[GP] All we can do is learn to swim

[st_oriedqueen]

Grief is like the ocean; it comes on waves ebbing and flowing. Sometimes the water is calm, and sometimes it is overwhelming. All we can do is learn to swim. - Vicki Harrison

"You're sure?" Regina already knew the answer but demanding that Sam tell her what she already knew satisfied something petty in her. Or maybe just something hurt that hoped he'd have a different answer than her locator spell had already provided.

"Yeah." Sam half-rolled his eyes at her as he leaned across the pink bar counter to grab bottles of beer from the Silver Bar ice bin -- probably the results of Rebekah's last work-effort at the Inn -- for himself and his newly arrived companion.

Briefly, Regina considered burning a hole in the seat of his jeans, but it wouldn't bring Rebekah or any of the absent ones back. Instead, she took refuge in straightening her A-line and walking around the stylish counter Sam lay across like he was surfing the waves of grief. She took down a bottle of pointlessly pricey champagne, and then found the precise cut-crystal glasses Rebekah and Miss Fisher had preferred for their afternoon indulgences. She poured herself a glass and one for the person who dared her openly bitter expression.

"So who all are we missing?" they both said at once, glared at each other and sighed. They both knew the answers, in their own way and for their own reasons. And neither of them wanted to say.

Rebekah Mikaelson. Henry Winchester. Jack Robinson. Phryne Fisher. Dorothy Williams. Angua von Uberwald. Jaime Vegas. Harry Dresden. Lydia Martin. Raleigh Becket. Yasmeen. Joanna Beauchamp. Constance Bonacieux D'Artagnan. Lindsey McDonald.

"Grief is like the ocean," Sam clearly quoted from some fucking where, and Regina tuned him out until he added, "All we can do is learn to swim. Rebekah told me that."

Now Regina rolled her eyes; they weren't friends. "Shut up, Sam."

Comments

[st_raighttovampire]

Caroline stalked into the bar not too much later. If she'd been a cat, her tail would have been lashing back and forth, her fur sleek and her ears laid back. She'd seen the "check out" list on the front desk and she was in need of a drink.

She didn't bother with a glass, just picked up a bottle of whiskey, the same brand the Salvatore brothers preferred in the boarding house, twisted off the top and drank deeply.

Rebekah was gone. It was fucked up to miss someone you hated.

Lindsey was gone. Caroline didn't even know how to classify the feelings she was having around that.

She grabbed another bottle for good measure and dropped into one of the pink wing-backed chairs.

[st_everybodylives]

"That is a look I think I understand." River was in another wing-backed chair not too far away, but she had tea instead of whisky.

She was very British sometimes. She would miss Henry. But of course missing people was somewhat normal for her, so she knew it would pass soon enough and he would be a pleasant memory.

"Scone?" She offered the plate to the blonde.

[st_andingtall]

As much as Sam wanted to retreat, hide, lick his wounds, there was no Rebekah to call to comfort him this time. No Henry to remind him that things often turned out different than they seemed or distract him with magic. And River would doubtless have some perfectly logical or logical-to-River reason she shouldn't leave him alone, anyway.

He caught Caroline drinking deep from a bottle of whiskey and envied her that choice. Maybe he should take a bottle and hide out in Rebekah's room. Rebekah's old room. He sighed and half-muttered, "I should know better by now," to himself.

Meeting himself halfway on the desire, he grabbed a bottle of whiskey for himself and sat near Caroline. "She never told me how you knew each other," he said, with two intentions. One, hopefully to learn more about Rebekah, another piece of her to keep close to him. Two, to see if he could satisfy his own suspicions about how they knew each other. The Inn didn't seem to do casual acquaintances.

OTA

[st_eadfast]

Ignis had no doubt that Yasmeen and Raleigh, wherever they had gone, were happier there. Yasmeen particularly had felt trapped in the Inn. It was comforting, in a way, despite the fact that she had been one of very few in the Inn he'd actually had regular conversation with. He wasn't missing her because she was dead, merely... gone.

Much easier.

The list of the missing was a long one, though, so Ignis busied himself with ensuring that there was food out for people to eat to soak up the alcohol from the likely inevitable heavy drinking. The kitchen was open as usual, but sandwiches, appetizers, and other such small items required no effort at all to get.

