TDM - JANUARY 2021

[robbies]

TEST DRIVE MEME - JANUARY 2021

Good to the last gasp.
CW: gaslighting, potential mentions and depictions of trauma and other problematic material, body horror, dolls, violence

---

“Help me. Please, help me…”

A child’s voice, calling out for aid. There’s no rhyme or reason for when it comes to you. It’s so quiet, a whisper in the deepest, darkest corners of your mind. Were it not for the sharp, stabbing pain it pulls out of you, you could ignore it. You could even pretend it’s just your imagination.

It all happens so quickly and powerfully. Left in the dust, your brain struggles to process it all. Blacking out is the least it can do, but it’s also all it can do, and it does so before you even have a chance to fully register just how young the voice is, and how deeply, heartbreakingly lost it sounds.

When you finally awaken with your bare feet tangled in soft sheets, a layer of fuzzy fleece or slinky silk clinging to your body like another layer of skin, the sunlight pouring in from the window next to your bed momentarily blinding you, and the cries of happy children playing outside of it carrying faintly, it all becomes very clear—

Something is horribly wrong.

---

JANUARY 1st.

It becomes very clear very quickly that this isn’t a simple kidnapping. If you’re twenty years old or older, the bedroom you wake up in is very clearly a couple’s bedroom — with separate beds like a modest, modern couple of course! A similarly lost and confused stranger is in the other. They are your counterpart, for everything in this room has a matching counterpart — the nightstand and lamp each of you have beside your beds, the framed pictures on the wall, even your pajamas. If you’re under twenty years old, your room is smaller but more personalized, filled with comic books, model kits, stray baseball cards littered around the floor. Dolls, fashion magazines of people dressed from a bygone era, stacks of vinyl records neatly arranged next to a record player. And then there are the pictures. They’re everywhere in the house — in a frame on your nightstand, hung on the walls, stuck in the photo albums and scrapbooks lying on your desk or tucked away in drawers. Here you are on your wedding day, exchanging vows with your partner. Here’s you sitting in a fishing boat with one of the younger members of your house. Here’s a picture of you at ten years old getting ready for the first day of school. All of the photographs are aged, sepia, even yellowed and dusty in frames hung for a long, long time. By the time you make it down to the living room, you’ll notice that the television is on; someone must have forgotten to turn it off before they went to bed. On it, the morning news is playing. The newscaster, a man in a gray suit and horn-rimmed glasses, keeps shuffling his paperwork on his desk as black and white footage of people in the midst of celebration — throwing streamers, wearing paper hats, toasting flutes of bubbly liquid — is interspersed between his droning report: ”New Year's Eve was in full swing last night as citizens from all over Santa Rosita came together to ring in 1961. A surge in ginger ale and sparkling cider beverage sales was reported by Honeybees as early as eight o'clock in the evening, a boon for the store…“

---

GETTING TO KNOW THE NEIGHBORS.

As you get acclimated, you gradually begin to learn more about this strange new world you’ve found yourself in. You’re in a neighborhood on the east side of a town called Santa Rosita located… somewhere in California (wherever or whatever that might be). The year is 1961. If it wasn’t clear enough, your neighbors are more than willing to humor you if you ask. Even if you accost them with questions and demands. Sure, you and your family are a little kooky, and you have a very overactive imagination, but the key to any good joke is playing along! And how could something like “I’m from the future, from another world” be anything but a joke? A. CLOWN AROUND. If December was a time for sweet treats and good food, January is the month where everyone is trying to unload their leftovers. Who better to enjoy them than you, the newest family on the block? Your neighbors have quite a bit of food to share: Throughout the month, they'll stop by to say hello, bringing a new sugary dish with them each time. As always, jello molds are a staple. One plate turns into three turns into five, and by the end of the first week of January, you're likely to end up with a collection of jiggling pink, green, and orange lumps taking up space in your fridge. From mountains of Whip 'n Chill to Broken Window Glass cake, you'd be forgiven in thinking that there's no end to it. And yet, there's the occasional exception. Someone comes by with a Bundt cake lathered in vanilla icing and topped with rainbow sprinkles. Were it not for the giant candy clown head topping it, it would almost look good enough to eat. "There's a rumor going around that you've been a bit under the weather, so I thought this would cheer you up!" they say, right before thrusting the technicolor nightmare into your hands, the clown's dead pink frosted eyes staring up at you. Your neighbor is quick to tell you to eat it while the icing is still fresh (you never know who might lick it off when you're not looking, eh kids?), but not that the clown itself is made out of styrofoam. That's something you'll just have to find out for yourself when you take it back inside and start chowing down!

