TEST DRIVE MEME 001

[rubimods]

⚰︎ ⍢ ⌲ ⍚ TEST DRIVE MEME:

CONTENT WARNINGS for this game include: monsters, body horror, dub-con, non-con, religion, blood/violence, and marking/branding, loss of autonomy/self, and mental influences.

This log additionally has warnings for: nudity, spiders, waxplay, character death, and references to children in proximity to sexual situations.

✧ ✧ ✧

Welcome to RUBILYKSKOYE — a dark, horror-smut game where player choices will drive a mod-run storyline about the world and its NPCs. For the first round, this test drive serves as characters' arrival into game.

THESE THREADS CAN BE GAME CANON if both players are accepted into the game and agree to it. However, if players who'd prefer to start fresh are welcome to reuse these prompts in their own personal logs upon acceptance into the communities.

If you have QUESTIONS about the test drive prompts, please ask HERE. Questions about the game itself or the general setting should be directed to the FAQ.

FAQ ✧ SETTING ✧ CALENDAR ✧ RESERVES ✧ APPLICATIONS

AWAKENING IN PAJAK WOOD

The chirping of partridges in the treetops rouses you. Light barely filters through the canopy, just enough to suggest warmth of the sun. By the time it reaches the forest floor, the daylight has taken on a sickly green tinge. You lie amongst the mosses and ferns, the soil cold and just a little damp on your bare skin. Wherever you were before this moment, whatever you were doing or wearing, when you awaken in this forest, you find yourself naked and helpless as the day you were born.

Fortunately, you seem to be alone. The birdsong continues as you sit up and get your bearings — aside from a brief wave of disoriented nausea, you seem to be no worse for wear than you last remember. Amongst gnarled oaks and moss, you see nothing around. No sign of civilization or sentient life. Movement flickers at the corner of your eye, but it's just a curious animal — brave squirrels or lizards who have come to see what stirs in their home.

Then, like the rippling of the horizon at noontime, the ash-gray soil around you undulates. Sea, not earth. Something else has come to greet you — their grey bodies blended in so easily with the floor, but as you stagger to your feet, you see them. Thousands of spiders roll like waves underfoot. They crawl towards you from the darker edge of the forest.

attack

Individuals who attack the spiders will find the small spiders are easy to kill, but the pheromones released by their corpses draw larger spiders in their place. Huge, blood-red spiders the size of hunting dogs drop from the treetops. In addition to their venomous bite, which contains a fast-acting paralytic, these creatures are clever: they will attempt to use their webbing to handicap any trespassers, binding limbs together or to trees. If you're unfortunate to become fully cocooned, you don't have long before this forest will be the last thing you see.

FAQ: DEATH RULES

hunt

Any aspiring monster-hunters enterprising enough to try to follow the spiders to their nest will move eastward. This way, the forest grows darker and darker — though the sun never grows warm red-gold with sunset.

In the void, the birdsong is replaced by the click of mandibles and the skitter of many legs, but soon it is impossible to see. Even with the brightest magical light does not reach further than a few inches. The air grows heavy and thick, as if it were not air at all but some more solid mass. Almost like liquid-smoke, it presses down upon you. Slowing your movements. Soon, you cannot move at all.

Turn back while you still can — collapsing out here is dangerous. The void can play tricks on your senses. You may find yourself reliving unhappy memories or hallucinating your worst nightmares.

SETTING: THE VOID

But flee the spiders westward and you will discover that the wood is well-populated with the survival resources that someone might seek — berries bushes and trees bearing stone fruits; sticks and dry leaves to aid in the building of a fire; rocks big enough to fashion into crude weapons; small animals that can be hunted or caught; hike long enough, and you might just find the freshwater stream that runs north-to-south, populated by both poisonous toads and delicious crawdads.

What's more, you may run into others with stories just like yours. Some may have already formed clumsy nudist hiking parties, others may still be naked and confused and processing how they have no memory of how they got here. They all stagger vaguely, as you do, with only the sun for a waymarker — and even that won't last long.

