fabledend | TAKE ME TO THE MOON (End Game Investigation)

TAKE ME TO THE MOON (End Game Investigation)

[Friday arrives uneventfully. The fog is growing stronger, it's true, but nothing obvious has happened. It's probably a relief not to have Kakuya's presence or a monster breathing down your neck. That doesn't help the sense that something has changed. Not one but two areas have opened up. A large skyscraper now towers over everything in the east, it's large bulk casting shadows over the entire 'city'. In the west, a park surrounding a lake sprawls out; a solemn looking Japanese shrine sits on an island in the middle of the lake.

Two large new areas are open to you... it's a bit disorienting but you probably should spread out.]

((Welcome to the final investigation for the dead! It's entirely optional so don't feel pressured to join in. ICly, this will be happening at the same time as the living's investigation and trial. Something may happen near the end of the investigation not involving these locations so keep an eye out.))

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Then...I guess we just have to hope right now.

[If it's all they can do, it's all they can do. Hope that everyone in the school is okay. Hope that Kakuya was beaten. Hope this is at least a version of Earth. Hope they can all go back to their homes.

It's terrifying, being helpless like this, but...if there's nothing else they they can do, it's the only option, isn't it?]

[Edward is spiraling into panic at the moment, and trying to repress that, and trying to hide that he is, but the weight of everything is landing on him like a million pounds, and he is falling, falling. He shuts his eyes and tries, in a method that has become practiced as of late, to shove that down and away. It's harder, now, when things are beginning to feel real again, but it's all he can do. His eyes are slightly bleak in that knowledge when he looks back up at Dylan, fist clenched with his knuckles white against his skin, holding himself into inaction when he wants to tear apart the world to find where he belongs again.]

I suppose you're right. That's been our lot for some time, however.

[...]

Do you...need to let off some steam and break something?

[Because this is the one time he might allow it.]

[He laughs a little, but the sound is more desperate than amused. Is this the last refuge of a madman? Perhaps.]

I want to tear everything apart until I find where I got taken from. It's... It was easier, somehow, when there was so much that was strange already. But mindless destruction....

[For a moment he pauses, and is somewhat tempted, then lets his head fall back against the wall with a light thump and stares at the ceiling.]

I wish I was home. It's amazing how even all the tediums and irksome problems of life begin to appeal when one is removed from them, isn't it?

I'm sorry. I'm being very selfish, I know.

[...concerning laugh, fun times!]

You're...not wrong, really? At this point, I'd take anything my family could throw at me over pretty much everything I've seen here. Even if that means keeping the house from flooding again.

And it's...okay, to feel angry, so long as you get it out in a healthy way. That's pretty much why dogs have chew toys-we take our anger out on them instead of anything that might not deserve it.

[Now that doesn't always work, admittedly, but...no need to mention that, at a time like this...]

[He's just. Sitting back against the wall, head leaning back against it, looking at the ceiling. It may actually be a familiar position for Dylan, being quite similar to the shadow that he left after he'd killed an innocent girl.]

I'd always assumed it had more to do with boredom.

And do you know, somehow it's worse, knowing that they'd forgive me for what I've done here. I don't even know whose blood I've been... [he gestures vaguely in the direction of himself, thinking again of his crimson eyes.]

Rosalie might be a little smug about it, perhaps Jasper might be as well. Emmett and Esme wouldn't even care, I don't think, and Carlisle...

He's always put too much faith in me. I'm sure he would this time as well.

Well, that too, but getting anger out is also a big part of it.

[Like when those humans on TV punch those giant cylinder bag things. Or at least, that's what he's pretty sure that's what they're for...

And that pose is indeed familiar, so time to distract with some questioning!]

Well, that's...

What would be the other choice?

You obviously need to drink blood. I don't know what you'd do without it, but you'd at least starve. Some blood was being provided. At that point, it seems like you had to either take it, or risk someone-someone we know getting hurt.

And...at that point, I think that's only one option.

Technically I don't have to.

[Which he primarily says because Edward is here to make himself feel bad for all the things he has done, not because here's here to be reasonable.]

I wouldn't have died. It gets... harder to stay in control, as the thirst grows worse, but I could have refused. I could have asked for something else. We hunt animals at home, they keep us strong enough.

['We hunt animals at home, they keep us strong enough.'

'We hunt animals at home.'

'We hunt animals'

...HMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM-]

W-well, that-that still wouldn't be a good thing! Wait too long, be too picky, or lose control at the exact wrong time, and that would've been a big, big problem!

[Distraction with the mental image of a hungry, rabid vampire in a school full of literal children. Horrific, but effective!]

