Difference between revisions of "Log:Magical Misery Tour"

19 August, 2017

Every action has a consequence. First there were the Days of Rage Revisited which ended in arrest and Visiting the Prisoner, then someone took it upon themselves to play outlaw and said 'Get in, Loser - We're Leaving!', and then after some calls to discuss A Day In The Life, a plot was hatched. This? This here? Is the best they could come up with to keep C.B. Alexander out of jail and alive. Let's hope these jerks know what they're doing, because it gets messy. (Content warning: references to graphic violence, drugs, kidnapping.)

Horrible Places

There was Pizza, There was booze, but none for CB, for the others well... 'This would sharpen you up and make you ready for a bit of the old ultra-violence.'

Once the actual 'hurting' CB starts, Count's chipper jokes and quips seem to vanish, and a much more serious demeanor settles in over the features of the beast, as if a switch were thrown, or he's simply adjusted some dials in his internal setting menu. All smiles gone in favor of grim detachment.

Clio, is a scientist when it comes to violence, a fucking surgeon of blunt force trauma and the breaking of bones, which, well, they are going to hurt. Luckily for CB, the man has been started on his regimen of drugs, including morphine, so it's not quite as bad as it should be. Then Clio is gone, Only to return once or twice, every few hours to place a few more cruel bruises and abrasions. Time, it is passing, perhaps slower for CB than the others, but time is indeed passing.

Clio is gone now, and she's put the rest of the job into Count's hands. CB has been living with ropes and old bondage gear attached to him for a couple days now, not restricting his movements so much, but definitely chafing, leaving marks.

A New Day! Or Evening. Count is arriving, walking up to the house with... what? As he gets there he seems to be scattering things all around. Are those... cigarette butts? They appear to be yes... Why is he doing that?! He hasn’t even come to say hi yet, or Check on CB, he's just... huh.

And finally, he's coming inside, tossing a few more around and wiping his hands free of ash. As usual, the man leaves no footprints.

Hey, so... Franklyn's here. Besides a brief spell where she had to return to the town to act like her life is not a huge fucking nightmare mess, Franklyn's pretty much been doing shift work with Calliope to make sure C.B. isn't entirely left to fester in some unsupported isolated consensual but still traumatic beatdown hellhole. Because they have A Good Reason to be doing this, right? RIGHT. Franklyn thinks this, because she has to, because the other option...

...Well, failure is not an option.

So here is is, having spent a while reading something or another aloud to C.B -- something about some hunter who has to walk in the alps for a really long time, then gets dragged down into a village by a wanderer, they've gotta meet all these people from his past -- jeeze Franky, could this fucking play be any more depressing? Well it's Strindberg, so, no. No it could not.

But Franklyn likes it more than the alternative, which is sitting in silence with a dude she digs who's fucked up on morphine and bruises. She's even dressed the part of grim observer: black, all black, like a trainee beatnik nun at some horrible remote abbey.

"Where have I got to, and how far have I come--" Reading cut short, Franklyn turns to watch Count - blinking slowly, before she calls out to him; "What the fuck?" She's gone off script! The book is closed, but she doesn't move yet -- just watches. Unimpressed. A little flat. Guess how she's been sleeping? Spoiler: poorly. "What're you doing?"

There's not much screaming going on. Well, anymore. There was some in the beginning. But C.B., thanks in part to their brand-new Pledge that maybe? involved some extras to help him handle the pain, appears to be done with such reactions, for the time being. Whether or not that is good is a whole different story. What's /actually/ good is that he's not screaming and raving about things he can't see. That's the bigger danger than C.B. breaking a few bones.

The constant playing of Sgt. Pepper helps with that, although sometimes, while in a morphine daze, C.B. does seem to be having /fairly/ mellow conversations with his friend "John." It seems like John is a sort of threshold guardian, though, who is being placated and thus, has not subjected C.B. to further intrusions. This, along with Franky reading C.B. depressing literature, is helpful.

The often-motormouthed Author is now mostly silent. Glassy-eyed, curled up in a ball, and staring up and out into something only he can see.

"Well." Count says, giving the woman a lazy smile "Since the two of you shacked up here, and smoke like chimneys, and I doubt you've managed to police all of your brass, so to speak, I figured we could make this look a bit more like a hang out spot for random folks all over, and not just have yer DNA all over this place. You know, because once he's found and they start looking for places he might have been stashed; even this house is in the records somewhere. Better not let them find yer DNA all over, yeah? I already came by last night and picked up what I could find." He Did? When?!

He steps closer to the two of them, glancing towards the speakers with a flash of irritation at the song that he's getting pretty damned sick of by now. he doesn't comment however, instead he moves over to CB, to look him over, check the makeshift bonds wrapped around strategic 'chafe points' and whatnot. "How you holding up my man?" he asks of CB, but his eyes move across to Franklyn, as if reading her face might give him a more accurate answer.

Franklyn is probably quite glad that the screaming portion has - for the time being - stopped. Is there a tender way to talk a person through getting a beatdown? Franky -- in all her strangely inspiring, unusually coolheaded manner -- managed to keep her shit together for the sake of helping C.B. keep his shit together. How odd. It's like she's had a bunch of experience talking down people who're like, super-duper suffering. What was she between stage school and now, a trauma coach?

Don't worry about it.

