lucetilogs | Luceti Land!!

Entry tags:

Luceti Land!!

Who:

luceti
What: Amusement Parking!
When: Today til the end of the month
Where: A veritable pleasure island, east of the Beach Fort.
Summary: An amusement park has popped up in Luceti. It's all over here.
Rating: F is for friends who do stuff together!

Just some notes here not in the mod post -
1) The weather will be bright and partly cloudy for the rest of the month on the beach side of things. A nice cool sea breeze will keep people from melting out there.
2) All the old Luceti Land rides are still available. However, feel free to make up your own attractions and rides as well.
3) Since this is around for two weeks, we may put up another mass log if this one gets too full. So keep an eye on that!
4) Don't forget to tag your character's name on to the log! If you don't have one yet, just let us know and we'll get you hooked up.

As way of explanation for all this, Bil will have written a message on the first page of the journals. It cannot be replied to, it simply states:

"My condolences for all the trouble. You were due for an experiment today, but I thought you might enjoy an amusement park instead. It seemed like the sort of thing the Great One would do."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"The Hall of Personas". [Giles has already been through it, probably twice, chiefly because he keeps running into people who want to go.] Nothing I've ever encountered before, but...worth the walk, nonetheless.

... Would you accompany me through it?

[Aw, Robert's scared - okay, not really scared. Maybe cautious is a better term.

Either way, Giles' company would make this easier for Robert to consider, and less boring. ~~And more awkward.~~]

If you want.

[He gives Robert a reassuring smile. Yes, it will be awkward on multiple counts - Giles in particular already knows just what he's likely to see in there, although with any luck the images of himself, Ginia, and Grune won't be there without the other two. But even so...]

It's something like a hall of mirrors, Robert. Except...you might not expect what you see in the mirrors.

Don't be alarmed. Nothing in there can actually affect you.

[... Now Robert is a little more hesitant. But he nods, cautiously, and steps into the building.

At first he doesn't really notice anything strange - it's a room covered in mirrors, that's odd enough to his perception. And from the initial entry angle, there aren't many mirrors that catch Robert's reflection. So he just gawks at the building itself - mirrors on literally every surface... how visually disorienting.

But then he starts to notice who's in the mirrors. It's... It's not himself, not as he is now.]

[It's himself from five years ago - how he looked before his family found out and tried to push him away from the drugs. How he looked before he escaped.

The Robert staring back at him is smiling, almost normally, but it's his eyes that are strange. Unfocused and hazy, not quite seeing... His hair's tousled, and he's in what might even amount to "ordinary" clothing - loose clothes, clothes that look as strange and out of place on Robert now as a lab coat would look on this teenager.

There's a needle in one slender hand, with the other pulling a sleeve up to expose a scar-riddled arm, and as Robert watches with almost detached horror, his old self smirks slowly (mockingly? commiseratingly?) and slides it into one of the veins on his arms.

Then he depresses the plunger.]

...

[It makes Robert's stomach wrench. What does he say to this? How many times has he thought about it in Luceti, wondered what having that familiar oblivion - something he lost control to, because it was happy and safe and he could be a person there instead of somebody who didn't understand others - would be like? Wanting it again, even knowing how dangerous it'd be? Especially when Giles died?

... And he's right there too. Robert doesn't know if Giles can see this, yet, but he's so engrossed that he almost doesn't care. Either way, it would be obvious that whatever he sees in the mirror fills him with some mixture of shame, fear, and... longing.]

[Giles can see it. He's not entirely certain if he's surprised to see it or not. Some facets of Robert's personality...probably should have been hints. Some, much less so.

Even so, he lays a hand on Robert's shoulder before leaning down just slightly to his level. All without looking away from the scientist in the mirror.]

It's all right, Robert. It's over.

[He can't look at Giles yet, though his fingers go unconsciously to the marks on his wrists - they've had half a decade to dull, so they aren't quite so obvious as the ones on this apparition, but they're still stark against his nearly-flawless-elsewhere skin.

... Robert trusts Giles, yes, and would probably have eventually admitted this aloud one day. On purpose. But this wasn't how he wanted - or expected - anybody to find out.

Finally, breathlessly:] F-Five years ago. N-Nothing... nothing recent.

[The mirror version of him pulls out the needle, from an arm that's obviously been accustomed to them for years. Hell, there's even a mark where the needle was withdrawn, visible evidence that same spot was used dozens of times.

Robert's hands shake.]

...

I-I... I am sorry.

It's not something you have to apologize for, Robert.

Not to me.

[His voice is soft, and steady, and he gives Robert's shoulder a soft squeeze.]

[Robert wonders what Giles thinks. Part of him is terrified that Giles is ashamed on his behalf, or angry somewhere and just isn't showing it, or re-appraising all the nice things he'd ever thought about Robert - what kind of person could lose himself like that so easily? Does he not have any control? Any rationality? - and the rest is... hopeful. Hopeful that Giles will be like Don and Vivi and... and be okay with this. Still love him - or care for him - anyway.]

...

I... I sh-should have... should have said something. I just...

D-Do... do you still... [Like me? But he trails off.]

