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TDM 004: WASHED ASHORE
| TDM 004: WASHED ASHORE |
Arrival  This time, you come out of the water. While the Augur reboots, the Nameless Island's own inherent energy draws people in. It's like being suspended between realities and walking through a rift in dimensions. It may make you sick, or that might be the motion of the ocean, lifting you and carrying you to shore. Waterlogged and covered in sand, new arrivals will be greeted by robots who welcome them with towels and bracelet devices. The A5 card is already loaded up. Inventory will be found a day later, wrapped up haphazardly and delivered to each person's makeshift home. I. Feel the friendship!  Recent arrivals and visitors to the beach may notice a sudden influx of hundreds of bright red crustaceans crawling (and coupling) across the sand. It's crab mating season, as it turns out, it's a regular invasion! To keep the beach a pleasant place to gather for the island's inhabitants, the robots are offering credits to especially enterprising crab-catchers. Grab a bucket and get to work! Be sure to watch out for their pinch, mind you. Their little claws are tiny, but that doesn’t mean they don’t hurt. Surprisingly, there is another effect that even the robots don't anticipate: islanders who are pinched by the crabs find themselves feeling instantly buddy-buddy with the next person they spot. Did you just become best friends?! Get pinched one too many times, however, and those feelings may sour into a crabby mood, indeed. If you are feeling particularly vengeful (or just hungry), the little crabs do make for delicious gumbo. Once cooked, they have no side effects whatsoever. II. Phallus Phestival  Although the Augur is offline and supplies are scarce, the robots of Erku are still eager to make their run-down little island a welcoming place for the new arrivals. To that end, they have arranged a three day festival to boost morale and promote the generation of plenty of Eros energy to assist in the restoration of the damaged and decayed parts of the city. The robots claim that this celebration was once a cornerstone of the long-lost civilization of the island. By the dawn of the first day, every island resident will find at their doorstep (or tent flap, mobile suit, etc) the traditional costume of the ancient islanders to wear to the festival. It appears to be... a giant sheet? There doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to the sometimes garish colors and patterns of the fabric, but at least the robots have uploaded instructions on how to wear it to your bracelet device. Attendees will find food (mostly crab-flavored), confections, and household necessities in rather suggestive shapes, as well as goods you might find handy to complete your A5 squares: sex toys, pervertibles, sexy maid outfits, and the like. While islanders are welcome to set up shop on the festival grounds and sell (or charge) whatever they like, all items from the robots are offered up for free to those who wear their traditional island garb! III. Fireside Adventures  Each night of the festival is wrapped up in style with an enormous bonfire on the beach, where drinks, fruity cocktails, and lively music appropriate for dancing is all provided at no cost by the robots. Even if you’re not usually much of a dancer, the longer you stand by the fire and allow it to warm your limbs, the more you feel like moving! Not only that, but everyone is looking quite beautiful by the firelight, are they not? If you’ve grown tired - or if dancing just isn’t your thing - you might prefer to sit back and swap stories on one of the many driftwood log benches the robots have prepared for seating. Or, maybe you’d prefer to rough it for the night in one of the beachside canvas tents. Better claim one quick, though, or be prepared to share… there’s only one sleeping bag! N A V I G A T I O N |
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Do you - do you know what they base these on? [ she sounds a little panicked, the fear edging into her voice. she feels like an idiot for being blindsided by this; of course whatever brought them there would know what she was.
it's been a while since she's lost control like this, but before she's really aware of what's happening, the veins underneath her eyes start going black while the whites start to go red. she lets go of carmilla once she notices, hands going to her eyes before she turns from her. ]
Nononono, not here, not here...
oh no the poor baby 🥺
( she's got in heat on hers, and considering she actually is capable of such things... it might be an alarming indication that the Augur is more aware of their personal intricacies than she might have initially realized. still, after further perusal of her card and others, she figures it's probably just an uncomfortable coincidence.
there's nothing like necrophilia or bloodplay on her card, after all... and frankly, she doesn't consider herself turned on by any of the above. it doesn't seem as if the Augur had any interest in picking accurate kinks. it just threw a bunch of shit at a card, nothing to take too personally.
she's for sure not expecting the idea to cause the girl to panic. her dark eyes widened and she follows Caroline, despite the obvious attempt to evade attention. the black eyes and eerie veins are a new one, a supernatural tell if she ever saw one. tie that to terror related to potential exposure via bloodplay on her card, it's not hard to put two and two together.
she steps closer again, putting a hand on the blondes arm to attempt reassurance. ) I don't think it has anything to do with who we are and what we're into, cutie. A card isn't going to out you. ( going fangs first at the mention of blood might, though. ) How long ago were you turned?
