#wr remmy

[mor-beck-more-problems]

@whatsin-yourhead said: [pm] I think we sort of…need each other. She’s all alone in that big house– well, aside from the, you know, bodyguards– and you’ve got Deirdre. Um…usually. I just– I can’t leave her alone, you know? But, uh, yeah. Sure. Help would be nice.

[pm] I understand. It’s alright, Remmy, okay? I figured you weren’t gonna stick around forever. And, okay, yeah,  I’m gonna you around all the time and sneaking into your room, but I’m glad Lydia’s gonna have you around instead too. I don’t think she’s been out much at all since she got hurt. She needs a real friend.

I’ll help however you want.

[constancecunningham]

@whatsin-yourhead

[pm] Constance, please come back. I wasn't able to get any of the stuff, you're in danger.

[pm] You sent me away to return to your friend. I suspected as much and should not have made such an outrageous request in the first place. I will manage on my own.

But I am sorry. I am telling you the truth about everything. It wasn’t what it looked like.

[walker-journal]

What is your character’s D&D alignment (lawful neutral chaotic, good neutral evil)? What do they consider their alignment to be? If you’ve answered this before, has it changed? Why or why not?

(OOC) Adam started play in WR just after accidentally killing his fraternity brother James. Before this time Adam had strayed from the Lawful Neutral (emphasis on the strict Lawful part) teachings of his family while giving into rage over his father’s demise. But Jame’s death scared Adam and guilt dragged his alignment back toward Lawful territory. This wasn’t always constant and the Somnivore incident and his conflict with Regan over taking (corpses) justice into his own hands were relapses into the dangerously erratic behavior that he’d started the RP with.

Midish Season 1, Adam encountered Celeste, a Hunter with a very different worldview. The doubts he gained from this encounter and her subsequent murder, combined with meeting honorable supernaturals (Winn, Remmy, Mina, Layla, Arianna, Arthur, and Regan) for the first time in his life began to slowly inch Adam towards Lawful Good..ish. 

But then Adam was a direct accessory to literal human sacrifice, dark magic and the whole nine yards, and Adam underwent a similar regression as happened with James. He concluded that this happened because he strayed from family dogma, and he needed to ‘get back on the path’ 

Part of why I define Adam as Lawful, is because the Code and the expectations of Hunter society takes precedence over his actual feelings. (As opposed to Chaotic, where individual emotion takes precedence over moral systems and  societal expectations) Recently Adam concluded that he has to try and take down Winn even though Adam personally hates it. Adam in this sense is relinquishing his own moral agency to faithfully follow an ideology, which is arguably Lawful Evil.

[mor-beck-more-problems]

@whatsin-yourhead

[pm] Yeah, I read that article. I told you there would be a price I still want to talk.

[pm] Oh. Okay.

Did you uh, like the cake? I put brains in the extra filling, so it’d taste like something besides ‘creamy’.

[mor-beck-more-problems]

@whatsin-yourhead

[pm] Morgan...she kills people. Even if it is somehow for big, cosmic balance, I already told her I don't want to be a part of that. I love her, and I always will, but I can't keep compromising on that.

.

[pm] Yes. Because she has to, because of what she was born as. It’s not much of a choice when the alternative is harm spreading outwards to dozens of other people or more and when she’s part of an incredibly rare species with this ability. It’s not her fault.

I just thought you should know, now that I can tell you. She’s not the same as Lydia.

[mor-beck-more-problems]

@whatsin-yourhead​ replied to your post: [pm] Morgan?

[pm] Can we talk?

[pm] I don’t know. You were kind of the one calling the shots on that last time. So, can we?

[mor-beck-more-problems]

Burn Your Bridges || Morgan, Constance, & Remmy

TIMING: Current

PARTIES: @whatsin-yourhead @constancecunningham @mor-beck-more-problems

SUMMARY: Remmy makes good on Constance’s request to sabotage Morgan’s plans, but things quickly go terribly wrong.

CONTAINS: soft zombies

Constance had asked Remmy half a dozen times if they were sure they would do this for her. Did they mind if Morgan would be angry? Did they think this was a betrayal of her trust? She needed this, she wouldn’t ask if she didn’t need it. And was it still alright? Would they still do it? Remmy said they would, they would, they would. And Constance tried to believe them, but when she saw them leave the house and begin the long walk to Morgan’s home, Constance couldn’t help but follow behind and drift away in order to watch them. She made herself a nice roost in a cluster of birch trees in someone else’s garden and saw Remmy go in. A minute passed, and then more. Remmy did not immediately run straight out, and the road to the stable where Morgan kept her automobiles was empty. They couldn’t be conspiring with her directly. Constance observed the house, still curtained and dark, with rapt attention. Could Remmy truly be doing what she asked? Even if the reasoning she gave had been nothing more than her own welfare? She hadn’t known that was something people were capable of doing. “My heavens…” she whispered to herself, a smile growing slowly on her face. Perhaps Remmy had some grasp of their will after all. Perhaps the reason they believed so determinedly in impossible kindness was because they created it themself. And just when she thought that she would be allowed no more hope on this day, a blue automobile pulled into the road, with Morgan driving inside.

She didn’t know if this was fate or the betrayal that she should have expected, but Constance did not need to know for certain in order to take her chance. And it wouldn’t be an attempt on her life, it would just be another game, a little...fun.

Morgan left work as soon as her class was over. She had some calls to make, she needed to look through some texts. She had a few students she was leaving on read that needed her attention, but she felt so close to putting everything together, and if she could get more of that knocked out, maybe she could slow down, take a break, actually enjoy making dinner as much as she used to. She got out of the car and headed inside when she heard a splash in the pool. “--Mina?” She asked. “Hey, Mina, did you need something?”

She came around the side of the house and into the back yard, surveying the scene. She didn’t see her friend or any sign of straggling company. But the light was on in the shed, so Morgan jogged quickly to turn it off. She didn’t check the salt lines like she normally did. She didn’t imagine that there would be anything waiting for her inside except a space she had neglected to clean up. So when the door shut behind her, there was a gasp of time where everything still seemed alright. Then the lock clicked shut on the outside.

“Mina--?” She tried the handle, rattling it hard. But she hadn’t seen Mina. Maybe she had missed her at the bottom of the pool. “Deirdre? Deirdre, I’m--” But Deirdre knew that being shut up was one of Ruth’s favorite punishments for her. Deirdre would never. Was it the mushrooms? Did her mushroom self resent her for how things had ended? Morgan threw her shoulder against the door. That was how people did it in the movies, right? “Deirdre!” The lightbulb in the shed burst and sparked before going dark. Morgan screamed.

‘Don’t freak out, don’t freak out, don’t freak out…” She just needed to break the door. She was home, she was safe. Her trembling fingers barely grazed the handle before a scalpel went through her palm. Morgan screamed again, “Help me!” She swiped blindly in search of who was in there with her. She’d tear them to pieces, she’d end them and eat their intestines for desert, she’d-- Morgan only caught air. The dark was thick, absolute as nightmares. No shadow, no taxidermy, no weapons. Morgan’s thoughts drowned. She was back in her small room, barely bigger than her bed, banging and begging through the door to be let out. She would be good, she’d get the equations right, she was sorry and she would do so good if her mother would please let her out. She slammed against the door with all her weight. “Please--!” She wailed.

Remmy hands vibrated as they shuffled through Morgan’s collection, trying to figure out what in there was actually used for exorcisms and what was just random shit. Her notes made no sense, either, so that wasn’t any help. Someone would be home soon, they knew that, and though they could probably talk their way out of being caught in the house, they didn’t want to have to lie. To Morgan or Deirdre. And really, they just didn’t want to see Deirdre. They didn’t need that guilt right now. But they weren’t even halfway through grabbing the right items when they heard a scream and pounding. “Morgan!?” they shot up quickly, running around to the back of the house. The pool was empty, but when they looked out across the yard, they noticed the shed door closed. It was rarely closed. And the sound was coming from there. They raced out and across the yard, yanking on the door. “Morgan!?” they called out again. “Morgan, open the door!” A chill ran through them. No, it...it wasn’t possible. It couldn’t be possible. “Constance!” they tried this time, calling through the door. They slammed against it. Once, twice. The door burst open, the paneling splintering. And there she was, standing beside Morgan. “Constance, don’t! Don’t do it! You said you wouldn’t do it!”

Morgan always put off breathing for too long. If it wasn’t right away, she couldn’t convince herself to keep up with the beat. Air came out of her chest in shrill gaps. She couldn’t remember why she was supposed to be fine, she needed to get out, she couldn’t be trapped in the dark again, she couldn’t stay. Another blade slid into her, this time at her throat. Morgan clawed at it, grunting as she struggled to cry out again. Someone would hear her, someone would come home…

The door split open and Morgan stumbled back, falling to her knees as she struggled with the scalpel on her still-healing hands. Her eyes found Remmy, wide and desperate. Please help me, please help me, please...

Constance lost her concentration and her calm when the door opened. The next scalpel she’d been toying with clattered to the ground and she looked at Remmy with guilt. “I wasn’t going to kill her, it was just--” A game? “Please don’t be mad, she’s fine, she’s just scared!” And scared was so much less than what Morgan Beck deserved.

