you can't wake up, this is not a dream [OPEN]

[circumitus]

Who: Rey and anyone willing to deal with her crazy ass.
What: Now that the madness of the thrilling citysplit adventure hour is over, Rey attempts to deal with the aftermath of her outburst and attempted murder during Love's return... in a rather not-so-wholesome way.
Where: Robot House and the Old Bar.
When: Catch-all log for April!
Warnings: Colorful language and maybe some allusions of the sexual kind. Will update if necessary!

---

I. First Spiral Neighborhood; House 1401

To probably no one's surprise, Rey hasn't been feeling very social lately. Even the rejoining of the city doesn't have her rushing towards friends and acquaintances, especially not the ones she had cursed out not long before everything went to hell.

She should be grateful. Things are okay. For once, it didn't seem as though the entire fucking sky was falling.

Then why did it still feel so bad?

Nick's in one piece, as are Bianca and Firo. Russia... She hasn't heard from Russia since the city came back together, but he is usually the one to seek her out instead of the other way around.

In any case, she doesn't leave her room all that much, and she's been more or less totally absent from the Guard. Most of her time has been spent in her room, curled up sleeplessly in various corners of her room. When the gods announce their revelry consisting of feats, racing, and musical celebration, there is still very little sign sign of Rey where she keeps herself scarce.

Whether you bother to knock, help yourself inside, or take a peek through the window over the ground level balcony, Rey isn't accepting any visitors. That doesn't mean that those more persistent aren't willing to endeavor to try, though.

It isn't that one finds her injured. The more serious wounds she bears have long since healed, and what remains are scars deeper than the ones that can be seen. But that's usually the case with her.

II. Old Bar

When Rey isn't being dead to the world, she is tending to the restoration of the old bar. What had once been an establishment founded by Sally Malik has now come under the care of Rey, along with a few like-minded individuals calling themselves Ned and Jacob.

Though hardly the sole proprietor of the place, it seems to be the location Rey is most likely to haunt over the weeks following the city's reunion. Sometimes she's arranging some new furniture and decor, while others she is working on producing more liquor and wine to ferment.

These things take time. At the risk of leaving the city bar-less for long in the wake of Delight's reluctance to bring hers back, this is their best alternative.

So far, anyway.

Besides, it's good to have a hobby, isn't it?

III. Wildcard

[ooc: You know the drill. Have something different you'd like? Pick a contact, any contact! And I'll get back to you as soon as possible. Beep!]

Comments

old bar

[skelebro]

He ends up crashed out here, 'cause of course he does. 'Cause pickin' his way back home would be - a little too immediate, feels like. A little too familiar. He don't quite mean to simply doze into oblivion when he ends up here, nor does he actually mean to end up at the bar itself.

But end up there he does. Scrapes up a chair, plonks his coccyx into one of the seats, and is almost immediately out like a light.

It's a fitful rest at best. He keeps seeing a lotta things behind closed sockets: kids falling from walls, faces slit open in wide, reddened grins; a high scream of claws and teeth hitching into skin as she told him go because she'd cover him; a buzzing, static-torn message that barely gets through, that must'a been important, only he only catches a handful of it. A patient, bright smile atop a skull that inevitably becomes parted from its body, the headless spine waving uselessly among the ice and snow before it folds to dust and takes the vibrant arc of red with it.

He jerks awake with a start, periodically, unable to catch more than an hour or so at a time. Place is mostly empty. Mostly.

Thank god for that.

[circumitus]

Get out is the first response that comes to mind when Rey first notices the slumbering skeleton setting up house at the bar. While a few others she has been more easy (if not begrudgingly) to forgive and forget, she finds herself struggling with how willfullying prying Sans had been the last they spoke.

Everyone is tired, though. She knows that. Part of her can at least ease into the smug satisfaction that Love's grand return had been cut short, thanks to Fear's fuckup, so at least she has that.

Thanks, Fear.

After arranging some strange animal heads on top of bottles on the wall, Sans snaps awake in a rather familiar fashion.

