singillatim | 🎵whistle while you work🎶(closed)

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🎵whistle while you work🎶(closed)

Who: A. Rama Raju, Lanfear, William Gibson, Renny Oldoak
What: wilderness chore bonding time!
When: I'm thinking some time after the ghostly housefire, but it's loose
Where: the forest around Milton

Content Warnings: talk about food/eating/not eating, possible talk of fire stuff. will add as stuff comes up

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It's impossible to pick the worst thing about being trapped here. He has a list, and it rotates. The worst of it, for now: the restlessness, the need to move and do inside of him that's supposed to be turned to running a track, or punching a bag, or weights, or anything to ease it enough to leave him tired. His shoes, even with a couple nails he's managed to find small enough to hammer into his heels, don't get enough traction on the snow to run for long, not unless he wants to be cold, restless and wet on top of it, and nothing he's seen here was made for training in the way he's used to.

Finding firewood isn't quite enough. Splitting it doesn't take up enough of the task. For all he'd mocked the man he'd found cutting wood that was green and new instead of dry and old, he's been tempted himself, if only it would last long enough to make him sweat. Maybe another day. For now, making sure his hands and feet don't slip on the snow-slick branches as he makes his way up this tree takes enough concentration that it will almost do.

The gloves, treasured but not so good at holding a grip, are tucked inside a pocket he's sewn inside the blanket wrapped and tied around him. It's a good day for going barehanded, by the standards of this place; the snow on his fingers is only cold enough to hurt a little. He makes his way, bit by bit, up toward a dead branch caught in the canopy, the excuse he's found for climbing this way, climbs far enough to grasp one end of it, gives a tug—

And only realises he should have looked down after that branch tugs the ones it's caught on, and the lot of them dump their accumulated snow onto whatever might be below. If it's a person, hopefully they're out of the way; otherwise Raju might have some apologising to do.

Foraging, Raju's found, is best done when hungry. It makes it feel important, worth keeping his attention on the task. Tins of beans and old vegetables would do well enough if he wasn't so aware that the only stock they have comes from what stores this little town had before all life in it had ended, and that those living here now had been into those stores for a couple months before he... arrived, and that he's been here months after that. There's been no progress at all in figuring out how to go back to a place which, if not home, at least needs him there and makes sense, and in the mean time canned food isn't going to last forever.

He's found traps here and there in the forest which must be meant for rabbits or whatever else it is that manages to keep living here, and studied their construction, and thinks he might be able to try, at least, to figure out how to use one himself, but... another day. Later. For now he makes his way through the forest, the hint of hunger helping keep his gaze sharp, even while part of him is caught up with thoughts of things that he can't have.

How full Raju's pantry had been, after Akhtar. How empty it had been before. Sleeves rolled up against the heat taken for granted, the glare of a bright sun and open sky, the living murmur of so many other people around looking to buy something themselves, the dust kicked up by so many feet. His friend buying vegetables and fruits and the tragic face he makes when Raju says he won't pick any, that anything they buy is so Akhtar will have something he likes to eat whenever he comes to visit, that it doesn't matter what because Raju would eat anything.

How dim the sun always is, here. How quiet and cold it is, walking through the trees and the snow alone.

But it's for the best. It would be worse, wouldn't it, if a man with a family who needed him was trapped in this place too. And Raju was always going to have to leave the city behind and the idea of Raju-the-student and Raju-the-friend behind him with it, anyway.

Raju's gaze is sharp, but only enough to catch on things he might be able to eat; he realises his mistake, how distracted he'd been, when he notices near too late a form in front of him, an odd log or rock, or maybe a person hunched over. He tries to move around it but no matter how nimble he is his shoes don't always have the traction on the snow that he wants, and whether it works will have to be left up to fate.