B. SNOW DAY

What awakens you one cold Friday morning isn't the blare of your alarm clock or your family getting ready to start their day or even the chilly air that tickles your toes as they poke out from the bottom of your covers, but the sound of hooting and hollering outside your window. The sight that awaits you when you go to investigate is something out of a Norman Rockwell painting: The entire neighborhood is outside, playing and carrying on in the snow. While everyone was sleeping, Santa Rosita got four inches of snow, more than enough for the schools to close but not enough to stop everyone from enjoying it.

And enjoy it they are! Children build snowmen in their front yards while their fathers work on shoveling their driveways. Most, however, are busy erecting snow forts in their yards and the middle of the street, running back and forth as they collect ammunition for an ongoing snowball fight that takes up half of the neighborhood. Nobody is spared from their assault, not even the adults, and especially not the newly arrived ones who leave the house. Good luck getting the mail, mom and dad!

"Come on! There's plenty of snow!" one young boy yells at you over a snowdrift. "You can join my team!"

"Nuh-uh!" another boy shoots back. "You can join my team!"

And on and on it goes. Well, for the pacifists among you, making snow angels is always an option!

---

THROUGHOUT JANUARY.

CW: gaslighting, potential mentions and depictions of trauma, and other problematic material

There’s no business like show business! And business is hopping at the Starlight Drive-In, which has been boasting about its all-new film premiering on January 2nd and playing all month long. The critics are raving, the townspeople are flocking, and plans to go to the drive-in seems to be all anyone can talk about. “Make sure you get there early to see the serials,” many of them suggest, eyes wide with excitement. “I couldn’t look away!” Whether you come with your family, your friends, or simply come on your own, the lot is packed, Robbies and normal townsfolk alike beaming as they hook the individual speakers onto their cars. Apropos of the cold weather, the concession stand has added seasonal items to their menu, serving up hot chocolate and kettle corn in addition to its usual soda and popcorn. Watching a movie against a backdrop of gently falling snow while you're sipping on steaming chocolate and melted marshmallows has a certain je nais se quoi to it that even you have to admit is appealing. At last, when it's finally dark enough to start, the projector clicks on from the booth in the back of the lot and the movie begins. A. COMING ATTRACTIONS. The movie, Curse of the Doll People, is a horror flick. A real chill-o-rama, starring actors you've never heard of playing a group of archeologists who unknowingly trigger a deadly curse that sets a group of murderous living dolls upon them. The poster pasted on the ticket booth promises it'll be the most fun you'll have screaming. Unfortunately, you have to sit through several minutes of previews first. The coming attractions aren't anything special — a bunch of westerns, a romance, even a beach musical. Far from being bored to tears like you might be, the people in the cars around you are glued to the screen, popping snacks into their mouths and whispering their commentary among themselves. The movie is the reason why everyone's here, sure, but you don't just get one flick out of going to the pictures! There's also the serials, little 5—10 minute long chapter plays that tell a story in pieces. Nothing can beat those, and when the first one starts, everyone sits in rapt attention as if it were the feature presentation itself. But as the scene opens up on a sight that is instantly familiar to you, and your own face stares back at you from the projection screen, it becomes clear that this is no ordinary film. You watch your memories play out in grainy black and white footage, aired for all the world to see. Or perhaps not — though you may not realize it, the movie playing out on the screen differs from person to person. No one sees the same thing. The person next to you might see one of their worst fears come to life, whether imagined or real, practical or fantastic. You might see one of the worst moments of your life — the death of a friend, your hated enemy bringing you to the brink of death, your absolute lowest point — exactly the way you remember it... save for the way your double on the screen occasionally turns to face the audience, staring directly at you with a knowing smirk and a wink. Or the way your loved ones will sometimes go off-script, gazing at you with pleading eyes as they beg you to help them. The people of Santa Rosita will see an exciting battle between two pirate ships, swashbuckling and cannon fire in place of the traumas you're witnessing. When the serial ends on a cliffhanger, much to the disappointment of everyone around you, it's almost a mercy. "Tune in next week for the thrilling second part!" Well, you will, won't you?

