Rapture

[Fangirl05]

"Speak for myself!" Erin called, "From what I saw if Lydia, she was quite nice, and Ari might've been the best of us." She fiddled with Dingo's fur thoughtfully. "There's a reason they both disappeared, I'm just not sure what."

[Marcus Pheonix]

"Perhaps they left in disgust over the fact that you named your cat after a species of dog?" Jaune suggested.

"And as I stated, I didn't see anyone leave last night, I walked to all the nearest shopping locations so unless she deliberately took a strange path I would have run into her," He finished, crossing his arms. Jaune then let out a loud yawn.

"I think I might go to bed now... wake me for lunch," He walked over to one of their vehicles and climbed on top and began resting on the roof.

[DragonSpirit009]

Emily took her plate of food and took in a seat away from all the commotion. If this was going to keep up Emily might want to find herself disappear as well just to get away from those two bickering. As she started to eat her food she could see out of the corner of her eye that Nougat was watching her with puppy dog eyes. Thou they didn’t usually worked on her but today she could just smile and give the pooch a small nibble of her breakfast. With almost every third bite Emily took she set a small something aside for Nougat which the pooch gladly accepted.

[Fangirl05]

Erin raised her middle finger at Juane at his suggestion about Dingo and watched him curl up on the hood of the ambulance. "Okay, quick!" she hissed, "While he's not looking let's pack up and shove off! I'll push him off the hood, James you throw it in reverse. One less mouth to feed and a whole lot less crazy to hear."

[Kestra15]

As the others talked - and the inevitable bickering began - Mak had taken a seat on the stairs and rested his head against the bannister, closing his eyes and trying to block out the throbbing of his wrist. Thankfully it didn't appear as if he had fractured anything or left any particularly troublesome splinters, but it would no doubt bruise well and leave his hand tender for a couple of days. As with all the previous altercations from the previous day it ended with one party storming off - thankfully, the one party who would give the most grief to the group's ability to work cohesively. Even Micah's religious interpretation of events was less inflammatory that Jaune's almost-intentional trolling.

 

"Ignore Jaune," Mak said, getting to his feet and unwrapping the towel. Blood covered the inner edge and his hand, flexing slowly to get some feeling back in and confirm his suspicion that he had done no lasting damage. "Ari's clothes, bag and shoes are all by her bed, but I want to make sure. There's only two roads in this village and it won't take long to search them. James, Erin, could you take one road while Micah and Wisper check the other. Petra and Emily, you stay here in the bar in case Ari somehow makes her way back here without the other four noticing, and keep a weather-eye on Jaune. Don't go chasing him if he disappears, just make a note of it. Nay and I will check the property."

 

He looked around at everyone remaining in the room. "Twenty minutes, then be back here. We'll depart." Without another word he gestured to Nay and went to start what would be a short and fruitless search.

[Fangirl05]

"Hold that thought, boss man" Erin raised a finger, "Lemme see your hand."

 

She took a loose hold of his hand and twisted her head to examine it from all sides. It didn't look seriously damaged, but the split knuckles in particular had to hurt.

 

"Hang on a sec" she told him, darting back to her suitcase. She'd gathered up whatever medical supplies she'd thought might come in handy while searching for radios the other day. Now she pulled out an ACE bandage, a tube of Neosporin, a patch of gauze and some medical tape. As an afterthought she pocketed one of the bottles she'd taken, too.

 

"Here."

 

She sat down next to Mak and squirted a few dots of Neosporin onto the cuts on his hand, covered them with the gauze and taped it down, the straightened his wrist and wrapped the bandage around his hand just tightly enough that he would'nt be able to bend his wrist.

 

"Try not to move it around too much" she suggested, "It should be back to punching shape by tomorrow morning or so. Here." She uncapped the bottle and dumped a couple Asprin tablets into her hand, which she handed off to him. "This aughta kill whatever ache there still is."

 

Having tended to Mak, she turned her attention to James. "Come on," she said shortly, and headed for the door.

Edited September 12, 2014 by Fangirl05

[Fortune86]

Hearing Mak form some sort of plan James headed back towards the main room. When Erin spoke to Mak James waited and leaned against the door frame of the kitchen. He watched patiently as Erin did what she could for Mak's injured hand and then foloowed her out into the street.

 

"You think we'll find her?" he asked blinking in the sunlight.

[Fangirl05]

"No, not at all" Erin answered, "I think we're either gonna find nothing, or we're gonna chance upon wherever Juane dumped her spray-painted corpse." She raised an eyebrow at him. "Seriously, though, why didn't you leave him behind when you found him?"

[Avialae]

At hearing Mak's idea, Micah nodded at the other man. "Sounds like a good idea," he told him, "just let me finish breakfast." There wasn't much left, Micah had eaten quickly. He ate the last few forkfuls of food as Erin tended to Mak's wrist and then stood up as she and James left the room. He wasn't sure where to put the dirty plate, so he decided to leave it where it was, and then walked over to the door to the outside to wait for Wisperlee. As he did, he idly started to wonder what would happen if the two of them ran into someone besides Ariella, someone hostile. He wasn't armed and neither was she, as far as he knew. He'd seen James with a rifle yesterday and remembering that really made him wish he had a weapon as well, one he knew how to use.

[Salix]

Petra nodded her agreement of Mak’s plan. The sudden disappearance of Ari was upsetting, not only for the possible loss of Ari, but for the reminder that none of them were safe, it felt that at any minute any one of them could be the next to disappear.

 

She nibbled her lip and watched as Erin bandaged up Mak’s hand. In her heart Petra didn’t think that they would find Ari, but she was glad that the group was making an attempt to search for the girl.

