[Right, his sense of smell always has been quite acute, as Natsuno had mentioned in the past himself. But, there wasn't even a glimpse had of anyone else in the hall when he arrived, it seems...not good. The culprit's still out there somewhere, now? Another possessed? --This looks like some sort of knife wound--
The thoughts are rushing at a mile a minute. Jade presses the folded gloves more firmly to Rita's neck, as crimson blooms through teal fabric, seeing and yet not seeing the blood at her lips and the utter lack of breath all at once--but Natsuno's words earn a sharp glance up, to where he is at the doorway.]
--The verdict will be certain if Tear cannot render any aid herself. But time is of the essence. [...Natsuno does sound strained. His expression is somber. Yet something nags, indistinct, at the very back of Jade's head. Something about...the lack of overt action, beyond the sending of a text. Which is perhaps a rather irrational thing to fixate on about now, tangled alongside a similarly irrational flicker of frustration to accompany it. When Jade had found Clarke Griffin bleeding out in 109 those weeks ago, Natsuno had been tense--speaking far more than normal--desperate to know what could be done and what ought to be done, to help--yet here...
...Granted, Clarke was not yet an entirely lost cause. And Jade knows, after all, that Natsuno is likely right in what he doesn't quite manage to say. There's little actual sensible fault, in such acceptance. Yet, far less sensibly, the fact that he's giving up already even despite the highly narrow chance of healing doing some good, is. Something, ever so slightly discordant. But.
Rita's body is still warm before him. Thoughts don't want to settle straight. Everything feels unsettled--ringing, persistent, is a sharp memory of how he'd once promised Flynn Scifo he'd never let this happen to Rita again, not under his own watch--not practically outside his own door--
Steady breathing. Focus--check for a pulse, even if there isn't one. Natsuno departing for Tear's cabin is registered from periphery, if he does go. (Surely he'll be cautious, alert and quick. Surely his steps might still have haste to them...do they?)]
Edited (actually let's punch up this metatext even more ) 2022-10-20 17:06 (UTC)
[Blissfully unaware of the cogs turning in Jade's head, Notsuno nods grimly and runs to cabin 106. Perhaps Jade can even hear his fist going BAM BAM BAM against the door and the yells of "TEAR!"
He sounds properly stressed, at least. Good thing he has the invitation excuse as to why he doesn't kick down the door.
Now where is Torn, really? A few more moments of unanswered knocks and he will have to go look for her...]
[ and follows natsuno to the cabin, where she gives jade a stiff nod of acknowledgement, mouth set in a tight line. there's a lot of thoughts buzzing through her head right now, wondering if the colonel will find her outfit change out of place -- wondering if she'll be able to sell this at all.
it was time to get serious.
she makes her way over to the body, and crouches down next to rita, pressing her fingers to the girl's throat to check for a sign of a pulse. her long, dark hair falls in a curtain around her and the other young girl, shrouding them from view. ]
She isn't breathing ... She has no pulse.
[ she sits back after she says this, her head remaining low, eyes locked on rita's motionless body. ]
I can't find any vitals. I think she's already gone ... I don't think there's anything I can do. When did you find her? If only I'd been called earlier...
[ she sighs heavily, keeping her expression hidden behind tear's hair.
what she says is true though: as powerful as tear is as a healer, the ghost was one too (somewhat). she knows just as well as tear herself would that you can't actually bring back the dead. ]
[Natsuno's departing steps are hasty indeed, in the end, and the more distant sounds of door-knocking and name-calling register vaguely. ...It's at least expected enough, all of that. Tear's voice is even slightly audible, through the open doorway--even if it still isn't nearly enough, to ease the icy thing already coiling and settling in his own chest, a terrible weight. Jade's still holding the makeshift compress to Rita's neck, when the sound of several steps signals Natsuno's return, alongside Tear's arrival. Though, looking up--
The sight of her can't help but bring some pause, in another way that has nothing to really do with relief. Because that's certainly not the Locrian Sergeant's uniform she usually wears, in the least. Clearly something from the Tommy Bahama, before its theme-change earlier in the month. ...He knows she makes use of bed wear when possible, countless past shared inn stays dictating as much, but it's not even very late in the evening at all right now, and...
