hadriel_logs | Intro Log: HOLY F*^K THAT'S A F*&KI%G DRAGON

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Intro Log: HOLY F^K THAT'S A F&KI%G DRAGON

Who: New arrivals and everyone else!
What: The intro log for October
Where: The colosseum and all around the city.
When: October 10th-13th
Warnings: New faces, new greeting posts, and dragons. What's more to want?

If your first thought upon waking up on the cold, hard ground of Hadriel's very own Colosseum is 'maybe I partied too hard last night', one, Delight would love you and two, you're wrong. Or- maybe you did, but that's not why you're here. Instead, you wake up with the same clothes you were wearing when you were last home, but surrounded by very different people. So, make some friends! Might as well voice your confusion and concern and show the technologically unsavvy of you how to operate these fancy new phones, right? Just be sure not to trip over these odd bags of chips on your way to greet your fellow man.

Don't spend too much time out in the open, though. There are monsters about, and not quite the usual ones. This month, Hadriel is bringing in four dragons, each with their own unique abilities and raidboss-esque stamina. They'll be terrorizing the city until someone puts them down- maybe that someone is you! Maybe you should, uh, actually hide. They're hungry and territorial and mean and they're definitely out for a good meal. Check out our OOC post for more information, as well as who will be eventually killing the beasts!

But hey, once you escape from the dragons, feel free to go explore the rest of the city! Find a house, find a new monster, or simply scavenge for supplies.

New, as of October's intro log is a Newcomer's guide that installs itself by default on every activated phone. Thanks, Mello!

Good luck, and enjoy your stay in Hadriel!

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

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[Yeah. This is goin' pretty damn fantastic, he thinks. The pinpricks of lights in his sockets flick between the pair of them before his shoulders droop in something that approximates a sigh, for a creature without lungs.]

Believe me, if I could leave? I woulda by now.

[Another roar cuts across whatever else he might have to say. He waits patiently for the dragon to finish its wordless vituperation at whoever might've ruffled its proverbial feathers, and continues:]

This ain't my idea of a good time either.

[ Data points, stimuli, a matter of degrees and measurements -- in these seconds, there is much to process. Hermann feels the tightness of the muscles wiring his jaw, the ache along his back, and a phantom pang in his wrist. Hermann watches Mr. Sans, the shifting of his 'eyes', the shifting of his bones, the empty resignation of his voice. Hermann watches as Newton positions himself, sweetly and absurdly defensive, an unnecessary and pointless body blockade.

Hermann listens to the wall rattling roar, to the snipping, bitter cut of Newton's voice, and he shouldn't, he really shouldn't, they hadn't discussed it, but except for the last Mr. Sans had not intended it, and for the last, it had shaken him, hurt him, yes, but it was less the act and more everything unsaid behind it that had fractured his patience.

There's no need to ask why Mr. Sans has not gone, when he clearly would, he's tired, something, and so there is this, this battered store, this toxic air, this estimation of minutes, hours, of passive-aggressive aversion.

Hermann has plenty inclination to passive-aggression, he's rather good at it, the most of his outright aggressive output saved for Newton -- but those easy to predict and pattern minutes, he cannot stand the thought of them. ]

Oh, honestly.

[ Muttered, dragging his hand over his face, and then -- he props his cane against a shelf and slides down, taking an unseemly seat on the floor. This may be awhile. He's already tired. ]

This will be unbearable. I refuse to bear whatever this will be.

[ His hand fumbles, fingers unsteady, into his pocket, on his phone, pushing his glasses to his face. Hermann looks at the screen, at the time, keeps looking at the screen. ]

I am not angry with you, Mr. Sans. I suppose Newton is, but he's overreacting.

[Newt, predictably, immediately bristles--] Overreacting?! [squawked, at Hermann, because what]

[His first thought is that it's bullshit. It's gotta be. A peace offering, the extension of an olive branch. And Sans laughs, a low and mirthless chuckle, as he reaches up to scratch his cervical vertebrae with one bony hand.]

Gotta agree with Newt on this one, pal. [He's still smiling, 'cause of course he is. But he looks at the pair of them, looking and feeling for all the world as tired as he is.

Tired as he's always been. Tired of everything, of his own string of failures. Of thinking about his failures and then finding ways to marinate in his own pity and dirty laundry for days, weeks on end.]

