🩸 you know, you know, you know it all went wrong — open.

[mordue]

Who: claudia et al.
What: may catchall — continuing tdm stuff and settling in.
When: end of april through may.
Where: throughout milton.

Content Warnings: typical vampire stuff, maybe animal death, lots of discussion of fire and burning bodies, murder plots, terrible relationships with vampire dads, will add more as they come up!



i. milton
Nothing about this place feels right to Claudia, who has still half-convinced herself that it's some sort of almost cosmic punishment. She thinks she stopped believing in that sort of thing when the fire in her house started raging, before she even laid eyes on the angel who became Louis, but maybe in her core there's something still there, a kernel of belief in divine punishment. It's stupid. It's childish of her, and she is no child, no matter how much she might look like one to some. The circumstance means nothing, it makes no difference. She isn't being skinned or pulled apart or fed to demons, so she can survive it, whatever it is.

She comes out only at night, resolute to be alone, a slight and small figure identifiable primarily by her head of thickly curly brown hair. She can be quiet when she wants to be, but not silent; the supernaturally keen ear and eye she has used all her life to hunt are entirely gone, but she still has her instincts. Keep low, keep quiet, be unseen unless absolutely necessary. As soon as she can stomach it, she leaves the Community Hall entirely, taking her precious few belongings with her: her diary and pen, and a winter coat that seems far too glamorous for her surroundings, but at least it's fur-lined and warm.

She's not happy to play the role of a fourteen-year-old if she's approached, but it's safer, at least for now. Better to let someone underestimate her until it's too late. At night, she bundles up for warmth and writes in her diary by moonlight. Sometimes there's nothing new to record, but she writes it anyway, just to get the words out of her head.

ii. lakeside
The singular trip she takes to Lakeside is slow-going and unpleasant. She travels by day with the intent to avoid the sunlight while she's underground, but when she actually gets there, she still has to wait for the sun to set, hunched in the comforting protection of the mine's open mouth and waiting for the colour to leech out of the sky. She's tired and bitter by the time night has actually fallen, and to top it all off, Lakeside doesn't seem to have been worth the visit. She reassures herself by thinking that at least she knows it's here, at least she's seen the place once.

Determined to make the most of it, Claudia explores all she can of Lakeside, peering into the cabins whether they're inhabitable or otherwise, and doing a slow circle of the lake in the process.

iii. wildcard
[ hit me up if you want something a bit more specific, or we could backdate something with one of the TDM prompts! shoot me an PM here or on crowders if you want to plot. ]

Comments

closed — for lestat.

[mordue]

( from here. )

None he didn't ask for!

[ She says it loudly enough that she's suddenly aware of herself when a few eyes dart in her direction, aware that she's airing grievances that everyone who is party to them would prefer be kept quiet. She wishes again and again that she'd made Louis do it, made him throw Lestat's body into the incinerator and forced him to watch it burn just like Lestat held her head towards the open door as Charlie melted inside. Her eyes screw shut for a moment, tight; she can hear her heart pounding in her own ears, the rush of blood through her body.

Louis can't be here. If he was here he'd be here, with her, now. Not Lestat. Louis would've found her first.

She should get away from him, as far and as fast as possible. She's not harmless, but he's even less so. In spite of that, she finds herself moving, following the edge of the table with slow, even sidesteps that take her all the way to its edge. There's a knife resting innocently by a hank of bread, in arm's reach. She'd have to lean to get it, but she could. Which means she needs a distraction. ]

He saved me of his own will. He begged you to turn me 'cause he couldn't stand being on his own with you anymore. You think I don't know that? He saved me to fix what was broken between you. Mardi Gras was just the first time he ever realized there's nothing there worth fixin'.

closed — for louis.

[mordue]

( from here. )

Claudia doesn't much want to let go of him either, but at the sound of that name she can't help but pull away, her eyes searching his face. All she can read there is honesty, honesty and pain. It reminds her of those horrible weeks after she first came back to him, nursing him back to health, hearing him jolt awake from another falling nightmare. She felt, sometimes, like she could feel the pain he was in; not all of it, not as deeply, but like a dim reflection. It feels a little like that now.

"I know," she tells him, and is surprised to hear a flush of guilt in her own voice. She should've scoured every inch of this place to find Louis, whether she thought he was here or not, but it's been days since she got here and he had to find her first. "He found me. He said..." A lot of things. Too many. "He said you were here, but I couldn't find you with my mind so I thought... I thought he was lyin' to me."

