maskormenace | 008 {Video}

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008 {Video}

[Coming to you live, from some motel parking lot, it's Sookie! She's settled up on the hood of her car, wrapped in a thin blanket despite the heat. She looks tired, worried.]

Hey from Shreveport, y'all. [Sookie smiles weakly, gives the camera a little wave.] I guess I planned my vacation about the right time, huh? I just hope everyone's doing okay back home. Can't even get a flight back into De Chima right now, they turned me away at the ticket counter.

[She sighs then, scrubbing a hand across her eyes like she's fighting sleep.]

I'm sure everyone's distracted right now, but- [A pause]- I came out to Louisiana to, oh, I don't know. I looked it up when I first got here and I knew my hometown wasn't here, but I just had to check, y'know? Can't trust everything you read online.

[Ahem.]

I mean, the parish ain't even here. Looks like there was never any Renard Parish at all, it's all eaten up by the ones that were around it at home. Shreveport is here, at least, but it's all different. This motel here's sitting where my friend's bar is supposed to be. It's all so weird. Is this like this for everyone else, whole towns and counties vanishing into thin air? Has anyone even been able to find their old home?

It's just...weird, is all.

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[Greetings from this luxurious hotel room in London, where it's several hours later into the day.]

Our town disappeared, too. And other stuff around there. It's supposed to be exactly where our farm is.

[Well, hell.]

I'm sorry, I didn't even realize.

[Sorry, not for anything she's done, but sorry for that feeling. The little pit in your stomach you get when you look at where your home should be and it just....isn't there.

Of course, her surprise could've been tempered if she would've just let her mental wall down around him (and his...friends). She's been so stringent with it lately, she's been totally missing the important things.]

[For the best, really, that she hasn't tried looking into this particular mind.]

Oh, it's alright.

[If they depended on the ley line for Noah to manifest, that would be one thing. But its absence hasn't had an effect on him or Ronan's dreams, so there's nothing to miss except the home he was already exiled from.]

I always wanted to drop out of school, anyway.

[Good lord, Ronan. You're just desperate to be everything that makes her nervous, aren't you? Granted, it's absolutely none of her business how he conducts himself nor is it her business to even care, but still. It's concerning. ]

I guess you wouldn't need a high school degree to get hired on anywhere around here. [>:T] And it's summer.

I've been here since February.

[He could have graduated in that time! Instead he starred in a stupid reality show.]

It was always sort of a life plan, anyway. School was pointless back home, too.

MIT is there. My dorm is there. It's eerily what it's supposed to be, down to trees and walkways. Different donors on some of the plaques.

My dad's house, though? Never existed. It's been a bookstore since the fifties.

Alternate timelines are trippy. But at least we don't tend to meet alternate selves.

[Mark this one down in the history books as the day Newt was finally helpful. She leans into her screen, curiosity peaked. It's not hopeful exactly, but it's definitely interesting.]

Did you find anyone you knew?

[a hint of disappointment in his headshake. He'd wanted to, because he was scientifically curious and because, well, maybe...he might find a version of his dad?]

No. Every time I thought an office looked maaaaaybe familiar from circa this time? There was a different face behind the desk. The only people I've known here are the ones that came through the Porter. Hermann, Mako... and the people who were fictional in my world, but real in their own, which is a weird phenomenon.

[She knows the feeling, dude. A part of her, a real small part, thought that maybe she could find some version of her friends out here. Pam, maybe. Eric.

But, uh, since the bar is just a motel here, no such luck.]

I gotta wonder, are there any common people between this universe and any of ours? I mean, if they're gonna build whole dorms the same...

I'd assume so on some level. I mean, America was founded and created by someone in yours, mine, and theirs, and I'm going to go out on a limb and guess there might've been some MVPs in there like Franklin and Washington and Jefferson in all three verses. And something similar can be said for pretty much every country I know from the map, presumably, because they're all here, with some elements of same culture intact. Institutions exist similarly...physical landmarks...cities...flora and fauna. ...

