InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "it's the eye of the tiger"

Q (smallobjects) wrote in somerealityrpg,
@ 2021-05-11 21:23:00

Entry tags:

active: eliot waugh, active: quentin coldwater

Log: Quentin & Eliot
Who: Quentin Coldwater & Eliot Waugh
What: Surprise, it's an Eliot
When: Nowish
Where: Narnia; around the lamp post
Warnings: Nah

Truth be told, Narnia may have been one of the other fictional worlds that Quentin had wished was real at some point in his life. Fillory had been his first love, but there were a lot of similarities between the two. Parts of the landscape, talking animals, sentient trees, the siblings finding their way into a magic land, and don't forget the kings and queens of earth. A plus? These stories hadn't been completely ruined for him because the author was a fucking sociopath and pedophile that turned one of those siblings into a Mothman.

What Hawaii might have been to most of the Goodland residents, Narnia was to Quentin Coldwater. It was like stepping into Fillory again for the first time before he knew the truth, and before the stories were tarnished. Almost. Fillory was still, well, Fillory. Though, could he just say that Cair Paravel was really fucking cool? It wasn't Castle Whitespire, but he could imagine sitting in one of the thrones with the Great Lion before him, placing a crown on his head. Quite the difference between of their makeshift ceremony in Fillory.

Instead of the Magnificent, the Gentle, the Just, and the Valiant it was the Spectacular, the Destroyer, the Wise, and... the Moderately Socially Maladjusted. One of these was not like the other.

He spent some of his time wandering around, exploring around and feeling like a mystical tourist. He'd had tea with a pair of talking rabbits, gotten directions from a fox, and watched a group centaur galloping by through the woods. Bumbled up in a heavy coat, it was about an hour or so into his latest excursion into the snowy woods. It was the second time he'd been in this particular area, since of course he'd had to check out the lamp post day one, but this time he was looking for something else. The wardrobe - or the door that led to the wardrobe. He had no clue if it existed in this pocket version of Narnia, but it was worth a try, right?

On his handwritten map that he carried around, Quentin looked down to see he was coming up on the lamppost which had to mean the wardrobe, if it was there, couldn't be that far ahead. Stuffing the map into a coat pocket, he walked a section of trees and smiled when he saw the light coming from the post. There was the small clearing right around it, and when he looked up, Quentin saw that someone else was there too. If he entertained the thought that seeing him again was possible, Quentin would have recognized him even from behind almost instantly, but he'd long ago accepted that it wasn't likely to happen.

"Um, hi," he started, taking a step or two closer but was still several feet away. "You haven't seen something that looks like the entrance to the back of a wardrobe by chance, have you?" He looked down briefly to pick out the map again, and in those couple of seconds, the man turned around.

"I think it's supposed to be somewhere arou-" As soon as he looked up, Quentin cut himself off and froze. He didn't think his eyes were playing tricks on him, but... was this real?

"Eliot?"

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smallobjects
2021-07-06 02:31 am UTC (link)

A fuckton, but still on the low side of how deep Quentin could have gone in his initial explanation of the who, what, where, and nobody in hell knows why. During his pause, he took a breath in order to keep himself from going on or saying anything else and just smiled. Impossible shit happened here, and this was proof of that. He'd almost assumed that his view into mirror land had meant he'd never see Eliot or Alice in person again. That the mirror was his version of goodbye to them as much as it was for them for him.

"Seems a little ironic considering some of the other worlds we've been, doesn't it?" He couldn't help but laugh and shook his head. "If the name Goodland isn't enough? The god or being that created this place? Calls themselves the Jubilant Entity. Big shocker: it doesn't always live up to its name."

They were all real, but it still didn't seem like it yet. Maybe once others could confirm he was here and this wasn't a trick he managed to conjure up or play on himself. "This whole time is a little more complicated than it might seem, but basically, yeah. After the Underworld, I turned up here. Well, in the Manhattan here. Not Narnia here."

Quentin stared up at Eliot for a few seconds before finally blinking away. "Sorry, it's just.. I'm here telling you this is real, but I'm having a hard time believing it myself too. Oh! Julia is here too. Her and.. well, she's been here a while."

He nearly spilled the beans about Hope, but he had no clue if Eliot knew about the baby yet. From what Julia had told him, the pregnancy had been a quick one from start to finish, but she and Eliot had figured out some of the traveler rules after being locked up in Fillory.

"Okay, El, this is probably going to sound weird, though no more weird than the rest of this has, but what's the last thing you remember from home? Time isn't the same here, and people arrive from different points. How long has it been since.. you know."

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kingshit
2021-07-07 06:58 pm UTC (link)

Eliot couldn't help but scoff at the name of the being who had created such an absurdly named place. It wasn't surprising that neither the god nor the world lived up to their names. If Fillory had taught any of them anything? Hell, if their entire lives had taught them anything? It was how to deal with disillusionment. Nothing was ever as shiny as it was on the surface - except maybe Quentin's laugh.

A part of El was convinced he'd never actually saved the world. That he somehow died in the proverbial boom, but if the dying meant being in fucking not-Narnia and seeing him again? Well, maybe he would take it. On the flip-side? He desperately needed a drink or two. Maybe twelve. "I'm far too sober to engage in a riveting conversation about the mechanics of time or whatever other fuckery is going on here. So, how about we stick with 'Q took a detour'?" Simple, basic, and a hell of a lot easier to wrap his mind around at that moment. "At least until we raid the Beaver's stash."

Because there wasn't a chance in hell, Mr. Beaver didn't have one. It would probably taste like river water, but he'd probably drink anything right now, as long as it had some sort of alcohol in it.

Then Quentin was staring up at him, and he couldn't help but reciprocate, which only led to a shake of his head once they both snapped out of it - yet he smiled all the same despite that brief instance of awkward. He was definitely too sober. "That makes two of us." His eyebrows arched at the mention of Julia, though. "Doesn't surprise me that she's here too. She has a knack for being everywhere."

He could still hear that 'I don't trust you', falling off her lips. Things between himself and Julia hadn't ever been sunshine and rainbows, but that was par for the course.

All thoughts of Julia skittered away at Q's next line of questioning. Shuffling through his pockets for the cigarettes that were thankfully on his person when he dropped into Goodland, El hastily lit up and moved to lean casually against the lamp post. Where had he even gotten these? Probably from that never ending party he'd resided himself to repeat forever. At least until the door appeared in front of him.

"A year," he finally said abruptly. "Give or take. Feels like longer after my stint as Bill Murray. Last thing I remember is saving the world. You know. Again."

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