Re: OTA

[st_upidgravity]

Steph wasn't going to let herself too worked up over the departed guests. Presumably, they'd all gotten to go home, which was more than the rest of them could say. It sucked, because she'd liked a lot of the missing people, but it sucked only for those left behind.


So she was considerably more upbeat than the average citizen when she bopped into the kitchen. "Hey, Ignis, need any help with the food?"

Re: OTA

[st_alksthroughwalls]

It wasn't so much that Kitty and Ignis were friends as that she worked with him day in and day out and she'd grown sort of fond of him. They rarely talked except in the way that people in the restaurant and bar industry did during shifts, but she knew well enough that he'd been close with the Captain and Alcuin and he both had been very dear to Miss Fisher.

She maybe couldn't work up the energy to care about everyone (or to act on the fact she did care) but she could at least check-in on Ignis. Which began the way most of their conversations began. "Order up!"

Corbie - OTA

[st_rikingblueeyes]

It was absurd. Corbie was an adult, legally. She barely knew Joanna, and she hadn't known Harry at all. But Joanna had been such a kind, warm presence, and Harry hadn't been so bad even though he'd frightened her. She had been about to be brave enough, to scrape up her nerve and ask if he might teach her after all...

She was an adult. And yet somehow she found herself curled up against the wall and behind a chair in the lobby, sobbing like a child. She knew it was fucking stupid.

The barely healed wound of Felix and Mildmay's loss had torn wide all over again. And now she was still here and didn't know how long she would stay or where she would go if she ever left and two of the people who had offered to teach her were gone she would never, never learn to be a wizard.

Re: Corbie - OTA

[st_affandskull]

None of those who'd gone were anything more than the most casual of acquaintances to Dorian - Lindsey had pretended to know nothing about magic, and Jaime had been a charming woman, but that was all. It meant that he was largely unaffected by the air of gloom and incipient liver damage that permeated the public areas of the Inn, which was all to the good. Dorian Pavus did not have a history of handling either gloom or incipient liver damage with much dignity. He didn't disrupt the mood, either; apart from possibly Fenris, he had no enemies and wanted to keep it that way.

No, his intentions were more or less pure: collect food and drink and retreat to elsewhere before someone tried to reminisce at him. But then he heard sobbing coming from an empty chair and that was too odd not to investigate.

The solution to the mystery was nothing stranger than a young woman curled up on the floor behind the chair, weeping. He'd felt lost and despairing sobs like that himself, in the past, so rather than pass along, he took a seat in the chair she was hiding behind, offered his lemonade in the direction of the hiding-place, and said, "If misery loves company, I'll offer that as well as lemonade."

Re: Corbie - OTA

[st_oriedqueen]

Once upon a time, the sight of all this suffering would've warmed her wicked heart. She'd have chortled victoriously--

And ignored the ugly unending emptiness that no amount of suffering seemed to banish.

It wasn't once upon a time anymore and she wasn't the Evil Queen. She knew these people and cared about their suffering. She wanted to help. Even though she'd lost two of the people she'd counted dearest to her. That was definitely now and not once upon a time, but also now was that she hadn't the slightest idea how to help.

Or who would welcome it.

But as soon as she heard the sobbing, it somehow didn't matter. She turned and sought the source of the sound--

And when she'd located it, it all but broke her heart. To see Corbie, who'd comforted Rowan and so many others through these kinds of losses, broken and curled in the same position she'd coaxed so many out of.

Regina crouched, awkward in body, but for once, reasonably pure of intention, and stretched out a hand to pet the girl's hair.

Snow White - OTA

[st_arkcrowblack]

Snow was not anywhere near the hotel. Rather, she had made a point of getting entirely out of earshot of the place. Not because of the people, well. Not most of the people. But the noise she was letting out would fear the horses too much. And Mama.

Finding Lindsey was gone was... well, the feelings as far as she could tell were rather mixed. She didn't know how she was going to handle the horses all by herself, but damned if she couldn't try. Lindsey was a snake, but as there hadn't been any reason or advantage to hurting her, he had not. And he'd let her be. He was a snake, but he had not been the worst.

Yasmeen, though.

