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bestforgotten ([info]bestforgotten) wrote in [info]vas_captio_rpg,
@ 2009-11-10 22:11:00

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Who: Gabriel Van Helsing, Kimberly Corman
What: Arriving
When: Morning of day 29
Where: The forest just outside the church
Rating: I'll say low, just getting started
Status: Active


The last place Gabriel had recalled was the cabin aboard the ship that was carrying them across the Adriatic; for him all roads still lead to Rome, it seemed. His past remained a mystery, yet now he found a certain peace in letting it rest. He knew enough now (if he had been told the truth) to keep him going.

It was with this peace that he traveled with Carl to return to the Cardinal and whatever assignment would be his next. There was always something that needed to be vanquished, and the night would hopefully bring better dreams for once.

It did not. The familiar paths of his nightmares remained, but when he awoke he found himself not aboard a ship, but lying on a forest floor, his hat covering his face as it had when he had laid down to sleep. Sitting up he realized that his weapons seemed to be missing- the comfort of their weight was gone; a quick check confirmed it. It was not a reassuring feeling, and a visual search revealed no footprints, nothing that could indicate the direction the thieves may have gone. After all, he had his weapons when he went to sleep, what happened since must have been the work of others.

Gabriel pursed his lips as he moved to stand, pausing to note the strange box beside him; it was created with a material he did not recognize, and within it were items that seemed so strange- they made no real sense to him, save for the bottle t hat seemed to be water and perhaps the book with the pen. Both of those he stowed in his pocket, and while he considered throwing the rest aside, he did not. It was there for a reason, he simply needed to divine the purpose.

Without another word he began to explore, to search for a way out. A path, a river, anything that would show a way out of the dark woods- animal trails would be perfect as the path did get thick from time to time. Instead he simply noticed that it seemed exceptionally quiet.

When the woods thinned he spotted a structure; an old, crooked building that further inspection revealed to be a church. It appeared abandoned, yet there was certainly an irony in finding a lone church here; there was a strange comfort about it as well. Quietly he approached the dilapidated building and moved to open the door if he could; if there were people here he needed to know their nature before he simply entered and announced himself.


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[info]cheatingdeath
2009-11-17 02:03 am UTC (link)
Kimberly woke with a start, gasping for air as if she'd been missing oxygen for the whole time she'd been sleeping. The motion caused her to cough and sputter, water dribbling out from between her lips and down her chin as she sat up to try to calm it. The water. The tanks. "Connor..." she breathed, eyes widening as she scrambled to her feet and looked around. "Connor!" she yelped. He'd been with her; they'd said their silent goodbyes staring at one another through glass cages far smaller than the apparent one she'd had yet to see for herself that surrounded this place. Kimberly remembered the feeling of the air bubbling out from her mouth and nose; remembered the feeling of slowly expiring for lack of air. The burn of the water in her lungs and the heavy, helpless feeling of dying. Only new life can defeat death, the man in the crematorium had told her and now Kimberly had done it twice. The first time hadn't defeated death; not really. There was nothing to tell her that it had this time. Her main concern was whether she'd managed to save Connor's life by taking her own. But he was nowhere to be found.

Her hair, still wet from the water that had killed her the day before, clung to her face in fat chunks and thin tendrils alike, but she took little notice of it as she tried to navigate her way back out of the woods. She'd woken up in the woods a few days ago and now it was happening again. Was this what the place was all about? Maybe she was really dead and this was just limbo...or some kind of Hell. Maybe Death had already come for her.

"Connor!" she kept calling out periodically as she moved onward, finally taking relief in the fact that it looked as though she'd found her way out. The trees thinned and there was the paved road she knew as the one that ran through the town. When she came out from the tree line, she could see that she was near what looked like a church and Kimberly felt for her journal, relaxing only slightly when she found it on her person and pulled it out to look at the map. Where was the church in reference to where she lived? ...where were the tanks? Most importantly, where the hell was Connor?

At first, Kimberly didn't even take notice of the man who seemed to be trying to get into the decrepit house of worship as she stood in the middle of the road, examining the map and looking around. Connor was probably still in that tank...and oh, God...if he was, would the water have transferred into his after she'd died? Tears brimmed in her eyes just thinking about it and she looked over to the man at the church. "Hello? Can you help me? I can't find my friend and I think he's in trouble. I only just got here a few days ago and I haven't really had a chance to look around, so I don't know my way," she explained, looking as upset as she felt as she approached him.

