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Post by Sebasian Darcy on Jul 14, 2010 17:05:52 GMT -5
(Didn't know where to put this thread, so I just stuck this here >> )
cough. Cough, cough… He was coughing. Why was he coughing? He didn’t need to cough. He had left that particular necessity long, long ago. Three years, and never once had his thought so much as tickled. Not a sneeze, wheeze, or sniffle. But he was coughing now. Reasonless, he was coughing.
To tell the absolute truth, he was nostalgic. Maybe that was stupid… maybe it was just plain ridiculous. But he somehow, for some reason, missed the couch. He had always been sick, once. Thirteen years was longer than three, so he had spent the majority of his existence sick. His memories of life were colored deeply with memories of illness. So, in a way, couching reminded him of being alive. It was a feeble security blanket, but there it was.
And, in any case, rainy days had always made his lungs hurt, causing him to cough more than usual. And it WAS raining today. Pouring, in face. Sebastian never did like foul weather. When he lived, it made him ache in the chest and feel generally dreadful. And in death… well, suffice it to say that it wasn’t nice to be a ghost in the rain.
It was one thing to have rain falling on you, soaking your skin to what felt like the bone. But feeling pellets of water bypass your skin entirely and go right down through to the ground where you literally covered… it was unpleasant. And strange and tickling and ever so wet. It made him shiver, transparent hairs standing up on the back of his neck.
No. Rain was never a nice thing, for the living or the dead. (At least it had been long enough that he was dead that he no longer felt it falling over his grave, soaking through the earth to his bones. That had been the worst.)
The rain drove him inside, drifting in through a wall. (ooh, that felt almost as bad as the rain! Stone going right through you was one of the single most bizarre sensations in the world.) And from there, he began to wander, drifting through the halls he once walked.
He did not have a set path in mind- he never did, really. He just sort of went. Maybe that was a ghost thing, as he’d never done that in life. Then again, in life, he’d carefully planned his day around where the adults were most likely and least likely to be. The more careful you were, the less likely it would be to wind up on the floor, lungs burning with hurt and head reeling in pain.
But that had all ended a long time ago. Again, he had no feel of anything anymore.
So Sebastian wandered. And he coughed. Cough. Cough.
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Post by Dr. Gene Menelaus on Jul 14, 2010 21:32:04 GMT -5
Dr. Gene Menelaus flitted from one hall to another. He never quite felt at ease wandering any wing of this building. Too many dark memories lurked in each room. Not to mention the living relics of the horrors--the children. He couldn't bear to look at some of them. Many of them still wore their hatred and pain clearly on their faces.
As much as he disliked the Shadow Man, at least that demonic... creature had bought the children a little time outside the hands of authority. They needed to heal and to be free of those who might abuse them, for a time. At least he thought so. That was the beginning and end of his support for the Shadow Man. Any creature who killed and fed off of life was...nothing he'd dare say to its face.
Which was another reason he tiptoed through these halls. He didn't wish to run into that man, or any demons who might serve him. His fanciful imagination had conjured up quite a few horrifying possibilities. He feared to let his imagination run in that direction for several reasons...and it kept drifting that way each time he looked into a deeply shadowed corner.
Gene crept through the hall in utter silence... until...
Cough...
He stopped mid-step. The room felt colder than it had a moment ago. Was there someone here? He turned his head ever so slowly and stared back the way he came. He saw nothing... or did he? His eyes narrowed in confusion. "H--hello? Is someone here?"
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Post by Sebasian Darcy on Jul 14, 2010 22:10:05 GMT -5
If the doctor looked closely, very very closely indeed, he might catch the sight of a boy standing in a corner of the room. Not a boy exactly. More of an impression of a boy. A shimmering outline. Heat mirage being oddly exact. It looked to be a younger teenager or else an older child. Hair pulled into a ponytail worn low at his neck's nape. There was a fragile look about him, particularly around the face, which was directed to the ground. Only his eyes (colorless, save for the very vaugest and washed out impressions, just like the rest of him) were raised to look at the doctor himself. One hand curled over his mouth, as if to politely cover up a bout of coughing.
Seastian watched Gene with those eyes. He had heard him. Or felt him. Or somthing. No matter how it was still apparent that an adult had noticed his presence. That was new.
What wasn't new was the man himself. It took Sebastoan a moment of staring before he realied that he knew this person. Dr. Gene. He had been there when Sebastoan had still been alive. He had been around him rather a lot actually. For obvious reasons. Too often for him to forget. And he had see him around after all. But this was the first that he hadbeen noticed by him.
He looked older. More drawn somhow. Or perhaps that was just the apparent nervousness. Sebastopn couldnt blame him that.
Oh well. Might as well be polite. He inclined his head. "Im here, sir," he said lightly, "Sorry to bother you."