( she could be wrong and it might be a problem if she is. but Carmilla is pretty confident she's not wrong. )
sorry to wreck the party carmilla ;-;
carmilla, to her surprise, doesn't react with horror when she follows, and that combined with the method of suppression stefan had taught her is enough for her to push the reaction down, her eyes and skin returning to normal, if a little teary. but from the sound of things it's nothing carmilla hasn't seen before, or she's at least familiar enough with what caroline is to not be frightened of her. ]
...A few months ago. [ she's managed to learn some control since then, enough that she probably won't tear into anybody here, but she's new enough for it to still get the better of her sometimes, especially when she hasn't had the chance to eat. ]
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a few months? jesus. a baby fang if she ever saw one. her eyebrows knit downward, making her seem a little softer. ) I don't think the Augur is quietly outing vampires with Bloodplay, it's not on my card. ( snuff isn't either, which would be another dead ringer for an undead girl. that said, ageplay is on there, which ... frankly pretty much anyone she sleeps with would be ageplay, because she's ancient. let's not go there. )
It's not as bad as it sounds, cutie. You can get blood out of the dispensers. No hunters, as far as I've seen. I've been here months and so far nobody's tried to stake or immolate me. ( and unspoken is the fact that Caroline is not the only vampire around, which might be a relief in and of itself. it's horribly isolating, to be the only one. ) Come on, let's take a walk, shall we? ( come back once the panic at being outed is over. and maybe after a snack — newer vampires seemed to need to feed far more often. )
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So you're... [ she trails off, not wanting to out carmilla if she doesn't want it to be public knowledge, but then she goes on to tell her she hasn't had anyone trying to hunt her or hurt her for what she is and where she can find blood if she needs it. she sniffs, wiping underneath her eyes for any stray tears or makeup, and nods at her proposal. ]
Thank you. [ she is feeling pretty hungry. ]
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she catches Caroline's hand again, and even collects the heels for her before tugging her away from the bonfire and to a less populated part of the beach and toward a dispenser to continue their little chat. )
A vampire? What gave it away? ( a little wry and teasing, hopefully just to break the fearful vice Caroline seems to be under. she doesn't need to be afraid, they're sadly trapped under the same curse. while Carmilla is usually far more cagey, it seems almost cruel to hide her vampirism from the girl that is so new and terrified of it that she's in tears over a kink bingo card potentially outing her. yes, perhaps it's a risk to trust the girl immediately, but... it's a risk worth taking. Carmilla hadn't had the benefit of someone who understood, someone to guide, when she'd been newly turned.
she probably won't be great at it, but, maybe could be even a little help. to make all of it less terrifying. and if she can, then yes, she'll try. so, without any avoidance of the truth, she agrees, ) Yes. I'm a vampire. And it's been a lot longer than a few months for me.
cw: murder by smothering, abuse, blood consumption.
she never wants that to happen again, especially not somewhere that could be even more dangerous than her hometown had turned out to be. so she lets carmilla take her hand, going willingly, and maybe it's a mistake to trust so easily, but she's not afraid of her, disgusted by what she is, or trying to expose her. the lack of intention to hurt her is enough, at least for now. ]
How long...I mean, sorry if you don't want to answer that. But everyone I've met who's a vampire or knew about them was hiding it from me until recently.
[ until it had gotten her killed, and she'd become one of them. ]
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as for vampires hiding what they were, well... ) I hide it from humans, sure. But what's the point with other vampires? We've got enough to worry about, we don't need to be tearing each other apart, too.
