networkinthenight | [Backdated to 9/9] @silent

[ Aziraphale frowns in absolute distaste for this as he is quite a bit smaller than Rosinante and now absolutely covered in seafoam that came out of his body double's gut. It's all over his face. It's all over his hair.

Damnit, it's all over his nice coat and shirt that he's had for one hundred and sixty years!!

He blinks and looks like he might be about to lose it for a moment before regaining composure. ]

--Are you alright?

[ He barely squeaks this out. ]

Not that I've seen, but that doesn't mean it can't happen. It seemed alive enough to be one. Strangest one yet, if so.

[It's all over everything, but even though he's soaked now, it seems to be... un-soaking him? As it seeps out of his clothing and recollects itself to sink back into deeper water.

And somehow that's even worse than just being lake water. Ugh. He shudders visibly as he sits upright and watches the foamy water drip off his bangs and drain away.]

I think so? Other than completely horrified.

[It's still way more reassuring to have someone else here experiencing it. Hopefully nothing more results from this, but after what he's seen deep in the woods, he's still concerned.]

[ It seems to be actually crawling out of Aziraphale's mouth in order to return to the greater sum of itself, which is both horrifying and terrible.

He nearly screams. ]

--Oh! Oh dear God, that's--

[ There is a full-body shiver involved as it sluices off his person. ]

Absolutely dreadful.

Let's--

--We'll come back and get the body to cremate it, dear boy, but I think we should come back with reinforcements. And perhaps some holy water.

Is there even any body left?

[He can't have watched in detail, of course - he'd fallen backward trying to get away, and had closed his eyes to keep the foam from getting into them. As he stands, now, and scans the lakeshore, he doesn't even see a single finger or wisp of hair floating in the water. It hadn't just burst from the belly; rather, it's as if the entire body had itself been foam made solid and human-shaped, and all that's left now are the wet remains as they slip out of clothing and between pebbles to return to the water.

Deeply concerning for future sailing trips, to be certain. But it's not going to stop him from trying. He stoops to retrieve his lantern, and the fishing pole, too.]

Reinforcements sound good, though. I wonder if there are more of those things down there.

[He's not sure what he's expecting it to do, and if it did start speaking that may make the whole situation worse.]

I think it can hear you. This probably isn't a corpse, some sorcery is animating it.

[Which is disturbing and he doesn't know what to do about it.]

What do you want to do with it? It's.. yours I suppose.

[Though neither of them seem to want to touch it.]

I'm not sure, but I'd rather we find out later.

[ Because that was a hot mess, and Aziraphale feels very gross and possibly needs a long shower before they continue on this lil adventure, Rosinante! ]

I really, sincerely hope there aren't any more. In fact - goodness, what had that even been?

[ He's very disturbed by this somehow, even though he'd been cool as a cucumber about the dead body. ]

Well...

[His tablet buzzes, and he looks away long enough to pull it out of his coat pocket and have a look. Others who are interested want to investigate also. Good.]

Nothing just yet. Seems you're not the only one willing to investigate. I'll let a few people have a look and if we can't find anything I might try to have it cremated, unless it proves itself more alive than it looks.

Not a clue. A spirit of some sort? Something else entirely?

[All he can do is speculate, and he hates speculation. It serves a purpose but needs to be backed up with real information before it can be acted on, and too many people seem to think it's fine to skip that crucial middle bit.

He shakes his head, and sucks at his dwindling cigarette.]

Shame to meet anyone this way, but I appreciate you coming to have a look. I owe you a drink sometime.

A spirit. Perhaps, I do admit that I don't know them well enough.

[ Either way, the moment is thankfully passing and they can move on from it, because Aziraphale doesn't want to think about this for a long time, after they bring people back to come try and carry this off. Nope, he'd really like to erase this from his memory entirely. ]

I wouldn't say no to a drink.

[ He shoots Rosinante a quick smile. ]

--Ah, that's right. I heard around that you'd been trying to map the stars.

They're not like they are on Earth--

[ He takes a look at Rosinante and quickly adds: ]

--Where I'm from, so I was wondering if they looked familiar to you?

[Another Earth person. Earthlander? What do they call themselves? There sure are a lot of them here, anyway. Must be a busy place. Or maybe it's just a common name for planets somehow, since quite a few of these people don't seem to have a lot else in common.

He smiles back down at Aziraphale, though it's a little hollow. That whole experience was disconcerting and he doesn't feel particularly happy, but it's good to make an effort.]

No. I'm not from Earth, but I've never seen this pattern of stars either. I started off wanting to map them but have also been working with Doctor Ingram to see if there's anything else we can learn from them, like this world's rotation speed.

[ He keeps watching it, as it keeps watching Rosinante. This is about a hundred kinds of unsettling.]

Very well. Should we pull it out of the water?

[ He's willing to do that, but the idea of carrying this anywhere is unsettling. ]

Sure. Mind grabbing the legs?

[They only need to get it above the waterline. Enough for him to be able to safely look it over without contacting the lake itself. Otherwise, he'll risk becoming just like this thing, only probably with less eye and mouth motion.

An exaggeration, since it isn't that deep here, but he's spent his whole life cautious around water and that's definitely not changing today. So without waiting for confirmation, he stands, then reaches for those cold, clammy arms. If nothing else, by being closer to the center of mass, he can carry more of the weight. It's a good excuse.]

Ah, yes, and what have you learned? I myself am very interested to know. It seems that either our rotation and revolution around this world's sun are such that they are in sync and therefore, we always face away from it.

Actually, that was how our moon was on Earth - I'm surprised we have just the one, here.

[ And he's really fascinated by it, and space in general, which was possibly one of the things he knew better than humans did, having seen the cosmos up close. This, though. This was a strange sky, and strange stars, and he felt so very small standing underneath them.