---

END OF THE MONTH.

CW: body horror, dolls, violence

Aside from the horror of the drive-in, January might seem to be passing calmly... until one night, something changes. In the middle of the night, once you fall asleep in your comfortable bed (or on your couch, or with your head lolling against the kitchen table), a nightmare comes to you. The shift from whatever dreams you were having to the cold, dark void you find yourself standing in happens gradually and quietly. So too does the image that plays out in your mind's eye: From out of the darkness, a featureless mannequin stands ramrod straight, facing you with its arms pressed rigidly to its sides. It has no face, no identifying marks, no features at all. It's a blank slate in every sense of the word... until it isn't. Slowly, the material of the lower half of its face begins to split as a searing pain tears through your own, as if invisible fingers are ripping your lips off inch by inch. The slit on the doll's face widens and deepens until, finally, mercifully, its new mouth opens as yours disappears, replaced by a flat, smooth barrier of skin. Like it was never there to begin with. The pain returns, this time in your arms and neck — right as the doll's own begin to jerk. Your joints are hardening, seizing up as the doll's arms go from minutely twitching to slowly flexing. While every nerve and bone from your fingertips all the way up to your shoulders grows heavy, the doll tilts its head and looks down at its hands, as if seeing them for the first time. By the time it takes its first step, you've taken your last: the pain has spread to your feet, ankles and toes hardening and locking into place. Every part of you is claimed this way; what isn't taken by force simply fades from your body and shifts into being onto the doll's, your skin replacing its cloth body, your clothing dressing it, your hair filling out its head. Your tongue goes numb as the licks its newfound lips, coarse cloth and batting surging up from your lungs and all the way to the back of your throat. By the time it's over, you can't move. You can no longer breathe. All you can do is stare at the perfect, eyeless double of yourself standing before you. As your eyes begin to burn, the last thing you see before everything goes black is the sly curve of a smile — your smile — before the face wearing it turns away and walks back into the darkness. Luckily, you wake up to a room full of sunshine and the distant sound of traffic as the neighborhood gets ready for another beautiful day. The morning air feels cold and dry on your skin. You're you. As much as you've always been. Right?

A. DOPPELGANGER.

It's the kind of morning that makes you want to sing. Where the sky was once dull and grey, it's now a deep blue. Barring the usual hustle and bustle on the streets of Shadyside, the first sound that greets you when you wake up is the steady beat of water trickling outside your window as the snow begins to gently melt under the rays of the sun. You may even hear the chirp of a bird! January, in all its dreariness, is nearly at an end.

When you leave the room to go downstairs — or upstairs, if you slept in the living room — the house is quiet and flooded with sunlight. With how perfectly silent everything is, it's easy to mistake the calm for solitude and think you're alone.

This is not the case.

Waiting to greet you is a familiar figure. If you go downstairs, you'll see it sitting in your kitchen with its head bowed and its arms hanging limply at its sides; if upstairs, lying in your bed on its back. There's no mistaking who it is. Even at a distance, their hair, face, clothes and features all instantly recognizable, and you know who it is before you even fully register their presence:

You.

Motionless, your doppelganger looks more puppet than person. Its chest is still, not a single breath leaving its mouth. Its eyes are closed. They snap open when you get closer to it, wide enough to see the whites, as its head jerks up to look straight at you. In a staccato imitation of your voice, it chirps at you:

"Hi!"

"Good morning!"

"Hello!"

"Rise and shine!"

Your clone is a good imitation, but not a perfect one. Its movements are stiff and uncoordinated, like a marionette being commanded by unseen strings. Though its cheeks are rosy, its skin is pale and almost glossy with the texture of newly polished porcelain. None of these setbacks bother it in the very least. If left alone, it goes about the house mimicking your morning routine, though given how awkward just walking is for it, it's almost certain to do a very bad job. Still, it tries its hardest, following you all day around the neighborhood, trying to imitate your movements — all with a smile!

That is, until you become aggressive with it.