( Carmilla also is more often than not used to being surrounded by her mother's cabal of undead minions, who she would never trust as far as she could throw them, but there was also no point in hiding the obvious. the fact she was her mother's favorite was no small secret to anyone, which her mother did plenty to foster and all her undead peers delighted in resenting her for, despite the fact being her mothers favorite could not be any less of a prize if it tried.
more importantly, she's used to Mattie, who she does trust. she's never really had an opportunity or frankly a desire to be that kind of figure to someone else, mostly because all her mother's newly turned flunkies hated her and were gormless morons that could be easily bent to nefarious plots. Caroline is completely and blessedly unattached to all of that... or her mother finally recruited someone start enough to know what they're doing, and she doubts that. Lilita was a master manipulator but surely even she had her limits, and hopefully getting in on the ground floor of multi-universe machination.
and if that's what this is, well... Carmilla figures she's seen her mothers games enough to spot it sooner or later. until then, she'll give the undead cheerleader the benefit of the doubt. they've made it to a dispenser and it's as easy as a few button clicks to get some blood. ) Our robot overlords seem to understand some of us have unique dietary restrictions. Easier than trying to compel a snack, even if it tastes two weeks old.
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(honestly, the group still isn't great at sharing the details with her. but she'd been keeping secrets, too.)
she follows along until they reach a dispenser, which carmilla shows her how to operate, and it seems so...simple that she almost wonders if it's a trick. like maybe it's not really blood, but she can tell once it's retrieved that it is, no matter how old it may be. her eyes and veins go dark again for a moment, and she quickly replicates what carmilla had done to get her own supply. ]
You can compel, too? [ the blood arrives and she grabs it eagerly, pulling the top of it open and taking a long drink. however frilly the drinks had been, they'd evidently been strong enough to curb her cravings; she hadn't realized how hungry she'd gotten until smelling the blood. after about half the bag is downed, she wipe at her mouth and licks at her lips, trying to get rid of whatever evidence remains. ] What else can you do?
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( like that hopeless idiot boy that had been fixated on Laura, he'd been absent enough up top that she'd managed to gently suggest he not be concerned about the fact she'd attacked him and suddenly he wasn't. frankly, she doesn't compell terribly often, only when she has to. there'd been a time in her past where she'd cut a red path through beautiful cities with Mattie and erased every little violation with a little whisper.
the whispers tend to haunt her more and more of late. her sister would be dismayed to see her drinking old blood out of a bag, but, it's easier on her bruised moral compass.
Carmilla frowns slightly as she observes the way Caroline's face changes when her hunger pangs are too strong. that's a new one. she's gone fangs first when presented with blood after too long without feeding before, or at least she had when she was younger. still, showing fangs and entirely black eyes are sort of two different beasts. she hadn't much considered the possibility of different varieties of vampire until just now, but it's an interesting thought. )
Super strong, super fast, super durable... depending on how my diet is going. ( aka, depending on how well fed she is. ) Not sure it was all worth tension headaches in sunlight and having to watch everything grow old and die around me, but I've always been a pessimist. ( she's got a few other magic tricks that she's not exactly hiding but she's also not exactly admitting at the moment. even within her mother's flunkies, she's been a rather unusual case. it might come up sooner or later, but she's testing the water with Caroline still. besides, a girl does like to keep some of her mystery. ) What about you? The black veins aren't something I've seen before.
cw: abuse (fuck you damon)
Me, too. [ she might sound weirdly enthusiastic, at least at the first part. the second isn't really something she's let herself think about. honestly, she still isn't sure if this is something she's going to survive. damon definitely would have killed her if he'd been allowed to. ] Strong and fast and durable, that is. And my senses are like, superhuman.
[ sunlight is a lot more dangerous to her. it burns her and would actually kill her if she remained in it, if not for the daylight ring she wears on her index finger. that seems a little dangerous to reveal to somebody she's just met, though, even if she is like her.
at the mention of her eyes and veins, caroline's hand touches her cheek, hoping it's not happening now. ]
That happens when I get too hungry, or sometimes if I get upset. I hadn't fed, and we were at a party, and it just reminded me of -
[ she trails off, not really wanting to go into it and hoping carmilla won't make her. ]
- the first night. When I first transitioned.
cw: more tragic vampire backstories, sexual abuse
( it happens way too often for her liking. listening in to Laura gleefully rejoicing after Maman had showed up to personally chew her out, for example. that'd been fun. Carmilla's senses aren't ridiculously over-tuned, but enough that she definitely hears more than she wants to on a regular basis. superhuman senses are for sure not all they're cracked up to be.
as for the veins being such a visible trigger, that's slightly worrisome. especially if Caroline doesn't have any control over it. Carmilla chews at her lip and sucks mildly at her own bloodbag like a Capri Sun as she thinks. as for talking about tragic origin stories, no worries Caroline, Carmilla is more than happy not to dig into being an 18 year old girl murdered at her birthday ball and kept in a sex dungeon by her would-be fiancé long enough for him to marry and procreate more than once. that's totally fine, they can keep their turning stories to themselves for now. )
Yeah, I get it. ( she gets it way more than she'd like to admit, even with centuries of distance between her and her transition. ) Just... be careful, cutie. Make sure you stay fed. This stuff tastes like trash but it's enough to get by if you don't want to get it from the vein. Just because I haven't heard of hunters doesn't mean they aren't out there.
