WHEN: 1943 MAR 7; afternoon
WHERE: Eumenides Sanitorium, max security ward
WHO: November, Naoki, and Hunter
--
[12:00] November Morsus came racing up the steps as soon as he'd heard the news; a sudden new admission, an urgent call to assist. He'd learned since now to never expect peaceful, routine rounds, so he was rather unruffled as he donned the customary white lab coat, strode to the door of the newest patient. A brief, polite knock on the door, in order to announce his presence before simply barging forth. "Hello, Mr.... Sato?" The name gave him pause, echoes reverberating down the hollow halls of his memory, spiralling out and out and-... Focus. Here and now, stick to the here and now. There were plenty of people named Sato on the island, of course there were...
"I'm Dr. November Morsus, and I'd just like to come in for a bit and see how you're doing dear, alright?" That low, bass tone was gentle, soft as falling rain as he slowly undid the deadbolts on the door, eased it open... And froze.
[12:11] Naoki Sato had been moved rather quickly from medical to actual holding. It hadn't taken it long to connect the deaths in the church with him especially when the mental acrobatics Thirteen had exerted on their memories was undone. When he hung there he didn't seem surprised, only tired. The blood and black ichor had not been washed from his face, the split skin in the shape of a Seiman, a five-pointed star, the obvious source of the black fluid. He had bruises and cuts but most were healing, the the more egregious wound being the hole in his abdomen that he'd only just begun to regenerate. It went clear through his stomach, under his left lung and exited his back to the side of his spine.
He smelled like blood, of course he did. He was covered in it and discerning noses could tell it belonged to multiple people as well as himself. The eyes that looked up at November from where his head hung at the inverted point of the star were clear, pale blue... surrounded by bloodshot vessels and the loose tresses of silvery hair. "...it's warded," he explained. "...to prevent any use of my abilities." Straight to the point it seemed! There was a pause and behind the muzzle the Jikininki curled his lips into a slight smile. "...why are you surprised?"
[12:20] November Morsus stared with empty gaze for a long, long moment. Through their shared connection, lifetimes played out behind his eyes, buried spools of shared universes finally popping loose, spilling their contents across his consciousness, the weight of that which they shared, running deeper than blood, deeper than eternity, settling around him, almost staggering him.
A moment where the light behind those eyes just, flatlined, his body stilling. But as soon as he came back to himself, he was rushing for the restraints, his shaking, fumbling hands pressing key to lock to set Sato free. "Oh, my darling-..." his words cut off in his throat as the thousand things he wanted, he needed, to say to him all fought to spill out at once, leaving him stammering, choking back sobs. At long last, one thought fought its way to the top of the pile to fall from his lips in shivering tone. "What have they DONE to you?!" His head shook in response to that soft query, one hand pausing to wipe away tears. "I-... I wasn't sure if I'd, dreamed you, or if you were real..."
[12:35] Naoki Sato had to shut his eyes. Memories were a tricky thing - other lifetimes, other timelines moreso, especially when Deadman himself was so quiet and Sato... coped, with quiet walls and little barriers and stinging pains to focus on the here and now. He breathed out and peered up at November shaking his head as the man went to unlock his restraints. "...wait," he said quietly before again, louder, "WAIT - " until the lanky man was touching at him, firing off flashes of heat and divine energy that rocketed through the hanging Jikininki.
"...I exist," he said with a little haggard breath. It clarified very little but Sato was all too aware of other staff loitering around the asylum that might be listening in to patient conversations. "...so does this Ward. Which will... have to be undone before the jacket. Or muzzle." Sato shook his head. "Though I *am* considered dangerous... *doctor*." November's empathy picked up plenty... the residual glee from Sato's feast at the church, the overhang of guilt, the curious sort of introspection in the Jikiniki's mind at the whole ordeal. He felt used. He only slightly minded that fact. There was, too... another nagging curiosity, much more intense than Sato's own. It was amused and observant and devouring everything of the lanky doctor's mannerisms and interactions. Another presence in the room.
[12:44] November Morsus braved that maelstrom of sensation, feeling, memory, all of it with a steely determination, his indomitable will forcing him to keep a clear head through that cacophony. He growled as he found the ward resisting his efforts with a magic far from his own, too alien to know how to break instinctually. A low growl, claws raking through the markings on the wall in the faint hope that this would undo the spell, before he sank to his knees, pressed his forehead to Sato's muzzled face. "How do I, get it off? I want you in my arms again, my darling..." his words were a low, fervent whisper, voice muffled enough to try and restrict the sound to only Sato's ears.