She thought he was lying, but she knows there's something else, too. She didn't want to believe him, didn't want to believe that they'd been here for months, just the two of them, with Lestat whispering poison in his ear all that time. And, most bafflingly of all, he didn't tell Louis she was here.

closed — for sansa.

[mordue]

( from here. )

Nothin' much I wanna eat here.

[ Hot food, comfort food, and it's all little more than flavourless mush to Claudia. She would've killed for something like this when she was a child, a spread of warm and hearty meals, but now it's as if she's being mocked by it. Her jaw sets firm. ]

I have allergies.

closed — for darling.

[mordue]

( from here. )

[ Maybe it ain't possible, she wants to tell him, sticking her chin in the air and glaring at him like he just told her it's bedtime and she wants to stay up late. Sometimes she thinks those childish instincts aren't instincts at all, but a perfectly understandable response to being patronised by someone who thinks themselves better than you just because they seem to be older. ]

You think we're all stuck in the same circumstances? [ she asks instead, eyebrows raised in disbelief. ]

closed — for heartman.

[mordue]

( from here. )

Thank you.

[ As if that's not some sort of backhanded compliment, Claudia delivers her reply with earnestness and a bright smile, flashing very white teeth. ]

You can't be fussy if you're that famished. You take what you can get.

i. milton

[burying]

[ Even with the surprising acceptance of his whole diet revelation, Kieren prefers to go about eating at night. Still too ashamed and too disgusted with himself to be open about the whole thing. He hates that he has to do it, but it's just... that's just his life now. And while he's cleaned himself up, he can still feel blood under his fingernails beneath the fabric of his gloves and he can still taste gore and brain-matter on his tongue.

He can clean himself up better later, once he's home, and he's headed there now — trekking through the snow at a slow, strangely-gaited pace. Or he would be, were it not for the small figure huddled in a fur coat writing under the moonlight.

He should mind his business, really. Move along, but as he draws closer on his way to pass — shit, is that another kid? There's a whole lot of them here now. Teenagers, like Kieren. Well, not like Kieren. But— ]

Hey. [ He slows to a stop when he draws near enough — all nervous hovering and huge, sad eyes. ] You alright? Bit late to be out.

[mordue]

[ Claudia looks up with a flash of glassy red-toned eyes that appears briefly hostile, before she relaxes, remembers herself. He looks young, and sad, and pale. She thinks for a moment that he's at death's door. But if he was, he wouldn't be talking to her like that. ]

I'm a night owl. [ She says it with a little shrug, like it can't be helped. A pause, as she tucks the little bookmark into her diary and shuts it, firm. ] Couldn't sleep, anyway. Don't know how anyone can.

[burying]

[ Kieren's head dips a little. It's a fair point, really. Practically a ghost town where all the former residents upped and died, in the middle of the frozen wilderness, and there's a whole bunch of awful shit going on. ]

Mm. It's not so bad, really. It's quiet. [ At least there's that. It does help with trying to sleep. ] Wait until the Aurora hits. You'll definitely not be sleeping then.

spoilers, folks

[flambeaux]

Lestat has indeed been doing his damndest to get back in Louis's good graces, helped along by Louis's guilt about his role in the attempted Mardi Gras murder. But Louis would not hear a word against Claudia. (He remembers how Lestat carefully handled their family photo--) Louis and Lestat spent their months alternately being angry and soft at each other. There is more than one way to be snowed in.

Lestat knew she was here and didn't tell him. He could have simply hung around the General Store like a gadfly and found him. Another slight to add to the pile of hurts. Louis should have expected that Lestat might want to delay the inevitable onslaught of dirty looks and catty remarks--Claudia learned from the best. Or maybe Lestat had less finesse than that. Maybe he was just feeling petty.

He cradles the side of her head and the fall of curls like she is his own little girl again--forever a little girl in a doll's body she hates.

"This place has taken our gifts," he explains first, because it's the easiest thing to start with. "Or numbed them, I don't know how. That's why we suffer from cold and whatever's in the air outside now. Sometimes it gives back, but different. Lestat can speak to anyone but not hear. I can run like I used to, but I ain't strong. Don't you worry, I'll find you food when you need it."

[solitarysoul]

Levi had seen Claudia at the community hall. He's not that happy that she's moved out but hopefully she's moved in with someone or at least stayed close to the center of town. It bugged him to see kids dragged here, so due to his crippling guilt at getting other kids killed or failing to save them he tried to look out for them. Not in the hovering 'I won't let you do anything dangerous, don't leave my sight' way, but in what he hopes is a big brotherly 'let me do the dangerous stuff with you' sort of way. Gods knew he had become pretty capable at a young age and who knew what the kids here had gone through before.

