02 || River Tam || Day 55

[enchangement]

The air tastes strange. [ River knows the video is on but she's not looking at it, allowing instead for the broadcast to show the hallway of house seventeen in the waning afternoon light.

An arm reaches out and a door swings open to a bedroom. Bed rumpled and several books scattered around but otherwise empty.

They took him and she doesn't know when. They took a note, the whole song is wrong now.

[ River sounds exhausted. ]

The air tastes strange. All the notes should be careful and keep themselves in tune.

Comments

[undomesticated]

Sure it is. If you say yes and you're the one in control of yourself, then it's an automatic win.

[enchangement]

There's a chink in the armor, a flaw in the thinking. Can you find the assumption before it bites your fingers?

Control is fought for, and she's tired today.

[undomesticated]

Then maybe you should take a bit of a rest. That might help you see things a bit differently.

[enchangement]

[ River sighs again. ]

Stop. An effort, gallant brightly shining, was made.

[undomesticated]

Why don't you call me when you're feeling better. Maybe we can meet in person and, I don't know, you can tell me more about these things.

[enchangement]

Maybe. Maybe.

[undomesticated]

You can call anytime. If you just want to talk or something.

[nedofpies]

Sure. [ Ned half-smiles at her, but it isn't a happy smile. He thinks that, though he might not be telepathic, he understands a little bit where River is coming from. After his mother died, he hadn't been up for much conversation, for quite some time. It's a comprehensible reaction. ]

Why don't you help me set everything out? [ He gestures towards the heap of items and starts shifting them out of the bowl and onto the kitchen counter. Ned wants to let River participate as much as possible, knows that the mindless, tactile aspect of baking is one of the most soothing things about it.]

[ Once everything is laid out, Ned rubs his hands together. ]

Ready to start making some pie? [ It's partially a rhetorical question; River can answer or not as she pleases ]

[video]

[tryingitall]

We can hang on to the ones who've stayed.

[rigging]

Ugh. M'just getting - more spider comparisons outta that. [ Shudder. ] That ain't new, though. I mean, they been fucking with us, right? Even when they help, we get bitten.

[retrograding]

Darwin. [ A beat. ] I don't know him. But I'm sure he's alright. [ He can lie a little. ] Perhaps the supply grew too quickly. Perhaps they sent some home, to monitor the reactions of those still here. It's all a science experiment, after all.

video

[enchangement]

A proper noun has been taken from the pages and now who will define the baby sister part?

There will be another, we gather the memories of others to feel like the ones that are missing, we gather them like flowers trying to remember a perfume long gone.

There will be others but it won't be the same. They took Darwin.

[enchangement]

There's no moment in home to send him too, just a gravemarker with no grave if they even managed that much.

[ River looks so tired. ]

When does fear become anger become something useful to feel?

[video]

[enchangement]

All the little half-moon circles impressed upon their skin won't protect them from the thieves.

[retrograding]

[ That sounds familiar. Jet frowns. ]

There will be quiet for him, at least. And the answer to that is, as I find it often is, when time permits it. While you can't always get rid of it until our Lady Time sees fit, you can cheat her a little. Feelings can be converted with complicated formulas and a spray paint can or two. [ That's mostly a joke. ]

[enchangement]

[ River nods, so it's good that Ned is asking rhetorical questions - the first pie is in the oven before she deigns to say anything at all.

Ned will find that River is an attentive assistant, but she does, at times, stop and allow Ned to verbally explain his reasons for doing this, that, or the other. River finds a lot of comfort in hearing other people talk about the things they care about deeply, even if she knows the words before they hit the air.

But she's kneeling on the floor, peering at the metal door with it's obscured window in to the pie, when she turns her head towards Ned and smiles. ]

You're a good brother.

[enchangement]

Art as a guerrilla tactic, art as war.

Will paint you a star chart, and then she'll feel a little better.

[retrograding]

Art is the weapon. [ Jet agrees with a nod. Her next part makes him smile though. ] I would love to help with that, if you would have me. I'm not sure how but I think enthusiasm makes up for the lack of knowledge, right?

video; yes okay!

[mentis]

Considering there was nothing any of us could do.

[ Charles isn't one for hypothesising but he's fairly certain that Darwin's death would be fixed no matter what. Telling him seemed unkind. ] I had hoped he'd stay here for longer, that he could have been spared the knowledge of what was to come.

[enchangement]

Where did the Spidey sense come from? It's a thing like Sol is a thing.

Yes. It's not new. Just... [ She covers the communicator with one hand and sticks her head out of the window to scream. ]

video;

[enchangement]

Once, once, I gave the option to a man of the Lord, once, once, I asked if he wished to know how his story ended and he said he wanted to continue chasing the mysteries.

Don't think it was the wrong choice. [ The choice that Charles made. ] All this anger, and nothing to focus it on. Come show me how to pray for the dead?

[dowhatisays]

I don't knows about you sweetheart but ain't no one poked nothing at me yet.

[nedofpies]

[ As they bake, Ned isn't at all bothered by River's silence. He can fill the air with sound all on his own, talks to her steadily as they work, tells her all his little tricks, spins off into anecdotes about how he worked them out, and about disastrously failed pies, incidents at pastry school, the best pecan pie he'd ever made; until the pie is in the oven and River finally speaks up. ]

I used to want a little sister. When I was very young. [ He'd been desperate for siblings, before his mother had died. Of course, he remembers, he does have siblings. Technically. They just don't know he exists, and he likes it that way. But he remembers all that River told him about Simon and recognizes the compliment for what it is. ] Thank you.

[video]

[tryingitall]

I suppose not.

If my sympathy is worth anything, you have it. [Being left behind, whether by people who meant to go or people who have been forcibly taken, is miserable.]

video;

[mentis]

Sometimes that's the best way, River. [ Charles wouldn't want to know how his life goes. He's heard of this other man with his own name but he's ... cautious about finding out how much they are similar. ]

I don't know very much about religion, but I'm on my way. I promise.