[Someone under far too much pressure who feels as though he doesn't have any control over his life and is simply desperate to find his own way, to feel something other than the endlessly crushing frustration.

That man, plus a couple of decades, is the one hugging you right now, Robert. Even if demons were involved instead of needles.]

Precisely. It's something you should have had the chance to admit, under your own power.

I'm sorry.

[The hug is a lifeline right now, evidence that Giles has learned a dark, sad, frightening part of Robert and has not run away. This is a good thing, and it's what Robert was most concerned about.

So he embraces Giles fiercely and just breathes.]

...

I... I would have t-told you, I just... I... d-didn't want you to... leave, and...

[Fear of rejection. Isn't that what it always is?]

And if you had never told me, that would have been perfectly acceptable.

...it would take far more than what you're capable of to make me think any less of you, Robert. What's past is past, and everyone has times they'd rather forget.

...

Th-thank you... [It hurts less knowing Giles is okay, that he's not angry.]

... Y-You... you are the... third person to know, now. And... and Vivi is... no longer here...

You have nothing to thank me for.

We are friends, after all.

[Giles pulls away slightly, just enough to look down at Robert with an odd expression. Finally he sighs, and tugs the scientist towards another mirror.]

Come on.

[Wordlessly, Robert follows.

"We are friends, after all." It's such a blunt, straightforward statement that it pushes away some of the remaining self-doubts. And though Giles' gaze is odd, more unreadable than usual, he still trusts this. He can't help but trust it.

He just wonders what Giles is going to show him.]

[Other personas of Giles flicker and flash past as they walk - a boy covered in mud and grass, dragging along a small dog. A vampire holding the dead body of Mizuno Ami. A librarian. The music teacher from the Luceti Valley experiment. An old man.

The one Giles is apparently leading Robert to see is far removed from all of these. A wild sort of man with unkempt hair, too many piercings, and torn clothes leans against the frame of his mirror, watching them with a predatory smile and wrong eyes. They're far too deep and dark to be the eyes of a real person - only possession by Eyghon the Sleepwalker gives those eyes.]

[Robert's personas ghost along with them too, pressing back at the mirrors along with Giles' - a toddler at a console displaying the Randi Institute with a look of un-toddler-like concentration; a younger teen with his fingers threaded through darker ones of another teenager with a casual smile and a slouch; a graduate from school, gaze still hollow from walking away from everything; an intern at the Institute, with a look of cold detachedness blended with worry - even fragments of experiments, like the turtle with his hands clasping Don's or the maverick math teacher cradling Vivi...

Each of them are only visible for a few seconds, but they call out to Robert with their gazes, and it takes awhile for Robert to force it from them enough to see Giles' - was that Ami? - and spot the one on the far end of the hall.

Those eyes... They don't look like eyes. They don't even look like something biological. They look like... like crude oil in tar pools, or a vacuum, or a black hole. Nothing is there, even to Robert's extremely limited perception.

He presses instinctively into Giles.]

... Who...? [Robert actually cannot connect the person they're looking at with the man next to him. The two things are so disparate they don't even seem related.]

Me.

...I preferred magic, over needles...[He takes a deep, shuddering breath.]...but that's me, Robert.

Ah...

... I see... [Robert blinks owlishly a few times, as if a flashlight was shone in his face, then studies the scrappy-looking young man again, searching for similar things. All those piercings - Giles doesn't have any of those, does he? - and the angry look... None of that looks like the significantly older person next to him.

Huh.]

... That is... quite a difference.

[Strangely, there's less trepidation now. Now that Robert knows who this is... mostly the confusing part is why.]

[Giles laughs softly, wryly, bitterly.]

And that is an understatement.

[Of course there's a difference. He's spent day in and day out for there decades ensuring that there would be.]

And this was... because of magic? [Is it anything like their first conversation? Where Giles talked about the addictive properties of magic?

Did it alter his entire personality, too?]

It must certainly have been... potent. [At least his own druggie self had been... somewhat similar... in some ways at least.]

This was because of a great many things, Robert. Magic was just the most convenient escape.

[In part. Partially, it was Willow. Partially, it was Giles.]

Ah... [He thinks he might understand, and tries vaguely to spell out the connection.]

... I... I... used because... [Softly:] ... it made me feel less alone...

... and, and... w-well, there were other reasons. I... was more competent, socially... [The kind of false social skill one achieves when one isn't dwelling on one's own fear. Namely because it's been drowned in a euphoric haze.

And then there was Benjamin. But he doesn't know if he can admit that aloud.]

Really? What a coincidence. I was actually allowed to be social, when I took up with this crowd.

[when the alternative had been studying and books, books, books and he'd still been young enough to hate the idea of that sort of lfie.]

[Robert had always fiercely embraced that sort of life, even when he was young. But of course, to Terran children, that isn't anywhere near as strange - not when science, teaching and doctoring are careers that children idolize and inspire to, even when their talents are clearly elsewhere.]

Similar reasoning... I would think. Being... being accepted, somehow. [Even superficially. Even falsely. It was an illusion that had been enjoyable for a person who had never had real friends before.

Robert seeks out Giles' weathered hand and holds it carefully.]

... it is not... not the act that is... the problem.

It is... losing oneself to it.

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