She's drawing forward, and crouching down beside Rita, and Jade slowly straightens away to give her that space, release the makeshift compress for Tear to take up.
She never does actually take it up.
--Again, the matter that sticks. The acceptance of it all. Even more jarring now than it was coming from Natsuno. It's entirely reasonable in a vacuum, and that's the most terrible part...the chances of saving Rita were minuscule even before Jade arrived, and such chances now practically dwindle to nothing in the time that slips by and the blood that now completely soaks his gloves. And yet, and yet--even setting that aside. (Painful as it is, to set that aside...) This...is not occurring in a vacuum at all either, is it?
It's occurring here--in the words coming out of Tear's mouth, and the way she sits back and simply stares at Rita's body. Expression hidden by her hair, yes, but there's the tone in her voice...and the way her hand never even raises to take the compress--]
...Yuuki found her several minutes ago. The wound cannot be older than a half hour, in itself. This is the earliest you could be called.
[When has Tear ever so indirectly laid such guilt, about not being called earlier? In the past there has been regret, at times, at being unable to arrive sooner...but...]
You think-- ["Think."] --that there's nothing you can do? You're not certain?
[She's never minced words about a lost cause.
If she's uncertain, why isn't she trying?
If she were uncertain, she would already be casting.
Jade's straightening slowly himself, now, watching Tear where she's knelt beside him. Natsuno's presence is still an awareness, off to the side, but this...
Perhaps it's he himself that's compromised. Perhaps he's questioning what he shouldn't. Things feel far away and unbearably close, all at once, and Rita's small prone frame even out of focus continues driving something terrible and painful into his chest. Yet still, in his head, something else is stirring too--something he hardly wants to look at, for all that it's already sending a new sort of prickling chill down the back of his neck. (Wait, hold, not yet. Hear Tear's answer. And hope, hope, that there might at least be something familiar there--)]
[ she lifts her gaze to meet his eyes now, and there's something of a sense of anger there: at being pressured like this by him, at being so heavily scrutinized.
but also, because he was denying something that was an actual truth -- something beyond her fault, her control, at least. no healer can bring the dead back to life. after everything, a necromancer should know that.
for a moment she doesn't speak, not until the anger wanes into a more resigned sort of sigh, a slight softening of her features.
of course he would be upset. his friend did just die ... she can sympathize with that. ]
I can't raise the dead... So yes, I don't think there's anything more that I can do for her. I'm sorry, to both you and to Yuuki. But there really isn't anything I can do. I just ... I wish I could have gotten here sooner.
[ her hands twine in her lap, as she overlooks rita's body again. she still thinks that it's a shame -- the magic this body can use would have been really useful. she already knows some people are pissed about her throwing away that opportunity, too ...
[Shit. He doesn't like Jade's tone and Torn is losing patience. Which is understandable, considering she had to come back to the murder scene and the old fart is being too clever for his own good. If this doesn't de-escalate soon, they will have to resort to double homicide. Jade is focused on Torn - one supernaturally enhanced lunge, blow to the head to disorient, grab the arm before he can conjure up that spear or finish an incantation and bite. Then, finish him off while he's docile.
Ugh, he wishes he could just take Colonel Douche out. But now's not the time. He deserves a fucking reward for being so good.]
You shouldn't fight over this.
[That's something Natsuno would say, right? Very rational kid.]
[Oh, most certainly...as an attempted necromancer, and as someone thoroughly familiar, with the seventh fonon and its immediate limits...Jade knows quite well, that even a melodist at Tear's level cannot resurrect the dead. That any chance to save Rita has already likely been lost, in the too-late timing of the discovery. That's sensible--no matter how terrible--and Jade is hardly one to often go into denial about such hard truths, these days.
But that isn't the problem.
It's a brief thing, that flickers in Tear's eyes and colors her tone, in the immediate wake of that pressure applied. It fades soon afterwards, and the words she speaks with more sympathy afterwards settle back well enough into an expected sort of frame. But that smothered anger...it's noted, all the same, in the time it takes for her to sigh it back out.
Frustration of this brand is not an expression that Tear often wears.
It isn't...something she would wear here and now, even briefly, in a circumstance like this.
