[network] Event: Long & Lost [NIGHT 217]

[snowblindmods]

it's been so long between the words we spoke
will you be there up on the shore, I hope

[Make sure to note any specific warnings in your subject lines!]

Comments

[bookofnope]

The loop you controlled - I see. So you did have some power. Some equal footing. [He mulls on that for a while, an uncertain note in his breathing. They're skimming dangerous territory again.]

And now here you are. Yes. I see how it is.

[thewarningafter]

Some power. Enough.

[There's not much to add. He's already said much too much, good as it feels to get it off his chest.]

And now here I am.

[bookofnope]

[Yes, he knows that feeling. It runs ahead of him, bursts and leaks out -]

There's no getting away from it, this, this unmaking - it's like no helplessness I've ever known. It shouldn't be possible.

[thewarningafter]

No. It shouldn't.

What about you? What've they done to you?

[bookofnope]

They made me a living man again. They made me mortal.

[Normally he tries not to put it that way. Suppressed my nature, neutralised my abilities, these are nice sanitised ways to put it. This is the filthy, ragged truth.]

[thewarningafter]

...Huh.

[In a distant way, Stephen can sort of imagine how that's probably a great blow to someone for whom it's not the default state of things. It's hard to feel as much sympathy as Beckett probably feels he deserves, though.]

Like...living, living? Not just...less vampire-y?

[bookofnope]

[Beckett does, admittedly, feel that he deserves quite a bit of sympathy. When he isn't feeling that he deserves what he got. It's a complicated mindset.

He glances at Stephen from under his tinted glasses, a spark of anger at the question.] Living enough to be hungry and cold. And sick more often than not. Feeding feels good but it does nothing. Breath, a pulse, the lot... and it isn't a gift. It was never what I wanted.

[thewarningafter]

Didn't say it was.

[But okay, the whole thing where he's still apparently really into "feeding"? Not the most endearing admission.]

I gotta imagine it makes the whole only-allowed-out-in-daytime thing easier, though. Unless that's another myth.

[bookofnope]

Oh, no. That one is the unvarnished truth, and going about in daylight never gets comfortable, let me assure you. Though the fact that that "daytime" has no sun to speak of is a help.

[Cold comforts. As it were.]

[thewarningafter]

Oh, yeah, it would be. I mean, apart from how you're probably just as prone to vitamin D deficiency as the rest of us now.

[Stop enjoying something he hates.]

[bookofnope]

Why, thank you for the reminder. I absolutely needed another addition to my list of reasons I feel like a shambling wreck.

[That? That wasn't on.]

[thewarningafter]

Join the club.

[Sorry, was that dickish? That was dickish.]