( a surprisingly considerate, almost sisterly suggestion. look, Carmilla doesn't intend to take any metaphorical bullets for Caroline any time soon, but she doesn't want to see her killed, either. and the black veins were more of a give away than anything else about the pretty preppy blonde (let's face it, as cliche vampires go, Carmilla would definitely be the more obvious candidate), and pretty hard to explain away. )
cw: tragic vampire backstory the primetime hour, compulsion
she's better at control now than she'd been a few months ago. the veins and bloody eyes only come out during times of more extreme duress, but the fear of being outed and having not fed enough had reminded her enough of a time like that to trigger the reaction. having fed a little now, she starts to sip from her bag a little more subtly, considering carmilla as she listens to her. ]
At least it tastes sort of human. [ whether or not it is is something she's not sure she wants to think about, all she knows is it's sating her hunger enough to quell the urge to find somebody to feed on. ] Thank you, Carmilla.
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( look, she's gotten a lot more morally gray in the past few decades, but Carmilla does have her limits. and snacking on bunny blood just doesn't do it for her, she's never bothered to try. she can find blood bags or just a particularly intellectually challenged frat boy before she'd snack on Thumper, but age begets arrogance, perhaps. either way, there's not a lot of animals around the nameless city to snack on, so it's good that the dispensers will spit out blood when they need it. )
Just in case these things go down, you might want to make a stockpile. I've started one if things ever go dark. ( it's almost close to kindness, don't read to deep into it. maybe that's just bragging about how prepared she is, not an invitation. that's possible, right? as far as the thanks, Carmilla shrugs that off. she doesn't like it when people point out she did something almost decent, she'd much rather everyone collectively pretend it didn't happen. ) Yeah, yeah. Just finish your smoothie, blondie, you still owe me a dance.
( she's not going to just come out and say that it's nice to not be the only dead girl around, because of course Carmilla isn't going to crack into emotions, that's ridiculous. much easier to lean into her favorite distraction, which happens to be hedonism. she's never one to keep things dark and serious if they don't have to be. instead of saying she's pleased to have another vampire around, she'll just show it by being minutely less of an asshole than she usually is. complete with something that almost looks like a smile as she tries to coax Caroline back towards the bonfire. )
no subject
[ which might explain to carmilla why she hadn't been seen without a drink in her hand. alcohol helps curb the cravings for blood, at least in her case. but yes, she'll feed on rabbits or deer. it's the safer option more often than not, but it leaves her a little weaker than vampires are otherwise known to be.
it's good advice and caroline makes note of what she'd done to obtain the blood and where this one was - though apparently, upon closer observation, there's plenty more dispensers where that came from. ]
Deal. [ she smiles, taking the last few sips from her blood bag before letting her hand slip back into carmilla's, letting her lead them back to the bonfire. she pauses in step for a second, her fingers going to her mouth. ] Wait, do I have any blood anywhere?
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( either a dispenser or if that ever fails them, they'll have to figure something else out. because a hungry vampire is dangerous, not just to whoever ends up their snack but the vampire in question. because ravenous and blood starved, it was easy to make a mistake. to get sloppy. that's the sort of thing that could get you killed, again. and while undeath wasn't amazing, the idea of being truly nonexistent isn't particularly appealing, either.
they ditch the blood bags and head back toward the beach, though at the pause Carmilla does stop to look the blonde over. hmm... mostly presentable, though, she does lift her spare hand to brush a tiny drop away from the corner of Caroline's mouth with her thumb. ) You're good. ( is it a little sexual to suck the blood off her finger? maybe, but look, Carmilla has a tendency to make everything look sexual, it's a talent of hers.
