sixthiterationlogs | Open | South Fountain and surrounding buildings

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Open | South Fountain and surrounding buildings

WHO: 7
WHERE: South Fountain
WHEN: Tonight
OPEN TO: Open to All
WARNINGS: N/A, will update as applicable

7's world opens with pain in her chest, a breath in, and immediate choking as her throat and mouth fill with water. Her first experiences as human are this constricting pain and confusion, rising in a panic. In that moment, a blue string of light unfurls itself in front of her, and leading up and towards the greater light above. She pushes against nothing more than the resistance of water, grabbing onto the edge of the fountain and eventually pulling herself into the air proper.

Coughing up water, gasping for breath, she pulls herself fully out of the fountain and onto the ground. As she expels the water from her lungs and takes proper, deeps breaths of air, she starts to see her surroundings in earnest. The village isn't familiar, but in some ways reminds her of the cracked and broken world she left, if sporting a little more wood than stone and metal.

But she's found herself in the center of the village, and it's entirely too open for her tastes. Pushing up once she's regained the strength (in all honesty, probably a moment or two prior), she darts away from the fountain and into the shadows. Once there, once hidden, she really takes a moment to drink deeply of the air around her, to look at her hands and shove the soaked strands of hair out of her face.

What's next? What's next - she's covered in navy blue cloth, soaked layers, she's got a pack - deep breaths. She doesn't question why it's important, but it feels right, so she doesn't fight against it.

What's next - is she being watched? Is she being followed? Where are the others?

You will find 7 making her way through the village - building by building - moving in a way that suggests she doesn't want to be seen, looking around to try and catch sight of anyone else, keeping a curious eye on the ground.

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Hawke is also someone who knows how to use the shadows to her advantage. For someone boisterous and chatty, she is a master of stealth and shutting her mouth when necessary. She's about to head out for the night, but she decided to perch on the roof of the inn, fiddling with the bow she would have to live with until she got something better. She tries not to spend too much time dwelling in the darkness, but sometimes it happens. And no one is around anymore to tell her to stop and come play some Wicked Grace.

She's at a good perch to spot people, no matter how carefully they're walking, but it doesn't look like a hulking monster or anything to be concerned with ... yet. They clearly don't want to be seen, but that could mean all kinds of things. She watches and realizes she has to make a decision before she's out of ear shot. Sneaking up wouldn't be much help. Oh well. "Oi!" Hawke says from above, dark hair loose, mostly just a dark shape at this point. "What're you up to down there? Lost something?"

7 freezes, looking about for a moment before she catches sight of Hawke up on the roof. She doesn't move for a long moment - she's been found out and darting off to hide is a little obvious. She stands, slowly, and takes a couple steps into the street, and not an inch further.

"Lost some friends." Were they here? Were they human, too? What about the machines?
She looks carefully at Hawke, noting the bow, and eventually makes her way over and climbs her way up the side to join Hawke on the roof. Though, still keeping a respectable distance. "Have you seen anyone else around here?"

Caridis had been so tightly packed, its canals and alleys purposefully built into a narrow maze, it was easier to move along rooftops when able. The buildings here are too widespread, too low to the ground, to allow much the same--but he likes the rooftops all the same.

They have a certain texture under his feet, a certain vantage, that puts him at ease. He can see people, and they often enough don't see him.

While most often he uses the Inn's roof to play, sometimes he lingers in the houses he borrows for a bath. If he's lit the furnace anyway, why not heat a little breakfast, why not make a hot drink to balance up through attic windows, and watch the sun rise later and later each day?

Usually, there's no one about. Usually, no one skulks.

He pulls his legs up from the eaves and closes up around his tea, watching over the rim. She--it takes a moment to glimpse a face and make the guess--is too wet for the morning dew, and dressed as he had been in the bunker. Someone new, someone they've managed to miss. The way she moves, is it sympathy to let her pass, thinking it secret, or to let her know the house is warming below him?

The village custom is the latter and he is trying, day by day, to be part of the village. "If you've wearied of darting around, there's no claim on this home, and you can have the first batch of hot water I've started if you'd like."

