curtainsdown | now let's skip the tears and start on the whole-

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act 2

now let's skip the tears and start on the whole-

[You remember dying. Maybe the memory is clear and bright and your body still aches from the cause. Maybe it was fast enough that you didn't feel it and don't remember what you went through. But no matter how you went out you're still trapped here.

When you open your eyes it might take you a minute to recognize your surroundings. For the executed, it's your dressing room. For the victims, you startle awake in the place your body was discovered. But no matter where you are nothing is where you remember it. It's like everything has been picked up and moved to the other side of the room. The entire room has been perfectly mirrored from what it used to be and, upon leaving, it seems the rest of the opera house is just the same. If you remember one room being in the east wing, it's now in the west. If it was in the west, it's now in the east.

Welcome back to the Opera House, friends. Even in death you're still in the woods.]

WEEK 1 | WEEK 2 | WEEK 3 | WEEK 4 | WEEK 5

[ooc: Welcome to deadland, darlings! It's a perfectly mirrored version of the Opera House and each week, as new people die after new floors have been revealed, the stairwell doors will unlock and allow you to reach them. For example, week 3 victims will unlock floor 2 and so on and so forth. Also, all dead characters will wake up at their actual canon point.

Have fun because we have some fun things planned for you.]

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[ She can't know that their thoughts match. Riley knows- whatever happens, whether the Phantom makes good on reviving them or not, she's- she's going to be alone. Either in jail or burning in Hell.

She doesn't deserve this reprieve. But- but maybe she can give just a little of the comfort she's felt back? Maybe- she can stop framing this as a selfless action. ]

D- dad-! Don't- don't let go, okay? Pl- please, don't-

[ Don't think about your little girl when you think of me.

It'd been one of the hardest things for her to write that night. They were all difficult, in their own ways. But-

She liked it. That warm, warm feeling- that love she felt, that security. Rejecting it had been the hardest thing in the world. ]

Stay— [ What she'd said to Mephisto during that desperate haunt. My girl, he'd called her that, the night she murdered Claudine and left Spinel ripe for the picking, and it left her wanting for everything to be different. And now... He was so angry, for good reason, that Riley can't help but feel a twinge of guilt, like the guilt when she thinks of poor Christine begging Jeremy to listen, but

we can't help who we love, can we? Whatever horrible things her broken little family does, even to each other... Riley doesn't think she can hate any of them. Not in a way that outweighs the love.

Maybe that's something he's learned, too. ]

St-stay. Please- dad... Dad...!

I'm not going anywhere. [He can promise that now, at least, and mean it.] I'm not leaving you, I swear, I mean it. Not as long as I can choose.

[And god damn it, he's going to choose right this time.]

[ He doesn't have to let her go, leave her to her execution. There's no pressing, pushing need to escape. No secrets tearing her apart, no missing memories of another atrocity she's committed. Just...this.

Riley hopes this gives him some comfort. And she'll derive everything she can from it too, just crying there until she doesn't have any tears left to spare. ]

[Would that he could stay here forever, but, apparently? There's still things to do even when dead. But when they part, it's at least one without any fear that it'll be the last time.

She'll find him later in the graveyard, wandering the stones. Searching for his own, maybe?]

[ This is... Everything is exhausting. And apparently Riley still can't haunt. She makes her way to the cemetery. It's always easier there. Her hair's still down, and she's got...the bear Mephisto left for her, despite it still being there, in the living world.

Being dead's strange, isn't it? ]

Oh. Hi, um, D- [ She clears her throat, face coloring. Ha... It's not like communicating with the living, he's right here and could reject her at any moment!

Okay. Okay, he wouldn't do that. But it's hard for her to really internalize that feeling. Not after so many years of...nothing. ] D-dad.

[ It's quiet and...ridiculously bashful. With the bear, she looks even more like a kid. But, if she's damned, might as well soak up a little joy. Right? ]

What, uh. What're you...looking for?

[Being dead is strange. It's almost like being alive!!

But he turns when she greets him, and while he takes a moment to process what she's said...it does make him smile, when it does.] Hey, Riley. I thought...I'd go ahead and see if they redecorated, yet.

[Y'know. Giving S&S markers.]

[ She gives him a fluttering smile.

He's just died, almost betrayed all of them, really going to just let it all slide, rich from a monster like you, really think you deserve to be playing at a family--

And. Clears her throat to drown out all the little hisses in her ears. Takes just as long as she can find a perky grin to replace them with. ]

Ohh, that. Well, um. I...don't know, honestly. Wasn't too eager to come here, for the first...day? Or so?

[ Ugh. Time. ]

[...he knows that smile. What's more, he knows it...hides things, now. His own falters just a bit, and after a moment, he turns back to the stones.]

Can't blame you.