All these countries exist so UP TO A POINT our worlds overlap. But somewhere, maybe with the Porter, either as a result of it or as a result of the Cold War, or something...a butterfly flapping it's wings...somewhere in the last hundred or so years, my world and this one ceased to mirror each other. Their Cold War dragged out while mine pretended it was done. Their world gained a Porter and more advanced technology while mine presumably never got a Porter and advanced at a slower pace. Mine was invaded by Kaiju.

Something diverged and either diverged so ENTIRELY that biological and social circumstances resulted in a different population to exist present day...OR something with the Porter has opted to forget or eliminate the overlap between this world and that of any of the potential imPorts that it might pull in...or at least any overlap we'd be directly impacted by.

Because there could be some common-variable people we just don't know about, but how do we test for that?

[Oh, and there he immediately goes squandering her being impresses, as per usual. So far, Newt seems to be the most predictable person she's met so far. It's comforting, kinda.]

Um, I think I lost you at butterfly. [Sorry, dude. She looks a little sheepish, but in her defense she never asked for a lecture.] Sorry.

He's referring to The Butterfly Effect; a concept that states that even the slightest change can affect a given timeline. The Cold War ended because of a miscommunication in our world. Perhaps the reasons or people behind it haven't happened here for any given multitude of variables. The same can be said for towns and such. The theory has been the catalyst of many time travel films.

Babe, I got this.

You confused the poor girl. Honestly Newton, you're a teacher.

Oh, please. I am a great teacher. I wasn't even trying to give a lesson. I was bounching around some theories. She just got caught in it, ok.

[Poor girl? She's not a dog or an idiot, sir.]

Anyway.

What he said.

Huh.

[Okay, she kinda gets it. Little things make big ripples.]

So tiny differences at one point turn into big changes later on. Like when stream branches turn into a big river.

I haven't left America, as yet, but I haven't heard anything about Florence not existing, or Guildhall not being in London. The buildings might be different, but I'm not there to see it.

Well, I mean, Florence is Florence.

[That's the floaty one on the water, right?

Oh, wait, no, that's Venice. She thinks?]

I've never heard of Guildhall, though.

Guildhall is a conservatoire in London - I did my undergraduate there with the cello.

[After a quick internet search for what "conservatoire" means:]

Didn't know you could go to school for playing an instrument. You must be real good.

I really shouldn't have been there, honestly, I was just taking up a place someone else would have valued more. But music has always been part of my life. I haven't actually looked to see if it exists here-- I just can't imagine it not.

[He's in London, in some random park of all things.]

A Kanto, Hoenn, Sinnoh, and Kalos exist... but... [They're not the same.] Just as stupidly weak copies.

[There's a part of her that's a little jealous, that regrets coming here, but what good would it have done to go to England and put this trip off even longer? ]

It's just not right. Have you ever like, rearranged furniture but your brain still expects the old layout? It's like that, but huge.

[London is fun! and kinda exciting, but he's also starting to lose his patience with the paparazzi that are all over the place.]

Yea, something like that. At least it's not as bad as the remodelled Viridian Gym.

You're that big a fan of gyms? [She laughs then, taking it as the joke it sounds like.] I've only heard of LA Fitness, to be honest.

Not that kind of Gym. [He stresses the 'G' with an irritated look.] A Pokemon Gym.

Edited 2017-07-23 09:37 (UTC)

Well, I cannot leave the United States to go check, but I looked it up online and my city, Novosibirsk, does still exist. I could not, however, find any record of the hospital I worked at, nor my home village. All the maps I found just list that area as wilderness. It... is disconcerting, to say the least.

That's...in Russia?

[Oh, poor guy, the natives probably aren't too nice to him on top of the standard imPort crap.]

I actually drove all. The way out to where my town should be, it's the same. Just a lot of woods and one real old gas station.

It is. Specifically, it is in Western Siberia.

[He shrugs, a bit helplessly. If the accent didn't confirm it, that does: he's as Russian as they come. At least his fellow imPorts seem to be nice enough.]

I wish I could do that. At the same time, I feel as if visiting must have been rather hard on you, given the differences you described. Are you alright? [He's not an expert but this doesn't sound like the most cheerful of ideas.]