He has no way of knowing Claudia isn't the 14 year old girl she appears to be, so she falls under someone to look out for in his mind. He comes across her one night, and the boy in the oversized coat with the rifle on his back raises a hand in greeting. "H-hi."

[clothed]

[ allergies? ]

I'm not certain I know what that means. You can't eat certain foods?

[ she knows some people can't eat certain things, because it makes them sick. pregnant women who can't stand certain smells; some children, who find themselves getting sick when roasted almonds or certain berries; seafoods, too, even for some men. ]

What can you eat?

[flanerie]

[ The delicate control of her sideways slide reminds him of a hundred nights of lessons, as little as she needed them. She took to her nature with all of the eagerness of a child to a new game, and how well she has learned to play it.

Lestat does not search for knives. The most dangerous thing besides him in this room is her, not unattended blades or probing eyes. A danger to his unlife, perhaps not - not on her own, caught off-guard, unprepared for the encounter - but a danger to his heart? ]

I made you.

[ Another step closer. Not enough to catch up to her measured flight, but enough to be heard, the throb of insistence in his tone bruised and petulant despite his tempering. ]

As he asked, but as I chose. How little either of you see fit to remember that. How much more you know of me than I seem to even know of myself, if I am so terribly mistaken in what I recall.

But tell me, if this is true - what would that make you, if you were made for a purpose you cannot serve? What reason is there for you, then, sister? [ He asks curiously, lightly, as if indifferent to the answer. ] If I am so loathsome to him as to be nothing, what hope for you, my disobedient rib?

[mordue]

"What kinda food?" Claudia has a feeling she knows already – it's how she's been surviving herself, trailing to the edge of the forest, snatching small rabbits when she can. They're more alert than she is now, their hearing more honed than hers. She hadn't realised how much she relied on the gifts she'd been given, until they were taken away from her. It's hard. She hates it. She's hungry. But there's a small part of her hoping there might be some other way, some flow of human blood they can take advantage of. Surely Lestat himself hasn't been eating animals all this time too? It's naïve and she knows it, but she's feeling a little indulgent of her naïveté right now.

She also doesn't much like the idea of Lestat being able to get in her head after all this time. It had been such a relief to know that was the one place he could never go, the one area of her life into which he could never intrude. The thought of his voice slinking through her head makes her shudder a little, and she returns her attention to Louis completely again. "We gotta get you fixed up," she murmurs. "That fog out there, it's like the sun. It burned me when it touched me. How long were you out there?"

closed — for ruby.

[mordue]

( from here. )

Why should I?

[ Claudia's voice is chirpy, though there's a quiet edge of hostility there too. She has no intention of letting a total stranger inside with her, whether they need help or not. And the fact is that there are too many unknown entities in this place for her to even approximate magnanimousness when it comes down to it. Outside isn't safe; inside is. That much she knows. ]

I don't know who you are. You could be anyone.

closed — for irving.

[mordue]

( from here. )

[ A fire. Claudia isn't opposed in theory – she's certainly cold – but there's a guarded look on her face, just for a moment, as she turns it over in her mind. Fires are all well and good when they're contained and merrily burning in a fancy grate, but this place is a hovel in a largely abandoned town, not a well-appointed townhouse in New Orleans. She doesn't like to think about how easily it would spread, and how quickly they could both become trapped.

But that's just residual caution, surely, from the fire that killed her Aunty when she was just a child. Logical though it may be to be nervous of unchecked fires, it wouldn't serve her to be afraid of them at all. ]

Do you have a way to start one?

[mordue]

What's that?

[ She's heard of an aurora before, but as far as she knows it's just a scientific phenomenon, some refraction of light and particles in the sky. The way he says it makes it sound like more than that. ]

I know what an aurora is. Didn't know they could be a disturbance.

[mordue]

Claudia has attracted the attention of a few younger people since she got here, which she knows is for a very particular reason. That doesn't make her happy about it. Children tend to think they're experts in everything the second they have even a little experience. She certainly thought that herself, and look what happened to her when she went off on her own. But there's no sense pushing anyone away just yet; it wouldn't do well for her to refuse friendship in this place, not when Lestat seems to have made himself so very acceptable to others here.

So after a beat, she digs her hand out of her coat pocket and lifts it to wave back. "Hi. You goin' huntin'?"

[solitarysoul]

Probably wise, since Levi is on good terms with Lestat.

