GRAVEYARD ✨

[probe]

POPULATION: GHOST TOWN

You die - and then you wake up.

For a second, it feels as though you can't breathe, and then your head breaks the surface. You crawl out of a pool of blood and into a large, crystalline room. Moving images play across the crystal walls, and if you watch close enough, you'll realize that you're seeing the land of the living; a familiar space station with familiar faces. You can watch these images for as long as you'd like - there are several very large benches (as in, you have to climb them to sit on them) around the room for you to rest on while you do.

Regardless of how you died, it seems as though you're not quite gone completely. You're in one piece, at least. That's good news. However, your surroundings are not exactly what you remember.

When you exit the first room, a bleak, empty city sprawls out ahead of you.

The city itself is large. The framework of it seems to tower higher and higher than you can see, up into the black opal sky that shivers and curls every so often. A river entirely made of blood runs through the city, winding around buildings and ending at the crystal room. The most noticeable thing about the buildings themselves is the fact that thorny vines made of pure white steel dig into the walls and floor, cracking the foundations.

The residential building is worn down and old. It's two floors, and has a few small studio apartments built for one or two people to live in. The beds are extremely uncomfortable. It has a communal area downstairs, but the TV is broken, and the couches are torn apart. Sometimes, this building feels obscenely hot in temperature, and smells like rotten eggs.

The grocery store is your typical convenience store. There's a large selection of food in this area, but it all tastes the same - like chalk. On top of this, every so often there will be bloodstains on the walls, the floor, and the displays. They change in size and location, each time you enter the store.

The clothing store is thrifty in nature. All the clothes here are uncomfortable and scratchy, and don't fit quite right. While you're here, time feels... weird. Distorted, almost dreamy. As you're picking out clothes and trying them on (no money needed, just take what you want), you swear you can hear a gunshot in the distance.

Enjoy your time in this city, and remember...your story isn't quite over yet.

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Comments

[brightred]

I'm glad someone understands!

[commedia]

[Right...]

[They poke at their own torso wound. It seems like its just about done.]

Can I...ask you to help me up?

[brightred]

Oh? After I put you there in the first place? [But she does hold out one gloved hand to them to assist. She's much stronger than might be expected, all solid muscle.]

[commedia]

W-well...

[Yeah, she is pretty strong! After getting up, Douman bows their head.]

Thank you for the favor, anyways.

[brightred]

Of course~ It would be rude of me not to offer assistance when I'm asked so politely~

[commedia]

...

[They seem a little nervous to be around her.]

Have you been...killing a lot of people here?

[brightred]

Only the ones that ask for it~

[commedia]

Is it true that you're a serial killer?

[brightred]

Really, when I told Fukuda that I didn't mean for him to share that with everyone!

Ann and I had our own personal reasons for what we did. Rest assured not a single person in this entire damnable place is someone either of us would have targeted. And besides, it was all her idea, I just worked as her backup.

[commedia]

Who did you target, then?

cw: abortion-related things, miscarriage, infertility, jack the ripper stuff

[brightred]

Ann was a doctor. [Grell says, and she's talking, a little distant. This isn't a topic she wants to revisit.]

She'd become a doctor after a tragic accident where her husband and unborn child died. There aren't very many female doctors, let alone female surgeons. She worked with prostitutes, low-class women, orphans, that sort of people, as a charity.

Some of the women needed her assistance with... a certain surgery. The sort of medical care that prostitutes and women in terrible circumstances need, you understand. One day, one of those women laughed in her face, said that Ann was lucky to no longer be capable of bearing a child.

That was the first woman she killed. I happened to be there, after it happened. Then those were the sort of women she went after, in the next few months, and I helped, of course. Until she let herself be caught.

[commedia]

[Oh boy...that IS a story.]

So her targets were...people who laughed at her? What they cruelly saw as a hypocritical nature?

[brightred]

Her targets were women who with a smile asked her to remove an inconvenience from their lives that she desperately wished she could have in hers.

[commedia]

[This does NOT make them feel better about this serial killing.]

Still...killing them...isn't that too drastic?

[brightred]

Of course it was, but that was the path she chose to take. And I sympathized with her, so I chose to assist her when she needed me.

[commedia]

[They frown.]

Even after you explain...I can't sympathize with you. I have cursed many at request for revenge, but...that sits poorly with me.

[brightred]

Why would you? I didn't ask you to sympathize with Ann or me. Our choices were our own, and I certainly don't need permission or forgiveness from you.

[commedia]

...

[It just feels like something they have to say. To stake their claim in this fragile existence, to say that no, somehow they will not become a monster who will delight in the suffering of many.]

I apologize. I suppose it was your decision, yes.

[brightred]

And besides, I've already been punished for my involvement. Will lectured me for hours and put me on probation.

[commedia]

Probation...

[That does not sound like it is ENOUGH punishment.]

[brightred]

And overtime work.

[commedia]

Work doing...what, exactly?

[brightred]

Oh, of course~ [The "death scythe" apparently didn't give it away to this guy.]

I'm a Grim Reaper. We judge and collect the souls of the dead.

[commedia]

[LOOKS EVEN MORE NERVOUS]

A-ah, I see...

[brightred]

[Does she even notice that nervousness?? Maybe?]

Unfortunately, I'm just as human as anyone else here! Even my deathscythe is useless for anything other than cutting...

I wouldn't have much to do here, but it would be better than being bored.