Event Log - Level One

[lucetimods]

Who: Everybody
What: Lucetians reverted back to level one!
When: Well. Now. Right away. It ends on the 25th, so chop chop.
Where: In Luceti. You think you guys are getting out of here after that stunt you just pulled?
Summary: Well. So sometimes the Malnosso actually do legitimate experiments that aren't heaped in heavy plot. This is one of those times. Look, just go read the mod post, would you?
Rating: P for Prologue-licious.

Remember to tag with your character like so: [canon] character name

ALSO, all the journals will be completely wiped clean for the duration of this event. Nothing prior to this log will appear on the journals until after the 25th. So good luck figuring things out!

Comments

[greenjacketed]

[ here stands a younger richard sharpe. he'd woken that morning in his red coat, his queued hair, and he'd expected to meet the hot indian sun. but instead he was indoors -- a strange indoors with strange things. a sword, for one, which he squirrelled away under the bed. and a gun which looked like musket but which was certainly not like any musket he knew.

and -- fearing he'd somehow been captured -- he'd slunk his way outside. and now he's wandering luceti. private sharpe is a youthful twenty-something: an enlisted man, with a suspicious glance for just about everything. he's waiting for the other shoe to drop...punishment or war or for this dream to end.

you can find him at good spirits, maybe, or else just wandering around the village in his bright red uniform jacket with equally red facings. he's tanned, a little rough-looking, and probably in need of a good three or four bottles of mouthwash. if just to clean out his language, for he can often be heard swearing colourfully at various inanimate objects. ]

[stillplaying]

There's a smile on her face when she sees him walk by in the village later that first day. She hadn't seen him that morning before she had slipped out into the woods. Not all that abnormal. Often times, their schedules didn't exactly mesh But she had been a little surprised not to see him later in that day, when she had returned home shortly after lunch to finish preparing her catch for the winter. With work still being done on both the garden and the annex, she more often than not expected to see him around the house. But he hadn't been there. No one to share the morning's stories with.

The red is far more noticeable than his normal choice in jacket and it makes her smile widen even more. Stopping a few feet in front of him, she looked him over approvingly. The color worked. Made him look a little younger than he was.

"I like it. The red. It looks good on you."

[greenjacketed]

"...Eh, miss?"

The soldier stopped. The compliment was a queer one, certainly, because he wasn't sure he'd ever had anyone compliment him on his uniform before. Well -- maybe once a country whore looking to get a tip. He seemed to squint at the young woman. "I...err -- thank you, I suppose."

[stillplaying]

"You suppose?"

Katniss spoke the words with less confidence than she had felt moments ago. That wasn't the response she expected. Maybe she didn't know what exactly to expect in response, but use of the word miss definitely was not part of it. He hadn't called her that in... in months.

[greenjacketed]

"...Aye?"

He was lost. Adrift. Certainly uncertain. What else, he wondered, did she want from him?

[stillplaying]

She wanted recognition. She wanted him to say her name, to not regard her with the look one reserved for a stranger. Because it hurt, not being recognized. Especially from him. From someone she had grown to not just respect but maybe even love.

"Richard?"

[greenjacketed]

Hearing his own name on a stranger's lips made him stand straight. He stepped back, body leaning away -- not frightened, no. But certainly wary. He cleared his throat.

"Yes, miss. My name's Richard. What can I do for you?"

[stillplaying]

He still doesn't recognize her. And for the first time, she takes a good look at him. Notices the lack of age lines on his face. Sees skin smoother than she remembered. He's younger. He's younger and he doesn't know her and that shouldn't hurt. Not this much.

"We... we live together," she stutters out, not aware of how the words might be misinterpreted. "Here. You and me. You don't remember?"

She hates how much it hurts. When did she grow to care for him so much?

[greenjacketed]

"...You an' me?"

His brows raised. Certainly, he took the sentence a rather opposite way than intended.

[stillplaying]

She nods, still oblivious to any other implications in her words. All that's important is that he understands. And that, somehow, it'd cause him to become the man she remembers. Not this younger man she doesn't know.

This isn't her Richard. Not a Richard that doesn't know her.

"You and me, and my sister. We share one of the houses here."

[greenjacketed]

He verbally stumbled -- clumsily fumbling over his words. "Pardon me, miss, but you're a lovely creature and I've no doubt you'd make a man might happy -- but I think I'd remember you and I..."

[stillplaying]

Her eyes go wide very, very quickly. Katniss stares at him for a second or two before rapidly shaking her head. And then scowling.

He's serious, isn't he? He really thinks that they were...? Oh. Oh.

"No! No! It's not like that!"

[greenjacketed]

"...Oh."