Confused creasing of his brow as that flood of sensations informed him of what transpired to bring Sato to this place; the church, the corpses. A spike of dark, sadistic glee at the sight, only to then meet with confusion, at that other presence which lurked at the edges of his perception. Who-...? Not Deadman... Not Roesler, he didn't think... Not the others he'd had more fleeting introduction to. Then... Who? That curiousity reached out through his synapses, gentle tap tap tapping at that stranger's presence, like the antennae of an insect.
[12:54] Naoki Sato let out a little breath, something like a laugh of disbelief at the utterance of pure endearment and love from November. Flashes ran through his mind - an autopsy table, an apartment, meat pies, blood and scfalpels... and the Jikininki chuckled. "The Ward... or the jacket?" he responded with another little glance at the door. As November touched the wall he smeared white powder from the glowing circle that burned a bit against his skin. The light that issued from it went inert but still Sato hung, as if held in place by more than the cords that tied his ankles to the metal star. As November pressed his forehead close he whispered to him. "...not a jacket."
And as if to prove those words a singular eye, a familiar color of yellow, opened up in the fabric of his torso and peered up at November in response to the tap. In his mind he felt a similar poking, words that sounded like they were spoken by many voices at once. /"Who am I?"/ asked the voices, gravely but energetic. Excited. /"Will you ph'lloig -
[12:54] Naoki Sato remember?"/ The fabric of his straitjacket bubbled, writhing... like worms beneath the surface, making Sato's eyebrows raise. He looked at the door, nodding at it. Through those nerves the very strong intimation it would be better off closed was sent.
"...we may want privacy," Sato whispered.
[13:03] November Morsus growled, slashing at the wall again with those thick, obsidian claws. "The *ward,* I want to get you down off of that, *thing...*" He glared at it even as the marks on the wall burned the heel of his palm, leaving a red welt behind even as it fizzled and went dark. However, his frustration at the ward shifted as he looked down at the jacket, or "jacket," and it looked right back at him.
Another sudden flood of memory, this time from aeons and dimensions he'd barely even realized existed, tea parties and bedtime stories and a creature, a child, he loved like his very own. Yet more tears of shock, love, joy, relief, all poured down from his wide eyes, and immediately he reached for the door he'd been too shocked to close before, one clawed hand tugging it quietly but decisively *shut.* As he did so, a name echoed through those endless streams of memory. "...Hunter? Is that my little Hunter?"
[13:14] Naoki Sato simply watched November, taking in the emotions that played over his face as the roll of memories played like film through the connection that bridged their minds. He himself felt burned out of emotion, a sparkler or a firework that had fizzled out after his little church-house massacre but experiencing November's second-hand was... warming. "I'm terrible at Wards," Sato explained but he sounded amused. Observing November's sentiments, still intact both for himself and for the Eldritch spawn wrapped around his torso was a treat. "...but. I think he can teleport. Hunter. And... teleportation is not one of my magics. It should not be bound." Sato wriggled a little, shifting his hips so the name written underneath his body was visible. His full name was inscribed there, the bindings tied to HIS magics specifically.
Hunter, for his part, formed a set of lips and a toothy grinning maw beneath the eyes that peeped open in his jacket-face. "Am not little," Hunter argued. "Ahog ahog - grown over years. Time."
[13:14] Naoki Sato Here, in this timeline, with how close and old things were - it seemed harder for Hunter to fall too far away from speaking in Old Tongues. Hunter's face and a sprawl of scraggly ginger hair pushed out of the jacket material at Sato's chest, wrinkling and scrunching his nose around before he was able to properly move his lips and cheaks. "...can teleport. May be... scrambled. Usually just me, Sah-totou..."
[13:27] November Morsus just piled yet more of that flood of sensation on the two of them, once again sinking to his knees, pressing his forehead to Sato's desperate for even this small contact. There was above all else an overwhelming sense of *homecoming,* of settling down by the warm fires of home after a long and tiring journey, of being surrounded by the love of family so long distant one had forgotten how it felt. "Don't know the first bloody thing about warding, only ever paid heed to fleshcraft," he sighed, frustrated, only to cast a hopeful look at Hunter. "Oh darling, LOOK at you..." Those gentle long-fingered hands reached to pat the ginger hair that now sprung forth from the straitjacket, marveling. "Look how you've GROWN! I remember when you fit into the palm of my hand, and now you're a proper young man by the looks of you..." He shook his head, grinning wide.