"Smart." What, that's it?! Only reply to Count? No snark or sass or whatever? Newp. Franklyn is keen to just shut the play she's reading, look at C.B. with... Cool curiosity... And then finally turn back to observe Count. "...I think everything is, fine."

No smile, no animation -- it's weird, but Franklyn doesn't seem angry either. Maybe she's just gone all 'method' with the ice princess role, and is reluctant to thaw out and get them feelings all over the place. "What are the next steps? I am... Time is like, ticking onwards, right? I'm feeling, mmmm, impatient." A quick glance back to C.B. -- ah yes, there's that glimmer of concern. "You ready for the next act, bucko?"

It takes C.B. several moments before he seems to register that anyone is talking to him -- perhaps both Count and Frank questioning him makes it happen, though. He tilts his head far to the side, but doesn't really look at either of them.

"John says we can roll up soon," he says mysteriously. "Roll up for the Mystery Tour. He's gone to change his clothes, but said he'll be back in a flash." He blinks, very slowly, and adds, "Can we wait that long?" Huh?

"Impatient?" Count asks, raising a brow "I mean, you are watching someone that you seem to genuinely give a fuck about, being beaten and suffering, staring at his madness... his vulnerability, I mean I hope you are feeling the need for it to be done." He takes a breath. "Well, I've found a road, a bit of a ways from here, it doesn't get a lot of traffic, but it gets some. There's a stretch of road with no turns or hills, where it'd be next to impossible for some farmer to miss him in the road. There's a copse nearby as well, where we can watch what happens. I think we've done all we can."

There's another pause as he looks to C.B. and frowns as the man starts talking of people that aren't there, and Count looks worried. Should he tell them most of his legal knowledge comes from the TV and vague common sense?

No, Pretend like you know what yer doing and push forward!

Okay, okay, not all of it, I mean Count has had some serious training but well... the mortal world is a tricky thing.

"Our Next problem is getting him there. It's a few miles, and there are some crossings with cameras. I've marked out another path however, through the hedge, should only take us about ten minutes through there."

Is Count suggesting bringing Frank into the Hedge?!

Yes.

Franklyn frowns as she watches C.B. -- she's been doing this a while, but the twang of sympathetic gloom doesn't really go away, does it... Still. Difficult times, and all that. One must simply power on. Book? It's tucked away into that rucksack of hers, and Franky adjusts her jacket -- black, leather, ludicrously expensive yet tastefully understated (how novel) -- before she moves over to give C.B's hand a little pat.

What is she, English?! How fucking gentle and reserved does a person have to be...

"Hey, you're doing amazing, alright? Like we said; can you get through the next ten seconds, yes? Then you can get through -everything-, all we're in is a series of moments..." Don't get too philosophical, Frank: C.B's pretty tilted on morphine and skewed brain chemistry, there's only so much abstraction can do.

Maybe she notices this? Because one hand remains on C.B's, while the other is placed on her hip so she can stand up straight, power pose it up, and look from C.B. to Count as she starts a Monologue: "You're right, Count -- I am feeling that drive; but we're... We're not quite done -- we have a little further to go, and what you're talking about isn't a problem, it's just an /issue/, and we can handle it like we've handled this."

See? They're =handling= it. Franklyn is talking like she's got Total Confidence in Count, C.B., Calliope and herself. Does she? Well: Franky certainly acts like she does.

"It's just ten minutes -- that's only six hundred seconds. That's like, in the grand scheme of everything? Nothing at all! We can -do- this, and it's going to be amazing, and the dedication the both of you have already put in? Is going to pay of. I have like, total fucking faith in the both of you -- you should be proud." Turning to C.B, she squeezes his hand and nods and looks -so intense- because, well, she is. "You're a survivor. You can do this."

A beat, and Franky glances around quickly. "...Okay, let me do a last sweep, then we can do this right." And lo, Franky squeezes C.B's hand, gives Count a super serious upnod, then scuttles around doing last minute... Things.

C.B.'s indubitably swollen eyes start to close, then open again, then close again. Whenever Franky touches him, they seem to flutter open once more. She's talking to him, through some of this, and he vaguely registers, sort of, not really. He swallows and says, "John says he's gonna get me a drink and a smoke once he changes costume, so I /really/ hope he comes back soon, you know, because I'd really like a cigarette, and I'd really like a drink. I really would."

He wets his lips and continues. He hasn't been speaking much through all of this, so it's anyone's guess if him speaking now is a good thing or a bad thing. "He told me that someone who liked The Catcher in the Rye a lot let him down, and I keep wondering if that person is me? Because I always told myself I'd kill him, and I really like Catcher, you know...ever since I first read it when I was 13. So I wouldn't be surprised." C.B....smiles? For some weird reason.

All look at Frank, So Inspiring! So wordy! So... So... self help book-y.

Still, her words /are/ inspiring,m and even Count smiles as he dumps a bit of winter chill into the area. "Ten Minutes in the thorns is a long time, count every second if you wish, but I need your eyes and ears open more, I need a gun in your hand, and I need you to be ready to help this man move if we gotta skate early." And then he takes a deep breath. "There is however, one rule, that you must obey, above all others." Count says, those golden eyes locked onto Franklyns face. "Do not, ever, EVER, leave the fucking path. Ever. I don't care if yer about to piss yer pants and need to pop a squat, you do not, leave, the path. Are we clear? Distance, Physics, they are not linear or straightforward in the place we are going, so please, please... do not.. leave the path."