“Scared!?” Remmy balked, rushing to Morgan’s side, yanking out the knives that had been slid into her flesh, throwing them far away. “You were trying to kill her!” They kneeled between Constance and Morgan, caught between a battle they were just now realizing they had no say in. This war would continue until one of them was gone for good, and they weren’t sure they could stop any of this. They looked sharply at Constance. “Get out!” they said to her. “Leave, now!” They didn’t want to force her out just yet, but they definitely were inching closer to the salt lines on the floor, ready to grab some if they needed. They didn’t want to hurt Constance, but it was clear, now, that she didn’t trust Remmy to keep their end of the bargain, and that she would take things into her own hands.

“I wasn’t killing her! I swear, Remmy, I didn’t even come here with the intent of-- I needed to know if you meant anything you said!” Constance cried. And weren’t they proud? She’d reached through the roof and crushed the lightbulb so carefully with her hand. She wasn’t even angry, she didn’t even care that Morgan had things so much nicer than her, it was just a bulb and the glass sounded like chimes as it fell and the scream Morgan gave was so harmless. “Remmy, I just needed to know. I’ve never been able to trust anyone before, and then she just arrived, and you couldn’t be interrupted!” She reached for another thread to pull on, something to make Remmy look at her differently. “Remmy, please!”

Morgan gasped, clinging to Remmy with shaking hands for support as she dragged herself up to her feet. “W-what...what’s happening…?” She could see outside behind Remmy and flailed, unsteady on her feet, desperate to get to the fresh air. “R-remmy--?” She croaked, pushing against them, trying to move them outside. Faint puddles of black formed formed on Remmy’s shirt. Her foot slid out from under her, but she held on and tried to push. Out, she needed out.

“What do you mean you weren’t killing her!?” Remmy shouted. It felt like just another betrayal, another yank of their heart, another person taking advantage of their kindness. All they ever wanted to do was help. And people kept pulling them down and using them. Throwing that decision of softness in their face. “There was a scalpel in her neck!” they growled. “Leave, now. Get out of here.” They looked at her sternly, “before I make you.” And back at the mansion, they’d have a long, long discussion about this. Morgan was shoving against them, desperate to get out, and they took her by the arms and lead her out, making sure Constance didn’t follow. “Go inside,” they ushered to her, “hurry.”

“I wasn’t!” Constance said. “She doesn’t even bleed, how could I! Please!” But Remmy’s eyes had turned hard as everyone else’s in her life. She fled through the back wall of the shed and ran to somewhere, anywhere else to be.

Morgan staggered on shaky legs, still gasping and whimpering to her panic. No. Not inside. She stumbled to the fence that bordered the yard and sunk to her knees, pawing at the shallow trench she’d dug around the house. There was so much less salt than there should’ve been, and maybe it was all for nothing. She gathered as much into her fists as she could, heaving until the worst of her shaking had passed. She was in White Crest. She was safe. She was home. And the last thing she was going to do was go inside. She wasn’t leaving herself alone and she wasn’t staying still without something to protect herself with. The world spun, fuzzy and heavy like a twist-a-whirl. The last few minutes were putting themselves together in her head. Remmy. Constance. Together. “Where--is--she?” She asked, forcing her words through gritted teeth as she fought herself for control. “And what...were you doing...in my house?”

Morgan didn’t go all the way to the house, but Remmy wasn’t about to push her into anything. They followed slowly behind her, making sure Constance did as she was told and left, before turning back to her. “Hey, you’re okay, it’s okay--” they started, but the words that whistled through her grit teeth made them freeze. “She-- she’s gone,” they said, trying to keep their voice steady, “she’s gone, Morgan.” They bit their lip for a minute, before stopping just short of her and kneeling down to meet her level. “I was...looking for your exorcism stuff,” they said, deciding here, in this moment, they could not lie to her. They would not. She deserved the truth after what just happened. This was, after all, their fault. “I was going to get rid of it.”

Morgan had one moment of relief between hearing that Constance was gone and the words that came after. In that time she managed to release the salt from her hands and cling to Remmy for a few seconds more as her body settled back in place. She was in White Crest. She was with her friend. She was okay. Remmy’s words came to her delayed and muffled, rolling slowly into her like waves. “M-my...exorcism. But I’m almost done. I-I just need to find someone.” Why would Remmy do that? She had long figured out that they didn’t exactly approve of her actions, but they’d respected her enough to stay out of it. This wasn’t like Remmy. Remmy wouldn’t do this to her. Morgan turned to look at them, searching their face. “And you...you know what this means to me. I don’t understand. And didn’t you see what she just--” What she had done to her. Constance had no way of knowing how many times Morgan had been dragged into her room and locked up, but she had done it all the same. And she had delighted, it seemed, on running her through with Deirdre’s scalpels in the dark. Not for revenge, not to kill her, just for fun. Because she could. And then something else clicked into place for Morgan, something Constance had said. I’ve never been able to trust anyone before, and then she just arrived, and you couldn’t be interrupted… “She put you up to this.” Morgan couldn’t push herself away from Remmy fast enough. Without their support, she was a teetering mess, but she didn’t care. “She...trusted you? Why would she trust you? Why does she even know you?”

Remmy waited, silently, for the pieces to fall together. Morgan pushed away from them and they stumbled, not looking at her. While they were shameful of going behind her back to sabotage her attempt to torture someone, they would not apologize. Even if she hated them, they weren’t going to let her ruin herself like this. Just for revenge. Hands dug up grass as they sat across from her. “She did,” they answered softly, “she does.” Or, well, perhaps did at this point. Remmy had probably ruined that, too. Could they not save anyone? Not Lydia, or Deirdre, or Cordelia. Not Constance. Not Morgan. They held back the pain burning in their stomach and grit their teeth. “She knows me because...I ran into her in the park. And I know you were trying to-- Morgan...you want to torture her. Are you really going to sit there and tell me that I’m supposed to just let you do that? After everything you’ve been through? After everything we’ve been through? Seriously?”

“Yes!” Morgan screamed. “Especially for those reasons, Remmy!” She had known, always, no matter how quiet and accommodating Remmy was that they hadn’t believed in what she was doing. But this-- coming back to their house, the house they’d left, just to take her chance away from her-- Morgan didn’t know who or what she was looking at anymore. “How do you not understand that neither of us would even be in this shitty situation if it wasn’t for her? I wouldn’t be dead if not for her! I would still have magic! I would still have parents! Parents who gave a shit about me, who loved me! She is everything I have been through. And you don’t get to force me to roll over and just keep taking it and taking it and taking it just because you don’t like it!” Her voice ran raw and ragged as she struggled to breathe. She rounded on them, fists clenched, still trembling and crying, but no less furious at realizing that Remmy cared more about the ghost that had undone her than their friendship. “Tell me why,” she said, choking down a sob. “Why does she get to be your pet project, you new friend, after killing my whole family with her curse, killing me, but my house is the one you can’t stand to be in. Tell me why that is, what I did to you. Because I don’t get it. I don’t get any of this from you.”

“I never said you should just roll over and take it!” Remmy found themself shouting back, wondering, suddenly, where this anger was coming from. Hot tears stung their face and they wiped at them furiously. Their decisions were tearing them apart, but they couldn’t think about that right now. “What happened to you was terrible! What happened to me was terrible, but that doesn’t give you the right to hurt someone back! She’s a child, Morgan!” An angry, upset, lost child, but a child all the same. Her life may have been sacrificed for darkness and cruelty, but that didn’t mean it hadn’t been taken too early. From what Remmy had pieced together, Constance’s life was nothing but pain. And they understood that. They understood the anger that came with that. If Remmy had died and come back, too, they were sure they’d be just like her right now. “She’s not my pet project, Morgan! She’s a fucking person who, might I add, you brought back to this world! She didn’t choose to be here! She doesn’t want to be here! And you just-- you really think hurting her is going to solve anything? Help anything?” They shook their head. “No, no-- what doesn’t make sense here is you. You, who has always been soft and kind and gentle to me and others you love and care about. I don’t understand what you want from this, Morgan. Why is it so important to you that she suffers? Haven’t we all fucking suffered enough? Why does there need to be more?”

“Oh, please. You can dress it up however you want, but letting her--no, I’m sorry, giving her peace in a cozy magic circle on a goddamn platter, the same peace and sleep that you and I are never going to have, is asking me to do exactly that. And that is not something you get to decide for me. She destroyed my life. Me. From minute one, I was a thing of her magic. And getting even an ounce of freedom from her made me this!” Morgan pulled on her fingers. On anyone else they would have at least dislocated, but on her they hung bent like misshapen claws and moved slowly back into place. Morgan wrung them out to speed the process along, still shaking her head at Remmy’s inability to see her, to see what this meant. “I know I’m never going to get to be alive again, and I am never going to get those places inside of me that were magic back. I know that, I don’t know why you and everyone else think I don’t know that, but I do,” she wept. “So I am taking back from her what little I can. I am taking back my choice to do what I want, what I see fit, not running scared or working against some timeline of doom she’s set up for me. Stars, do you have any idea what it’s like to live like--” No. Of course Remmy didn’t. Remmy never would. Anyone who might have understood the dread that had consumed Morgan’s mortal life was already dead and destroyed. “I am taking back my power,” she said, more quietly this time. “I don’t need to feel the universe inside me to work my will. My soul is still a witch, and I will make sure she knows that when I watch her end.” She sniffled. “I am the same person I’ve always been, Remmy. Kindness, balance, autonomy, fairness, it’s all still important to me. It’s just that I’m finally taking my turn to decide what’s fair, and this is what I want. It’s not going to make up for a hundred twenty whatever years of suffering, but it’s going to be all I have. It’ll be enough, and then it’ll be over.”

