#toooldforgermany

              She has -- at least some what,  changed her focus from finding the remaining survivors of the parade district to cleaning up the streets. People were angry,  it was understandable -- she had been angry too, when she was forced to be taken off of her joy. It took her longer than she’d like to admit to come to her senses,  to get over her anger and make sense of what was happening to the world around her. 

              Once she did,  however,  it was for the better.  These people would come around, too. If, that is, they all don’t leave right away. She did notice a few stragglers who were either too shocked or horrified to make a decision on if they should stay or if they should go. 

              She ended up finding that a lot of the people she considered her friends were the same people who ended up abandoning the parade district, perhaps they had felt betrayed and hurt by what had been done. The same, so it seems,  couldn’t be said for the scrawny six foot something Arthur Hastings that she catches among the debris of their district. He was almost unrecognizable to her now,  though.  He looked so... tired.  

She stands a few feet away, just at the entrance of his office, nervously shuffling in place. 

“I just wanted to ask if...uhm...” Bella frowns, her gaze averting from his. “Do you...regret getting married to me?” She doesn’t even wait for him to answer before speaking again. “N-Not that I’m questioning your love for me! B-But I just feel like I...” 

A sigh.

If she didn’t care about making a scene she’d snarl       *  &&  bare her fangs; warn him to leave her be.

As it stood though, she just huffed,            crossed her arms and tilted her head up; looking to him with an annoyed, though inquisitive, look.                                As if she were wondering what he wanted with her.

            Now, however...  forgive him if it all seems a little too real. Everything out here seemed to be dead or dying,  from the nature that surrounded them to the animals that gnawed on the bones of their prey. The people that roamed just outside of their make-shift ‘homes’ were hardly anything more than skin and bones. They didn’t look insane,  they still spoke to one another in a civilized manner and seemed to be just trying to get by...  They still couldn’t see him yet,  they were still far enough for the RK unit to run if he felt the need,  but he doesn’t. He can’t imagine Arthur’s plan is to walk through there,  considering who he was currently accompanied by... It’s what he was hoping for,  at least. He wants to know what the people outside of Wellington Wells were enduring,  but not exactly at the cost of his own life existence. 

tagged by!  @sylphim tagging!  @atlasshrvgged,  @toooldforgermany,  @spellfear

“I’ve never seen humans with that kind of face before. Is it real?” 

" ghosts? geez, man. that's a loaded question. "

he and arthur really had become fast friends, did they not? in the amount of time they had known each other ( which, truth be told, was not long last he considered it ), most of what they talked about regarded mutual interests - literature, philosophical ideas and the like. he could go on for ages about what they had discussed. but tonight was a rather different occasion, when the question had come up at some point or another.

so what about ghosts? well, that was not exactly how the question had gone, but it was raised on this cool autumn evening just a week before halloween ( though, did brits celebrate halloween? lord if he knew. maybe they did, maybe they didn’t. america had certainly turned it into quite the commercial enterprise. ) for a man such as arthur, so learned and quite the thinker, the question came as a surprise to jonathan, who had often fantasized about meeting a ghost in real life, well... certain ghosts. not all of them. one he especially did not want to meet.

we will leave that one up to your imagination - but you can certainly guess who it is.

“ i mean, anything in this world is possible, i guess, “ he uttered softly, leaning back in his chair. it truly was spectacularly quiet that evening - only the crickets to accompany them on this dilapidated patio. naturally, a cigarette dangled between his fingers, having just been between his lips moments before. but, how rude, to blow smoke in someone else’s face. so, he opted to exhale as far away from arthur as possible, as not to bother him. how kind, how considerate. you ought to get a fucking medal for such generosity. “ we could discuss where ghosts come from, their literary tradition, why humanity is so fixated on ‘em, but that would be pretty boring, don’t you think? it’s more fun to imagine what kinds of ghosts there might be, if there are. and if they do exist, how are they possible? what are the prerequisites, y’know? like, are they just made up of protoplasm, white smoke, or can they manipulate their appearance based on whomever they’re attached to? there’s infinite rules, as long as we’re thinking about this. “