foundationmods | R5: ghost hangout

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round 5

R5: ghost hangout

[What's this? The fog of the miasma has pulled back, revealing a path down to the basement. None of the living seem to notice it though, only those who are dead are aware of it.

Down in the basement is a large furnished room. It doesn't seem as dusty as the rest of the house, and it actually seems lived in? Or...un-lived in, technically. But the lighting here works and there's plenty to do. Even if the ghosts might not need it, there's several beanbag chairs (brought in by one of the many groups of teenagers who have disappeared into the house), a large couch, and even a jacuzzi. Because even if you're in eternal pain, you can relax a bit, right?

If the ghosts look up, they'll see that the ceiling appears to be made of spider-patterned stained glass. Which is weird, considering that it should be floorboards and such. But the stained glass allows them to look up into all parts of the house and easily spy on the living. What they hear can be hit or miss, especially if the living are whispering, but seeing what they're up to should be easy enough.

Well. Might as well make the most of this space, right?]

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[ He's awake again. He's awake again and he's not quite himself and his body hurts in every possible location a body could hurt. He didn't think it was possible for a hardened fighter like him to experience this much pain, but life's a bitch and death is apparently no better.

For a moment, Zabuza simply lays on the floor and takes in the agony, staring up at the strange ceiling. It would have been too easy for it all to be over, instead he has to be this and---

So does Haku. That's what makes him bolt upright after all. Haku. He doesn't know what he actually has to say to him, but... He should find him. Just to ascertain for himself what kind of state he is in.

Zabuza can be found exploring the basement though he doesn't linger too long in any one spot. He's searching.

After he and Haku had a ... chat, however, he's in the Jacuzzi because that is what he deserves right now, fuck it all. ]

[There's a card table down here, probably from college kid beer pong. Sho is using it to make elaborate card houses. Out of the corner of his eye, he watches Zabuza]

Looking for something?

[ So this is indeed the ghost hangout spot... It's good to know have Sho's presence confirming as much. ]

Haku. He's supposed to be here, isn't he?

[Sho has about 15 different comebacks ready to fire back at what he suspects will be a snarky answer or just silence, so he's a little taken aback when he gets such a straightforward answer. He blinks a few times, then shakes his head a bit]

Uh. You can't feel it? ... Well, I guess you're zetta new. You might not get it yet. He's with them. He's the Vessel now, the curse holds on to them a little longer than us single digits. He'll be back.

Edited 2020-05-05 01:35 (UTC)

[ Zabuza has been trying very hard to not feel anything related to the curse. He hates its invasiveness, he hates the way his mind isn't his anymore. So he stubbornly tried to tough it out, somehow. It's futile, of course.

And when Sho gives his explanation, Zabuza instantly knows it to be true.

Shit. ]

Something like him will be back, at least.

It'll still be him. Just with... additions. The curse doesn't change us, not really. It just sort of shuffles our values around.

[He leans back in his chair]

.... For now, at least.

[because he can feel it, too. Every day, a little worse, a little more... growing in his brain like slime mold over a rotten log.]

.... I plan to keep myself as long as possible, anyway. Maybe with someone like you around, he can do the same.

[Zabuza will find Haku sitting on a bean bag chair staring up at the ceiling. If he's paying attention, he'll observe that Haku seems to be looking very specifically at the little shrine that Room 2 have apparently put up for him, a faint smile curling his lips. Then again, that may not be the most pertinent thing seeing as Haku has changed. A faint shroud of miasma surrounds him and it might almost be pretty if it weren't for the aura of misery that it induces.

He will, however, look at Zabuza when approached.]

Sit.

[ Any sense of relief Zabuza might have felt over finding Haku seemingly alright dissipates into nothingness at the command and his own undeniable urge to follow it.

He sits, instantly, without question, and it's wrong wrong wrong. The Demon of the Hidden Mist doesn't obey, not like this. Haku doesn't command, not like this.