“That’s not the same and you know it! Just because we don’t get something doesn’t mean you have the right to deny someone else that!” Remmy roared, feeling anger pulsing up through their arms and into their head, making them dizzy. They wanted to hit something again and it made them feel sick. They’d never wanted to feel like this again. But it was an inescapable part of themself and the guilt they felt at it made them turn away from Morgan, repulsed by the idea that she had made them feel this way. “Killing and torturing her isn’t going to give you back anything!” they finally said again, bile in their throat, a bite to their voice. An ice they hadn’t known was possible to be present in them. “You’re not taking back your fucking power by killing someone, ghost or not. And if you think that’s the truth, then, I--” they hesitated, the words building in their throat like lava, burning to get out. Remmy clenched their jaw, clicked their teeth, “then I don’t know who you are anymore.”

Morgan flinched at the cut in Remmy’s voice. Remmy, who hadn’t hesitated to walk to her house with bags full of ice cream when she thought she’d lost Deirdre for good. Who’d let her punch them until she fell over because they understood she had no other way of exorcising the rage trapped in her. Remmy, who tried to understand everyone, turning away in anger at Morgan. At who she was. “Then you what?” she snapped, suddenly stiff and cold. “That’s not what you were going to say. Or maybe you think I can’t handle it. Like I don’t know what you walking away like that means already?” That same rage that overtook her in Remmy’s yard was back again, cording through her arms, begging to be let out, to punch, to break, to hurt. “I’ll do you one better and say it first. If you can’t even admit that I might have a point, if you can’t even pretend to see where I am at, enough that you think you’re entitled to choose for me, then you are not my friend and you can leave. Now!”

Tears raced down Remmy’s cheeks in hot paths. Shock registered in their chest first, then their head, their throat. “What-- no, I-- M-Morgan,” they stuttered through the words like this was the first time they’d ever heard them. They shook their head, wiping more tears away with calloused palms. “That’s not what I-- I wasn’t going to say that, how can you--” they reached towards her, dirt stuck under their fingernails. “I wasn’t going to say that! Morgan, I-- I’m mad but I’m not-- i would never say that to you! I-- we’re-- don’t say that!” they scrambled towards her, reaching out again, “don’t say that!”

Morgan flinched back, whimpering as if Remmy’s touch might hurt. “You say that like I haven’t seen you cut two people out of your life already,” she murmured. “And it’s really not complicated math. You think what I’m doing counts as killing her, which you hate, and you think her killing me and everyone I cared about before coming here is okay enough to make her worth hanging around because it’s in the past or she looks young  or--I don’t even know. And you can’t even admit that carrying over a hundred twenty years of cursed, fucked up trauma passed down to my miserable mortal life, might just be a good reason for me to have the say in what happens to Constance. And I just can’t handle hanging on and begging you to see me and where I am only for you to realize in another week or a month that you can’t and I belong off to the wayside somewhere. I don’t have it in me so please just go. And don’t come back unless you have something different to say.” Morgan turned away from Remmy and their earnest, pleading face. She had already lost more than she’d ever reckoned to Constance, she didn’t need to watch Remmy’s love for her fade out too. She wrapped her arms around herself and trudged into her empty house.

“Morgan!” Remmy called out, standing up on shaky legs. “Morgan, I-- I never said any of that! How-- how could you think I would feel that way!?” they stepped forward, but Morgan shrunk away from them. They shivered, folding into themself. “I’m trying to keep you from killing her! From making yourself into something you’re not! You don’t have to do this, you have a choice! You can be--” their tongue caught again, but this time, they pushed past every feeling inside of them to get the words out before Morgan disappeared into her house, “You can be better than Lydia!”

Morgan froze in the doorway. Maybe she should have expected a parting shot from Remmy, maybe she had hoped too hard that she would get the kindness of slinking back into her house and holding herself together as much as possible until Deirdre got home. But she hadn’t expected that name to come from Remmy like that. “If you think that I could ever be like that, if that’s what you think I’m--” Morgan couldn’t even make the words come out. “Then I don’t know how you were my friend at all.” She ran the rest of the way and slammed the door shut behind her.

[constancecunningham]

Fetch Quest || Constance & Remmy

TIMING: Current

PARTIES: @whatsin-yourhead & @constancecunningham

SUMMARY: Remmy tries their best. Constance learns about fetch.

CONTIAiNS: Implications of past abuse.

“Moose, fetch!” Constance threw the ball as far as she could. Without any body strength to speak of, it didn’t go very far. The dog caught it in mid air and dropped it just off of where Constance sat hovered in front of a park bench. Without Nancy to show her how to be calm in the world, she struggled to grab anything except in frustration. Every time she tried, she saw her disappearing into the air and rage blazed through her. She threw the stick again, scowling into the horition as Moose made a big circle around the grass to give himself a few more moments of joy before picking up the ball and delivering it the short distance to her. Constance stared at it. She had never been allowed a pet of her own, and whatever ‘fun’ this was supposed to bring was beyond her. “I think I spent too long in the ether” She said. Moose panted and wagged his tail, expecting something from the non-magical nothing in the air.

Mourning someone who was already dead felt strange, even to Remmy. They didn’t know how to properly mourn something like that, even for themself-- but perhaps they’d need to start finding a way. “What do you mean?” they asked when Constance spoke up again. This time, Remmy leaned down and grabbed the slobbery ball, tossing it a rather commendable distance across the park for him. Moose took off with the utmost joy and Remmy turned to look back at Constance. “Spent too long? Do you… remember what it was like there or something?” They’d pondered what it was like between life and death, wondered if that was a place they’d ever get to know, or if their undead life now meant they never could know. Was dying supposed to be peaceful? They didn’t know that answer either. Moose came trotting back with the ball but Remmy was still looking at Constance.

“Not really,” Constance shrugged. “I don’t see things when I think about it. But I feel...different. Wrong. In a way I didn’t before. Or at least, wrong in a way I don’t believe I was before, even in the ether. There’s just darkness over all those years, like one dark, dreadful sleep. Like when you know you had a nightmare, but you can’t recall of what.” She tried to unclench herself, finding ease in the air the way Nancy had been trying to teach her over the past few weeks, visiting the house, even staying some nights.

When Remmy didn’t throw the ball again, Constance reached for it, and watched in anguish as her hand fell though. Constance sulked back. “Do you remember what it was like? You must have been dead once, for a little while. Did it feel like a bad dream then, or am I the only one?” Again.

“I don’t remember being dead,” Remmy said quietly. The wind rustled through the valley and the only way they knew it happened was by the movement of their own hair. It had gotten so long again, nearly down to their shoulders. They drooped a little. “I barely remember dying in the first place.” They watched Constance’s hand sink through Moose’s ball, and they bent down to pick it up and hold it out to her to try again. “Sometimes I think not remembering is better,” they explained after a moment, “it...hurts a lot when I do. I had to have someone else tell me how I died because I guess my brain blocked the memories and I couldn’t, like, reach the memories anymore.” They glanced at her again, concern on their face. “What makes you feel wrong?”

“Perhaps you are right,” Constance said. “At least your body anchors you to this plane and the grass bows to your weight. You belong here. If you don't remember being different, you cannot confuse yourself by thinking otherwise.” She ran her hand through the ball again before deciding she didn’t care about it anyway. “It’s just a feeling. Mind, I was always told so, by everyone.” Well, almost everyone, but they had been liars and traitors, so what did that count for? “But I never felt half so wicked as they told me I should until I was returned here, as this. I feel as though this world does not want me. I feel as though there is something missing, and sometimes as though I might come apart, but perhaps that thing is merely my body. Or perhaps now that I lack it, I can see that they were right. I am wicked and wrong.” But she was also very powerful. And when she was certain she had the strength for it, she would continue, and she would win. Glancing sidelong at Remmy, she smiled and said, “Don’t trouble yourself about me. And don’t let me keep you from your fun. I can watch just fine.”

“I...don’t know if that’s entirely true, but I am grateful to be...whole, I guess,” Remmy mumbled. They’d already tried to talk to Nadia-- er, Cordelia-- about what it felt like being a ghost, and it sounded even more miserable than being a walking corpse that felt nothing. That remembered nothing of what soft fur or sheets or grass actually felt like. “You were never wicked, Constance,” they said, “and you still don’t have to be. You can move on, you know? Peacefully. Happily.” They let out a long breath and threw the ball again, watching it bounce as Moose chased it down loyally. “I trouble myself about everyone. I just want to make the world a better place, even if it’s just a tiny bit. Even if it’s just making one person feel better, or even just okay.” They picked up the ball once again, “that includes you. And people like you.”

“You don’t know who I was, Remmy,” Constance said. “How can you argue for such a thing when you have no clue? Do you not think me wicked for trying to kill your so-called friend? And I killed many a rat, bargaining with the heavens for small favors. I was desperate, and it was the only power in the world I had, but there are some who believe that it was no kindness or necessity. And those are only the crimes I meant to commit…” There were others, so many others. Constance saw that girl in the classroom with the bleeding head every time the shadows swirled in the corners, how her lifeless eyes had stared... “I was never a gentle person, even when I meant to do good. And I am so beyond happiness and peace, I cannot even make true meaning out of those words.” She sighed. “I am afraid we do not understand each other very well, Remmy. But I think it would have been nice to have known someone like you before.”