[ Whether she notices or not, she doesn't draw attention to it, instead humming in thought and dragging her feet to her own grave. ]

It's...nice to be here, though. Usually...this is the best place to get through. It was a good idea for Christine [ the walls echo and Riley ignores them pointedly ] to try and reach us here.

[Who'd want to reach me? he wonders, but- Christine would. Even at the end, she tried to reach him, and at the end, she was the only one he could trust with the results of his sins.

He finds himself standing next to her, looking down]

...how do those letters get through?

Um... Well.

[ The letter from Mephisto sits in her jacket pocket again. Close to her heart. ]

Usually, we just...concentrate...and whatever anyone who's alive has left here starts to...show. [ She bites her lip. It's hard to explain and she knows she's doing a bad job. ] For example...

[ She closes her eyes and lets out a slow breath before kneeling down. There's letters, the bear (another copy of it- or maybe she has the copy), and flowers. Her hand swoops down and seems to slip through a flower, or...a ghostly visage of it. When it comes back up, the ghostly visage rises with her and then solidifies, into an actual one. With a satisfied little smile, she hands it to him. ]

Like this.

Huh.

[That.s...all he really has to say, as he accepts the flower with surprise. He looks down at it, touching it with his other hand]

I guess...I really fucked things up for you guys, then, huh. [It's light - self depreciating - but Riley, of all people, can probably tell that...there's quite a bit underneath that 'humor']

[ Her smile's the one to falter this time. ]

Uh. [ Eyes back on the ground. ] We could still receive things, that was...fine. Just...couldn't send any messages back.

[ And oh, did she try. ]

Maybe you could have...[What? Told him not to do it? He shakes his head, dismissing the thought]

...I'm guessing none of you moved the bottle of ether? Or knocked over the trash?

[ Maybe you could've done something right for once in your--

Riley shakes her head. ] We were trying to figure out how to tell you that, but...all we could do was get the lights. To...try and show the Phantom and the stupid Wizard we were still there.

[ She sighs in annoyance. ]

That stage is a menace. Just trying made me feel like I was gonna be sick.

...the lights went weird before, too. But none of you saw what happened, when...?

[When I won?]

[ Another shake of the head as she chances a look back up. ]

It...got all weird? Like- like we saw...Santana run at you, and then- then she was...yelling, at Mephisto. But it was hazy, like...far away. [ A moment- ] Was that...what happened before?

[In all honesty, he doesn't want to think much about what happened before. About the trial. But...he ends up taking a seat for this, leaning against a blank gravestone]

After...everything was over. When the Wizard appeared, and- thanked me. [And doesn't that have self-loathing in it.] When I told him when I wanted to go back, he said that he wasn't willing to let me drag everyone through it again, that he wouldn't go back, and...

[Pop. He makes a gesture with his hand.]

...glass. But I was still so angry, I could barely think straight.

[ Gee, the disgust in Stephen's tone is strong enough that Riley shivers. She hugs the bear close. ]

...He brought us here in the first place. What's he care if... Drag everyone through it, that's what he said?

[ Gross. Ugh. ]

Of course he thinks he's doing the right thing.

'I did what I had to do, and now it's over.' He didn't care you were children, he said...he'd always wanted to be a father. [Such. Hatred.]

[ ...Okay. She sets the bear down, actually, because- ]

A father? Is that- that what he thinks he has the- the right to fucking say, after--

[ Oh, dear. Her voice takes on the same raw edge it had, when she was cornered and recounting just all the ways she'd fucked up. ]

That's what he says?!

[ Everything feels hazy and far away again. Like the ocean in her ears. She automatically reaches for-- ]

Edited 2020-08-09 07:03 (UTC)

[ ...Riley isn't wearing a utility belt with her knife on it, today. Riley decided...bringing that to the trial would've been a show of bad faith. But everything blurs, a bit, when you're dead.

Or...when you're her.

So, she's stunned when she brings up nothing. Stunned enough to be shaken back from her daze. ]

I don't... [ The world's spinning, like she'd just tried to reach through for a haunt, so she braces herself against the stone and sits, instead of kneels. Her head hurts. Why does her head still hurt, when she's dead? ] Ohh. I need a minute, sorry.

[He looks up sharply at that tone, because- hearing it from himself is one thing. But from Riley?...

He actually starts to get up, then- hesitates. Then;]

Can I help?

[ Reflexively, she slides a- well, an attempt at a smile on, but it's strained as she winces and rubs her head. ]

No? No, I- it...goes away, I just. Need to...stay grounded, or- s-something. [ The slight stutter sends a chill down her spine. But, she manages to raise her head to show that pained smile. ] Guess being dead doesn't mean I'm not still...you know. A few...crayons short, or...something.

...hey.

[And he - slowly - reaches to take one of her hands, if she'll let him.]

You don't need to talk like that.

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cw: parental neglect mentions

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cw: riley's mental state, self-loathing

you know what let's just continue that CW for the entire thread, shall we?

generally a good idea!!

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1/2

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cw: ableist language

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