Hoeing that he's hammered this into Franklyns head enough, he looks to C.B. and his rambling. "Smokes and Drinks soon...." no, not really "...we just gotta push your ass through the window and hope for a soft landing. Yer gonna have to walk, but Frankinator and I will be helping you, mostly her tho, I need to keep my hands free..." For his guns/

"Fucker is waiting by a pair of trees not too far away, I'm good to go when the two of you are."

Hrmm. That sounds suspisciously like Crazy Talk from C.B, and it garners a semi-concerned look from Franky as she goes about gathering the last of her stuff. What was that glint around her mid section as she leaned over? A 9mm in a shoulder holster, don't worry about it! She's standing up now, backpack on as she chatters to the poor busted Wizened; "It's alright babes; when this is over, you and I can sit on the roof of my place, smoking and drinking and listening to John Zorn and you're going to feel amazing and I'm going to argue why you need to join the twenty-first century and give Zizek a chance, okay?"

Yeah. Very self-help book-y. Franklyn turns and looks at Count -- doing her best to soak up what he's saying about the thorns. Franky? looks totally unimpressed - RBF in full swing. She doesn't get it, see. What's so fucking wrong with thorns? She's been blackberry picking in Maine - she knows what's up - she's not afraid!

Which is so fucking stupid and wrong.

But also... Possibly not true. Franky does look a bit scared. Also, who the fuck is Fucker? She doesn't ask. All this focus on staying on the Path, it's got her distracted. Franklyn frowns a bit, adjusts her bag, and then tentatively puts her hand on C.B's, tapping him twice, like she was afraid he'd vanish or something. "...C'mon young Mr. Schmidt; let's get a move on." Esoteric reference over, she moves to offer an arm. Yeah. Franky'll pretty much carry C.B. -- good thing she got all that emergency medical training!

C.B.'s not really listening. Or is he? Perhaps he's answering back in his own addled way, because he does look at Count and he looks at Franky, too, before he chooses to look at nothing at all. Also, he's not terribly interested in joining the twenty-first century as a general rule, although he might just end up getting a cell phone for himself when all is said and done. Or at least a series of burners...

When Franky taps his hand twice, though, is when C.B. just focuses on her, as much as he's able to focus on anything. He makes no move to stand up, however. "I need to wait until John is finished changing," he says, and there is a note of anxiety in his voice now. A note of rising tension, though the actual volume of his voice does not change.

The beast looks from Frank, and then to C.B., Frowning as the man starts to sound a little belligerent and insistent. Or maybe that's how Count is hearing it. Count is not a psychiatrist, but he has some empathy, and there's a frown. "Homeboy, John can catch up to us, yeah? We need to get this done, before it get's too late and yer laying in the road at three in the morning."

A hint of annoyance in the beasts voice? Just a touch.

He moves over towards the two of them, and stands there on C.B.'s other side. "If he becomes intractable, we might have to just knock him out..." Count's words are calm, reasonable, matter-of-fact.

Franklyn peers oddly at C.B. as he seems so... Reluctant to move. Look at her, watching him like he was some kind of biomechanical puzzle she's supposed to solve before the walls grow spikes and close in and crush everyone into a thick pulp. Is it a nice look? Well, it's a scheming look.

"Count... Dude. He's like fucked, right? He's not steering this crazy bus, yeah? You are -- so just like, get /your/ shit in order, and I'll... Handle this shit here. Don't worry about it." SO BOSSY. Franklyn moves, zero fucks given re: what C.B. would prefer to be going. The classic Dr. Garreau Bedside Manner is on full display as she just, swooosh, sweeps in on there and tries to haul C.B. up, throwing one of his arms around her own shoulder so she can gingerly coax him to stand.

Expression? Determined and dour. Which is why it's probably weird she's starting to hummm and.... "Roll up -- and that's an invitation! Ooooh, roll up -- to make a reservation..." Sing? Sing. Franky is whisper-singing as she's trying to move C.B. along -- looking up and over to Count, all like:

'Dude, where the fuck are we going?'

Franky went to mime camp. She's really good at /looks/, even if her voice is just going: "..The magical mystery tour is waiting to take you away -- waiting to take you awaaaay..." A hand gestures, manicure stabbing the air as she watches Count. This way? That way? Which way??

"No, no, he can't, he can't! He's got to catch the bus," C.B. exclaims, eyes huge as he stares at Count. A full-body shudder moves all through him, almost a spasm. When Franky suddenly appears and tries to haul him up, he lets out a paralyzing scream, as though he's dreadfully afraid of being moved, and makes his body as heavy as he can...

...until she starts singing. His eyes are still wide as he joins in, just a little bit out of tempo from the actual song he's singing, almost like he's jumping the gun. "We've got everything you need," he tells Franky, looking at her, and managing to sing it in a fraction of that loud, clear voice that lends his vocal chords a very nice singing ability. His gaze shifts to Count next, though his eyes are just so round and bloodshot and he's not at all blinking. "Satisfaction guaranteed."

