video, un: j.k. [post-butterfly effect]

[aeturnus]

[ On the screen is one Cain, also known as Romulus, commonly known in the city as Jacob Kane. He looks normal. Normal as he's ever looked, really, but the confidence that he lacked during the recent event is back in full force and he's very nonchalant about it all. He's at a flimsy-ish table with a laptop off to the side where the camera is obviously his propped up phone instead. ]

Hey! Long-time no talk, Riverview Quarantine. Just a few things. If you met me over the last week and a half or so, that was... technically me but not. You know that thing that was going on? Yeah, that. Don't worry about it. Forget about all that.

Quick catch-up for those who have (or haven't!) met me, I go by Jacob Kane nowadays. [ Not Romulus. Nope. This total 180 is completely normal considering he hardly looks any older or different at all. ] My job while I'm here is designing phone apps. I've been here for about two months now and I think this is my first actual post on the network. Anything interesting happen while I wasn't looking?

to Doom; Still good for lessons?

to Shai; Thank you. For everything you did.

to Natsume; Seen anything like our colorful friend lately?

Comments

[aeturnus]

No, see, almost but not quite. If you'd carved the bone and used it for weapons or jewelry or rituals or whatever, sure. Trapping a soul to their body means it's theirs, first of all, and that makes it a people when there's someone in there.

[greyjane]

[She's too sharp to miss that overture, so her tone is rather bland,]

Out of my spare room, unless I miss my guess.

[burntbridges]

And I'm telling you that isn't what I was doing. It's the opposite of that. I'm blocking a soul from their body - jewelry made from bones is still something the dead can speak through, you know.

[As if to aid her point, a loud caw can be heard from the crow skull pin in her hair. Her crow doesn't really know what's going on, but she's annoyed and it's gotten the bird ruffled as well.]

[aeturnus]

Well, probably not there unless you want a mooch. Or a paying tenant, I guess. Not that I'm going to insist that I pay you back for the charity since that's a little too close to home right now.

[ He gets it. Older, wiser, all that jazz. Romulus likely would have insisted on continuing to pay her back until it was a fair exchange. ]

[aeturnus]

Not naturally, though.

[ That crow does get a pause, however, and he eyes it oddly. Why. Why, Letha? ]

[burntbridges]

Yes, naturally. That's just how it works.

[She's rather indignant now, is she really being accused of forcing people to use their own corpses on their own time?]

[greyjane]

Mm.

[The world's most noncommittal answer. Not a yes or a no, really. She liked Romulus but trust is harder won, and honestly his personality couldn't be more at odds. On one hand, she's glad he seems to have found confidence and purpose - but on the other, it's a big jump to make without some sort of catalyst.

Still-- her innate suspicions aside,]

How're you holding up?

[aeturnus]

[ He pauses to put his hand over his face. Breathe in, breathe out. Slow breaths for only a moment. ]

All right. I get that these things are different between different worlds, but I don't believe that's the case here. It certainly isn't where I'm from.

[aeturnus]

Well enough. Mostly hoping to just get that whole thing behind me. It wasn't... MY childhood wasn't the greatest.

[ No shit, Sherlock. Forget that he hardly looks any older now than he did then. ]

You really went above and beyond there, and I'm incredibly grateful.

[greyjane]

[Yeah she's not going to mention that part. It's probably one of the reasons she's being a bit standoffish, though.]

Didn't do it for gratitude.

[That, at least, is gently said.]

You don't owe me anything.

[aeturnus]

No, look, that's—I'd have probably done the same. Maybe.

There's some things I don't want to talk about, but if you have questions, I can answer them. Not because I owe you, but because I'd like to think we were friends for that time, anyway.

[ She might want to know where that gentle, unsure and infinitely curious young man went. ]

[burntbridges]

Well, maybe if you listened to me you'd know better. Necromancers deal in aiding the dead with their transition, it would be pointless to force them to stay in their bodies.

[aeturnus]

What was that about eventually being a soldier that animates the dead?

[ Oh, he was listening. ]

[burntbridges]

Well, with people who distrust necromancers for no reason, we need to use some method to keep our town safe. Risen just tend to be the most reasonable solution.

[Letha that's not... no.]

[aeturnus]

Have you ever heard of self-fulfilling prophecies?

[burntbridges]

I can't see how they relate.

[aeturnus]

Using scary necromantic powers against people who are scared of necromantic powers to get them to back off will just make more people scared of people who use necromantic powers.

[greyjane]

[She considers it, which says rather a lot.

Can't say she's not curious. But she has an aversion to questions of this nature - deep, personal, prying, that runs too deeply in her to be excised by the offer. The bones of everything she is has been picked over too many times by the vultures of modern media. She could never do that to another living creature, regardless of her personal feelings on them.

She also feels a little disgusted with herself, frankly, like she took advantage of the situation somehow without meaning to.]

Man's secrets are his own. I'm not looking to overturn yours.

[Her mouth twitches. Half a smile.]

Jacob's certainly easier to say than Romulus, though.

[aeturnus]

[ He can't possibly know her reasoning, but he respects the choice she makes. Offer will be on the table if she changes her mind, because it was just something that happened when Romulus was too young to know better and now Cain's too old to care as much. ]

Not a lot of secrets left to be kept.

[ He smiles back, soft, in return. ]

Yeah, I liked that about the name, too. Thankfully there's a more modern variation on my old name but it's a little too on the nose for me to reuse it.

[greyjane]

Maybe not, but you keep them just the same.

[She's not unwilling to listen - hardly that - it's only that she won't ask. Not about his past, at least. To the rest-- well.]

My door's always open, by the way. Friends and strangers alike. [Since they're both, in an oddly synergistic way.]

[burntbridges]

They have catapults, we have risen. It's their fault for being so superstitious about simple concepts.

[aeturnus]

[ He hums for a moment. ]

Just the early days, really. Most of what came after you met me was fine enough.

[ If you skip around ten years or so. It evened out around then from apocalypse level down to stuck in a storm on the ocean. ]

Fancy a Kassurat rematch? You might have to show me the rules again.

[aeturnus]

Because catapults where you're from are also fueled by the souls of the dead?

[greyjane]

[Life's life, and it is inexorable. That, she understands.]

My pride can only take so much defeat, you might have to go easy on me.

[aeturnus]

Maybe my skills have gotten rusty in my old age. It's... been a while. [ He says with with a lot of irony, because he knows it doesn't look like it. Cain realizes she might not ask, but he generally doesn't mind people knowing and kind of hopes to just ease it in there if he can. ]