simplestgift | Thirty-Seven Bells: [Voice/Written/Action]

[Last he knew, Archie Kennedy was lying in his cot on board His Majesty's Frigate Lydia, in the surgeon's cabin. No one really remembers falling asleep, do they? But when he was falling asleep, he was very warm. It's the cold that wakes him.

When he opens his eyes, he's lying in a bed of grass. Overhead is a pale blue sky, and November bites the air.

He's back. After more than three years, he's back.

He sits up, shivering, and looks over his shoulder. The wings are there again. He's had a good long break from them, but there's something that is both thrilling and horrifying about their existence. Beside him, folded nicely, are civilian clothes, on top of which lies his journal. He dresses quickly, but only so he can stop shivering before his shaking hands open the journal. He speaks with a stammering quickness, voice unsteady.]

This is...M-Mr. Kennedy. [Using his real name in front of everyone has come to feel very wrong.] I've come back. I've come back, and it's been three years. How long has it been here? Who is still here? Elizabeth?

[He'll wind up both at house 36 and house 7, desperate to see sorely-missed faces. Later, much calmer, he makes another announcement, this one writen.]

It has come to my attention that it is November already. On December the First, beginning at four o'clock PM, as happened one year ago in Luceti, there will be a Christmas ball and feast. I will require help with the food, setting up, and cleaning after. Anyone wishing to attend may do so, so long as they are properly dressed. This year it shall be held in the Battle Dome.

[OOC: Archie is returning from his mallynap believing he went home for three and a half years, somehow alive and with memories of Luceti. He looks no older, but he's definitely thinner and his hair is no longer than shoulder-length now, so he does look somewhat different. Have fun.]

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He sits, as well, eyes cast down toward the floor. "Two and a half years."

"That's...not right."

She didn't even need to look at her fingers to know that math didn't add up. Even more so than usual. Buffy leaned the poker up against the wall and fell unceremoniously into the chair. Casual posture but a worried expression.

"You thought they had you for two and a half years? That's weird, even for them..."

"...I believe I was sent home. Or...I did. Now I'm less certain."

...There was that familiar feeling: horror plucking at her throat and pricking at her heart. Sent home? As certain as Archie himself did not sound, she felt those words with terrible terrible certainty. It only made sense; after all, everyone else was tumbling home.

Except -- "How could that...I mean, no offence but I wasn't really certain you had two years left in you, back home."

"...It was the year 1805. Three years after my death. I...remembered Luceti, Buffy. I missed you terribly. But...yes, I was kidnapped before that. I thought...well, William went home while he was in their clutches, and the more time went on, the less I thought of it."

Three years after--

Her fingernails bit into the comfortably worn fabric that made up the chair's armrests. And by the time he tried to tell her that he'd remembered Luceti, she wasn't sure which she actually wanted: his tale to be true or his wits to be addled. If true, then there was hope for memory yet. And if false -- well, she wouldn't have to face the other notions that would have been true as well.

"See, that's -- it's just not possible. We don't get to remember. Jack said. He lived years and...

What was it like? Did everyone else think you were still---?"

Dead.

"My parents took the news rather well, for folk who've been through this twice now. Horatio was astonished, but...he also remembered. I didn't understand it. I took it to be a miracle. Mr. Bush remembered nothing."

"From what I remember of Mister Bush, he might've just wanted to spare you all the embarrassment of remembering. Or spare himself."

But that was too lovely a jibe to not follow up with darker stuff: "You don't think they might've been...experimenting, do you? With sending people home? Memories intact? Like that time we all--"

"I thought they couldn't. It's what they said, once. That I'd be dead even if they sent me back that way."

"I'd welcome you to the resurrection club, but..."

But this was still very fishy.

"Maybe we should wait a few days before I get your badge made."

There's a long pause.

"You think it's the same thing that happened to Elicia, only mine took place back in my home."

She paused, weighing whether it was worth potentially upsetting him. And then she decided that if she were in Archie's boots, she would rather be upset than deluded.

"Well...it does kinda have that vibe. Objectively."

"As no one knew I was gone...yes, it's very possible." His voice gets stuck, and he swallows and clears his throat. "A shame."

"Dunno if it means anything, really. But -- I also find a shame. A crying shame."

For a moment, she'd allowed herself a drop of hope.

No. No, we are not at all happy. We had reconciled our parents to Horatio. We had let them know we are alive. We have been sailing with our captain--not as an officer, but still with him, in a proper navy. Everything was right, except...

"I...missed all of you. Very much."

"Which makes me wonder if we're better off not remembering..."

Oh -- but that was dreary and he was already looking drear-smeared and dammit. "A few days. A few weeks, maybe. And then we'll know for sure."

He nods, then takes a deep breath and releases it in a whoosh. "Well! In the meantime, I suppose things will go back to the way they were regardless of whether or not the last three years actually happened."

"...That's the problem with a town built on cycles, Archie. It feels like nothing changes, even when everything does."

A beat. "Doesn't mean you can't talk about it, though. If you wanna."

He stares out the window quietly for a moment.

"It was the second time my family looked upon me as though they thought they should never see me again."

It was her turn to drop eyes and focus elsewhere. It was a surreal situation -- to meet others when their expectations involve your...permanent absence.

"I can only imagine that they were beyond relieved to set eyes on you."

"There was weeping. A great deal of confusion and anger. Not at me, of course, but they did not understand why they had to believe I was dead for three years."

"...And did you have a reason for them?"

How far did the fantasy go?

"Came up with something. I think they believed it."

"Came up with something? So you -- you didn't tell them. About here. About what you, uhm, remembered..."

Thirty-Seven Bells: [Voice/Written/Action]

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