Renny's unaccustomed to remaining in one place for too long. Even when their finances stabilized, he and his sister would spend afternoons combing over requests from the Adventurer's Guild and marking rumors on maps. But Milton's different. It's a remote village rendered barren under mysterious circumstances, its secrets buried beneath ice and snow. There is no guild to turn to for direction, no ever-encroaching danger spurring frantic treks, no bustle and clamor of a port city. This plane's wilderness is a freezing grave - and the days stretch, ballooned by worries about home, about his friends and family, about what the next step should be.

He's still learning about the strange nuances of this plane. There's so many things similar to Faerûn - the humans, the fauna and the flora - but the differences are what he occupies himself with. If he's to make any progress in discovering a way back home, Renny has to first learn what he doesn't know. And to do that, he needs to survive long enough. Therefore: he needs to figure out his food situation, sooner rather than later. No adventurer can continue without knowing where to gather their rations.

His childhood growing up in an apothecary serves him well, even here. There are some plants he recognizes, to his delight - lichens and mosses, the fir trees bent underneath the snowfall - but there are even more that are a mystery. In the afternoons, Renny goes foraging, careful to pick plants with gloved hands. He's examining a particularly leafy find (curious, its shape reminds him of mothers'leaf) when he picks up movement out of the corner of his eye.

Immediately, Renny straightens up. An animal passing by? No, he catches sight of someone trying to go around and grins.

"Hello!" he calls out, being loud on purpose. All the people he's met so far have been friendly. He has confidence that, if anyone meant ill-will, he would have been attacked by now. "Don't be a stranger, come on over."

Raju's head snaps around toward the voice and he stares, half in surprise, half in blank denial. If he's going to trip over nothing in the middle of the forest where no one lives, someone can't be here at exactly the right time and place to see. It's bad enough with Akhtar, who seems to know the forest the same way Raju knows the city, where Raju isn't stubbing his toes tripping over roots, or stumbling over nothing at all.

It's only that walking idly, looking for whatever plants still grow in this frozen place, is so slow. But he has to pay attention.

Nevermind. There's nothing for it now. Raju puts on a quick, tight smile, certainly not embarrassed as he makes his way over and stands looking down at the man, hands in pockets. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to disturb you. I was..." Looking for food? Not if he doesn't have anything to show for it. Trying and failing, he might as well have been taking an awful stroll in the awful chill here through the awful snow. "...only passing through."

Still, he isn't in much of a hurry to move on; the inside of the Community Hall is just as boring as the outside is cold. He cranes his neck instead, tilting his head to try and get a better look at whatever's held in the man's hands.

That Raju had tripped isn't something Renny comments on. Company makes everything better, as far as he's concerned. A stranger's a potential ally and friend - and if not, then they'd still make for a decent story. He stands up, three feet tall, having to crane his head to properly make eye contact with the newcomer, but he doesn't seem bothered by it. There's so many taller races scattered throughout Toril that you got used to talking to them like this.

"Disturb me?" Renny chuckles. He waves his free hand, the other still holding onto the mysterious plant. "Nature doesn't belong to anyone, much less me. Are you like me?"

Ah. He should clarify.

"An Interloper?"

"Ah." It took him a moment to remember what the term means, here. It isn't one that Raju's used, himself. It always feels like a little bit of an insult, even the times it isn't meant as one. "Odd term, isn't it? I didn't ask to be trapped here. I'd go back if I could."

His hands fit in his pockets oddly; he'd been thinking more about not thinking than his posture, automatic on the heels of being seen embarrassing himself, and he'd forgotten that he's wearing mittens. As his awareness of that distracted moment fades, he becomes aware of it. And of the implications of the question; there might be things this man doesn't know.

"You'll hardly see anyone here who isn't," he says, pulling his mittened hands out of his pockets and wrapping his arms around his chest instead, holding the warmth of the blanket closer to him. "The old man who greeted you in the Community Hall when you arrived, I think he was here before. But everyone else is dead, or disappeared. The first crop of us, before I came, found corpses all looking to the east."

It is an odd term, one with interesting implications. 'Interloper' - unwanted, intrusive, something to be defended against. Raju's right. Renny's yet to meet anyone who'd intended to come to this frozen little village. And if there's anything his experience as a bard has told him, it's that titles - desired or otherwise - speak to the giver as much as the receiver.