“Because I see who you are now,” Remmy answered simply. And it was simple as that. “You��re suffering, Constance. You’re suffering and things could be better if you just...let go of that pain. I know it’s hard...but the people who hurt you have long since died. Morgan isn’t the person who hurt you, she’s not even close.” They let out a long breath, rubbing hands through their hair. “I don’t think you’re wicked, Constance. I never did, even after…” they paused, “...and I guess if Morgan knew that, she’d probably hate me, too, but...I can’t find it in me to feel that way about anyone. Not you, not Lydia…” They tossed the ball, a bit harder this time, “For the longest time, I thought I was wicked, too. That I could never find peace, or happiness, or any of that feel good shit everyone always talks about. But the thing is...I learned it’s never just gonna happen. You have to go and find it.” They picked up the ball once more, and held it out. “Kinda like how Moose finds his ball every time I throw it.”

Constance scrutinized Remmy the whole time they spoke. She had never been able to tell when someone was lying to her before, but she thought if she squinted at their strange face, she might be able to tell for certain so she could stop wondering when this facade might come apart. “Her presence is an insult to my own in a way I don’t believe anyone in this time can understand. There is no sense of collective responsibility, nor legacy, scarcely any duty. But I suppose I shouldn’t be cross over you doing something that would make that ugly cow seethe. I should rejoice, if I had any sense. But you’re wrong, so it is only a bittersweet victory. Although maybe it doesn’t matter. If the heavens opened up and stamped me as a no-good heathen once and for all, I would still refuse to accept what was done to me, what was made of me. I would simply be dragging myself to hell with her. And maybe that will be something like peace, if it comes.” Around them, autumn was losing its grasp to winter, pointing with spindly fingers toward the gray-white horizon, as if something important might materialize from it. “Morgan doesn’t know you’ve been coming to see me, right? I’m a secret not to be shared?” She tried the ball again, and found that she gripped it with ease. She threw it before she could resent summoning the power because of Morgan Beck. But it was as she had said all along, wasn’t it? This was her purpose, no more and no less. “Will you still think such pretty things about me if I succeed? Even if I turn out to be right?” Moose came back with the ball and Constance threw it again, thinking this time on what the world would feel like after she had won. She imagined forgiving the sun for not making her warm, and the moon for casting no shadow on her. She imagined giving Remmy and Blanche one last smile, and saying that it was always meant to be this way, but she was sorry for making them sad. It wasn’t so different from this moment, she realized. And yet it felt so far. She threw the ball again. “Perhaps a better question would be…” She hesitated to speak it, the thought alone seemed blasphemous in its own way, “...what do you propose I do if I am wrong? All of you love to say ‘let go’, as if she were a ball I could throw. And I imagine if I could kill her by picking up her body and throwing it into the sun, I would understand perfectly. If I were to cut her throat, I would certainly let go of her body then. But that isn’t what you mean and I don’t understand how to entertain this fairy story you want me to partake in.”

Remmy thought and pondered quietly. They didn’t truly understand Constance’s line of thinking, but then again, she was from a completely different time. It must’ve been so jarring coming here, to this world of technological advancement and strange machines. “What’d they do to you?” they asked her quietly, after a long silence, in which Moose sat and waited patiently for them to throw it. They were preoccupied, though, and turned fully to face Constance and her fading form. “Well, yeah...if you continue to do bad things that hurt people, I’ll change my mind. But I still think that you’re worth saving and that you can be saved. But you have to let go of your anger. I know you didn’t choose to be here, but you can choose to leave peacefully. Don’t you want that? I want you to realize that revenge isn’t going to make you feel any better. I want you to realize that you deserve something good, Constance,” they muttered, “that’s all.” And they tossed the ball again, this time as far as their strength would let them.

“Which time?” Constance asked, smirking bitterly. “When my family was left to fend for themselves in caves, or when only one family would take me in as a servant because my mother was suspected of being a witch, and scorn was thrown on them for their pity, never mind anything else about me, never mind the power of true magic. How dare a woman fend for herself and bargain with a God that will hear what no human ear will. Or do you mean when that family, when Agnes--” The ball lifted on the power of Constance’s rage. The leaves drummed a skeleton tattoo on the ground. Constance whimpered and tried to calm herself. “I can’t,” she whispered. “I can’t talk about it without… I don’t want to become lost and changed, like others say I will. I want to stay myself. I’m sorry.” She concentrated. She tried to remember how breath once soothed her, imagined lungs and veins moving in and out. “I don’t know what something good is. I don’t know if I have the time to find that out. Your Morgan is so determined to destroy me for my supposed crimes…” she shook her head. “I don’t think I was destined to ever find out.” The ball settled and Constance threw it to Moose, further than she had yet, smiling into the distance. After a silence between them she said, “If I were to believe you, if I were to...consider something else, would you help buy me the time it will take to learn?”

Remmy felt their heart sinking again. How were they supposed to have the power to fix something like this? The truth was, they didn’t. All they could offer now was their sympathies. “I’m sorry,” they mumbled, “I...think you would’ve liked it here, in this time. If you’d been able to be here.” They watched the ball rise, the leaves swirl. They winced a little. “It’s okay. Whatever happened, I know it hurt a lot. But…” they looked out and around at the park, “...there’s no one left in this world that deserves the anger you feel. I’m not saying you shouldn’t be angry-- there are things I”m still mad about that happened to me ages ago-- but you just...you can’t keep holding onto it. I wish I had more to offer than that, but that’s all I know how to do. All I know to offer. Is just...help letting go.” They held out their hand to her, knowing that they would not be able to feel it or truly hold it. “I would, yeah,” they said, smiling gently, “of course I would.”

Constance stared ahead, watching the ball come back and throwing it again. Perhaps her star had been crossed and cursed by time. Perhaps in a life in this new world, in Morgan Beck’s world, she would have found someone to suffer with. She didn’t know how to tell Remmy that they should be angry too, that they didn’t have to lay like a corpse and accept the wrongs done to them. They had hands that could grasp and break, feet that could crush, teeth that could tear. They could do so much. So much. But she could not imagine them doing so, even if another of their kind showed them how. She felt a strange pity for the zombie then, a kinship with the starving cats that roamed the streets, innocent and yet so full of potential. She put her hand through theirs, shuddering with longing that she couldn’t hold it. Theirs seemed like a hand that would be gentle, and it had been so long since she had felt that. “Thank you, Remmy,” she said. “And it isn’t much I ask for. I just need you to find Morgan Beck’s stash of exorcism magic and steal it.”

[mor-beck-more-problems]

@whatsin-yourhead​

[pm] Not good, but also like…not worse? So there’s that.

.

[pm] Not worse is good. You know no one’s going to ask you to fight unless there’s a really good reason, right? You’re not in that place anymore. You can take a break from all this if that’s what you need.

[mor-beck-more-problems]

@whatsin-yourhead

[pm] I'm guessing you um-- heard that explosion, right?

[pm] ...Which explosion? The Ring explosion? Remmy were you?? How do you know Erin??

[constancecunningham]

Safe as Houses || Constance & Remmy

TIMING: Current

LOCATION: Gallow’s End Estates

PARTIES: @whatsin-yourhead & @constancecunningham

SUMMARY: Shaken by her actions at the docks, Constance goes for a walk, but she isn’t alone. Remmy makes a proposition.

CONTAINS: Brief references to past abuse.

Remmy had a decision to make.

Life was still moving and they’d been standing still so long. It was time to decide if they were going to keep moving, or if they were going to stay still. Sure, they had forever, but that didn’t mean the people around them did. And forever wasn’t even guaranteed, was it? As long as slayers and hunters existed, nothing was guaranteed. Not that Remmy blamed them, but they had to accept the fact that even if they did nothing wrong, even if they presented no threat, did nothing bad, there would always be people like Alain who would cut them down anyway. Though he had agreed not to go after them until they hurt someone for real again, that didn’t mean he wouldn’t change his mind again. Or that someone else would come along who wasn’t willing to compromise. There were too many variables in forever, that was the one thing Remmy knew was true.

And so, it was with that in mind, that Remmy found themselves strolling through town, coming upon old places that they’d found comfort in in the past. Mooseventure, Al’s, the Commons...and lastly, the Bend. And the awful, dirty, shitty apartments they’d first lived in when moving here. And while the place had been just horrible, they’d met two of their very best friends while living here-- Blanche and Nora. And while Nora was off doing...who knew what, Blanche was still here. Still fighting. And Nora was around, she made sure maintenance came to the house to keep it in working order for the residents that did still live there, even if they were undead. They deserved a nice place, too.

It wasn’t until Remmy got closer to the building that they realized the person they’d seen standing out front wasn’t standing at all-- they were hovering, just above the ground, and Remmy could see straight through them. A ghost. Thoughts of Nadia flooded their head and Remmy hesitated a moment before they realized, again, that they recognized this ghost. She had been the ghost sitting next to Remmy on the bench in the park that day-- the day Morgan had died. This ghost was Constance. Remmy would never forget her face.

They walked up towards her nervously, but kept their demeanour calm. “You’re um...you’re Constance, right?”