Okay, okay, the girl would tell you for free that she didn't exactly like Yasmeen and she didn't think Yasmeen really much liked her either. But they had an understanding. And the woman had been there for her when Regina was not, when she'd had horrible dreams nightly. And now she was gone.

She had grown up a little, perhaps, to know it was probably for the best.

But the noise kept coming.

Re: Snow White - OTA

[st_arknaked]

Dyson hadn't been avoiding the inn, except that he'd sort of been avoiding the inn. Giving Regina space. Giving himself space. Besides, he was as comfortable outside as he was indoors so it felt right to leave her domain to her.

The noise was distinct even in the den he'd made himself, it made his ears twitch. Something, or someone was... in pain. That was what it sounded like. He shifted back into human form, slipped into a pair of jeans and a pulled on a shirt as he loped toward the sound.

He stopped in his tracks when he saw her.

"Shit," whatever it was that inspired this, he knew it wasn't good.

Re: Snow White - OTA

[st_ingofthehundred]

Still thinking about his talk with Vex, Kash headed out away from the inn. This time, it wasn't so much a full retreat as gather and regroup. He'd try to help, but he needed to help himself first.

The howl crept across his skin, sank into his soul and stood his hair on end -- and that was when he thought it was the blonde wolf girl. When he realized it was a human sound... he wanted to bolt, to vomit, to call down flame to kill what caused the hurt.

Instead, inexplicably, he moved toward it, as if somehow he'd known... Shitdamnfuck.

"Snow?"

Re: Snow White - OTA

[st_ubby]

Half the inn seemed to be grieving over the recent disappearances – or "check-outs" but that sounded too mild for a third of the characters just being gone with no warning – and while Vex was blessed to still have those she cared about most still here, not being able to do anything to help the others was getting stifling. So after running into Kash, she'd decided to take Trinket out for a ramble-slash-hunt.

They'd wandered far from the worn hiking trails following a rabbit track when suddenly a sound broke through that made Trinket growl and Vex nock an arrow before either of them realized they were doing it. On the broom Vex was as fast as Trinket, and they took off toward the sound at full speed. She was too far from the inn to send a Jenga over the earrings, but it didn't occur to her to do it anyway.

Vex and Trinket both drew up short when they came across the source of the sound rather than barrel into Snow when she might not even notice them in her anguish. Trinket sniffed the air for signs of anyone or anything else, muscles all bunched for an attack, and Vex scanned the area around them, but there was no one.

"Snow?" she said softly, not knowing whether the girl would hear but wanting to give some warning as Trinket lumbered up and flopped down beside Snow. He really was such a good bear.

[st_arkunderitall]

Sansa could have stayed at the hotel but, ultimately, chose not to. While she would have recognized the names of the people who had disappeared, she hadn't known them. Anyone that she might know a little was still around or so she hoped. There was one person that she hadn't spotted as of yet so far and it made her worry.

So she left the hotel in search of Snow, a concerned expression resting on her features as she tried the most random spots she could think of in hopes of finding the other young woman.

Finally, it was the noise the caught her attention and gave her pause. With a frown, she followed it until she found the source. There was a brief sense of relief but it was quickly replaced by concern as she took a tentative step forward. "Snow?"

Tag Sam

[st_makemeastone]

She waited until the woman left him alone at the bar before she slipped onto the stool next to him like a silent wraith.

He may not even have realized she was there until she patted him awkwardly on the shoulder. She couldn't tell, the grief and pain in the place was too thick for her to get more specific.

It felt sticky, thick and she didn't like it. It was all over her skin.

He would need to feel better. So would the others but he was slightly more important.

Re: Tag Sam

[st_andingtall]

Sam did notice when River sat next to him. Only because years of training made it impossible not to notice when anything came close to him. But he didn't care until the thing next to him touched him.

He'd have jumped, but the Inn wasn't exactly a dangerous place. So he turned to look, instead, prepared to glare--and then found River.

"Sorry. I know it must be really loud right now."

Tag Butters, others by arrangement

[st_alksthroughwalls]

First Lara. Now Henry.

You'd think with the life she'd lived, Kitty would be used to it. Losing people.

Maybe she was. She was used to the anger and hurt and fear and, more than that, she was used to the pure, blind rage at being absolutely powerless against it. She could walk through a wall, short circuit a spaceship by plunging her fingers into its computer console, but she couldn't keep a human from disappearing from a space roughly the size of her high school.