Now is a good time to overcome any hang-ups you have about modesty, as it's going to be a long hike. If you sneak a good look at your new companions, you may four varietals of marks on their bodies. Maybe someone will even point out that you have one, too.

FAQ: CURSE MARKS

EVERY DAY LIKE THE ONE BEFORE

Hike far enough — or long enough that the sun does go down — and signs of life come into view. The glow of fires and lights, the smooth curve of a stone wall. A town sits at the edge of this wood, a reward to the survivors.

The fifty-foot wall of beige stone protecting the town's perimeter has only a single entrance — an iron gate positioned on the southern edge. When you arrive, the gate is already open, welcoming people into town from the winding dirt road. Attentive eyes may note that the road itself bears the mark of many wagon wheels and horse hoofs, but not cars.

guards

The guards grant entry to anyone who attempts a conversation with them. However, if your character is more likely to attempt to sneak in, overcome the guards, or attack them, please reach out HERE.

Inside the wall lies a quaint, historic town with a population around five thousand. The streets are cobbled, and their signs are lit by gas lamp. Wooden shutters protect otherwise open-air windows on the buildings, which are all under three stories with gabled roofs. A number of businesses hug the main street — a clockmaker, a cobbler, a bank — while residential homes sprawl outwards towards the wall. At the far end of the main street, visible about a mile to the north now that the trees and the enormous wall is out of the way, sits a castle with three towers.

No matter what time you pass through the gate, the streets are full of people. The climate of the bustle befits a night market or a busy friday downtown — plenty of people to ogle at your exposed body. But despite any efforts on your part to hide or make excuses, the locals don't seem offended by your nakedness. Even families with children don't gawk or look twice. In fact, the further into town you go, the more you may notice that they all wear revealing clothing that, to your sensibilities, may seem sexually suggestive. Some individuals openly expose their breasts and nipples, while some others may incidentally reveal when they turn around to tend to their errands that their dress is backless — entirely! If anything, they seem to be under the impression that you're naked to participate in the evening's events with the rest of them.

Those still determined to find proper clothing will find that modern clothing stores aren't a thing here. The closest this town has is a tailor's shop, which is closed for religious observance, and a stand in the central marketplace selling scarves and blankets.

Fortunately, the people of the town are very generous! The locals will gladly share what they have with those who ask politely — but those items are as revealing as what they're wearing. You might get a mesh bodysuit or drape outfit. Remember not to be ungracious! it's only appropriate for the occasion.

steal clothing

Anyone unwilling to ask nicely for help could break into someone's house or yard to steal some of their clean laundry. Notably, inside their homes, the people of the town also appear to own some more modest apparel. Be sure to alert us HERE if your character pursues this option.

SETTING: CRIME

And what is the occasion? The locals are excited and flattered by any interest in their ordinary weekly prayer: the folks dancing and selling their wares are all offering their energies to give thanks and ask for their god's patronage! The abstractions are all familiar — fertility, harvest, peace. Smalltalk makes them eager to chat and draw you into those festivities — including some ceremonial wax-dripping on the exposed parts of your body!

Anyone who chats at length with the townspeople will gather that the locals feel it's better for the newcomers to dive into the deep-end because, since you'll be settling in here, they expect you'll want to participate down the line. They seem to be under the impression that the new arrivals are a boon from their god.

In addition, many of the locals' choice of clothes reveal the same four types of marks on their bodies as the folx who were wandering out in the wood!

ROOM AND BOARD

Once you're tired out, the locals will help you find a place to stay. The boarding house is several stories tall and spacious, accessible through an embellished iron garden gate and obscured by hanging plants, trees, and vines. Beyond the overgrown yard is a bright red door, which opens into a spacious cottage.

The house has clearly been empty for some time — dust has gathered on various furnishings — bedding, sofas, curtains, wooden tables. According to the locals, it has remained empty since its last occupant passed away, and that's all they'll say about that!