Constance had fewer and fewer places left to her where she felt safe. Everywhere she explored, there Morgan was and there her rage blazed, weakening her grasp on her own soul, narrowing her vision to the size of a pinprick. And yet the sun rose and the sun set and she could not sleep. Perhaps, all this considered, returning to the outskirts where she had been born and the woods where she had played alone. Constance glimpsed the gray sunlight cut and scattered like flour through the many branches. She imagined that the sun remembered her, the trees remembered her, and the creatures she cared for and buried and the treasures she was so afraid to lose she buried them too and touched them not at all until they were useless--those must remember her too.

Drifting forwards, she explored further, searching for the way back home. Or what she had called and cursed as home. It had to be right around--

Oh.

Constance was no fool. This world had no love for brittle things like the excuse of a house she had been born in. No markers or ruins signified the life of her or anyone else she had crossed paths with. And yet, there were still ruins before her. Chipped and peeling print, exposed bricks of gray rock, falling shingles, a faint drip of a leak, somewhere. It almost brought a smile to Constance’s face, to know that this world, and this spot, was one still riddled with leeks. Inside people were cold, they cried, they hated, they starved. And most likely, no one would remember them any more than her. How to think of such a miserable life, now rendered into multiples like some catastrophic math riddle. Was it cursed ground? Was it her, or just the twisted bend of this world and the wickedness of the people who moved it?

She heard a voice call her name and turned. She knew the face, but its place didn’t come to her at once. “...Good day,” she said curiously. “You’re solid, real solid. I don’t have many of those that know my name. How are we--” And then it came to her. That day at the beach. Constance stiffened. “If this is another one of Morgan’s blessed stomping grounds, I can take my leave without being threatened,” she said. And she should leave, if this was true. She was so weak, and so angry. She wanted Moran’s death to be something precise, even elegant. She couldn’t manage that if even looking at the woman riled her to snapping light bulbs.

“What? No,” Remmy said, shaking their head. “It’s not-- it’s not. This is uh-- I used to live here.” They motioned to the apartment building down the way, as ragged and decrypt as the houses surrounding it. This had nothing to do with Morgan, and Remmy found it all the more quiet when they realized that, too. They turned to look back at Constance. “Why are you back? You know she-- she wants to hurt you, because of what you did, what you’re...doing.” They weren’t sure what to feel yet, only that they knew they could sense a deep sorrow coming from the specter, and the idea of one of her closest, best friends wanting to harm someone simply to harm them. That wasn’t the person they thought Morgan was, but it terrified them, deep down. And they weren’t sure if it was the thought of her hurting someone or the thought that Remmy hadn’t known her capable that scared them more. “It’s not safe here for you.”

Constance grew more confused. For people who were determined to align themselves with the Bachman family, Morgan’s friends demonstrated a strange amount of concern for her. “I never left,” she said carefully, waiting for the subterfuge to reveal itself. “I saw her bleeding on the street, and there was so much noise I thought even you wouldn’t hear how I screamed with relief. I was sure I had never done anything more perfectly. Did you know that there were only two other casualties? I regret them as sins and doubtless I will be punished eventually, but all those machines, all that glass and noise and screaming, and she was gone by her own doing with only two more people caught in the crossfire.” Constance’s voice softened, wistful. “And I thought, I want to stay to see the moon and the stars and a new sun, in a world with no more survivors of the Bachman line. And I saw it. And then I thought, alright, that must be enough now. Only I didn’t fade. And I think I’ve tried rather hard at it, but no one I ask can tell me the secret, because if they had it, they wouldn’t be here still. But here we are. I can only think that some part of me suspected the truth all along. I did nothing perfect. I only made her into more of a monster.” She went quiet, regarding the strange figure again. “I don’t care about being hurt. And I don’t care about what she wants to do. I want what I asked for.” What was so very hard to understand about that? “Why is this not safe? If you’re not going to beat me with iron or tell her where to find me, why wouldn’t I be safe? Why is it any concern to you in the first place?”

Remmy wasn’t good at this part. There was a struggle going on in their heart and it made them feel sick. Morgan was their best friend, they should be on her side for this-- but Constance was clearly suffering, too, and even if she’d been the one who’d put Morgan’s death into action, did she not deserve a chance at forgiveness as well? If Morgan got that chance, why not her? Simply because she was a ghost? And so young. Younger than Remmy. Younger than Nadia. Remmy wiped at their one exposed eye. “What’d they do to you?” they asked quietly, ignoring everything else for now. “The-- the Bachmans. What made you so...sad?” And they chose the word carefully, pausing for a long moment before saying it, because it was a very particular feeling they heard in her voice. It seemed like such an innocuous word, but Remmy could find no other to describe it. The sound was so familiar, so close to their heart. “It’s not safe because...when people want to hurt you, it doesn’t matter who you are or how you feel, they’ll do it. And it’s just-- it’s just another cycle of violence. Why does everyone wanna hurt each other so much? Why does anger have to be the emotion we respond to? Does anyone really think making someone else hurt fixes anything? Makes anything feel better?” They sniffled again. “It’s my concern because I don’t want to see you hurt. You or Morgan or anyone. I’ve had enough.”

Constance rolled her eyes and turned back to look at the building that had replaced her family’s house. She felt nothing as she drifted through the world, but she could feel the despair coming from this place. “Why do you care?” She huffed. “It was tragical, and foolish, and I lost everything. Even before I cast the spell, I had nothing left but myself. And handkerchiefs worth of objects I had on my person, but those were worthless, too.” A picture. A phony charm. Some cornbread. A flattened penny. The paper she’d used to make her plan with Agnes. A baby’s rattle would have been worth more in comparison. “My father said I was born melancholic. And cruel. He said a great many things, but perhaps he was right about the way I was born. It is difficult to come to an end such as this and feel as though you were not fated to pain from the start. And if you cannot understand a feeling such as mine, if you have never needed to see your pain paid back threefold, if you have never needed to feel a name and a line burnt out by time once and for all, I should think you wouldn’t want to taste it.” But the figure persisted, and Constance wondered if they knew Blanche Harlow as well. “Morgan is my only missing piece,” she said. “And my worst, for of course it should be this way,” she sighed, rolling her eyes. “It used to be that you couldn’t walk half a mile without running to a Bachman relative, or Bachman owned land, or a Bachman friend. And now I have one fiend of a woman so small, she’s practically the size of a child. I think I’ve accomplished a great deal. I’ve changed the world.  If that was your only wish, and you’d paid for it with your self, wouldn’t you risk paying again to see it done? To be finished, and have your wish come true?”

“I don’t know,” Remmy answered honestly, “I just do. I can’t help it.” And they couldn’t. And the more they thought about it, the more they realized they’d always felt this way. They’d always had a bleeding heart, hadn’t they? Even when they were a child, so angry and lost and scared, all they’d wanted was to help other people. Taking the fall for things that weren’t their fault; letting others use them if only to make themselves feel better; helping others even when they were struggling themself. Remmy had always felt the pain of the world around them and wanted to help-- it had just taken death for them to realize that. Swallowing, they looked square at Constance. “No, I wouldn’t,” they finally said, once Constance was done speaking, and was looking at them for some sort of validation. “But that’s just me.” They knew everyone, everything was different. “Doing that will just turn you cold, you know. I-- I understand how you feel. Maybe not entirely, but I do, on some level. I grew up with nothing. No mom, a deadbeat dad, poor as shit...and queer, to boot. People all told me I was never going to be good for anything. That all I did was bring others pain. I was trouble. I wasn’t worth it.” They swallowed, clearing their throat of the tears that threatened. “But they were wrong. Because...they don’t get to decide who I am and what I’m worth. I get to decide that. And-- it took me a long time to figure that out, but I did. And it’s true for you, too. What do you even gain by killing Morgan? By destroying a family line? Whatever pain they caused you-- it was so long ago. Morgan is so far away from whoever really hurt you, the pain you cause now just starts a new cycle of pain and violence and-- why would you want that? Don’t you want peace? Don’t you want...to be happy?”

The story the figure told was so familiar, Constance couldn’t bring herself to trust it. Perhaps someone had written about her, perhaps her death had meant more than one more miserable, nameless body in the woods. Which was more plausible? That some misguided record and put down the details of her cruel existence, or that this stranger, this person who had screamed and cried over what Constance had done would possibly understand her? “You don’t understand anything about me,” she said stubbornly. She drifted away from the building, away from this...person. “I don’t want to talk about this anymore. I’m trying to conserve my energy and be stable! A solid like you wouldn’t understand that either.” She wanted them to go and leave her be. A world that ignored Constance was painful but it was at least familiar. And perhaps if she stomped on her feelings enough she could find the words to explain how hopeless she truly was, and how little she had left beyond her wish. She bound herself to it that night, however many moons ago. Constance wasn’t sure if she would know how to let go until it was finished, even if she was mad enough to ever want to.

“Yeah, I do,” Remmy insisted, following after her. “Life treated you like shit-- you never got anything good and happy. And then when you finally did, it took it from you, right? It tore everything away, including yourself?” They went around her-- remembering how Nadia had said she didn’t like being ignored and walked through-- and stopped in front of her. She could easily phase through them, they supposed, but it was the act that mattered, right? “If you really think you’re the only one that’s ever suffered, you’ve got a big reality check coming, Constance. I died, too, you know,” they said, crossing their arms over their chest. “Alone and afraid and only after watching the rest of my world be destroyed. The only difference is that I woke up solid and you woke up transparent. That doesn’t make you any less of a person, or-or any less worth being given a chance. Maybe-- maybe you’re still here because this is your second chance to do better, to be better. To be...happy. And don’t-- don’t tell me what I do and don’t understand. I understand a lot more than you-- or anyone-- thinks.” And they were tired of everyone thinking they didn’t. They were tired of being pushed aside.

