this one's optimistic [OPEN]

[circumitus]

Who: Rey and You.
What: Hope's hopeful future has kind of an adverse effect. What better way to resolve this temperament than drinking possibly dangerous liquid courage? Also insomnia makes you do some shady things.
Where: Sally's bar + the city streets.
When: Catch-all for March + mirror event.
Warnings: Nothing real major at the moment.

---

I. March 14th-18th

Hope doesn't become Rey.

The emotion, that is. Not the god.

In some warped sense of logic, she ought to be happy, seeing what she does when she wakes up one morning with a peculiar mirror in her apartment. Yet, the truth is, she feels anything but.

There is some contentment, being able to see the face of her brother again. It also serves as an unpleasant reminder of the unfinished business she has back home. That he and other people she can't help but care about have been taken, possibly tortured.

And here she is, staring into a mirror. A mirror depicting scenes of her and her brother together. Of a particular redheaded woman and a seemingly impossible life shared with her. Rey never had any illusions that her story would end in happily ever after, hence... the lack of comfort in the matter. She would never be able to have a family, grow old and be happy with the one she loved.

It just isn't possible. She isn't sure if she can even grow old.

Perhaps she isn't the only one plagued by the same sentiment, when Rey can be found in the bar, with an upturned mirror on the counter and a melancholy disposition about her. She doesn't get drunk easily, though that doesn't mean she can't try. She hasn't even been paying much attention to what she's been consuming, despite her awareness of the precarious contents of some of these bottles...

That is, until at one point in which she stops, a pink bottle in hand, and takes in the brief whiff before giving pause. The acrid odor forces her back, dropping the bottle to the ground. The glass breaks. The floor sizzles. The acidic drink burns through the solid floor.

"Shit," she mutters, staring at the hole below her foot, grateful that that didn't just go into her stomach.

With any luck, Delight's bar wouldn't be as stocked with drinks that try to kill you, but Rey isn't holding her breath.


II. The City

She can't sleep.

This was hardly anything new to Rey, for someone who can get by on just a few meager hours of rest. It is late at night, however, and she doesn't anticipate there to be anyone else out and about.

So then, why is she? If anyone were to ask, she'd just pardon herself for patrolling. The streets had been overrun before, and she is always one to be on her toes.

Perhaps she's looking for an excuse to fight something. Anything. After all, it is in her blood to fight. The one thing she's good for.

Anyone wandering about in the dead of night with a claymore at her belt can't possibly be up to any good, though. Right?

Comments

march 14

[mismanagement]

The mirror just appeared one morning. Maketh rolled over and found it lying on her bed next to her, deceptively plain. What it showed her was - not. Inside the glass there was Hadriel, though one slightly different from reality and devoid of gods, but thriving. Happy. The glass shows Maketh standing alongside her friends, and they are all alive. Smiling.

Sometimes a tall woman threads through the images, her arm around Maketh's shoulder. Not a stranger, though someone long gone.

Itani Basra smiles. And the Maketh in the glass smiles back at her.

It's an...odd thought. Maketh almost smashed the mirror when she first found it, but something in her held back.

Normally Maketh isn't one for hand mirrors, but this one has been wrapped in a scarf and tucked into her breast pocket constantly. Perhaps as motivation. Maketh hasn't decided yet. Either way, she heads back to the bar full of toxic drinks, and a few safe ones. She needs to start hiding a few supplies away for when things get bad again. A bottle of drinkable alcohol might open doors when the time comes.

Maketh hesitates in the doorway. She didn't expect anyone else to be there.

"The blue ones are usually safe," she offers, after a moment. "If you're looking for something to drink."

[circumitus]

There's no reason for Rey to have brought her own hand mirror. Like Maketh, she isn't one for them, either. If it had been a normal mirror, she would've shattered it on the spot. And, despite the emotions that the images summon, she can't help but glance into it from time to time. Try and see if there's some sort of catch to this sudden act of kindness. Or maybe it was cruelty, in a way.