[If Sookie were being honest, the accent perks her ears in a way that she's not proud of. She was born in '78, so her childhood was still steeped in that late stage Cold War mistrust of Russia. It's an unwelcome remnant of the past, but something she tries to pay no mind to. Besides, the Russian people were never the probelm. People, generally, are better than their government.]

I'm...no, I'm not fine, but I'm getting better. [She pulls the thin motel blanket closer around her bare shoulders, the chill more from within than without.] I think I had to do it, though. I had to see it for myself or I'd always wonder.

[Anatoly has nothing against Americans. Most seem not to know much about where he's from or what his culture actually entails, so he doesn't take the wariness personally. He does wish that he wasn't so often the sole Russian in the room, because it's awkward, but he's getting accustomed to it.]

I understand. I would probably do the same, if I had the capacity to do so, though given how much time has passed since my era and this world's present day I doubt much would be recognizable either way. Although admittedly my desire to visit died off greatly when I read online that my old synagogue had been demolished. [He has no desire to see whatever building is standing in its' place. Maybe it's for the best he can't go look for himself.]

Still, take care of yourself. Such things can be quite taxing on the heart and the mind, after all.

The town I was living in at home isn't here either but right outside of De Chima is approximately where it should be. It's disorienting to say the least.

Shreveport huh? Is the crawfish there still good at least in this world?

That has to be hard for y'all.

[It was painful enough trying and failing to find where her house should be. She got it down pretty close, but it was all woods. No graveyard, no old Compton place, not even the same road as a guideline.

But it's not good to dwell on these things. She's cried enough today.]

Ah, I haven't had any here, but I haven't been disappointed by the stuff we ship in back in the city. [The idea perks her up though. Drown your sorrows in food, always the best idea.] Can't beat fresh, though.

[His expression softens. That was the intended effect--focus on other things.]

To some extent, but we have almost everyone we need here, luckily.

[Save for Blue and Ronan's brothers pretty much. He knows Adam is more than happy to be here instead of home and Gansey doesn't exactly blame him. They're all thrilled with being here if just because Noah is here. Alive.

The same hotel room that's in the background of Ronan's message is in Gansey's background as well.]

I haven't been there in years but I've found crawfish just doesn't taste the same unless it's really fresh, like right in Shreveport. Are you from around there?

[Man, why didn't she go to England? Those rooms look so much nicer than the threadbare one waiting behind her in the Shreveport Motor Inn (Vacancy!) behind her. At least it's clean.]

Uh, yeah, about thirty minutes south of here. Or, it should be thirty minutes south. It's real small though, it's the kind of town where everyone knows your business without you ever being on TV or in the tabloids. [She smiles, a small and sad thing.] Bon Temps.

[You should've come to hang out with them, Sookie, Gansey is showing his boyfriends around--he lived in the area for a while.

There's a small wry smile of sympathy.]

There's something quaint and nostalgic about that kind of hometown dynamic.

[Of course he says this as someone that has never experienced it.]

I've been to some of the cities I've lived in. But you're right, things are different—houses, apartment buildings. Not like the ones I remember.

What cities? I mean, if you don't mind me asking.

[It's a sensitive subject, obviously.]

This suburb of Tallahassee, near where I was born, and then out in Denver where I went to college. Denver wasn't that different, but it was disorienting, like little landmarks I remember just weren't there. And then the suburb wasn't there at all.

It's probably stupid to feel upset about that.

Geiszler's got the right idea, I think. They didn't disappear, they were never here at all.

God, I know right? It's so trippy that entire, huge, massive cities I know are just ... They just aren't. Never were.

Not that I miss Blüdhaven. That trash-fire can stay gone.

Your first clue was that De Chima, Heropa, Maurtia Falls, and Nonah are all themselves bullshit, yeah?

[ Recognisable ID does what a strange voice can't do in self identifying. ]

This country's got bad land for putting your roots in.

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008 {Video}

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Video - I don't mind fourth walling if she'd do it.

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What a nice boy

Gansey is the actual sweetest

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