“If only I had truly been here this long,” Constance said bitterly. “If I had really been here this long, I might have finished my curse before your wretched friend was ever born. But when I bargained myself, I went…” Constance didn’t know the words for what had happened to her. There was nothing like it in any scripture she had ever read, Christian, Pagan, or otherwise. “It was like sleep, but it wasn’t. I didn’t know what was happening. I didn’t know that my house was trampled like it never mattered, or that there were huge petrol beasts coloring the air or that a girl can get made fun of for wearing a dress now, that was a stupendous treat to discover while I was visible. By the heavens, I wish I had really been here for so many years! I would know what to do with this nothing body better!” She was getting upset again. Lights behind her were flickering, screaming strange, buzzing, artificial screams. “I...woke up...in a circle. When she brought me here,” Constance said carefully, voice trembling. “To hurt me. I died and then I...was there, and I had lost even more than I knew how to reckon for. And I don’t think I’m the only one who’s ever suffered. I just think I’m willing to do something about it. I wasted my power when I was alive, mostly, but I won’t make that mistake again. I was a witch beyond measure, and even in death I can rebalance the scales. If there’s anything being in this wretched era has taught me, it’s that time bends long and slowly. Maybe you don’t see the point in what I’m doing or what I want, but maybe the stars and the trees will, maybe the lives that can grow without so much destruction or meddling. And I will know. I’ll know I didn’t just take it, or give up or ‘get over’ it.” She sighed, and realized what a fool’s gesture it was. “I don’t know if I am a person. I don't feel that way all the time, and however I try to be better, whatever I touch so far has turned to destruction and hut, and not even that which I intended. I think my soul is...strange, at best. But I do appreciate...whatever it is you are trying to do. There are not many kind people here. It is good to know they continue to exist, however few.”

“Morgan isn’t wretched,” Remmy said quietly, “and neither are you.” They were quiet for a long while, not flinching when Constance made the lights flicker and screech with electric hums. They looked over to the decaying apartments, then back to the spirit, and felt another tug at their heart. “She didn’t summon you to hurt you, you know,” they finally said. “She just wanted answers. To why her life was always falling apart, to why she wasn’t allowed happiness. You can...relate to that a little, can’t you?” They didn’t know what they were searching for in any answers from Constance, but they knew that she was trapped in a world that she wasn’t allowed to escape, suffering more pain. Remmy looked at her with eyes full of sorrow. “This world is-- scary, yeah. There’s a lot of not good things in it, but...there’s a lot of good, too, you know. You just haven’t...seen it yet. I could show you, if you want,” they wondered if she was even still listening, “if you’d give me the chance. Not everything here is destruction and meddling, like you said. And...certainly none of it is because of one person. Cursed or not.” They paused, biting their bottom lip, before continuing. “You are a person. Maybe different than the kind of person you remember being, but...you’re still a person. Just as much as me, or anyone else. And I think...I think maybe your soul is just a little lost. And I don’t think you deserve to be hurt just because of that.”

Constance couldn’t cry or rail at the stubbornness of this person, not without destroying yet even more of the world, and she did not want to rush to disappoint herself or Blanche even further. But it was all she could do to keep herself from it. She wanted to laugh, or fall over from the incredulity of it all, but feared the impact of that feeling as well. Could a shade such as she disrupt the world from delight? Had such a thing ever happened before? “What manner of creature are you?” She asked, shaking her head. “You know better than many what I am capable of. What I have done. ...What is it you really want from me?”

“I don’t...I don’t want anything from you, Constance,” Remmy said back, shaking their head again. “That’s not...I just want to help you. I know you’re probably alone and afraid...and I know how that feels. I don’t want anyone to have to feel that way.” They mumbled, hands digging into their pockets. Constance wasn’t safe, just drifting out among the general population. There were hunters and exorcists and mediums everywhere. She was already having such a hard time even keeping her spirit body together. It reminded Remmy of some of the ghosts they’d seen wandering the old haunted mansion. Slowly, an idea struck them. “Hey, you, um-- you said you’re having trouble staying stable, right? Figuring out this...spirit thing? What if I had a place for you to go? Where there’s other ghosts and it’s safe. No one can hurt you there. Would you come with me?”

The idea of such a place had never occurred to Constance. She couldn’t imagine it in her head, except as some euphemism for a ghost prison. They didn’t make human proof vessels, only salt and iron lines that tore her apart for trying to exist. But this...whoever they were, were so persistent. Surely if this was some jest or a trap, they would be worn out by now? Or would they? Constance had learned the hard way how persistent a lie could be. Perhaps this was how they proved their loyalty to Morgan, by luring her into a trap.

Constance hesitated for a long time. She should know better than to believe in...oh, so many things. But she said, “Tell me where it is and I will find it on my own. I can find out if it’s what you say it is or not. Who are these ghosts who trust you anyway?”

“Right, yeah,” Remmy said, nodding slowly once Constance finally spoke. “It’s um-- here,” they motioned for her to follow them around the building to where the horizon broke and on top of a small hill sat the mansion, off in the distance, beyond the cemetery. “It’s that house there. I, um-- used to live there, actually. When we moved in, there were already ghost residents so we just sorta...let ‘em stay. Didn’t seem fair to make them leave, you know? We had to establish ground rules and stuff, but we made it safe. For us and for them,” they explained. “We’re all just people. I think they...liked being seen. I would sit with them, even the ones that didn’t talk. It felt nice...to be needed by them.” They paused, went quiet, then looked over at Constance one last time. “Come whenever you want, no obligation. But...it’s safe there. I promise.” And even if it wasn’t yet, Remmy would make sure it was.

[mor-beck-more-problems]

@whatsin-yourhead

[pm] We're um-- we're gonna get that fixed tonight. So we can talk after? Or tomorrow?  I just-- I know there's something bad between us and I wanna remember fi

[pm] Okay, sure. I mean, we can talk now, if you want, but it does feel...weird. Having more cards than you do. And not being able to tell you what those are. Not the most fair to you, you know?

How are you recovering?

[mor-beck-more-problems]

@whatsin-yourhead

[pm] I-- I saw. I'm so sorry, Morgan. Do you need anything?

[pm] I’m home. I’m managing. I’ll be okay, just as soon as I find a way to make her pay and make it stick.

[mor-beck-more-problems]

@whatsin-yourhead

[pm] Maybe date? I'm not sure. I'm not good at reading signals. No we're just fucking  friends. I think. Like I said...bad at reading signals. And a while?

[pm] I know you haven’t asked for any advice, but seriously: get some clear, honest communication going. Especially if you don’t know how to read her subtext yet?

Also, maybe don’t wear anything, you know, too nice. Don’t try too hard, you know? Just be yourself. But freshly laundered and a little shiny. Like, your good jeans and a t shirt you feel really comfortable in. Maybe something on top, I don’t know.

[mor-beck-more-problems]

[pm] Morgan? [d: I need to] Can we please stop this? I know you left the cake. I want to talk to you again. [d: I need to see you]

@whatsin-yourhead

[pm] Hey. I maybe hypothetically want that too, but before you say whatever, you should probably check the local news and know that it’s my fault. Mine and Constance’s, but Constance is also my fault too, so. Also, the body count is short one person.

If you don’t hate me and still feel that way, then...yeah.

[mor-beck-more-problems]

Remember You Have Died || Morgan & Remmy

TIMING: Recent past, during the reign of Shroomdre

LOCATION: Morgan & Deirdre’s house, war memorial

PARTIES: @whatsin-yourhead & @mor-beck-more-problems

SUMMARY: Morgan and Remmy need help on a low day.

CONTAINS: discussions of death, depression, ptsd

Morgan couldn’t afford to spend the day on the floor. The house was a mess. Mushroom Deirdre was off doing...she wasn’t even sure what. And the sheets were getting that off-color of needing a wash. The sun was getting annoyingly near the windows for the second time in the day, which meant she hadn’t moved in...way more hours than she’d realized. The cats would need to be fed soon, and dishes washed so she could make dinner and get them dirty again so they’d get washed again, and maybe some other Morgan in some other dimension was already doing this, but this one, stuck to the empty bed, was just watching her daily responsibilities stack up and teeter over, all because, what, her life had blown up once some years ago on the same day? Morgan made herself breathe and reminded herself she was here, and there was one other person still in the house who might be feeling almost as immobile as she did.

It took an hour’s work, but she made it to Remmy’s door and knocked. “Hey…” she called weakly. “You got room for another zombie in there?”

The silence wasn’t really all that quiet when Remmy listened closely. There were ticking clocks and sometimes people shouting outside. The soft hum of the air conditioner that they couldn’t feel, or the low groan or a car engine outside. On the bed, in their room, they didn’t jump so much at each noise, but the impossibility of relaxing had circled them for hours, tugging them away from doing anything that could’ve been considered productive. At one point they turned on the radio and wished for the drone of the afternoon DJ’s voice to cut out the rest of the world’s noise, but it didn’t work. It never worked. Moose had stayed on the floor next to the bed most of the day, like he was trained to, occasionally nudging their hand with his nose to make sure they weren’t slipping into a world that didn’t exist except for in their own mind. At another point, they had sat up and opened their notebook, wondering if occupying their mind with thoughts of designs would bring up anything, but all they’d managed to do was scrape out a picture of Luce, and the last smile they remembered her having.