"There a reason why you're napping here?" A brow raises, and she's not stewing in mystery over what's causing the skeleton trouble. Hey, who is she to judge on uncomfortable sleeping positions? Rey could sleep standing up if she needs to. She just wishes he'd do it somewhere else.

[skelebro]

He's kinda...forgotten. That their last conversation ended so badly. Ended with her dropping threats, being righteously pissed at his attempts to cool things down. Maybe she should be. Weren't any right of his to intervene, was it? That's what happens when you give a damn. That's what happens when you try.

The light in one eyesocket narrows in on the peculiar carved shapes of animal heads for a long moment before he responds.

"They call it a nightcap for a reason." The wit jumps easy to his proverbial tongue as he flicks at a bottlecap lying atop the counter with the tip of one phalanx, winking.

[circumitus]

Sans might have forgotten, but Rey sure as hell hasn't. Not when she's spent some time stewing in it. Both the anger and the shame are frequently passing forces.

Right now, she lets those things turn into disapproval, arms folding over her chest as she bears down from the other side of the counter.

"And a nightcap typically taken before bed, which you're not in, and last time we checked this wasn't a motel," Rey says curtly as the bottle cap flicks past her and onto the floor. She ignores it.

Dammit, Sans, don't litter in her bar.

[skelebro]

Uh-huh. Definitely seems like she's still sore after that little exchange. Too bad it's takin' him a minute or two to scrape together what reason she'd have to be especially huffy at him in general. It's been a wild coupl'a weeks, all right? Spent most of that time stressing about erstwhile children and trying to fix a goddamn magical generator. Or gettin' in Alphys's way while she fixed it.

"Just takin' a union-regulated break." That joke don't really work when he don't have a job the same way Rey has her unofficial establishment here, but why not, right? Everyone loves a classic.

Almost everyone, anyway.

[circumitus]

If Rey had half a mind, she'd be more inclined to kick Sans' seat from under him and show him the door. Even if that is no way for one to run a 'business', there is little reason for Rey to give a damn what other people think.

But she doesn't. Instead she turns her back to Sans, and begins working on labeling the bottles that they do have up on display. Occasionally opening up a cap for a quick whiff to tell whether or not to mark the drink as alcoholic, as some of them are not.

"Make it a short one, then. Still got work that needs to be done here."

Not that that means she can't have company; she just hasn't been in a social disposition with particular crowds.

[skelebro]

"Yeah, you're lookin' real busy right about now. What with the evening crowd rushin' in and all."

It's completely devoid of bite, more along the lines of witty commentary than anything else. Point being that whatever work needs to be done, he don't think that it's a real pressing issue. More liable to be an excuse to shunt him on outta here.

Means things still ain't falling back to their typical back-and-forth. Which is, uh, kind of a problem. Technically speaking.

II -- Old Bar

[so_dark_a_road]

Curufn has heard a rumor (from one of the gods) that someone might be trying to pull together an alternative to Delight's Bar. He locates the place and nudges the door open. "Anyone home?" he calls.

[circumitus]

"No one here but us chickens," Rey says dryly.

Curufin doesn't look the type who'd catch the meaning of such a phrase, but she just finished storing some wine bottles still in the fermenting process. This shit takes a while, so she's not caring about much at the moment.

[so_dark_a_road]

"No one but chickens. . . ???"

But then, he grins. "Oh, you mean to compare this place to a chicken coop, metaphorically? How poetic."

"How are you? We haven't spoken in a while." From the way she looks, he guesses she's been through the ringer. (An expression an Elf could safely use, since their domestic technology, I'm afraid, hadn't gotten past the washtub with a hand-crank clothes-wringer mounted on its side.)

[circumitus]

Poetic? No, that's not...

Rey sighs. "Sure."

She's given up on trying to put effort in with having much social grace.

"Been better, been worse." She shrugs in response. "Blew up some tunnels. Killed some things. All in all, been pretty productive."

Including working on this place, it would seem.

[so_dark_a_road]

He doesn't worry about social grace. In his own world, he didn't exactly have a reputation for it.