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[info]bestforgotten
2009-11-19 04:11 am UTC (link)
The sound of footsteps behind him caught his attention only moments before she spoke; once again he was painfully aware of the fact that his weapons were no more. Without them he could still defend himself, but they certainly made things much easier.

Gabriel turned quickly at the soft sound of the woman’s voice, the distress in it drawing his concern before anything else. Without hesitation he moved away from the old building to the drenched young woman who was calling for his assistance. A lost friend- it put him in mind of Carl, but it wasn't unusual for Carl to go his own way for a time. There was an assumption that he would return soon enough, but if not within a few hours- the search could potentially include both her friend and his.

“Are you all right?” he asked as he took in her appearance; how she had become drenched was a mystery to him, as he saw no evidence of rain. “What happened to you?” Perhaps in the telling of the tale he could learn why her friend would be in trouble. This place felt strange, but the feeling was not entirely unfamiliar. There was no direction to it, nothing distinct.

“I have only just arrived,” he began as he searched for a kerchief or anything similar that he could offer her; it seemed almost as though his pockets had been picked clean, but why? “Do you remember where you saw him last? If you have been here for a few days, you could show me where you have been, retrace your steps. In the meantime you could tell me what you know of this place."

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[info]cheatingdeath
2009-11-23 10:10 pm UTC (link)
The strange man turned away from the building and started toward her and Kimberly hugged herself reflexively. He didn't look like a threat, but then again, he didn't look as friendly as Connor or Chris, nor as awkward and non-threatening as Spencer. Though, when he asked if she was alright, Kimberly nodded and took a step back. "Stop," she said quickly, holding up her hands. "It's better if you leave space between us. The more, the better. It's nothing personal, believe me," she explained awkwardly. "You could say I'm kind of a curse. And...the people who run this place tried to drown me yesterday is what happened," she added. Hugging herself again, Kimberly looked back at the man and gave a weak smile. "Well, they did drown me, but I'd like to think Connor managed to get out of his tank and revive me...except, I can't find him and I know he wouldn't leave me unless he got lost or taken," she finished.

When the man said that he'd only just arrived, Kimberly felt her heart sink. He wouldn't have any more idea where he was or where she should be looking than she did. Letting out a soft sigh, Kimberly shook his head. "I mean, I saw him last in the tanks, but I don't know the layout...and we just sort of woke up in them, so I don't know where they were. If he's still in it, he's dead; there was no air," she said with a frown, hugging herself tighter still as she looked down. She didn't want to think about that possibility, especially after she'd drown herself to keep him safe and repay the favor of his insistence on protecting her.

"I don't really know a lot about this place. I know that we're not in Kansas anymore, so to speak...and I know that my best friend is from, like, a few years in my future, so we're from different times which makes no sense to me at all. Connor says we're outside of time, but I'm not entirely sure what that means." Kimberly paused and rolled her eyes as a weak smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. "Then again, he says he works with dinosaurs and they've been extinct for, like, sixty-five billion years or something, so I'm kinda taking the 'outside of time' thing with a grain of salt," she added, looking back at the other man finally. "Oh! I'm Kimberly," she finished quickly, realizing she'd been rambling without even so much as introducing herself.

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[info]bestforgotten
2009-11-24 01:49 am UTC (link)
So much of what she said seemed incredibly strange, and while anything was possible he found himself having quite a time believing it. She had died, and yet she stood before him? Still, he sensed no curse about her, but if she preferred that he keep his distance he would do so. He raised both hands as he took a step back; let her have her space.

“Well you seem alive enough to me,” he answered as he let his hands fall and looked around; it was quiet otherwise. “We can look for your friend, and maybe we will find answers that we both seek. Maybe the worst has not happened, and your fears are unfounded.” Then again it could just be truth; better to know now.

The story became stranger as she spoke of the future, existing outside of time and dinosaurs. Of all the things he had been trained for and all the experiences he’d had, this was entirely new. Her introduction brought him from his momentary reverie and his lips quirked in a small, albeit brief smile. Normally others knew of him, but he enjoyed being unknown for a change- how long could that last, he wondered.