When the knock came, Remmy closed the notebook quickly and looked to the door, before sliding off the bed with great effort and pulling it open enough to find Morgan slumped outside. She looked as weary as they did. “Always,” they said quietly and let her saunter in at her own pace, sitting back on the bed and setting the notebook down on their nightstand. “Where’s Deirdre? Is she still…” they didn’t need to finish the sentence. The answer was in Morgan’s eyes. “Sorry, never mind.” They scooted over to her when she climbed on, arms already reaching for her. “Wanna talk about it?”

Morgan shuffled into the room and let her body collapse itself next to Moose. “I don’t know where she is,” she huffed. “Which, you know, isn’t new actually. She’s got stuff that’s unpredictable.” She shrugged, and tried to smile at Remmy. She was supposed to be looking for the positive, for where the seam between one Deirdre and another matched up. But her thoughts teetered two steps forward and one step back today. “It’s gonna be at least a week, just so you know,” she said. “Today’s just not a good day for me. This time of year is just...not good.” She worked her arms around Moose and tried to remember what his fur felt like. “What’s up with you today?” She asked. “I’m more zomb than me, but I can still listen, probably…”

Moose, objectively, was better at snuggles than Remmy. He was big and soft and heavy, a weighted blanket full of love. He shuffled into Morgan’s grip a little more when she wrapped him up, as if trying to let her know he understood her need. Remmy leaned in gave him a soft pat on the head before scooping their arm around Morgan, laying their chin on her shoulder. “You’re allowed to have not good days, you know,” they reminded her. “Even not good weeks.” They thought for a moment how to answer, before realizing there was no point in skirting around much. Not with Morgan. “Nothing is really up with me today. Just trying to remember I’m safe and loved,” they said quietly, “even if some people won’t admit it.” Eyed their journal before focusing back on Morgan. “Guess we’re both a little more zombie today, huh?”

Morgan let go of whatever crummy piece of pride she had and reached up to pull Remmy closer to her. “Of course you’re safe and loved,” she mumbled, giving their arm a squeeze. She smirked, wry with the hilarity of depressed irony. “Says me, in my girlfriend’s fancy house, that I wouldn’t be in if she didn’t love me, in the room you wouldn’t be in if we both didn’t love you, and here all are feeling like..pfft.” Another dry gasp of a laugh. “Did you know she told people I hate her? I know I should probably get over myself on that. At least my girl will come back to me someday. Eventually. But hey, maybe Luce will figure her stuff out before then.” She kissed Remmy’s arm and gave them a squeeze. “Why do things have to be awful in the first place?”

“You know she doesn’t mean it,” Remmy said back, holding her just a little tighter. Knowing that they could squeeze her in their arms and never hurt her. Not really. The comfort that tightness brought was a familiar brand. Like a weighted blanket or the warm embrace of freshly dried sheets, something neither of them would truly ever feel again. “Deirdre loves you more than anything. Mushrooms or not. She’ll always come back to you.” They nuzzled into Morgan, breathing her in and letting out a long breath-- a simple motion that still brought old comforts with it as well. “I doubt it,” they muttered into her shoulder, “she keeps signing off on me. I don’t know why I keep letting myself hope she’ll let me in. It just-- it hurts, you know?” they turned their head to the side so they could look up at Morgan. “Seeing her in pain. It hurts me, too.” They contemplated the words for a moment. “Because there’s no good without bad?” they answered, raising a brow.

Morgan’s snort was a little lighter this time. “Will it make you feel any better if I tell you all the times Deirdre signed off on me because she didn’t want to talk about her feelings? Maybe in a few months you’ll be all...cute and cuddly and obnoxious. You just have to get over the, ‘she’s afraid of her feelings and doesn’t think she deserves happiness’ thing.” She shifted away from Moose, curling up fully in Remmy’s arms. “That was supposed to be in the hopeful rainbows sort of tone. I’m sorry, Remmy. I know it hurts. It hurts like nothing else, and the helplessness is just as bad. You don’t have to hide it, you know that, yeah?” She sniffled. “Ugh, don’t get all wise and philosophical on me now. I’m tired of being on the ass end of the Wheel of Fortune. I want better for us than that… but that’s kid’s talk, huh?”

It didn’t make Remmy feel better, but they didn’t need to say that outloud. They nestled Morgan-- they often forgot just how small she was-- in their arms and leaned back against the headboard. Someone drove by outside and Remmy stiffened, waited to hear it move away, then relaxed. “I know I don’t,” they said after a moment, “but sometimes I just don’t wanna feel it, I guess. I know she cares, but she won’t even try and believe that someone could care about her like that back. I don’t know how to get through to her.” They sniffled with her, though no tears pooled in their eyes. “Oh, trust me-- I’m not wise. Or philosophical. More just...hopeful, I guess. I’ve gotta believe that suffering through all of this shit means we get good things at the end of it. We have to. Otherwise, what’s the point, right?” Moose let out a big breath, shifting to move his head into Morgan’s lap, looking up at them as if to agree with their point. Remmy patted his nose and he licked their fingers. “Me, too, buddy,” they nodded sagely, as if they understood his big sigh, “me, too.”

Morgan felt Remmy tense and tightened her grip on them in assurance. She waited with them in stillness. She hadn’t thought anything of it at first, but as Remmy waited it out, she imagined murder vans and hunters with guns and swords and whatever the hellInfector Mortis looked like before it ate up a zombie’s insides. When all was clear, she kissed their arm again, pressing her mouth hard enough for them to feel it. “You’re okay,” she whispered against their skin, holding them a little tighter. “Feeling’s hard sometimes. But that’s how we know we’re still going. We’re really here. Things can still reach us. And I dunno, that sounds pretty philosophical to me.That’s borderline witch talk, great balance in the universe, the wheel coming up again before you know it?” She didn’t say that she was growing skeptical of this. That between the three people who lived here, there didn’t seem to be much in the way of good to outweigh the bad. She wanted them to have this, have whatever hope they could scrape together on a bad day. Just because she felt her stores of hope waning, didn’t mean she had to take theirs. “Can I ask you a weird death question?” She asked into the quiet.

Remmy felt a hot flash of shame. They shouldn’t be so afraid as to flinch every time a car drove by, or a noise sounded around the house that they weren’t familiar with. But they couldn’t help it. Not once, but twice now, they’d been beaten down and stolen away from where they thought they could be safe. They listened to Morgan’s gentle voice, let the feel of her arms around them settle in, blocking out the bad thoughts and perhaps even the ghost pains they still felt in their stomach. “Must’ve gotten that from you,” they muttered, settling into her a little further, a little calmer. A little more defeated. They would hold on for so long that sometimes they forgot it was okay to let go, every once in a while, and let themselves deflate. They sat up a little at Morgan’s question. “Umm, sure. Yeah. What’s up?”

It was funny how they kept coming back together, Morgan thought, draping her legs over Remmy’s lap. However much she made Remmy mad or disappointed, they managed to show up for her and whenever she asked, she got to feel like she wasn’t so alone anymore. And as much as she’d hated them for turning her at first, well, now they never would be alone, would they? Even in five hundred years, as long as Remmy didn’t do anything stupid like die trying to be a hero. Morgan smirked at Remmy’s remark and shifted her arm so she could muss their scruffy hair. “That’s not such a bad thing, right? I have my moments, sometimes?” She gave Remmy another scratch hoping to signal that it wasn’t anything urgent. Nothing like the fate of their loved ones hung in the balance. “You don’t have to if you don’t want,” she said, mumbling into their chest as she made herself cozy again. “But I was just wondering--do you ever miss yourself? Your alive-self? Like, do you wish they were still around, or that you could do something for them, or that they’d had a better time? Is it...weird, do you think, to think about that?”

Remmy scrunched their nose as Morgan ruffled their hair. It was already messy and sticking up in every direction and now it looked like they’d been caught in a wind storm and didn’t know hairbrushes existed. They lifted a hand to smooth it back down after a moment, still holding Morgan with the other. Whatever expectation they’d had when they first met Morgan, this being the center of their relationship had never crossed their mind. They’d never felt like they were enough of a person to have someone who they could know better than anyone else. And even if they shared her with Deirdre, Remmy knew that they could understand Morgan on a level that even she couldn’t. They looked at her with a soft expression, not quite a smile, not quite a frown. Wistful, perhaps. “I think about them a lot,” they muttered, “I feel like they’re lost somewhere and I don’t know how to find them. I--” they paused, “--I don’t think it’s weird. I think...dying was hard. Sometimes I wish I didn’t think about it so much.” They laid their cheek on the top of Morgan’s head. “I don’t even know what I’d do if I could do something for them.” Except, they had done something, hadn’t they. They sat up a little. “Do you-- can I show you something?” they asked. “If you um...have the energy to drive somewhere? It’s not far.”

