cloud ☁️

[unrecked]

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[skyagain]

[ what two years later ]

... She looked like she felt guilty. But it was the same thing as Sieghart. Shadows went to see her on Monday. [ he shakes his head ] ... Wish I'd been able to tell.

[unrecked]

[He shrugs in that agreeing sort of way.]

I talked to her a few times. Friday, too, no less. And she didn't seem off even to me. So you're not the only one.

[skyagain]

I know. I just... [ he sighs and shakes his head because it is sentiment jason. gets it. ] She was worried about her kid.

[unrecked]

She was. But she's also worried about others, too. We played the trolley "game" in the experiment room before. She was really ready to sacrifice my pal in favor of the five people on the other track. She was just possessed. Don't tell me you're going to try to take the blame just because you were in the wrong place at the wrong time?

[Cloud.]

Look. It's not so bad this way so long as the contract and that weird fuck hold their side of the deal. Do I trust it? No. But for now, AJ seems to be a guarantee. We just have to make sure she goes back.

[skyagain]

... Does it even count if I came back?

[ like. that's what he is worried about. but he shakes his head ]

... Yeah. I know you're right. We've got six more weeks to get this right and get everyone out of here.

[unrecked]

I mean--beats me technically. But I assume Nightman isn't looking to have us dead forever. There's little fun in that. Probably just satisfied someone is dying in general.

Then again, I don't think we ever quite figured out the musical chair clue.

[LET'S NOT THINK ABOUT THAT]

You die again tomorrow, and I'm putting my foot up your corpse's ass.

[skyagain]

Might've been because I kicked a chair at her.

[ sometimes. it's not that deep, jason. but either way, a little offended; ]

Stop putting that shit on me. It's not like I wanted to die. The whole impaled experience was a one time deal in my book.

[ sometimes you are just... so unlucky ... with gravity ]

[unrecked]

That's the stupidest hint I've heard heard in my entire life then. Get better hints.

[Not to him, though. NIGHTMAN, YOU LISTENING? GET BETTER HINTS. WHY DON'T THEY MAKE A LICK OF DAMN SENSE? HOW WOULD THAT HELP THEM? As I come unhinged in my brackets.]

And the bullet through your eye wasn't? Jesus.

[He will CONTINUE to rag the shit out of Cloud because he's mad.]

[skyagain]

They're not gonna give good hints for free.

[ dryly. he is so used to jason bitching that he just starts moving towards the restaurant bar (actual bar is banned for trauma rn) and fully expects jason to follow ]

I meant I didn't expect it to happen twice. The bullet through the eye was new. That's a memory I could do without.

[unrecked]

[Yes, he just goes along and follows like a puppy (don't read into this zia).]

I think the whole thing is one someone could probably do without. Maybe stop wearing so much hair gel, and you won't be top heavy enough to fall over and not be able to get back up.

[skyagain]

[ THEY ARE BEST FRIENDS and cloud if making an offended noise ]

I don't wear hair gel. [ why's he offended by this. ] Curtain rod pinned me. Who even makes them like that.

[ he's grumbling because it fucking hurt to have the world's sharpest curtain rod stab him :/ ]

[unrecked]

[NO STOP

it's so funny he is offended by this but also funny the hair stands that way on his own, and i simply have to let jason accept it]

Nightman. He has very specific interior designers for his very lavish and out-dated aesthetic murder hotel. What better way to incapacitate you for a sixteen year old girl who he has possessed. Since people killing each other normally is no fun.

[skyagain]

Do I get first dibs' on kicking Nightman's ass now that I died and came back?

[ he is just saying he would enjoy it. anyway, now they are at the bar so jason just has to accept jrpg hair, and cloud grabs a drink. and then another and slides that one over to jason. illegal underage drinking!! ]

You find out anything else while I was dead? I can't say I got much from our excursion on Thursday besides-- well, everything ended when the sun rose up.

[ the dream theory... ]

[unrecked]

No way. Get in line.

[This feels incredibly socially debilitating to him, but he is going to have to suck it up. Luckily, he is not a drinker really.

Though this place feels like it might start turning him into one. Roy would laugh.]

Thanks. [Quickly moving on:] Nah, not really. Still think things might be a dream, yeah. The hallway of fucked up doors? Feels kinda like nightmares.

You tried to do, uh, room service yet? Or cut a deal? Like—talked to them about it.

[skyagain]

[ cloud has actually not drank as much as he pretends to, but like, he died and came back to life. he deserves this. ]

Not yet. I was supposed to talk to them again on Thursday, so I thought I'd check then, but... Stuff happened.

