked out by everything shouldn't watch either. It's not... I mean, it's. It isn't anything good, is what I'm saying. So.

[ He could try and filter the video away from those parties, but the thought doesn't sit well with him. The last time he tried to hide secret video footage from someone it kind of backfired spectactularly and people got killed and Tim got sent here by Tall McDarkandfaceless and everything was awful. He'd rather not repeat that, thanks. ]


[ When the promised video begins, it doesn't look very interesting. The camera is trained on the ground, where someone has been digging at the snow and dirt to reveal a layer of smooth pebbles. The cameraman - Tim, obviously, though he can't be seen - kneels in the snow, picks up a handful of the pebbles and brings them closer to the tablet. It's a little hard to make out since they're covered in dirt, but each of the stones is speckled in something that looks very much like dried blood.

The tablet is then propped up against something on the ground, showing a better view of the surroundings: a park complete with playground equipment. Tim walks back into shot, crouches, and resumes digging. After a minute or two he stops, a puzzled expression on his face, and pulls at something in the hole to get a better look at it.

There's a strangled gasp of breath that might have been an attempt at a scream, and Tim drops the thing like it's on fire. People with sharp eyes (or who pause the footage) will see that it was a human arm, dismembered just above the elbow. Tim scrambles out of view and the video briefly goes black as he turns off the tablet.

When the video resumes, it seems Tim has been busy. The view is panning across the ground again, revealing several patches that have been dug up to reveal frozen corpses. Some are bloody and horribly wounded, while others appear to have died less violently - the only thing they seem to have in common is that they're all remarkably well-preserved. And remarkably dead. That too.

Also worth noting is that the video is distorted badly. It's warped and stretched as if it's being tugged on at the edges, and there's a large amount of visual tearing evident in the footage. There isn't exactly a lot to be heard - wind noises and muted, huffy coughs - but the little audio that's there sounds tinny and distorted as well. It doesn't really make the fact that there's a mass grave in the fucking park any less horrifying, unfortunately.

After half a minute or so, the video cuts out. Mercifully. ]

Comments

Voice; ID: max;

[feralone]

[That's actually somewhat curious. Horrible, obviously, but it's not just someone wanting to talk about nonsense is the point. So while he's squirreled away in some corner far away from his recent travel "buddies" once they get inside for the night he'll respond out of vague interest.

Though it's audio only the man on the other end doesn't seem the least bit affected by the sight. Max has seen worse to be honest. He's done worse.]

Where is that? Which park?

[Max has been through one of the parks, but he's not sure if it's the same place.]

[maskintape]

It's like - it's by the walls. In the north-west. A day north of the, uh, the morgue?

[ More or less, anyway. And it's not exactly likely that the guy wants exact directions. ]

[feralone]

[Duly noted: he walked over a mass grave on his second day here. Fun times. Also noted is the fact that the funeral home must be between the two areas of the west wall he did not directly travel. He has a pretty good map of the western end going now.]

Hm. Why did you dig there?

[What did you see that he didn't? Or what other demented reason did you have for digging for no particular reason?]

[maskintape]

I -

[ once found valuable clues back home digging around in the dirt for a bunch of melted videotapes?

have been making more and more questionable decisions at a steadily increasing rate lately? ]

- I dropped something. And I thought, you know - if I dropped something somebody else might have, so it was worth a look.

I'm almost out of cigarettes, so. Kinda getting a little desperate.

[ Clearly that explains everything ]

[feralone]

Hm.

[Yeah, clearly. He's skeptical but he doesn't talk much on a normal basis so there's no extra comment to indicate this anyway.]

Is that everything? [That was found.]

[maskintape]

Uh. Yeah.

[ Even with the hoarseness, he sounds a little bemused. ]

I mean, is... is a bunch of bodies not what you were expecting, or...?

[feralone]

Hmph. [Not amused. Not aggressive though.] No, wondering if there were more.

[maskintape]

Oh.