It doesn't take much to set your doppelganger off — a simple shove will do it. When that happens, its eyes will do the impossible and open even wider, its mouth yawning into a wail that pitches louder and louder. That's the point when it will lunge at you. Its hands will try to go for your throat, but not always. It's resourceful enough to improvise with whatever it has around it, whether that be a kitchen knife, a paperweight, or even a letter opener. Luckily for you, they're fragile. Just hitting them is enough to crack and chip away at their skin. With enough strength, their limbs can even come off. Unluckily, they don't stay down for long; even a severed appendage can be popped back into its proper ball-jointed place.

All the while, they never stop childishly whining and shrieking at you.

"Not nice!"

"Why are you so mean?!"

"Not nice, not nice, NOT NICE!"

The only way to shut them up for good is to keep pummeling them until they're nothing but a pile of doll parts. But be thorough — even a mouth that's nothing but a shard of porcelain can still talk.

---

OOC INFO

Hello, and welcome to We're Still Here's second TDM! Here's a few things we'd like you to keep in mind:

The TDM is canon. You can treat this as the game's first real event and pick and choose what threads you would like your character to remember when they enter the game. For characters who app into the game, the events of the TDM will be treated like a dream. Upon awakening from it, characters will find that time has jumped ahead to February 1st. You may also feel free to use similar reality and/or time distortions to explain why the family members your characters have in the TDM aren't the same as the ones they may be assigned to in the game proper. Additionally, starting today comments made to the TDM will now count towards Activity Check. Current players are permitted to use up to five comments from it for this month's Activity Check — half of the required amount to pass. The other five must be made within the game's communities.

If you would like to have January or other winter-themed content in your relaxed housing prompts, please feel free! You are not beholden to follow our prompts exactly so long as the spirit is maintained.

There is no Network prompt listed, but feel free to wildcard one for your characters anyway.

Although the TDM is canon in the sense that characters are free to remember its events when they app into the game, it does not count as an official plot heavy event, meaning that characters will not receive regains from participating in it.

A note about the drive-in theater: Players are in full control over what memories, phobias, or fears the serials before the movie will depict. You can also specify whether or not other characters will be able to see your character's serial. Be sure to label your threads with relevant content warnings if needed!

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Comments

b

[sonicsiren]

[Some would say that an alleyway is no place for nice girls - certainly no place for a happy homemaker in the '60s, and while Dinah Drake Lance might be a nice person, she's not exactly what one would call a happy homemaker. Still, she looks the part, in a very nice deep blue wool coat, low-heeled boots, and a little hat. It is a little brisk out, after all, and you need to dress warm if you're going to investigating the bizarre town you've woken up in.

Not that Castiel seems to have gotten that message.]

Please tell me the sirens aren't because someone's reported you for public indecency by way of pajamas.

[It's immediately clear that, despite her clothes, she's not someone who's exactly from around here.]

[heraldingangel]

[ Dinah blends into her environment seamlessly in her nice coat, sensible heels, and fashionable hat. While he looks like he might have escaped a mental asylum, not for the criminally insane, he wears his thoughts too openly for that. As it stands, his head tilts to the side, brows furrowing down as if he's not quite sure he heard her right. For one, she doesn't look concerned or even a little bit frightened by his appearance, a common reaction from most of the people he's come across. Second, he's been the butt of enough quips from a certain duo of brothers to make him pause. ]

I don't know.

[ His breath comes out a little fast which is visible between them. It's cold out and as she's already noted, he's not exactly dressed for success. He steps from one foot to another trying to get some blood circulating to his bare feet as he keeps looking at her a little too closely. ]

You don't sound like one of the people here.

[ He sounds suspicious, shoulders leaning slightly forward before his head snaps up when the sirens of a nearby police cruiser draw closer. Turning his head toward the street he just came from, Castiel knows it's not a good idea to stay out in the open despite how much he wants to ask her some questions. ]

I have to go.

[sonicsiren]

[Spend your years as a spy working for a black ops team and as a crimefighter who tends to go undercover a lot, and you too can learn how to seamlessly blend into your environs! Dinah highly recommends the experience, truly.]

I'd introduce myself as the new girl, but it seems like there's a lot of newbies here around town.

[As she speaks, she walks around Castiel, towards the direction of the sirens. If the police end up whizzing past them in their car, they'll see her from the opening of the alleyway, but they won't see him.]

You need to hide, which would be a lot easier if you weren't wearing something that you could be so easily - ahem - spotted in.