Each floor of the house has a shared sitting room, but only the first floor has a kitchen — large enough to support feeding the entire household. Here, a few of the townspeople will help out — they stock the kitchen and help make dinner for the new arrivals.

finding roommates

Don't spend too much time in the dining room going for seconds, though. You'll want to claim a bedroom quickly because each one only has two full-size beds, and there aren't enough spaces for everyone. The last people upstairs will need to double up to squeeze in. Roommates will not be mod-assigned; players should coordinate directly with one another to determine their living arrangements.

Get a good night's rest. By the light of day, locals will help get the new arrivals set up on the coal stove with breakfast. You may notice they're dressed in a way you would almost call normal — at least, in a manner befitting 19th century Eastern Europe. As you find your way around town to get your bearings, folks are eager to help you find a place to apply your skills so you can contribute to your new home.

Comments

genya safin | shadow & bone | niez

[pigeonblood]

[ content warning: history of SA, mutilation. and note: depending on this answer, her rune may or may not be visible. ]

AWAKENING — spiders

[ It's as she wipes cold clods of dirt from her skin, the reality of her undeniable nudity sinking in, that she begins to shiver. Shaking, she reaches to her face. Her fingers alight on her brow in dread. Her eyepatch is gone. Tumbling down, she hesitates to touch her bare neck. Genya balks silently, aghast. Nausea boils in her stomach. The ruthlessness is unfathomable.

Genya clasps an arm across chest, fingers gripping into the opposite shoulder, and casts a frenzied, furious glance about. She seems to be alone in the forest, abandoned. No aches or stings surface in the ebbs of her panic. With certainty, she knows she wasn't physically harmed. The sense of violation hardly abates.

As she steels herself to stand, the ground shudders. Dark pinpricks, the first soldiers of a swarm, tickle up onto her legs. Tiny black dots speckled among her innumerable scars. (An underlined diamond marked on her inner thigh briefly registers.) She hastens to her feet, frantically brushing them off. More start the climb, threading back along the ground to a thickening stream of spiders that pours out from the canopy's darkness.

Genya screams. ]

AWAKENING — heartbeats

[ She runs until the last spider has dropped from her skin, then relents to an urgent, inelegant stride. Vigorously, she combs through and shakes out her hair, losing a tangle of strands and several more of the skittering pests. At last, she stops to collect herself despite the compulsion to swat at phantom vermin. It takes some time.

Eventually, she's able to breathe, if not easily. She reminds herself of what she can do from here. Genya then tucks herself against a tree, spine to its trunk. Attuning herself to her own heartbeat, she gradually allows it to lullingly fill her head. Her hand, held at her breastbone, comes to her side in a mirror of the other. Palms of both faced outward, her fingers spread as if netting the air.

A heartbeat. Any heartbeat. That will be her heading. Once she has it, she proceeds with caution. But she isn't used to the forest, and can't manage silence among the leaves and brittle twigs. From afar, she can at least tell that the person she's found is no less nude than she is. If a perpetrator, then a wolf in sheep's clothing. She won't learn anything of her predicament by avoiding them. ]

Hello. [ she calls, approaching slowly to within several paces. She stops there. She keeps an arm crossed across her chest, though her grip on herself isn't so severe as when she first awakened. ] Are you also lost?

LIKE THE ONE BEFORE — supplies

[ Within the gates, Genya is quick to adapt. The ambivalence of the townsfolk sickens her, but that indignation won't clothe her nor her companions. She tames her mussed hair by simply brushing it back. With some effort, she musters a gentle smile and approaches one of the locals. ]

Excuse me. Do you have any clothing to spare? A blanket, perhaps? [ She doesn't feel the need to explain the situation, as people continue to trickle in from the woods. Others made it here before she did. Their plight is obvious. What follows is a bit of back and forth, until her congeniality ultimately wins her some supplies. Far less than are needed: a blanket and two robes comprised of so little fabric they could be more appropriately called sashes.