"But... Could you? Would you? Get him out of that dreadful ward? I can make up some nonsense about how I thought to let you down so I could conduct a medical exam, let the blame fall on my shoulders, I just.. I just want to hug you both again..." He sniffed back a few errant tears, stained black by the kohl around his eyes.
[13:35] Naoki Sato hummed as he shut his eyes again. Studies. Years of studies, hermetically-inclined, directed by the professor under whose watchful eye he typically operated in *this* world, flitted past his mind's eye. He was searching for something about Warding, about protective magic... but the entity wrapped around his torso made a sputtering "Psssshhhh" with his lips. "What's proper? Not proper, people say," Hunter corrected though he didn't seem in the least bothered by this. "Questions at inappropriate times. Like... why not go under the underthings outdoors." Hunter's face heaved a little sight and he shook his head with a little creak and rustle of straitjacket material. "Under the unders is warm. Felt homey. I can fit, if I make myself. But - moving, moving. Careful, if scrambled."
Then there was a blink and they were both gone, the bindings that HAD been holding Sato upside-down falling limply from the metal frame of the star. Another second later and they reappeared, though Hunter the 'jacket' was on the floor on his own and Sato was without a shirt - and a little off-kilter. His right shoulder was just a bit too close to his chest, his left just a bit too far, - as if his arms were just a tiiiny bit dislocated at the proximal-most joints by the teleportation and Hunter's attempt to extricate himself from the Jikininki's body at once. He wobbled on his feet with a hiss and a groan, his arms slightly bent at the elbows as they had been in the jacket's confines.
[13:43] November Morsus laughed at that, the flood of rage and sorrow at seeing Sato brought to such disrepair muted a bit by Hunter's delightful cheer. "Never once gave a toss about what /they/ think is proper," he assured the boy, "it's all a bunch of absolute twaddle. What matters is that you're lovely and brilliant and so delightfully /yourself,/ making your fathers and I proud every moment, I'm sure. But you know that, my darling, I'm sure I've told you a thousand times...." He sighed, bathing in those warm memories, even if it still felt strange to have /memories/ of future points...
As soon as Sato was free, he was in November's arms, holding his broken body gently, carefully, but thrumming with the yearning to latch onto him tight, tight, tight, and just never let go. "Oh sweetheart... Look at the state of you, I should... I should be..." A soft sigh as he looked to the black doctor's bag he'd brought in with him and subsequently abandoned. "Or perhaps..." His fingers then went to the wire muzzle that masked Sato's jaw swiftly set about unlocking and removing it.
[13:56] Naoki Sato was not terribly injured, the dislocated shoulders aside. As November pulled him close the crunch of bone on bone was audible, proximal heads of his humerus grinding against the lateral tips of clavicle until Sato leaned forcefully against November's chest to pop the closest shoulder back into place. He was able to breathe a bit better then, just the other shoulder out of sorts as slender fingers removed the muzzle. The mess on Sato's face was not his own. It was remnants of the blood and bits of his meals and that odd black ichor that ran from the star that seemed to have split the skin of his forehead. The hole in his abdomen was healing, wriggling muscle fibers and nerves and connective tissues working their way to slowly close the puncture in his stomach, then the more superficial bits of his back and his front.
"It's nothing," he said to assuage some of the doting doctor's concern. Sato's eyes followed November's to the doctor's bag as Hunter, a malleable black moosh that was reshaping itself from straitjacket to wriggling tentacle mass, sloshed on over to peek a couple of eye stalks at the bag curiously. "The blade used was ... charmed? Enchanted. Without the effect of that magic I will heal eventually." He licked some of the remaining gore from his lips. "...with food. HUNTER. NOT food," came a sharp addition. The squiddly had opened up something that looked like a maw over the entirety of the bag, clearly intent on swallowing it up. He stopped, pulling back to pout, if a tentacle-mass could pout. Two appendages curled downward and pursed.
"Hungry. I smell hunger here. Am hunger - hungry. Here," Hunter complained.
[14:05] November Morsus purred low and deep in his throat as he finally held Sato tight in his arms, felt one shoulder pop into place, felt the wounds begin to seal and heal themselves. "I recall once, long ago, you needed fresh blood in order to do such things... And here I was willing to give up as much of my own as it took for you to become whole again... Not that I'm averse if you still desire a taste," he purred, chuckling softly.
