[network][video] @Enoch; Day 241 [open] [blood and bones and human skin leather, Hell Tower]

[warriorscribe]

[Enoch speaks from behind the camera as it is raised from pointing at his feet, having turned the video function on in some amount of haste. The camera pans over the grisly scene of building 264, and all of its "blood, broken bones, scattered teeth, human skin turned to leather and used to decorate the walls". There are prophet symbols all over the cubicle walls and the walls of the building itself.]

Look at this...what did they do, all in the name of some "prophet" who was only a frightened, blinded girl? [He speaks to someone farther behind the camera:] Quark, perhaps you should go back up to the bridge? This place is... I don't want to subject you to it.

[When Quark has gone, after whatever discussion ensues, he resumes talking to the network.]

The air here... [He swallows heavily.] It's awful, thick and foreboding. Oh, it's like breathing vileness in all over again... I should follow him, get out- no.

[He tucks the tablet into his makeshift belt and goes outside, finding a spot away from the door and beginning to dig in the snow, unslinging his backpack and bringing out a large, flat piece of scrap metal to act as a crude shovel to help.]

I can't leave it like this. This is wrong, to leave these people like this. I can't bury all of it, but-

[He's interrupted as he hits ground beneath the snow. He can't dig through it no matter how hard he tries.]

...That isn't ideal. But it must suffice.

[He returns inside, shuddering as the atmosphere rolls over him, and begins gathering as many remains as he can carry at a time, moving them to the grave he'd just dug in the snow and clearing out snow that had fallen in. He tears a piece of leather off the wall and reveals a prophet symbol, which he pauses at with a wordless noise of surprise.

He comes back to this uncovered eye after finishing his crude grave and the doors have locked for the night. His breathing is heavy from the labor and distress as he removes the camera from his "belt" and switches it to the internal camera to show his face. Despite all the activity, the oppressive atmosphere and gruesome task has him looking sickly pale, the healthy flush draining from his face rapidly.]

I wonder why...what significance did covering these eyes have, and why human skin? Why such a macabre scene? I hope I've brought some comfort to whoever belonged to those remains I buried...they must be suffering in here.

((Anyone else staying the night here is free to come down and drag him upstairs where it's marginally less hellish. Or just announce their presence because he thinks he's alone in here.))

Comments

[warriorscribe]

[For Enoch, that's much easier said than done. Or perhaps in some cases impossible. Not feeling their suffering as his own, for example. The fact that the situation reminds him of his own suffering to begin with really doesn't help matters.]

My own needs...

[The only reason he considers it at all is because there's nothing he can actually do here, not yet, to meet the spirits' needs.]

I know dying here will do me no good, but I'm not certain what else I could be doing. I have no appetite, and don't think I can sleep here. I can't leave until morning. I'm warming myself as best I can.

[Psychological needs? What are those? He's aware of them on an instinctual level, and is happy when someone else pays attention to them, but has very little capacity to recognize them as true needs. He's better at - of course - seeing them in other people.]

[absentconstellation]

You must eat, and you must drink. Sleep will come, in time.

If it does not, perhaps I can help.

[ He doesn't mind staying up purring for a while. ]

[warriorscribe]

[Reluctantly, with a grimace at his surroundings, he pulls out a water bottle to slowly sip away at. His stomach churns at swallowing anything in this place with a pang of sharp pain, pulled from the depths of an awful memory. But he knows what the Cat says is true. To his credit, he seems to have his gag reflex on a tight leash, even if he very clearly forces the first few sips down.

He distracts himself with the Cat's offer. A cat's purring is relaxing, but between the tablet and the fact that he never fell asleep to a cat's purr, he doesn't immediately get it.]

Help? How so?

[absentconstellation]

[ The Cat watches intently, and nods his approval. Food will be more difficult, but it's important that Enoch make the effort. ]

I may not have the powers normally afforded me, but I am still a cat. Many creatures find a cat's purring to be quite soothing.

[warriorscribe]

Ah... [He smiles wanly, lower lip pressed against the edge of the water bottle, hesitating before taking another sip.]

I'm afraid I wouldn't know the extent of it. All the cats I've been acquainted with spent their nights chasing smaller animals rather than indoors with humans trying to sleep. It is quite a nice sound, though.

