» THIS IS THE STORY OF YOUR RED RIGHT ANKLE; AND HOW IT CAME TO MEET YOUR LEG.

[extramuralise]

Who: Edward Little, John Irving, Kate Marsh, Wynonna Earp, + open to other CR drop-ins in need of temporary shelter!
What: STORMED IN (Winterstille).
When: January 24th - 28th, and/or potentially just before / after
Where: The 41 Mackenzie Street cottage
Content Warnings: 'Does one not bring his habits [aboard]?' — which is to say, all of these characters have their own canon and in-game baggage, shared or otherwise, so please label all threads accordingly!

✒︎ how it whispered ❝ Oh, adhere to me⨾ ❞

» ARRIVALS; GETTING WARM; SETTLING IN FOR THE STORM.

---

The bear-beast alone would have been bad enough (and no question, knowing it was out there somewhere made actually preparing for this storm a beast in itself), but at least the looming presence of such a monstrous creature was sure to drive people indoors before the weather really turned.

As it happens, the cabin on 41 Mackenzie Street (home to Lieutenants Little and Irving, and Kate Marsh) is well-kitted out to weather (ha ha) the coming — now imminent — storm that's been circling, or at least as insulated as possible without knowing precisely how bad the storm will be yet. The windows and doors have been protected, reinforced; candles, matchbooks, and oil lanterns abound throughout various parts of the house; there's plenty of firewood, and food to last about a week if needed (which is not to say plenty of food, but hopefully enough to get them by).

So if you're passing by and need some shelter, come in and warm up by the fire! Have some tea, stay for supper! And hopefully you can be on your way again before the snow really begins to come down, or else you may be stuck here for the foreseeable.

✑ For we are bound by symmetry⨾

» FUN AND GAMES?!

---

If you have been trapped here, never fear! There are still ways to keep occupied, especially for those would appreciate a distraction from the concerning colored strings that have mysteriously appeared on everyone's fingers (because seriously, what's that all about? Well, if you know, you know, or maybe you at least have developed a suspicion or two...), because don't you know? Victorians simply adore parlour games, and surely there are even a few old board games lying around that had been left behind back whenever the great Milton exodus occurred.

So, if you're feeling bored and not yet quite up to socializing about the weather (or, again, especially not those threads which seem to be connecting everyone to each other), take your pick! Gotta pass the time somehow, after all.

Blind Man's Bluff—

Blind man's buff is played in a spacious area, such as outdoors or in a large room, in which one player, designated as "It", is blindfolded and feels around attempting to touch the other players without being able to see them, while the other players scatter and try to avoid the person who is "it", hiding in plain sight and sometimes teasing them to influence them to change direction.

Charades—

The basic object of the game is for a player or team of players to act out clues that will allow another player or team to guess a secret word. Most people today are familiar with the basic concept of the game, but there are different ways to play it. During the 1800s, Charades was played very differently from the modern form of the game. Mohr describes this older form of the game as "complex theatricals" and cites Cassell's Book of Sports and Pastimes (1881), which describes players staging a short play with two scenes in which the actors gave their audience clues to the word they were supposed to guess. This is different from the modern form of the game in which a single player mimes words for the other players to guess instead of speaking out loud and uses certain common gestures to help the other players understand the clues, like holding up their fingers to indicate the number of words in a phrase they want the audience to guess or tugging on their ear to let the players know that the answer is something that "sounds like" what they are about to mime. The only props used for the game are some basic household items that might be lying around, such as items of clothing or furniture. From there, it's just a matter of being clever and creative and acting things out. ( Read more about Modern Charades vs Victorian Charades! )

Forfeits—

One person (called "the judge") is chosen to leave the room. All the other players must place a small personal item into a box. This might be an article of jewellery, or an item from the pocket or handbag, or a small item of clothing such as a tie or shoelace. The "judge" is brought back in to the room. They pick up an item and describe it. The owner must identify themselves and pay a forfeit — do something amusing/embarrassing — to win back the item. The judge chooses which forfeit to award the player. If the player fails, or refuses the forfeit, then the judge keeps the item.

( Suggestions for forfeits: sing a song; dance; stand on your head; tell a story; bark like a dog, do jumping jacks, imitate the person on your left, hold your breath for as long as you can; hug the person sitting opposite you; tell everybody something embarrassing that happened to you; walk around the circle backwards; etc! Many and more ideas can also be found here! )

Yes and No/Twenty Questions—

One person picks a person, place, or thing, and commits it to memory (Mount Rushmore, the ocean, an item in the room). They do not tell what this item is but they say, for example, "I'm thinking of something large." The guests are then allowed to ask yes or no questions. "Is it a building?" "No" "Is it an animal" "No." "Is it a monument?" "Yes." "Is it in Europe?" "No" and so on until one person guesses the item correctly. If the person guesses incorrectly the game still ends and the wrong person must chose a new "something." Players should never guess until they are completely sure they know the answer.