 

She drifted over to where Micah had left his dirty plates and started stacking them and any other used plates and cutlery, and then carried them into the kitchen where she stacked them into the dishwasher robotically, trying not to think about what the future may hold.

 

[Fangirl05]

"ARI!!" Erin bellowed through the last section of the last house on the street. She got the same no response as every other time, but her throat hurt more now for it. She trudged back outside to look for James.

 

"Nothing" she reported morosely, "You find anything Ari-ish? Long blond hairs? A red ribbon? Shoes? Blood? Black hairs? Dragging marks in the dirt?"

[Kestra15]

Returning to the bar some fifteen minutes later Mak looked defeated as he leaned against the wall by the staircase. Nothing. Not even a hint of Ari having disappeared the usual, human way. So much for a safe haven.

 

"No chance Ari came back?" he asked of Petra as she returned to the main room.

[Fortune86]

"I guess because I was afraid if I left him, he might only have been an hallucination" admitted James. "At least if I kept him where I could see him, I knew he was real. If I had known I was going to bump into you guys though, I might not have bothered."

 

When Erin wandered off to check one side of the street James seached the other. Apart from a few pigeons and a seagull, he saw nothing else alive. Meeting back up with Erin he shook his head.

 

"Nope. Let's head back."

[Fangirl05]

"Kay" Erin agreed. She walked back to the pub with James in silence, both mulling over about what he'd said and wondering who was going to disappear next. Her money was on either Micah going to heaven or Juane going to hell.

 

"Hey," she suddenly broke the silence, "if you don't mind my asking, who'd you lose?"

[Fortune86]

"My older brothers" said James softly. "I was out late and they weren't at home when I got back."

 

He sighed.

 

"No one else was either. My entire block was empty. I guess I don't have to explain how freaky the whole thing felt."

 

James stopped walking just as they drew closer to the pub.

 

"I just wish I knew what happened to them. If I knew for certain they were dead, I guess I could accept that. It's the not knowing."

[Fangirl05]

"I take it your parents weren't part of the picture?" she pressed, expecting to be snapped at, "Or did you just not like them?"

[Fortune86]

"They died when I was a kid" said James as he gave a small shrug. "I don't even remember them. They're just faces in photographs."

 

He started to walk forward again.

 

"What about you?"

[Fangirl05]

"My mother and sister here," she nodded to one side, "my aunt and uncles there. At first I thought about jacking a boat back to the states, but now I'm thinking what's the point? I got nothing to risk capsizing for back there."

 

Mak and Petra were the only ones there when she and James returned to the pub. "Bad news," Erin reported, "No sign of Ari anywhere. Worse news, no evidence that Juane killed and dumped her, either."

[Salix]

“No, I haven’t seen any sign of her” Petra answered sadly as she walked over to Mak and gave him a comforting pat on his arm. “Maybe the others will have better luck”, but some of that hope was dashed when James and Erin retuned to the pub and reported that they hadn’t seen any sign of Ari either.

[Marcus Pheonix]

((If anyone wants to wake Jaune up for whatever reason feel free, I don't really know what to write at the moment, which is why I'm asking for someone else to wake him...))

[Mistress of Whispers]

Wisperlee was walking back from her search with Micah. As she had feared, Ari was nowhere to be seen. Rummaging into her bag, she pulled out her emergency gloom packet - gummi worms. Ripping the packet open and stuffing a hand full of sugary worms in her mouth, she passed the pack to Micah. She sighed once and could already feel the sugar rush kick in. At least she'd have the energy to make it to the next location.

 

"So," she said to Micah as she tried to focus her thoughts elsewhere, "tell me about your home? If it's not too painful a subject."

 

 

((Apologies for the late reply again - work has been crazy busy and doesn't look to be letting up anytime soon.))

[Avialae]

Micah accepted the bag of candy that Wisperlee offered but didn't eat from it. He was still full from the big breakfast he'd just had and the last thing he wanted right now was more food. He slowly rolled the loose ends of the packet up as he considered Wisperlee's question. He'd never had to explain what his home life was like to someone who lived so differently from him, and he wasn't sure how to explain it.

 

"Home was . . . noisy, I guess," Micah said slowly, trying to put his thoughts into words. "All of the kids would run around everywhere just causing a ruckus everywhere until Dad or David would yell at them to stop." David was Micah's older brother, and got favored treatment as the firstborn son, but Micah didn't mention that to Wisperlee. "Everyone knew to do what Dad said, but the little kids just couldn't stay still for very long, I guess, and then things would start up again."

[Mistress of Whispers]

"That actually sounds nice," Wisperlee offered. "I'm an only child and it got a little boring at times."

 

Then, after a moment's pause: "So what brought you to the UK?"

 

It was nice to talk to Micah about his home and take her mind off Ari, though she hoped Micah didn't mind the questions. She didn't want to push or alienate him. They were stuck together for a long time, after all. At least, she hoped they were - she shuddered as Ari's mysterious disappearance intruded on her thoughts again.

Edited September 20, 2014 by Mistress of Whispers

[Fangirl05]

((Hey, is it okay if people with animals post as them?))

[Kestra15]

((OOC: Yes, but remember that your character is the main focus, the animals are supporting roles. -KM))

 

"Then unless Wisperlee and Micah have found her, then we're going," Mak sighed, getting up once more. "Everyone, gather up your things. We leave in ten minutes." With that he moved over to the bar to scoop up some ice into a sandwich bag and rest on his bandaged hand, hoping to remove some more of the pain and swelling. He could move it and would be able to drive with it, but it would certainly give him problems, and after a couple of minutes rooting around he managed to find a box of paracetamol. Taking the first gram of his allowance he pocketed the packet before going out to the vehicles.

 

"Jaune!" he called, banging his good fist off the chassis. "Wake up, we're leaving."