#bill 01

You still can’t find your say home. You’re filthy and you probably smell, but things aren’t as bad as they were when you first arrived. The city’s becoming less scary, now that you know that monsters, though few, are walking freely (or, as freely as anyone can, here). There’s comfort in that. There’s also comfort in the park, where you soon find yourself lost in the winding paths lined with summer wildflowers. You keep to yourself, mostly, stopping only to pick a single bloom that’s grown between two slabs of the concrete sidewalk. But before you can pluck it from its home, the ground on which you stand is shadowed over in a distinct triangular shape.

When you raise your head to meet its single eye, you realize that it doesn’t look like a threat; quite the opposite, in fact. You even smile at it. “Hello,” you greet it.

@cryptographism

     When she first arrives her head is swimming, and not in the pleasant way she had normally preferred. The landscape is expansive, and worryingly devoid of one specific person. “Oh no... Frank? Hello?” She needn’t call a second time, for she knew if her husband were to have passed alongside her, he would have been just that– by her side. Forget the change in scenery, the fact that he was nowhere to be found was the most concerning part of all of this. A fingernail rises unbidden to be clenched between her teeth, and Sadie finds herself struggling to hold back tears.

    “No. No. No crying,” the medium admonishes herself aloud, though her hand doesn’t quite leave the vicinity of her face as it clenches into a fist. “Get a hold of yourself. You’ve dealt with the–” she swallows a dry throat with a sour expression, as though her mouth were full of bad wine. The words tasted all to similar. “-the afterlife from the side of the living before, you can deal with it from the other side now.” Now all she needed was a distraction, or a drink, or both, and in hopes of finding one or the other she opens the bag which she’d so generously been given upon her arrival. Not a drop to be found.

    Well past decent hours, Chara sits on a park bench, their surroundings lit only by a single streetlamp. Most would say it wasn’t safe for children to be out at this hour, especially not in a city like this. But between that child and the demon in paper clothing that drew ever nearer, one could hardly call these two ‘children’ anymore.

   Today's the day of the (somewhat rushed but still meticulously planned) wedding and Gideon couldn't be any more proud of where his accomplishments lay at this very moment. Here he stands at the alter, adjusting his white bowtie and waiting for his bride-to-be to inevitably come walking down the aisle.

   Except... There's definitely something missing here. No, it's not the obvious lack of guests (no one would've wanted to come) or the lack of Mabel, his bride ('she's just nervous,' Gideon reminds himself). The ex-psychic looks around the room once more before settling on the alter. Or rather, what's not behind the alter.

   Right, the reverend. Gideon has to force himself not to roll his eyes before moving behind the thing, spotting the man hunched over with his back to him, doing god knows what.