GRAVEYARD

[cluedin]

THE GRAVEYARD

No two deaths are ever quite the same. Some might remember the exact moment their lives were cut short; others might only see a blinding flash of light; the particularly unlucky ones might not recall any details whatsoever.

No matter how it ended up happening, though, all of you here will always have one thing in common: one second you're dead; the next, you wake up to find yourself in a dark room. Before you can even start to try and get your bearings, a shadowy figure appears in the doorway of your room, face lit from the bottom up by a faint, almost ethereal glow. It stands still for a few seconds before murmuring,

"Oooooh... I see dead people."

... The voice is followed by a snicker as a gloved hand flicks the light switch on, revealing the mysterious entity to be Pumpkin, the fox-eared groundskeeper. Lowering the game console that had illuminated her face, she continues, "That one never gets old. Anyway, hey, sup, you're dead, that sucks, the house is probably gonna eat you as soon as this round is over. Wanna see what everyone else is up to on the other side?"

As you take in everything the gardener has told you, you suddenly realize as you look around... though you don't see anything, why does it feel like this place is already crowded?

---

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Comments

[allfornone]

That isn't much better -- either way, it sounds like the house wants our... souls trapped here. That's what you guys are, isn't it?

[Even if they're all nonchalant about it.

It's not the sense of losing time that's scary; he's not even sure what the flow of time is like anymore in the first place, and he's also not sure Nesta is the type to give up once she's gotten her claws in, so there's some weird reliability there. But. Still...]

But if you're absorbed, it's kind of weird that you're still out here running around, so I'm still not sure what the exact sense of absorbed is...

[cluedin]

You just answered your own question. We died, the house absorbed our life energy to sustain itself, and now we're stuck here for... ever, more or less. [ if he sounds a little bitter about that, well... who wouldn't, in the same situation as them? ]

[allfornone]

It's a little oxymoronic to talk about life energy as dead people...

[Now he's just quibbling around, but there is a certain amount of bitterness in his voice as well; for being here, for coming here the way he did, for everything that he was and is now. The point is, welcome to the salt mines, fam.

He shakes his head.]

... But I think I get what you mean. This must be pretty complicated if it's gone on for so long, but I don't have any intention of staying here. [he kind of sounds like he's trying to convince himself because like, death, but still] ... When we were back on the other side, there seemed to be forged letters talking about experiments done in the mansion on previous rounds. I was trying to get more information on who might be behind these, but it seems like your fellow ghosts didn't want to answer.

I don't suppose you'd have more information this time?

[cluedin]

What do you think? It's the house. It's the one messing with everybody.

[allfornone]

I was trying not to just blame the house for everything? That seems sort of lazy when we don't know much in the first place. Besides...

What about Master Blue and his staff? They have to have some role to play here.

[Or are they just like. Minions for the house. Does Master Blue is House WHAT IS THE TRUTH!!!]

[cluedin]

Yeah, well, spoilers: the house is alive. You literally can blame it.

[allfornone]

That's still not the weirdest thing that's happened to me lately... But I'd rather have someone to take out rather than something to blame.

[It's somewhere between a sigh and a mutter and a grumble.

A pause, and then he tilts his head.]

You didn't answer my question about the house's Master, though.

[cluedin]

[ he—wow, you'll never see this one coming—shrugs. ] Look, it's not like I know the guy personally. Never got the chance to meet him. (Probably a good thing, all things considered...)

[allfornone]

Does that mean... you never found out enough about him, same as the announcements...?

[Disappointing, but not surprising, probably. He's keeping an ear open to the other conversations even as the noise level rises and rises and somewhere in the background Asch is getting his skull kicked in and multiple people are congratulating their resident fork demon on the sex (or something).

Let's pretend we didn't hear that.]

Haha... What can we even do from this side?

[cluedin]

Make sure the others don't give up? I dunno. I'm not the inspirational speech kind of guy, if you haven't noticed. (Ugh. Just the idea makes me gag a little.)

[allfornone]

Right... I definitely wouldn't say I'm the inspirational speech kind of guy either. Maybe a speech in a pinch, but...

[Inspirational is for like. Protags and super cheesy people, ignoring the fact that Neku is a protag and Subete's entire canon is concentrated Cheese Whiz.]

Is what they're doing on the other side really going to do anything on this plane, though? I already know we can affect them in some ways.