He wondered how Rosinante felt about the whole thing. ]

[He nods, steeling himself for carrying this... corpse he supposes. At this point he'd be happier if it was a corpse, as every other possibility is somehow more disturbing. He walks to the shoreline hefting the thing's legs out of the water, frowning at the lack of shoes. Rosinante is definitely wearing those, so if this is some sort of copy it's missing some pieces.

It's not moving, and it doesn't react to being touched, but it's still watching Rosinante. What is this thing?]

Let's put it down over there, far enough where it won't be swept away by the lake. I wonder what the significance is to the lack of shoes.

Were you wearing shoes when you died?

We're still working on it. He's the one with all the math know-how. But the map's progressing well enough, when the clouds part. Why's the one moon surprising?

[Sort of strikes him as an unusual thing to say. Should worlds have more than one moon? His only has one, as far as he knows. If there are others, they're small and dark and nobody pays them much attention. There are other planets out there, he thinks he recalls hearing, but maybe that's wrong. Truth be told, aside from what he needed to know for navigation, he never paid much attention to astronomy anyway.

Maybe it's just another little act of rebellion, given how the people of his home country practically worshiped their twisted concepts of descent from the stars and rulership over everyone lowly enough to have risen from mud instead. Stories based on maintaining a position of power, nothing to do with truth.]

[Every moment spent touching this thing creeps him out, and he's glad to move it the bare minimum distance and then set it right back down. He wipes his hands off on his pants, as if that's helpful in any way, and pretends not to notice its widening grin as it stares up at him.]

Yeah, of course. So it's not that, but I dunno why it's missing them either. Whatever this thing is, it got the rest of the clothing right.

[Sweater and pants, anyway. The hat must have washed away, if it ever had one. Why the lack of shoes? He takes his off if he's in his room at the Inn, or anywhere else that their removal is requested, but how does that translate to the state of this strange duplicate?]

Some people here know a thing or two about magic. Maybe it's a common thing when you're making a copy of someone. Hell if I know.

I mean - I guess not really. Planets can have any number of moons, it just strikes me as odd that yours and mine and this one should all just have the one.

Particularly since this one also seems to just have the one face.

It's also quite similar to home, I might add. The architecture is a bit different and the fauna is, of course, quite unique to this place, I would say.

But... all the same. When things could be so different, I find they are... not so much.

[ He doesn't know if he made any sense, but he sure as heaven is rambling. ]

Oh, I'm very sorry. Don't mean to talk your ear off.

No, it's all right. It's an interesting subject. I'd like to hear more about Earth, actually, since so many of you are from there. But let me get cleaned up first, all right?

[He chuckles; an attempt to pass the whole thing off as a lighthearted moment and an opportunity rather than a distraction from whatever the hell he was just witness to. Maybe Will or Rastus knows more about this. Maybe Robin, though he doesn't trust her to give a straight answer. But it can wait until he's had a moment to shake off the shock of meeting his corpse.]

I'm going to head to the inn, but I'll be at the tavern in half an hour or so, if you want that drink sooner rather than later.

[Fascinating.]

I see.

Thank you for indulging me. I'm sure it was a very unsettling experience.

Hopefully you won't be gone for awhile, I'll bring someone back to look at this, see if we can salvage anything.

[ He doesn't know how long that will take, but certainly not long if it's as he says and everything has just... schlooped back into the water. Disgusting thought. ]

Certainly I'll come meet up with you later at the inn, and I'll tell you anything about Earth you wish to know.

[ Rosinante doesn't know he's talking to someone who's been kicking around on it for a cool six thousand years. ]

If you don't mind me asking, what exactly were you doing by the water, anyway?

Good idea.

[Salvage, study, whatever they want to do. That kind of science isn't really Rosinante's gig, but he's all in favor of understanding things better. Especially mysterious exploding corpse doubles.]

I was fishing, or trying to. Seemed like a nice way to kill some time and maybe learn about what lives in the lake.

[Instead, he got what's somewhat dead in the lake, so... success?]

Oh.

And here I was hoping we'd find a nice patch of it to go swimming in sometime.

[ Yes, this is going to be extremely unfortunate. ]

Ah well. I'll hopefully see you soon.

[ As soon as Rosinante is out of sight, he'll go back by himself to clean up, only to find that there's nothing left as said, not so much as a disembodied frown.

So he walks back home as a formality, miracles himself clean, and heads on over to the Inn. ]

[Ha ha. If he was ever intending to swim in that lake (he wasn't) then he sure wouldn't now, but he's not the right person to ask anyway. He shrugs it off as the joke it probably is, then waves as they part ways.

But after returning to his room at the inn to shower and change and have a much needed few minutes to just. Sit and smoke and not think about that nightmare, he makes his way back downstairs to the bar, where he spots Aziraphale easily enough from the stairs. At which point he stumbles and falls the few remaining steps onto the floor. Graceful as always, Rosinante. Whether Aziraphale or anyone else tries to help, he gets himself back up, checks his lantern over, dusts himself off, and walks over, though there's a quick detour to retrieve the pillow he usually leaves in a corner of the room. He places that on the floor at Aziraphale's table and sits, and even on the floor his long legs have to bend awkwardly to fit under the tabletop.]

Hope I didn't keep you waiting too long.

[ Aziraphale makes it over in a second, trying to keep Rosinante from falling entirely onto the ground but settling for helping him back up once his pesky legs have made him tumble. It's alright, he knows this feel. ]

Not at all, though I would've happily started without you.

Would you-- surely there's a short chair around here you could sit on instead.

I'm so sorry, this entire town must be so inconvenient for you.

[ Like, how does this guy fit on a bed... Can he close the door when he goes to the bathroom? How does he shower?? ]

[Backdated to 9/9] @silent | open

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject