Intro Log: Off my chest

[hadrielmods]

Who: New arrivals and everyone else!
What: The intro log for April.
Where: The colosseum and all around the city.
When: April 10th-13th
Warnings: Newbies, explosions, and things that are definitely treasure chests and not evil monsters out to get you.

Welcome to your first day in Hadriel! Enjoy your surroundings, meet your fellow travelers, and be sure to start exploring so you can collect as much loot as possible!

On the ground around you may notice bang snaps, scattered haphazardly. Try not to step on any of them, or you might burn your feet! Feel free to gather them up and use these baby fireworks however you see fit; there are dozens strewn about on the ground. Popping them will emit clouds of smoke of various colors, and... well, not much else.

Is there anything else lurking around? Glad you asked! If you look around, you may find a few innocent-looking treasure chests. Which you know, normally means free loot- except, in Hadriel, nothing is quite the way it's advertised of course and the chests are actually dangerous mimics. Mimics- often disguised as treasure chests- are monsters with surprisingly quick movements and gaping maws filled with teeth. They exist to try and fool an unlucky traveler into thinking they've gotten something good... only to lunge at them in their moment of triumph and prove that life is actually terrible and nothing comes for free.

Good luck!

Once you've managed your daring escape from the colosseum, feel free to go explore the rest of the city! Find a house, find a new monster, or simply scavenge for supplies. Good luck, and enjoy your stay in Hadriel!

► This log covers April 10th-13th.
► Feel free to make your own logs, as well!
► All characters now arrive with phones that have network communication.
► Please put your character's name and open/closed in the subject line of your starters!

Comments

[kickingand]

[ Geez Sam, did you really have to bring on the mooshy shit?

Dean just sort of hangs his head a bit becuase it always feels like such an unfair move, as if Sam is reaching down deep (not that deep because this shit is never hard to find) and pulling out the crap between them that does such a good job of making him feel like a dick. It's all the same stuff that always makes him want to leave the situation, finally blow it all aside and act as if he's unaffected, hanging on to his anger for dear life because it's often easier than all the rest. Being pissed off is almost second nature, but everything else? Everything else is hard and always makes Dean want to avoid it altogether, but here he is now, being presented with the hard facts that he's only just getting around to absorbing.

Sam has been here for months. Check.

Sam missed him. Check.

He's here now (check) but not yet making up for lost time. Which is, okay, maybe what he needs to be working on now instead of standing here stomping his feet. ]

Yeah, okay- I didn't really have the chance to miss you. So hey, you think you maybe want to show the ropes? Or should I let you get back to your reading.

[ See, he can even... sort of cool his jets after a major blow up. He heaves a breath and shoves his hands into his pockets, eyebrows raising with impatience. Because while that might have been a question, there's not a lot of other options here that he's offering. ]

[hollowly]

( YES. YES HE DID. NOW YOU SHUT UP AND YOU TAKE HIS BROTHERLY LOVE.

and it's not like he digs it up on purpose. these things, they come out of his mouth without him putting much thought behind it, and they spill out of him before he has a chance to either backpedal or do some retcon, and it always ends up with him coming off as the kid that wears his heart on his sleeve. right out in the open for everyone to see, to stomp around on, to squeeze until it hurts. and it's only ever going to be for dean that he dredges these things up, because neither of them have ever made much of a habit out of prolonging the chick flick moments – but he'd had to say it, to get it out there, because he can't stand seeing dean as pissed off at him as he is right now.

so … no, he hadn't done it on purpose, but he wasn't going to not tell the truth about that. he had missed him, and he is glad that he's here now, even for what that means for the mess they've left behind them.

making up for lost time is something that sam can get behind – if he has a chance to – and even as the words come out of dean's mouth he's making to move toward the door that would lead them back outside, more than willing to show dean around and let him try to start getting his bearings. )

I've mapped the place out pretty well. ( he looks a little pleased with himself, truth be told. ) Anywhere in particular you wanna start?

[kickingand]

[ GOD FINE, BE THAT WAY.

At the end of the day, it's not like Dean minds that Sam's the kid who says all crap he won't. That he ups and outs with the chick flick moments before Dean would ever be willing to, the heartfelt stuff that he has such an unbearably difficult time even admitting exists somewhere within him. Because while it oh so problematically does, Sam (and Cas) is the reminder that it's there in the first place. That he feels the thing he feels, that family is the only thing that ever truly froths it all up to surface where he can't avoid it for any longer than he knows how.

Dean's not even finished by the time that Sam's starting to move and that finally, finally drags a half-assed sort of grin to the surface.