Was that...disappointment? Nothing heartsick, but it was hard for a young man barely out of his teens to not see such a creature, to think they might have been lovers, and then to be denied. All in one fell swoop. He was quick to tug at his forelock and bow away his mistake. "So sorry, miss. Bloody hell."

[prims]

Early in the morning, Prim's outside. September is a time for thinning out plants, and it's always time to weed. And while soon enough the garden will be done of the year, there are still vegetables and herbs that like the early autumn weather. While she still thinks of it as "Sharpe's garden" for the most part, Prim likes to work in it and has added this or that thing that she finds useful. Herbs, mostly. Some are transplants from around Luceti. Some things aren't going to grow for a long while yet.

It's work that she likes doing.

The parts of the growing things around the house that aren't that are the flower beds at the front; those aren't really useful at all, except to be pretty, and while there's nothing there yet, planting bulbs now will mean there will be pretty flowers next year.

It's a long-term sort of gardening, but she feels comfortable doing it. Even if she disappears, there will probably be someone who will enjoy the flowers left.

When the front door opens, she glances up, smiling, and sits back from her current row. "Morning! I like the red." She does, too. Colors - Prim likes those.

[greenjacketed]

"...Eh?"

His head whipped about, and he fixed a suspicious eye on the girl. Such a young girl. Where the bloody hell was he that bright-eyed little girls weeded gardens outside cosy little houses? His expression darkened with doubt for a moment longer, he itched at his inexplicable wings, and paced a little closer.

"It's faded," he said -- self consciously touching the front of his uniform. "The dye ain't never lasted."

[prims]

"I don't know much about dye, but maybe someone in town knows a way to make it stay longer." Prim's looking closer now, a hint of a frown as she tries to place what's off. ...He looks younger, in the red. Maybe she's just not used to the color on Sharpe.

"Even faded, I like it, though. Maybe especially then. It means it's been lived in, doesn't it?" It has character.

[greenjacketed]

"Aye. Lived in, little miss. It's been that."

Sharpe had marched across India in this jacket. Flanders, too. And he'd paraded back in England. The jacket was one of the few things he actually owned -- but then he wondered if he truly did own it at all, or whether the army laid claim to this, too. Like it did to him.

"...Where are we?"

[prims]

That immediately cinches something being off and wrong. Prim looks more closely. She'd thought it herself, hadn't she? He looks younger. But...he hadn't been dragged off anywhere. Not that she'd noticed. So...why did he seem to be under the effects of something else? It was probably one of those times that people got strange, but Katniss had been just as usual, and Prim felt fine...

"Luceti." She can answer that much, at least. "House forty-three, specifically. I normally just call it "home", though. The house."

He'd called her 'little miss', and that wasn't usual, these days. So Prim went on. "I'm Prim, Prim Everdeen."

[greenjacketed]

"That's yer house?"

He looked back at the building -- feeling sheepish once again. "...'Pologies, Miss Everdeen. Didn't mean to go wakin' up in it. Must've had too much to drink last night."

[prims]

"No, it's..." Prim's not sure what the protocol is. She's never had someone not remember her, here, without her also not remembering them. She's not sure what Richard would or wouldn't believe, but...

...she also doesn't really like lying, and it's important that he knows he has a place to go. Even if he ends up going elsewhere, for however long this lasts. "The room you woke up in - it's yours. You don't have to apologize for being there. Yesterday you went to sleep in it."

She paused. "At least, I'm fairly sure you did. I went to bed before anyone else last night. I fell asleep studying."

[greenjacketed]

"Can't be true, miss. I ain't owned a room in my life. Can't afford one. Unless..."

He patted his pockets -- looked back at the house -- and frowned. "Funny looking inn, though."

[prims]

"It doesn't cost any money," Prim said, before realizing how suspicious that sounded. She still didn't believe it herself. "Well - in our house you do chores and we all do certain things, but...I guess you could say we pay with our work, not our money?"

She's not sure how to put it. "...You can come back here later, at least. The room's yours regardless."

[greenjacketed]

Luckily, he's no real stranger to paying with his work and not his coin. After all, he so rarely had coin of his own. And the sweat off his brow was often all he had to offer. So he offered another stiff bow and...

"Appreciated, Miss Everdeen. It's good to know there's a place to rest m'head."

[prims]

That's a relief, at least. Prim smiles again, although the stiff bow makes her feel a bit silly. "If there's anything you need, you can ask. I'll probably be here most of the morning before I go into town..."

To Seventh Heaven, probably. And to see if this is more universal than just Richard Sharpe.

[greenjacketed]

Ah, that was a question worth asking: "What town is it, lass?"