He slips a hand into a pocket, mirroring the man for a moment, as he twirls the leaf he plucked in the other. Renny raises his brows at the last piece. "Really? I didn't hear anything about the corpses."

It's a horrifying fact but the adventurer in him stirs at it. Wherever there's danger, there's answers and power to be found. Curiosity lights up his eyes, apparent even to a stranger.

"What's so special about the east? Someone must've tried to find out, right?"

"How?" Raju shrugs, but he looks frustrated when he does it. Having to resign himself to not being able to even try to look for answers doesn't mean he actually is resigned to it. "Both ends of the town are blocked, and supplies are thin enough; we don't know how long what we have will have to last, or for how many. I won't take any away from that for an expedition that may not even help. But maybe..." He sighs, breath blowing out in a cloud around him. "Maybe things will change. I don't know. But it isn't the right time yet."

He doesn't want to think about answers he still doesn't have, day after day, minute after minute still doesn't have and can't find, and he doesn't want to think about how long he might have to wait here. He nods toward the leaf twirling in the man's hand instead, hoping for a distraction. "What's that you have there? I... think I recognize it. Or maybe not. They're all just leaves, aren't they?"

He still sounds frustrated. It might not be the plant he's frustrated at.

The inside of the Community Hall is warm. As warm as anything gets here. It should be a relief. Raju closes the door behind him and takes a deep breath as he makes his way to the little bed he’s claimed, partly to give a frustrated sigh, partly to feel the way the air inside the building doesn’t hurt his nose and throat going in. A lack of feeling he’s learned to be grateful for.

It’s better than the alternative, being inside, or so he tries to tell himself. And he always spends long enough out there that a part of him is relieved to give up and sit in front of the fire for a while. But he doesn’t feel any better. No progress, again; the same chores day after day, important, but not in any way that’s going to change anything. That’s all that life is, here. No matter what he does, he can’t find a way to change anything that matters. Maybe this place would be a fitting punishment for his failures, if it really was—

Raju’s frowning as he takes off his shoes, tugs his sewing kit from its place between the bedframe and the mattress. This isn’t an afterlife. There’s no proof of that. There’s no point in thinking about it.

He settles crosslegged close to the fireplace, pulls the blanket that’s supposed to be covering his bed from around his shoulders, inspects one of the loops sewn onto it and doesn’t care for what he sees. Well, if he’s fastening the whole thing there of course it would wear faster. Maybe he should have added the other one in a different place.

A few quick, certain movements of his hands later, Raju’s frown eases. This has always been something peaceful, in better— in different days, closer to home. Or, in some ways, maybe just as far away. That doesn’t need thinking about, either. Maybe he’ll check the other straps and loops meant to help him wear something which wasn’t made for it, and then the pocket, and then the neat, oddly shaped hem where he’s cut material from it before. That will keep him occupied for a while, at least. Something useful, something he can do with his hands. That’s what he needs.

That's Renny's favorite word to hear - how - because there's an inherent challenge in it, no matter the way it's said. Nights spent around the campfire, laying out maps and supplies, preparing spells for the coming day, discussing with his companions: How do we get into the tomb? How far are we from the Gate? Never mind the fact that Renny's got a tendency to throw a plan's details out once he's in the thick of it. Sometimes, a bit of improvisation goes a long way, for music and for adventures, right?

This man seems like he's itching to see things done. Renny will keep that in mind. He holds up the leaf, going along with the change in topic for now. "I aim to find out." He points to the seeds clustered in the middle of the leaves, then prods at them. "I was thinking of taking a nibble, actually."

Raju raises his eyebrows, distracted enough from his frustration to push it into the back of his mind. Being in this place has always felt that way, at least after the first week or two, and the man in front of him may be making his bad decision now.

