[open semi-mingle] All we want for Christmas is...

[gainedlove]

Who: A popsicle and you!
When: Through to January 10th.
Where: Cryo Bay
What: CORPSE PARTY CORPSE PARTY (a.k.a. mingle for all the losers chilling with Shepard)
Warnings: None forseen, will update as necessary

Within the confusion of the fog blurring past, present, and future, one could be forgiven by missing the presence of one of Avagi's number. But to a select few Jane Shepard's absence is immediately felt. The residents of Sadcat Manor, the tiny family that had woven together by chance, move through their daily lives as best they can...but as life starts to settle into normalcy once again, she has not yet woken from her sudden slumber.

So a few make small detours. Settling for a few minutes or even an hour or two at a time near the cryo chambers, they keep her company. Some simply seeking some form of comfort by proximity, others of a more defensive mind seeking to be sure nothing will disturb her until he wakens once more...whenever that may be. And with so many visiting...well, it's inevitable that eventually some schedules might overlap.


(( ooc: Treat this as a mingle log for hanging around Shep's cold not-corpse! Top-level comments below will be posted for different scenarios for ease of organization, but otherwise go wild and have fun! ))

Comments

DAYLIGHT

[gainedlove]

'Daylight' is a specious term on Avagi, but the crew's waking hours stll leave some hustle and bustle through this section of the medical wing. Doctors checking that equipment is in working order, routine examinations of patients coming in and out. But there are places for a visitor to settle in for a time, should they so wish.

NIGHTTIME

[gainedlove]

At night the activity slows to a near standstill. Monitors beep in quiet patterns, and the only light is that shed by monitors. It is far quieter at these hours, and in theory more private. Though maybe be careful you don't fall asleep leaning against the cryo pod, or else you might need the services of the fine doctors in the morning for catching a chill.

PARTY [January 10th]

[gainedlove]

How this exactly started is hard to pinpoint. FIrst someone happened to have brought a bottle of liquor, then another came with snacks, and eventually the gathering grew to something resembling a tiny celebration. The woman of the hour is, of course, entirely unaware of the commotion, but those left awake can take comfort in the presence of others feeling their same loss. Or maybe you're just annoyed there's a bunch of rowdy idiots getting in your way--it is a bit of an awkward location for a party.

[aka_pistachio]

[ It's super late at night. Or what passes for "night" on a space station, anyway. But Kelly Ann has studying to do, and Peter has Pino for the night, and she's not really ready to hang out in her room alone. So she goes to where Shepard is just... in stasis.

Somehow even in stasis she seems like she knows what she's doing. Kelly Ann takes the book she's supposed to be reading for her lit course/independent study/whatever thing with Professor Xavier and sits next to the cryo chamber. It's cold, which makes her shoulders ache. But better than being by herself with her own morbid thoughts when she's not going to be sleeping anyway. ]

All right. So I think we had just started the first battle. [ She flips to the page she had stopped reading at last time.
"THEN from the moorland, by misty crags, / with God’s wrath laden, Grendel came. / The monster was minded of mankind now / sundry to seize in the stately house."

[ She rubs her forehead and sighs. ]

None of this makes any sense. [ She mutters. "This" referring to the story, the station, her own state of mind. Whatever. ]

every night. every single night from 12/22 to 1/10. ota.

[inconsequence]

[It's ritualistic. It makes it easier, once they fall into a reasonable rhythm of it - carefully settling down, cross-legged, beside Jane Shepard's cryo pod, and opening a slim, much-loved, well-thumbed volume. They clear their throat, each night, and venture without expectation for an answer:]

I'll be picking up where we left off, if there are no objections.

[There are, of course, no objections.]

[Easy, certain, spoken with the calm recitation of someone who has uttered these words many, many times before, Chara begins to read aloud to the sleeping Shepard. Perhaps she cannot hear, but if there is even the remotest possibility that some small piece of this may come through to her in the form of a dream or a half-formed memory, then it is worth it.]

[One is, after all, never too old for a bedtime story.]