No, really, thank god.

If he had to drag Sam out of here by the collar - and don't you even dare, he so would - he'd have come up with a hundred more things to bitch about. Instead, he's tagging along, all but slamming his way out the door for a breath filled with not-library-air. Mmm, smell that underground stench. ]

Uhh, somewhere that's not a library. That work?

[hollowly]

( GOOD 'CAUSE HE'S GONNA.

maybe he should work on keeping some things to himself, or at the very least, dialing it down a little when it comes to things like dean – because it's always about dean, whether he openly admits it or not, and there's no denying it – but living with someone that has a tendency to be so emotionally constipated that it takes extreme measures to even get him to admit that there's a feeling left inside him, he doesn't feel as embarrassed or ashamed about it as he might otherwise would.

because he can never be ashamed of or embarrassed by his love for his brother. it's what's gotten them this far, what's dragged them up and out of the pits of hell more times than either of them can count, and if there's going to be anything in the future that makes any hardship they come across just the slightest bit easier – it's that. the reminder of family, of blood, of a bond that started at birth and has been frayed, whittled away and strengthened all over again by the passage of time and the patience that only sam himself possesses, where dean is the headstrong and stubborn will that acts as the centripetal force that keeps them both side-by-side and on the path they were meant to be on.

dean's grin might be half-assed, but at least it's there, and it gives the semblance of something normal that will help them both over the hurdle of his lie. he pauses for a small moment once they're back outside, weighing his options and trying to think of where the best place to start would be – and then it hits him, as easy as anything, like the proverbial smack to the forehead when you could have had a v8. duh. )

I could show you where I've been staying. It's not much, but at least you won't have to find a place on your own. ( a beat. ) Unless you wanted to, I mean.

[kickingand]

[ Dean sometimes thinks that Sam should work on a whole hell of a lotta things (and occasionally, Dean thinks he should try and work on his own shit but we all know how well that turns out), but then the rest of the time? Most of the time? Dean wouldn't want Sam to change for the world. While they're not exactly opposites (no, Cas is more Dean's opposite than Sam) they are still two pieces of a broken whole. They are the cogs that often keep each other ticking and because of that, neither of them can change as often as they wish they would. They're both too stubborn to believe in character growth at this point in their life and there ain't nothin' wrong with that. It's just the way it is, and if anything, they'll only become infinitely more set in their ways.

They are what they are - it's the Winchester way.

And even within Sam's lies, his occasional flubs, they're connected and bound. Dean couldn't drop Sam no matter how many times he's tried, and that alone should prove something. That neither of them can break this in two, even with the mistakes and the twisted words, no matter what they do.

Hands shoved into his jacket pockets as they settle outside of the library, Dean gives a definitive nod before he sweeps a hand out in front of him, encouraging Sam to carry on. ]

Lead the way. I'm not even gonna ask when you go a place for yourself- i'd rather you be sleeping in some ramshackle shithole than in some ditch somewhere. Four walls is better than none at all. [ See? He's trying to get over judging you for your misplaced lie. He's getting over it. Slowly but surely. ]

[hollowly]

( there are always going to be things that sam thinks he can work on, whether for his own benefit or dean's. but there's something in him that insists that there's nothing wrong with a little white lie if it means keeping someone from getting hurt, from experiencing something that they don't need to otherwise, even in this particular case it would have come out of him anyway, sooner or later. lying for the sake of sparing someone's feelings, there are good intentions behind that, it's not done out of malice or any sort of ulterior motive. and that's all he can think about when he justifies it to himself, whether he realizes it or not, and it's going to inevitably be his undoing.

and it really isn't like either of them are chomping at the bit to change their ways, especially now, with as old as they are and the things they've been through – their ways have been what keep them together, those broken pieces slotting together to make an almost-whole, the gears that lock in place and keep the whole of their broken, splintered lives something worth salvaging, even at its worst.

but the fact remains that if there were ever anything dean wanted to change about him, he would try like hell, if it were at all feasible. plausible.

striding away from the library, it's enough of a walk from there to the spires that they have time for ample conversation – and sam isn't entirely sure if he's prepared for that, because even if dean is working on getting over his well-meaning lie, there's still potential for conversation to go south. for another argument to crop up. for something to happen to ruin this reunion that he's been waiting for for months.

so, he breathes out a small laugh, more of a huff, really, and shrugs. look, you don't even have to ask when he'd gotten his own place. he's just gonna up and tell you. ) Not too long after I first got here, actually. When I found out that there were empty places … I found one and took it. Made more sense than waiting for a way out.

( because he'd still be waiting. )