capeandcowllogs | i was on my way to work when i realized i'm wasted

i was on my way to work when i realized i'm wasted

WHO: A WHOLE BUNCH OF PEOPLE
WHERE: Here, there, everywhere.
WHEN: Anytime from 6:00 PM to the wee hours of the morning; feel free to tag in with a specific time in your subject header.
SUMMARY: Chronos and Vector are failures and half the City goes apeshit!

It's been a lovely, warm, sunny day in the City, winding into a nice warm afternoon that definitely doesn't feel like the first day of Fall. As the sun gets lower and lower in the sky, however, something goes wrong. It's a very discreet malfunction, and even people in the general area probably won't notice it; what they will notice, however, are the temporal shockwaves emanating from the malfunctioning device.

Not to mention the eventual effects of those shockwaves. Is that man standing in the middle of the crosswalk with a lampshade on his head? Where did he even find a lampshade?

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Alastair noted the glow, but he was familiar with it by now, and breathed a sigh of relief. "Better?"

Kiryu nodded with an even bigger smile. "I can actually breathe. Do I look normal now?"

"Yeah, pretty much." But to himself, Alastair wondered. Did being in Signer form, which Kiryu seemed to like better, make him feel like that all the time? Short of breath and overheated? He had no idea...

Well, that Kiryu was used to it. Any amount of breathing was a lot after being dead. But it was more than weird to a Kiryu who hadn't gone through that yet.

"I saw a guy laying in an alley once. Dead. His eyes looked like that." He shrugged, starting to inspect his hair. He didn't want to talk about that anymore.

"Alastair...how close are we?"

"Uh..." Alastair didn't even want to touch the dead comment, he'd seen bodies before in childhood and it wasn't something he wanted to dredge up. Not that the other comment was any easier.

"Honest?" He shrugged, shifting so he could look Kiryu in the eye. "We're kinda seeing each other."

Kiryu couldn't help a brief moment of disbelief, if only because he couldn't imagine how long he must have been here already to have a relationship with someone. Although Alastair had been pretty friendly so far; he could think of quite a few people who'd be a much worse date.

"Yeah? I wondered if it was something like that. I haven't heard anyone else use my first name."

"Heh..." Alastair looked down sheepishly. "Yeah, that's a real funny story. You told me to, so I just kinda did." And when they were estranged, that simple name change meant everything. "That was a while ago, before we ever got together.

"It's okay, right?" he quickly added. "I'm not gonna pressure or anything, until you can remember again, but..."

"I just...haven't heard it in a long time." And he had to wonder why he'd been telling anyone to call him that without being so close, but he was sure he had a reason.

He blinked over at him at that question. "It's fine. I'm just sorry I can't remember any of this."

It had been so long Alastair had forgotten the circumstances exactly. He just knew it had become a habit, and the fact that he was the only one who did only made their relationship that much more unique. "Nah, it's okay," he assured. "We'll get those memories back, or figure it out. Maybe there's something on the network about it."

He really hoped it was something different. He didn't want to think that any of his family were brainwashed. His new master wouldn't betray him like that, would he? Brainwash the closest people to him?

Kiryu held out the comm in his hand. "Do you want to check? It'd be good to know if I'm the only one or not."

"Yeah, it'll just take a sec." Alastair's thumbs flew over the keys, pulling up the listing and skimming the posts. It did sound like a couple of others were having a similar problem, but there was no announcement from the Porter, no villain claiming responsibility, nothing of a "this is what happened and this is how to fix it" sort of vein. Sighing, he handed it back so Kiryu could wait for an alert from Yuusei. "There's a couple of weird posts, but nothing major. I'll keep an eye on it through the night."

His doubts were intensifying, so he tried to shake them off and focus on Kiryu's needs instead. He could snoop online and investigate his questions tomorrow, there were more important things right now.

"Just a couple?" Kiryu studied the comm for a moment before just going back to holding onto it. It would harder to hear it if it was in his pocket. "That's good though. It's better if it's only a few people."

"So far, anyway." Alastair was willing to entertain the idea that there were more people affected than those who posted to the comm - there always were. But people tended to flood the comm when something was going on, so he remained wary.

And that was about how long he was willing to sit still for now. he glanced back at the kitchen, still a little amazed by that, and got up to start pacing around the living room. And after a brief sound of annoyance, he was tugging his hair back in a messy ponytail.

"I don't get it. What's the point? Getting amnesia is practically suicide..."

Alastair sat forward with his elbows on his knees. "I don't think it's something you do on purpose," he suggested. "You were fine before I went to take a nap, so whatever happened, happened in the last hour or so while I was asleep." His lips twisted in a thoughtful frown. "The real question is, whether someone else did it to you on purpose, or if it's some kind of random accident or what."

"I doesn't matter if it was on purpose. It's still one of those things you just...really don't want to have happen."

He paused next to the windows, momentary awed by the sight of the rest of the city. It sure looked like how he imagined Neo Domino.

"Has anything like this happened before?"

"Um...sort of?" Alastair had to think; being in the City for almost a year and a half made some events blur together. "The Porter herself has done a number on people before, but she usually makes some kind of cryptic announcement when she does. Lately people have been going missing and acting weird, there's been all kinds of accusations that people have been brainwashed." His expression hardened briefly as another flash of doubt lurched through his stomach.

"Brainwashed?" Kiryu scowled over at him, not really because of him but because that was the most repulsive thing he'd heard lately. It was something he could easily see Security trying if they were here too. "Brainwashed to do what? By who?"

Alastair bit his lip before answering - keeping his cover was getting harder and harder each day. "Nobody really knows. I hacked a transmission from the Major the other day that said maybe up to thirty-five percent of us are affected, but nobody knows why or how."

Only a small part of that was a lie. A very small part.

Kiryu couldn't think of anything to say to that. It was too unnerving. That was proportionally a lot of people; at least one of them could be a victim just by the numbers. He had no idea how many people that might include, but any amount was too many.

He crossed his arms and turned back to the window, trying not to show how unnerving that really was.

Alastair got up and went to join him, coming up beind Kiryu and only setting a hand on his shoulder. "I know I keep saying 'don't worry,' but that's all I know how to say right now. I don't know how to fix it no matter how badly I want to."

He smiled a little; that sounded familiar for other reasons. "Yeah, I've given that speech enough times to know. It's okay. I've been through worse. It's just weird feeling like I have no idea what to do."

Alastair attempted a smile. "Have some dinner and hang out?" he offered. "Go see the shark tank in the Mancave?"

Blink. "There's a shark?"

A huge grin. Alastair loved that reaction. "Yep. See? There's cool stuff to check out later, so you don't sit around worrying all night."

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satisfiedsigner - 2010-09-24 02:21 (UTC) - Expand

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