Scene #9562: Your Punishment Is Cleaning Please Please Please Hurry

Owner	Pose
Vantablitz Remnants	Ahn may have opportunistically spun Regulus' condemnation of her hard-earned (and survival-ensuring) vegetables into twisting her arm into cleaning her house, but that doesn't mean that anyone involved can't have a good time, right? It's just housecleaning. So. Maybe everyone can hang out after! Just, move some boxes. Toss some clothes in the laundry. Get pizza. Yeah . . . The warpgate drop you off in the riotous noise of the jungle. The daylight is blinding, filtered by less of the atmosphere than usual, stabbing your eyes at first exposure. The white noise of millions of insects, the background melody of singing and screeching birds, and the staccato screaming of wild beasts, is so loud that you have to raise your voice to be heard. The air is thinner than usual. You have to breathe the extreme humidity deep. The one mercy is that, in the middle of February, the air is only 'warm' rather than 'sweltering'. It's still not that much below room temperature. There's a trail marked out for you. It's not a long one (by hiker's standards), nor hard to follow, but it's steep and outdoors. The ground is cleared of brush despite seeming seldom walked-on, with the most hostile inclines set with wooden crossbeam steps; though few of them. Flourescent yellow tape is wrapped around the trunks of nearby trees, one always within sight of another. There's still time to believe that the climb will end in a cozy little weirdcore cottage on a hilltop, up until the end. But no matter how you look at it, that's a bunker. And you're on the top of a mountain. Countless miles of further jungle roll out beneath you. Floodplains have redeced down to a broad green river. The only signs of civilization are the smoke rising from the foot of the mountain above the cluster of dots that causes it. Perhaps if you squint at the black smear on one horizon, you might assume it's a city, but you can't see lights in the daytime. In the mountain wall, near the peak, built into the rock, is a bare concrete face with its paint long-ago stripped off. One wall seems to extend out to daylight, long and curving around the side. The door is solid metal, sturdy yet clearly once repaired at least. A grimy security camera is set into the corner overhang, shielded from rain. There's a control panel with a speaker, but none of the buttons work. Approaching it leaves you standing there like a pack of assholes for a minute, then the doors open of their own accord. A mid-sized lobby has dirt tracked all over the floor, previously wet and dried down, along with gritty sand. An empty security office has collected dust for some time, next to a huge map on one wall with directions written in three different languages, only one of which is English. Useless bollards and tape have been haphazardly piled in one corner. Flourescent orange plastic relief crates are piled against another wall. Defunct checkpoints with non-functional metal-detectors are left where they were, as are chest-high heaps of sandbags. All the corridors lead to stairs down. Despite damage and wear to the walls and floor, an old-fashioned coat rack has been riveted into a wall by the door, hanging two backpacks, a yellow hazmat suit, a helmet, bug mesh, a gardening hat and gloves, two different webbing harnesses, and an empty purse. Someone has spraypainted on the map. On the level below, the north hall has been marked with a skull, the south has dotted lines weaving through it like directions, and the east path is double circled. The west side has the words DON'T EVEN THINK ABOUT IT underneath.
Rita Ma	Rita shows up with a little hair-tidying bandana and worn apron over her usual dress like an un-frilled scullery maid, the smile on her face sunnier than the yellow gloves dangling out of the mop-bucket in her hand. Then the smile drops sliiightly on contact with the muggy jungle air. She'd forgotten, for a second, what 'visiting Ahn's house' entails. "Okay. Um," she says, adjusting her fretful little mopbucket-grip and shifting the mop onto her shoulder like a redcoat carrying their rifle, "stay close behind me, Ms. Regulus. Don't touch any weird plants, okay? Or any weird... meat. Or any... um... in-betweens, either." "Hope they're still doing okay..." she murmurs to herself fondly, when an overlook reveals the rising smoke from dots below. Rita gets up on tiptoes and waves to the security camera with her non-bucket-toting hand eagerly, like she's greeting an old friend, and then sets down her mop-and-bucket in the dirty lobby. That's an obvious place to start, but... the north hall has been marked with a skull The west side has the words DON'T EVEN THINK ABOUT IT underneath "I wish I remembered where stuff is," Rita murmurs, rubbing the side of her head. "We're not not allowed to think about the skull, so I think we should go there first. We don't want to carry dirty stuff back out through places we've already cleaned, so let's start with the furthest-in and work our way back to the entrance, right?" A little pause. "There might be old dead bodies," she confides as a warning, reminded by the skull. "I can handle those for you."
Regulus	Regulus was just told to move some boxes and also to, like, call someone a smelly shut-in that she hasn't met before while making it not seem like Ahn told her to do so. The last one she's a little uncertain about, she doesn't even know this 'Lotus', but that was a bonus objective! The important objective is to help with cleaning and the prospects of ending THE TURNIP WARS by doing this actually makes her excited to do manual labor. Regulus is always excited to promote peace and love and end wars, even if the Turnip Wars is just Ahn being miffed at her. She doesn't want Ahn miffed at her! Regulus has invited two of her best buds in the multiverse to help out--of course, Regulus's best buds are labeled as such from Regulus's perspective, actual opinions may differ. It's also true that Regulus's understanding of cleaning a place amounts to, broadly, 'swabbing the deck' and dusting and the like. She's going to clean SO HARD that Ahn will never be upsetty spaghetti with her ever again. Peace and love, Regulus tells herself, peace and love. APPLe is also brought along as a peace offering--as diplomat that is also a healthy part of a meal to help dispel the rumors that Regulus cannot get along with turnips. This, too, is for world peace. Neither of them are expecting to appear in a jungle. "Woah woah... I can practically drink the air here..." Regulus remarks. "But according to the map..." Regulus holds up a map that she drew herself to make it look like a treasure map with X marking the spot where Ahn told her to go. "We're on the right track!" She also drew a skull and crossbones in the corner and a giant box of treasure in the center. For the sake of authenticity rather than accuracy. As miserable as the climate is for her, the brave captain bravely steps forward onto a trail outlined to her by her host. Oh she groans, and grits her teeth, but her pirate's pride is on the line here. She's not going to start whining before she's even got to their destination. She's brought a bucket of water with her too and a mop, because 'swabbing the decks' is the part of any cleaning job she's most excited about because it it is a pirate-like activity and then she can also slide across the wet deck and just have fun with it. Eventually she does admit, "A pirate shouldn't be this far above sea level though..." And when she sees their destination her initial instinct is 'oh finally' as she rushes forward before suddenly stopping as she sees that it's... ...some weird ... bunker. "Huh... Is this the right place?" She looks at her map, then spins around--squinting at the sky. "This is the right place. I'm sure of it. Well, let's say hallo!" APPLe floats over to the control panel and pushes a button when Regulus says, "Hallo Ahn! We're here to help out for the day! I brought some pals along!" "Captain..." APPLe says. "I don't believe this intercom is functional." Before Regulus can decide 'ah, we have to fix this intercom too!', the doors slide open on their own.
Regulus	''Rita's helpful warnings!'' "What did you mean by in-betweens?" Regulus asks. "I'm glad you've brought your own buckets..." APPLe has two, one balancing on his head and one in his hand. "Because I think I underestimated how many buckets we'd need, and how many mops." Then she steps in after Rita, admiring the skull for a moment, then looking at the west side. She does think about it, before she can stop herself, but she doesn't move down that way. In fact, she doesn't even seem to be in a rush to visit the skull corridor either. "Yeah that's good thinking, Rita. Though--" ''There might be old dead bodies. I can handle those for you.'' "Why would there be dead bodies...?" Regulus asks, trying not to get nervous about this job because of world peace, but faltering slightly.
