logsinthenight | EVENT LOG: BURY A FRIEND

EVENT LOG: BURY A FRIEND

characters: everyone.
location: around town.
date/time: october 9-17.
content: the hallucinations begin...
warnings: psychological horror. please cw tags appropriately.

it's probably something that shouldn't be said out loud

October 9 feels like a normal day at first, save for the red lighthouse beam cutting through the darkness overhead. You know by now—or you've heard—that the lighthouse is only active during ferry arrivals and events... And there's definitely no ferry docked at the, er. Beach. The town is quiet, the forest spirits behave business-as-usual, Rastus doesn't know what's up. Whatever's going on, you'll have to figure it out for yourself.

And you will, though the hallucinations are subtle at first: objects moving when they shouldn't, people's proportions looking just a bit off, voices in an empty room, and so on. Is it just your mind playing tricks in the darkness? Might be! Will did warn you all about the effects of living without a sun and a proper day/night cycle.

As the days go on, the hallucinations are harder to ignore, no matter how much you may wish to wave them off as flukes. What's wrong with everyone's faces? When did all the howling start? Who do you hold onto when the world drops out from under you? And those hands...

While you might know it can't be real, it certainly feels real. But at least it can't last forever!

...Right?

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"I'll bribe it with coffee," the Soldier suggests. "Especially since it's been so long. It. Wouldn't be safe, to visit during all this. But the spirit asked me to come back soon."

Deflecting from the Lighthouse Keeper thing, or trying to. Considering how many people died the last time someone tried that.

"Do spirits like coffee?" Crowley asks, looking equal parts disturbed and interested. "Something to think about, at least."

"I don't know, but it's worth a try. Aziraphale keeps feeding the ones in the church and the library. So we know they eat." It gives Crowley a bland look. "You should have told me I could have that coffee sooner. I had to put up with Aziraphale's fussing to have my first coffee since the war."

It's teasing. Mostly, anyway.

"You hadn't had coffee before?" Crowley says. "Oh, thats right. Protein packs and water or whatever they feed their Assets. Can't have the fun things like coffee and alcohol."

Which, to be clear, are basically what Crowley runs on.

"What other things do you need to experience, now that you're free of your old role? Coffee----you tried the ice cream stand yet?"

And tubes. It's had that kind of utterly dehumanizing feeding before, too. The ice cream hadn't been a whole lot better than the taste of that, though. It hadn't been able to choose a flavor, and so just took whatever the vendor gave it, and it had been... not a great flavor. "Once. It was. Unfortunate. Coffee is much better."

"Eh, you can go with Aziraphale or me next time, we'll miracle it into a decent flavor," he says. "The ones they have there are rubbish. It's like someone read a wikipedia article on ice cream and picked a random list of flavors to choose. Blue cheese ice cream? Who would even think to do that, really?"

He takes another drink.

"Music?"

Well, that is neatly distracting from horrible ice cream flavors. In a potentially nice way. The Soldier's gaze actually sharpens right on Crowley's sunglasses, precision focus. "What? About music?"

"You heard any music since you left----" He gestures a bit with his glass. "You know, all that. Do you remember music?"

There it is, that inexplicable longing associated with music. Not even coffee or cigarettes had that kind of unsubstantiated pull. The Soldier actually looks a little distressed-- not afraid, obviously, but unhappy, entirely because it doesn't remember music. How did Crowley even know? (Demonic temptation? Fuck. Maybe. That would tempt us a lot.)

"No," the Soldier finally says. "I don't. I want to. I feel like I should. Misty has some, on a discman. But the headphones were too wet to listen."

Crowey fishes in his pocket, pulling out his mobile. He flips through a few songs before ending up with Don't Stop Me Now, by Queen, of course. He doesn't have wifi in this place, but his mobile has all of his favorite songs already downloaded. The song fills the room.

"Bit of a limited selection, I'm afraid. All of my music turns to Queen after a fortnight. But I've got all of the hits on here."

The Soldier's eyes snap wide. The flesh hand makes an abortive gesture in the direction of the source of the sound, a little wordless noise of surprise popping out out of its mouth. Plates ripple in its metal arm, but not loudly, more like a purr.