The place I like best in this world is the kitchen. No matter where it is, no matter what kind, if it's a kitchen, if it's a place where they make food, it's fine with me...

only sort of here. feel free to react if you want idk it's the thought that counts.

[inconsequence]

[Someone has very expertly woven a circular chain of golden blooms, carefully dried to as not to be crumbling, and settled them around the cryo-pod's top, very much like one might deposit a flower crown atop someone else's head.]

[Not that we're naming names, but it was probably Frisk. They're way better at owning this soppy, sappy sentimental bullhonkey.]

[gainedlove]

[Frisk was, in fact, not the one that put it there.]

[They do notice it, though, when they come through for one of their daily checks that Shepard hasn't vanished or fallen ill with some weird cryo disease or...whatever else might happen to her. The spot of color atop the cold metal and glass gives them pause, and they stare at the crown for a moment before they smile, just a little.]

[Pointing it out would be rude, but adding a 'Get Well' card with butterflies drawn on isn't so bad, right?]

12/27

[gainedlove]

[They don't mean to intrude, really. It was another night of little sleep and too much restless energy, and finding someplace in the apartment to curl up with a blanket to wait out the night wasn't as appealing as usual--perhaps thanks to the increased number of people experiencing the same. They hadn't expected anyone to make their way to the cryo bay at this time, and just before they cross the threshold they hear a familiar voice begin a tale.]

[They stop halfway across the threshold, frozen with indecision. Much as they want to stay, to speak up and ask permission...it would just ruin their mood, wouldn't it? For Frisk to come in, to take yet another thing away from them...]

[inconsequence]

[They shouldn't feel so out of place; this was, after all, Frisk's idea, was it not? And it was a good one. There's still a careful array of flowers atop Shepard's cryo-pod, along with a few other odds and ends. They can place a rather telling Get Well card with some familiar handwriting, not that they'll be calling attention to it.]

[They speak with barely a deviation in their level tone.]

Are you staying, or passing though?

[gainedlove]

[Frisk swallows hard, and it takes a few moments before their voice decides to work again.]

...was jus'...for a little while.

[They pull their blanket a little closer around themself, as if to shield themself from...judgement, rejection? They aren't really sure.]

I can...I can go, if you don't want...'f it's private.

[inconsequence]

Oh, yes. Private.

It is so incredibly private, Frisk. It is so very private that I am reading it aloud, in a public space, in front of a person who is very asleep and cannot hear a single word I am saying.

That's how private it is.

[gainedlove]

Well--I mean, everyone's asleep, an'--!

[Frisk flushes pink and looks away, before stepping inside and settling themself a little ways away from Shepard's pod.]

...'s this th' story you were reciting before?

[inconsequence]

[Clearly not everyone. Shepard is sleeping enough for the both of them, Chara has surmised. So why shut their eyes and succumb to dreams that they know they'll wake from mere hours later?]

I do, on occasion, read.

Shocking, I know.

Any random day

[pleasereset]

[Asriel hasn't gotten to know Shepard as closely as Chara and Frisk have, but knowing how important she is to both of them, and how kind she's been him, he keeps visiting her cryo chamber to check up on her. He starts off with talking to her, telling her what's currently going on in their household and how everyone is doing.

As days pass, talking to her turns more into a habit. Whenever he thinks no one else is listening, he'll start to talk about how much he misses Thisavrou, how he wishes he could find a home where nothing bad can happen to them, anything that's on his mind or troubling him.]

-And that's why I was thinking about painting the Velocity Raptor green, like a real velociraptor. Wouldn't that be cool? I wonder if I'll get a chance to fly it again.

12/30ish

[notglitching]

[Jane_Shepard isn't in danger. If the recent environmental faults were any sign, she might even be safer from the local hazards than the rest of them. Whenever she might restart (and in what condition), there's absolutely nothing Rinzler can do.

That doesn't stop him from adding the medbay to his patrols. Or, once the chaos of the system glitch is done, stopping by a little earlier than usual. He isn't surprised to hear another visitor inside.