Timekeeper	Frankly, Vertin agrees that Regulus needs to be taught to eat vegetables and say thank you and clean her room. When Regulus came to announce her new task (punishment) to them, their opinion of Ahn went up one step further-- they can smell the opportunism of the request just through how Regulus relays it, and it's a deft way to ensure Regulus can earn forgiveness while providing something valuable so that there's no bad blood on either side. Given everything Ahn's done for her, too, Vertin figures she might as well lend a hand herself by accompanying Regulus. It's a matter of good practice to help a friend and comrade with menial chores. Vertin strongly believes this to be the case, and a fundamental pillar of the concept of community. There's never been a time where someone moved into the suitcase and Vertin didn't give them personal assistance and attention with getting settled in. People want to help and want to be helped, and so Vertin also extends an invitation to one of her less socially-adept companions to help her out. "I've only met her on a few occasions, but I think you'd get along. She's shy but clever, and she's always excited to talk about what she's interested in. Even if you don't think you know much about the topic, as long as you actively listen, she's happy to engage with you." "O-oh... I-I guess she does sound nice...." "You're not obligated to, but I think you'll be surprised at how easy it is to get outside the manor and meet people if you try." "Al-alright--! I'll do it! I-I can clean, too, since that's all it is... even if I'm a slob of a person, I can always keep my room clean, at least...." . . . "Oh my god! Aaaaaaahh!! Is this Africa?!" Poltergeist, the sheet-covered ghost, shrieks and tries to shield herself with her arms from the beating sun. Instantly, Vertin is reaching into her suitcase and withdrawing a blue parasol, popping it open and handing it to the other girl to shelter her in the shade. Poltergeist quivers and jumps at every single noise in the jungle, reduced nearly to tears when she hears a roar. "I'm fairly sure she's Vietnamese, though we haven't discussed precisely where she lives before." Vertin calmly corrects Poltergeist, though the brim of her hat does dip down in thought. Following the path to the bunker, Poltergeist's tone changes instantly when they reach the clearing at the top-- "Wowwwww! It's so... beautiful! I would never have seen anything like this if I stayed back home!"-- followed by a wail of despair when she turns around and sees the bunker instead. "Don't touch any weird plants, okay? Or any weird... meat." "Alright." Vertin nods at Rita, while Poltergeist covers her eye-holes with her sheeted hands and mumbles about how she doesn't want to touch any weird meat in any circumstance. "Are you familiar? Should we expect danger?" "A pirate shouldn't be this far above sea level though..." "I believe you'll manage, Regulus." Vertin's tone is still relatively bright for the circumstances, chatting along with Regulus. "Thank you, by the way, for agreeing so easily to do this for Ahn. I have a feeling she's not used to being appreciated all that much." "We don't want to carry dirty stuff back out through places we've already cleaned, so let's start with the furthest-in and work our way back to the entrance, right?" "Would it make sense to try and find Ahn first? To ask what she wanted cleaned?" Poltergeist carefully reveals her eye holes and peeks around warily. "D-does she just live... all of... here...?"
Vantablitz Remnants	To Rita's examination, things are mildly more clear and less cluttered than, like, four years ago. It's a little embarrassing that it isn't much less, honestly, but baby steps. A camera in the corner sharply moves when Regulus starts yelling. The motor barely seems to work, but the screen isn't as dusty as outside. The intercom inside must not work either; or else Regulus is being lead into a den of cannibals to be chopped up for her succulent, soft, exercise-less flesh. No it just doesn't work. After another minute of awkward poking around, you can hear Ahn coming up from one of the staircases; specifically you can hear her distantly yelling "Sorry! Sorryyyy! I lost track of the-- I think the clocks are fast in here or something! Um, I don't know how to find out because there's no GPS and my phone is dead so--!" A little bit later, you can hear her footsteps, rapid-clattering up what sounds like multiple flights of stairs. She comes into view with a loose sweatshirt dangling around her neck, which she fights her way into after smoothly vaulting over a pile of sandbags like she does that every time she goes outside. Like she might. Her hair is messed up and she's sweating, probably from sprinting here, face flushed in embarrassment. "I was trying to watch the security consoles and stuff too but something suddenly came up and-- sorry again! I--" Beat. "Vertin?! Rita?! Oh god the apple is--" Ahn suddenly blinks in Poltergeist's direction. She looks to Vertin for guidance. 'Trick or treat?' bubbles up to the back of her tongue and is swallowed again for just sounding so stupid. "Um. H-hi?" she says, waving in Poltergeist's direction nervously. Like she thinks she's being subtle, she mouths 'Can you see her too?' at Rita.
Rita Ma	Poltergeist's anguish clearly gets to Rita, scrunching her face in Little Sister Sympathy and lagging awkwardly near the terrified girl's shoulder. Would Poltergeist want comfort from her? "Miss, um, Poltergeist? ... It's good to see you again. I was there at the restaurant. Um, could you use a hug?" "I'm fairly sure she's Vietnamese, though we haven't discussed precisely where she lives before." "Mmm! She is. I guess I'm not sure if this is still in Vietnam, though," Rita says, tapping her lips thoughtfully. "What did you mean by in-betweens?" "Huh? You know," Rita says casually, wiggling her hand in a 'so-so' gesture. She seems to think 'something in between a weird plant and weird meat' should be self-evident. "Are you familiar? Should we expect danger?" "Mmm. I've been here twice, but it was a while ago," Rita nods. "Her house seemed mostly safe. I don't think you should expect danger, just..." 'Just be careful', goes unspoken. "Why would there be dead bodies...?" "The world sort of ended," Rita says, as if that too is fairly normal. "Would it make sense to try and find Ahn first? To ask what she wanted cleaned?" "Maybe?" Rita says, noncommittally. "Asking someone exactly what they want you to do can be as much trouble as them doing the chore themselves. She might just feel better if we took it off her mind..." Rita takes a moment to appreciate Ahn's midriff while she struggles on the sweatshirt, and then doesn't even have the grace to seem embarrassed when she perks up a second later. "Oh!! Hi, Ms. Ahn! Is Ms. Lotus doing okay? I hope you don't mind if I help out Ms. Regulus. We were just about to go to skull." 'Can you see her too?' Rita nods, with serious-sympathetic eyes that say 'Be gentle'.
Vantablitz Remnants	Attempting to be remotely helpful, to make up for her lateness, Ahn glances around the lobby several times, then points at the map. "U-um, we're in the surface level west wing! After arrivals and checkpoints it's all barracks and security, so, we don't need to go there. Ah, south is, um, the civilian block, and there's a cafeteria and storage and--" she skips a word, her unhappiness briefly spiking. "But nobody lives there, so. Oh." She gestures north. "That's the hospital, and the quarantine and biolab ward, so, really, really don't go there. Please trust me." She urgently looks Regulus in the eyes. "It was so so so hard to seal that off. Please don't. I'll be so mad." Finally, she gets around to "And east is centcom-satcom with the servers and staff facilities! That's mostly where I hang out! You don't need to help with anything outside that, okay?" she says, circling the eastern part of the map with the palm of her hand and then blocking out the rest with her arms. "You used to have to go through the south wing to get there, but I, um, 'cleared it out', so I could unweld everything." Ahn stutters, "W-well not everything everything, but, all the stuff that's-- yeah. Don't worry! You're totally safe as long as you don't break into anywhere you shouldn't be!" An awkward pause goes by. She looks left and right, then jazzhands at block letter characters above the map. "Welcome to Camellia! Yaaaay!" She scoots off fast enough that she's definitely cringing inside about that one.