"Oh sweetheart, I-... Poppet! That's not for eating!" His voice rang out with a parental instinct that, though long slumbering in dormancy, seemed to pop right back out again as soon as Hunter was in the room once more. "Goodness me, I have GOT to start carrying sweeties about with me again... Let's see what I've got in my pockets...." One hand reluctantly peeled itself from Sato to rummage in his pocket, revealing a single, rumpled Werther's Original. He quickly unwrapped the sweet before he held it out to Hunter, knowing full well that if he didn't the boy was likely to eat it wrapper and all.
[14:16] Naoki Sato felt feverishly hot against November though the difference was less stark than it... had been. Had been? "Vampire," Sato recalled quietly before humming in thought. "...not quite." His connection to Deadman and the tangle of time that ran through his mind as a result was hard to discern when the man himself was not physically near. He didn't know exactly what this November was and the hand of his fixed-up shoulder reached to take his carotid pulse experimentally to try to remedy that.
"Poppet? Poppet?" Hunter repeated, one eye lingering on the medical bag as the other looked up at Sato and November, affecting a chameleon stare that was familiar to them both. His attention was on the tall doctor fully once November produced an actual candy though, a Hunter head emerging from the tentacle mass to open up and chomp - first around November's hand before correcting himself to JUST take the candy and cronch, squish, and suck at it as another eye opened in his masticating cheek to stare at the wrapper November was holding.
"I always have a taste," Sato answered, the two fingers against November's carotid painting a streak of red, Sato's blood, down the line of that artery. The red liquid was warm as it slid and encircled November's throat, giving it just a little squeeze before sliding back over to Sato's hand. "But your flesh may not sit well with what I just ate." Churchgoers, missionaries... like mixing liquors.
[14:26] November Morsus nodded, squinting with concentration as he pawed through the rolodex of lifetimes now opened up in his memory, sorted though devil, ghost, mortal, vampire.... Yes, he *had* been a vampire once, hadn't he... "Yes, my darling, I'm... Different now. Harder to fit into, simple terms, I don't really think what I am is supposed to really, happen." A small soft chuckle. "Perhaps 'ghost' would be a close enough term. I was dead, once... But I remade my living flesh. Do you like it?" He stretched out languidly, as if showing off a dandy outfit rather than the flesh that cloaked his bones, all while never quite breaking skin contact with Sato.
"Yes, my darling poppet," November purred at Hunter's curiosity, even as a long, black tongue slithered forth to dab at the blood from Sato's wounds between words, "that's my doctor's bag, and full of all manner of things that are not even a little bit tasty, I'm afraid. But I shall fetch you all manner of sweeties now that I know you're here..." A bright, cheerful laugh as the tentacled mass attempted to eat his whole hand for a moment, before Sato tempted his attention back with that slight squeeze of his blood, November's long tongue darting down to lick at it just a bit, purring his low puma purr in absolute bliss, before he sighed bitterly as Sato mentioned the contents of his stomach. "Good BLOODY riddance, I say... I hope they were delicious. I hope they /screamed./"
[14:44] Naoki Sato held up a finger towards Hunter who was about to say SOMETHING in response to people being harder to fit into. "He means a category. Words. Descriptions," he clarified for the Eldritch spawn, prompting a cock of Hunter-head and a shrug of tentacles vaguely reminiscent of shoulders. Sato gave the slender doctor a look up and down, eyes like a metal probe poking and sliding over skin. "You remade it perfectly," he concluded before running a finger down the exposed part of November's sternum. "On the outside. Haven't seen the organs." Pulling back, Sato wiped more of the gore from his face, cleaning it off of his palm and each finger, almost cat-like. "They did. It attracted attention," he explained, not remarking on the taste. Remembering the murders, the church, his eyes narrowed. "They wanted to take my child."
The latter caused a burble from Hunter, who came on over to settle himself in a puddle of black worms and eyeballs on the floor nearby. At his core he was still working on the sticky, tacky candy while the rest of him wanted to stay present and contribute, eyes blinking, shifting from one to the other, then furrowing and narrowing to copy Naoki's expression. When he spoke next it was in their minds, telepathic and concerned and questioning. /"Gof'n... child. Why take the child?"/ he asked, the intent in their minds meaning himself - but correcting to LIKE himself, perhaps inadvertently alerting November to the presence of another.