"Jesus Christ." Count murmurs under his breath. "This mother fucker took too much Acid at Woodstock and now here I am... ...like a fucking sucker.. ...goddamned... ...stupid..." It's really hard to make out off of what Count is muttering to himself, because he';s turned his back and has started leading them. Once around the corner of the big hole in the side of the house, Count picks up an assault rifle that he's set there, you know, so as not to upset the fragile minded. The assault rifle seems to be made of too glossy metal and bone, and Count hold it like... well like someone who really knows how to fondle his weapon. Things are checked, and double checked without a break in pace as he leads them towards the trees.

Frank, has totally met Fucker before, he's that large Monitor Lizard that stared at her that one time in his house. Right? Right. Well, to her newly opened eyes he looks... well pretty much the same, like a great big ornery lizard. Maybe it's claws are a bit glossier, teeth a touch longer, but it more or less looks the same. It's lounging on a rock near a pair of trees that have grown together into the form of an arch, waiting, watching them approach with cold reptilian eyes.

"Remember..." Count says "Stay on the god damned path." and then Count approaches the trees, waves his hand between them... and well, a hole in reality opens up, revealing a forest, a rather thorny one, and a path. The air coming from that hole smells... strange, different, otherworldly.

Franklyn is not going to sing the whole way -- that'd be tedious -- so as The Author Otherwise Known as Crazy Bastard starts to sing, she lets him settle in to those good vibes himself, giving a little musical hum of encouragement which is so sweet and light and in contrast to the /look/ she shoots Count.

That look? At first it's irked, then its sympathetic, then it's irked again - but it settles down into a sort of fed up 'what can you do?!' of shared grief and compassion. Does Count see it? Maybe not. But the Mortal's got a lot of feelings, damnit! Franky carries C.B. onwards, hesitating a little bit when she sees two things:

Fucker, looking slightly more menacing than before -- then that assault rifle, which is always menacing even without the impact of it's oily Mien.

A hand raises reflexively, and Franklyn pats her side, right where her holster is. Yes. Yes she has a gun. It's rainbow and beautiful and she kinda understands how to use it. She's been practicing! Just not here...

"Okay, /okay/, ohmygod - you're not my real dad, stop hammering me." Huuuh? Franky clears her throat and scowls and-- WHAT THE FUCK? When Count works his Wyrd magic, and that Hedgegate opens? Franklyn's jaw might as well drop to the fucking floor. Ya gurl is /gobsmacked/.

Mystery trip! Aaaah... the magical mystery tour...

Franklyn is not moving. She's just... Gawking. She'll need a little help from her friends.

Assault rifle, lizard...C.B. doesn't seem to have a problem with any of those things. But when the Hedgegate enters, he screams about it: "NO, NO, I DON'T WANNA GO IN THE HEDGE -- " At least he knows what it is. "We never finished The Game, and he loves it when I'm like this..." What? John? Someone else? C.B. isn't clarifying. He tries to sing louder, in fact, moving onto the next song: "But the fool on the hill...sees the sun going down...and the eyes in his head...see the world spinning rooooooound..."

Count steps into the hedge gate, and then turns around to be sure they are following, and finds that they have stopped. Suddenly he looks both exasperated and a little pissed. "This aint gonna stay open for more than a few, move yer asses." Count is waving his arm for her to follow, and then reaching across the barrier between worlds, holding his hand out to... Her? Him? Both of them?

Fucker just sort of hisses, and then uncurls and darts into the hedge, slipping into the thorns, like a fish into a lake, into it's natural habitat.

"Don't make me be your Daddy, and come on, this is a risk, but better than being caught in public places."

Why is Franklyn shivering? NO REASON. She's hauling C.B.'s weight up on her shoulder, expression all 'I'm Cool' as she starts to march on, like she wasn't totally fucking afraid of whatever's been said and whatever's going on. Franky? Is emotionally disconnected, damnit. She's cool, she's collected, she's composed -- totally. Totally. Don't let those twitching fingers elude to anything different, she's got this, just like she's got C.B., er, screaming in her ear? Well, that's one way to break the last bits of being gobsmacked over the Hedgegate.

A scowl comes and goes, as Franklyn bows her head away and then jerks the Author forward. JERK. Then softer movements - like it or not, they're heading this way /together/. Like a =team=. An ad hoc squadron of misfits, up to nefarious deeds in the name of JUSTICE. Only... Who's justice, and why? Because it's the right thing to do and--

BLINK. Franklyn looks at Count all like /woah/. Is she blushing? She's nervous! There's Wyrd shit happening! Clearing her throat, she turns to C.B. as they shuffle on together, moving along to follow after Count and Fucker and all that looming danger of the place of a thousand trillion thorny nightmares.

"Babes, s'all good: don't worry, we got you -- we're gonna just, take a little walk. Six hundred seconds, if you're real smart, alright? It's just six hundred seconds..." Yeah. Franky's being all encouraging. It gives her some distraction from the wariness of entering... A whole new fucking dimension? YUP.

C.B. turns and snarls at Count when he says that bit about being their -- his? hers -- daddy. It may have been in response to Frank, but it doesn't matter; something about it rubs him the wrong way, and for whatever reason, he manages to wrench himself free of Franky (presuming he can) and run /straight/ through that gate, the very opposite of what he was just protesting. He's also stopped singing -- or talking, for that matter.