[ That makes more sense! He relaxes a little. A LITTLE. Tinyteeny lil weeny bitty bit. ]

Well, like - like I told some of the others, I only dug five holes. And found five bodies. So I either got - you know, lucky, or...

[ Or it's impossible not to hit bodies when digging around there. ]

[feralone]

There are more.

[He finished the sentence almost unconsciously. It's a statement rather than a question and it doesn't sound like a prompt to go on or anything. A musing out loud.]

Are you going to go back? Look for more?

[Maybe he doesn't get that most people wouldn't want to look for more. Maybe he doesn't hear the shaky tones in Tim's voice. Maybe he's just too far removed to understand the natural fear of the find. Or maybe he just doesn't care.]

[maskintape]

[ Why do people keep asking Tim that. Has he given off the impression of being someone who gets a kick out of this? HE REALLY HOPES NOT. ]

Yeah, uh, no. Pretty sure I've found enough - enough dead guys for now. It's not like I'm trying to get together a whole football team or whatever.

[ Not when he's so far away from the shed with all the sports equipment!! ]

[feralone]

[Max hasn't heard the word "football" in ages, man. What is that again? Never mind.]

What if there's something useful on one of them?

[Aren't you curious at all? Max possibly would be but he's already headed somewhere else equally interesting. He just thought...most people wanted more clues about this place.]

[maskintape]

I'm-- I--

[ He wants to splutter out some kind of outraged comment about not stealing from the dead, but since one of the last things he did back in his own world was take a bottle of pills from a guy he'd just killed...

Ugh. He'd had to do it, but. Just ugh. ]

I checked them for ID. I don't - I don't want anything else they might have. So.

[feralone]

Why not?

[Survival was survival. Max did what needed to be done. No matter how macabre. In his world that was just how things worked. He knew, or should have known, by now that most people weren't from a place like his ruined world... but it was still hard for his mind to wrap around that. Still hard to think in old terms. To remember how the old world worked. Before the wars. Before the world fell apart and everything was about survival.]

[maskintape]

Because they're dead!

[ The audio distorts briefly, a hard metallic FRRRRRZZZ twisting at the edge of Tim's outburst. ]

It's not-- you don't-- I wouldn't want somebody picking me over for scraps, so I'm not gonna do it to anybody else. It's - it's just. You don't do that.

[ Unless you really have to. ]

[feralone]

They're dead. They can't feel anything.

[His voice was still a dead calm, unemotional and unaffected by the topic. If anything there's an inkling of reproach to the tone. A disbelief, not understanding why this was so hard, why it wasn't natural.

That's just how it was.]

You're not. You need. For survival. Take what you need, or you won't survive.

[maskintape]

Yeah, this'd be a hell of a lot more convincing if you weren't talking to a guy who died already. You don't - you don't know they're not going to come back. Y'know, even if you're cool with overlooking the whole respect for the dead thing.

[ For his part, Tim's voice sounds a lot shakier than he'd like. He's trying to keep it steady, but after the last few days it's not that easy. ]

[feralone]

[There's a long pause from Max in his response. But when he comes back it doesn't sound like he took Tim's reply as a chastisement at all. It simply seems rather that he was thinking on how to put his next bit of argument for pilfering from the dead.]

You think they're going to wake up and find you taking what you need to survive? Do you think that's how it works?

[He's pretty sure it doesn't and even if it does you're being a pussy, Tim. Man up for God's sake.]

[maskintape]

No, I don't. I just - I don't - why does this matter?

[ The question is settled uncomfortably between a challenge and a plea. Debating morality is hard enough when he is in his right mind. ]

If you want to come out here and get your hands on all the sweet dead guy loot you want, be my guest. It's all yours. Happy goddamn birthday.

[feralone]

[Max grunted, unamused, and somewhere out there where no one can see he's shaking his head.]

Busy. Maybe later.

[And it doesn't sound like a joke. But all right, he'll let up and leave Tim be for now. The argument isn't getting him anything after all.

He disconnects from the network for the day.]