The realization is a naked knife's blade with no hilt; the harder it's grasped, the more it hurts, and bleeds. ...The temptation remains, not to take hold of it at all. To set it aside and chalk it up to the chaos of processing all this. But...he can't, can he? It's too late. When the steel trap of his head is already snapped upon it, the idea bringing about an entirely new and nearly sickening sort of dread.
He could say something, right here, right now. A reaction to an accusation would surely be most telling. But--Natsuno--is still present, as well. A voice in rational tone that speaks, from behind his back. If he's--surely he couldn't be--but if he is...
(And even besides that. There's another thought, quiet and painful, that says: Not more death right over Rita's body, at least put the poor girl to rest--)
The window of eye contact is brief, but Jade stares back at Tear for the long moment in which it's held, expression entirely blank of any emotion at all. ...Then she looks away, and Jade does as well--his own glance, too, dropping back down to Rita.]
...You're right, of course. My apologies. I had hoped--no. ...It does seem...we cannot do anything for her now.
[His tone, too, empty enough of feeling to be hollow. The tension in it earlier seemingly draining. .....Certainly an easy enough thing to invoke, as approximately close to the truth that it sits to the thing knotting horribly in his chest. This is a close friend that has just died, after all, and surely even Jade Curtiss isn't entirely immune to moments of distressed denial on occasion...
A quiet breath is taken, and then Jade's slowly drawing himself to his feet, head turning to take in the rest of the room in a detached sort of fashion.]
The culprit is indeed still at large right now. There may well be another death soon, if we cannot solve what's transpired here. Before Miss Friday arrives...I should contact Palamedes... [A beat.] Do you know of anyone who might have recently passed through the cabin halls, Tear?
[ the first thing she'd done was strip off the drab, brown dress her host always wears: tearing off the gloves and the long stockings, the garterbelt -- all of it, and throwing it under the cabin's bed. she'd have to rush to the laundry later, to get rid of all the stains.
thankfully, her host was at least some kind of military person, a soldier or whatever, and would have the memories to be able to do it.
she pulls a long, dark dress from tear's closet to wear instead, wondering just why this girl wastes her looks with such boring clothes. were these colours all she wore? what's up with that?
everything was dark and overly-modest ... stuff that a total grandma would wear.
she jumps out of her skin the second her phone chimes with a new message, not having expected for rita to be found so quickly--
although the shock dies down when she sees its from "natsuno". from the way he's wording it, people probably aren't looking over his shoulder or anything right? ]
do you think i should go? or should i just stay here?
[ right now, she thinks it might be better to hand off the responsibility to someone who was a better planner. unfortunately, she'd always been pretty reactive. passionate, and blunt. it's a lot easier to compose herself if she's just following the directions of someone else. ]
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no subject
The thoughts are rushing at a mile a minute. Jade presses the folded gloves more firmly to Rita's neck, as crimson blooms through teal fabric, seeing and yet not seeing the blood at her lips and the utter lack of breath all at once--but Natsuno's words earn a sharp glance up, to where he is at the doorway.]
--The verdict will be certain if Tear cannot render any aid herself. But time is of the essence. [...Natsuno does sound strained. His expression is somber. Yet something nags, indistinct, at the very back of Jade's head. Something about...the lack of overt action, beyond the sending of a text. Which is perhaps a rather irrational thing to fixate on about now, tangled alongside a similarly irrational flicker of frustration to accompany it. When Jade had found Clarke Griffin bleeding out in 109 those weeks ago, Natsuno had been tense--speaking far more than normal--desperate to know what could be done and what ought to be done, to help--yet here...
...Granted, Clarke was not yet an entirely lost cause. And Jade knows, after all, that Natsuno is likely right in what he doesn't quite manage to say. There's little actual sensible fault, in such acceptance. Yet, far less sensibly, the fact that he's giving up already even despite the highly narrow chance of healing doing some good, is. Something, ever so slightly discordant. But.
Rita's body is still warm before him. Thoughts don't want to settle straight. Everything feels unsettled--ringing, persistent, is a sharp memory of how he'd once promised Flynn Scifo he'd never let this happen to Rita again, not under his own watch--not practically outside his own door--
Steady breathing. Focus--check for a pulse, even if there isn't one. Natsuno departing for Tear's cabin is registered from periphery, if he does go. (Surely he'll be cautious, alert and quick. Surely his steps might still have haste to them...do they?)]
how dare you call him out on this obvious fuck-up
He sounds properly stressed, at least. Good thing he has the invitation excuse as to why he doesn't kick down the door.