Or maybe the rage was an excuse. For not wanting to care. That had always been Jean and Ororo's job. Even Moonstar's. Not hers.

And when she looked out across the bar at all the grieving like walking wounded, she didn't feel compassion. She felt...tired.

"I'm a terrible person," she mumbled to herself and went back to tending bar. In that capacity, she could be friendly, express concern, lend a listening ear. No one expected her to come across the bar with hugs and handkerchiefs, and certainly not with answers.

Re: Tag Butters, others by arrangement

[st_rutsthepolka]

"Nah. Alcohol is a public service." Butters wasn't in as much of a funk as he thought maybe he should have been. After all, he'd lost Harry before, and, y'know, a checkout notice at the front desk was a lot better than a bloody crime scene and a silent lake. Harry was probably home, and Chicago needed Harry Dresden more than Butters did. So he managed a weak smile as he met Kitty's eyes. "Terrible people would be hoarding it, not handing it out."

Tag Kitty

[st_everybodylives]

"That makes two of us," River slid a glass across the bar for a refill - she'd moved on from tea. The grief so evident in others was likely not even a flicker on her. Sure she would miss some of those who had gone, but she'd felt grief so deep it had almost stopped time.

She would be fine.

"I have an excuse being raised as a single minded psychopathic assassin will do that to a girl. What's your reason?"

Tag Vex, others by arrangement

[st_ingofthehundred]

Nothing in his training or his temperament prepared Kash for the mass misery over the check-out list. If people had been bleeding and dying, weeping over the wounded and the lost, then he might have been able to do something about it.

But this? What was there to heal? Who was there to sort, assist, find?

Kash knew when he was beaten. A dragon? Two fire giants? No problem. But he took one look in the bar and then turned around and walked away.

Re: Tag Vex, others by arrangement

[st_ubby]

Vex was on her way to the cafe to maybe see what magic Ignis had gotten up to in the kitchen today when she saw Kash walking away, the set of his shoulders and tightness of his jaw radiating do not want. Okay, so that wasn't an entirely uncommon reaction from the good Brother Kashaw, but it did make Vex curious.

She angled her path to meet his and fell in step alongside him. "So. Where are we going?"

Molly OTA

[st_eampunk]

Molly hadn't thought anything about not seeing Harry on their normal boundary walk to find gaps in whatever was keeping them in. She just figured he was with Jaime and while Molly had mixed emotions with that, would always have mixed emotions with anyone with Harry (even Karrin), she was 90% happy for him.

When she entered the bar area, the unexpected emotions hit her like a wave and Molly stumbled in response. The shield quickly went up stronger and her own emotions shut down as not to be drawn in. But something niggled at her, to check it out. Rather than go in and trust that she wouldn't succumb to the emotions suppressed or displayed there, Molly went over to the front desk. That was where Fate kicked her in the teeth again. Harry was gone. Jaime was gone. They left together, she should be happy they did, right? Yeah, not so much.

The hotel and the emotions flowing in her and those around her were swirling tighter and tighter. It felt like the walls were closing in and she had to get the hell out before the ugly dark monster clawed its way to the surface and she'd do something that she'd regret. Like tip toe not so gently through the man behind the counter's mind to find out what really happened to Harry.

Molly headed for the hills, literally. If she was going to explode it would be best not to be in a populated area. Once she'd reached far enough away, she let her emotions flow freely.

With a snap her voice, she yelled, "dispertius" and a gaping hole appeared at her feet as the earth opened up. Since that was vaguely satisfying, she yelled it again. It felt good to direct the rage at something even if it was at the ground at her feet and not the hotel itself.

Re: Molly OTA

[st_accato]

Buffy paused in her jogging as her 'spidey sense' was going off and she couldn't figure out why. There wasn't anyone around and as far as she knew, there weren't vampires nearby either. Plus daylight and everyone knew that vampires went poof in daylight. You never ignored the Slayer tingling, that was a fact that she'd learned the hard way, so she went back to jogging but in the direction that her instincts sent her.

When she got closer, she saw a girl in the distance, not much older than her yelling. When Buffy took a step closer she faltered with impact of the ground giving way. "Woah, so not of the good." Buffy's pace picked up, "uh hey, everything okay?"