Regulus	Regulus's room is pretty clean, all told, and she does do her own laundry but that's maybe to be expected from someone who cares about fashion and proper treatment of one's various clothing options. She is not, in fact, a total slob! Really her biggest issue when it comes to manual labor is when it's strenuous, then she tends to try to avoid it. And of course, sometimes she just decides to veg out for a while. ''I-I guess she does sound nice.'' "She's pretty nice! To be honest, I was surprised when she went after me like that because she tends to be so sweet! But I like it, she's got a good backbone...!" Regulus says, flexing her right arm though her flexing it doesn't seem to cause anything to happen. "It'll be fun." Regulus tells Poltergeist, having brainwashed herself into thinking this will be fun. "You can have fun with cleaning, sometimes, and it's nice to feel all accomplished afterwards, though -- I wasn't expecting a place like this." She's a little uncertain about how fun cleaning the skull chamber can be. She's not even really against skulls, that's a pretty piratey thing to run into after all, but she's less sure about skull-marked hallways. In general. ''I have a feeling she's not used to being appreciated all that much.'' "That's why I'm doing this! I can't let her go around thinking I don't appreciate her!" Regulus is determined! Regulus has exercised at least once in her life now and if you count the trek up to this place, that's twice. At this rate she's going to be a pro athlete. That is, if you ask Regulus how much working out she's been doing. ''Ahn!!'' Regulus throws her a wave. Obviously, teasing Ahn right now is an IMMEDIATE MISSION FAIL. So Regulus doesn't do that. And also, Vertin saying that Ahn is used to not feeling appreciated means that Regulus is now hyper focused on the mission. She will do what society has failed to do and thus prove that rock and roll is the real power that moves the universe into a better place, one more governed by the ideals of peace and love. Yes, the world might collapse into utter ruin if Ahn doesn't come away from this feeling appreciated as hell. To protect the multiverse from such a dire end, Regulus must do her best. No, her better than best. "We brought our own buckets and mops and cleaning clothes!" Regulus looks like she came right out of a 60s ad for a vaccuum cleaner with a fluffy white apron dangling over her miniskirt and a bright blue blouse. "I know you just said to move some boxes but might as well do a little extra while we're here." Feel appreciated! Feel appreciated now! This is only the beginning of appreciation, there's so much more appreciation left to do! ''Huh? You know.'' Regulus takes a moment to eye APPLe critically and uncertainly. ''the world sort of ended.'' Regulus wonders if the world sort of ending would make it harder or easier to save the world and maybe the multiverse by appreciating Ahn. ''Ahn lists off all the zones.'' "Oh wow... No wonder you need help cleaning up. That's SO MUCH for one person for sure." ''It was so so hard to seal that off. Please don't. I'll be mad.'' This is a task that Regulus is perhaps most enthusiastic for. "Aye aye, Capt-Ahn! We won't open anything that shouldn't be open."
Timekeeper	"I was there at the restaurant. Um, could you use a hug?" The vague outline of Poltergeist's head under the sheet starts nodding emphatically, and then very quickly switches to shaking side to side even more emphatically when Rita finishes her last sentence. "I-I remember! Miss R-Rita. S-sorry, about... b-back then, I was... o-oh no. No thank you. N-no, no, I'm so-- I'm all damp and gross and slimy, and y-you'd hate it." She paff-paffs her cheeks. "I'm gonna be alright. I-I'm gonna be alright. I-I can make friends. I mean, what's g-gonna happen, I'm gonna d-die again? Gonna have a sea monster f-follow me all the way on top of a mountain and d-drag me back down?" Poltergeist keeps mumbling to herself, getting quieter and less confident as she goes. "Or zombies, or h-horrible plant zombie things, or weird meat, or dead bodies, or ghosts, or-- asgdfgw-!" She cuts off with a strangled scream when she sees a fist-sized spider clinging to the edge of her sheet, shaking around wildly to try and dislodge it. Vertin crouches down and plucks a short stick off the ground, gently brushing the spider off for her. "It'll be alright. See? Regulus and Rita are here, and this is Ahn's home." "Vertin?! Rita?! Oh god the apple is--" Vertin serenely raises up a hand in greeting, the exact opposite of Ahn's overflowing nervous energy. "Hello Ahn. I imagined it had to be a considerable task if you were asking for help, so I thought I'd accompany Regulus. And I wouldn't want to be swept up in things and forget to give you a hand myself." Gesturing behind her, where Poltergeist has very literally sunk halfway into the ground, she adds, "And this is Poltergeist, a friend of mine; I hope you don't mind. She's a very gentle person. Poltergeist, this is Ahn." There's a feeble sheet-covered wave in response. A beat, and then looking back up at Ahn, "Is Lotus your roommate? I remember you mentioning the name," While conjuring fucked up brambles and stuff. "But I wouldn't presume the context." Vertin hoists up her suitcase in preparation for more travel. For some reason, despite the climate and the activity, they're still wearing their same uniform suit as always, but it's sort of impossible to imagine them showing up in, like, sweatpants or something. "East wing it is. I'm starting to see why you took to the situation in the Motherlobe so quickly, now."
Vantablitz Remnants	'Hello Ahn. I imagined it had to be a considerable task if you were asking for help, so I thought I'd accompany Regulus. And I wouldn't want to be swept up in things and forget to give you a hand myself.' "Oh gosh, it's really not that big of a deal." Ahn says, putting up her hands. "I just thought, y'know, that it'd maybe help set Regulus straight. Not, like, to punish her or anything, but, maybe make her a little more grateful? And then bury the hatchet! You don't have to do anything you don't want to! You just got back from all that stressful stuff at the place!" It's strange. She seems more nervous here than she did at the freezing, hostile, broken down Motherlobe. Is it just because of having company over? 'Is Lotus your roommate? I remember you mentioning the name,' Ahn hesitates for five whole seconds. "Yyyyes." she decides. "Basically?" Then, after a startle. "Oh! Hi Poltergeist!" she says, hurriedly waving back, perhaps just now processing in mental queue that the funny sheet ghost isn't a hallucination or an evil spirit or something. "Nice to . . . meet you?" 'I'm starting to see why you took to the situation in the Motherlobe so quickly, now.' Ahn frowns, narrowing her eyes, but she keeps it to herself. "Yeah. Well. I don't really look after anyone here, so it was still a challenge." she says, lower energy. 'Oh!! Hi, Ms. Ahn! Is Ms. Lotus doing okay?' "She's fine! Thanks for asking!" Ahn calls out, now moving at a trot from embarassment. "Since the start of winter she's been like, hibernating or something? She just kinda said 'I never thought it'd be that time' and stuck herself in the sun room. She was basically asleep all the time until the whole 'institute thing'. Now she's awake but she won't move and she's being a huge baby." 'We were just about to go to skull.' "DON'T--!" Ahn start-stops, cutting herself off on automatic flinch for yelling. "--do that! If arcanists are anything like humans-- I-I mean I don't even know if you would be okay, Rita . . ." she says, fretfully wiggling her sweater a little further down. 'We brought our own buckets and mops and cleaning clothes!' "Oh. Um. Thank you?" Ahn says, stunned, as if she hadn't thought of that. She looks over her shoulder. "I mean, there's tons of . . . Does bleach expire?" Huh? 'Oh wow... No wonder you need help cleaning up. That's SO MUCH for one person for sure.' "I mean I kinda cleared out most of those a while ago. The ventilation to most of those places is sealed anyways so they don't even get dusty." Ahn says. "But even the east wing is kind of a lot! You're right! It's natural to struggle to keep up with chores in this situation!" she whines, sounding like she's arguing with someone else.
Vantablitz Remnants	You kind of have to chase Ahn down the stairs to not fall behind. Regulus is given another workout in a narrow concrete stairwell that empties out into mesh mezzanine that circles around a four-spoke junction, less dusty and dirty by far than above. Ahn jumps off from the railing, looks back, freezes up, and then points to the metal steps down that were like, ten feet away from the corner she cut. She walks you by engineer crawlspaces flooded with dim red lights, mostly spray-paint marked with 'NO', 'NUH UH', and 'ONLY IN WINTER', and a narrow maintenance shaft with a missing hatch and a cramped ladder that descends into the dark which she has graffiti'd 'DUMMY HOLE'. She also walks you past doors, of the slightly too cheap and chunky to really count as 'sci-fi' persuasion, mostly of which do open on sliding rails if you push a button next to them, or walk under a motion sensor; disused washrooms, locker storage, supply closets, and long-abandoned resting spaces that have been designed like lounges despite being the size of hospital rooms. Once you've gone far enough, you can see a broader staircase on a gentle spiral, which, if you glance around the concrete corner by going up a few steps, lets you see a sliver of glass geodaisic dome up above; which means you've followed the structure far enough to get behind the rock face. The doors to get in look as if they were taken off their tracks by a plasma torch and kind of tossed under the stairs, along with heaps of sandbags, a tangle of wire, and two menacingly long green-painted flat crates. If you listen very carefully, you can hear a faintly echoing refrain, like from a mall speaker system, of a few words here and there. '--receiving stations----border are to return----Son Tay----do not risk entry----exposure has already----all staff----repeat automatically--' "Soooo . . ." Ahn tries to start conversationally, but at another door, she glances down, glances up, and flips the lights off in a corridor for some reason. "Getting cold, huh?" she says, about sixty-five fahrenheit. "Keep meaning to get the elevator working . . ." Her lame attempt to keep your attention is more or less pointless. Turning off the lights doesn't make it all that difficult to see in the crossroad just ahead. The south side was clearly bolted and welded shut by a team of skilled personnel. The north side, where the soft glow that outlines the room issues from, is held shut by melted seams, hard epoxy, rubber sealing, and impromptu girder buttresses. The view through the cracked plexiglass is one that is choked to bursting with vegetation. Without sunlight, an indoor jungle radiates bioluminescence into the junction, filled with purple, pink, orange, and teal flowers that erupt from the floor, walls, and even the ceiling, all choked with a thick mat of creepers over fleshy green trunks and roots. The air behind the door glitters with sparkling pollen like a snowglobe. Though, perhaps it's just the dim light and the random shadows, but, looking closely invokes the sort of pareidolia reserved for bad acid trips. Looking past the beautiful flowers, you're almost sure you can see the contours of partial human bodies in the vegetation, almost woven together, as if conjoined under a thick green blanket.
