#simspirationsimplicity

Wait - Vivek, I know too! That’s Vivek Burritt. Just not the BFT. I’m going to have to either find a way to check the meta.data or open my backup AR save on my laptop, cus this is going to bug me now.

…

…oh. I forgot I don’t have IP and ITF installed on this thing. Fuck.

Amelia: “Ah, Virgo and Clarke. They’re usually pretty social. Maybe they’ll lead me to-”

They do, before the words are even out of their mouth - there’s a boy with the couple that they’ve never seen before. His scarf is tight, and his sleeves long - he’s used to the cold... was he born here, like so many others? He seems close enough to them, chattering enthusiastically - but then why do his flapping hands look so different in color to Clarke or Virgo? He’s heading to the centre of the park now on their urging, still carrying at least a fraction of conversation, pulsing conversaᛏion... 

ᛏᚱᛖᚡᚣᚱ?

Perhaps he’s the best mark today will bring.

Target solidified, they approach him slowly from a side that he might see them from. Up close, closer, he seems young even in his adult body. Best be gentle.

Amelia: “Hello? ...Excuse me? Can I speak to you a moment?”

?: *turns, looks them right in the eye* “You’re Amelia Ruth Limerence.”

Amelia: “Y-” 

The forthrightness catches them off guard a touch. Are they so notorious that strangers know of them before their eyes can meet?

Amelia: “Yes. I am. Can you tell me your name?”

?: “Yes.”

Amelia: “...so, what is it?”

One way-too-much of a sandwich later, Amelia’s back to work, with the results of their book in hand. Or I guess in pocket.

Vivek is such a cool name. I love that he has inherited the infamous pigtails, too

I HC that Clarke had input on the names of most of the Burritt children: Vivek, Jamal and Jasmine all sound like names from countries he would have travelled to in his lifetime. 

Lidon: “...There’s nothing more we can do here. It’ll take forever for them to get home like this. And we’ve said what we must. Now all we can do is wait, and keep ourselves safe, best as we can.” 

The knot around them loosens like a breath...

Lidon: “Come, love. Let’s relieve Lady of her duties.”

Bianca: “And you know what the most bullshit thing about all this is? The saddest part of this whole thing we’re doing? It’s that we’re not even the first ones to say it!”

Amelia: “...”

Bianca: “Nora’s just said, she’s told you all of this before. It was all over TV even, I think. Those, uh, fucking, the fortune teller cookie cutters, they’ve must have said something, they can’t have just left it there.”

Clarke: “We’ve all shouted stuff at you over and over again on the streets!”

Lidon: “I warned you what you could have caused before it even happened! And what about the Grim Reaper? Didn’t he make it clear enough?”

?: “Even your father’s tried to get it through to you.”

W-what? Who knows about...? They look around through the throng of multi-coloured bodies, but can’t find the speaker. 

Bianca: “Yyyeah, what all them said! And what do you do when you’re told all this? You just brush us off!”

Junior: “Yeah! You just go into this pot of denial and think yelling Love Love Love to yourself is going to fix things, while we’re over here drowning in our own shit with nothing to hold on to!”

Bianca: “And you’ll probably just do the same to us now!”

Caesar: “Nothing will change!”

?: “The cycle won’t break!”

Amelia: “...then why? Why bother keeping me here?”

Bianca: “Cus you not listening doesn’t take away our right to talk. And maybe one of us is holding out some kind of hope that something will sink into your thick fucking skull. Not me, obviously. But maybe someone is!”

Before they can even acquiesce, Lidon - the clear ringleader of this whole setup - charges on.

Lidon: “I thought I knew hatred, Amelia, before I found you. All of us standing here, now, thought that we knew hardship, or the self-destructive cycle of apathy and disgust. We thought we knew what pain was, just how humiliating death could get. 

*snarling* “And then you came along and set that security ablaze, didn’t you? Just because you could. You broke every underworld, every heart, every spirit, every neck that you could come across, to keep that grip on your pretty little mannequin of yours. You showed us the worst of the worst, how it could be tied up into a single entity. For good measure, you made that worst a bonafide first class citizen, grinding us into the dirt with every step, every click of your heels, every chant that there’s ‘no place like home’. 

“I thanked you when you squeezed the life out of me, Amelia. But you deserve no mealy-mouthed ‘thank yous’ now. You see, you also squeezed out the life I could have built after that death - that we all could have built. You made us all dependent on you and you alone. Pawns to your vulnerable king and queen. 

“But make enough pawns, and those husks can capture the queen.” *smirks* “And have. And it’s our turn to turn you into the shell.” 

The truth hits Amelia almost as quickly as the rage behind each face does. Some familiar, some not, all regarding them with the same seething hatred that they once regarded Nora Luck Bloom. 

It jolts their core, being on the other side of it.

Amelia: “...it is, Lidon. It’s late for all of you too. I have to get home, and you’d better do the same.”

Lidon: “We have no home, Amelia. Not truly, not since you made this place--”

Amelia: “Well, I do! And I am going to it! My Laurel is waiting.”

They get as far as stalking past him up to a fairy ghost of similar hues. But before they can escape, the rest of the crowd pushes in on them, pinning them back to the caravan - disquieteningly solid for such translucent things.

Cree: “Oh no, A-me-me-me-lia. No no no no.”

Clarke, overlapping: “You are not going fucking anywhere until we’ve said our piece!”

Madison: “You’ve got us trapped in so much bullshit and misery already! A little on your side isn’t gonna kill you, is it?!”

Sylvia: “A-and we’ve... you’re in the most danger of all of us. We’ve got more than just p-physical spirits on our side. We can keep you here all night if we have to!”