Of course -- C.B. can probably only run so far, which is to say -- not very far at all. One presumes that the various broken bones and wounds he's sustained, to say nothing of the morphine still in his system, have made it difficult for him to get very far at all. If he can even manage to not just collapse once he gets inside the Hedgegate.

The Hedge!

It's a wonderful place, a magical place a... fucking terrifying place. The gate to the real world closes moments after all three of them are in, Planet Earth, Simple Reality, simply... Gone, no way back, or at least, seemingly so. Count and C.B. at least are familiar with the place but for Frank... WTF.

"Welcome to the hedge Frank, see the very thorns that have torn apart the soul of every one of us you meet. Again, please don't leave the path." As he speaks he's already moving and Count is the hedge is... a very different man. The way he moves is near-feline, more so than usual, all the nose his boots usually make is gone. His eyes are shifting back and forth, scanning as he leads them up the path. The path itself is simply hard packed earth, bound on either side by thorned foliage and root systems. The Sky above is night, just as it was on earth, but the stars... oh man they just don’t seem right, staring at them too long, trying to get your bearings by them is likely to spark a migraine. Then the walls, a towering forest of trees that look coniferous but are somehow, subtly wrong, of no variety found on Earth, tall, towering, claustrophobic.

"This is the world, that lies between the one we were born in, and the Arcadian realms of the Others. This place is... made up of deceptions, filled with strange creatures, and deadly to the stupid, unwary, or unlucky."

How many seconds has it been?

Tick. Tick. Tick.

You know, CB probably smells like blood.

Tick. Tick. Tick.

"Aw, c'mon babe jus---" Franklyn's totally soothing and eloquent and well trained persuasive attempt at getting C.B. to comply and cease his snarling is cut short, because the hobbled Wizened used all of that spiteful internal combustion to lurch himself forward and... Oooof. Even Franklyn in her Emotionally Detached state can't help but wince and grimace as the Author sort of stumbles an' deflates and flop about all painful like.

There she is, hopping up next to him to -grab- onto the collar of C.B's shirt, and then go about the whole laborious process of hoisting him up off his own metaphorical petard. She does not look pleased, but her tone is even. "Alright there champ, how about... About... How about you don't fucking do that, and I won't have to literally handcuff you to me, how's that sound, eh? Righto, now just lean, just... Lean, lean on..." So Franky has a pretty good grip on C.B. now: one of his arms over her shoulder again, her own arm snugly wrapped around his waist and gripping to his belt like he was some kind of oversized ventriloquist doll. But does she have a grip on the situation?

Because look at this fucking place. Where the fuck are they? Franklyn is trying to stay -focused- and -cool-, but she's slipped down some kind of rabbit hole and into... The Hedge? Who's told her about the Hedge? Both C.B. and Count, actually -- but nothing has really /prepared/ her for this.

Franklyn stops. She listens. She looks both ways. She is not comforted. Not in the slightest.

"..." Listen to that, guys. It is Franklyn Garreau having Absolutely Nothing To Say In Response. Her grip on C.B. tightens - it's totally for him, right? To help and protect him. Not her. Right. Right... Right. She tries to move along, wide eyed and keeping Count in her sights and... Staying silent. Unusually silent.

Yes, indeed, unusual silence from the Big Talkers seems to be the order of the Right Now, because C.B. is not speaking at the moment. Nor does he look particularly nervous or scared at the moment. Instead, he is sharp-eyed and glowering, paying attention neither to the Beast nor the confused mortal. But he stays leaned onto Franky, hobbling along.

For the first time in awhile, lightning begins to crackle around him. Just little sparks, here and there, zinging up his arms, or echoing in his eyes. The lightning was very much absent during the last day or so (though quite active whenever all this started), and now it's back. But speech, and camaraderie, and manners: those are not present at the moment. Who knows? Maybe they'll never come back.

The thorns are, Count's natural habitat... or if not, a habitat that the Knight of the Tongue(s) is fairly familiar with. So when they turn a bend, and there, dressed in rags, scratched and bleeding, is what appears to be a six year old girl in the rags of a pink party dress, complete with broken tiara, big blue eyes, and tears running down her cheeks, Count curls his lips back in utter disdain. "Oh fuck off you bottom feeding shitgibbon." Count says, aiming a kick at, for all appearances, seems to be a sobbing lost little girl.

"Can you help me find my Momm-EEEE!" the Girl cries out and falls over, rolling away from the kick, looking even more pitiful than before.

"Keep moving guys, ignore it."

Ignore a helpless little girl? What a jerk!!

Franklyn leans on C.B-- helps C.B. along, moving as swiftly and surely as she can manage with 140lbs of Broken Wizened on her shoulder. When the lightning starts to crackle? She gives him a long look -- so much easier to just look at him, and not the towering walls of thorny discontent. "Hey..." Nudge. Nudge. Franklyn swallows and murmurs to C.B. as they walk. "So... Not too much further, you're doing good..." Was that a little tremble in her voice? Well, at least she isn't crying.

That weird little girl up ahead is, though. Franklyn looks like she's going to just stop and turn tail; shocked, glancing from C.B. to Count and back again, hand raising in protest as Count goes to /kick/ her, like what the =fuck=.

