[she does wonder, of course, what Helena's experiences are with such a thing. but she'll put that on pause to answer her question.]
Ah. So. There once was a stubborn and gnarly little man named Izzy Hands. That happened upon the locations of Jenny's brothers after learning their names. Or at least where their souls were kept, in locations named after them. The bars. With intentions to somehow gain her alliance, since she used... to have her own ship, she would be his choice for helping taking control over this one.
Well. He took Deputy Pratt along with him, and managed to summon one of the brothers. A cat. And I was told this story, along with a request to investigate one of the other locations but found nothing.
Anyway, it happened that one of the newer passengers, Eleanor, had come across the corpse of a passenger that had vanished months prior. While she was diving in the waters...
That makes me far less inclined to ever go swimming anywhere that's not the pool.
[souls being kept in the bars, and one is a cat. why not, at this point. who knows why for anything. and having this place taken over...it was a risk, but hopefully not one that would have ended in the Captain's death. whatever his plan, Ava speaks of him in the past tense, and so Helena lets it lie.]
I don't really like to swim... the hot tub is nice though.
Anyway. In October, the ship had been overtaken by a series of possessions. Former passengers, ghosts, taking control of the bodies of the living. I thought... well, here I have a spare body. No decomposition. And I know where a trapped spirit is...
So Pratt and I went to one of the bars to summon one of Jenny's brothers. To see if we could get him inside the body? I wanted to know if it was possible to bring those that were stuck in the Nothing back...
[she will refrain from asking Ava where she planned to get enough spare bodies to get those in the Nothing out, should this be a viable strategy. likely the older woman already knows all this, and considered it.]
[she nods slowly, takes a big breath, and just seems to...
settle. as if all the panic, decision making, concern were neatly filed away to be dealt with later if at all. so. flesh eating ghosts. it was taken in and accepted, and it was part of reality now. it's an odd thing, but it's something she knows how to do, when otherwise she'd get fully sidelined from what's going on.]
Do you have any idea how many pieces the Captain might have divided himself into? There's the memory you found, the piece Miss Friday has, the one we know...that's three already. Four, if the piece that's talking to Miss Fio has to remain out of sight. Of course, there might be parts we can't get back...then it's a question of if that's akin to amputation, or if things can be somehow repaired.
I'm not... quite sure. How it works. How many pieces. If some are just memories, and he's gotten rid of so many. Thousands of years...? Or if this one is more specifically a bigger essential part of him, like his soul. Since he told Valdis he doesn't have one. And Bash might have encountered it in the Nothing.
And given... Friday's reactions. Called it the part of him that used to be loved, what she was holding onto for him.
And I think there are... magical protections in place to prevent him from knowing.
[Helena leans back on the couch, taking that in. there's honestly so much that she doesn't understand, that she can't grasp, but she's not expected to understand it all at the same time.]
...All of this...it must have been so heavy to hold it as a secret. [and it still will be, but at least there's one more person to shoulder the weight.] Thank you, Ava, for trusting me to know.
I'm not sure how much I've... if sharing will cause even more problems. [some things are meant to be kept secret, Friday warned about this... but she can't shake the feeling that because it's so horrible that it has to be known by more than just her. but the right thing emotionally almost never seems to be the most strategic. all of her good intentions seem to lead straight to the most disastrous outcomes.]
It feels so impossible. But alone, I can't do anything to fix it. [and it's possibly already too late.]
We will figure something out. You, me, and whoever else is involved. We'll manage, somehow.
[she says it with all the belief she can place in those few words, an absolute certainty that even if she's to die again and again in pursuit of this, it would happen.
though, one hopes not.]
We got this far, after all. The entire ship hasn't fallen to violence like we could have. There's more hope than you would think.
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[she does wonder, of course, what Helena's experiences are with such a thing. but she'll put that on pause to answer her question.]
Ah. So. There once was a stubborn and gnarly little man named Izzy Hands. That happened upon the locations of Jenny's brothers after learning their names. Or at least where their souls were kept, in locations named after them. The bars. With intentions to somehow gain her alliance, since she used... to have her own ship, she would be his choice for helping taking control over this one.
Well. He took Deputy Pratt along with him, and managed to summon one of the brothers. A cat. And I was told this story, along with a request to investigate one of the other locations but found nothing.
Anyway, it happened that one of the newer passengers, Eleanor, had come across the corpse of a passenger that had vanished months prior. While she was diving in the waters...
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[souls being kept in the bars, and one is a cat. why not, at this point. who knows why for anything. and having this place taken over...it was a risk, but hopefully not one that would have ended in the Captain's death. whatever his plan, Ava speaks of him in the past tense, and so Helena lets it lie.]
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Anyway. In October, the ship had been overtaken by a series of possessions. Former passengers, ghosts, taking control of the bodies of the living. I thought... well, here I have a spare body. No decomposition. And I know where a trapped spirit is...
So Pratt and I went to one of the bars to summon one of Jenny's brothers. To see if we could get him inside the body? I wanted to know if it was possible to bring those that were stuck in the Nothing back...
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And...what happened then?
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But. Uh. It ripped the body apart and ate it.
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[she believes her, this is just...]
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Didn't seem capable of crossing the counter, though.
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[just as a suggestion. she's still trying to wrap her mind around the ghost eating it. where would the stomach even be?]
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But since the sigils were damaged. Not sure how long until something like that manages to sneak out.
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[at least Siffleur kills his prey.]
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settle. as if all the panic, decision making, concern were neatly filed away to be dealt with later if at all. so. flesh eating ghosts. it was taken in and accepted, and it was part of reality now. it's an odd thing, but it's something she knows how to do, when otherwise she'd get fully sidelined from what's going on.]
Do you have any idea how many pieces the Captain might have divided himself into? There's the memory you found, the piece Miss Friday has, the one we know...that's three already. Four, if the piece that's talking to Miss Fio has to remain out of sight. Of course, there might be parts we can't get back...then it's a question of if that's akin to amputation, or if things can be somehow repaired.
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And given... Friday's reactions. Called it the part of him that used to be loved, what she was holding onto for him.
And I think there are... magical protections in place to prevent him from knowing.
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...All of this...it must have been so heavy to hold it as a secret. [and it still will be, but at least there's one more person to shoulder the weight.] Thank you, Ava, for trusting me to know.
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It feels so impossible. But alone, I can't do anything to fix it. [and it's possibly already too late.]
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[she says it with all the belief she can place in those few words, an absolute certainty that even if she's to die again and again in pursuit of this, it would happen.
though, one hopes not.]
We got this far, after all. The entire ship hasn't fallen to violence like we could have. There's more hope than you would think.