piper90 | [video] [locked]

Entry tags:

[video] [locked]

[Saturday is rubbing sleep from her face as she talks, hair disheveled and her bunk in the background. The sounds is slightly unsynced, just enough to be annoying, and the image is tinted purple. Still, it's coherent]

Hey, crew. We've all had a real fucking night an' I'm sorry to add more, but this might be useful. I think I just a clue from like, some kinda supernatural dream-traveling hint-dispenser? Called themselves Cain and Abel, gave me a choice between a secret and a mystery, I picked mystery 'cause it meant I could tell you guys about it.

Man, I hope this sounds familiar to someone.

It was Cain I talked to, he told me a story about two brothers who uh - fuckin' hell - one killed the other because they were both in love with some invisible chick named Bell but she hadn't picked him. Their parents thought the one brother just flipped out and did murder for some fuckin' reason, because they thought Belle was fictional? Someone who knows what they're doing, start asking me some questions because I don't know how this is supposed to be relevant, but the dude said it was and he was for real. I got some experience an' I know when the dream I'm having didn't come outta my own head.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

It is a religious thing. The first murderer, Cain, and his brother, Abel, the victim. Cain was a farmer and his brother a shepherd. At the end of the season, they made their sacrifices to God and God favored the sacrifices of Abel. Cain was angry, which led him to kill Abel, for which he was exiled to the Land of Nod. Or, possibly, to wander the land. The translation is a bit weird.

[Sam goes quiet, scratching a few notes down.]

That's. Interesting. Especially when you think about the fact that, if she was a thoughtform of some sort, it might explain how she goes through walls.

There are some religious traditions that claim that Cain and Abel had sisters, of varying names, whom they married. At least a few claim that Cain killed Abel in a fit of jealous rage over getting the more beautiful bride.

I can't make any comments towards the supernatural, [and here she says it like a dirty word] but it does have some... rough analogues towards Abrahamic traditions.

[He gives a quick grin at the way Alia says 'supernatural' so distastefully.]

Like I said. Translations are weird. Though, yeah, I've heard those stories as well.

Roughly, yeah. It's not perfect, but it's close enough that I'm not going to split hairs about it.

If this was home, I'd be considering it might be a tulpa. Which I'm really hoping it's not because those are a bitch and a half to deal with.

Yeah, that was in the story too, I think? Except he was a spaceship captain judging their terraforming. Don't ask me. But like, Belle was going to choose who to marry based on whose work Space Captain God liked better. Which was the dude who had meat. Uh, Frank. Joe got murdered.

First murder? So it's like a creation story.

[There's a half moment of incredulity on Sam's face before he runs his hand over his face.]

Frank and Joe. Sure. Okay.

And creation story in a way. Cain and Abel were two of the children of Adam and Eve. Biblically, the first people in the world. Though there's some contention about that because some of the translations say that Cain went to live among the people of Nod and if Adam and Eve were first, where did these other people come from?

[He makes a few more notes.] It's interesting that he'd choose that particular story, though, and telling it in that way.

Oh. I don't know a lot about Christian mythology.

Sorry. Wish I could be more helpful.

Don't worry about it, Saturday.

[Another moment as he writes something down.]

The dream itself probably has what we need in it. [A pause.] Actually. Considering the description we have of the woman. Did Cain mention anything about a brand?

No, no brand. But. Hold on, the exact words were -

[She closes her eyes and thinks]

'And, if he'd inspected the scene of the crime more closely, he would have noticed that the bloody footprints walking from where Joe's body fell weren't of a man at all.'

Okay. The brand is usually a part of the story, part of Cain's punishment. So that everybody would look at him and know what he had done.

[His pen taps against the paper in thought.]

So. Possible thoughtform or spirit. Possibly pitted people who loved each other against one another out of...spite? Desire to provoke competition? [More scribbles.]

Does the whole thing with it bein' a planet with no one else cause it's being terraformed matter? I mean that was probably just because, beginning of the world stuff, but...

[She trails off, closes her eyes, focuses. God, she wants coffee.]

It was a planet that was being terraformed, so there's only one family. That's Adam and Eve, right? Plus their kids and Belle. And Captain Adoni, Adonay? Adonai. And part of the whole thing is that he likes Joe's meat more than Frank's mashed potatoes - which is kind of lame? Even bad mashed potatoes are still pretty good - and that decided who got to marry Belle. The he who should be looking closer is the captain.

[She's just throwing context at the wall, hoping something sticks]

[There's a twitch of Sam's lips at the phrase 'he likes Joe's meat', but that's because some part of Sam will forever be twelve. And his brother is just as bad.]

[He clears his throat to hide it, though.]

I don't know if the being terraformed matters. It might just be a setting thing. Especially since it gives a reason for them to be the only ones there. You don't want a lot of folks in the area when it's all being changed, after all.

I'm still not sure what to make of Belle, though. Is she like what we're fighting here? Is she the actual thing we're dealing with? Is there something completely different going on and we're just not seeing it?

Uh...

[Put that conspiracy brain to work, Saturday. What's the dumbest possible obvious bullshit thing it could be?]

Fuck, okay, like, the story is about being so focused on what you think the problem is that you miss what's going on. What are we not talking about? Can you pull up the thing with Planker? From Alia? Maybe there's somethin' there that'll make more sense now.

[It takes a moment, but Sam pulls it up to rewatch it. And anybody who is listening can rehear Planker's side of the conversation.]