... Not to mention other (more modern!) classics such as Truth or Dare, Never Have I Ever, and Two Truths and A Lie (if you can convince your hosts, that is!), or card games, or the much beloved campfire tradition of scary storytelling!

( OOC | Feel free to include in your prompt games that are NOT mentioned here; these are just a few examples, but anything is on the table! If it's a board game, you're welcome to assume your character can find it lying around in a closet or on a shelf somewhere.  )

✒︎ And whatever differences our lives have been⨾

» TEA & FOOD; SHARING CONFIDENCES; OTHERWISE PASSING THE TIME.

---

However long it's been by now, know that there is an ample enough store of tea, biscuits, and sandwich fixings to help keep a person from going too stir-crazy... not to mention a reasonably well-equipped bookshelf, and whatever other elements of personal entertainment the hosts may own, or that a guest may have brought along. Music, radio, handheld TV? Let's not succumb to cabin fever yet here, people!

Or maybe it's finally time to take someone aside and speculate amongst yourselves (or God forbid, even gossip) about the bear-monster, or even the strings... likely you've noticed some very telling colors and/or connections by now between others that you'd like to discuss in private, if not yet necessarily — or maybe exactly that! — with one of the concerned parties yet themselves.

✑ We together make a limb⨾

» WINDING DOWN; CONFRONTING THE UNSPOKEN... (OR NOT).

---

Some people may end up having to shelter overnight, or possibly even more than one night, so make sure you know what your sleeping arrangements will be if it comes down to that. Not a problem, if so; these things happen, and there's a comfortable sofa, plenty of blankets, and (maybe?) even a spare room for guests to avail themselves to.

But let's also circle back a moment, because maybe this will also demand confronting your string situation head on in some way; if you're sharing a room with someone you're connected to, for instance, that's a hard thing to miss, let alone ignore. Maybe it's time to talk about it, or talk about something else that you hope can eventually lead into talking about your threads in a more casual, natural way— if such a thing is even possible.

It could also be that you're struggling to sleep, and find yourself "alone together" with someone else who is experiencing the same problem... offering, again, the ideal moment to confront the connection privately, or else talk around it until you finally build up the courage to address it, talk about it by not talking about it, exactly, or simply avoid the subject at all costs. Ultimately, in the end, that part is up to you... but remember the storm, remember that privacy is hard to come by in such a claustrophobic situation; maybe it's not the worst idea to take advantage of it while you have it.

Comments

[fidior]

[ He has to laugh in response — very quiet, but easy enough, something not quite as tightly-wound as he might have been as of late. ]

She certainly had her hands full, though at any given moment, there were a few of us able to help raise the others.

[ His siblings came in waves... ]

But now the question is, do you think I was the eldest?

[pacificator]

[ Wynonna shifts, setting down her hot chocolate for a minute so she can turn herself on the sofa, tucking first one and then the other leg underneath her to sit cross-legged, her elbow on her knee and her chin in her palm as she studies him, eyes narrow in thought.

The string can't tell her, but she's known him for over a year now, and she thinks back over what she knows and what she might assume, before, finally: ]

No.

[ She straightens, grinning, certain in herself. ]

I think you're in the middle. Like me.

[fidior]

[ Somehow, he's not surprised that she guesses correctly. Or— is it really a guess? She seems to figure something out more than guess, studying him beforehand with an intensity that has him flustering just a little, inhaling slow and even, though he doesn't let his eyes flit away from her scrutinising gaze. ]

You're correct. [ He breathes it almost like a sigh of relief, and has to smile a little afterwards at just how sure Wynonna looks about it. ]

How did you figure it out?

[ 'Like me.' Maybe that's how. How yet again, for all the ways they're so very different, they're also the same — middle children must have a way of recognising their fellows. There's something to be said for that particular position, that particular weight, whether it's being in the middle of two siblings or eleven. ]

[pacificator]

[ She'd been sure she was right, but having it confirmed makes her smile widen, self-satisfied. He looks pleased, too, and a little indulgently amused, which is a pretty nice look on him.

Wynonna unwinds one leg to reach across the sofa cushions and prod him lightly in the thigh with the toe of her socked foot, teasing. ]

We're the peacekeepers, right?