Casting a glance to the figure in the doorway, Rey reaches over the bar-top to find one of the aforementioned blue bottles. Surely a stranger would have no reason to lie to her. If she's fortunate enough, and she so rarely is.

"Thanks." She sets one of the blue bottles in front of her, then takes her own hand mirror on the counter and holds it up. Partially so she can set it back down, face down. "Don't suppose you've got one of these, did you?"

For some reason, she couldn't seem to bring herself to leave it back at the apartment. No, she had to take the one thing she meant to escape with her to the bar. Why? Who the hell knows.

[mismanagement]

Maketh hesitates, then pulls hers out, unwrapping it carefully. Why she's taken such trouble with it, Maketh can't quite say. The images are comforting, though she's uncertain whether or not they can be trusted. It might be a trick. The gods are devious. "Yes."

She turns it over in her hands uncertainly.

"Do you...see things, in yours?"

[circumitus]

"Other than a reflection, you mean?" Rey nods. "It's no normal mirror, that's for damned sure."

Though she almost wishes that it was. Then she would have no reason to be here, and she could be drinking without much of a reason. That would be nice.

She opens her mouth to ask what the other woman sees in her mirror, then closes it again. Perhaps it's none of her business, and not her place to inquire. But she's curious nevertheless.

[mismanagement]

"Neither is mine."

Maketh hesitates in the doorway, clutching at her mirror and wondering what the other woman sees in hers. Something, clearly. She clears her throat. "I recognize you. From the network. Your name is Rey, isn't it?"

[wormintheglass]

Bianca found her mirror lying right by her hand in the morning, and it's not even 11am when she comes stalking into Sally's bar.

She walks like someone looking for a fight, tense as an unsprung trap, her dark eyes glittering with unshed tears and her mouth hard; she carries her mirror in one hand like a weapon, though her pistol and long knives are right there in her belt and thigh holsters. She does not introduce herself, though she addresses Rey when she speaks.

"Who do I need to kill to get hold of some tequila in this hellridden hole in the ground?"

[circumitus]

Eugh, tequila. Rey has had bad experiences with tequila.

Regardless, she glances over towards the woman addressing her, and pulls out one of the colored bottles from the counter. "Haven't found anything that tastes like tequila yet, but there's more than enough of this to go around if your goal is to get drunk quick."

There are no questions, such as what ruined the other woman's day. Rey has a pretty good idea, anyway.

[wormintheglass]

Bianca takes the bottle offered to her, giving it only the most cursory sniff before taking a long pull. Her eyes close briefly in what might be pleasure, and her two hyenas come in, a little behind her, just in time for Bianca to reach out and grasp one furry scruff for support while she performs a slow, theatrical collapse onto the nearest equivalent of a bar stool.

She takes another pull from the bottle before she speaks again.

"I am Bianca, and I am going to expand the frontiers of drunkenness."

She hasn't yet looked at Rey too closely; now her eyes track from the mirror on the counter to the other woman's eyes.

"You too, hmmm? Then this is one of those delightful pranks played by our so-called Gods."

[circumitus]

"The frontiers, huh? Then by all means..."

Rey starts to gesture towards all the bottles, then stops when she glances to the hyenas that enter the bar. Her brows raise, but it's nothing that summons any sense of apprehension or any such similar emotions. If anything, she's intrigued. She's never seen tamed hyenas before, not even during her times spent in Eurasia and Africa.

She's wrenched from her thoughts when Bianca speaks again, bringing a hand to her chin as she scoffs at her own mirror nearby.

"It would seem so." Her eyes then dart towards the woman. "Take it that's why you're here?"

Drowning sorrows in liquor isn't a concept Rey is unfamiliar with.

[wormintheglass]

"Given that I don't presently have the capacity to reduce the petty godlings of this place to dust - why, yes. Getting outrageously drunk seemed to be the next best option."