“Van Helsing,” he answered simply as relaxed a bit- as much as he relaxed a bit- as much as he did around strangers. “I cannot speak on the future or what may be truth in this place, but it feels much like the place I last remember. I know it is not the same place, and we will never know where we are if we stay here. Do you know your way anywhere at all, a starting point?”

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[info]cheatingdeath
2009-11-30 10:39 pm UTC (link)
The man lifted his hands up and took a step back, immediately lulling Kimberly into the belief that he respected that she needed space and thus was probably not a threat to her at all. She gave him a small smile of embarrassed appreciation. "Yeah, I've gotten pretty good at cheating Death, you could say," she replied with an uncomfortable laugh. "But I know I drown...I know the feeling of the life being sucked out of you, because it's happened before. How Connor managed to bring me back without all the medical machines and crap Dr. Kalarjin had to use the last time, I have no idea, but I'm not complaining," she replied. Much, she thought, if only because Connor bringing her back to life - if that was the case (and she had to assume it was) - would mean that now he was on Death's list, too, unless Death had already taken him. Kimberly didn't much care to think about that possibility.

But the man offered to help her find Connor and tried to make her feel a bit better, she thought, by suggesting that maybe she was afraid of something bad having happened to Connor when nothing had happened at all. As much as Kimberly wanted that to be true, she wasn't sure just how much faith she could possibly have in that, all things considered. The way he was speaking was soothing enough and the vernacular was interestingly formal, she thought. "Humor me? What year is it?" she asked, curious.

"Nice to meet you," she replied upon being given his name. Although her body language made it clear that she was nervous about doing so, Kimberly extended a hand to shake as the rest of her body stiffened slightly and she clenched her free hand into a repeatedly opening and closing fist at her side. She gave him a small smile when he pointed out that they would never know where they were if they stayed put and she nodded her agreement. "Uh...oh! Yes! I know the library; that's where Connor and I stay," she said quickly and pulled her still damp journal out of her pocket, flipping through the pages. "There's supposed to be a map or something..." she muttered more to herself than to Van Helsing as she looked through. "Ha! Yes! Okay, I'm gonna go ahead and assume that that's the church," she said with a small grin, looking up at the dilapitated building he'd been trying to get into when she'd first come across him. "And the library is...here," she said, running her finger from the church on the page down the road to the library. "But that's sort of all I really know, honestly...I haven't had time to explore," she finished apologetically. And even if I had, I'd have been too damn scared to, she thought miserably but kept to herself.

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[info]bestforgotten
2009-12-03 06:05 am UTC (link)
It was not unheard of in his experience; he had met many who lived lives that seemed to verge on immortality, but none had cheated death. Better said might be one managed it one time, but even he fell at the end. “You are fortunate, Death does not surrender lives easily,” he replied, “although I cannot imagine the experience being a pleasant one.”

She seemed a bit more at ease when he backed away, which was good. He wasn’t prepared to upset the first person he’d met here; he needed to know more about this place. Already it sounded far less than friendly than he’d like if she had been drowned; he would need to ask her about it in greater depth, and how he was missing something else particularly necessary. The question was on his lips when she asked about the year and it caught him off guard. Of all the questions he might have expected, that was far from his mind. “An odd question,” he replied as he looked to her. “The year is 1888.” Her reason for asking would be something he would ask depending on her answer; her attire was not like anything he had seen, but many locations had different styles and mannerisms. Perhaps it was a peculiarity specific to her people.

Whatever thoughts were occupying his mind was set to the side when she nervously extended her hand; a gesture of trust, confusing to be sure. He wasn’t certain if he should accept, but she did seem to be trying; the handshake was careful and brief in consideration of her previous statements. “And you,” he replied to her kind greeting as he stepped back and placed his hands on his hips. Being relatively lost in a new place was not a new experience to him, but having a friendly person greet him- that was new.

He watched as she pulled out a book similar to the one he had found in the strange box that he had found when he had awakened, and he frowned. As she glanced through hers he withdrew his own book and turned it over, taking a moment to open it to see if he too had a map. It was a curious coincidence, and now that she found something to focus on she seemed to be coming out of her shell.

“Wait,” he started as he held up his own book. “I found this by me when I wok- a book like the one you now hold. It was with a box of some sort, yet my own… personal belongings were gone- why? Where would they be, do you know?”

