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Tweak says, "Take it easy, Timberlake."

stephen hart secretly listens to the spice girls. (bleedinghart) wrote in vas_captio_rpg,
@ 2009-10-16 00:12:00

Who: Stephen and Connor.
What: Friends and teammates reunite.
Where: Vicinity of the library.
When: Day 26, early afternoon.
Rating: PG.
Status: Active.

Stephen was taking everything in stride. He had to. Panic wasn't really his thing, nor was it productive. You couldn't protect people if you were stressing out. You couldn't take on something that could easily kill you if you were busy thinking 'God, this thing could eat me in one bite.'

So, upon finding out the basics of the place he now found himself in, Stephen separated himself from the two men he woke up with and set about finding his own facts. Which so far had consisted of him exploring a bit of the forest near where he appeared and making notes in the notebook he found in the sorry excuse for a survival kit. He didn't want to wander too far from that location in case an anomaly was the cause of his arrival and it happened to reopen. The chance was slim but it was still a chance.

Once that familiar handwriting caught his eye, though, everything changed.

The forest was put to his back and his feet were hitting the pavement at a light jog, one goal in mind. Find Connor. If he was alive then perhaps Cutter was too, and Abby. God, could the others be here? Stephen spent a few moments flipping through pages looking for the map that was mentioned before deciding it was a waste of time. This place couldn't be that big. Libraries tended to have a certain look to them as well. And really? He'd probably recognize Connor a kilometer away. As he jogged Stephen couldn't help but wonder at the town; the streets were a contrast to the condition of the buildings, making one or the other look out of place. Was this place a mix of times? That man with the peculiar eyes had mentioned something about people being from different times. Perhaps that had something to do with it?

Hell, he could try to figure this place out later. He had to see that Connor was well and truly alive. Nothing else was remotely as important at the moment.

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leconnortemple
2009-10-19 03:46 am UTC (link)

Good thing Stephen was getting over the shock quickly, because Connor wasn't. He was finding words hard to come by. There was no bloody way this could be happening. Who were the fuckers running this place to try and pull this on him? But he couldn't make himself argue it. How he was going to keep his secret, though, was beyond him.

Step number one, pretend nothing was wrong. Right? Beaming, Connor grinned up at his friend. He was real. He actually existed. It was nearly impossible to believe. But there it was. He was getting a second chance. But he'd changed so much since Stephen's death. In many ways, Connor was just starting to come into his own. How could he explain the changes in him without pointing out that he was from a future where the man in front of him didn't even exist?

Trying to chuckle, he shook his head. "Helen lied. Big time. We were all fine all along." Oops. Already a wrong choice of wording. But he couldn't go letting Stephen think he'd been yanked to this place when he should have been saving Helen Evil Wench Cutter of all people. "She's a bitch, Stephen. You need to remember that." Even if he had been... Ew. Connor really didn't want to think about it. Not that he had a lot of experience to judge anyone but that wasn't the point. The fact was that at the end of the day, Helen Cutter was the reason Connor had lost two of his greatest friends. And Connor wasn't about to forget it any time soon.

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bleedinghart
2009-10-20 02:32 pm UTC (link)

"So Cutter, and Abby... they're alive too? Are they here?" He couldn't help but to glance around, as if there was something or someone he'd missed. If this place was truly as he'd heard, then it was unlikely they were, and it certainly wasn't the sort of place he would want them all to end up at. But Stephen couldn't deny what a relief it would be to see those two. Especially Cutter.

"What happened, Connor? Was it the traitor?" Which he was convinced was Lester. His attention focused on Connor as he brushed aside his emotions for the moment. He needed to know. Needed all the facts so he could make sense of things. The talk of Helen was ignored for the moment, though Stephen did find it a little curious coming from Connor. It sounded similar to something Cutter might say, even if the conviction Stephen thought he heard wasn't quite as strong. Was he missing something?

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leconnortemple
2009-10-20 11:24 pm UTC (link)

Oh boy, was there a lot to explain. Connor released a slow breath, then nodded. Sure, he could explain a lot about what had happened without telling Stephen about how that day had ended....right? Even if a part of him did think his friend deserved to hear what a hero he was. But then, Stephen Hart had never been the craving the limelight sort. He'd probably be okay with not knowing it.

Nodding towards the library, he led Stephen to the front steps and settled down, motioning that he should join him. Sighing, Connor shook his head. "They lived through that," he amended carefully. To say anything else might imply that Cutter was alive in Connor's life. And he wasn't. And that just made the hurt that much fresher. So he gave a little shrug instead of going into detail. "We all did." Sort of. "It wasn't Lester, Stephen." They'd all believed it. Every one of them. "Leek. He was working with Helen."

Because damn if he was going to let Stephen think Helen was any sort of innocent. As far as Connor was concerned, she could rot in hell. And he couldn't tell his friend why. Not really. That made it hurt more. "What do you know about this place, mate?" he asked quietly. That would make all the difference in what Connor could tell him upfront and what he'd have to explain first. While Stephen might be a little more receptive to the taken-out-of-time theory than Kimberly had been, he was still prepared to be given that I'm-hanging-around-a-crazy-bloke look Stephen sometimes wore around the student.