Vantablitz Remnants	Not much further beyond that, the floors look half-heartedly mopped, and the lights are bright enough to be new. The white walls and coloured lines were repainted sometime in the last decade at least. Through multiple keypad locked doors in a row, it branches out into a branch-shaped scatter of modest facilities, within eyeshot of each other, visible through glass doors, none of which bear a resemblance to their original purpose. A communal shower seems to have had all its water rerouted to run an indoor hydroponics setup of considerable size. A server room has been dismantled to use the power sockets for charging dozens of power tools and a vehicular battery of some kind, the rack sliders now hosting long tables covered in loose parts and messy binders of schematics. There are scrape marks around a corner office where office furniture has been replaced with blue-painted standing lockers and wall-mounted holders; one for a fire extinguisher and the rest for guns. An old meeting room of some kind is covered in DVDs, board games, and tabletop RPG manuals; the big screen is playing Christmas fireplace ambiance-- still. The 'spine' of the spread leads to a set of stairs that cut the hall in half, leading to to a satellite monitoring station, if the English signage is to be believed, with a staircase cut underneath that has 'HELIPAD' crossed out with spraypaint and 'YARD' written over it. Following the corridor past both staircases, you pass one major junction, to what is clearly a laboratory 'clean room' of some kind on one side, and original-signage labeled 'REACTOR' on the other, all the way into what you could assume was once some kind of executive staff lounge or officer commons. Coffe bar (empty), vending machines (empty), a quick breakfast station (still empty), several benches (naturally empty), and wine rack (half-empty); the assumption holds water. Scuffs and burns are engraved into the fake hardwood floor, but some care has gone into preserving it all the same, despite the current existence of muddy bootprints, tracking in and then right back out to put them on a shoe rack. A walk-in freezer is identifiable by the typical cheap silvery door and soft hum, on the opposite side from a shower room. Vases and hanging pots stuffed into the room must contain eighty different plants, sunned by sloped inset lamps that take up most of the far ceiling and make the indoors feel somewhat like daylight. The air is actually a normal humidity here, too. There's also a stupid fucking loft basically bolted into the far end of the commons, hovering over a couch, desk, endtable, and laundry hamper shaded under it. Someone (Ahn) has dragged a mattress, beanbag chairs, a set of drawers, a low table, a mini-fridge, rice cooker, and a movie projector kit up there. With no further exits from here, it seems clear that she chose the most corner-feeling and generally liveable area in the whole base and just decided this is her house now.
Vantablitz Remnants	It's pretty obvious, really, because it's a fucking mess. There are paper cups all over the place, and empty mugs littering the counter space. Magazines across four decades are placed on random table surfaces, with no sign of a TV remote. A single laptop is left open to a browser with six hundred tabs still open. Cup noodles form impromptu towers within spitting distance of a full fridge and an open, empty dishwasher. There are spills where the plants were watered in places, and heaps of clothes that have somehow never made it to the half-full hamper. Empty MRE cases are still stacked in half the freezer, and the remains of some overcomplicated strategy game are left on the main table from quite possibly months ago. Access to Multiversal funds, through having a wage in the Watch, hasn't helped in the slightest. There are open boxes from deliveries sent to Watchtowers, filled with packing filler, right next to unopened ones with send dates from summer. New clothes are still in sealed plastic bags, while maintenance and medical kits are still in pieces from being unpacked for examination. A brand new game console is sat on top of the TV, not even plugged in, next to a construction brick comprised of game cartridge and blu-ray casings. For some reason, she got a printer, then couldn't find a use for it, and just left it in the corner, along with five identical umbrellas and a nice pair of boots with the tags still on. Candy wrappers stuff an entire waste paper basket and a half, all of them Multiversal brands, along with one of every single soda can anyone has ever heard of chilling in the cooler. It appears intentional, though, that the only stairs that are supposed to be there, going around a corner to an indoor balcony on a higher level than the janky loft, is cordoned off with police tape (fake, bought from Spirit Halloween), along with a bunch of equally fake warning signs and a mannequin traffic controller like a shitty scarecrow. The whiteboard on the staircase wall hasn't been updated since October, except for writing down scratch marks like a prisoner in confinement. If you squint, you can see where someone started wiping down the counters, then ran out of the room really fast. The smell of burnt floral incense is too old to be covering anything up, though. "So . . ." Ahn says, dazed, ostensibly at looking at it twice and realizing just how bad it is. She looks at Vertin and Poltergeist, and internally screams. She didn't think it'd matter, because it's just Regulus, but now it's embarrassing in front of her cool new friend and their friend! "You guys really don't have to help, you know. You can just sit down and . . . I'll make popcorn?" she says, weakly.
Regulus	There's so many workouts Regulus is going through lately! She's gonna end up RIPPED at this rate! She's gonna be so buff she'll just suplex Forget Me Not and carry all of Schneider's siblings into the Foundation HQ with one arm. A THIRD workout? Without even a soda and ice cream break in between? My god... But Regulus is quietly agreeing with Vertin's understanding of why Ahn took so well to the Motherlobe situation but she doesn't want to harp on it in case she accidentally complains about it to hard and upsets Ahn again. Nope. She WILL shove that turnip into Flamel's face but now it's so that he can properly appreciate turnips. That's right, it's not revenge anymore it's a good deed. ''DON'T--'' Oh good, Regulus thinks, they didn't actually have to go to Skull. Skull was also bad, as it turns out. And now they don't have to do Skull. Gosh, maybe she should clean for Ahn more often if she's going to be told to not bother with half the place. Then again, even discounting the death zones, that's still a lot of cleaning to do... ''I just thought, y'know, that it'd maybe help set Reuglus straight--'' "Setting a pirate straight, ha ha! That won't be easy! ... Uh, though, I am grateful. Really. I didn't make 'em come or anything, we're all happy to help out." "And if it helps bury the hatchet, this APPLe is quite willing to lend a hand." APPLe tells Ahn, with a bit of emphasis on 'This'. ''I don't really look after anyone here--'' "Besides your roomate right?" Regulus asks. ''She whines, sounding like she's arguing with someone else.'' "Well that's why we're here! Let this cleaning crew clean up your worries!" She salutes. Playing it up like this isn't just for fun, it's necessary. The bit of roleplay she's putting into this is part of Regulus's self encouragement despite, you know, death zones and quarantines being around here. She rushes after Ahn, though not too quickly--she doesn't want to spill water! That's dangerous! But another feeling is hitting her as she sees the phrase 'ONLY IN WINTER' that is starting to really nag on Regulus along with 'keep meaning to get the elevator working' and also 'The world sorta ended'. "Hey, Ahn..." Regulus says. "Don't take this the wrong way or anything, I understand wanting to live in a place like this with a big engineering project to fix up, but have you considered moving out? We could probably get you and Lotus rooms in the suitcase if you wanted. There's an outdoors there now--" This seems to be the place, Regulus thinks, as they head into what the designated area, taking a look around the commons for a moment rather than getting straight to work. "Looks like this is the place...." She says, setting down her bucket. "Mr. APPLe, how about you start with the loft area, and I'll start around the benches. and move onto the lounge?" She reaches into her bag and draws out a pair of rubber gloves, sliding them onto her hands with a SNAP and then gets to work. Despite her words, she starts with the footprints since they're pretty obvious and like right there. r"Make this place fit for a queen, swab the deck till it's nice and queen o/~" She sings. "The best way to sail the sea, is when you keep your cabin tidy o/~" APPLe sings along. They're totally in sync.