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Post by Dr. Gene Menelaus on Jul 14, 2010 22:49:01 GMT -5
A shape rose out of the gloom. An outline: a sketch of a child, nearly indistinct enough to be a trick of the light. Gene's eyes widened and his brow furrowed. Was he imagining things again? So well, perhaps, that they appeared before his eyes?
The doctor's fear outweighed his curiosity for the moment. He took a step forward. He remained tense, shoulders hunched, eyes occasionally darting to the side before their wistful gaze returned to the ghostly figure. Each time he expected it to be gone. Instead, it seemed a bit more filled in. He could make out the shape of a ponytail and limpid eyes. Terrifying... or it should be. Instead, it was only a little eerie and familiar. Sadly familiar.
When the figure spoke, he knew why. "Se...Sebastian?" He spoke the name as an indrawn breath. Despite himself, he continued to approach the child, though he feared the apparition would dissolve if he got any closer.
Could it be? That sad, small youth, always ill, whose death was a deep stroke of guilt on his conscience.
Gene paused mere inches from the figure and knelt at eye level to it. "Is it you...? I..." He meant some kind of apology, but it stuck in his throat. He could only continue to stare in mute appeal, unable to find the words he wanted.
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Post by Sebasian Darcy on Jul 15, 2010 1:32:07 GMT -5
As the doctor came closer, Sebastian automaticly drew back. Three years was not enough to erase ten years of shrinking back in fear every time an adult came too close. But he as ware of it and stopped himself. No. The doctor did not deserve that. He had never laid a touch that was anything but healing on Sebastian or any of the other children. In fact, he had once been the only thing that kept the boy breathing. Were it not for him, Sebastian might have met his end even sooner. He had to be grateful for the little time Dr. Gene had stolen for him. Even now that it didn't matter anymore.
He deserved better than a fearful reaction. Looking embarassed (his cheeks blushed a slightly more opaque color), he righted himself and ceased drawing away.
He gave him a very genuine smile. "Hello, Doctor Gene," he greeted him in a quiet void that held a slight misty quality, "You remember me!" He looked so sincerely surprised and thrills about that fact that it could break a heart.
In all three years, Sebastian had never once had a real mourner. Nobody came to see him in the graveyard. Nobody left him flowers. This might have had more to do with the fact that he had no headstone, but still. It was the empty feeling times when he wishes he had been more outgoing and made more friends in life. Maybe then someone would remmber him.
But he ought to be thinking more plasent things. No use in showing distress and upsetting the doctor whom he remembered as being a rather fragile sort. "...How are you, sir?" he asked as polite small talk. As if convorsations with ghosts happened every day.
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Post by Dr. Gene Menelaus on Jul 18, 2010 0:37:10 GMT -5
The doctor couldn't take his eyes from the shade. His expression was fastened there, despite any fear he might have felt. Wonderment, sadness and guilt all flickered through his expressive features. This was the first ghost he'd truly seen. All his life he'd felt strange things and occasionally heard them, but never had one appeared to him. It was astounding and yet tragic. This boy deserved to go on to somewhere better, rather than linger in this place which held so few gentle memories for him.
"Of course I remember you!" Gene very nearly gasped that out. He'd never forget any of the children who perished here, especially those he had taken care of. He swallowed a little to regain his composure. The last thing he wished to do was startle the child away. "May I...may I ask if you are a spirit for a reason? If there is something I can do, to help perhaps."
He felt bitter, though he tried not to show it. He doubted he could do anything for him now. Just as, years ago, he hadn't been able to keep the adults from ending the young boy's life.
"Oh... I am. Well, better than I was. And you? Are you well?"
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Post by Sebasian Darcy on Jul 18, 2010 10:51:09 GMT -5
The slight spectre's smile widened, pale-as-blindness eyes sparkling. It was so good to actually speak with someone at all, not even mentioning the astounding fact that he was remembered by somebody. He had never even hoped for such an amazing thing! He had always assumed that nobody missed him, and that the fact that he had ever been alive was quickly pushed from the memories of those around him.
(It was his own fault- he'd kept to himself an awful lot, after all. Unable to play active games like the others, and devoting most of his limited energy towards not being seen, and trying to contain his coughs.)
"A reason?" he tilted his head curiously at the man's words. "Well... uum... no, actually."Sebastian was suddenly very quiet, shoulders shrugging up in a slight, embarassed wince. "I mean, that's supposed to be the ghost thing isn't it? Unfishished things?" His voice sounded almost babbling, "But I don't think I left anything undone. And I know who I am and that I, um... I... you know... died. So it isn't that."
He began to bite at the inside of his cheek, a habit he had held all his life. "Honestly, I- I think I just did something wrong. Maybe I was supposed to do something when I was leaving my body. But it was all very abrupt, and I must have just missed something." Sebastian sighed, looking at the Doctor, "I wish I'd paid better attention in Church. I bet they told everyone what to do on a day I was too sick to get up."
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