"I heard that those of you who were on the west side had to blow up the tunnels to kill the creatures. Sounds productive to me!"

He sniffs the air delicately. "I smell alcohol. You're already stocking the place?"

[circumitus]

"Was less to do with killing the creatures and more to do with keeping whatever's trying to kill the gods here from snuffing all of us as well."

And destruction is what Rey excels at. It's what she was born for, after all.

Well, that and distilling liquor, apparently. Rey has only been applying what she had learned from others, and so far her efforts have been paying off.

Then, she nods. "Yes. Had some help with others in getting the operation functional, so it's been a quicker process than expected."

[house]

[wormintheglass]

Bianca lets herself in. She holds her head high, and refuses to let her moments of abject, miserable terror inform her actions. No one witnessed it, therefore it never happened. She is gaunt and limping a little, but mostly unhurt.

When she finds Rey, she stares for a moment, and can find nothing worth speaking out of the rat's nest of emotions behind her eyes. In the end she just sinks down, a slow motion surrender, and folds herself onto the floor with her head resting on Rey's legs.

[circumitus]

A long, agonizing moment passes before Rey even stirs, life blinking back into her eyes. The sudden weight over her legs has her eyes moving down, catching Bianca lying there.

Some guilt wiggles its way into her chest when Rey acknowledges the fact that she hasn't exactly been the most communicative party lately. Love's revival and presence in the city has continued to leave conflicted notions warring in her mind, and whether or not she feels comfortable expressing affection at the risk of empowering the god.

But then she had come so close to losing it all, and right now Rey exists in a time where none of that matters.

Placing a hand over Bianca's head, stroking her fingers through the woman's dark hair, Rey is silent for several seconds.

"Sorry."

She has a lot to apologize for, whether or not the other agrees with it.

[wormintheglass]

She doesn't even need Rey to move or speak. It's enough to feel the warmth of her skin, the weight of her limbs, the soot and sulphur scent of her.

When Rey touches her head, she arches up, pressing herself into the touch, and it's a long time before she answers, as though she'd forgotten what her voice was for.

"I thought - Was it very bad? On your side?"

[circumitus]

Rey hesitates to answer. She hadn't spent much time among other people to know the details of what things were like on the other side of the city, the one that was able to get moved forward. Knowing who they were stuck with and what few supplies they had, she can hazard a guess.

"Doubt it was a picnic for anyone," Rey mutters, weariness dragging her voice along. "Those things that killed the gods before were trying to get in. Had to buy time for Fear to get our asses out of there."

Which involved blowing a lot of shit up. Rey is good at that, though. She can destroy and wreck and shed blood if needs be.

[wormintheglass]

It's the mention of Fear that sparks another recollection. Bianca sits up, abruptly animated.

"He's been shifting this entire city from planet to planet for - who knows how long. I ought to have known. I ought to have been able to feel it, Rey! Every time I start feeling - every time I start to become reconciled to captivity, something comes along to remind me. I couldn't tell. I don't mind so much, not being able to tell when. But this!"

[circumitus]

Bianca isn't alone in what she 'should' be able, but can't. Rey should be capable of sensing others like her. Synthetics. She had felt IV's presence during her brief visit, but no one who has ever fit a similar bill from elsewhere. It reinforces the idea that there really isn't anyone else like her, much like back home. She's alone in what she is, so much so that even IV wishes to rip Rey apart, see what makes her tick.

She frowns, thinking about this and shaking her head. "Don't think this place operates under the same rules as they 'should' be." Her mouth tightens into a straight line, uncertainty etching on her expression. "If it's​ any consolation, the gods do need us. They wouldn't have been able to get anywhere without our help."

It's that mutual reliance and benefit that keeps Rey from grinding her teeth too much over the idea of being 'captive' in this place. In any case, she's used to a lack of freedom. Who is she to get offended?

II!