[absentconstellation]

It is profound enough that I am rarely questioned when I put someone to sleep more... forcefully.

[warriorscribe]

That's, er... I suppose I can't say I haven't had the same happen to me. Does it only put them to sleep, or does it, say, induce visions or prime their soul to travel somewhere?

[absentconstellation]

Only sleep, of course.

[warriorscribe]

Ah. One must be sure, with beings that are more than they seem. Sleep may be sleep, it may come with an important but cryptic message, or it may not be sleep at all.

[Well he's actually sort of joking (or at least using a joking tone), so that's a good sign. If nothing else it means he's not beyond typical defense mechanisms.]

[absentconstellation]

Such things are for the gods to spend their time on. I have no patience for them.

[ Being cryptic is one thing, but leaving divine messages and such is just silly. ]

[warriorscribe]

At least someone beyond Earth's bounds is willing to be straightforward with humans. Even the most direct of angels I knew began giving terribly obscure advice and warnings at times.

[This is a good thing to talk about. Heaven and its silly penchant for being vague. Not how this place makes him feel.]

[absentconstellation]

That is precisely why I prefer the Mortal Realms. Immortality is bad for one's character.

[warriorscribe]

You say that, yet you are - I presume - immortal, and also speaking to one who is.

[He's amused instead of insulted. He understands, he thinks. Angels had issues understanding humans more often than not.]

Innate immortality tends to belong to those with an odd perspective on the lives of mortals.

[absentconstellation]

How could they understand? They spend no time among mortals, and form no true bonds with them. They care not a wit for the struggles and joys of mortal life.

[warriorscribe]

How true that is... [He sighs.] They aren't beyond learning. The angel who is now my closest friend, we didn't get along. He was always so...standoffish and cold. But as he traveled on Earth with me, he began to understand, and I saw his attitude only came from the lack of it.

[absentconstellation]

Perhaps.

[ He yawns. ]

None that I know have ever shown any interest in mortal affairs. And I have little interest in them.

[warriorscribe]

You care so much about mortals. How did that come about? Were you intended to?

[He's used to immortals - those "born" immortal - being made for a specific purpose. It's the situation he defaults to, more or less.]

[absentconstellation]

I have always been more active than my constellation brothers and sisters. It happens that the Mortal Realms have much to entertain me. I admit, I have become quite partial to humans.

[warriorscribe]

[Oh, this is perfect, he loves talking about the virtues of humanity! The angels fight to protect their potential, after all, and seeing that has made him appreciate his own species so much.]

We certainly are unique, for better or worse. What is it that draws you to us, if I may ask?

[absentconstellation]

Your passion. Humans care about things the gods are hardly even aware of. Your lives have meaning and intensity that they cannot understand.

[warriorscribe]

[He laughs now, the room's air reduced to a slightly nauseating pull at the back of his mind. He's had a talk like this recently, about the state of being human and what makes it special. It helps him. Reminds him he can still fight.]

Of course - give a reasoning being mortality, leave him to carve out his own niche in the world with only the directive to take care of it, and the capacity for language to express himself, and what can you get but unrelenting passion?

[absentconstellation]

You can get a great many things. That's what makes them so interesting.

[warriorscribe]

Yes - the improvements on the tools I know of were to be expected, but inventions like phones or these tablets? I never would have thought writing letters would somehow turn into this.

[Phones...it's strange to think now that the idea should still be mostly alien to him. A device only his angelic companion had, and only used to talk to God. Nominally a human invention, yes, to talk to other humans, but never used by a human in his own experience, until Norfinbury.]

[absentconstellation]

There are advances, yes. But there is also selfishness, greed, compassion, generosity, hate, love. Humans are unpredictable. Some of them are worth a great deal, some of them are worth very little.

[warriorscribe]

[Enoch tilts his head. Considering the other party is a cat, it makes it seem vaguely doglike in contrast. There's judgment of a sort in it, but not necessarily instantly negative. He's dealing with a being from beyond Earth, who knows what lens this one sees humanity through? He learned his lesson dealing with angels. Ask questions before getting defensive.]

How do you measure a person's worth, exactly?