You got no call to trust me. [Another laugh. Just as humorless.] I wouldn't trust me either. [And for damn good reason. Only good thing about him is his memory, and even then that's plenty fallible.]

So whatever, uh...speeches either of ya might have prepped - could ya just get 'em over with? Tell me I messed up, tell me I did such and such bad thing, whatever. Or we could do this after we're not about to be made into dragon chow. Y'know, whichever.

Then you're both wrong.

[ Flatly.

Perhaps -- Hermann may have a better sense of social situations than Newton, more of an interest in norms and attending to cues, as little as that truly said, given, well, Newton. But he generally does not seek out people (as expanded as the definition of 'people' has become since Haven, since Hadriel). He generally is not good with them. And, as had become a honed custom with Newton, when sensing friction, when sensing an altercation (though then, before, through Newton's abrasive indifference to niceties), a reflex -- to divert Newton's attention, to antagonize.

Only, he did mean it, too.

Hermann has stopped noticing the uncanniness of recognizing when a skull looks weary, the subtleties in expression. An empty laugh is as empty in any mouth. People are people are monsters are people.

He glances at Newton, then rolls his eyes at Mr. Sans. ]

Make no mistake, Mr. Sans. I did not say I trust you. I said I am not angry with you.

[ Words may be hopelessly inadequate and imprecise, but he will nonetheless strive for accuracy. ]

I also did not prepare a speech. However, whatever this is, I doubt it would happen if not now -- unless you have an idea as to how to get safely out of here.

[ Which he also doubts. He'd have gone already. ]

[the look Newt gives Sans when he starts going on about prepared speeches is nearly comical--absolute disbelief and confusion; a definite "what are you even talking about."]

[Naturally, that doesn't last--Hermann neatly draws his attention, and Newt's huffing in scowling annoyance, dropping the bag of baby carrots]

I doubt that. If he did, then he'd have already used it.

[and now, to Sans]

Also, dude, prepared speeches? First of all, who does that? Second of all, who expects someone to do that? That's, like, something out of a fanfiction someone wrote as a teenager. Good for drama, sure, but sounds ridiculous to anyone over the age of fifteen.

[Did not say he trusted him. Well, uh...who would, really? There's not a single person who does, frankly, and he's, the one guy who did, he - technically never did in the first place, 'cause you shouldn't go thinkin' about people and things that never existed, huh? Yeah, that's one rabbit hole he doesn't wanna go down right now.

Sans shrugs tiredly.]

I dunno, man. Maybe I got a lotta dramatic friends.

[He does, in fact, know plenty of people who are ready, able, and willing to spout dramatic speeches on a whim. Papyrus, for one. Undyne. Mettaton. Too bad most of 'em are - well, Papyrus is here, but that's only 'cause he showed up at the right time. From the right time.

As far as it is, he - heh, it's not like he's been all that forthcomin' about himself. To either of 'em. It'd be real damn helpful if he could take a shortcut right about now. Get the pair of them outta here, get himself outta here. But he can't. Confusion really, uh...did a number on him, huh?]

For what it's worth, I, uh...that really wasn't supposed to happen. Back there.

[ As he's seated, the bag falls beside him, almost as if so intended. Hermeann leans to take it, fingers working idly at the plastic, not yet tearing it open.

Again he rolls his eyes. He should perhaps be less dismissive, less brusque, but -- ]

I know that, Mr. Sans. I was there. I am not an idiot. That is why I'm not angry and why, if Newton is, he overreacts.

[ It did sound like an indirect apology. That it is indirect annoys, simply because, ]

Of course, you did intend the last of it. 'Intend' may not be the right word, but it wasn't Miss Confusion's influence.

[ He was there. ]

It's our fault, too. We imposed no conditions. We aren't strangers to this sort of thing.

[ There had been Yao 'employees' sought after by those butchered childen, and many of them had been controlled, had not been in their right minds when serving the corporation. They knew well, had seen enough, that in such places, people could be made to do things they would not. Mr. Sans could just as easily have been puppeted or had his mind addled, compelling the choice to attack. They knew about his shortcuts; Hermann had not asked whether there was more. ]

[Newt's still bristling, though some of that eases a bit at the statement that he didn't mean it to happen. It still did and Newt definitely doesn't trust him as far as he can throw him, but hearing that is a hell of a lot better than hearing someone go on about blame and speeches and stuff]

[he bristles again, predictably, at Hermann] Yeah, well, maybe you're underreacting. [It's more petulant and annoyed than anything--and he's dropping down to sit next to Hermann, finishing opening his chips. But yeah, there's that whole business of that last part--the intended part. That's what's really bugging him.]