Clearly it wasn't, Buffy wasn't stupid but she hoped the sound of her voice would distract - was that Molly? Oh man, really not of the good. They'd met a few times "patrolling" and around the hotel with Jane, but they weren't close. She had a respect for her magic and now Buffy had a respect with her temper.

[st_artrekodo]

Odo was usually quite a broody person, he admitted to that, and was known to be at times something of a buzz killer, draining the life out of a party if the noise exceeded the regulation or if there was a chance to catch a petty criminal, were it the DJ. Yet today, it was a bit of the other way around. So many long faces, gloomy people mourning the departed... Odo was rather cheerful, for once. He tried not to smile too openly, but he felt so relieved to know that, after all, there was a way out of this dimensional trap! Granted, he didn't know yet most of the people who disappeared, and the few he did know he was sorry to lose, but he was happy for them. They were out at last, and with any luck, back to their own universe. And if not, at least, they had a change of scenery.

[st_rongheart]

"I wish I knew how," Sora confided, mostly randomly, in the melted-face man. He was one of the few people who didn't look especially sad, and Sora knew he was focusing on the wrong parts of this whole thing for most people. But people disappearing meant it was possible to leave. Someday, sometime. "I mean, I'm not worried or anything. But this is pretty much the longest time I've spent on any world in a while."

Closed to Kitty

[st_arkintern]

Things were weird.

Not the sort of weird that Peter Parker was getting accustomed to. The kind of weird where people from all over the place just sort-of showed up here out of nowhere. Or the kind of weird that resulted in baby animals suddenly appearing and then disappearing just as quickly. This was the kind of weird that he didn't like. The sort of weird that was firmly rooted in reality. The kind of weird he'd experienced first with his parents when he was very small, and then again, with Uncle Ben when he was older.

Loss. That was the sort of weird Peter was sure he was never going to get used to.

But there were some things he was used to now. He'd been uneasy about going into the bar his first day here, even with Butters' encouragement, but now, it came easy to him. Walking with the same casual ease as he did when walking to the school cafeteria, he finds a stool at the bar, and takes a seat. There seems to be more people here than usual. Peter's not entirely sure how he feels about it. But today, it does appear to be staffed.

"Uh, excuse me," Peter says, hoping he's not interrupting the bartender from anything too important. "Can I have a coke, please?"

Re: Closed to Kitty

[st_alksthroughwalls]

The number of people who ordered anything but alcohol was non-zero but otherwise negligible, and, in that sense, it was significant. It drew Kitty out of her internal montage and back into the world, in much the same manner as she materialized when she phased back into solid matter.

She blinked briefly as though adjusting her eyes to sight again, tilted her head, and then smiled--not automatically, but genuinely, at the teenager sitting on her bar stool.

"Sure thing. You can have something stronger if you want. No one cares, since there's no drinking age in half the worlds people are from," she said, but didn't let it stop her from filling up a tall glass from the soda gun for him.

"We haven't met yet." Which was also significant. Kitty knew everyone. "I'm Kitty."

Tag Regina

[st_arknaked]

He didn't run back to the inn after talking to Snow, but he didn't take his time either, and once there he went looking until he finally located Regina in the Silver Bar.

He didn't approach, just followed her with his eyes trying to determine how she was, and waiting for her to notice him.

Re: Tag Regina

[st_oriedqueen]

Even now, it never took long for Regina to sense Dyson's presence nearby. The weight of the air changed. She turned from the conversation she wasn't really having with Kitty anyway, and let her gaze rest on him, look him over, see that he was still here and reasonably well.

Since the day she'd stopped raging about him breaking things off, she'd spent much of her magical study time focused on a single problem--his. Not because she wanted him back, although she did. But because she couldn't bring Graham back and she couldn't keep Dyson here, but she could, just maybe, give Dyson something more important than the love he didn't want from her. Something that she could live with when he, also, disappeared.

All of that was in her eyes now, at least, for someone like Dyson who knew how to look. To see beyond the prideful stiffening of her shoulders and lift of her chin as she blinked slowly and turned her gaze away. She wanted him so badly, even just to talk for a few minutes, but she was too proud and too afraid (still, even after Robin) to ask.