Rita Ma	"o-oh no. No thank you. N-no, no, I'm so-- I'm all damp and gross and slimy, and y-you'd hate it." "... Well, I don't think you're gross, Ms. Poltergeist, but I understand." Rita has surely declined a hug with almost those exact words. Her lips wobble in soft-pained sympathetic anguish, but she manages a smile. "Is Lotus your roommate?" "Oh, she's sort of her..." Rita leans towards Vertin and lowers her voice, and then suddenly realizes she isn't certain that Lotus and Ahn are girlfriends. Rita! You can't assume that just because she engulfs her. "Um. Yeah." "I-I mean I don't even know if you would be okay, Rita . . ." "Oh! Well, that's okay. I won't test it. It's not like I like doing things that are bad for me, right?" Rita lies. But when she sees the acid-trip-foliage south wing for herself, she stares for a few long seconds, before shifting her body to hopefully keep Poltergeist from seeing too. "Since the start of winter she's been like, hibernating or something?" "Oh. I'm glad she's awake now, but..." Rita puts her thumb to her lips while following behind Ahn, periodically hopping down a flight or two of stairs behind her to catch up, just barely in the plausible-human-scamperzone. "Well, I guess that happens to me too if I don't eat for a while," she admits sotto voce, unknowingly describing an experience universal to twentysomething women.
Rita Ma	On final arrival to the Cozy Loft House Zone, Rita thunks down her little bucket, pulls up her forearm-length yellow cleaning gloves, properly appraises the mess, and... Puts a hand to her cheek fondly. "I don't think I saw where you actually sleep before, Ms. Ahn..." she murmurs. "I like it. I really, really like it. It's sort of like an, um... a treehouse, isn't it?" She brightens after she remembers the word. "Oh, and you've got National Geographic! And a walk-in freezer!!" Is that really so cool? "And..." "You can just sit down and . . . I'll make popcorn?" "No, I like helping! I'll have popcorn later as a reward. For now, you have to tell us what's trash and what isn't, okay Ms. Ahn?" Ruthlessly, Rita locks on to the clothes in sealed plastic, gathering up a few articles, pivoting around, and holding one up to Ahn as if trying to visualzie her wearing it. "Hmm. Is this one a keeper? How about that one?" she says, judging the fashion involved (positively!). "I'll just throw all the ones you want to keep in the laundry, to get rid of the plastic-y smell, and then-- did you wash the bedsheets lately, Ms. Ahn?"
Timekeeper	"I just thought, y'know, that it'd maybe help set Regulus straight." Vertin looks over at Regulus, sounding like she's smiling a little bit. "Yes, and I agree with that. You'll see soon how dedicated Regulus can be in showing her appreciation, though." "Really, I believe she'd be fine with no oversight. I just thought I'd take the opportunity to come visit you." "Nice to . . . meet you?" "Hi..." Poltergeist starts to sink further down into the floor with the sheer effort of responding to an introduction, but then her eyes widen and she frantically scrambles back to her feet, leaving a spot of saltwater-smelling damp where she phased through the ground. "I-I shouldn't do that, I don't know what's-- what kind of things are down there." "Since the start of winter she's been like, hibernating or something?" Vertin won't start running to follow Ahn or jump over railings, but she keeps up a moderately brisk walk to at least stay in earshot. This sentence immediately makes Lotus make a kind of sense to Vertin, as someone who recently slept twenty four hours straight and sometimes locks herself in her office for multiple days and forgets to eat. "Would she benefit from any MREs? I've recently been threatened with an excess of them and I'd be happy to pawn them off." "Besides your roomate right?" Vertin idly responds to Regulus while making her way down the stairs after Ahn. "That's different. That group wasn't expecting or experienced in being thrust into a survival situation. That'd be like saying that I look after--" Well, she does look after Regulus. "Sonetto." Vertin pensively absorbs the mounting signs of the world's end, falling silent for a significant portion of the walk. There's a somber atmosphere to even things as simple as signs and placards, every little trace of life that was so sprawling that it needed infrastructural management before the end. In her reflections, she keeps her eyes out for a calendar anywhere one might have been, as a symbol. Poltergeist creeps behind for some time, before realizing that she really really doesn't want to be at the very back because what if something snatches her and yanks her away and no one even notices she's gone for hours-- which leads to her soundlessly trotting into the center of the walking group. Something a little unexpected, once she's no longer so terrified of everything, is that she latches onto all of Ahn's pointless small talk with equally awkward babbling of her own. "S-sorta is kinda cold, isn't it? Though it's warmer than the ocean... o-or, also, w-warmer than winter usually was back in Florida! Th-though I was thinking... it's sorta like people said the Everglades were outside, though I never went to them even though they were just an hour away because I thought they'd be scary...." Poltergeist also, of all things, isn't afraid of the vividly colored and obviously evil human plant growths. She looks past where Rita is trying to block her vision and snort-gasps in shock, clapping her hands over her mouth. "Woah..! That's unreal... that's so g-gross...."
Timekeeper	"We could probably get you and Lotus rooms in the suitcase if you wanted. " Actually, offering Vertin's house to other people is one of the best things you can do as a friend of Vertin. All she sees fit to add to this is, not pressuring, "You'd be welcome anytime either way." "You guys really don't have to help, you know." Someone trained in the study of Vertin's expressions might notice the tiny hesitation on her face when she sees Ahn's room, but it's gone in an instant, and they set their suitcase down by the shoe rack. Easily, they remark while unbuttoning their coat to drape it over a free surface, "Is this all? It'll be no issue to help, of course. This is practically what my office looked like before Sonetto sorted me out." This is patently untrue. Even though Vertin is much messier when left to her own devices, she'd never let any of her spaces end up like this. The suitcase, too, is immaculately decorated and cared for at every square centimeter. But it's true enough that she can say it to help Ahn relax. Poltergeist is less graceful. She snickers in an ugly way, and blurts out, "Oh no, wow, what a mess." Instantaneously, almost before she even finishes her sentence, her mind catches up to her mouth and her expression does a full 180 into sheer abject despair. "Oh gosh. I-I'm so sorry. Should I just kill myself?" This second outburst makes her even more defeated. A bunch of pieces of trash levitate off the ground towards a garbage bag and she hangs her head. "I'm sorry. C-can I just help clean up so I-I'll stop talking?" Vertin's admonishment never even reached her mouth before Poltergeist went through the full five stages of grief. Eventually she just says with a touch of irony, "I suppose you're obligated to try and bury the hatchet now."
Vantablitz Remnants	'Setting a pirate straight, ha ha! That won't be easy! ... Uh, though, I am grateful.' "Well I'm setting you straight about being nice to the person who feeds your stupid face." Ahn huffs. "Which even pirates are. Even evil pirates are!" 'Yes, and I agree with that. She follows up with a more subdued "Good." and then looks at Regulus like a stinky little kid whose mother just told off. 'I just thought I'd take the opportunity to come visit you.' 'I-I shouldn't do that, I don't know what's-- what kind of things are down there.' "Oh gosh, um, yeah be careful." Ahn worries out loud, stepping towards Poltergeist with her hands outstretched then turning them to face herself and pantomiming half a hug as she works through how exactly she expects to grab her. "It'd be really bad if you got lost, and, I'd worry about you a lot, so, stick close, okay?" Man. Friends of friends are hard. "Huh? Really?" Ahn blinks, then winces just as she quietly says, "Why?" Fuck. 'Besides your roomate right?' "Not really." Ahn says. "I did when she was little, but now she just kinda takes care of herself." And, frankly, Ahn's executive function. 'Would she benefit from any MREs?' "Oh gosh no. There's still like a million of them in here." Ahn says, throwing up her hands. "This shelter was supposed to be for like two thousand people. I won't ever get through all of them in my life!" 'Don't take this the wrong way or anything, I understand wanting to live in a place like this with a big engineering project to fix up, but have you considered moving out?' Ahn stares back at Regulus. Stopping in her tracks, it takes her, visibly, a while, to even comprehend what Regulus is talking about. "I haven't actually." she says, as if that were the salient part. "That'd be kinda dumb, right?" Huh? 'It's not like I like doing things that are bad for me, right?' 'You'd be welcome anytime either way.' She shakes her head. "Um, thank you, but there's way, way too much stuff for me to move to do that. And not all of it would fit in a suitcase?" she pauses for a second, struck by how stupid that sounds. "And some of it isn't really safe. And I still have things to do here that I can't do anywhere else. And who'd help out the village?" Ahn looks at Rita good and long, purses her lips, then looks away again. ". . . Right." 'Oh. I'm glad she's awake now, but...' "She's kinda pissy about it." Ahn grumbles. "She was just totally gonna leave me alone until spring. I'm sure of it."