Now where is Torn, really? A few more moments of unanswered knocks and he will have to go look for her...]
no subject
okay, she guesses all that knocking is her answer.
no text back needed, huh?
she hesitates on opening the door, wondering if she
can manage to keep composure right now.
is it better to let him have to go and look for her?
would that nasty old colonel show up to try and
look if "natsuno" left?
auugh, why did killing people have to be so stressful??
eventually she does open the door, her heart beating like crazy
in her ears. ]
Y-yes? What's all this noise about?
no subject
Just don't heal her!
[Then, louder:]
Rita's hurt - come on -
[Convince the old man it's hopeless, then get the hell out of sight with an excuse of "investigation" or "emo teen needs alone time."]
no subject
R-right ...
[ and follows natsuno to the cabin, where she gives jade a stiff
nod of acknowledgement, mouth set in a tight line. there's a lot of
thoughts buzzing through her head right now, wondering if the
colonel will find her outfit change out of place --
wondering if she'll be able to sell this at all.
it was time to get serious.
she makes her way over to the body, and crouches down next to rita,
pressing her fingers to the girl's throat to check for a sign of
a pulse. her long, dark hair falls in a curtain around her and
the other young girl, shrouding them from view. ]
She isn't breathing ... She has no pulse.
[ she sits back after she says this, her head remaining low,
eyes locked on rita's motionless body. ]
I can't find any vitals. I think she's already gone ...
I don't think there's anything I can do. When did you find her?
If only I'd been called earlier...
[ she sighs heavily, keeping her expression hidden behind
tear's hair.
what she says is true though: as powerful as tear is as a healer,
the ghost was one too (somewhat). she knows just as well as tear herself
would that you can't actually bring back the dead. ]
no subject
The sight of her can't help but bring some pause, in another way that has nothing to really do with relief. Because that's certainly not the Locrian Sergeant's uniform she usually wears, in the least. Clearly something from the Tommy Bahama, before its theme-change earlier in the month. ...He knows she makes use of bed wear when possible, countless past shared inn stays dictating as much, but it's not even very late in the evening at all right now, and...
She's drawing forward, and crouching down beside Rita, and Jade slowly straightens away to give her that space, release the makeshift compress for Tear to take up.
She never does actually take it up.
--Again, the matter that sticks. The acceptance of it all. Even more jarring now than it was coming from Natsuno. It's entirely reasonable in a vacuum, and that's the most terrible part...the chances of saving Rita were minuscule even before Jade arrived, and such chances now practically dwindle to nothing in the time that slips by and the blood that now completely soaks his gloves. And yet, and yet--even setting that aside. (Painful as it is, to set that aside...) This...is not occurring in a vacuum at all either, is it?
It's occurring here--in the words coming out of Tear's mouth, and the way she sits back and simply stares at Rita's body. Expression hidden by her hair, yes, but there's the tone in her voice...and the way her hand never even raises to take the compress--]
...Yuuki found her several minutes ago. The wound cannot be older than a half hour, in itself. This is the earliest you could be called.
[When has Tear ever so indirectly laid such guilt, about not being called earlier? In the past there has been regret, at times, at being unable to arrive sooner...but...]
You think-- ["Think."] --that there's nothing you can do? You're not certain?
[She's never minced words about a lost cause.
If she's uncertain, why isn't she trying?
If she were uncertain, she would already be casting.
Jade's straightening slowly himself, now, watching Tear where she's knelt beside him. Natsuno's presence is still an awareness, off to the side, but this...
Perhaps it's he himself that's compromised. Perhaps he's questioning what he shouldn't. Things feel far away and unbearably close, all at once, and Rita's small prone frame even out of focus continues driving something terrible and painful into his chest. Yet still, in his head, something else is stirring too--something he hardly wants to look at, for all that it's already sending a new sort of prickling chill down the back of his neck. (Wait, hold, not yet. Hear Tear's answer. And hope, hope, that there might at least be something familiar there--)]
no subject
Colonel... The body is already cold.