7 is wearied, and she's cold, and all of these sensations are new to her. She hasn't been a fan of it.

She looks up at the voice, up up on the roof, taking in his words and then looking at the house. She wasn't sure she was ready for more water, but warmth sounded good.

Taking a few steps towards the door, arms crossed tightly in front of her to try and hold in what warmth she had, she looks up at the guy who'd made the offer.

"Who are you?"

Hawke wiggles her fingers at 7 to try and show that she isn't dangerous. She might have some weapons on her, but they're not out or aimed anywhere. She smiles and waits for the woman to join her, not seeming concerned at all that she's climbing up there. She wouldn't have let her position known if she minded. "We all have lost some friends here. It's a bit of a mixed bag here, that way."

She gives 7 a once over, and airily waves at the village as a whole. "Yeah, there's a good handful around. Not a giant city type handful, no oven what I'd call a full sized village, but maybe fifty? There's a list somewhere." Hawke has a tendency to chat on a stream of consciousness. "I'm Hawke."

"You can call me 7." She takes a seat, up there on the roof. Fifty is still a lot of people for her, and she glances out at the village as if she could see them all in that moment.

"Are they dangerous?" She hadn't been attacked yet, so she was beginning to suspect she may be relatively safe, "-- and what about, Machines?"

Kat was working outside of her house when she spotted something at the corner of her vision. It was a brief flash of blue and then it was gone. She looked up from her garden and brushed the dirt on the side of her dark green scrub pants. She didn't like the pants but they worked well when she was gardening.

"Hello?" She called out, her voice soft and sweet.

"Is someone there?"

She wasn't sure if it was a person or maybe it had been her imagination.

Ducked behind a corner of the house, 7 debates. She could just leave - hope this woman thought it'd been a trick of the wind - or do the neighborly thing and introduce herself.

She didn't want to do the neighborly thing, though, she really preferred to sit badk and observe ... but that was much easier to do as a doll than it was as a fellow human. Taking a breath, she finally steps around from the corner, though doesn't move much farther than that.

"I'm here. Hi."

She's got on navy scrubs, carting the backpack, wet once but has been here long enough to be fairly dry at this point. It's miserable, but she's putting on a tough face.

"Hi."

Kat quickly took in the details of the woman before her. She still had the backpack which meant that she was likely new and probably deserved a little bit of warmth and kindness. It was cold and anyone walking around long enough to dry off was going to give themselves a fever.

"Would you like some tea? You look cold. I have some inside."

"Tea?" She's thinking Kat means the letter, but her context is suggesting something else.

She is cold. She's not used to being cold. "I, could yes."

Kat's expression remained soft as she waved the young woman inside. It was chilly in the house though it grew warmer as they stepped towards the kitchen. The stove fire was already smoldering and she set a small pot of water over top of it.

"It'll take a moment for the water to boil. I have lavender tea and honey. I hope that's alright." It's what she was able to obtain or grow in her garden.

He toasts her, and the cold morning. "I am the diminutive man armed with nothing but a mug of tea, offering you water I've been heating up for myself. You may call me Cael."

The short, weighted dagger he wears on a leather thong is under his clothes, and reserved for people who attack him first. He doesn't consider a lie in context, and drinks smoothly from his mug. "Or just tea, and a fire," he adds with a shrug. "Most of the houses have towels and things as well. It's too small a village to really sneak about in the daylight."

"7, got it." It physically hurt her not to immediately make a joke about where one through six was, but she manages to hold back since the woman's new. And clearly not comfortable in the area yet. Hawke will subject her to the humor another time.

"Not that I've found. They're all rather polite, actually. Nice even. I'd think they were all possessed if I didn't know that possessed people are the opposite of nice." Hawke isn't used to nice people, not on a scale like this. She and her friends are too rough around the edges to even approach that words, outside of Merrill, who has issues of her own. The sweetness was deceiving. "Machines?" Her eyebrows furrow. "Nah, don't think I've seen any those. I was told it can be dangerous around here, just haven't witnessed it yet. And not from any of us."