Still, he hadn't expected to hear Chara read.

The enforcer won't interrupt. But when Chara pauses for a breath, they might hear the soft rumble ticking from the doorway. Rinzler tilts his helmet, quietly curious when they look back.]

[inconsequence]

[They pause when they catch sight of someone else nearby. Evidently, the sound of a child reading aloud is of sufficient interest to plenty passersby. This is fortunately one they recognize; the immediate tensing of shoulders and back, the straightening of spine, the short intake of breath, all soon relax once they determine the source of the sound.]

[Rinzler has not struck them as someone interested in stories. Though in all fairness, the subject simply never came up before. They never asked.]

[...]

[They ought to have asked.]

...interested?

[notglitching]

[A brief lag, and the black mask dips. He is. Albeit as much in the fact of Chara's reading as the content. Rinzler steps inside, a lingering glance assessing Shepard's pod. Readouts steady. No change.]

Can she—hear?

[It takes a moment to piece the phrase together, but not as long as it would have a few months back. Practice helps.]

[inconsequence]

[Can she hear?]

[A full sentence, with pronouns and verbs and everything. To mock him for that achievement would be a cruelty; not everyone can speak easily, and learn to assert their personhood with ease. Nonetheless, something in their expression seems to ease, a slackening of the guardedness that they veil over themself by default.]

I very much doubt it. But if she can...

[If there is even the mildest, slightest, silliest chance that she can, then it is worth the daily effort.]

[notglitching]

Worth it.

[It's less complete than the last string—but this time, there's no lag at all. Rinzler knows intimately the value of distraction.

He completes his circuit, settling at one side of the room. He's still curious, and unless Chara suggests it, he won't leave. But he won't interrupt, either.]

[inconsequence]

Yes.

[It's barely a whisper, hardly audible but for the quiet hiss of the word's termination. If there is any chance, any chance at all, that some of it will bleed over, that her dreams of those unforgotten six weeks will be interspersed with memories of a softer, kinder variant - then they will read every night, if they must.]

[And even if they must not.]

Do you read often?

[araignee_du_soir]

Why are you reading Beowulf?

[Shortly after the question was voiced, Widowmaker's form came into the light being emitted by the surrounding equipment. She wasn't looking at the girl with the book, but focusing on Shepard as the woman chilled in the pod.]

[notglitching]

[The enforcer's helmet shakes from side to side. Pauses. Shoulders twitch as he qualifies the answer—there is one exception that stands out.]

Data lookups.

[What words mean. How things work. The user world prompts far too many questions, and Rinzler learned early how much it cost to ask. Not in exchange, but consequence: the way users looked at him. The terms they might choose.]

Not stories.

[inconsequence]

[Somehow, that answer does not surprise them. It twitches at the corner of their mouth in a way that almost communicates genuine amusement, though not of a scathing sort.]

Perhaps you ought to expand your reading list. It is my belief that a great deal can be learned from stories of all kinds.

[Stories...some say they make the heart grow bigger.]

[Fancy that.]

[aka_pistachio]

[ Kelly Ann startles and looks up, blinking at the unfamiliar woman for a moment before responding. ]

Oh. Because Professor Xavier assigned it. It's like, a seminal work in Western literature or some shit. [ She shrugs. ] Figured Shepard might like the company.

[ She looks over the stasis pod, still not quite sure how any of it works or why, but she did look up what all the meters are supposed to say and everything is in the acceptable range. ]

[yorisearching]

[Yori's too busy to spend all that much time near cryo, but she does wander through the medical facilities two or three times in a given week. There are plenty of questions to ask, things to learn. Shepard's status is on the list.]

That would be cool.

[She didn't expect to find Asriel here. It's nice to see him talking cheerfully to Shepard about painting his ship green. Yori offers a quick smile.]

If you're busy, I won't bother you. But I'm sure we'll find somewhere to fly before too long.

[Especially now that the portals seem likely to open to a different planet soon enough.]