[ she lifts her gaze to meet his eyes now, and there's something
of a sense of anger there: at being pressured like this by him, at being
so heavily scrutinized.
but also, because he was denying something that was an actual truth --
something beyond her fault, her control, at least. no healer can bring
the dead back to life. after everything, a necromancer should
know that.
for a moment she doesn't speak, not until the anger wanes into a more
resigned sort of sigh, a slight softening of her features.
of course he would be upset. his friend did just die ...
she can sympathize with that. ]
I can't raise the dead... So yes, I don't think there's anything
more that I can do for her. I'm sorry, to both you and to Yuuki.
But there really isn't anything I can do. I just ... I wish I could have
gotten here sooner.
[ her hands twine in her lap, as she overlooks rita's body again.
she still thinks that it's a shame -- the magic this body can use would
have been really useful. she already knows some people are pissed about
her throwing away that opportunity, too ...
but what's done is done. ]
no subject
Ugh, he wishes he could just take Colonel Douche out. But now's not the time. He deserves a fucking reward for being so good.]
You shouldn't fight over this.
[That's something Natsuno would say, right? Very rational kid.]
We need to find out who did it.
no subject
But that isn't the problem.
It's a brief thing, that flickers in Tear's eyes and colors her tone, in the immediate wake of that pressure applied. It fades soon afterwards, and the words she speaks with more sympathy afterwards settle back well enough into an expected sort of frame. But that smothered anger...it's noted, all the same, in the time it takes for her to sigh it back out.
Frustration of this brand is not an expression that Tear often wears.
It isn't...something she would wear here and now, even briefly, in a circumstance like this.
The realization is a naked knife's blade with no hilt; the harder it's grasped, the more it hurts, and bleeds. ...The temptation remains, not to take hold of it at all. To set it aside and chalk it up to the chaos of processing all this. But...he can't, can he? It's too late. When the steel trap of his head is already snapped upon it, the idea bringing about an entirely new and nearly sickening sort of dread.
He could say something, right here, right now. A reaction to an accusation would surely be most telling. But--Natsuno--is still present, as well. A voice in rational tone that speaks, from behind his back. If he's--surely he couldn't be--but if he is...
(And even besides that. There's another thought, quiet and painful, that says: Not more death right over Rita's body, at least put the poor girl to rest--)
The window of eye contact is brief, but Jade stares back at Tear for the long moment in which it's held, expression entirely blank of any emotion at all. ...Then she looks away, and Jade does as well--his own glance, too, dropping back down to Rita.]
...You're right, of course. My apologies. I had hoped--no. ...It does seem...we cannot do anything for her now.
[His tone, too, empty enough of feeling to be hollow. The tension in it earlier seemingly draining. .....Certainly an easy enough thing to invoke, as approximately close to the truth that it sits to the thing knotting horribly in his chest. This is a close friend that has just died, after all, and surely even Jade Curtiss isn't entirely immune to moments of distressed denial on occasion...
A quiet breath is taken, and then Jade's slowly drawing himself to his feet, head turning to take in the rest of the room in a detached sort of fashion.]
The culprit is indeed still at large right now. There may well be another death soon, if we cannot solve what's transpired here. Before Miss Friday arrives...I should contact Palamedes... [A beat.] Do you know of anyone who might have recently passed through the cabin halls, Tear?
no subject
[ the first thing she'd done was strip off the drab,
brown dress her host always wears: tearing off the gloves and
the long stockings, the garterbelt -- all of it, and throwing it
under the cabin's bed. she'd have to rush to the laundry later,
to get rid of all the stains.
thankfully, her host was at least some kind of military person,
a soldier or whatever, and would have the memories to be able to
do it.
she pulls a long, dark dress from tear's closet to wear instead,
wondering just why this girl wastes her looks with such
boring clothes. were these colours all she wore? what's up with that?
everything was dark and overly-modest ... stuff that a total
grandma would wear.
she jumps out of her skin the second her phone chimes with a new
message, not having expected for rita to be found so quickly--
although the shock dies down when she sees its from "natsuno".
from the way he's wording it, people probably aren't looking over his
shoulder or anything right? ]
do you think i should go?
or should i just stay here?
[ right now, she thinks it might be better to hand off the
responsibility to someone who was a better planner. unfortunately,
she'd always been pretty reactive. passionate, and
blunt. it's a lot easier to compose herself if she's just
following the directions of someone else. ]