Anyone she met on her way to the village, she will offer the first robe. The second she allows herself. It drapes across one breast, sewn at the hip and fluttering down one leg. Positioning it mindfully affords her modesty so tenuous, she's exposed by a light breeze. She supposes she has to be grateful it covers anything.

Genya returns to the gates with the blanket, and approaches someone who enters looking particularly distraught. ]

Here, take this.

LIKE THE ONE BEFORE — wax

[ Throughout the night, Genya repeats this process with whatever amenable-looking townsperson on whom she has yet to attempt it. They get wise before long. Then there's nothing left for her to do but observe. She wonders at the runes and what they denote. To that end, she strikes up conversation with a local, presenting herself as curious about the festivities.

The woman is happy to engage her. She barrels on sentence after sentence, regaling Genya with broad, flowery nonsense. Then, she spots someone behind Genya, and motions enthusiastically for them to join. It all happens so fast, Genya hasn't glanced over her shoulder before hot wax is poured onto it.

She hisses in alarm and steps back from the two of them, colliding into someone else. Instinctively, she shoves herself away from them, too. ] Don't --

ROOM & BOARD

[ She could have stayed longer. Could have found out more. But Genya was weary, and iller as the revelry continued. Somehow, that became the worst thing about it. It just carried on, convincing her beyond hope that what happened to them was nothing new. As if it has happened before.

Retiring before many others, she's able to secure the privacy of an empty room. There are two beds, though, and she expects she won't be alone for very long. How can she feel about that? She's exhausted. Worse than this has been foisted on her already. Genya wraps a sheet around herself and stands at the window, looking out. Her hand plays over her throat as her eyes begin to sting. The nichevo'ya took her sight and left her her tears.

The thought crossed her mind tonight that whoever is behind this is crueller than the Darkling. In this sobering solitude, suspended like the silence after a strike, she's reminded of other evils. Different in their methods, all alike in ruin. Degrees are an illusion. Evil is evil.

As the door creaks open, Genya hastily wipes her eyes and turns to regard the stranger entering. Her guard is up and she doesn't care to hide it anymore.

Evenly, head held high, ] Who are you?

WILDCARD

[ Feel free to toss something else at me, or PM journal or PP verhoeven to plot! ]

heartbeats

[blueshit]

[ By this point, Jesse's recovered a little from his own spider misadventure. He's still stumbling helplessly through the woods, lost and naked, but at least the spiders are gone. So things could be worse. Marginally.

He stops when he hears the voice, looking over instinctively. Animal instinct takes over before he can think, and his gaze darts up and down Genya's body, drinking in the sight of her in a split second before he jerks his head away just as quickly, staring fixedly anywhere but at her. Belatedly, he brings his own hands up to awkwardly cover himself, nodding his head in a jerky motion.

Jesse himself isn't much to look at these days. Skinny and malnourished, torso sprinkled with scars, hair and beard grown out in a ragged mess. He can't even bring himself to care, though, not even now, in front of a girl. Everything's too fucked for that. ]

Y-yeah. I guess so.

Sorry about, uh. [ He waves a hand in the air, vaguely indicating his own nudity, or Genya's, or maybe both. ] Y'know.

[pigeonblood]

[ Genya offers a wanly understanding smile. She takes another step forward, as he doesn't seem wary of her. ]

I suspect you had as much choice in it as I did. [ Carefully, she pulls her bedraggled hair over one shoulder, then the other. It's long enough to cover her breasts, provided she and the forest remain still. With proximity, his scars come further into relief. As do hers. Genya is prudent not to break eye contact.

What else do they have in common? ] Are you grisha?

[blueshit]

[ He catches the movement out of the corner of his eye, and flicks his gaze over to watch warily as she comes closer. It's hard to know where to look. He doesn't want to be a pig or whatever and look at her body, but maintaining eye contact is hard, too. Something had happened to her, something maybe even worse than what happened to Jesse. It'd be rude to stare.

