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C H E R I S E x B O Y S Eo f x a p o l l o
#fa8072 || Outfit || Location
To be fair, Cherise was also not in the mood for anything dour. As she stood on the porch with Daniel and looked into Rae's cabin, she felt like it wouldn't be a great place for her. With Sloane being there, and after all that had transpired during the trials, it seemed that she'd also be out of place - not just Daniel.
With a bright and wide smile, as per usual, she spun around to face her companion and chimed, "On second thought, I am not sure that I feel much like a girly gossip." The brunette's head tilted from side to side as her thoughts raced. What to do? Then it hit her, "My cabin? Of course, you'll have to sleep on the couch." Since she and Rae arrived at the same time, their cabins were close to each other. Daniel and Cherise wouldn't have very far to walk at all.
While it seemed as though she was giving the guy a choice in where he would stay for the night, she kicked into a playful competitive mode. After biting her bottom lip and raising both of her brows, she pulled her hand out of his and started to walk backward. "Last one to my place is a sore loser!" Of course, she already gave herself a headstart.
She slowed down at the porch - whether she was first or not, it didn't matter at all. After she opened the door and the both of them slipped inside, she made quick work of setting a place for him to sleep. A few pillows and a blanket were tossed at him. It wasn't that she didn't want to sleep in the same bed as him, it was just that she's not that sort of girl. As tempting as it is. It also didn't feel like a good time.
A lot of things weren't feeling right tonight. At the very least, she could smile and put a little brightness at the end of a long dreary day. Once he had everything all settled, she rolled onto the tips of her toes, plopped an innocent kiss on his right cheek, smiled stupidly, and then fled to her room. She did not take a shower. She did not change. She just fell onto her bed with her eyes closed and already snoring. It was that kind of day.
Cherise tended to wake up a lot earlier than others. She's a... before the sun rises kind of gal. After her eyes opened she took a few moments to stretch out and greet the early day. She crawled out of her bed and dragged her feet to the closet so that she could pull out this morning's workout clothes. Every movement made was quiet and slow because she had a guest over, and it's unlikely that he was also awake. Not this early. Was the sun even starting to come out? No.
By the time she was ready to go the day was breaking. A quick stop is made in the kitchen area to jot down a note for Daniel when he woke. Out for a morning jog! I'll probably see you are breakfast. xoxo. Then she was out the door.
The air was nice and crisp; a cool early morning that was just shy of being warm. She stretched a little more on her porch and did some movements that would warm her body up, then she was off at a steady pace. She preferred the path that was already paved as it would cause her the least errs in step. There was nothing fun about tripping over roots, which she already has in this place.
A few Demigods were passed - Liam was one of them. He didn't look like someone that wanted to talk, and she really didn't want to poke a bear. She watched him slink off into his cabin and continued about her way. There was Sylas, and then shortly thereafter, Liv and some new face. It looked like they weren't on friendly terms, but the daughter of Poseidon seemed to have a lot of issues to work out.
Time passed by, as Cherise could probably run for days if given the opportunity. She was soon at the cliff that overlooked the beach, and a certain red-heads hair glinted in the bright sunlight. It wasn't even tanning time yet, but Rae didn't tan. It was far more likely that she was trying to get some peace and quiet, so Cherise wouldn't bother her. Not this time. They'd talk soon, but only when Rae was ready.
Just as she started to pivot, a man came out of the water. Had he been there the whole time? Was this the son of Poseidon? Not that it mattered. When he sat down next to Rae, Cherise thought that she must have been glad for it. She couldn't help but laugh, thinking that a man was something that Rae was probably wishing at the stars for. That would start her day off well.
With her friend in good hands (hopefully), she decided that it was that time for the main hall. Breakfast. Coffee. Gods know she needed some caffeine right about now. She half-hoped that Daniel would be around so she wouldn't have to randomly sit by someone else, but the other part thought that he deserved some extra sleep. After the brief jog to the chow hall, she paused at the entrance to assess the occupants. Evelyn slipped past her, in which Cherise would move aside, and there were several others inside. None that would interest her. One or two that make her a little on the uncertain side.