"You're sure?" Raju does sound concerned, but only a little, balancing between the practical concern of someone who's seen what comes of eating the wrong plant and the instinct to let a man take his own risks. "There's a surgeon here somewhere," or at least, someone claiming to be on the notice board, "but I don't know how much he'll be able to do for poison. I've only been collecting things I'm certain that I know."

Which is little enough. But maybe this man doesn't need to know about Raju's failure to figure out the things he needs to know. Especially if he's about to poison himself anyway.

"My mother was a dwarf. If it's poison, I'll just throw it up." Renny says this with a dismissive wave of his hand. He isn't too concerned about the consequences because he believes in the best outcomes - more importantly, he's managed to distract the other man for a little bit.

"But if you know which plants are tastiest, I'll be happy to listen." He touches the brim of his knit cap, grins. "Name's Renny Oldoak, by the way."

Raju’s still looking confused as he gives a tight little smile, nodding back. He’s got no idea what dwarfism has to do with poison. But the man seems confident he’ll be able to vomit up anything he needs to, so who is Raju to argue?

“Raju. Should I call you Renny?” And then, well— Raju huffs out a breath, smile turning rueful. Maybe he does have to say it after all. “I don’t know about tasty. I barely recognize anything that lives here, not enough to be sure. Acorns you can roast, or boil. Pine needles, if you care how your water tastes.” He might drink coffee more often, but that doesn’t mean he’s willing to call boiled needle water anything like tea.

His smile, now, has a hint of a grimace in it as he nods toward the leaf. “If you eat that and it doesn’t kill you, you might know more about that sort of thing than I do.” He sniffs — the gloves keep his hands warm enough, but his uncovered face still complains in the cold — and ducks his head against the shifting direction of a frozen breeze as he goes on, curiously. “What makes you so sure that it’s safe?”

Even though Billy may not always be the most social person around, he can't help but go to the Community Hall from time to time. If he is to live in this place - or rather, survive in this place - it's better to make some connections, he thinks. Or at least to see what the people of this place are like, even if his main opinion so far is 'strange.'

Maybe this is yet another example of it. It's not too strange to find anyone sitting near the fireplaces here when warmth is such a precious resource in this place, though it is definitely strange to see the man wearing a blanket, before the other takes it off and starts to work on it.

It leaves him to blink for a moment or two, not even fully realising how much he's just standing there and staring.. It's a good thing the other man seems caught up in his work, really. Keeps Billy from looking like a creeper.

The combination of the familiar activity with the unfamiliar object use for a garment makes Billy slowly approach after a few moments though. It's pretty unobtrusive, like there's something about Billy that just seems very unoffensive, like he blends in with the scenery.

".. may I ask a question, sir?"

Look, he has manners! He knows how to be polite!

When Raju looks up he’s smiling, with his eyebrows pulled tightly together. He looks baffled. He is baffled. Sir in that tone, from a man with that accent. The accent is one of the softer ones that Raju’s heard but still, he thinks, an Englishman.

But very few here seem to act the way they should. Especially the Englishmen. And Raju’s hardly going to call it strange out loud when the man’s doing so much to try to be polite. Maybe he’s only been made so hesitant by this inescapable, inexplicable place. Anyone would be.

The bafflement does its part to drive the frustration left in Raju back, as does the expression that takes its place, a wider smile, a friendly set to the skin around his eyes. It’s instinctive to try and meet that kind of hesitance with something reassuring, and Raju pulls his knees up just far enough to set his forearms on, leaning forward as he smiles.

“Why not?” he asks, one hand holding the blanket while the other rolls the needle back and forth between its thumb and fingers, dark thread stretching out between them. “How can I help?”

While Lanfear's own irritation at being trapped here primarily stems from being cut off from the One Power, that only means she has to be more deliberate about how she acquires what she needs to endure her circumstances.

Relying on the hospitality of others isn't a position that's unfamiliar to her — and now, she at least has a temporary place to rest her head with the spare bedroom that March is extending to her. Beyond that, she has very little to her name, but there don't seem to be many here who can boast more in the way of possessions. Everyone is scraping by, though Lanfear has already internally decided that it would be much easier to concoct a plan for departing if she could at least channel. Without the One Power, she's as helpless as any ordinary human, and she loathes it.