I mean, it's not the first time someone's powers have gone fucking haywire, and knowing our luck, it probably won't be the last. But--[and he shoves a chip in his mouth like a rude person]--there is that whole 'intentional' bit. [he waves a chip at Sans] So. There's that that needs explaining. [and chip going in the mouth again]

Intentional?

[Yeah, he...well. They ain't wrong. They ain't wrong, that's the bit that stings. And he's loathe to revisit that, that thing approachin' panic. That thing approaching memory. A blade stained red, the thing that would've, that did kill him.

His eyesockets droop closed.

He don't wanna think about this right now. He just - he wants to be away from them, the both of them, more than anything he just wants to be gone and he could just up and bash his head against a wall or a shelf and that'd be good enough, wouldn't it, good enough for 1 HP.

But, uh. That ain't his style.

It really ain't.]

Maybe not intentional.

[He shoves his hands into his pockets.]

[So. Now comes the part where he makes a decision.

How much he tells 'em. How much he trusts 'em. How much of this he's willing to salvage, to fix. How much he's gonna hold close to the chest. What's he told the kids now? How much have they figured about him now?

They know things he doesn't really tell anybody. Even Papyrus.

He knows what he did. What he did is - it's inexcusable, frankly. Even if he panicked, even if he fucked things up, even if he was tryin' to avoid gettin' skewered and reliving the dramatic and frankly traumatic mechanisms of his own death.

He's got a policy, you see.]

[A policy. When it comes to others. When it comes to himself. When it comes to everything he's ever done. Maybe he had a different means of doing things, a different methodology. But, uh. Yeah. That ain't happening anymore. He got that ripped outta him a long, long damn time ago.

He's got a policy, when people come to him. Askin' for answers. Askin' for anything, anything at all.

He's got a policy.]

[He's got a policy.

Works out real great for everyone, don't it?]

[So he makes a choice. He hates himself a little for it, but that's nothin' new. Only, uh. "Hate" ain't really the word. Hate takes time, and hate takes work. Mistrust, maybe. Dislike?

Well, heh. Like he said. Ain't new.

Sans opens his hand. Somethin' small and grayish materializes above his palm. It looks almost like a heart, only - upside-down. He looks at the pair of 'em with lidded sockets, lookin' resigned.]

This is a SOUL.

All monsters have 'em.

All monsters have 'em, [he continues, tiredly, and the little pinpricks of light in his sockets fix on the faint little fluttering thing there. It hovers inanely on the spot, innocuous. Like it ain't a constant threat to him. Like it ain't the weakest SOUL anyone's ever seen in their goddamn life.]

Mine's, uh...

[He chuckles. It ain't really got a lotta mirth to it. Ain't really got a lotta anything.]

Well, it's not what you'd call a strong SOUL. Y'know, uh...it doesn't take much for it to just -

[He closes his hand over it, and it disappears.]

Yeah. It doesn't take very much at all.

[His hands go back in his pockets. He looks at them both. Level.

You think bein' the judge of someone's SOUL and the content of their character is the hardest thing he's ever done? Maybe bein' the immovable object to halt someone's trajectory into the termination of all known existence? Nah. Nope. That ain't very difficult at all. It ain't very difficult, because he knows it doesn't matter. And this, uh.

Well. This, this right here. This honesty, blunted and straightforward and pained, this is - it's way harder. 'Cause for all he knows, this might be one of the first things in his life that'll stick.]

So I see someone comin' at me with a knife. I see a friend comin' at me with a knife, and I just kinda - maybe I panic, a little bit. [Another laugh, no less humorless, no less deprecating, no less resigned.] 'Cause it doesn't matter what you mean to do with it. If you're just tryin' to help. Point is, I can't afford to trust that you weren't gonna - [He makes a vague gesture in the general direction of his ribcage. The place where his hateful weakling of a SOUL is housed.] Even by accident.

That's all it takes.