"Not so much right now. I'm patrolling the town. I, um, do that a lot." There wasn't much else to do. "You're new, right?"

i

[bigbaddy]

Bigby is out less at night nowadays than he used to - considering he now has a kid to look after, and midnight walks aren't exactly the sort of example he'd want to set in this dangerous place - but sometimes he still can't help himself. Sometimes he just wants to be out there when it's a little more quiet for once, out underneath the light of the moon.

But even though it's quiet, he knows it's rare to ever be fully alone out there. It's why he's not surprised to spot a figure sitting out there and seemingly writing.

.. it's a little more surprising once he realises just how relatively small - and therefore seemingly young - the figure is. Sure, Bigby Wolf of all people knows you can't always judge age just by someone's appearance, but you never know. Maybe this really is a young teenager.

So the man slowly approaches, though keeping something casual in his step, as if to indicate he's not a threat.

"You keeping safe out here?"

[20likes]

[ Heartman looks at the mess, and then that bright, bright smile. There's something he can't quite pick up on, something that causes the barest twitch of a frown to start spreading across his lips.

Logic, math, science--he understands that, grasps it very well. But emotion, and--well, girls, despite having had one of his own--is something that completely surpasses his knowledge. That includes this one, it would seem.

The lull is there, poignant, and Heartman clears his throat. ]

You're a new Interloper--It's a pleasure to meet you, despite the circumstances.

[burying]

Aurora, like there's a capital letter on it. They're.. something else, entirely. [ Meaning not like the ones they know of. Sure he'd known about auroras, too. Lights in the sky when you're fair enough north. Kieren pauses for a long moment, trying to put it into words. It's.. definitely a lot. ]

They're like an aurora on drugs, or something. Sky's bright enough it's like day with all the lights, and there's all this noise — like some... weird unearthly chorus. Cracks and pops, like the skies full of electric. All the power comes back on for the most part, too.

[flambeaux]

"Not long. I didn't even get as far as the treeline before I had to turn back."

Loathe as he is to let her go, he begins struggling to his feet like he's actually in his old age. Louis is lucky to be in Claudia's good graces enough for her to fret over his state. It's a funny sort of reversal, the little daughter-sister caring for her caretaker. She's always been more resilient than him despite her moods. She endures.

"I go after deer mostly when I'm not settin' traps. I know how hungry you get. Bad idea to tangle with a wolf, even if they attack people now."

He'd take Lestat's annoyances via the new Mind Gift versus a wolf attack. Louis explicitly told Lestat not to use it on him, making allowances for slip ups while already in conversation anyway. He should not be so surprised that Lestat hasn't contacted him like that. Lestat wants him to come back to him. Every longing glance or hurt look says so as much as his words.

[guidemyway]

[Ruby feels a little pit form in her stomach at that question. She kind of wishes she had time to go find another house, but she's not sure there's a whole lot of time for that at the moment.]

Uh- I don't really have a good reason why you should. But- I think it would awfully nice right about now.

[Because realistically. Claudia didn't have any reason to trust her, and there were plenty of other people around who probably shouldn't be trusted.]

My name's Ruby- Look. I'll try and make it up to you if you do this one solid.

[mordue]

Not soup.

[ Claudia's interest piques a little. She seems to be paying attention to Sansa properly for the first time, her eyes flickering over Sansa's face with plain curiosity. She sounds smart. Sounds rich. But she's never heard of an allergy? Granted, the word's a little new for Claudia, but she still knows what it means. ]

Where'd you come from? Before you were here.

[mordue]

[ His words make her lip curl. Not because they've cut her, which they haven't, but because she's heard them before. Not exactly those words, but close enough, and they came from far more damaging a source than Lestat's monstrous mouth: her own mind. ]

I have my own purpose. Nothin' to do with you. Either of you. [ She adds, before he can pounce on that. It's clear enough to her, and has been for a while, that although she might have been made for Louis, that's not what she's for now, and she wouldn't want it to be. ] Not everything in the whole world has you at the centre of it, Uncle Les. It's time somebody told you that. Your head's so full of your own bullshit it's a wonder you got out from under it often enough to make Louis think you actually loved him more than you love yourself.

[ It's petty and, yes, it's childish, but it feels good to say it anyway, and she punctuates the final word by reaching for the knife and winding her fingers tight around the handle. It won't kill him, but it'll put a barrier between them, at least. Claudia's not stupid enough to think she could actually fight him without preparation, and especially not when she feels like this, like all the energy's been sapped clean out of her. She feels more comfortable with it clutched in her fist. ]