[She smiles in spite of herself. She's not generally one for a joke quite so corny, but this one was staring her right in the face. She's powerless, okay?]

What has you running around town in pajamas anyway? Are you okay?

[heraldingangel]

[ He spent millennia perched up in Heaven watching civilizations rise and fall over petty conflicts. His garrison was stationed closest to Earth waiting on orders that never came. Given his unique opportunity to watch humanity, you'd think he'd be better at spotting a joke. He isn't. ]

New girl? As in new in town? When did you get here? [ More importantly. ] How did you get here. What is this place?

[ The questions come unbidden, keeping him in place for far longer than he knows he has time for, so when the sound of tires rolling over pavement drift over to them, he knows he's lingered too long. Giving her a look of confirmation when she tells him to hide, Castiel follows her lead and quickly looks around for anything big enough to hide his vessel. A few meters back, he spots a large trashcan and hurries over to it. He hides behind the metal container as the squeak of someone riding their brakes pass them by. He stays hidden long enough to hear the car turn a corner before poking his head out, slightly surprised he's not alone. He honestly didn't expect her to stay.

Stepping out of his hiding spot, he takes a moment to look around. He hasn't been in this part of town yet and he hasn't taken many of the alleyways considering he has no clue how to navigate them. When she speaks, his head turns back to her and he wonders why she keeps bringing up his state of dress. He has pants on and a shirt. Wasn't that enough? ]

No.

[ He's far from okay. He woke up in a strange place with a strange person calling him odd things. To top it off, he's completely cut off from Heaven and his grace is all but depleted. He can't even keep his vessel from succumbing to the environment. ]

I'm looking for a way out of this place.

[sonicsiren]

Woke up here in a home that I didn't recognize, with pictures of myself and a family I didn't recognize, with clothes that I definitely wouldn't have picked out for myself.

[Dinah's much more a studded biker jacket and fishnets gal than she is a prim-and-proper tailored suit lady. Plus there's the fact that it's 1961, which should technically be an impossibility, given that she's from like 2019.]

Not sure how I got here and it's all an unpleasant mystery, one I'd like to figure out as soon as possible. As far as I can tell, we're some place in California. In 1961. In a town filled with...smiling zombie people who really don't seem like they notice anything out of the ordinary.

[heraldingangel]

[ The words lure him in, the picture they paint an exact replica of what he woke up to that morning. He didn't pay attention to the pictures but he saw them. Recognized their significance but at the time, it didn't matter because he was once again cut off from Heaven. He was alone, powerless, and with no idea how he got here. In those few moments, he stupidly thought it might be God. That his Father had brought him here just like he'd brought him back to life, but this place felt more like one of Gabriel's creations than his Father's. A joke for someone else's amusement. ]

California? Like in Stanford?

[ Even if it was 1961 and Sam wasn't even born yet, he can't help but feel a connection from the three degrees of separation across time. He's standing only a few feet away now, drawing closer still as he nods at her words. ]

I can't get any information from them. [ He admits. ] When I press for answers, they don't seem to know what I'm talking about. I don't understand. When I woke up here, I had no memory of how I got here. That's not supposed to happen. I remember everything.

[ Except when he was dead. A thought he doesn't linger on. ]

If you've been here for some time, why are you still here? Why haven't you tried to leave?

[sonicsiren]

The one and only. Stanford, Hollywood, Coast City, Disneyland.

[She's stuck her head out of the alleyway, looking left and then right. No cops. That's good. For now, at least.]

Unfortunately, I woke up here this morning as well. I don't have much more to go on than you do, but there are moments where...I kind of feel like I'm kidding myself, and maybe I am the woman in the house. With the husband and the kids.

[She was married once before, she remembers that much. To a man named Kurt who...well, he was dead now. Not by her hand, but that didn't make much of a difference. She'd lost him, she'd found him, and she'd lost him again. That cyclical thing seemed to be the one standard in Dinah's life.]

I've been trying to get answers as best I could. Figured snooping around town would be the best way to get any answers, but...no. Nothing yet. Though I did apply for a job at the florist up the street. It'll keep me out of the house enough to maybe do some extra detective work, come across anyone else in a similar situation to you and me.

