Receive them into a twinkling star

[cethflayn]

[When the remainder of the passengers returns to the ship, Flayn steals away to read what Constantine gave her upon their parting. She reads it, and cannot find it in her heart to burn it.

Well. With the rest of the letters from the dead it goes. They'll all be on her person, now, which is the safest place she can think to keep such precious words.

Quietly, privately, Flayn comes to Lelouch to ask for his assistance, and soon enough pieces of paper with Flayn's lovely handwriting find themselves slipped under your door.

Please come to the Pub on the seventh floor this evening, so we may not spend this dark night alone.

- Flayn





Cethleann

No more hiding.

Between Lelouch actually knowing how to cook, and Flayn being a doggedly determined young lady, the pub is much more hospitable when you arrive. There are homemade snacks as well as...McDonald's milkshakes and apple pies? And all manner of sweets brought over from the various floors of the ship, as if in Jasper's honor. Lengths of relatively subdued fabric have been cut from bolts in the crafts room and laid out over the tables and bar, and there are even some various liquors put out if you feel like getting absolutely wasted. We're all kind of fucking sad at the moment, it's fine. It's fine. Just eat before you imbibe, please.]

Comments

Purple room

[cethflayn]

...Magica, I know magic.

[She thinks you mean, oh, so I'm going to have to do all the magic shit by myself. But anyway...last two ladies and the shortest people on the boat. There's gotta be some kind of solidarity, right?]

[magycks]

[ That's absolutely what she means! Her response is flippant, as per usual, but not totally uninterested. ]

Oh, is that so? Might have come in handy when we... ohhhhh, right.

[ THAT WAS LORNA'S WEEK, WASN'T IT... ]

[cethflayn]

[A sigh.]

It may be different from yours, but are we not both unable to use the full extent of our powers, limited to what we know instead?

[magycks]

... Ugh, yes. Just tell me you've at least gotten over the whole "raising the dead is bad" thing, because whatever those two are doing now, it's not sending themselves peacefully into the hereafter.

[cethflayn]

[Well.......Flayn thinks about it!]

I think...so long as it is not through the means from Fodlan, we should be fine. [Not like they have JRPG The Holy Grail and all four of the correct Crests to even try.] Besides, their souls are...not completely crossed over? Right? Perhaps it is not as dangerous to bring back a soul that has not reached its fated end.

[magycks]

Uh-huh, and that's what I've been saying for the last month, but as long as you're finally on board! Beggars can't be choosers, especially now that that insufferable mage is gone.

[ HOLD UP!! ]

—Oh! Yes, that reminds me. Quickly, we've only got a few more hours.

[ And she's just going to enter the purple room with no further preamble and expect Flayn to follow her! ]

[cethflayn]

[It took Filbo telling her to really believe it, no offense Magica.]

-?

[Follows! Show her the fucked up blood and bone ritual shit, Magica!]

[magycks]

[ Well, before BOOOOOOONE? and blood exposition, Flayn will walk in to Magica checking coffins 12 and 13. Have the J-squad's dolls already just magically appeared in here? Because she wouldn't be surprised! ]

[cethflayn]

[Do we need the mods or what]

...I did manage to look at the runes in the recesses in use. They are not familiar to me, so I do not think anyone is doing anything untoward with certain things.

[magycks]

Mmhmm, putting a pin in that for later...

[ Whether or not they're there, while she would love to demonstrate the fun surprise by cutting open Constantine's doll specifically, she can work with anything! Also then Flayn might get all scandalized, and she's probably going to Strongly Dislike what this implies about Magica's actions anyway, which will for sure be fun at first but then might get to be more of an annoyance than anything else. ]

Before Jack's extremely timely demise, I managed to get some minimal information about these dolls out of him. He said they were made following a recipe.

[ The following impression, while mocking, is actually weirdly accurate considering how offensively bad hers usually are? It's almost as if Magica can be supernaturally good at impressions, depending on Ducktales plot convenience and her current power level, and was keeping that in her back pocket in case she tried killing someone! ]

Something of the thread, something of the head, I'm not going to finish my own stupid rhyme because I'm a brainless patsy for dark forces beyond my comprehension.

[cethflayn]

[I mean it'd be terrifying but you wouldn't make her run away if you did it, she's seen worse.]

A recipe...that does make sense. If you need an item to do something specific, you have to follow the instructions. [She'll ponder this for a moment.] If they are items "of the" thread and "of the" head, that means they come from there. So, head could be...any number of things? Someone's hair, for instance. Thread...might be metaphorical? I do not know what is magical about ordinary sewing thread.