"What the fuck!" Seriously. Franky hesitates, wavering as she moves along with C.B., footsteps a bit wobbly as she tries to figure out where to go and... If Count is possibly insane. Her skin pales. What the hell has she gotten into? Looking to C.B. probably won't give her many answers, but she does it regardless; marching on, following orders, looking... Displeased.

Is Franklyn muttering under her voice? Yes; only a few words come through as she sticks close with C.B: "...three, four... seven... ten. One, two... six..."

C.B.'s manner is quite different from before, all silent and grim. He doesn't even look ahead, but stares down at the path in front of him. Is it possible, though, that he is leaned a little closer to Franklyn, especially in those upcoming moments of peril she has? It is possible. Like he's some flower, planted in bloody soil, now growing in her direction.

He doesn't even look at the hob or at Count. It's like he has blinders on. C.B. went from screaming and singing and running to barely moving, barely breathing, barely doing anything, all in the space of a few steps.

The little girl however, seems determined. "PLEASE!" It's voice squeaky and raised, and trying to circle around Count, staring at the totally mortal girl with big soulful eyes, brimming with saline. "I'm hungry and I have a boo-boo!"

Count looks annoyed, not really scared or in fight mode, just... agitated. They continue to walk, but it's started following them.

How many seconds is it?

Up above, something flies over head, letting out as noise somewhere between a crow cawing and an elephant seal. Big, feathered, foul smelling.

"Pleee--"

Nope! Count stops, turns around, and brings the rifle up to his shoulder, aiming down the sights at the thing and approaching in a deceptively quick stalk.

The little girl holds it's place for almost eight full seconds before his lets out a hissing Sound and backs away, then darts towards the trees. In the last moment, it's suddenly no longer a little girl anymore, it's some... seven foot tall pencil thin... thing in robes... like Voldemort had sex with a bowling ball on a stick and that was it's baby. His makes a high pitches shriek sound and vanishes into the hedge, off the path.

Count, looks to Frank, points at the thing, and then starts down the path again, where Fucker is waiting far ahead, thrashing it's tail impatiently.

"Ceebee..." Oh shit, Franky just got real and used proper acronyms sans cutesy nickname. "Ceebee, I really-really need you to work with me here, please." Is that a rising note of tension in her voice? Mmhmm. "I need you to walk with me properly, it's only, only a couple hundred seconds - yeah? I need you, to like, match my pace a little..." Franklyn frowns, twisting her lips and looking at C.B. with a very complicated expression: mostly it's pained. "Can you help me out here? C'mon, let's do this..."

Franklyn's eyes dart around, looking anywhere except where that little hob was/is/could be. Also not at the foliage of thorns. Starry sky, that's out as well. Hard packed ground looks a little dodgy too. Where's Count? Franky will look at Count, and then C.B., and then Count - then C.B - back and forth, facade of Totally Chill slowly slipping a she marches along at whatever pace C.B. will allow them to travel together.

Because FUCK staying around whatever the hell that horrible pleading thing is - and fuck even looking upwards and finding out what makes a noise like that. So the Hedge is psychoreactive, right? Good thing Franky is totally only reasonably scared, and not Freaking Out or anything. Oh shit, she just broke her rule and looked over to the side, just in time to see the little kid transform into Lord Voldermort and fuck right off into the terror thorns.

"...Ceebee I really need you to help me out here." Franklyn insists, tone oddly flat and serious. Her eyes drift back to Count, and she mouths silently: 'how much longer!?', with a little flusterd finger-jab motion in the air, like that wound help her feel better.

C.B.'s posture might be stiff, but his pace is steady. When Franky asks him to keep her pace, he does so, even though it's clear it's causing him pain. If anything, since the two are close together, he might be walking faster than her now. But he still mostly looks at the ground, and not at her or at anyone or anything else.

Then he opens his mouth and speaks, not particularly loudly, but loud enough so at least Franky can hear him, in a colorless monotone:

"What the Beast forgot to tell you is that we are cursed. I was cursed before I even set foot in this place, but everyone who escapes comes out cursed. And there is absolutely nothing that can change that." A very small, dark smile comes to his face. "You will be fine, you will always be fine, you are blessed. But not me. I am cursed, and I have been walking through Hell for a long time, and I walk on a deeper and deeper circle every day."

He then finally -- finally! -- turns to Franky, unblinking, and says, "Mister city, policeman sitting, pretty little policemen in a row. See how they fly like Lucy in the Sky, see how they run. I'm crying..."

I am the Harbinger, goo goo goo joob.

"Oh'lor'ha'Mercy." Count mutters not quite silently under his breath after C.B. talks about being cursed, shaking his horned head as they move further along the path. Once again something flies overhead on great feathered wings, and once again that hot garbage smell comes, but whatever it is, it does not seem interested in them for the moment.

Count looks like he's going to say something, but then the man starts mumbling his nonsense again, so Count just grunts and moves on.

It has definitely been more than 600 Seconds. 700 Seconds. Look, Count forgot to account for the pace of Cripple McGee here alright? Count moves through the hedge fast, efficiently. It's been a few years since he had to stagger and craw his way back to Earth.

800 Seconds

Finally they come to... something? Is that a... the inside of a car door? laying on the side of the path? It appears to be, and Count leads them to it, opens it up, and the scents of Vermont come rushing back. When they step out, they are on a hillside, overlooking a long dirt road, with a copse of trees to the right a ways. What they step out of, is an old Ford pickup truck, covered in rust and old vines that has probably been sitting there longer than Franklyn has been alive.

