Accountability.

[explosivecombat]

There are all sorts of secrets to this place, really, ways to get from place to place reasonably unnoticed. Some of those ways involve the ability to shift one's appearance, some of them involve shadows and vessels and darkness; for those without those sorts of gifts, though, one has to rely on more conventional means. Panels and doorways, joins and seams that don't join up quite right; portions of the wall that will open up if you manipulate them properly. The Conductor himself tends to rely on the latter; he is, after all, entirely human. He's thin, as though he doesn't eat terribly much, but his clothes are immaculate and sharply-tailored, a suit and long coat all in white and shades of pale grey; his hair is long, trailing at least halfway down his back in a thin, tightly-tied ponytail, and his eyes are cold when he moves to stand at the thirtieth podium – it's not his, it never has been, but it's going to do for now. He doesn't seem anxious at all about being here; there's nothing nervous in his demeanor, and he's keeping his head up, perfectly willing to look everyone in the face. There's a definite arrogance about him, as is probably to be expected, though he'll certainly acknowledge everyone once he's there – when he bows it's enough to be respectful, but not nearly enough to expose the back of his neck. When he speaks, his voice is recognizable but it's quiet, far moreso than one would assume him to be based on the volume of the intercom alone; his tone is even, almost unsettlingly calm given the circumstances, though there's a hardness to it that never quite goes away. "It's a pleasure to speak to all of you in person; I'd say that it's almost a shame that the circumstances have to be what they are, but I'm not going to insult your intelligence like that." He straightens up then; the smile he's offering is understated, but it's not particularly nice. "I understand that we have a fair amount to discuss; shall we begin?" Your host for the evening, everyone; let's start.

Comments

[blazeit]

So that's why Lisbeth chose to stay, huh. Because apparently you have to go through a metric ton of absolute fucking bullshit and you might get dumped into some offshoot timeline without one of your limbs even after all that absolute fucking bullshit.

[openterrain]

It doesn't sound like home will be missing us much anyway, if it even still exists.

[ This is so unbelievably shitty, goddamn. ]

[blazeit]

Well, it might exist. It just exists with alternate us who didn't get swept up in FUCKING BULLSHIT.

[ UNBELIEVABLY SHITTY ]

[openterrain]

I don't know about you, but I wouldn't handle it too well if another me suddenly showed up.

[blazeit]

No, I'm pretty sure that would fuck up a lot of things and probably just make another offshoot timeline or some other parallel worlds shenanigans. Not that I want to test this theory.

[openterrain]

... Especially if it was other versions of us missing random body parts.

[blazeit]

Or it could just be our fucking corpse that drops back wherever we're supposed to be from, for that matter. I am so fucking done with this, we are literally the most unlucky bastards across an infinite number of worlds.

[announcemyvictory]

...if it thinks that's fair, that explains a lot of things.

[withabigsmile]

...What are we going to do?

[announcemyvictory]

I don't know. I'm worried about home, and my home d-doesn't... [hesitates] It doesn't even really need me. Not like with so many of you. Even if I act like it, they're all likely better off now.

[blazeit]

...

Why don't we change angles for a while. I mean, we have a more immediately solvable problem, as stupidly crazy as it sounds... bringing our friends back to life.

[ninehundredlives]

You're right. We know there's ways to do that. And if we do that, Lisbeth might be able to help us with the rest of it.

[She might not have ALL the knowledge Kimblee has, but at least she's willing. She'll be a sight easier to deal with.]

[announcemyvictory]

With the god, you mean. Blue may be right that it's foolish, but we've got no other choice.

[ninehundredlives]

Oh, it's absolutely foolish.

[Susan's practical; she doesn't think it's a good idea to charge headlong at God in their current state at all.]

But she'll be a lot more helpful than him, if there is a way.

[withabigsmile]

[...Wait a minute.]

We have to give something up to get back through that gate, right?

[So maybe-]

What about that thing in his mouth?

[ninehundredlives]

If that one isn't sufficient, he's apparently got others lying around.

[blazeit]

... He said that thing's got like 40 souls in it, right? [ Blue, you absolute genius. ] Maybe we can also get our powers and stuff like that back that way, too.

[blazeit]

Yeah, and we talked about it earlier... you know, the way that Logan managed to come back to life?

I guess we'd need access to everybody's.... [ uh ] ... bodies to do it that way.

KIMDUCTOR

[ninehundredlives]

We would.

[To the Conductor:] Is that why you saw fit to lock the morgue drawers?

[explosivecombat]

[oh my god woman will you think for a moment - ]

Consider how some of those people died and tell me that you would like anyone here to just blunder into opening a drawer.

[openterrain]

With those potions, right? I got a ton of them earlier this week.

[ ... along with a bunch of Weiss' underwear, apparently, but that's not something he needs to bring up right now. ]

[announcemyvictory]

Just a way into the morgue lockers? Mr. Conductor must have keys.

[sunsong]

I'm down. That was step one, anyway.

[icysemblance]

Agreed. Even if we can't go home, that doesn't mean we have to be alone.

[oftheland]

...Yeah, I think I'd at least like to work on that so on top of the infinitely valuable sundae of reviving our dead friends, we can possibly get the cherry on top of having some more heads to put together. They still might've figured out something that they haven't really been able to tell us about that yet.