[She's trying!]

[magycks]

Ooh, close, but not close enough! Fortunately, I can show you exactly where you're wrong.

[ 8) ]

After last week's meeting, I took a thorough look at the dolls to see what connections I could make. You basically got the hair part — the "thread" is pieces of their clothing, taken god knows when to dress the dolls. And as for the rest... I'm going to open one of these drawers, and I'm gonna need you to not be terminally precious about what's inside.

[cethflayn]

[Oh boy oh boy we get to learn a new thing]

...Okay?

[Look she's not expecting these dolls to be made of anything good, but she's also not prepared for the actual truth. Even so, we're going to try here because it's important.]

[magycks]

[ Magica, upon receiving this confirmation, opens the coffin that contains Chloe's doll! The head damage... well, they all saw that in real time. But the slit down the middle of the doll is new! It looks kind of lumpy in general, as if someone removed the stuffing and then put it back in place. ]

... Look, it's not like she was getting any deader.

[cethflayn]

[Mmmmmmmmmmm

Okay well. Okay. Guess we're coming closer to help investigate.]

...This is true. And I do not think she would physically be in pain anymore, were you to...do that.

[Hopefully she's not suffering any consequences of Magica's actions in Deadland?]

There is something further inside the dolls, isn't there?

[magycks]

No, I'm making you look at your dead friend's effigy for no reason. [ Magica, when you get sarcastic, you have to say something that's not completely plausible... ] Behold!

[ She punctuates this by reaching inside the doll and withdrawing her hand, now in possession of a BONE?!? ]

I'll give you three guesses as to what the rhyme is on this one, and the first two don't count.

cw: fucked up fire emblem trauma shit

[cethflayn]

[BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONE?!?!!?

Yeah no she just. Pales a bit. Because hoo boy when the majority of your extended family is twitching, glowing weaponry you can recognize what old bones look like! And shit is that blood on there? Oh fuck! Oh fuck this is some dark shit, this is some mole men dubstepping under ground in a cyberpunk lair shit!










Flayn just takes a deep breath to calm herself. She does not feel calm after doing so, but the important thing is that she tried.]

I cannot quite guess as to the specific rhyme, but I know what...bones are.

[magycks]

[ Sounds like something someone who doesn't know what bones are would say, Flayn!!! Is what Magica would say if she weren't so flabbergasted by the first part. She chalks Flayn's reaction up to squeamishness and doesn't think to interrogate it any further, and honestly thank God for that. ]

What, seriously? Come on, obviously it's something of the dead! The blood part is where they lose me.

[cethflayn]

Oh - y-you mean, keeping with the theme! [Thinks for a minute.] "Something red", maybe?

[Head, thread, dead, red!]

[magycks]

You'd think, but the color really isn't what gives the doll its power, now is it? It's probably some stupid slant rhyme we won't even guess until it's too late.

[cethflayn]

Well, it was the first thing that came to mind...

[Just going to run throgh Rhymezone real quick..."Something that bled" or "some blood shed" makes sense, and could be possible, but let's not decide on anything concrete.]

Is there a way to determine where those bones came from? Or how old they are? They...not every one of us who has died had bones. [Unless Shard secretly had bones? Or the Kraken burped them back up for use?]

[magycks]

That's the thing -- these are old.

I mean, older than you'd expect if they came from our dead, anyway. [ And just to reinforce this fact, shee continues to sort of hold the bone fragment out for Flayn's perusal! She's helping!! ] Robbing graves is dark magic 101, to be fair, but everything else in the formula seems connected to the doll's target, so...

[cethflayn]

[HAHA THIS IS DEFINITELY NOT PINGING HER SPECIES TRAUMA AT ALL

Flayn's not gonna touch that shit but hey mods can she determine just how old these bones are by looking at them, maybe get an idea of what kind of being they came from? She's specifically wondering if they're, you know, the bones of her people, but confirmation on them not being so would be good too.

Also is there anything etched into the bone? Any glyphs? Symbols? Anything particular about the blood dried on them?]

[bathymetric]

[ There's every indication they belong to the same species as the dead! As for age, probably not more than 100 years or so? And nothing is carved or drawn onto them, no. ]

[cethflayn]

[So like, bone of a dead human for a dead human, then? Still, good to know it's not, like, fucked up Fire Emblem shit.

Flayn releases a sharp breath and nods to herself.]

I think they must match the people who have passed. Chloe is a human, and therefore what you hold is a piece of human bone. Though it cannot be more than one hundred years old. I have seen some very, very old bones that have been through much more duress over centuries, and these are nothing like them.