“I think about alive-me a lot,” Morgan admitted in a whisper, even if it was already rendered obvious by her asking the question. “I almost wish she had her own body so I could just point and be like, yup, there she is. Also, I’m sorry I got us killed. I’m glad I’m here, and that you saved me. I just think about what she wanted for herself, how awful it was for her, and sad. I think, alive-you is somewhere too. They’re not lost-lost, even if it turns out you can’t come back together again. Deirdre says I’m the same. That, even if dying hurts and makes things different, I’m still...me in here. Maybe we just have to wait longer for more of our alive-selves to come home.” She sat up with Remmy this time, her face scrunched up with confusion. “Driving’s a heck of a lot better than walking. As long as I don’t have to fix my hair or get out of my house sweats, I think I can swing a driving trip for you. Just show me the way.”

“No,” Remmy answered, “you don’t. No one really visits there anyway.” They stayed sitting for a moment longer before pulling themself off the bed and Morgan with them. Moose followed suit as well, and they all sauntered in their slow, zombie like states to the car. Remmy plugged in the address-- White Crest Hilltop Memorial Wall-- and off they went. The ride was quiet, but it was quick. They both contemplated what it meant, to have an alive version of themselves somewhere out there, begging to come home. Wishing to be found. Remmy didn’t know what else to say to Morgan, aside from what she’d already said herself. They wished for all those things, too. When they pulled up, the sky was just getting dim. Remmy attached Moose to his lead and held out their hand for Morgan. When they made it up to the wall, Remmy stayed back for a moment. They remembered the kind woman who had handed them flowers, and they remembered the sorrow that had drowned them in their own chest as they’d waited for the sun to go down. And there, still carved into the stone-- the names of their fallen comrades. And their own name. “I don’t think alive me ever came back from that place,” they whispered softly. Their voice was almost lost to the wind, the ocean currents. “How do I find them now?”

Morgan hung onto Remmy’s hand the whole way they walked together. She hadn’t been to this side of town before, and the strange landscape unfolded strangely before her, even with how easily it blended into the rest of the town. It took her a moment to understand what she was looking at. “Oh, Remmy…” The war memorial, for the fallen local soldiers. Remmy had carried their friends this far and tried to give them a place to rest where they were known and remembered, right next to Remmy’s own. A casualty in an awful war, someone who would never really, fully come home. Morgan slid her arms around Remmy and tucked herself into their side. “No,” she whispered. “Not all of you did. But some of you has, or will. They’ll come out when they know it’s safe to. And maybe they’ll fit differently than they used to, but…” She squeezed them tight, tight as she could, knowing it wouldn’t hurt at all. “I think Deirdre would say something like...whatever parts of you feel like they are or aren’t here, you are whole, right now. You are one whole, wonderful Remmy. And I believe that too. Maybe your pieces are still going to shuffle around, but you’re whole. Maybe it’s not finding, maybe it’s just, moving forward and trusting that something will find you.”

Remmy stayed quiet. They listened to Morgan’s words and they understood that they were meant to help, meant to give Remmy something to think about, to process. But they couldn’t think of anything to say back. So they stayed quiet. Pressed to Morgan, they stayed silent as they looked at the wall and read all the other names that were there, pressed into the smooth granite stone the was erected for the monument. There was a flagpole next to it, always raised at full mast in the morning and pulled down at night. Remmy wondered who did that, who maintained this. Did they know the names on this wall? Maybe just one or even two? In a small town like this, everyone knew everyone, right? Did they come here and see the newly carved names and know who they were, too, then? Remmy blinked after a long time and looked down at Morgan. “How do I keep moving forward when I’m missing so much of myself?”

Morgan and Remmy held each other, hands clamped around their arms as tight as death. Morgan thought of all the places where their experience blended together, things they’d done, shitty memories they had in common, thoughts they’d shared. Even with all the awfulness at The Ring, they spent enough time together that Morgan sometimes imagined that conjoined spaces as one bright green field. Even the spot where Remmy brought her into their death was a patch of dandelions and thistle to her, dry and cracked and wild, but still hanging on to something that resembled life. She realized now that she had forgotten how much of Remmy was beyond her reach, not just the weeks they shut her out, but the childhood they’d never discuss, the years in a warzone, as a pawn in some fucked up power struggle bigger than them and everyone they lost. She couldn’t account for what was missing, she’d never see enough of the gaping wounds where Remmy had been blasted to pieces to figure it out.

After a long silence she said, “I think...maybe you have to set your eyes somewhere else. It’s like...the way we learn to feel different, taste different, be different. If you think about what you can’t feel all the time, you kind of go crazy with heartbreak. Or maybe that’s just me. But in any case...you look at what there is, and you look at what else grows. You’re growing new parts, Remmy. They’re not the same by a long shot, but they’re good. We’re mean, lean, regenerating machines!” She laughed feebly and gave them a squeeze. “There is so much here for you, and so much that wants you, Remmy. I think if you limp along enough towards them, you’ll feel as whole as you really are.”

Pain-- physical pain-- was like a distant memory now. But over the past few months, Remmy had come to know another pain-- the pain of absence. Absence of feeling, absence of support, absence of self. And it was strange-- they were things they’d never actually had before. Remmy had only been full of anger as a child and teenager. And then they were taught to shut themself down as a young adult going into the military. And then they were dead. And now they were here, staring at a veteran’s memorial that had their own name carved into it. Someone had brought flowers recently, the bouquet sitting idly by the wall. Remmy watched the leaves rustling in the wind, heard the soft crinkling of the paper they were wrapped in. Let the comfort of Morgan’s body tight against theirs remind them that they were here and they existed. When Morgan broke the silence, they just listened, watching the flowers and looking listlessly at the names on the wall.

“No one remembers me,” Remmy said quietly after a long time. “There’s no one left from who I was before, is there?” They weren’t entirely sure it was Morgan who they were talking to, or if it was the names they’d carved into the stone. The same ones that Luce had carved into their back. “I think-- they deserved better than the life I gave them. The old me. The human me. They deserved better than to die in a war we didn’t even believe in. What part of me still exists if there’s no one left to remember me?”

“Yeah,” Morgan whispered, unfurling an arm so she could comb her fingers through Remmy’s scruff. “They did. Deserve better I mean. They deserved so much more than they got, and it wasn’t fair, what happened to them. But some of them can sleep, and be okay. And the rest… I don’t know, Remmy. It has to be real on its own, doesn’t it? And as long as you keep showing yourself and opening that big, dopey heart of yours to people, won’t there always be someone who knows? It won’t be the same, but… it’s never going to be for us. Not ever.” Her hand fell down to their shoulder and squeezed tight. She shifted in front, looking at them with tear-filled eyes. “You could tell me, if you want. I gotta make it at least to 500. I can try and carry something from Alive-You.”

“But who’s gonna carry them?” Remmy asked, pointing at the wall. “If I let alive-me rest, who’s gonna remember them?” Their voice was wavering now, and it spilled over when Morgan turned to face them, her hand on their shoulder. Not a warm feeling, but a feeling of weight, still offering some sort of comfort even through the haze. “I was just a kid, you know?” they said, something of a nostalgic smile trying to pull its way through the tears. “I was just a kid. They told me I’d never amount to anything, but if I signed up-- if I went into the military-- then my life could mean something. That’s all I ever wanted. I just wanted my life to mean something to someone. It never had and I was so afraid that it never would. And then I just-- I got lost.” They looked at Morgan, wavering. “I still feel so lost. I don’t know who that person was, the old me. I never knew them. They were just whatever everyone told them to be. A bad child, a bad student, a soldier, a warrior, a sacrifice. A lover. And I listened to them. ‘Shut the fuck up, Remmington.’ ‘You’re worthless, Remington.’ ‘Pull the trigger, McAllister’, ‘Do it because I said so’.” They scrubbed and arm across their eye, soaked with tears. “Who was I?” they asked Morgan a bit desperately. “Who was I?”

“You will,” Morgan said gently. “You’ve still got them. You’re not all-gone, Remmy, okay? I can’t prove it to you, but I just know it. Hey--” Her voice cracked as she drew them down to her, forehead to forehead. “Hey, you were great. You were great because you were Remmy. And you must’ve been so lonely, and cared so much to do half the stuff you did. And maybe you were angry and lost, and you probably did some stupid stuff. You didn’t get a fair shake, you didn’t deserve half the shit you took. But you tried really hard to be strong and good. I dare you to tell me I’m wrong about any of that. I dare you…” She sniffled and squeezed them tighter, wishing she were big enough to wrap them away from all their grief, knowing they wouldn’t be Remmy and Morgan at all if she ever did.

Remmy folded into Morgan and let themself cry. They weren’t sure entirely what they were crying for, whether it was to mourn the past version of themself that no one got to know, or for their current self, who was fumbling, lost, in the darkness of a past that wouldn’t let go of them even though they’d died. They burrowed into her, hands gripping so tightly they surely would’ve cracked anyone else’s bones. But that was what they were now-- unbreakable. At least physically. Grief shouldered the two of them like an old friend and wrapped itself up in them as well. “Is it possible to miss someone that you never even knew?” they asked into the crook of her neck.

Morgan let Remmy collapse and fold into her. There weren’t enough hugs in the world to smother out their pain, or enough hands to scoop out their trauma and replace it with something good. All she could do was catch as much of them as she could and hold it tight against her, tighter as the sun dipped beneath the trees, tighter as they sank to their knees, and the birds flew home and the sky bled purple and the memorial emptied and it looked like the whole world had died and would collapse into dust with a stiff wind. And in the awful silence, heavy as the death that clung to them, Morgan told Remmy, “Of course you can. Of course, Remmy. But you’ll figure it out, you’ll be okay. You can, okay? You can… you can…”