graveyard part five

[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. (The graveyard so far)

Comments

[encored]

[look where being the lone wolf got you.]

Hmmm, if you're sure. You shouldn't waste any if you spill it. [blood, that is!!]

[goddamnphonies]

[SADNESS]

Eh? [Looks over confused, though he has by this time pricked his index finger on a shard. BLOOD...]

[encored]

[you know that look people get when they've spent all day working on The Perfect Meal™ and they finally sit down in the evening to survey it all nicely set out just before ravenously tucking in?

yep.]

There! Goodness, look, you're wasting it already. Come here, let me clean it up for you. [you might be missing a hand when he's done BUT HEY there are plenty of people here functioning well with only one!]

[goddamnphonies]

H-huh?

[WAIT A SECOND

CHARLES HAS GONE ON ABOUT NOT BEING HUMAN

CHARLES HAS FANGS

CHARLES LOOKS AT HIM LIKE SOMETHING EDIBLE

The lightbulb above Holden's head almost palpably goes off.]

I didn't know they had washcloths in the afterlife. [EHEHAHEH... SLOWLY STARTING TO... LEAN AWAY...

He should have stuck with the "safe distance" policy.]

[encored]

[these moments right here are literally his favorite part about not being human. he just beams...]

Don't be stingy! You've drawn your share of blood so don't waste any more by just mopping it up. A washcloth doesn't need to be fed. [puts his glass down and stands...] Well, I suppose a dead man doesn't need that, either. Would you like for me to look for towels for you, then? Some bandages, perhaps? [TAKING A STEP NEARER WITH EVERY WORD.

not even safe distance policies could save you forever, Holden.]

[goddamnphonies]

[A washcloth doesn't need to be fed oh jesus

WAIT... WHAT WAS IN THAT GLASS HE JUST SET DOWN...

Holden is in a vampire movie. This is what his death has become. There's crumby horror music in the background and everything. He reflexively looks for the exits and, of course, does not find any.]

You'd think they'd have bandages here if people can keep getting maimed but not die all over again. Maybe it's like The Picture of Dorian Gray, and our corpses are hiding somewhere and just get even more cut up. [Holden has no idea Oscar Wilde was actually a huge flit. He doesn't even know that's who wrote the novel.] That bothered me this whole game. Where the hell do our bodies go?

[encored]

[and you thought the Charles-Joshua tagteam combo was bad enough

NOPE WELCOME TO THE VICTORIAN ERA VAMPIRE NOVELS... remember that remark about people looking like the stepped out of spooky castles huh huh.]

Oh, they're likely still around somewhere. A room that hasn't been unlocked or something like that — these games always have the bodies in storage. Critter likely drags them off itself or the game mechanics transport them automatically. [he stops within a comfortable distance from Holden (comfortable for him, at least...) and folds his hands behind his back.]

If you're worried about waking up with extra injuries, you oughtn't be so careless around sharp objects, you know. Let me have a look? [holds a hand out YOU CAN TRUST HIM]

[goddamnphonies]

I almost thought one of the buildings would have been a morgue, that would have been really like this sort of game. [Though his grasp of "games" is tenuous at best.] But we've identified almost all of them, looks like.

[On the one hand, he's about to offer his hand to a goddamn vampire. What he should be doing is finding a stake or garlic or some crap like that. (He missed the "none of your silly superstitions are true" briefing Charles gave some other people.)

On the other hand this is an apparent twelve-year-old. He can't show weakness, can he?

He holds out his hand.]

[encored]

Doesn't it just? Well, the morgues aren't always designed to look like morgues, so there might be one yet. [which he seems vaguely excited by since HEY finding the bodies usually means you're pretty damn close to the mysterious center of any weird city.

it's probably a good thing Holden didn't try chucking garlic at him though since his favorite thing in the world to do is laugh his ass off at people who think those things will kill him... he takes the offered hand without hesitation AND



starts picking out the remaining pieces of glass. gosh he's not a dog, he doesn't drink from the palm of people's hands! he even has a paper napkin from his earlier snack that he uses to dab blood away with.]