text ★ un: cocked tale

[pathologise]

time loops
shapeshifting
walking dead
dragons
death at every route

that's the bullshit everyone thinks is the first thing you should know
not 'hi, sorry you're stuck here like the rest of us'
"at least there's alcohol" isn't a comfort
getting caught by magic is an absolute way to die so we're fucked
if the beacons just break why are we trying to find them?
why are they apparently believable?
we're helping the people that kidnapped us
has anyone said no? because i don't want to help them and fall into more magic and death

( she is very drunk and not at all coping with everything she's been told since getting on the train )

Comments

[pathologise]

they have wings
what's a train going to do?

[slippin]

I think these are unique circumstances. [ "I don't think anything outside the train is alive." ]

And what do they care about a train? Not like they can eat it.

[pathologise]

no but they could eat us when we get off it
or something else could kill us
ghosts??
the not as dead as it should be??
or just people??

[slippin]

[ Ohhhhhhhh boy, this is not what he signed up for. ] Okay, where are you from?

[pathologise]

minnesota

[slippin]

First of all, congrats on not being from Wisconsin.

Second of all, Minnesota is also teeming with things that might kill you. You got your thousands of frozen lakes, your carbon monoxide, city buses, moose, hitmen played by Steve Buscemi. Lyme disease. But most of the time you don't think about that, right? Or you don't think about every single one all at once.

Same thing applies here. You gotta figure out what kind of made up crap is the order of the day and put the rest out of your head.

[pathologise]

those are very different things
human things you can do something about to protect yourself
this you can't
not without more magic and that's more danger

[slippin]

[ He doesn't think moose (or, while we're here, city buses) qualify as normal human phenomena, but it sounds like she's just being stubborn. Which he can't really fault her for. ]

Then I guess you're left with finding a [ big dumb sucker ] heroic magical type who'll throw themselves in the line of fire for you.

The good news is, we got a lot of those. A LOT.

[ It occurs to him that maybe that's the secret purpose of this—not bad—until he reads through more of the responses and sees all the emoji bird-flips. ]

[pathologise]

pass
anyone doing that is a schofseckel
and probably dead

1/2

[slippin]

A what?

2/2

[slippin]

For what it's worth no one's ACTUALLY died.

[ Definitely the comment to send second! ]

[pathologise]

yet
that you know of
do the beacons even work???
they keep breaking

[slippin]

There are a couple people around who went in and came back. Which I'm aware isn't a ringing endorsement, but nobody's getting vaporized.

[pathologise]

just being thrown in lava pits
offered to dragons
all of the safe activities

[slippin]

Those are electives though.

[pathologise]

didn't sound like it

[saintclaire]

Adrienne, my husband and I are lawyers in New Mexico. This place is dangerous and often terrifying, but we've still managed for six months.

[slippin]

It probably helps that dragons don't know what lawyers are.

[saintclaire]

That too. Being hated by pigs is one thing, but dragons, that'd be something else.

[pathologise]

okay??

[saintclaire]

I'm not saying it's not awful. I'm just saying you'll adapt.

[pathologise]

you don't
it doesn't matter how long you have with something
it's still fucked

[saintclaire]

I'm not disputing that.

[pathologise]

but

[saintclaire]

But nothing. It’s fucked up.