[heraldingangel]

[ That answer isn't one he's expecting. His vessel, Jimmy, had a family. But the woman in the pictures wasn't Amelia and the child wasn't Claire. He promised Jimmy to keep his family safe, but that family wasn't the one he swore to protect. ]

I don't know what's going on, but I do know I'm not the one in those pictures. Neither is Jimmy. Whatever is happening here, it seems this whole town is caught in it.

Have you met others like us? People who were brought here?

[ If he can find them, then maybe he can piece together what's happening. Was it some kind of spell? ]

[sonicsiren]

So far, you're my first one. I haven't gone looking or asking anyone else yet, but running into you like this can't just be a coincidence. There have to be others.

[She sighs softly and turns back from the street so she's facing him.]

The first woman I met outside of my house this morning was bringing by a molded Jell-O cake to welcome me to the neighborhood. I accepted it as graciously as I could, but when I asked her if she knew when I had moved in, she gave me a blank, surprised stare and then laughed, thinking I was joking around. It wasn't a normal reaction, but nothing about this experience feels normal - and I'm already kind of used to having a weird life.

Wait. Jimmy? Do you know someone else here?

[heraldingangel]

[ She's the first person he's run into that doesn't seem like they're under a spell. So far, he hasn't met anyone else that didn't act like Bill, his neighbor. He gave him a welcome gift too which he threw in the trash before leaving in the same clothes he woke up in. ]

I got a cake from someone who said he was my neighbor. I threw it in the trash.

[ He tries to recall what else Bill had told him, but at the time he was trying to figure out where he was and why he couldn't hear the angels or contact Heaven. Even with his powers depleted, he should still be able to hear them but Heaven was silent and there was only the sound of Bill talking. ]

No. [ He shakes his head at the question, realizing his mistake. ] He's not here. His body is, but not him. He's my vessel.

[sonicsiren]

I should have thrown mine in the trash too, now that I think about it.

[The woman had seemed too cheerful, too glassy eyed. She made some sitcom characters seem downright dark and broody.]

Your vessel. Okay.

[It's not the weirdest thing she's encountered or heard, but if she seems worried that Castiel is a loon, she's not showing it.]

I...might need some context for that.

[heraldingangel]

[ Fortunately, he's never been constrained by social etiquette. It hit the trashcan as soon as he saw a place to dump it with Bill still watching. Maybe if he had some idea of what's considered normal, he wouldn't have brought up Jimmy, but he doesn't so here they are. Him, standing there in the pajamas he woke up in, looking like he's got a few screws loose what with walking around without any shoes to really sell the part. As it stands, his toes curl a little, flexing against the pavement, as the cold seeps in making it difficult to ignore the discomfort. He's not used to feeling cold or needing shoes, though he always wore them since Jimmy, the devoted man that he was, dressed in his Sunday best when he gave him permission to use him as a vessel. ]

This body. [ He touches his chest dislodging one of the buttons which doesn't help his 'I'm not a loon' case. ] It's my vessel. It belonged to a devoted man named Jimmy Novak.

[sonicsiren]

[They really do need to get him someplace safer - someplace warm, where he can put on some clothes and shoes. Dinah feels cold just looking at him.]

I promise this question isn't as judgmental as it's about to sound but...are you implying you're a body snatcher? Or did you get a new body - Jimmy's body - upon arriving here?

[Because Dinah's body, thankfully, is very much her own.]

[heraldingangel]

[ The good thing about having little knowledge of social queues is that few questions sound judgemental. Angels aren't subtle. They say what they mean and mean what they say. It's why lying is so hard for him. Why her question lands on a stoic mind despite unintentionally comparing him to a demon. ]

No. Demons take vessels without permission, angels ask.

[ He doesn't sound offended by the matter. His gruff voice, deeper than expected for someone of his stature, merely pointing out the discrepancies. ]

Jimmy gave his consent. He prayed for it.

[ Though, the second time was more of a trade. His daughter for him. ]

[sonicsiren]

[Angels. Okay. Not the weirdest or wildest thing that Dinah's dealt with. Hell, one of her closest friends is the daughter of an Amazon queen and the king of the Olympian gods. Angels are an easily digestible truth after that.]

So if I'm reading this right, that means that you've probably been cut off from any angelic powers you had before you woke up this morning.

[It would explain part of why he seemed so disoriented, to be honest.]