[ Weird as it might be for anyone here to think of her as a peacekeeper, but she had been. She'd been the buffer between Waverly and Willa, between Daddy and her sisters, just like she still is between Waverly and the curse. ]

But are you the oldest boy?

[fidior]

[ There's a rushing swell of surprise when she nudges him with a foot, contact made in one slight, simple, playful movement, and Little finds himself taken aback by her, somehow, even after all this time.

That said, he doesn't flinch back from the little tease.

No, he stays right where he is, those his grip on his own mug has gotten at least three times tighter. This is fine. (It's nice that she feels comfortable enough to be playful with him like that, physically, even if it makes his throat tight and he has to coax his mind back to the words, focusing on them as thoroughly as if he were studying for an exam.) ]

Peacekeepers. That's— very apt.

[ He nods, still with some faint amusement; despite his flare of nerves, nothing's unpleasant, just calm and quiet as they play this little game that's really more about revealing parts of one another. Peacekeeper. That does rather feel the role he's been playing since he can remember, doesn't it? ]

I was the middle there, as well. The third of six brothers.

....I always wondered what it might be like to be the eldest. It seemed, perhaps, easier in ways. That is, until I became First. Now I no longer envy my eldest brother.

[ He takes a sip of his drink to cover his smile, just a little. He ordinarily wouldn't dare to say anything that could constitute as complaining about his service, but around Wynonna, it's safe to tip that way, even if he's mostly teasing. ]

[pacificator]

[ There are so many things she likes about him, but this has to be near the top of the list: the times when he's so gently playful back at her, a little of his usual reserve loosening and giving way to show the sweet man beneath.

She likes it. She likes his little smiles and the way he hides them behind his cup, the way they crinkle up the corners of his eyes. She likes how he doesn't pull away from her, even when he's startled. She likes how he teases her back, even so lightly. Most of all, she likes being the person he can be this way with. ]

It's a lot less fun when you suddenly have to be the one in charge.

[ That's something she knows all about, too... not that she has any intention of bringing the curse and the heir into this dumb little game.

Wynonna scrunches up her nose at him in an amused, pleased smile, and pulls her foot back just enough to not be quite touching him anymore. She leaves it there, though, close to him, as she relaxes against the couch, leaning the side of her head against the back while she considers him. ]

Does that make it my turn? Okay, uh....

I used to live in Greece... meeting you and the other guys here was the first time I made friends with someone who lived a hundred years before me, and... back home, I'm a deputy.

[fidior]

[ There's a slight wince, and something knowing, a purposeful look he lets himself exchange with her. It is a lot less fun when you're suddenly the one in charge. It's— a particular stress, a weight, and... an erosion.

But! Fun things! Edward watches her think, and even when her foot pulls back a bit, it's close, close enough that the warmth of her closeness is still somehow felt, or maybe that's by memory alone, or maybe by virtue of the thread between them. Regardless, it's somewhere inbetween nerve-racking and comfortable, and then it tips a little further towards the latter, because— it's familiar, in its ways, the two of them sharing close space like this. It's been a while, but it doesn't feel that way now that he's there again, relaxing with her in the quiet of a home, warm. Three of his dearest ones are here under the same roof, safe.

Every single fact she lists is a surprise, and he blinks widely, looking her over now. How can he even decide which is the lie... ]

You can't have lived in Greece, can you?

[pacificator]

[ She reaches for her hot cocoa while he studies her, eyebrows lifted in patient waiting. The drink is hot and sweet and comforting, and it reminds her of Waverly, the way so many things do right now.

At his guess, she clicks her tongue very lightly and shakes her head. ]

I can and I did. For a little while, right before I went back home.

[ But he doesn't need to know about the email, or Uncle Curtis, or the way the revs lured her back to the Ghost River Triangle. This is just a fun, silly game, a way to learn things about each other that don't feel like they've been ripped from under fingernails and past cracked ribs. ]

[fidior]

[ It's one such reminder of how little he really knows of Wynonna's life before here — how little they know of each other's. His brows lift impressively — not forgetting the game, but unable to resist inquiring a little further about this one fact, pleasantly curious and conversational. ]

How fascinating! I hadn't realised you were a world traveler. [ He smiles again in his shy way; over-exaggerating truths even in such playful ways is distinctly non-Victorian, but once more, around Wynonna, he finds it much easier to be a little silly at times. To say and phrase things that aren't just careful and polite but a little more colourful. ]

Is it the most exotic place you've lived? If you might be comfortable sharing such a fact, of course.

[pacificator]

[ His gentle teasing is a light balm to a sore spot that's still lingering, a world and a year away from her aunt's stinging derision. No one had even asked if she liked Greece, or why she'd chosen to go there, if it was anything more than just 'being anywhere but Purgatory.'

