sinking down, down

[facultwist]

Death is a drop into a blackness that swallows you. You feel the movement of not air but shadow across your face as you plummet, and there is no bottom. No crash.

If there is another side, you do not reach it.

It is neither the light of heaven or the fires of hell that greets you when you wake. And wake you do, to the buzz and flicker of old fluorescent lights.

You are laid out beside a full-size competitive swimming pool, half-filled with stagnant water. The doors out are blocked off by locked doors covered in caution tape. The locker rooms are long since emptied, paint peeling from the humidity. The only signs of habitation are a few pieces of scattered graffiti.

Welcome to your new home. There's no sunlight, no indication of time passing. Just you and each other and your thoughts. the stagnant water bubbles a little occasionally, but there's nothing in it.

Before long you'll realize that you no longer need to eat or drink. You might notice your hand go through something if you don't focus. You're a ghost now. What's that they say about unfinished business?

Comments

Would you like to have a picnic with Mari?

[al_fresco]

[ Once she's done with the whole Being A Screaming Collection Of Eyes And Dirty Chlorinated Water thing, Mari is properly available to be talked with! ]

Being a ghost didn't really get rid of my bad knee, so... I'm going to hang out down here for a while before I try climbing out. But I'll answer any questions or anything that I can! Or we can just talk, I like talking.

I'm Mari, by the way. I've been watching you guys a little.

[thatsplato]

[Misty had been all smiles until now, ready to offer to help, but then she mentions she's been watching them. Misty's smile falls off her face.]

Why? And for how long?

[al_fresco]

Nothing weird! Just, you know... I can only go between here and Rosenblum Hall when I'm... all of what you just saw, and it's been so long since I died and became like that, so... When the other ghost isn't keeping me out, I've been kind of stuck going on instinct.

[thatsplato]

[Misty’s expression shifts, into somewhat of a smile. This? She can work with this.

She lowers herself into the pool, to get closer to Mari. People like when you’re close to them! She even moves like she’s going to put a hand on Mari’s shoulder. Then stops, because, right, whole ghost thing.]

It’s okay. You can tell me. What other ghost?

[al_fresco]

Oh, the... one working with the Interim Headmistress, or whatever she calls herself.

[thatsplato]

Isabella? She's ghastly, but--

[al_fresco]

[ Mari frowns, a thing she doesn't really do in any official art, so this icon is the best I can do. ]

No, there's... the "Interim Headmistress" girl, the guidance counselor, and then the ghost that's been in Rosenblum Hall way longer than I have.

[thatsplato]

[Misty makes a quiet noise, noncommittal with her enthusiasm. At least that rules out them all being gassed.... Unless she's the one being gassed - that's still a possibility she hasn't ruled out.]

Right. How does it work? Being a ghost? How do you get to see what's going on at Rosenblum?

[al_fresco]

Most of the time it's pretty boring... but you get better at it as you go. Unless you lose yourself and turn into a monster, I guess, but that's mostly something that happens when you're lonely, I think.

[ it's fine she's been fine down here ]

You can't really... affect the regular world very much unless people really believe in you - if someone doesn't believe in ghosts, they give off this sort of energy that messes with you. I remember when the Headmistress first came here to talk to the other ghost, before you all got here, she really wanted all of you to believe in ghosts and magic for some reason. Which seems weird, I mean... if someone opens the door to this place, them believing in ghosts would make it way easier for you guys to haunt them.