[ (Let that be swept away -- maybe you're underreacting -- let there be intentionality, haphazard abilities, the fluctuations and probabilities of prisons managed by the sadistic. Let that be a passing snipe, the closure of the deflection, and not a simple, settling truth --

in the moment, in those moments, his body always does what bodies do, they fight, they hurt, the chemicals and hormones floor, and so terror, and so indignation, and so, and so, but rationality follows, but the certain sweep of the numbers, and it is daft to be indignant, because it was an accident, because it was probable, because what is he doing, anyway?, because something will do it, because Mr. Hope may not always bring them back, because eventually --)

Mr. Sans says much more than Hermann expected, expects.

He can no longer think, even now, that he says everything.

But then, Hermann does not want everything. A person like Hermann, with his walls, with his distance, with titles that say respect for respect but also we are not friends, we are not close, would not want the burden of everything. Would not expect it. Would never himself give it.

He does not need the entire story from Mr. Sans, but he needed more than the slippery dregs of before.

Mr. Sans speaks and the plastic tears beneath Hermann's fingers, which will not cease in fidgeting movements, though nothing else in or of him would betray it. His fingertips brush orange skin and something grey flickers over Mr. Sans's bone palm. They have seen so much -- his eyebrows shift, but there can only be so much surprise for this sort of thing.

Hermann leans, slightly, as if that would help him better see it, understand it. A SOUL. His own SOUL?

It doesn't take much -- even the accidental graze of a knife -- and with Mr. Sans already disoriented, distressed by the taxing toll of his vast abilities exerting, pinning himself, panic is certainly understandable, if a touch insulting, because -- ]

[ It doesn't take very much at all.

Even by accident.

That's all it takes.

The fragility of those bones.

Hermann's eyes narrow, scattered memories clicking into an ordered sequence. Had Mr. Sans crossed the room, even cut across, for a pillow? For a pillow? Hermann had not been paying attention then -- ]

What is wrong with you?!

[ It bursts out of him, abrupt and snarling, low. He's so agitated, he grabs at Newton's shoulder to shove himself to his feet, shaking the bag of carrots at Mr. Sans. ]

How little are you inferring? Is it only a blade? The graze of a blade? What if I threw a carrot at you? What if I'd nudged you hard with my cane, trying to get you away from the laundry? Did you -- how weak -- How close was I to killing you every time I threw wild at Newton, or right at you?!

[ (And -- if he is that weak, that susceptible to even blunt objects -- there was more to that knife.

But Hermann does not want everything.) ]

Good heavens, man! -- Skeleton! You've enough preserving instinct to flip the room, but not to say a damned thing? We do not live gently!

[Newt listens. He's been doing a lot of that lately, as unlike him as it is. It's a peculiar thing to just...sit and take it in. At least he stops eating the chips. And that's....that's a piece of information that Newt was not expecting to be given. He stares at the little grey heart as Sans's fingers close around it and it disappears.

That's a SOUL. And Sans's is weak. So weak, that it could've--they could've--Newt could've--

It suddenly feels like there's a lead weight in his stomach. Because the thought of that--even accidentally, it's terrifying. But Hermann's suddenly bursting out with a snarl, causing Newt to startle even as he's unceremoniously used as a bracer for Hermann to get up. It's not really that big of a deal though, as Newt's going to push to his feet as Hermann justifiably yells at Sans, basically saying exactly what Newt might have. So, as Hermann continues to do that, Newt's just gonna...walk forward until he's standing in front of Sans--at which point he's going to drop to a knee so that they're at least on a much closer level]

[at which point, he's going to reach out and (very gently) put his hands on Sans's shoulders, look him in the eye(socket,) and state, with utmost weight:]

Dude. You're an idiot.

Edited 2016-10-14 23:46 (UTC)

[at which point he's going to use that grip on Sans's shoulders to tug him into a tentative hug. Because that's just what Newt does in times like these. He never has the appropriate words; he's traditionally pretty bad at that whole "reading social cues" thing in general so, like...this is what he has. He can't say it's okay or that it's alright, because the idea that there's a strong chance they've nearly killed him on accident before is awful and it sits heavy in Newt's chest--it's upsetting, okay??? And Newt doesn't have a solution to it. Except this.

So

yeah.]

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7/7 DONE

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1/?? aGAIN IM SO SORRY