Vantablitz Remnants	'S-sorta is kinda cold, isn't it? Though it's warmer than the ocean... o-or, also, w-warmer than winter usually was back in Florida! Th-though...' "Oh, you're from America?" Ahn stares at Poltergeist, absorbing this shocking new fact. "But you're so polite?" spills out of her before she knows it. "The Everglades? I read about them in NatGeo and saw a bunch of David Attenborough stuff. They seem kinda neat from, like, a wildlife and ecosystem perspective, but I always wondered how you were even supposed to appreciate that if you're visiting? Paddling a boat through opaque water filled with alligators and stuff just sounds kinda scary." she says, wrapping around to converge on an affirmative. 'Woah..! That's unreal... that's so g-gross....' "Come on." Ahn whines, stressed out rather than indignant. "It took me all year to finally get rid of . . ." She falls oddly quiet. ". . . the other stuff." 'I don't think I saw where you actually sleep before, Ms. Ahn...' Ahn, for some reason, suddenly looks very embarrassed. "Well. It's not all that special. So . . . ?" The implication is 'should I have? oh god' more than 'why would I?'. 'Is this all?' "Yup." Ahn says, strained. "Sorry it got so bad. Without Lotus around I just kinda . . . lost motivation. It didn't seem like it was really worth keeping it up if it was just me." 'Oh no, wow, what a mess.' "I'm gona die." Ahn croak-whispers from the back of her throat. 'Oh gosh. I-I'm so sorry. Should I just kill myself?' "Wha? Why? What?" Ahn gasps out, just before struggling to find a reason that Poltergeist can't commit suicide as fast as possible. "No! Because--! A-ah--! This place is haunted! And the ghosts wouldn't let you leave! So!" She's making that the fuck up. She looks at Vertin for backup. 'Hmm. Is this one a keeper? How about that one?' Oh no, and now Rita is touching her stuff! Just like she could have easily predicted! And it's new stuff! Stuff that reflects on her personally! Stuff which she can't just shrug and say she scavenged! Red alert! Red alert! "Well! A-ah! It'd be wasteful to throw out the ones I haven't even worn yet! D-decadent, even! And those are new and I haven't-- N-no I'm wearing those ones for stuff in the City! I was going to figure out a closet situation, so . . . Yes! I washed them, like, not . . . very long ago?"
Regulus	Regulus is someone who needs to hug people and yet she's surrounded by people who are awkward about being hugged. Thank god for Vertin, Regulus thinks. She doesn't want to hug people to make them uncomfortable, she needs to hug people because she has to show her love to people she cares about or she's in terrible danger. She's honestly not in a rush to call someone she's never met smelly or anything so she's a little grateful Lotus isn't around just yet. "Polly's a sweetheart." Regulus says. "And a pirate is never afraid of a little slime!" She declares, just in case any other sticky or clammy friends are anxious about how huggable they are. She can't help but crane her head a little curiously at what Ahn is inclined to wear. "Do you have any spare trash bags by the by? We could get a good go at that too. It's easier cleaning up a space that's already clean too," Regulus, of course, is willing to consider how it helps one work less. ''Oh gosh, I-I'm so sorry. Should I just kill myself?'' "Noooo! Don't do that!" Regulus cries and not just because it'd theoretically create even more mess. "We're here to help clean up after all, so it makes sense it'd be a little messy otherwise we'd just be cleaning...already clean stuff!" ''That'd be like saying that I look after--Sonetto.'' "Isn't Sonetto the one who looks after you?" Regulus asks offhandedly, but smiling. ''You'd be welcome either way.'' "Mhm! Mhm~!" ''This is practically what my office looked like before Sonetto sorted me out.'' "Nooooooo...!" Regulus is scandalized. "That was even before you nearly doubled the suitcase's occupants! Vertin, love, when did Sonetto start working with you and helping with the chores?" ''Even evil pirates are!'' "Yeah, yeah! Do you know a lot of pirates, love?" Regulus happily swishes around her mop. Despite everything, she's being pretty methodical about it. She used to have to take care of a BOAT after all and until recently, she didn't have a habit of capsizing them! ''I did when she was little.'' "Woah! How old is Lotus?" Regulus asks. "She couldn't be that much younger than you, right?" Otherwise Ahn doesn't seem like the type to tell Regulus to call her smelly. ''I haven't actually. That'd be kinda dumb, right?'' "Huh? Why's that?" Regulus asks. "Oh are you looking after like a whole village?" Ahn must sort of be like the Vertin of this world then if she's got a whole village of people that she has to look after. Will the suitcase become an entire, like, community someday? It's actually a thrilling thought though, like, does that make Lotus the Sonetto here? Maybe she should stop thinking about this. "......Well, you're still free to visit. And if it ever gets to be a lot or you just want a break now and then, you can rely on the Timekeeper Team to help out!" She frowns after saying that, thoughtfully, but shakes her head as she continues to mop, eventually meeting APPLe halfway and they toss each mops to one another and give each one a hi-five and a low-five before getting back to work. ''She was just gonna leave me alone until spring.'' "Is she one of those um--introverts?" Regulus asks, glancing over to Poltergeist periodically--maybe to make sure she hasn't killed herself, resulting in a ghost's ghost, or maybe just because she worries over her fellow 1966 buddy.
Vantablitz Remnants	If Regulus tries to guess Ahn's wardrobe from what's lying around, she'll only come away with 'like a million surplus army outfits that are only kind of her size' plus 'everything that looked kind of cute online'. The former selection is definitively worn out and stained, to various extends. The latter ranges from bright pastels that look vaguely sporty to dark cool colours that are probably only built for sitting on a snowy bench at night. There's nothing particularly . . . mid-range. Normal, even. 'Do you have any spare trash bags by the by?' "Oh. Pr--ooobablyyyy?" Ahn says, turning around to look behind herself and then turning several more times in full room-scanning circles. "I can-- No, wait, you can go to the nearest supply closet! Which is two junctions down, left, then right, then right again, and in the third door on your right!" she declares, confidently. There is an entire unused roll under the sink that Rita finds out she just forgot about. 'Yeah, yeah! Do you know a lot of pirates, love?' "No?" Ahn doubleblinks. "Pirates are from TV and stuff. They're not real." Five excruciating seconds go by. "Oh except you I guess." 'Woah! How old is Lotus?' "Oh, like . . ." Ahn mumbles a number really quietly while stretching and pretending to yawn. 'Oh are you looking after like a whole village?' "I don't-- actually do that much. It's just kind of. You know. There's stuff up here they don't have down there. And like, knowledge they don't have." Ahn says. "If there's a really screwed up harvest, or a lot of people get sick, or something dangerous is about to happen, I sneak stuff down the mountain to help out. And if the monitoring equipment says anything, I figure out how to send a warning. You know." '......Well, you're still free to visit. And if it ever gets to be a lot or you just want a break now and then, you can rely on the Timekeeper Team to help out!' "Okay!" Ahn says, as unconditionally brightly as she has after first saying hi. 'Is she one of those um--introverts?' "No, she's a pushy busybody." Ahn says, in that half-miffed half-fond cheek puffed but almost smiling way you do with very specific people. "She's just weird this winter. She hasn't come out of her-- at all. Except the one time. Kind of. Normally she can't leave people alone, honestly." At a loss for anything else to say, Ahn adds, "Maybe it's seasonal depression? Or . . ." She squints really hard. Her lips form the first syllable of 'puberty', and then she shakes her head. "That's stupid." she mutters.