They're not themselves anymore and the pain of being torn apart dulls in comparison to the sense of strangeness this evokes.]

Haku... that's who you are, right?

[The question makes something in his expression change -- the faint glimmer of amusement in his eyes now gone.]

Have you already forgotten who I am, Zabuza-san?

[... ah. Well, that's more familiar. That's its own kind of painful. Zabuza hasn't wanted to run from anything in his whole life, but this conversation? He's not sure anymore that he truly wants to have it.]

Of course not. We're just both not quite ourselves anymore, are we?

Could I be blamed for thinking it? You didn't recognize me when we last met after all.

[It's hardly anything that Zabuza can be blamed for, but being fair is really the last thing on his mind. So many new thoughts, so many new feelings ever since he's woken up here, it can't possibly be contained in his small body.]

You wanted to see me. So now that you have, you immediately question who I am? Must you hurt me even now.

...I never meant to hurt you.

[ Never meant to kill you either, absolutely never meant to leave him behind. Considerations for Haku's feelings are a fairly recent thing and Zabuza doesn't think he likes it very much, but this much is merely the truth. ]

Losing you to a place like this is the worst failure to suffer.

[His expression softens at that, eyes drifting back up to the ceiling simply to look at something else for just a few moments.]

I thought hearing such a thing would make some of this heaviness here [He places a hand over his heart.] feel less. You have no idea how disappointed I am.

[Or maybe he does, now that they're connected to each other in some way.]

[ He doesn't know, but every fiber of his body hurts and every part of his mind is alive with regret and anger, so he can at least... imagine. How he hates imagining. ]

You shouldn't have to be... this.

[ The curse doesn't suit Haku. This heaviness, the negativity, the overwhelming darkness... It's the antithesis of all Haku has ever been. ]

[Haku laughs at that, though it isn't a pretty sound.]

You didn't have a problem with it when I was serving as your tool.

[The heaviness, the stench of blood on his hands, tearing his heart into fragments for the sake of another's dreams. It's all on a different scale, of course, but wasn't all of that simply a precursor to how he'll be spending eternity?]

That was different.

[ It's a rough rebuttal and it comes instantly, because Zabuza isn't willing to even entertain the thought that their time together was anything close to the torment of right now. ]

And you know that. Or are you sincerely telling me the dream of this curse is something worth following?

[That gets a quiet laugh, gentle at first until it bleeds into a complete mockery of what it started as.]

I followed your dream for years.. Faithfully. Unquestioningly. Even when all the others abandoned you.

[His eyes narrow, as miasma pools around his feet.]

You broke my back and cut my throat. Then you left me to die in agony. After all that, you couldn't even survive. You tell me if your dreams were worth following.

[And then even more forcefully, through grit teeth.]

Answer honestly.

Edited 2020-05-06 08:18 (UTC)

[ Zabuza can't recall a time words had hurt him. Enraged him, yes, vexed him beyond belief, absolutely, but hurt? That seems like a stretch. He's spent his whole life so isolated from people emotionally, always a solitary tool until--- until Haku. It was exactly in the face of deceit from so many others that Zabuza had learned to trust this one single boy. The idea of Haku turning on him had always been preposterous. Haku's presence had always been a safe and reassuring one.

Until now. Now it's all so overwhelmingly wrong that it takes his breath away. The miasma has made him experience the feelings of his failed coup vividly from time to time and he thinks he should be numb to it by now, but this is different and it's worse.

There are many things he wants to say, many rebuttals he wants to spout, but his mouth moves on its own. The power of the vessel, then. Because Haku isn't Haku and yet is. ]

It is.

[ Even Zabuza himself is relieved to hear this come from his own mouth. ]

Returning to Kirigakure together, triumphant, is worth it. The Kirigakure of this future is worth it, for me, for you.

[ Even now he still believes that, but... ]

It's this cursed place, that's what made it all go wrong. Losing you here wasn't worth it. ...never could have been.