As she got the food she noted a lonely Mason. She probably shouldn't approach him, but then - would it be wrong to? She didn't know what the right answer was. With faux confidence, she approached him but keep the conversation rather light so that he could have an out if he needed it. It was also short, and with her intonation, sounded like she didn't intend to stick around for too long. "How are Andy's injuries?"
She'd have said good morning, but Mason didn't give off the small-talk vibe.
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J o s i a h x D a l i n s k i
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o f x h a r l e y & j o k e r
#B48F7C || Outfit || josiah
#52493d || the brute
#5c7340 || the enigma
#544073 || the jester
The man just wanted to get some sleep, but before he could sprawl out on a couch he was being approached. Rather, some other man's big ass hand fell on his shoulder in one of those demanding ways. When he looked up at Jameson, he rolled his eyes. What did he do wrong this time? He couldn't read his face. He couldn't read anyones face. "Can we have a chat? Man to man?"
To be fair, no one could know his mind. He barely knew it himself.
Because of Josiah's psychopathic idiosyncracies, the Ghostrider wasn't as intimidating as he thought. He has learned, to some degree, how to read body languages - but it's honestly a pretty pointless skill when you really didn't care in the first place. People. What use were people anyway? They were always like this, and maybe he didn't know any better - but he wasn't wired to. He certainly didn't have an adequate enough upbringing to make amends for the very important things that he lacked.
Regardless, he left with Jameson and sat himself down as requested. He could play along with this game. This guy wanted to be the man of the bunch - or whatever. Josiah was up to granting him his wish. He leaned forward, folding his arms across the table to look the demon of vengeance right in his face.
"So, who are you... really?" Jameson began, and there was no clear expression written across Josiah's face. In short, he was utterly devoid of the physical nuances of emotion scrawled across his face. It was good for him, but maybe not for others. Sometimes it was bad for him, too. People labeled him weird or rude, and maybe he was a little.
"What are you doing here? You don't have anyone here fooled. I don't claim to know you, or what you're going through. But I'd like you to try and make me understand. I'll go first." Ah, yes - the stereotypical man; some sort of alpha bravado. Some sort of white knight. Nothing short of a bully under the guise of 'for the better'. Josiah knew these types well, so he decided to hang back and listen. These people exposed more about themselves than he did to them, and that was well enough for him.
"I am the host vessel for a vengeance demon... or spirit. Whichever term you prefer. Some think they serve God, others Mephisto. Regardless, it gives me this little radar," the 'protector' kept spouting off at the mouth, and Josiah displayed some inappropriate physical gestures such as yawning and averting his gaze to someplace else. He was disinterested in other people.
He tilted his head slightly, and when he spoke his voice was passive and near robotic in nature. He sounded very much like someone that had no personality - no anything. "Who am I, really?" He started, and from here on out, there would be no lie that would tingle Jameson. There was only truth - a complex proof, almost like some really fucked up labyrinth that was inescapable and directionless. "I am a puzzle with missing pieces - a mansion with many strange occupants. I am Josiah, but sometimes I am not."
Yep, that was a perfect explanation.
"Perhaps, it's nothing more than you have no idea how to treat a woman. But I don't think that's it. So, enlighten me. Because you might be able to fool everyone else here, but not me. I'm the person whose trust you need. And if I think at any point you'll be a danger to us... I'll handle it." Whether or not that sounded like a threat to the mental case, he wouldn't give off any clue. Truthfully, it didn't register with him at the time. Not Josiah in his typical normal state. He didn't recognize the tonal indicators of a warning, and he wasn't quite sure what he meant by "take care of it".
Part of Josiah wanted to delve into the semantics of Jameson's language, but he decided that he didn't care enough to do so. He wasn't scared of the guy. This particular man was fearless, and it was a good and bad thing for him. He didn't have the capacity to be scared, especially of others. "When have I fooled anyone? When have I said I was anything other than who I am?" He'd pose these questions, opting to utilize a logical strategy to oppose having to jump through hoops to attempt to answer questions he did not, himself, know.