But of course Little wants to know about it — about her — even in the middle of playing a game. He always has questions, always wants to know more.

And they really don't know that much about each other, honestly. He knows so many of her deepest truths and darkest secrets, but the most basic information about each other still comes as a surprise. Also surprising: the fact that she wants to know more about him, too. ]

It was probably right up there, yeah. But I moved around a lot, for a long time.

[fidior]

[ It really is fascinating, and he's lifting his brows appreciatively as he takes another sip of his drink, impressed by how worldly Wynonna is. Of course, it makes sense, he realises; she's so knowledgeable in a great many things. Though he doesn't voice that aloud, something almost like pride might echo from his side of their shared thread, that odd thing that's more like unspoken language than true feeling.

...What?? There's nothing wrong with that, is there? A friend can be proud of another friend for being so worldly and fascinating! ]

Then.. I suppose learning you were a deputy of some sort shouldn't be too much of a surprise, but... That one must be the lie.

[ He thinks, with a nod. Compared to the other option, he feels quite certain. Wynonna surely hasn't met anyone from a hundred years ago, before she'd encountered those from the Expedition here. ]

[pacificator]

[ There's a small flicker of her eyebrows, twitching toward bemusement while her mouth presses, trying to keep from smiling; it's fine. It's just that nobody's ever seemed proud of her before. (Waverly, once again, is always the exception.)

It makes something warm and squiggly and uncomfortable but not bad wriggle around in her stomach. ]

Wrong again.

[ Now she lifts her eyebrows at him, like she's daring him to be surprised. ]

I've got the badge and everything.

[fidior]

[ Truly, there's so much about Wynonna he doesn't know, and this is a surprise. As to what she might have done back home in her world... well, he couldn't have even imagined it, especially with how different her era clearly is from his own.

But this... His brows, if possible, lift further. Surprised but also impressed, because any sort of deputy is a commendable job. He's unsure exactly what sort she might have been, there are a few different ones that he knows of, and he hesitates a moment before asking. ]

You were a deputy— of the law?

[ All right, it is a little difficult to imagine Wynonna as enforcing the law... much less always upholding it... ]

[pacificator]

[ Her expression flattens slightly and she rolls her eyes up to glance at the ceiling. I'm trying to wrap my head around why anyone would give Wynonna Earp a badge. ]

Okay.

[ It's slightly disgruntled, acknowledging that, yes, it sounds ridiculous. Only knowing Little would rather cut off his own arm than suggest she's lying saves him from real exasperation. And she knows, okay, she gets it. She's the last person she'd ever give a badge to. ]

Not of the law... exactly.

[ She even has her badge here, somewhere. Back in her cabin, probably. It had been in her pocket when she showed up here, along with her useless cell phone and truck keys. ]

It's a cross-border joint task force. US Marshals, special, uh... dispensation. It wasn't exactly my choice to join up.

[fidior]

[ He has no doubts as to the merits of Wynonna's character — but he knows of a certain penchant for following the beat of her own drum rather than any rhythm created by another. It's surprising to think that she might indulge a career involving what undoubtedly requires much structure and order (if only he knew that within that career, she has done such things as blowing motorcycles up)—

And then of course, she says that it wasn't exactly by her own choice. But— and although he doesn't quite know what all of those words mean together or entail — his brows shoot right up again, even higher than before. He can put together well enough to make a very quick conclusion: ]

Well that's— that's quite impressive, Miss Earp! It sounds very exclusive!

[ Special dispensation! If it were anyone else, the sudden flood of positivity and praise coming from him might seem excessive, but for Edward — there is no praise that isn't authentic, no word that's untrue, and the feeling of it bleeds through his end of their thread: strong and assured in itself, and not an ounce of it summoned up; it all happens perfectly naturally. As if he's seeing something he might have always known, accepting it easily. Of course Wynonna would be chosen for something that sounds so important. ]

Whether your intended career or not, it's evident your position is an esteemed one in your time. I've no doubt the sort of work you're doing must not only be compelling, but necessary... And cross-border? Well, I can only imagine the lives you've touched!

[ No wonder she's so well-traveled. And, he thinks— so capable in ways he isn't, and has come to rely on. She must be such a learned individual. ]

[pacificator]

[ From absolutely anyone else — maybe not Kate, but it would still be a possibility — this outpouring of enthusiastic support wouldn't be just joking, but sarcastic. There's no one left in Purgatory aside from Waverly who could say, with a straight face and no edge of sardonic cruelty, that she's touched lives. But from Edward Little, who has always believed in her, trusted her, it's utterly, transparently, sincere, and for a moment she's nearly speechless in the face of his warm praise. He means it, and just that realization makes her throat feel tight and thick, a weird squeezing feeling in her chest.

