graveyard part 2

[gamehead]

hunter's game the graveyard You wake up in an unfamiliar cabin. At first, it almost seems like you're in an entirely different place and that everything had been just a dream. The interior of the cabin looks nothing like the run-down, old-timey shacks that you had been living in before. Everything in here is sleek and modern, from the enormous flat-screen TV mounted on the wall to the fridge and mini-bars stocked with all your favorite foods. There aren't any individual rooms in here, just a common area large enough to house everyone comfortably, no matter how many more people join you...and there will be plenty more people joining you before the week is over. Because if you look outside the window, it quickly becomes clear that not only are you still in Prayer's Pass, but that you are no longer among the realm of the living. Judging from the tombstones directly outside, you're now in what had been the abandoned broken-down cabin in the graveyard. The cabin's not all that changed; the world outside has gone completely grey and everything you see appears to be faded and blurry. The only things that remain sharp and in color are what's inside the cabin, including your fellow ghosts. Occasionally, people who are still alive may enter, but it's clear that what they're seeing is completely different from what you're seeing. The door's unlocked; however, a mysterious force prevents you from stepping beyond the threshold, no matter how hard you may try. After all, this cabin is a cage for the dead - a gilded one, perhaps, but a cage nonetheless. On the flat-screen TV plays everything that is currently happening in the town. It will shut off once night starts...and something else will appear instead.

Comments

[motheringnation]

Yes I'm glad. Thank you for punching him, it seems to have done him some good.

[Sob, sorry Lithuania but she's saying this with full sincerity.]

I was sure I was going to have to slap him again to get him to start trying to work things out.

[tsunneverset]

[He smiles wryly.] I don't think I've ever been thanked for hitting someone before. I must remember to do it again.

Yes, I heard him say my name on the television a few moments ago, so I assume he's found whatever it is I've left behind. [He suddenly sounds unusually hesitant.] I can't...tell what the memento is though, so if you could...?

[motheringnation]

Somehow I think you'll do it anyway.

[She was there during the trial after all.]

Hmm? Oh yes, I'll check.

[She'll get the tv to go back to that point and pauses it.]

It's a notebook with....some poetry inside. I can read it if you want, I think I can make it out from the screen.

[tsunneverset]

I -- I suppose if we're to figure out what the blazes this real game is, we'll need to know every clue they find. Very well then, if you must. [looking hopeful so hopeful]

[motheringnation]

I think it's a good idea.

[She focuses on the first one that's left open and begins...]

When I consider how my light is spent
Ere half my days in this dark world and wide,
And that one talent which is death to hide
Lodged with me useless, though my soul more bent
To serve therewith my Maker, and present
My true account, lest He returning chide,
'Doth God exact day-labour, light denied?'
I fondly ask. But patience, to prevent
That murmur, soon replies, 'God doth not need
Either man's work or his own gifts. Who best
Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best. His state
Is kingly: thousands at his bidding speed,
And post o'er land and ocean without rest;
They also serve who only stand and wait.'

[She finishes and uses the device to get a good a view of the next poem as Lithuania flips through it. The poem she read isn't one she knows.]

....do you recognize it?

[tsunneverset]

[England starts smiling halfway through the first line, though it's melancholy and bitter.]

Milton. On His Blindness. [He gestures at his eyes.] Not exactly subtle, but then again I suppose there won't be many who'll recognize it in this town.

[motheringnation]

Or know what it means.... they wouldn't be able to know we're ...stuck out here like this.

[And that's even more confusing and hard to think about. Instead she focuses on the tv.]

Here's another one.

DEATH be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for, thou art not soe,
For, those, whom thou think'st, thou dost overthrow,
Die not, poor death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures bee,
Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee doe go,
Rest of their bones, and souls delivery.
Thou art slave to Fate, Chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poison, warre, and sickness dwell,
And poppie, or charms can make us sleep as well,
And better then thy stroke; why swell'st thou then?
One short sleep past, wee wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.

[tsunneverset]

Well, I told Lithuania and America that I thought the dead were trying to communicate with the living and that I'd send them something if it were true. Even if they don't know the specific poems, it should at least be clear that they're mine.

[He nods after she's finished.] Death be not proud, by Donne. Certainly not the worst of his poems they could have used. Still, that's an unexpectedly hopeful message for this town, isn't it?

[motheringnation]

It seems like they do.

[Thinking that over as she finds the next one.]

Oh here are two short ones.

But be contented when that fell arrest
Without all bail shall carry me away,
My life hath in this line some interest,
Which for memorial still with thee shall stay.
When thou reviewest this, thou dost review
The very part was consecrate to thee:
The earth can have but earth, which is his due;
My spirit is thine, the better part of me:
So then thou hast but lost the dregs of life,
The prey of worms, my body being dead;
The coward conquest of a wretch's knife,
Too base of thee to be remembered.
The worth of that is that which it contains,
And that is this, and this with thee remains.

[The other one is shorter so she's able to read it without changing the screen.]

Music, when soft voices die,
Vibrates in the memory;
Odours, when sweet violets sicken,
Live within the sense they quicken.

Rose leaves, when the rose is dead,
Are heap'd for the belovèd's bed;
And so thy thoughts, when thou art gone,
Love itself shall slumber on.

[tsunneverset]

Shakespeare and Shelley. [He makes a face, but he's clearly pleased. Fitting, if inaccurate. The only thing that's slumbering on is my bitter hatred and urge to punch France one more time.

[motheringnation]

Of course...oh here's the last one I think.

[She stops and gets a look at it, glances over to England and then back at the poem.]

...yes. I think they'll know it's from you. There's one more.

If I should die, think only this of me:
That there's some corner of a foreign field
That is for ever England. There shall be
In that rich earth a richer dust concealed;
A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware,
Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam,
A body of England's, breathing English air,
Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home.

And think, this heart, all evil shed away,
A pulse in the eternal mind, no less
Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given;
Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day;
And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness,
In hearts at peace, under an English heaven.

[tsunneverset]

[For a moment, England looks like he's almost about to cry.]

...Brooke. Of course it would be Brooke. Subtle, they are not.

[He's silent for a long moment, then clears his throat.]

Well, bugger that for a lark. I have no intention of leaving any area of this pit forever England. And save for Milton, all of these poems should make it clear that we're still around, even after death. Death, thou shalt die indeed.

[motheringnation]

[She nods, then realizes he couldn't see that.]

Yes.

...I hope they can figure it out.