Who was Josiah? Where did he come from? Why was he here?
"Are you vilifying me before I have had the chance to do so myself? A lack of trust is understanding, but who are you to make the bad guy because of a couple of crude jokes? I didn't molest the woman, did I?" He leaned in a bit more to close off a little bit of distance, "You claim to not know me or what I've been through, yet you've already decided that I would be a problem." He sat all the way back into his chair and began to laugh. This was strange maniacal laughter; gut-busting humor that was completely out of place for this situation. A normal person might be extremely offended, but instead, Josiah could feel the insidious nature of his mental disease kick in.
His laughter stopped with such abruptness that it was immediately disarming, and he slammed both of his hands on the table top. His teeth clenched and his jaw pulsed, and he closed his eyes for a moment to compose himself. The Ghostrider had unknowingly pushed the man's buttons; like a threat that stimulated his body's flight or fight response. Josiah wasn't aware of the threatening meaning or tones, but a part of him was at the same time. That part of him, much like Jameson's own inner-Demon, looked for a reason to reel its nasty head.
"Who am I? I am... a mansion with no windows and no doors, but many floors. All the occupants in my home," he tapped the side of his head, "help me survive this cold, cruel world in their own unique ways. Without them, I am just Josiah - a dumpster child with no parents pushed through a broken state foster system where most of us end up dead, abused, in jail, or in wards. I have been to all those places - even death."
He nodded his heads a few times and drew his gaze to peer elsewhere, "You might know me a little bit, Jameson. You have an occupant in your own mansion."
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L I A M x O ' C O N N O R o f x a r e s
#EB641D || Outfit || Location
Liam watched in forced silence and invisible bondage; impossibly still from his restraints, the powers of the Gods ensuring that his rage did not overwhelm the others. He boiled. Not only would everyone blame him for what they are going through, but he couldn’t even control his own emotions. His fuse was ungodly short; a hair away from exploding or imploding, whichever came first.
Most of the Trials did not overly excite him, though some piqued his emotion which were prickling at his skin. When his half-sister was up, he wasn’t sure how to feel about it. They weren’t family-family, whatever that was. Yet something about it rose his blood, if it could have possibly risen to any higher temperature than it already was.
There it was - Ares children, displayed like beasts, killers, pit against their loved ones as if they had no right to that emotion. The collar of Ares was strapped tight to their throats; the leash just long enough to reach something good, only for them to be yanked back into their place. It wasn’t fair to either of them. By this time, words could no longer describe the way he felt. He didn’t like to see how defeated his half-sister looked; like some sort of undeserving animal under Ares’ thumb. If one thread of his restraints would unwind, he’d end up spiraling downward hard.
The last Trial before his was to come was Andy’s. He didn’t know her very well, either, nor did he know anything about the Ajax and Mason situation. Again - the gods sewed more doubt into relationships that might have been stable had they not been the children of shitty parents.
Liam did not just have skeletons in his closet; he had demons. If anyone looked into that abyss, they'd find that monster looking back at them. That monster was him, Liam. It was evident that he didn't want anyone to view his life, especially Sloane. If it had been any other day before he met her, then maybe he wouldn't care. It was his life. Yet, his life has become wrapped up in her life, and vice versa, which made this whole exposure so... nerve-wracking. That says a lot because Liam wasn't scared of shit. Not until the very moment that his name was called.
He looked up but remained in his seat; unable to speak or move at will, only to glare at the gods as they are so righteously seated with their judgemental eyes. It didn't matter, though. The powers that be, from the gods (whichever it might have been), forced his body up. That same feminine whisper played through his mind, urging him forward. He looked like an inmate being walked to his execution; solemn like it was his last day on Earth. His physical body struggled with the godly command cast upon him, but it wouldn't have done much more than amuse whoever's strings were attached to his limbs.
Before he stepped through the archway, he looked up at Sloane. If he could speak, he would probably apologize for what was about to play out. This was probably going to be the last time he could look her in the face, and maybe even the last that she'd want to look at him. Then, as if pushed by an invisible hand, the beast was shoved through the portal into his darkness.