She drinks from the bottle again and makes a face.

"If Daleks were to piss in their casings it couldn't taste worse than this. Has anyone, to your knowledge, attempted to punch Hope in the face? Not that I typically indulge in fisticuffs, but..."

She makes a languid hand gesture that turns into another swig from her bottle.

[unitas]

The mirror is a cruel gift, and Sharon dares not to hope for the images within. She knows better because her future, her life, is just a series of cruel events. Sharon fully expects to die by the end of her ordeal in Silent Hill, is ready to accept whatever fate she must to save her father. But, still, a small part of her hopes, and that hope hurts.

It hurts so much.

So, Sharon heads to Sally's bar. It's not a healthy way to forget, not a healthy way to deal with the constant stress of events in this hellhole, but what else is there to do? She wants to forget, and this is the easiest way.

"That almost makes me rethink drinking," Sharon states as she pulls a bottle off the shelf behind the bar. The label states that it's some type of whiskey, but she takes a cautionary sniff. It smells right, and she takes a swig, and her nose immediately wrinkles in disgust,"Ugh, that is not good."

[circumitus]

"Almost," Rey agrees, "but not quite."

Even with the hazard of corrosive liquid in some of the bottles in these restaurants and bars, she's willing to take the risk. Who knows? Perhaps it'll take more than that to kill a synthetic human like herself.

It would seem that Rey isn't the only one plagued with the notion of having a bleak outlook on unfinished business back home. While there is some hope in the prospect of completing her 'mission', it's difficult to be hopeful when good things usually just don't happen to you.

"Here. Tried this earlier." She picks out one of the blue bottles and sets it in front of Sharon. It's the absinthe-like drink that she had sampled with Maketh not too long ago.

[unitas]

"But not quite," Sharon repeats in agreement, features still slightly puckered in disgust. She's never been a big drinker—sure, she's gone to a party or two and gotten a little (a lot) sloshed, but dad found out, and Sharon couldn't bring herself to drink away from home. Here, none of that really matters. She's not safe, she's not home, and daddy isn't here to give her a stern talking to (even if he would occasionally indulge her with cheap beer).

Rey sets down the bottle, and Sharon gives it cautionary whiff as she picks it up—Oh,"Black licorice?"

[circumitus]

An eye squints. "Think so? Don't really know what black licorice tastes like."

There are still a lot of things Rey hadn't yet had the pleasure of consuming, simply because she had no joy in eating until the last few years. Before that, she had spent several decades eating more out of necessity than any sense of enjoyment out of the act.

A shame, really, when she realized just how much she was missing out on.

[unitas]

"It's like, uh, fennel, I think," there's something awfully tough in trying to describe the flavor of something. She could compare it to fennel, most commonly used in sausage, but what if Rey doesn't know that, either?

Sharon takes another hesitant sniff—oh god, this will murder her taste buds—and takes a quick swig and,"Fuck!"

It burns like fire, tastes like ass, and Sharon swears her stomach threatens to leave if she ever tries something like that again. Absinthe, that stupid fucking green fairy, deserves to be tossed in the sea. She sputters slightly, licking her lips as if to rid her tongue of such an awful taste,"That's fucking awful!"

"Why would anyone drink that shit?"

March 14

[unfollowing]

Why Emily hasn't been to the bar before, she's not sure. Probably because it reminds her of home, of slipping fake IDs into a bouncer's hand while Jess flashes him a coy smile and takes a breath that almost makes her breasts spill out of her low-cut shirt, of drinking herself delirious with a happiness she knows isn't real and never will be. She'd kissed those nights good-bye forever about a month before their group's return to the lodge, and again upon arriving here.

Then had come her mirror.

Of course she'd come looking for booze to drown the rising anger in her (too much anger is bad, too much anger is too close to monstrous things, to wendigos), but she's met by that pink drink burning through the ground.

Emily looks up at the girl who'd dropped the drink. 'Shit' is right.