[14:59] November Morsus blushed crimson as he realized the phrasing mistake he'd made, in front of the LITTLE ONE no less! "Erm, yes, categories, not... You know what, never mind, ask your fathers." Though it seemed the little scoundrel didn't exactly need to, knowing far more about *that* sort of thing than November last recalled. All the same, he purred happily at Sato's approval of his recreated long-dead form, expression entirely like that of a pleased cat. "The organs do tend to get a bit more, wishy-washy, sometimes... Though I would think my passion for anatomy has gotten them at least *something* like correct..."
He sighed as Sato began to clean himself, offered the assistance of his own long wormlike tongue, part a lover's caress, part a catlike familial grooming, but he stilled as Sato revealed just what the church had *done.* "They WHAT?! They tried to take Hunter?!" Immediately, he reached for the little blob of tentacles, wanting to hug it close to his chest, feel the security of having his family right there, with him. However, as that, disconnect, from the word 'child' and Hunter himself took hold, he cocked his head, curious, confused.
[15:12] Naoki Sato froze up a little bit. There was the slightest hesitation, the uncertainty, the anticipation of this conversation. He'd not yet figured out how to have it with Lou... he certainly didn't know how to have it with November, not beyond the sharing of images in their minds. Explanations were much harder to provide that way. He watched as Hunter wriggled himself up into November's reaching embrace, curling into the semblance of arms and legs that hugged his torso. "Not Hunter," Sato clarified with a quiet sigh. "...one that hasn't been born. Another one," he said as Hunter gave a little burble that rippled his lips. /"Another. Not human, but not like I am. Different not-human. Different... other-maker. Different organs. I get the organs... improper,"/ he spoke at their minds, giving little images of inverted lungs and two hearts and a liver that looked like balls. Why? Because they held liquid and Hunter had learned that the liver held alcohol. Or so he understood.
"...exploratory dissection. For education," Sato said to try and stem the flow of incorrect anatomical structures and perhaps divert from the topic. Hunter had explained, hadn't he? Surely he didn't need to further elaborate. He did seem... proud though, at the concept of Hunter creating such things in an attempt to understand the human body. Clearly his own was vastly different.
[15:23] November Morsus cocked his head as he felt that uncertainty, eyes wide with quiet curiosity as he allowed Sato to work things through. However, as he finally spoke, November's eyes lit up. "You're having another child? Congratulations, my dear!" He beamed. "Should you ever need help with the babysitting, I am of course ever at your disposal, just as I always was for dear little Hunter." He chortled as Hunter described the differences between himself and his as yet unborn half sibling, delighted titters erupting from the proud mental picture of the "organs" he'd managed to create, especially that hilarious liver. "Very good dear, only, it's a little bit more like..." A vivid picture of a bisected human torso filled their mental landscape, far closer to reality but painted all in shades of lurid red. Each organ lifted out of its cavity in turn, rotated, displaying every detail in lovingly rendered imagination as November sighed softly, clearly reveling in the image. "But, yes, do let me know if you'd ever like more lessons on how the human body is constructed from your dear old uncle November, I suppose I shouldn't distract from the matter at hand..." He blushed softly, the mental picture dissipating.
[15:36] Naoki Sato let out a breath, relieved and a bit... taken aback. More than he had been with Hunter. With Hunter, considering how much of that child was LOU, how much he knew November loved and cared for Lou... it had been easy to accept, to understand. But Sato's mind about this other child was entirely something else. He seemed almost guilty. Reaching out without a word he put his hand at November's angular fingers on one side of his jaw, thumb on the other, trying to direct him so he could lean and push his lips against the taller man's. When he pulled away he ran his thumb against his lower lip. "...thank you. I am... working on better communicating gratitude," he said genuinely. "Gestation is happening quickly. Faster than a human timeline. Slower than Hunter's," he said with a look at the squiddly mass. "I'm unsure what to expect."
Hunter was busy replicating November's imagery with bits of his tentacles, occasionally an ever-shrinking morsel of Werther's candy protruding from the organs he made, indicating he was enjoying making the thing last even through his anatomy lesson. Sato's uncertainty put a gurgle of a giggle in him and another set of thoughts came to assail them both. /"Energy-eater. Corpse-eater. Hungry hungry. Wrapper?"/ There was a tendril held out toward November expectantly.