Nobody's ever.... nobody's ever. She could stop that sentence right there, because the way he looks at her and the easy way he believes not only that she's telling the truth but that she deserves it, that she earned it somehow, instead of being shackled to it just by the dumb luck of her ancestry, is unlike anything she's ever experience before. Abruptly she remembers Shorty, breathing short and fast and shallow and still looking at her with so much affection in his eyes. They're wrong about you.... you're a good girl, Wynonna.

He'd been proud of her, too. ]

Yeah, it is pretty exclusive. You could say I'm the only one who can do the job.

[ You could say that... it would be accurate.

(She'll tell him. Someday she'll tell him the whole truth. Just not tonight, when he's looking at her with so much delighted warmth in his eyes, when he's so impressed and happy for her.)

The line of her lips has softened; it keeps quirking, her smile glowing and dimming and appearing again as she tries to figure out what to do with the warm squiggly feeling in her stomach. ]

And it is. Necessary, I mean.

[ She lifts her cocoa for a sip, and arches her eyebrows at him. ]

But more importantly, it's also my second truth.

[fidior]

[ The thread lets him understand more of what's beneath Wynonna's usual maintained surface, an understanding that he's surprised her more than the sensation of the feeling of surprise itself — and sometimes he wonders why in the world the woman sitting so close to him seems to value herself so little, and other times he knows that some of it, maybe most of it, comes from the self-blame she feels, because he knows what that's like. It starts and it doesn't stop, growing and growing like a seedling that doesn't ever reach a point of true bloom, no climax of blossom, just perpetual and relentless growth. A twisting vine of a thing that curves with and into the nerves and organs and around and through and up. He'd told her about the men whose blood is on his hands (or most of them, not all, not specifically, not Thomas, not yet—) and she'd told him about the blood on hers (and he remembers her mentioning that she'd killed more, a vague numberless amount that one could wonder about forever), and is it any wonder she's surprised to hear someone think well of her? She's the same as him. She can only see the bruised parts on her own soul.

Alternatively, when he looks at her, it's like looking at the sun. Not too bright and burning, just— warm. Full and orange and warm.

She admits that it's exclusive, and necessary, coaxed into accepting his words or maybe she'd simply never thought to use them for herself, which is an oddly aching thought. Whatever this true line of nature of her work is, it's clear she isn't wholly thrilled by it — and it is a shame that it wasn't something she necessarily sought out to do, maybe was thrust upon her, but he knows what that's like too — ...but the way she smiles, almost like a cautious thing making sure it's all right to, makes something in him melt and want to make her understand, more, more, that she deserves the praise. It matters, it means something, when someone's done well, to let them know that they have. It matters that she realises how important she is. Maybe it matters to him more than it should. Maybe— ]

It is, [ he realises with a startled lift of his own brows. Her second truth. That means.... ]

...But that can't be right, can it? You haven't... met anyone from so long before your time, have you?

[pacificator]

[ There's a lot she hates about these strings — they're invasive as shit, giving people a direct line into her thoughts and feelings — but she's not sure she hates....this. This uninterrupted connection to Edward that proves without a shadow of a doubt that he means everything he's saying and more besides.

But really, he's always understood the potent, poisonous cocktail of guilt and self-loathing mixed with the constant need to do better, to be better. His big soft heart really does only see the best in her, the exact opposite to everyone back home, who just seemed to be looking for an excuse to shut her out, to treat her like dirt. He wouldn't get it, if he were someone to find his way to Purgatory, if he heard all the crap people say about her, behind her back and to her face. She doesn't know if that's a comforting thought or an unsettling one. ]

It's kind of a long story.

[ And it involves a bunch of details she hasn't wanted to tell him. Luckily, she's almost a professional when it comes to talking around the demon of it all. ]

But yeah. John Henry Holliday, better known as Doc.

[ She sets down her now-empty mug and toys with a loose string at the seam of her pants. Doc's still a thorny subject, even over a year since the last time she saw him. (If she really tries, she's pretty sure she can see the faint outline of a gleaming tri-colored string that feels like the wind in her hair and the kick of a pistol in her hand and tastes like cigarillo smoke spinning out from her fingertip and vanishing into the impossible distance between this world and her own. Things with Doc are... complicated, to say the least.) ]

Bon 1852, supposedly died 1887, and yet was definitely still hanging around Purgatory when I got pulled out here.