"I'm not even surprised. Acid seems tame after human meat."

[circumitus]

"No shit," she mutters, sliding her seat back towards the bar-top. Her own mirror is still there, beckoning Rey from time to time to take a glance at it. To watch the life she would never have play out like some sick milkbone dangling before a hungry dog, just out of reach.

It's cruel.

Her gut turns as she reaches over to select one of the different colored bottles, opening it to take a sniff. It smells more like sweet bourbon than chemicals, therefore it must be liquor.

Pouring herself a glass, she casts the newcomer she's yet to meet before a glance out the corner of her eye. "Came here to drink yourself into oblivion, too?"

[unfollowing]

Emily watches her for a moment, considering her options. Sobriety and safety, or risk and possible reward?

"After you."

That mirror is goddamn singing to Emily, almost. She can't help but glance at it as she grips her own mirror tight in her jacket pocket.

Well. At least if she's going to drink, she should take a seat at the counter. It's hard not to look at the mirror, but she tries. A lot. It's just-- so hard not to look as she grabs a shot glass. Once she sits back in her seat, she snorts.

"So yours is impossible too."

[circumitus]

Of course Rey would drink first. She wonders, if anything, whether or not she would be more resilient rather than having her insides turn into liquid. Not that she's eager to sate this curiosity on one of the more acidic drinks.

She leans forward in her seat, taking the bottle and pouring Emily a shot of the same stuff for her. The girl looks a little young -- not that it matters here, because you can bet that the legal drinking age isn't twenty-one in the Twenty-Second Century.

Rey takes a moment to drink hers first, testing the safety of the contents. After a few seconds when she realizes that she isn't dying a slow and agonizing death, she takes another drink.

"What makes you say that?" the soldier asks flatly, more or less interested in seeing if she was right in Emily's reason for coming here.

[unfollowing]

"You wouldn't be drinking and scowling if it were something that made you happy, right?"

Emily takes the shot. It's good, whatever it is (she doesn't trust it to be exactly like anything from home). It wakes her out of the fog ther mirror pulled her into, that weird mix of nostalgia and anger that she's been diligently ignoring for the past year.

"You don't exactly look like you're celebrating."

II

[imobouzu]

Jinbee is often out wandering at night. He tend to sleep in during the mornings because of it but he can't get out of the habit of patrolling. It is his duty to protect people from monsters, after all, and that doesn't change just because he's in another world.

Either way, he has left his mirror at home - because it would get in the way in case a fight happened - even if he had been very hesitant about it. But he didn't want to break or damage it.

He perks up cheerfully when he spots a familiar person skulking about and he waves as he calls out to her. "Rey-dono~!"

[circumitus]

At the sudden sound, Rey's hand instinctively goes for the hilt of the sword. It's still strange for her to be reaching for a blade rather than the grip of a gun, but it's better than wandering around, seemingly unarmed. At least she doesn't have to worry about any there being any shortage of swords.

Upon realizing that the owner of the voice is Jinbee, however, Rey eases the muscles in her shoulders and drops her hands back to her sides.

"It's just Rey." Forgive her; she doesn't know much of anything about Japanese honorifics. "And what're you doing out here?"

[imobouzu]

He doesn't react to her hand moving to her sword, even though he did notice it. He doesn't think that a friend would attack him (but that's one of the reasons why he's naive).

He smiles, although a little confused. "We are not all that well acquainted yet, I couldn't possibly call you without the proper honorifics." But then he just grins normally. "I am out patrolling, in case anyone need any help."

[circumitus]

"Honorifics..."

Oh, so that's what it was. Rey's a little culturally ignorant when it comes to that corner of the world.

So 'dono' it is.

"Ah." She nods. "Am doing the same thing. Can't sleep."

[imobouzu]

He nods. "Yes!"

But she can't sleep? He wonders why. "Is there something wrong that makes you unable to sleep?"