[ His voice goes quieter and quieter as he goes, but there is a conviction in it that doesn't waver. ]

[There's a certain refreshing clarity that mandatory honesty brings, though it leaves Haku with his own uncertainty. Questions that Zabuza cannot possibly answer for him, questions that he can only answer for himself. Questions that have become immeasurably irrelevant now that they're both here and the rawness of the rage and bitterness of all those who've died before him burn inside him, along with his own sorrows.

Still, the miasma recedes a little as the tightness in his chest threatens to become suffocating.]

I see.... so those are your true feelings.

[His expression shifts, the harshness of his tone dwindling back into the facade of somethign soft.]

You merely regret that I died here.

[ Zabuza goes quiet for a moment, thinks about the picture of Haku on the floor, in his own blood, so cold and desolate. ]

Death was always a risk in our ambitions.

[ He speaks slowly and carefully, a little similar in tone to all those years ago when he explained to Haku that he was in no need of affection and the like. ]

But none of my plans have ever included your demise. I wanted you as my right hand once I was Mizukage. That's the simple truth. Discarding of you is the last thing that was ever on my mind.

Your ambitions.

[The correction comes quickly with all the intensity of a floodgate threatening to open. Though once the reminder is given, the turbulence is gone yet again.]

Mine were simpler. But that would have been quite the rags to riches story, mm? [There's a distant look of amusement, though it doesn't reach his eyes.] A starving orphan child rising to second-in-command. I never wanted such things. Not when we met that day. Not now. I only wished to be by your side.

[A beat.]

Sad, isn't it? All these broken dreams gathered here in this wretched cesspool.

[ Yes, of course. Everything Haku had ever wished for was humble, but it had fit neatly with Zabuza's own ambitions all the same. They'd had a mutual benefit, all this time. Companionship against fighting power.

One of these things is useless now. The other.... Who can really say?

Regardless of that uncertainty, Zabuza is getting sick of hearing Haku (or half of Haku, whatever the case may be) talk down to him this way. Being passive doesn't suit him.

He gets up and takes the appropriate steps until he comes to stand right in front of where Haku is seated. Looking down at him, a grotesque mockery of their positions that day on the bridge. ]

I am by your side. Right now. Whatever creature we are becoming, that much is going to remain.

[If that's meant to be threatening or poetic or some combination of both, there aren't any cues to indicate that it's registering. Instead he continues to smile up a little blankly, hands placed delicately on his knees.]

You don't understand. do you, Zabuza-san?

[He straightens up to his full height.... and then floats upwards past that, rising ominously from the ground until they're at eye level.]

That isn't what I want anymore.

[ Those blank dead eyes, this empty smile... It's Haku, but it isn't Haku. It's the vessel, it's Haku under a curse, and Zabuza will be damned before he simply takes anything this person throws at him lying down.

He died. He let himself be killed, without putting up as much of a fight as he could have, in order to see Haku again. He's not going to turn on his heels now because of some petty words.

So instead of being sufficiently impressed by the floating display, Zabuza simply reaches up and grabs Haku's clothes, an attempt to pull him a bit further down again. ]

Well, that's just too bad, isn't it? You and I are going to be tied together forever. Haku's wish is going to be fulfilled, twisted or not.

[That actually surprises him a little. It doesn't get much of a reaction, other than his eyes widening slightly, but as Zabuza yanks him down closer, Haku's more gentle smile widens into a grin. It's an expression Zabuza might've seen before -- one Haku tends to wear when dealing with vermin he's finally allowed to dispatch of.]

You're a bit late to be concerned about my wishes, aren't you?

[His hands stay at his sides, clearly unperturbed by the grab. Why would he be when he can simply order Zabuza to let go whenever he feels like it?]

As if anything I wanted while I was still alive has any meaning to me now. My heart isn't that weak anymore.

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R5: ghost hangout

Week 4 - early monday morning

exploring;

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