For now, she's going to make herself useful, or perhaps even indispensable as far as her current host is concerned — and from there, she's going to attempt an audience with Methuselah, especially if she's managed to garner a reputation for being helpful towards others who have been displaced.

March's firewood supply is dwindling, and she decides she can at least procure him more as she sets off away from the house, wrapping her blue cloak around herself. It shouldn't be an errand that demands she remain away too long, and certainly, nothing that would arouse suspicion, but it feels as though she's only just made her way past the initial treeline before something cold and wet splatters down over her, draping her in a blanket of snow.

Lanfear gasps, the sound an audible seizing of breath, and then glances up into the bare, branch-laden canopy, blinking in a somewhat dazed manner that she doesn't even have to work to feign. "What — ?"

"Renny'll do just fine, Raju."

He nods along at the short list. Renny's relieved, to be honest, that the plants of this plane don't appear vastly different from his home. If acorns and pine needles exist here, then it meant some of his foraging knowledge remained useful. He'd been concerned, at first, that he'd have to learn everything from scratch.

He holds up his find, its leaves rustling in a suddenly robust breeze, and gestures at it theatrically. Renny never could resist a bit of dramatics, especially when he's given a chance to share knowledge.

"Mother was a druid. She taught me to smell it, touch it, then boil it. If it doesn't smell rotten and it doesn't give you a rash, throw it in some water."

He winks.

"I'm not certain if it is safe to eat, actually. That's what I'm trying to find out."

There's a gasp and a distinctly feminine voice moving up from beneath him, and Raju's eyes go wide. If this were another life, or another place, the mistake might be only mischief, and he could laugh. Or at least feel the little thrill, for a moment, of being caught doing something he shouldn't have before he takes the problem seriously. Maybe during those months in Delhi this would have felt that way. But it had been warm in Delhi, and Akhtar had been there. Here it's only cold. And snow will only make that cold sharper, the wet of the snow melting on her sharper still.

A branch bends a little under Raju’s shifting weight as he leans, trying to get a better look at just how much snow he’s dumped on her simply by not paying attention. Then he goes still, casting a wary look at the branch he’s holding onto. Better not to move too much, maybe, until she’s out from underneath him.

"Madam," he calls down to her, because if ever there was a time for flattery this would be it. “Would you mind stepping aside? I would hate to knock any more snow down there onto you than I already have.”

Raju doesn't know what a druid is, so it's hard to say what that has to do with poison or herbs, either. Renny's mother's turning out to be quite a mysterious woman. But one with good sounding advice; Raju's own training had focused on memorisation, how to identify this thing or that one, and not as much on how to figure anything out himself. Raju notes the process, tries to remember in case he's ever desperate enough to need it.

Raju grimaces a little as the breeze goes on, shifting around to put his back to it. He shifts his shoulders, but can't get the blanket higher on the back of his neck without reaching up for it. Moving his arms too high in something that wasn't meant to be a coat, no matter how well Raju's wrapped it, always lets a little of the cold air in, and in the moment that doesn't seem worth it. He hunches his shoulders and focuses past it.

"You'll be looking for more, then. Or do you boil the thing by itself until you know it's safe?"

At least Billy realises why the other is giving him that reaction. Even if he might be from before certain events in history, it's not like Billy is blind to the differences between the colour of their skin. But-- well, he figures that sort of thing matters very little in this place. There's no such thing as society here, let alone British society. (Which, in turn, was a society his own standing wasn't so great in either, making it feel like it matters even less.)

They're just a bunch of people trying to make things somehow work out here together. They are all stuck on the same level. If anything baffles Billy much more than the other's surprise, it's that easy smile on Raju's face. As if being greeted with friendliness on the other's part is the biggest mystery here to Billy. That is what makes him blink and stare in turn, even if it's just for a slight moment before he regains his voice, his expression more neutral again.