Rita Ma	"I-I'm so sorry. Should I just kill myself?" In the middle of Rita trying to hold up some City clothes to Ahn's chest, her head whips to the left to look at Poltergeist and her face goes slightly pale. She's too shocked to even cough up an urgent 'no!', but thankfully other people are leaping on that QTE. "It's... it's okay, Ms. Poltergeist," Rita manages after a good four or five seconds. "We all like you here, I promise," on behalf of someone who just met her and who she just called messy. There's the roll under the sink, but Rita did also bring her own trash bags in her bucket! How messy was she expecting Ahn to be, anyway...? Whipping one open, she hands it to Poltergeist for her trash-levitating help- "That's a really neat trick, don't you think, Ms. Ahn?" she says- and then yanks open all the clothes-packages before peeling off the bedsheets and gathering them all up together. "Well, bedsheets can always be fresher, and we'll be running a small load of laundry anyway... um, Ms. Ahn, have you got a washing machine somewhere?" Her eyes wander past the police tape, again, as she waits on an answer. She's sort of curious, but not quite enough to intrude. "But you're so polite?" "Americans are polite sometimes, Ms. Ahn," Rita scolds gently. "There's... um..." A couple of Clark's harpoonists from Apple Tree who Ahn wouldn't know. Uh... "... Mr. Calvin," who she probably hasn't met, "and..." Rita's trying so hard. "... and, um, I might be a little bit American on my mom's side," she finally says, as if the rudeness were genetic. Her lips form the first syllable of 'puberty' Rita can't quite make that out, but... "Are you sure she's not hungry? If she's going through changes... I kind of want to see her after we do the laundry, if that's okay with you."
Rita Ma	"And a pirate is never afraid of a little slime!" Rita's eyes narrow slightly at Regulus over a double armful of gathered-up bedsheets. How much does she know?
Timekeeper	"Huh? Really? Why?" "I believe it's good practice to stop by and visit friends when I have a chance." Using the sort of strong language of 'friends' with no wind-up is intentional, because oh god she lives in this entire bunker alone and the closest village has to at least be a decent hike away and there has to be a reason why she doesn't live with them and they don't live with her. "It's really no trouble." "Um, thank you, but there's way, way too much stuff for me to move to do that. And not all of it would fit in a suitcase?" "The interior of the suitcase is about a thousand hectares, though precise surveying hasn't been plausible yet." Vertin clarifies, patting the corner of the suitcase to indicate that she does specifically mean that one. After mentally reassessing that there are only Watch members here, she also adds, "Actually, Regulus completed construction of a warpgate inside of it just this past week. I was planning on inviting YuRia to visit, and you'd both be welcome as well." "But you're so polite?" Poltergeist is so readily able to accept being insulted, but and it's only natural that any compliment towards her be in the tone of surprise, but this particular brand of shock takes her off guard. She goes still for a bit, and then abruptly clutches her head with her hands in horror. "Oh my god! We declared war! I-I-I saw it on the television after I died!" It's almost possible to see the animated sweat droplets popping out of her head as she writhes her entire torso back and forth in distress. "I-I'm sorry! I'm sorry about America!" Vertin watches this for a minute before she sees fit to mildly interject. "I don't believe anyone holds it against you, Polly. You were fifteen." After agonizingly recovering from this, Poltergeist finally manages to gasp out her agreement to a topic that passed minutes before. Right, though?! It seems so scary! It's so dense and there's so many snakes! But it's sooo pretty in the pictures, still, and the advertisements and stuff...." "Sorry it got so bad." Vertin, stripped down to her dress shirt and making extra sure that her hair is properly bundled away, shrugs while squatting down to start picking up. "It happens, truly. Would you mind if I moved some of this so that Regulus can sweet underneath?" "Vertin, love, when did Sonetto start working with you and helping with the chores?" As part of that same conversational thread, Vertin says to Regulus, "Just about six months before the Storm of '66. But you know, before you moved in, she rarely spent time in there, and even I didn't half as much as I do now. It's hard to properly care for a space if there's no one to share it with. I suppose I was always hoping that the manor would fill up eventually." "Noooo! Don't do that!" "Wha? Why? What? No!" "Oh god... at least the other mean girls get to be pretty... what's my issue...?" Poltergeist's mumbling is a constant undercurrent to go along with the poltergeistery, being stunningly efficient at cleaning and organizing even while sitting on the ground with her face buried in her knees. "Please don't hurt yourself." Vertin adds her voice to the rest, though Poltergeist is like this often enough that it's a regular expression of her distress. "And please treat yourself more kindly. We care about you." "This place is haunted! And the ghosts wouldn't let you leave! So!" "Is-- is that true?" Poltergeist, a ghost, raises up her face to look at Vertin for confirmation. Completely straightfaced, Vertin backs up maybe the worst excuse Ahn could have made with no hesitation. "Yes, but only if you die here."
Regulus	''Rita's eyes narrow slightly at Regulus'' Oh god why is Rita narrowing her eyes? Or is she squinting? Is she not believing her? Regulus gives Rita a hearty thumbsup to reassure her. ''ACtually, Regulus completed construction of a warpgate inside of it just this past week.'' "Hm hm! I was being quiet to keep it a surprise, but actually I used some of the stuff we salvaged from the Motherlobe to help, so--thanks for that too!" Technically most of the stuff Regulus is talking about she went off grabbing but also, like, the Watch generally helped out so. "Oh yeah you remember YuRia right? She's got some style." She decidedly doesn't talk about how frequently she ends up trapped in a facility when she hangs out with Ahn but the thought does occur to her as she pauses to lean on her mop and stare up at the ceiling for a moment. ''I'm sorry about America!'' Regulus thinks about Petra destroying America for a moment. Just for a moment. It'd be a little silly for her to point out that Petra destroyed America when there's still so many other Americas out there still at large and capable of doing anything. ''I moved some of this so that Regulus can sweep underneath?'' "Regulus the Sweep Machine needs assistance in conducting additional sweeping!" Regulus immediately jumps in on it. If given the opportunity, she will indeed splosh her mop and engage in more 'deck swabbing' at the nearly opened up location. "Then we'll fill it up. And then you'll be wondering ''how'' to get some time to yourself." Regulus promises. "It'd be nice to have a little community in there, we could do proper events too, concerts--ones waaay less modest than the last one. Truly raging parties to clean up after." ''We care about you.'' "Yeah! We're '66 mates." Regulus adds, similarly with no hesitation. If nothing else, Regulus can say all manner of things without thinking things through in the first place. ''Pirates are from TV and stuff.'' "And radio!" Regulus reminds, as if that was the strange thing about what Ahn said. "Ah--sure I can go to the supply closet though uh... Just to make sure I don't get lost would you mind showing me the way? I mean I'd obey the signs but..." She is a little spooked by the place!! She thinks that's reasonable! "I had no idea you looked after a whole village. One you don't even live with. That's pretty rocking." ''She's just weird this winter.'' Regulus blinks cluelessly.
Vantablitz Remnants	'That's a really neat trick, don't you think, Ms. Ahn?' "Um, y-yeah! Haha! Gosh and it's all, thematic!" Ahn sweats bullets about Poltergeist's fragile little attachment to life(?) the whole time. 'Ms. Ahn, have you got a washing machine somewhere?' "There's two left." she states, informatively. And worryingly. "One's . . . I'm gonna move it eventually. Actually I was gonna move it today." Ahn lies, apologetically. She sheepishly points down the corridor. "Six doors down . . ." No fucking wonder she just gets new clothes honestly. 'I believe it's good practice to stop by and visit friends when I have a chance.' "Oh wow." Ahn says softly to herself. "Oh! Okay! Then, if it's not, inconvenient?" 'The interior of the suitcase is about a thousand hectares' "Wait are you serious? That much?" Ahn freezes, trying to think of something intelligent to say. The roll fails. "No wonder you don't mind Regulus mooching." 'Actually, Regulus completed construction of a warpgate inside of it just this past week.' Fuck. Bad timing. "Buh . . ." ". . . Okay. I'll mark it on the calendar." Ahn says, staring at the whiteboard and thinking really hard about doing that. 'Americans are polite sometimes, Ms. Ahn,' "I--" 'Oh my god! We declared war! I-I-I saw it on the television after I died!' Ahn sighs aggrievedly. She looks at Rita in a way that silently communicates 'Q.E.D'. 'I-I'm sorry! I'm sorry about America!' "I'm sorry about America too." Ahn mumbles. 'But it's sooo pretty in the pictures, still, and the advertisements and stuff....' "I guess, but advertisements always make things look pretty. It's their whole job." Ahn sighs, forlornly pushing together a pile of unsorted magazines and vaguely acting like she's tidying them up. She shakes her head, uttering a "Not at all." to Vertin. "As long as you don't do it all for her." As if that's the issue. 'Oh yeah you remember YuRia right? She's got some style.' "No. Should I?" With such confidence too. You were stuck in a capitalist death bunker together girl! 'I had no idea you looked after a whole village. One you don't even live with. That's pretty rocking.' Ahn shuffles uncomfortably. "Well, what else is anyone gonna do? Ignore them?" she says. "There's not really any point to living down there either." Ahn first squeezes her hands behind her back, then goes to fidgeting with her garish little hair flower at that. "Thanks, though. If you want to visit, you can go with Rita." Looking to her next, she says, "Yours was a white anemone, right?" Oh so she can remember that. "I can pick out some other ones in like thirty minutes. I can do that while we're eating even." 'Are you sure she's not hungry? If she's going through changes...' "No, she's not." Ahn says, confidently, folding her arms.