[sciencelizard]

Alphys spends a little bit of time being dead to the world too; after that last literal world-shakeup, I don't think anyone could blame them, even if she didn't quite exhaust herself fighting. Eventually, she's all but forced out of the house because of hunger, and after picking around the shops and the city, she ends up poking her head into the structure.

She'd heard there was another bar-- well, she had never gone to the first, so there was little point of comparison-- but this one seemed just as nice. Alphys steps in tentatively, finally spotting Rey and giving a gentle wave in her direction.

"Hey-- s-sorry, am I, uhm, interrupting, or anything?"

[circumitus]

After a long and hard last few weeks, you're in luck, Alphys. At the time she steps into the bar, Rey is utilizing a rather unique pourer to fill up a glass half-full with burgundy-colored wine.

"Blarrhghl!"

That, it'd seem, would be Rey emulating the 'sound effect' of the crow head pourer seemingly puking a stream of wine from its beak. So naturally it's an image that could only warrant such an impression.

When she notices Alphys in the room, Rey doesn't even blink or recoil in instant mortification. Rather, she very swiftly picks up the glass. "Actually, now is a perfect time. Trying one of the wines we just finished. Want some?"

This project has been one godsend of a distraction. It might actually pay off.

[sciencelizard]

Despite herself, Alphys giggles as she sees Rey doing this, getting as far as a rather ugly snort before she smacks a hand over her mouth to stop the persistent flow of laughter. God, that was cute.

"S-Sure! You've been, uhm, making them here?" She approaches, still as cautious as ever, but takes the glass from Rey's offering hand. "I thought only Delight, uhm, stocked the liquor."

[circumitus]

Eliciting laughter out of someone, especially one such as Alphys, actually feels pretty good. She'd blame the drinks, but she's stone sober at the moment, and doesn't even have that as an excuse.

Procuring a glass of wine for herself as well, she manages a slight smile at Alphys' inquiry.

"Delight's been feeling down since her bar blew up. Thought it'd be easier for her if someone picked up the slack." She takes a quick sip of the wine. It's nothing extravagant, and the taste bears an odd alien flavor of the fruit from Sorrow's orchard, but it's good. Firo's aid paid off. "Besides, people have been making wine and liquor for millennia. We don't have to rely on the gods any more than necessary when we can make our own."

Self-sufficiency is important to Rey. They need to figure out ways to survive that isn't just stuff magically appearing from nowhere.

Baby steps, of course.

[sciencelizard]

Alphys also takes a small sip, tilting her head a bit as she thinks about the flavors. Human food and drink always tastes a little foreign to her- thankfully, unlike Sans, she can eat it just fine without other changes, but the flavor is always something new.

"Well, uhm, o-of course. I mean, back in the Underground, we had to make our own stuff like this, uhm, t-too. It was just never, uh, my area of expertise." A chemist, possibly, could figure out something like that, but she has never been anything even resembling a chemist. "Doing all that just seems so, uh... delicate? I mean, I know, uh, precision, and s-stuff like that, but... working with food always seemed so, uhm, complicated. Like you could ruin any of it so easily."

[circumitus]

To Rey, everything here is alien. The slight taste of the fermented fruit leaves an odd taste in her mouth, though not an entirely unpleasant one.

She muses a moment when Alphys mentions the 'Underground', having heard the same phrase from others that didn't look like her, but like her in that they were anything but human. It's enough for her to put two and two together.

"It's not that complicated, and you can fuck anything up if you add too little or too much of something. That can apply to many other things." She looks down at the wine in her glass, swishing it a bit. "Was never a distiller, but when you're far out in the middle of nowhere with not a vendor or vinyard in sight... Well, someone can learn to get creative."

It's one thing she'd picked up on from fellow soldiers who came from a variety of backgrounds.

"Suppose you're in a military encampment with no store in sight, and shipments have been stalled for whatever reason. People want to get their drink on, they have to resort to less 'refined' methods with what they have." The corners of Rey's mouth twitches as she finishes off her wine, then sets the glass down on the counter. "Fortunately, Sorrow was able to provide the equipment so we wouldn't have to settle on just shit."