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[info]cheatingdeath
2009-12-03 04:44 pm UTC (link)
Cocking her eyebrows once and shaking her head, Kimberly looked down. "Fortunate is not exactly the way I would describe it and believe me, I know how Death works. If It doesn't get Its way, It hunts you down and tries again and again..." her voice trailed off and she frowned. "Anyway..." she added awkwardly.

Van Helsing pointed out that asking what year it was was kind of an odd question and, normally, Kimberly would've agreed with him. Here, though, where her best friend was from her future and she'd heard there were people from her past, Kimberly wasn't so sure it was that strange a question in the grand scheme of things. Though, when he answered, her eyebrows shot up. "Shut up! Seriously?!" she squealed. "That's like...dude, that's like more than two hundred years before me!" Her eyes swept over him again and her jaw went slack in its excited smile. "That is so cool!" she exclaimed as she looked back at his face. Her traumatic previous day was all but forgotten in her fascination with the man who was from the 1800s, so he said.

Kimberly shook his hand a bit more enthusiastically than she'd expected to, although her free hand still clenched itself at her side. She gave him an appreciative smile when he stepped back again after the brief handshake.

As she was looking back and forth between the road before her and the map in her journal, Van Helsing was asking a question and Kimberly realized she hadn't been paying as much attention as she should've been. "Uh...sorry, what?" she asked, looking up at him. "Oh, we all got the boxes," she replied once she'd processed what he'd said in a bit of a delayed manner. "I woke up here in my pajamas, so...I hear people complaining about that a lot but I didn't have that problem. I didn't have anything on me." Nodding up the road a little ways, Kimberly raised her eyebrows in a silent way of asking whether he was ready to start looking for Connor - or whomever he might be looking for, she supposed. "Couldn't tell you where they'd have put your things though...you could always write in the book asking and the other people who lost stuff could reply if they have any ideas..." she suggested.

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[info]bestforgotten
2009-12-06 04:03 am UTC (link)
Her excitement over the year seemed strange, but her declaration of her time being two hundred years ahead of him were a surprise, and he found himself in a state of disbelief. The new enthusiasm when she shook his hand was interesting, even though she still seemed a touch stiff, but it was nice to feel welcome. “Two hundred years?” He asked as he thought back on what she had said earlier; the explanation of being outside of time made sense if what she said was true.

After looking to see if he also had a map he looked at the book again, and the way that she spoke of the box made him wonder if perhaps it was useless- save for the bottle of water. The lack of weapons made him unhappy, but it seemed that no one else had them- no one else. There were others…

At her gentle (but silent) questioning he nodded, agreeing to go in the direction of the library on her map; they could converse as they walked, because again she said something that prompted yet more questions. “This book?” he inquired as he raised the one he held. “If I write in this others can read it? How- are you certain that it is people who answer it?” The very idea sounded like witchcraft if it was true. Never had he heard of such a device- clever as it might be if it worked, but the question was where the power behind it originated. The Holy Order had never spoken of such things, so if they had existed then he would have known of it. Until he knew more of the power behind it he doubted that it would be something he would use, and he pocketed it quietly.

“Tell me of these others who are here,” he said, wondering if this was a farce or an imagining, or if there might be names familiar to him. “Does no one know what power has brought us here, or what controls the books, who takes people’s belongings?”

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[info]cheatingdeath
2009-12-21 12:17 am UTC (link)
"Mmhmm, it's 2003 where I come from," Kimberly chirped. At least there was one good thing about this place, she thought, which was meeting new people that she'd never meet in the real world. Connor, too, was someone that Kimberly never would've gotten to meet in the real world, beside the fact that he was halfway across the world, he was from the future; who knew what he'd been up to in her year?

At the question about the book, Kimberly looked over at him, then down at the book, and nodded. "Yeah, I know, it's totally weird. I didn't believe it at first either, but you get to know people's handwriting after a bit and I know that my friend Connor has written to me in it. We all have one, I guess. I don't know how it works, but...it's kinda handy, I gotta say," she replied. "Especially with the map in the front."

The two of them walked and Kimberly pondered his next question. She certainly didn't know who or what brought them there, where people's belongings disappeared to, or how the book worked. She'd also gotten the impression that everyone else was just as much in the dark about it as she was; even people who had been there for a while. "I have no idea...you can write in there and ask around sometime, but I don't think anyone knows, to be honest. That's the impression I get anyway," she said with an apologetic look and a half-shrug.

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