Speaking of - the home you woke up. "Your" home. Do you remember where it is? And is it safe to return to? We might need to slip you into something a little more comfortable for the weather before we go seeking out any other answers. And, you know. Make it so that the police aren't looking for someone who matches the description of what you're wearing.

[heraldingangel]

[ It's only been a few hours, but he hasn't given himself any rest since waking up. Adrenaline has kept him going, but now that he's stopped long enough to hold a conversation, the boost of energy is wearing thin and the cold is seeping in. Still, he frowns at the pointed summary of his current state even as his feet shuffle a little at the numbing effects of the cold. ]

Effectively.

[ He doesn't look happy about it either. The last time he was human he was laid up in a hospital when he hit a shrimping boat off the coast of Maine. ]

It's not mine, but I did wake up there. I know how to get back if that's what you're asking.

[ He looks down at himself at the mention of the weather and his toes curl again as if they could hide from the cold. He is starting to get a little uncomfortable, but he still doesn't understand why - ]

What's wrong with what I'm wearing?

[sonicsiren]

I'm sorry.

[The words - and the slight grimace on her face - are genuine. She's no angel, but she is a metahuman - a human with powers - and she's been cut off from her sonic scream. Sure, she'd lived a long while without it before she even had it, but it's a nice little comfort ability to have. As much as she hates to admit it, she feels a little lost without it.]

I think that, for all intents and purposes, the beds we woke up in are meant to be ours in this city. Unless whomever brought you here as you confused with Jimmy...then I don't know. There's nothing WRONG with what you're wearing...if you're wearing it to bed, or to lounge around the house. But in public, especially in this era, a lot of people would consider it indecent. Also, I really don't know that you want your-slash-Jimmy's toes to get frostbite. There's not warm angel healing powers - are those a thing? - to help make them better if that happens. You'll be a lot less conspicuous in trousers and a shirt and a coat.

1/2

[heraldingangel]

[ The sentiment goes unacknowledged. It's not her fault his grace is gone, so he sees no reason why she should apologize for it, but rather than get caught up in a philosophical debate he stays silent. On the other hand, he does want to ask why. Why the place he woke up be considered his? But he refrains, lips pressing together disturbed by the mounting questions with so few answers. He shakes his head at the mention of Jimmy. It still pains him that he couldn't save the faithful man. ]

Jimmy's in Heaven. [ Died along with him when his brother decimated him with a snap of his fingers. God had brought him back, but let Jimmy rest in Heaven while he continued to fight. ] There's no reason to bring his body here without his soul, and if he was here, I wouldn't be.

[ He's effectively human, which means he gained a soul and only one soul can occupy a body. He could share Jimmy's form as an angel but as a human? It was impossible. ]

2/2

[heraldingangel]

[ He's accepted what happened and doesn't linger on the topic, placing his focus on the bout about his dress. ]

Indecent.

[ The tests out the word like it's a foreign thing on his tongue. ]

I suppose I'll have to pay attention to my clothing choices from now on.

[ Another foreign concept, but he's willing to do what's necessary to figure out what's going on. So, with little choice, he turns to her hoping to get some guidance. ]

Where can I find some trousers?

[sonicsiren]

I'm not calling you indecent. Just how others would perceive the public one-man pajama party you have going on right now.

[More than the trousers, though, she's more concerned that he will catch something. A cold. Frostbite. The attention of the police, again.]

The best thing would be to go to the house you woke up in - weirdly, whoever brought us here knew our sizes, and everything is a perfect fit.

[Though they didn't know their tastes. The Jackie O. cosplay that Dinah's rocking is never something she would have chosen for herself in a million years or a million multiverses.]

I'm more than happy to come with you, if you want. Just in case you need back-up or, you know. A friend.

[heraldingangel]

[ Somehow, he's in danger of all of these, a cold most definitely at the rate he's going. ]

A friend? [ Way to throw off the angel shivering beside you. It's enough to make him pause but the cold soon makes him reassess his priorities. He can get back to the place he woke up in, but the idea of back-up never even occurred to him. He's so used to going in alone or being the back-up that it's almost foreign. ]

Back-up would be good.

[ He nods to himself, fingers flexing into his palms to get the blood circulating. ]

It's this way.

[ he points to the mouth of the alley and starts walking again, his feet hurting with every step. Maybe he'd add some shoes to that list. ]