Right. So, there's two things here. There's the Virgin Mother and whatever it is that causes her stigmata to act up. Bacause Planker says it ISN'T that again. [Scribble, scribble. Hmm.] Something that you can only see because of how others react to it. Is that maybe what we need to be looking at?

Unless Planker is wrong. "It can't possibly be thing, thing only happens under circumstances" is just asking to be followed up with an "oh shit, we guessed wrong"

Virgin Mother is kind of a christian thing too, right?

[Sam seesaws a hand back and forth a few times.]

Sort of. I don't think I've ever heard anybody call Mary the Virgin Mother, but I suppose it's not impossible that somebody has. Mind, the meaning of virgin has changed since the days that the Bible was written.

[He could start on an entire thing about translations, but he refrains. At least, he refrains from going off more than he already has.]

[Still, Sam DOES huff a small laugh.]

Planker? Be wrong? Is that a thing that could even happen?

[The sarcasm is heavy with this one.]

I dunno, man, stranger things. [Her face is perfectly deadpan.] He's pretty with it most of the time but anyone can fuck up.

In this case, I think we can assume they mean virgin in the colloquial sense. I very much doubt Jorgmund's heard of Robert Alter.

I'm intrigued by the choice of Cain and Abel - I've never heard of those two coming up in a context quite like this. Perhaps the betrayal aspect is what we need to focus on? Deception, manipulation, that sort of thing.

Fair enough. Though, yeah. Doubt they've read his stuff, either.

It is pretty much the classic story of betrayal. Brother turned against brother from the very start. [There might be a look of regret on his face.]

[Or it could be constipation. Difficult to say.]

But who is doing the manipulating? We know that we're being manipulated by Jorgmund. Or, at least, I've kinda taken it for granted that we all believe that. Maybe we're not the first group of New Hires that Jorgmund have picked up.

I was under the impression that we almost certainly were not. They're too good at processing us, and too disinterested in the why and how of our arrival. No one can be that self-absorbed.

[Well, maybe Victoria Ash]

In the tradition I've studied, Caine's sin is pride; God's judgement enrages him because he believes he's done nothing wrong, and that his offering was equal to Abel's. As with the apple, the crime itself isn't the sin - it's his defiance, afterwards.

[He's struck by a thought]

I wonder if Belle isn't meant as an analogue to the serpent? In some traditions, the serpent is God's agent, sent as a moral challenge. Perhaps she views herself as one who reveals people's true natures through temptation, if our target and the Belle of the story are meant to be the same.

Hmph. If I was home, I'd know exactly where to start looking. But I doubt she's a Setite.

We don't have confirmation on it, but I agree with you. We're almost definitely not the first set of New Hires they've had. I kinda doubt we're even the second. It's all a little too...well orchestrated.

I think it's a bit of both. Though there are good reasons why Pride is one of the seven deadly, after all. That and envy, which Caine was also guilty of.

What's a Setite, by the way?

Vampire cultists. They worship the Egyptian god Set as the first vampire, and their origins do stretch back that far. They consider giving into temptation - and leading others to it - a religious imperative. Not bad people to know, as long as you don't accept anything they offer.

[He's got his device propped up in a lounge somewhere; Sam can see him drumming his fingers irritably along the chipped, cracked, patched leather of the couch he's on.]

Three hundred bloody years of education, and this is what stumps me. I truly hate this wretched place.

[Sam looks like he's in one of the regular rooms where they house the new hires. Though maybe a bit bigger. He has a couple of roommates, after all.]

[But the desk is big enough for him to have his device propped up so he can write.]

Well, I don't have that much, but I've been doing this sort of thing for around twenty years or so. [Considering he looks like he's early thirties at the most, that's a long time.] The problem that we're all working with, though, is that we know what applies in our own worlds. But we're playing with a brand new set of rules here that nobody's bothered giving us a run down on and, given how the Stuff works, are also rules that could change at any time in ways we can't predict.

Precisely, young one. [He is definitely being condescending, but in the manner of a an adult expert towards a precocious child - there's real approval there, mixed in with the vague surprise.]

It's infuriating. The - Stuff [this terminology hurts him deeply] allows her to be literally anything the mind can conceive of - a personal nightmare, a myth from a world that never was, or one we've never heard of - perhaps the parable is meant to give us some insight into her origin, but how can we know?

Perhaps the use of Cain and Abel means we can assume she's at least from an earth's mythology? But there's apparently dozens - though there does seem to be significant overlap.

[The condescension gets a quick glance up a grimace that his brother would have classed as a 'bitch face'.]

This is the sort of thing that keeps my brother and I alive back home. The better I am at it, the better our chances.

[Still, it eases off as they move on and the grimace turns to a frown of thought.]

I know that some of us have powers here that we don't back home. I wonder if, maybe, she's something like that? Brought here as...an imaginary friend or something similar. Made more real by the Stuff and given powers. Or enhanced.

[He tosses his pencil down, reaching up to rub at his face.] Not that that helps. It's all just theories at the moment. We don't have much that's solid, if you forgive the phrasing.

[God, he wants Castiel. Cas could probably figure this out.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[video] [locked]

Re: [Video]

Re: [Video]

[Video]

Re: [Video]

[Video]

Re: [Video]

[Video]

Re: [Video]

[Video]

Re: [Video]

[Video]

Re: [Video]

[Video]

Re: [Video]

[Video]

Re: [Video]

Re: [Video]

[Video]

Re: [Video]

[Video]

Re: [Video]

[Video]

Re: [Video]

[Video]