Franklyn tries her best to keep in step with C.B., so she can take a portion of his weight and keep that break from getting any worse. It is... Probably not that successful - but at least they're making time, right? Only a few more hundred seconds to go and closing, no doubt. But then as they hobble together through the Trod, Franky's head dips so she can listen to what the weird Wizened has to say and... Okay, so earlier Franklyn looked a touch spooked. Then she got scared, because there was a terrifying little girl-monster-thing pulling at her heartstrings. Now?

Now Franklyn looks /fucking haunted/.

A shadow of something that, to Franklyn, feels like great and terrible power flies overhead. It stinks, and Franklyn is left to walk on and... Now she's muttering nonsense too: "Yellow matter custard... Dripping from a dead dog's eye..." Not helping! Count gets a -LOOK-, as if keeping him in her sights will somehow be super duper important. She isn't running - she can't risk it with C.B. - but boy, she looks like she wishes she was.

Oddly placed car door? That'll do! They've been here about 798 seconds too long for Franklyn's comfort: she's blinking and sweating a bit and yet competently trying to get C.B. through the car door first, so she can scramble on out /after/ him and look around and... pant. Just pant; trying to catch her breath or make sense of things or just -deal-. She's emotionally detached, but she isn't dead! Experiencing another dimension is not an easy thing. But witnessing a Chimera beat back a Noppera-Bo, and hearing a Harbinger's explain how the world /really/ works? That's pretty fucking overwhelming.

Some of C.B.'s cold distance drains when they emerge from the Hedge, and then he just looks like he's in pain again. Must be physical pain, yeah. Surely not emotional pain. What's there to be in any emotional pain about, right? Right. But at least he's not talking anymore like he's Dante walking without Virgil (Virgil is probably his cat, Yossarian).

In fact, he's back to not talking at all, but he does look over at Franky as though considering her for the first time in...awhile. He squints at her, looking uncertain and uncomfortable. Is she still helping him walk? If he can, he gets ahold of her hand and gives it a squeeze that's probably just a mite too hard. It's not going to hurt, but it's intense.

It's funny how one can get so... accustomed to the strange, so jaded. Count, four years ago, was terrified of the hedge. Times change, and now he moves within it as if it were his job, which it sort of is. Looking back to see the reactions of Frank and C.B. he frowns, and then sighs. "You guys alright?" He sounds a little Awkward. What? Everyone should be a hedge ranger like him right? Count von Aragon. Whatever.

He's looking around in the dark, his pupils gone wide, reflecting moonlight with an eerie greenish sheen.

"Alright, this is the end of th' line. Frank, give your boytoy a kiss and then were gonna tie his ass up good, turn a piece of his shirt into a rag, and leave him on the side of the road down there." he points down the hill. "We don't got time to fuck around, CeeBabes, this is the best shot I could think of, Frank I'm sure will visit you in jail as soon as she can. Remember the story, remember to get good lawyers, if you need more cash, we can hook you up. Best defense Lawyers. You are scared. You are sick. You are remorseful. You are the victim of gross police negligence and misconduct."

Then he looks to Franklyn. "You might wanna give him a good punch in the face when we get down there, a little fresh blood, to clean up the timeline. Clio aint here and well, my fist is bigger than yours."

Oh, Franklyn's still standing and acting as the Human Crutch for C.B. -- she's just taking a few long moments to catch her breath and readjust to being back in real reality. Troubled is how she looks; but once she clocks in on C.B. looking at her? She straightens up a bit - swallowing hard and glancing to the side before she attempts a semi-convincing smile, hand raised in a gesture of 'I'm cool.', eyes closing for a moment while she nods. It's a ruse, but hey, whatever. When her other hand is squeezed, she squeezes back - probably just as hard.

Not that Count would know. Franky turns to look at the Beast, mmming and nodding to him again now. Total fucking lie, her lack of cool is obvious in her silence. It's not until he starts speaking to her that she ices up again - narrowing her eyes a bit, standing up straighter, looking all... Determined and defiant and dour. But not in disagreement.

"Yeah, yeah, /fine/." So stroppy. "=Fine=. Jesus -- he'll only be there for a second, they'll have to take him to the hospital -- and he /is/ those things, it's not even a fucking story, it's the truth." Says Franky, the girl who can't remember when she lies to herself. "Give us a minute, okay? Gaaawd..."

Franklyn's turning back to C.B., walking along with him down the hill -- leaning in to speak in a rushed, hushed whisper. What, she doesn't want Count to hear? Pfffft! So secretive, this one - and yet not secretive at all.

Don't say the 'J' word, Count, unless you want to set C.B. off again -- his eyes flutter in his head, almost like they're about to roll back, and he swallows something. Maybe some bile. It's a good thing Franky sticks up for him, such as it is. Or is she just lying? Too bad he's too fucked up to throw on that fun Contract he likes so much.

He leans close when Franky takes him down the hill, listening like he's never listened so hard in his life. His posture may still be stiff, and he may still not be blinking much, but he isn't spacing out. All his attention is for her. Then he murmurs something in return.