she smiles, and it's more genuine than sensual, so it's fine. yeah, okay, still not admitting it, but it is nice to not be alone. it's thrilling to be presented with another vampire that isn't already entangled in Maman's mind games. more like Mattie, less a flunky that would run back to mother with anything she did. someone she can have fun with, someone that Gets It. not someone she needs to constantly maintain lies and stay on her toes around. being a vampire is unbearably lonely. is it really so wrong to enjoy the idea of having someone else like you around? )
C'mon. Let's go. ( that bonfire seems a hell of a lot more intriguing than it had before now that they're going together. )
no subject
carmilla reaches out and brushes away a stray drop of blood after looking her over, and caroline blinks a little, surprised at the gesture but not unpleasantly so, much to her own surprise. it is pretty flirty, but while caroline is more often than not attracted to males, she doesn't hate it.
she smiles back, and it's definitely genuine. however different they are in terms of their vampirisim and overall demeanor, she's glad to have somebody in an unfamiliar place that understands, too. ]
Want one of those fruity things on me?
tw: casual suicide talk, sire stuff, woosh
that said, while she'd been at peace with it, she didn't want to die for no reason either. she'd fought too hard, too long, too viciously, to just throw in the towel because it was easy. it made all of that fighting to survive a waste. it was almost a petulant refusal to give in and just let herself die — it'd surely be easier. she probably wouldn't be happy dead but she also wouldn't have to feel much of anything, and that's almost tempting in and of itself when she's used to feeling so eternally shitty.
she doesn't particularly feel like death would be better than the life she has now, though. she's not under the influence of Maman, whose temper could snap quicker and harder than a whip. she can do whatever she wants, and not do whatever she wants, which is truthfully the more important stipulation. Mother never did care what she did, as long as it didn't make a mess she'd have to clean up. it was more a matter of not doing what she was supposed to that always got her in trouble. until her loving, doting mother crawled back from apparent death and managed to pluck her back through space-time, why not enjoy herself here? the robots could only gently suggest she do what they wanted, and Carmilla only sometimes bothers.
much better than being trapped in a coffin of blood for decades for having the audacity to fall for a mark.
so she drags Caroline back towards the bonfire, intent on nothing but enjoying themselves. a long time ago she used to enjoy being undead, swanning around the streets of Paris with Mattie. feeling beautiful and limitless and on the cusp of a breath, like the still in the air before the start of a romantic play or an equisite poem. it took a good few decades to understand it wasn't the breathless moment before something beautiful, more like the still-lunged terror before a bloodied, desperate scream. maybe her world is black and bleak but that doesn't mean Caroline's has to be.
it seems Carmilla is not the only one who is accidentally sexual. she can't help but laugh at the offer, though she's well aware Caroline didn't mean it that way. ) Just in one of those red solo cups is fine. ( she agrees, teasing a little but not with any bite or heat. )
tw: murder talk, terrible friend discussion, 2000s pop
she doesn't want to think about that right now, though. mystic falls and all its problems are far from where she is now, and however long she's here she'd like to find the best in the situation. it's what she's always done, right? ]
You got it. [ she reaches out, squeezing carmilla's hand once before running off to the bar, returning before too long with the requested red solo cup and one of her own fruity things. ] Now, I believe you wanted to dance?
[ the song is another party favorite of caroline's. although it may be by a fake band, we don't know. ]
no subject
( drinks, a dance, someone else that at least kind of gets it... the night is turning off better than Carmilla had any hope of when it started. a part of her wonders if there's not some shoe that's about to drop. like Caroline might be some mole, planted by her mother. the same mother that's supposed to be dead, granted, but Carmilla can't help but suspect a trick when her life feels almost too good to be true. and of course, when it comes to tricks, her mommy dearest was always the best at pulling the wool over her eyes.
or maybe it's not her mother that will ruin this, somehow. maybe Carmilla will ruin it all on her own. she's good at it. it's probably foolish to hope for too much, here... but she can't help a little bloom of something that almost feels like hope in her undead heart all the same.
instead of worrying about how this is bound to fall apart or how it's a matter of time before she ruins it, Carmilla decides to just enjoy it. so she swallows at least half of her fruity whatever that Caroline delivered and then determinedly drags the blonde back toward the music and back towards the dancing. no more talks of blood or ugly things that go bump in the night. just enjoying a moment. somehow, eternal creatures were especially good at treasuring a moment. )