7 allows herself to follow Kat into the house, taking it slow and looking all over the interior as they make their way to the kitchen.

She watches Kat put the water on to boil. She watches the fire in the stove. Everything is new to her, or at least seen in an new context. A living context.

"Yeah ... yes, that's fine. I haven't had that kind before."

"Cael. You can call me 7."

She considers his words and gives a tight shrug. "There's too many unknowns not to sneak around."

Daylight or not, she's new, everything about her situation is new, and she doesn't want to take any chances. "But - fire sounds good right now."

The answer will likely kill any humor in the moment, but that's a story for another time.

It sounded like this 'Humans being nice thing' might be an anomaly. Was it just strange circumstances? Or does everyone she met so far have the potential to turn eventually?

She does seem to relax hearing there were no Machines so far. It hadn't looked like thy'd been around, but she didn't want to be wrong about that.

"So, you're expecting outside dangers?"

"It's good. I've been growing the plants here." She paused and bit her lower lip. "well, someone I knew did but she's gone and I've been tending to her garden in her absence." A sad note colored Kat's tone but she continued as if it wasn't there.

"Are you new?" She nodded towards 7's backpack. "You look like it. Maybe I can help?"

Kat was being nice but she was also itching for a distraction.

"I am new." She catches the sad note, almost asks a question about the implied departed but thinks better of it. "I'm not sure what I need help with?"

She's got a lot of questions about being human, first off, but she prefers to figure it out herself, and she's not too keen on anyone knowing the current disadvantage she's in.

"Have you been here long?"

Kat shook her head. "A few months. I'm not sure I'll ever be used to it." She steeps their tea before passing the steaming cup to 7. "Here. It's hot but ready." Kat holds her own tea close to her chest, enjoying the warmth that seeps through her fingers.

"I'm Kat. You don't have to have questions but if you need something I'd be happy to try and help."

As much as she can which won't be all that much.

7 finally sets her backpack aside in order to take the mug. It's hot, and she cradles it in her hands and watches the steam rise from its surface.

"I'm 7. I was never much the question type. Kind of just, figure stuff out as I go; let the others ask the heavy stuff." How they were made, who's responsible, how to stop the terrifying monsters from hunting them down ... she'd rather just get out there and take them out before they had the chance, but unlike 1 she didn't find it necessary to stop others from inquiring about the world. "I'm still here so, so far so good, I guess?"

"It's good." Kat confirmed with a soft expression. She wanted to smile but she didn't feel like she had the energy to shape her lips in such a simple expression.

She curled her lips together and then took a careful sip of her drink.

"The school has how too books. If there is anything you have questions on but don't feel comfortable asking about."

"Books." She's got a nostalgic little smile herself at that, thinking of her friends. She would check it out, if for their sakes, but then that small smiles was shortlived, "I do have one question. Where are my friends? Am I the only one, here?"

So far she'd neither seen nor heard word of them, either human as she was now or otherwise.

That made Kat's frown deepen. Her own friend had recently vanished and she was still adjusting. "They might not be. People are brought here randomly. I'm the only one from my world here."

And it stung to admit it.

She gives a tight nod of acknowledgement, taking a sip of her tea if only for a distraction. The heat of it overwhelms for a moment before the flavor comes through, but when it does she finds it to be interesting and pleasant. She's never sure what to expect in terms of flavor - having no previous frame of reference.

"I'm sorry if I - dredged up something awful."

Kat shook her head. "It isn't your fault." She was the one having the problem and she wasn't going to push it upon someone how had only just arrived to the village. 7 needed her own time to adjust.

"Don't worry about it." Kat really didn't want anyone worrying about her. It was just how she was.

"The inn has places you can sleep but if you aren't comfortable there you can take residence in any of the houses around here." She took another sip of tea, this one deeper now that the tea has cooled. "Your also welcome here. I'm not here all the time." But the house was stocked and kat really didn't mind people taking stuff.

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Open | South Fountain and surrounding buildings

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