Little to his knowledge, a little more godly magic would work into his trial. Where it might have done him better to have context into the scenery, a little background into the tragic moments of his life, it would be all but absent. Only the monster would be displayed to the crowd of onlookers. That was true punishment - to let them know that Liam was nothing more than a brutish thug with a nasty pension for assaulting "helpless" people.
The scene that began to unravel was a much younger Liam - a boy that was barely 17-years old but looked like a fully grown adult. Without context into why he had blown up in this way, his mother was crying. The high schooler had flown into a fit of rage, and his mother had her back against the wall, clutching onto his baby sister for dear life. The woman's pose was one of a battered person; her body turning slightly away from him in an attempt to show him her back. That way he wouldn't accidentally attack the infant.
The emotions are strong in this scene; a fit of raw anger that was uncontrolled and devoid of all sense. He wasn't even human. The worst part was that he wanted to stop. Liam loved his mother and sister so much, but his anger was all-consuming and did not discriminate against loved ones and foes. He paced back and forth, his fists covered in bruises and blood, his hands clawing at his face as if his biggest fight was against himself right now.
He grabbed one of the chairs at the kitchen island and threw it at the wall just shy of his mother; the wood splintering, his mom screaming out for him to stop. The infant cried, naturally, due to the stress and the noise. It didn't help that Liam's own emotions penetrated even the little one, causing her to also become unsettled. The entire tiny apartment they lived in was a nasty wreck; he had torn up everything and every person.
And to anyone that was an animal lover, he had killed his mom's annoying cat. Its body laid on the floor in the living room area, which wasn't hard to see through the open-floor design of the impoverished residence.
When that one melted away, more scenes would emerge like a reel of all of his crimes and shitty behaviors. It looked like he just did as he pleased. He treated women like his bitches, even coming close to non consensual physical contact. He did lines of coke, beat men nearly to death in the ring, and generally disregarded everything and everyone he loved or cared for.
In the end, when his memories spat him back out into reality, he was just left with a lot of shame. Most of all, a lot of anger. Yes, he was guilty of a lot of unpleasant things in his life. He wasn't a good man. He never claimed to be, and never wanted to be. He had no reason to be decent. What pissed him off was a lack of context - that everything painted him as some sort of monster without any reason.
This forced him to relive the nightmare and the emotional pain that was losing his father, and that immediately opened the floodgates for resentment.
He could speak, though, as the gods couldn't quite leash him up fast enough, "I'm going to kill someone,". The rage that filled him from sole to crown permeated through Pulvinus. It would affect everyone; especially those more sensitive to emotion. He was free, and his eyes were painted over with some kind of thick red cloud, and he tried to run for Heath like a bull. He didn't even know who he was about to attack; only that it was someone.
Sort of getting within arm's reach of Heath, Poseidon stepped in and grabbed the brute. Liam had clearly lost all common sense. His eyes were glazed over with anger, and they were nearly red in hue. His body had become harder, veinier, like he had hulked out - which would be nearly a correct interpretation.
The bonds were replaced immediately, and the God of the Seas made his intent with Liam clear, "Unfortunately, due to the danger that Liam presents, he will not be immediately returning to camp. We have a special place for animals like him."
With that, Liam was hauled away by several gods, and they dispelled the rage that once plagued the arena to be taken to Tartarus, as was promised.
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~ Toast to Hope ~
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There was much to do still and not a lot of time left to do them. This night could not last forever, as pained as Mrs. Picket felt for all involved. As she walked through the gala she noted the relationships that have formed, and part of her knew that happiness would be broken as the curse slowly lifted. But this was for the best, she told herself over and over again. They did not belong in this earthly realm, for every precious moment spent living their best lives in Essex, the Enchanted Realm withered away thanks to the vile curse of the Evil Queen. It wouldn't be long until it was gone for good. The people needed their beacons of hope, but they are all here in Essex.
Several fancy individuals went around the auction tables, presumably to look at the bids placed. They took about 30 minutes, or so, to close the auction and place the winning number on each item. It was a silent auction, after all.