[ STUFF. his arm is still fucked up please. ]

[unrecked]

Yeah, like you almost died twice.

[Fucking Cloud. Jason’s expression looks exactly like that sentiment. Fucking CLOUD.]

I’m going to try later maybe. See what the conditions are even if I don’t take it. Not a big fan of devil deals, but whatever.

[He sips the drink but nursing it makes him feel better actually.]

Kind of want to see if they’ll tell me anything about why I had to pull Claude out of the ground like a potato.

[skyagain]

[ look!! he had no control over it!! cloud is also nursing the drink because this is a social one. Also so he can swirl it pensively. ]

... Right, you guys kept mentioning that. And the cemetery. [ he missed the initial curfew talk so he's just. henwo? ] What exactly happened to him?

[unrecked]

[Cloud being dead and (more) brain scrambled…]

So Friday—by the way, as a side note, I fucking hate cemeteries—I went in to look for anything that might be important in the graveyard. I see a hand sticking out of toiled ground. Not sure if I was going to lose my mind or piss myself. [He was fine. Uh, mostly.] It was moving.

I basically just pull Claude out of the dirt which is weird because he was in the concierge with me and some others. But he startled me so bad being alive that I’m yelling at him to give me answers, so he doesn’t. He just asks me if I was awake then wouldn’t really talk. He finally tells me he remembers being awake and getting hit.

At trial, he said the same thing happened to Kim and Mikazuki. He said he woke up and got hit, then put in a coffin and buried. He had a weird dream about fighting a war at home at the other game he was in, but everyone was a machine? He could smell ink.

[skyagain]

[ ... okay. cloud's wracking his scrambled brain to make sense of this one, frowning deeply because burying people alive is bad. they have established this. ]

... If it was just the grave thing, I'd say that one was a hint at me. [ waking up in a grave hello. ] But who the hell was awake to knock them out? Clementine couldn't have pulled that off.

[unrecked]

[Yeah, hello. Very hello. JASON TODD HAD TO PULL SOMEONE OUT OF A GRAVE HELLO.]

Not sure. Could be the Nightman fucking around with something new he thinks is funny.

On the island, we had roles. So maybe it's a role of some kind. Don't know why a role would be putting three people in the cemetery, though. That's fucking morbid.

[skyagain]

[ it's fine it's just some minor trauma jay ]

I don't know. We had roles, too, including one that could check out the crime scenes while everyone slept, but... Whoever or whatever did that basically buried those guys alive. Doesn't seem like something someone here would do without being possessed.

[unrecked]

Maybe. We do have hostages, though. If they can twist our arms for a hotel game of murder, maybe they can twist them more for extra duties. You can't say no, stuff like that.

[He glances at Cloud, pensive and thin-lipped.]

When you went on your field trip, did you find anything... different? Like, related to the hotel? Yoo showed me something from theirs, but it didn't make a whole lot of sense.

[skyagain]

[ he does nothing but nod at that himself, a deep frown etched on his face. as for the question... ]

No. Only thing we got out of that was a locket. But... the whole thing was pretty much like the hotel anyway. Brought somewhere to entertain the hosts, and then it turns out their entertainment was watching us kill each other and die.

[unrecked]

What, they didn't think you had enough of the murder hotel already?

[He sort of gives that hissed exhale of exasperation through his teeth. He really has to put his forehead in his hand on the counter here.]

Yoo was convinced theirs was... memories of someone here. It sounded wild as hell, and he was already half out of it trying to tell me. Kept zoning in and out. Something about going into a hole.

He had a piece of hotel paper. Some people were playing Hangman, but not sure who. Ten-letter word. R was put in the sixth slot. T, S, M, L, O, D, E had all been tried, I think. The man was pretty much hung. [He closes his eyes like he's thinking.] The writing on the side was... "Give me another guess, you're missing a limb" in thick writing, "lmao" under it in slim writing, then "let the man die with dignity" in thick writing again. I think.

Below that was, "That is not a word!" in thick writing and "How dare you? Apologize to" in the slim writing before the page was ripped.

[skyagain]

...

[ cloud listens to all of that and just downs his drink, because you know what, his head already hurt before, and this did not help. he's not good enough at vocabulary to even begin to try and guess that without a piece of paper himself. for a while he just looks like he's thinking, frowning heavily and tapping the counter with a finger ]

This a hint that Nightman's not playing us alone, you think?