Vantablitz Remnants	Then, from upstairs, beyond the stupid Spirit Halloween crime scene tape, comes a second voice that Rita will find immediately familiar (save for its direly half-awake tone), and which, to everyone else, sounds as if someone a little younger than Ahn were doing an eerily good but not-quite-perfect impression of a radio with noticeably undervolted batteries. "No . . . don't listen to her . . ." "Oh come on!" "You have to feed me . . ." "You've been fed!" "You have to feed me good girls . . ." "Oh my god you're so cringe!" "You have to feed me sweet good little girls or I'll wither up and die . . ." "Go back to sleep!" For all of how weird Ahn is about committing to 'roommate', it actually sounds like a roommate fight. Yelled up and down the balcony and all. "How am I supposed to sleep when you're making all that noise?!" "They're helping! Unlike you!" "Isn't it normal to tell them to help quietly?!" "You can literally hear them through the floor!" "I can sleep through you can I not?" "Yeah, specifically while I'm telling you not to throw down the plates instead of bringing them down after you're finished!" "You're so crabby today. Go outside and get some fresh air." "I'm doing that! Often! Unlike someone who made fun of me for being a shut-in!" "I don't believe you." "Come down and look then you bum!" "You wouldn't tell a beautiful flower to get out of its pot and 'come look' now would you? Don't be silly." "If it were being a total hypocrite, yeah! I'd--" Ahn breaks from form just to hover defensively around the table, and go "Oh wait wait don't move that. We're gonna finish that campaign. We took like thirty eight hours to get that far!" Following up eepified is, "Are you moving the pieces around? Are you cheating?" "When do I ever cheat?!" "Mmhmhmmmhhhhh . . . I'm coming down." "Then actually come down and don't just send goo to-- Are you even listening?!" Right then, a thin, even trickle of some black fluid, so shiny that it glitters, pours over from underneath the railing and pools on the just-swept coffee table. It ripples, then forms pyramidal spines, then collapses into a cubic wave, then 'sprouts' a spirographic pattern that flowers open pitch black lotus-pattern petals, glowing bioluminescent acid green at the tips and interior.
Vantablitz Remnants	"You're so lazy!" "Oh bitch don't give me that. I'm always having to make you do everything. I bet it's a warzone down there." "N-no it's not!" "Your heart rate is spiking~ You're sweating, too." "That's everyone doing manual labour . . ." "No. Yours is different." "Don't be weirrrrrd!" Ahn, red-faced, is now arguing with a flower, from which the voice now originates from. "Oh my god you're acting like a teenager! Just go back to sleep until April! See if I care!" "Awww you poor girl. You must have been so lonely without me. It's affecting your mental health." "Get a job!"
Rita Ma	Regulus gives Rita a hearty thumbsup to reassure her. Rita's eyes narrow a liiiittle further. "I've never been slimy," she huffs softly, into the dirty-and-new laundry gathered in her arms. "I was planning on inviting YuRia to visit, and you'd both be welcome as well." "Oh! Um." Rita tilts her head and looks off to the side, initially unsure. Have I met Ms. YuRia? ... I feel like I've heard that name in the City. So maybe it's actually Mr. YuRia? But Ms. Vertin is probably going to have tea for me again, so I'd have to turn that down, and... but Ms. Cristallo was really nice, and... Wobble wobble. Then she perks back up, suddenly locking into a decision. "Mmm, I think I could do that! Thank you for the invitation, Ms. Vertin." "Yours was a white anemone, right?" "Mm, mm. With the black center," Rita says. And then to Regulus and Poltergeist, she adds: "That's a kind of flower," as if afraid they'll associate her with sea gribblies even more. "It's a really nice village. Everyone there's supposed to have flowers on their heads, though, and they think it's scary and bad if you don't wear one. They think Ms. Ahn is really enlightened, and I think they're right." . . . She's off for a minute to toss the laundry in, and when she comes back... "Oh!! Ms. Lotus!!" Rita looks like she's just come downstairs to Christmas presents under the tree. She dips forward, then hesitates, hand raised: "... Or, um, part of you, unless you've just gotten really little...?" "You have to feed me sweet good little girls or I'll wither up and die . . ." Remembering that eating people is bad: "We don't have any of those here, Ms. Lotus," Remembering that Poltergeist might kill herself: "um, except Ms. Poltergeist," Remembering that she might have a heart attack if engulfed: "who's past her expiration date." Whew. Skill checks passed! Relaxed, Rita open-palmed pats the flower. "And if Ms. Ahn was struggling, I think it's just because she cares so much about you, that it's harder for her to do things if you're not around to be helped. Right?" "Ms. Lotus, is it okay if I come up there and say hi in person? I know you're really sleepy, but I did miss you." She weaves around the caution tape to head up, if allowed!
Regulus	Regulus seems like a goofy pirate without a care in the world and she certainly actively works to give off that impression, but talk about people turning into goo has gotten her quiet and contemplative as the understanding that she doesn't really KNOW what happened to her friend hits her. That he might be gone forever. That he might've been used up. That her world and timeline is gone forever. What's she going to do? Think about THAT? That's stupid. Who can think about that sort of thing? That's the sort of thing you shouldn't think about, you should never think about, that you definitely shouldn't dwell on at any point because--well--it's just too much, isn't it? And really, she's the lucky one. It was the end of an era, and she survived. She hasn't heard of any others except for Poltergeist who is, notably and specifically, not a 'survived' type of person. At least the 1920s has all that jazz. And music. But what if it goes further beyond? What if time moves even further back? To the stone age? Then she'd have to truly find new meaning behind the term 'rock' music. ''No wonder you don't mind Regulus mooching.'' Regulus instead focuses on this, because it's a nice comedic bit to rely on. "She doesn't even charge rent." Regulus quips. "Best landlord I've ever had, though usually I avoid them by staying off of land!" Regulus can't really think of a reason to visit the village either. Oh, sure, she has some curiousity about it but that is, decidedly, the place where Ahn isn't. Then again, maybe she could use it as an opportunity to ask Rita about Ahn (and her goopy gal pal) without being weird about it? ''You have to feed me good girls.'' It's a good thing, Regulus thinks, that she's considered a ''bad girl''. She's safe! But she has to worry about Vertin who IS pretty good. And also a LITTLE short. And then of course there's Poltergeist and, dear god, Rita. Okay, Rita is actually pretty tall but she has to make sure Rita doesn't get eaten by a flower. Or, well, okay, she's not actually a flower right? So ... ... ... Regulus head starts to hurt. ''I don't believe you.'' This is her shot, Regulus thinks! To protect her friends! Remember her, Vertin, she's going to put herself out there and risk being fed to whatever Lotus is by standing out and disagreeing with her. "Actually I've run into Ahn a lot outside." Regulus chirps. "Once at the Motherlobe, and once--well twice really--in The City..." But is Lotus NOT a flower after all? Lotus herself is saying she's a flower. A beautiful flower who needs a pot. She rubs at her eyes. Shouldn't she believe someone if they tell her they're a flower? Or is this a metaphor? "It wasn't that bad. We're totally having a cleaning adventure, do you want to help, with the cleaning adventure? I was about to grab trash bags." She is not entering a space that might cost her toes. She needs those to wiggle and dance. ''I've never been slimy.'' "Huh? Why'd you be slimy?" Regulus asks, distracted from her brave sacrifice to protect the crew.