After a while, the music died down and Mrs. Picket took the stage front and center. Waiters and waitresses carried trays of champaign, offering one thin fluke to each person. She was given a mic, tapped it a couple of times, did the comical and fun one, two, three . . . test, test. She laughed a little to lighten the mood because there was nothing joyous about the occasion. Those that have lived miserable lives in the Enchanted Realm had grown content here, but Mrs. Picket's magic would soon shred their reality.
"What a wonderful night. It's been lovely to see all these faces together in one spot," she smiled as best she could. Of course, it was easy for her - she had such a bright outward appearance and personality that it was hard to see her as anything but jovial. She's just a happy old lady! "The silent auction has ended. You will find the winning bids place on the items," she gestured toward the various auction tables. There were, indeed, large white cards placed near each item with the number of its owner. It didn't matter if someone outbid them or if someone bid on their behalf; the digits would match whomever the item belonged to.
"I know, I know," she paced to and fro, adding a little comedy to her routine, "Such an eclectic inventory, right? And that's putting it nicely." She paused for the obligatory laughs. No one would leave an old lady hanging, even if her humor was dry, right?
She raised her glass in the air toward those gathered. They were waiting for her to get to the point, and she gets that. It's a long night and there are far too many personalities here for everything to remain pleasant. "The proceeds from the auction will go toward those suffering without hope." She paused, took a look around the room, and smiled lightly. Come tomorrow, this throng of good Essex people will be shattered. "Dance, be merry, and enjoy each other. Tomorrow will mark a new beginning in Essex. But I hope you will always remember that there is always hope. Hope in the world, in each other, and even in that which is hopeless - be it a person or situation. Believe in change. Believe in... goodness."
She wanted to sigh because certain individuals here were not going to change for anything. But she proceeded to be content in her vague ramblings. Maybe many would just dismiss her as an old senile lady, for she is quite geriatric. "So let's toast to that - hope, for it can be found in even the darkest places. Even in... all of this," she gestured around to the auction tables once more with a free hand.
After finishing off her drink, she addressed them for the last time. "Well, it's been lovely, dearies. My job here is done, and I must go." She left the stage, allowed others to say their good-byes to her and she to them. The Enchanted Realm had so few heroes within it to help stave off the Evil Queen's magic, and the Fairy Godmother was one of them. Even just spending a few hours here could have caused harm.
With that, Mrs. Picket left the building and went back from whence she came. She took one last look at Essex and the dimly lit streets before she "poofed" away as though she was never here. However, unlike she had intended in the beginning, she'd leave the residents a memory of her as to take a few words to heart later.
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Meanwhile, in the Enchanted Realm whole cities, kingdoms, and minor-realms were at war with one another. Many of them were headed by the co-conspirators of Jafar or the Evil Queen, both with the same goal in mind. The Realm was decaying at a rapid rate, and no one knew who to blame for the mess. The skies everywhere were a dour shade of grey, and the flora and fauna were diseased and deathly. Everyone was frightened because they were without proper leadership. The loss of certain characters meant the end of hope.
The Fairy Godmother returned to a small clearing in the Enchanted Forest that was kept alive by the magic of herself and a few others. She stepped into a small hut and nodded slowly, "They will come. Of that, I have no doubt."
The Blue Fairy, the six Fairies that blessed Aurora, and even the one that was said to have cursed Beast, were all having dinner at a large round table. It wasn't anything special; just stew. "We'll see," one of the six Fairies scoffed. "We should still look for a way to break this curse. Just in case. Who'd want to return to this?"
The Blue Fairy laughed solemnly, "Ah, yes - that will be quite the dilemma. Won't it?"
The Fairy Godmother peered out of a window. The skies were clear here, but she could see the tendrils of dark light stretching slowly toward them. "Hope, ladies. Hope. It's the only thing we have left."
They would all agree to disagree. Some of them felt that these were the end of days, and others were more optimistic. However, they were all realistic. Realistically, life was hell in the Enchanted Realm - even for those that supposedly had their "Happy Endings" - whatever that meant. Life here was no storybook.
RPG