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bleedinghart
2009-10-21 04:03 pm UTC (link)

He sat easily, arms resting on his knees as he turned his head to look at Connor, and his brows almost immediately furrowed at Connor's first statement. Not 'yes Stephen, they're alive' but 'they lived through that'. Implying there was something they didn't. The relief he had started to feel dissapated. What had happened... and when?

Stephen eyed his younger friend, took in the seriousness of his expression as he ran the words over in his head. "What aren't you telling me?"

He tried to ignore the sting of the words implicating Helen. Connor could have been lying. But, no. Stephen had never known Connor once to lie, and what reason would there be for it? None at all. He remembered how he had caught Helen on the phone earlier that day, the way she dodged his questions and seemed in a hurry to leave. It was convenient, just like the way she kept showing up. Stephen knew she was manipulative but could she really stoop that low? Maybe the better question was why should he be surprised? She let them think she was dead for eight years and had practically left him to die after he was attacked by the arthropleura. Somewhere in his mind Stephen had known Cutter was right; when she gave him the message to give to Cutter she had no certainty that he would stay conscious or live long enough to do so. She was toying with them, with him, just like she always had.

A deep frown darkened Stephen's face as he looked out at the street, mind running over thoughts he previously hadn't the time or energy to properly think about. What their lives had become... there wasn't time for anything but the 'now'. He had told Cutter to let go of the past and live in the present, but the past really did come back when it pleased, didn't it? At least when its name was Helen Cutter.

"This place... it's not right. It doesn't feel right." he quietly remarked, his absent gazing having pulled Stephen from his thoughts. His head cocked slightly to one side as he stared at one of the rundown buildings across the street from them as if it might have answers. "I keep thinking that it shows pieces of the past and the present but it's been almost impossible for me to pin a date to anything." Which, if an anomaly had somehow brought them here, wouldn't be the case. But the puzzle of it all still felt similar. He looked back over at Connor, that look on his face that said he was trying to figure things out. "This bloke with strange eyes, he mentioned something about people being from different times. Could that even be possible without time being altered?" Stephen was thinking back to all the times Cutter mentioned that woman, Claudia Brown, that none of them had heard of. Cutter had been convinced they did something that erased her from existence. If that was true, wouldn't that be happening here if people were truly from different places and points of time? Stephen was alright with figuring out the theory of it but possible logistics of messing with time? Not so much. Hence how he was looking to the smartest person he knew for answers.

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leconnortemple
2009-10-22 11:21 pm UTC (link)

"Ah, the creepy red-eyed bloke?" Connor asked, chuckling a bit. He knew he was skating on thin ice. Damn Stephen for knowing him so well. He was either going to have to tell the truth or outright lie. And Connor couldn't even say the truth out loud yet, let alone admit it to Stephen. For now, he would move past the subject as best as he could. "Ignore him, most of us do. Andy and I have decided he's way too comfy here. No one should ever grow to like this place." Hint number one to Stephen that Vas Captio was anything but normal.

Sighing, Connor shook his head slowly. "You're right about one thing, mate. This place is all wrong. To be honest with you?" Connor lowered his voice, preparing to not be believed again. "I'm not even sure we're on Earth. Haven't you noticed nothing looks right? And no animal life?" Even if some of his friends did think hunting the land was possible, Connor knew very few species could stay hidden as well as these had.

Figuring he was already taking enough chances with the skeptical Stephen Hart, Connor took a breath and threw caution to the wind. "I think we're outside of time, if you want the truth. People here are all from different times. Our past, future, everything. It's...it's not normal, mate. More than not right. It's downright weird."

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bleedinghart
2009-10-25 10:24 am UTC (link)

Despite the seriousness of his thoughts and the undertone of their conversation, Stephen couldn't help but crack a smile at Connor's chuckle and the normalcy of it. "Yeah, him. Didn't particularly find him creepy but he was hard as hell to understand."

His brows rose as Connor continued, and Stephen just let him speak for the moment, absorbing the younger man's theory. He was admittedly skeptical of the whole business of being on some other planet, but Stephen couldn't deny that the plant life he had seen thus far and the animal life that he hadn't had him scratching his head. And that wasn't even touching on trying to figure out the climate. Days of constant sunlight or darkness spoke to either of the poles, but clearly the weather was all wrong for that. Of course, he had yet to see the glass walls that were confirmation of their prison, which would only stir up new questions for him. He didn't like having all these questions with no solid answers he could find.

"What do you mean outside of time? Are you trying to say this is some sort of place where the past and the future and the present meet? Or... I mean, you can't stop time. So how could we be outside of it?" He gave himself points for sticking to one thing, even it was the one element that made the slightest amount of sense to him out of all that Connor had said. Stephen understood time, to an extent. It was something he could at least wrap his mind around. The possibility that this place wasn't on Earth? That would take some serious convincing.

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