simplestgift | Thirty Bells: [Action/Written]

[Archie Kennedy opens his eyes with his back against something hard, his wings spread out over solidness even as he grows aware of the prickle of grass underneath him. He is curled up on his side, wearing new feather trousers and shivering horribly. He hugs himself for warmth, and movement brings the rain to his attention. He is soaked.

My God, what did I lose? His hand grasps for the St. Michael pendant Horatio gave him for his birthday last year, only to find empty air.

He left it at home.

His wings twitch, and he twists to find himself pressed against a tall rock, probably near one of the lakes. His disorientation in full swing, he doesn’t even bother to try to figure out which lake it is. He sits up, waits for the world to stop whirling, and takes a shaky, hasty inventory.

Arms and legs. Nose and ears and eyes. Touch, taste, smell, sight, hearing. Ten fingers, ten toes, a wild mass of blond hair unbound and sticking to his damp neck and forehead.

What did he lose?

Still trembling, he curls against the rock and tries breathing for a bit.

Memories, maybe? Any holes in his memory? How is he to know?

Horatio. He remembers Horatio, thank God. Buffy, Jilly, Jack, Leonard, Elizabeth. Father is Finley Kennedy, mother is Elspeth, siblings Finley, Neil, and Abigail. His grandfather pushed him into the Navy. His first ship was the Swiftsure. Is everything important there?

Off on a mission, and now he's back as if he'd never left. Nothing hurts. The only pain now is in finding out what he paid to come back to life. And in telling…

No. He is not going to tell Horatio about another instance where he wasn’t able to protect him, especially from death. He can’t call for help, because anyone who finds him in this state will know, and no one can know.

His wings shiver, shaking off water, then wrap around his body as well as they can. He’s always so inclined to forget they exist, but they do help to stave off the rain and warm him a little. Then, weakly, his knees threatening to buckle under him, he stands up. It’s a long walk home, and he has to make it alone.

The next two hours pass in a haze as he finds the road and follows it, limiting himself to two thoughts every quarter-hour if he can help it. After a while, he doesn’t feel especially cold anymore, which he vaguely knows from his first appearance in Luceti is a bad sign. Sheltering in the tree village won’t help him get dry when he’s already soaked, so he continues at the quickest pace he can manage. It’d be even worse to die of hypothermia just after coming back from the dead.

In the village, he steals quietly toward the clothes shop, shivering hard and pale as a ghost.

It’s going to have to be a matter of putting on the face again. No one can suspect something is wrong. Those who aren’t scornful will be compassionate, and he doesn’t think he can take compassion right now.

The door to house 36 opens very, very quietly, and the lieutenant slips inside as if he doesn’t want anyone to know he’s there. As quickly as he can, he’ll find the St. Michael pendant and slip it on.

It takes some time, but in the evening, over a cup of tea in the tea shop, he writes on the journals, shortly:]

I’m back from my mission.

-AK

[At night, he goes out for a drink. He doesn't make it to Good Spirits.]

[OOC: First chronological tag goes to Amelia, last to John Watson.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Yeah, it is. You're proving it right now.

Being upset doesn't make it serious.

Being so upset you can't even talk about it does.

[Amelia sincerely hopes this doesn't devolve into a "nuh uh/uh huh" argument.]

You might as well give it up. You aren't going to win.

I don't want to win anything. [He just wants to be allowed to swallow his damage and plaster a smile on his face instead of coping.]

Fine. You're not going to convince me that you're right. Does that work better?

I wasn't trying to. [Spoken into his mug of coffee. The shivering has slowed, but hasn't stopped.]

You're not going to convince yourself either.

[Amelia frowns a bit, then reaches for the other blanket she brought to give to him.] Are you any warmer?

A little. [Another swallow of coffee.] I understand what you're trying to do, I think, but...not everyone's methods of coping match up.

Let me know when you're empty then. I'll bring back the pot next time.

[Amelia pushes the blanket over to Archie, not willing to go so far as to put it around him.]

Hope not. I wasn't kidding about the drinking. [Amelia's method of choice.]

[He sets down the mug and takes the blanket, wrapping it over himself.]

I know. [He doesn't assume he's the only injured soul around, just one of the weakest.]

[Amelia takes in a deep, slow breath. Archie's still being stubborn, of course. Men are always idiots in some way or another, even if a few aren't as bad as the rest. She rolls her head from one side to the other, using the small movements to stall for a few seconds.]

I really do get it. Even if it's for different reasons, I'm used to being on my own too. I haven't spent a whole year in the same place with the same exact people since I was a kid. Shutting it all in is definitely easier.

[That's not what he would say about it. When he'd experienced shame, pain, and humiliation for the first time in his life, he'd gone to one of the lieutenants instead of holding it all in. It was how he learned simply to hold it all in in the first place. Better to be quietly mad than for anyone to see you troubled, especially if you expect to be an officer.

He is quiet, but he listens.]

[Quiet is good. Amelia's trying to make a point.]

And I had to, anyway. Female bounty hunters aren't exactly common where I'm from. And a woman around a bunch of creeps who'd like nothing more than to get their hands on her... [Amelia grimaces at the thought.] Showing anything like vulnerability is a good way to get hurt.

But things are different here. We're some place with people who are actually decent. You really don't have to keep it all in.

[She's right. He knows she's right. He swallows.]

I know.

Then don't forget it. I will tell Jilly, and Hornblower if I have to. Not to hurt them, but to help you.

It'd hurt them and it wouldn't help me. [A beat.] I'll tell someone else.

Who?

I'll think of someone.

Uh huh.

[Like Amelia's going to let it go just like that.]

I know a priest.

I...didn't know we had one. Not...Church of England, I presume.

Well, he doesn't exactly give sermons or anything.

No. He's from Gunsmoke. [You know, that planet Amelia's from.] Nicholas D. Wolfwood.

[He swallows, feeling a little odd and out of his element. His grandfather and most of his Scottish extended family were Presbyterian, and he's known a share of Papists, but otherwise his experience with other denominations is limited.]

Dunno about telling everything to a stranger.

I thought priests didn't count as strangers for things like these.

[Amelia wouldn't entirely know. She's not religious.]

Not normally, no. [Maybe a priest is a priest.] What sort is he, then?

You mean, what sort of priest? Well, the first time I met him, he was a bodyguard for hire. So probably a bad one.

[Although, there is a very important factor involved here.]

Then again, he's from Gunsmoke. And he's still a good person.

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