"Why were you wearing that?"

It's a bit more of a blunt question, compared to the softer edge his politeness had a moment ago, but Billy is still careful to not put any real judgement into the question.

Even if wearing a blanket around is, you know.. a little strange..

"It doesn't exactly seem practical."

"It'll be more efficient to gather as many plants as one can. Of course, we wouldn't eat all of them at once - it'd be hard to tell what's poisoned you if you go about it like that."

Renny tilts his head, a question in his look.

"What are you doing in the woods, by the by?"

Raju raises his eyebrows, letting out a soft, amused breath as he looks down at himself with a wryly embarrassed little smile. Even without the blanket, Raju knows how he looks: There are the trousers which he does his best to dry a crease into, the shirt which he always tries to drape in a way that keeps it from wrinkling, but even the socks are the worse for wear now, the one set of clothes he's had since he came into this place washed often enough that it's started to show. And with the blanket, the same effect again: obviously not made to be worn, with the bottom edge of it an irregular line where he's cut strips and squares away. He's almost used to wearing it now but the question reminds him how little he'd want to be seen in it by anyone back home.

"Or fashionable," he agrees as he looks back up again, a little dry. "I know. But it keeps the cold out, more or less. I suppose I could have tracked down a proper coat someone else came here with and taken it for myself. But what good would that do when they came to take it back? I can wrap this well enough, and I've cut some off the bottom for these straps, see here? It works. We have to do what we can in this place, don't we?"

Raju's answer is matter of fact, responding to the question's non-judgemental tone, but he takes a moment to look the other man's clothes over anyway, comparing. "Have you not had so much trouble dealing with this cold? Maybe you're more used to it than I am."

Raju snorts, the cloud of breath puffing out in front of his face. "What are any of us doing outside in this hateful cold? Trying to keep busy."

But—

Raju's expression is a grimace for an instant and then it's considering, his gaze flickering down over Renny. He's already said it, hasn't he? How little he really knows about the thing he's trying to do. 'Trying to keep busy' is true, always, but it won't be anything Renny doesn't already know to share the details. "Looking for acorns," he admits. The one thing he knows he can eat here that actually helps fill his stomach, and not the dozens of other things that might or might not be edible that Raju has failed to learn enough about to try.

"And you?" Raju asks, sounding friendly despite the sour mood that failure and cold and the combination of the two puts him into. Speaking with someone about anything is helpful. The illusion of civilization, the distraction of a conversation, it's helpful. "Have you been out here doing this for long, or are you looking for something else?"

"I'm the same as you," Renny answers. He tucks the plant away into a pocket, along with the others he's plucked. Acorns. Not a bad choice. They're the safest bet, though they'd have to gather many to make a decent meal. "Truth be told, I hope to hurry to the good parts of this adventure."

Raju had considered Renny earlier; it's his turn to do the same, his gaze inquisitive.

What makes Milton tolerable is its people. Had Renny arrived alone - bereft of his dream guardian's guidance, his magic wrenched from him, the knowledge of the army that marched upon the Gate - he would have sunk into a deeper, darker place even he'd struggle to push through.

But there are others here, who are just as frustrated and puzzled and - most importantly - attempting to survive. That is enough to gird Renny against whatever comes next.

"It's as my friend said, 'Good things don't always come to those who wait.' So here I am, learning the lay of the land."

Raju tries to smile a little. "So far as there's anything out here to learn," he says and looks around at the snow covering everything, the cold which must be killing off most of whatever might have been living here when the temperature was more tolerable. If it ever was. "There's a man here who says he was in a place even more barren than this one, some time before he came. No plants, no trees. Hard to imagine. I suppose that makes us lucky."

The breath Raju huffs out afterward says plenty, wordlessly, on just what he thinks about that. Then he shakes his head. "I'm sorry, I don't mean to keep you. Looking for anything under this snow is no adventure, but it's better than staying still. I'm sure you'd prefer to keep moving."

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🎵whistle while you work🎶(closed)

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