[There's a palpable shift in the atmosphere, and it's really not hard to guess what caused it. A part of him had wondered, had avoided saying before partially because it seemed like it would be in poor taste, but he is fully in self destruct mode by now, again, and that seemed to be the mood where he turned most honest. Still, though.]

We're careful. You wouldn't have to worry, we don't kill dogs.

[The speculation almost feels like accusation, however, and he almost flinches, his eyes shutting, pulling his legs and arms a little closer as if curling up.]

Yes. That could have ended very poorly.

[And he hates that so much, he hates what he is so much sometimes, the fact that he is an ever present danger, that even at his most controlled he is never safe.]

['My family is not the ones I would be worried about, it's literally any non-dog I know.'

He very, very much wants to state that with anxious, terrified laughter, but to feels like now might not be the time. Not when it seems like he might've triggered something.]

Hey-hey. That's not what happened though. You drank the blood that was given to you and you didn't hurt anyone because of...because of that.

[Can't say de didn't hurt anyone, since Thomasin would beg to differ, but it wasn't a starvation induced thing, at least.]

[Too late, reminder of what he is and that this has never been safe, that he has never been safe, that Bella-

Maybe the best thing that could have happened for her was him being pulled away and locked up like this. His hands clench into fists, tight and white knuckled, but after a moment he makes himself relax, straighten up again, open his eyes, bury the despair that is slowly trying to fill him.]

I know. Yes, I avoided that much, I suppose.

[Crit failure. He tried so hard, didn't get very far, and in the end, it doesn't even matter.

There's about one thing left that Dylan can think of to help with this situation.]

Any chance...you or your dad know a therapist you-or any of us, really-could talk about this stuff with? Because that...that would probably be helpful, if we ever get back home.

[A vampire therapist is really the best hope he can think of for someone that can help them with the issues of remembering what it's like to die, among other things.]

[Edward looks a little better, the moment of weakness smoothed over, but it's a mask, it's almost always a mask with him. When had he started being so honest here? That was surely unwise. The question, however, startles him for a moment. It makes him think for a second or two before he makes a small, noncommittal gesture.]

It's not impossible, I suppose, but at most he might know someone who was a therapist once, before they were changed. And I doubt it. Most of my kind don't see much reason to practice medicine. There's really only a few pockets that stay relatively civilized. The rest are... Harsher. They have a very different way of life than we do.

Of course that's how it is...

[HEAVY SIGH]

Okay, Yuta's world has...a lot, of stuff going on. Maybe we can see if a therapist there could help with anything we've had to deal with here.

[Unless anyone else would like to butt in with an idea for mental health help? He is very much open to suggestions right now.]

I wish I had a different answer for you. Carlisle might know something of therapy himself, I suppose, but he's tended to specialize in medicine of the body rather than medicine of the mind. I know he does like to keep up with the latest advances, though...

Recommend it to him if we ever get back, that's probably the one medical area anyone could need help with, human or otherwise.

[The potential of an entire untapped market: vampire therapy.]

He probably knows at least a little of it. I don't always keep tabs on what he's doing, after all.

[he got a good part through being able to hear his thoughts, fine, but he also usually tried to tune his family out and give them what little semblance of privacy he could provide]

He's multidisciplinary already to an extent, but he has spent a lot of his time as a surgeon. But you'd be welcome to ask if that was something he could provide support with. I'm not certain it would do me as much good.

[Always knowing everyone's thoughts seems like it might hamper that kind of thing.]

You might want to try. At the very least, it might be difficult, but it shouldn't hurt.

[He would say the words 'possibly,' 'wrong,' 'what,' 'go,' and 'could,' but he knows better than to string together a sentence like that.]

[He just flashes a wry smile and touches his temple for a moment with a fingertip. He'd told Dylan already that he could read minds, after all.]

[...right.]

Is there...any way you can't read someone's mind? Like, some sort of natural immunity or material that blocks it out? That could be helpful.

[Dylan, this is mind reading, not x-rays-]

The only person I've encountered in 87 years who can block me is Bella. She doesn't know how she does it. So I suppose that technically, yes, it exists. But that's not very useful in this case. And somehow I doubt I would get the full benefit, if I can always hear what my therapist truly thinks of me.

...we...we can try to figure something out. Later.

[Maybe. Hopefully.

Please.]

[That makes him snicker]

It's fine. I've survived this long.

[Just. Not commenting further. Not sure if it will do any good.

please let him figure something out to help a mind reading vampire get therapy, this is his insane life now and he's not about to sit down and accept these sorts of things as unsolvable]

TAKE ME TO THE MOON (End Game Investigation)

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