Count? Count simply nods, and stays where he is, standing on the hill and watching the two of them move towards the road. Fucker on the other hand, is hunting, like a shark in the tall grass, searching for small furry things to crunch and kill. This part, he is apparently leaving to Frank. his own expression is a bit black, like he too has retreated a bit from the reality of the situation, the fact that his plan MIGHT not work. That this guy put his life in Count's hand, and the dice have been cast. The fact that he wasn't even supposed to be here today. No, wrong movie. Whatever it is that is on Count's mind, he's keeping it to himself.

Franky and C.B. go down that hill, to fetch a pail of... Well actually they're not getting anything, except a smidgen of time together before the second act of this epic tragedy starts, with an entirely new cast of characters with unknown motivations and stage direction. Franklyn's haunted look persists, like she's stumbled out into this and misplaced all of her script notes somewhere in the process. Are they back at the dilapidated homestead? Lost in the Hedge? Did she ever have them to begin with?

She comes to a stop, having either decided that this is the place it'll be, or she just doesn't want to go on any further. Turning to look at C.B. after he speaks with her, Franklyn looks, well... Pained. A hand is raised, brushing at his hair - pushing it behind his ear as she looks at the mess that he's in. The situation, the number that's been done on him, the grim reality of it all. Is she going to cry?

Oh yeah for sure, probably very soon.

But at the moment, Franklyn's just leaning in -- moving to draw C.B. close and kiss him. All careful, probably very gentle - why cause any more pain, right? But the kiss persists, all close and long and... C'mon Franky, you can't drag this on forever. Time is ticking onwards - people /use/ this road. That's the whole point.

So Franklyn draws back a bit, possibly murmurs something as she takes some gloves out of her pocket and slides them on. Bit said? She takes a step back so she can look C.B. dead in the eye, and then punch him right smack in the face. DOINK. Well. That's done then. She'll just have to go about the whole... Next steps. Is she crying? DON'T WORRY ABOUT IT. She just got some road dust in her eye. It's like, barely three tears. Possibly six. Who's counting.

Wow, what an asshole, right! Except...that's a bonafide smile on C.B.'s face, right after the kiss and before the punch. Sure, it's not a big smile -- it's a tiny little sliver of a smile that he's conjured up out of god-knows-where. But it's more of a smile than he's had this entire trek, from crazed man at the homestead to grim Harbinger in the Hedge.

As such, this particular Lost may be at his most human...somewhat ironically, in that liminal, Solstice-approved moment between love and violence.

C.B. staggers at the punches, obviously doing nothing to stop them. His hand wavers vaguely over his eye, and then he just...falls down. No, he didn't pass out (though he looks rather close to the verge of it), but he is sprawled out there on his ass, properly bleeding now and all ready to be hogtied and left in a ditch, alone, or however the exact details of this plan are about to go down...

The next steps were gagging with a piece of his shirt, and then tying up the ties that have been there for days, in a manner that is actually restraining.

Count, giving them distance, but not actual privacy, watches the whole time, not even having the common decency to look away from that kiss, with all of it's deep intimacy and touching meaning and stuff. no, he just watches, with hollow golden eyes, lips set neutral, just watching and waiting for it to be done.

Then it is done, Count starts to move, along the hill, parallel to the road, and motions Frank to follow him. It is time to wait, and in the distance, the sun is starting to lighten the horizon.

That smile. Does it make anything better? Not for Franky. But time moves on, and she goes through the steps she said she would - why? Because she's ambitious, she's stubborn, and she's travelling through life on a very iffy moral compass. That's why. Besides, this is the right thing to do. It has to be. It /has/ to be.

When C.B. is gagged and bound and left strategically placed by the side of the rode in a hidden-but-not-too-hidden position -- like say, he rolled out of the back of a passing car or something, who knows -- Franklyn... Well she looks down at him, she bites her lip shut and wipes her face twice with those gloved hands and then... Well if she said anything, it's muffled and short: she's turned, and with barely any hesitation, she's stalking up, up, up and away.

Back up that hill. Over towards where Count is. She falls in line, silent, grim faced, and barely looking at him although she does stick pretty close. Why does she even have to say anything, though? Her feels will give her away. They always do. So for now she stays low, patient and watchful and... Complicated.

Yeah, Frank looks devastated, she's radiating Count's court emotion like the Chernobyl Elephants foot leaks radiation. The beast leads her to the copse of trees, which has a good shadowed vantage point to watch the lump of a body on the ground. There's a trick that Count has found, to sometimes help people who are sad, and sometimes that is to get them mad at you, so as they are sitting there, Count smile sand says "He really didn't like it when I told you to call me Daddy."

Count, fully expecting her to hit him, just watches the road.

It takes almost an hour before an old pickup truck drives by, and then stops and backs up. An old man in sky blue flannel hops out and rushes over to C.B., Checking for life signs.

Then the police are called. At first only one officer shows up. Then there is a whole squad of them. Many of them looking none too happy.

A few more Civvies show up as well, the old Farmers Wife, Some other locals, and so there are indeed, witnesses, so when C.B . is first loaded into the police car, it's not long before an actual Ambulance shows up, sirens and all, and the Farmer insists on accompanying the poor beaten up Wizened in the back..

Whee Woo Whee Woo Whee Woo Whee Woo....

C.B. is on his way to the Hospital, under Police Custody. Only one of the cops manages to punch the man in the kidneys along the way.