That is. That is.

Fucking amazing.

Crowley is graced by the biggest smile the Soldier has made in his presence yet, though it's focused mainly on his cell phone. There may even be finger-tapping, because that melody is extremely catchy. "What is that. Queen."

Crowley grins back. Yeah, that's right. Queen invokes the best smiles.

"Only the best band your lot has ever come up with," Crowley says, holding up his mobile, where a picture of the band graces the mp3 that he's downloaded. He points to the lead singer. "Freddie Mercury. Where I got my username. Top notch. Saw him at Live Aid, absolutely stellar performance. I was up front."

The Soldier only half-listens to that, though it does duck its head to look at the image. Most of its considerable amount of attention, freed up from having that considerable amount of attention on fear, is now directed at the music with an intense kind of focus. Melody that's fun, rhythm that makes all the pieces of the Soldier want to move, harmonies that match up perfectly, lyrics about-- about god knows what but it doesn't actually care (Who the fuck is Lady Godiva?), and what the hell instruments even are those in the background.

"I fucking love it." The Soldier wants it. All the time. How can it get that from the phone to its tablet.

"Course you do," Crowley says, trying not to sound as absolutely pleased with himself as he is. "It's only the greatest band on Earth. Don't tell Aziraphale, he'll tell you it's be-bop, and it most certainly is not."

Crowley is on the same page as the human soldier person with wanting to give him the music. "Hang on, if you record audio with your tablet when I start up a song, you can probably get a copy. Might be a bit tinny, but at least you'll have it. I've got all the greatest hits, you can have them."

Crowley, you are the Soldier's absolutely favorite person right now. That didn't even occur to it (though it probably would have, given a few minutes to think about it). "Be-bop. That." That also sounds-familiar, actually. "What is that?" It's already getting its tablet out from between tac vest and shirt, finding the app for recording audio.

"Start the song over," it adds. Gotta get the whole thing. And then everything after it. (Maybe Misty will want to listen. And get her own music off that discman.)

Crowley doesn't even hesitate. He turns up the volume on his mobile and starts the song over immediately. He gives a little wave, and all the ambient noise in the bar goes quiet, keeping the little bubble in the room just the human soldier person, Crowley, and the tablet and mobile.

His glass doesn't even clink when he takes a drink.

He's got all of Queen's Hits and he'll play them all as long as the human soldier person wants.

Hope you're patient, Crowley, because the Soldier is, and is going to sit and create individual files for each song Crowley plays. Not even going to converse while it does so (if they even can converse, given the magic silence bubble), just going to keep up the laser focus on the music and soaking up every bit of it, and making the recordings as precise as possible, so as not to miss any opening notes or ending reverbs or anything at all. The recording app (probably) isn't fancy enough for much editing; easier to just get it right the first time.

It even uses the metal arm, now still and silent and braced at the elbow on the table, to hold the tablet as close to Crowley's phone speaker as possible without letting it move. There are some good things about having a machine grafted to your shoulder, and having a body part that will not move no matter what is one of them.

Crowley's not patient about a lot of things, but when it comes to sharing music he loves---he most certainly can be. He'll make the occasional excited face at a certain song when he puts it on, or gesture a bit when he's about to start another, but other than that, he'll remain totally silent to make sure each recording is totally the best it can be.

"Next one is 'Who Wants to Live Forever'," he says. "Last one I've got."

The Soldier nods, hits record again.

This one is... sadder. Not one that makes a body want to dance. But the melody is still lovely, the instruments a little more familiar somehow, and the singer's talented voice full of so much emotion. The Soldier puts its chin down on the flesh hand to listen, eyes half-shut, wondering what that must feel like. To have so much love like that, even if it was for someone who was gone.

When it's over, the Soldier says quietly, but with a lot of feeling of its own, "That was beautiful."

It doesn't say thank you, because Crowley doesn't like that, but it does untuck its hand from its chin and reach over to clasp it around Crowley's wrist in silent gratitude instead.

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EVENT LOG: BURY A FRIEND

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