So he looks sort of at her good eye and sort of past her, scoffing at her assumption and shaking his head. She's right, of course. Naked in a forest is the last thing he'd choose to be.

Well, almost last. ]

Yeah. I just woke up like this.

[ His brow furrows at her question, though, and he frowns, shaking his head. Maybe she'd mistaken him for someone else? Maybe she knows someone else here, or something about where they are and what's happening? ]

I'm Jesse.

[pigeonblood]

[ Staring doesn't bother her. She's practiced at acting as if it's beneath her notice. Genya has been stared at most of her life. For her beauty, for her unsightliness. A sea of attention, and her chained to a rock in the middle of it. Curious, lascivious, malicious, no wave is greater than any other, and they can all be broken. Not her.

At least he's trying to be polite. That's not lost on her. And, from his answer, he didn't earn his own wounds for a sin he was perceived to have been born with, which heartens her. ]

Genya. [ She approaches, hands hovering at her navel. She'd fuss with a sash or a button, were it there. ]

like the one before

[sunmon]

[ alina never wants to see genya safin again.

at least, that's what she's been telling herself, out in the northern woods at the border of ravka, clomping around as she avoids kirigan and stumbles into mal and everything else. genya safin had been part of it, had kept mal's letters from her, had betrayed her, just as surely as aleksander had.

when she's most honest with herself, and her own patheticness, that's really what it all boils down to: not the fold or the violence, but the broken trust. being treated like a doll and steered and used. and genya had helped him every step of the way.

all of this, however, is forgotten when genya is pulling a blanket around alina's naked body as she enters the town. because it is genya, and yet— ]

Genya. Genya, your face. [ a surge of anguish rolls through alina. she lifts her hands, cups the other girl's face. her beautiful face, and the violent scars like volcra claws that tear across it. alina's stomach turns. alina gasps, but it's already half on its way to a choked sob because she knows without asking how it happened, who was responsible. ]

[pigeonblood]

[ She yearns for a familiar face. Any, truthfully. But it's unkind to hope for a friend under these circumstances. Someone awful, then. A face to which she can put all this madness, just for the moment. She doesn't care if they're responsible.

Her heart breaks upon spotting Alina. Genya rushes up and throws the blanket around her shoulders, at first unsure of what to say. Before she can decide, Alina regards her with such acute horror that Genya forgets where they are. It's not similar to her reaction upon Genya and Baghra's escape from Kirigan, it's the same. The cool, dark night around them solidifies into stone walls. The milling crowd fills with the possibility of further confrontation: the queen, the little prince, David.

Genya swallows. Her hands rest firmly on Alina; if freed, they'll shake. ]

You're in shock. [ Isn't she? Genya can't think of any other reason she should forget, but then Genya can't think very well all of a sudden. Of one thing she's certain: Alina isn't simply surprised to see her blind eye uncovered. ]

Come. [ she implores as she ushers Alina further from the gates. ]

[sunmon]

Where are we?

[ she lets herself be dragged along for a moment, too bewildered to do anything else. her heart aches, yet her hands and feet and face have started to feel cold. not from the air or the exposure; it's not so different here from ravkan summers, even a little warmer. but yes. shock.

not of the sort, she thinks, that genya means. ]

Stop. Genya, stop. [ barely through the gate, alina stops walking. no. she's not going to just be led around like a child anymore. if she wants to have any say in what's going to happen in her life, then she needs to stop letting other people decide those things for her. that's how she wound up in this position in the first place, isn't it? ]

What's going on? What happened to — [ she doesn't want the answer, though, does she? alina realizes it before she can finish her question. to avoid making choices, to drift along with what others want from her, spares alina the ugliness of the truth. she gets her soft little bed and her warm bath and all the gilded praises of the boyars and the black general and all the crippling responsibility too.

she swallows thickly. her voice and her expression both shake as she finally musters a revised, targeted question, brave enough to face it head-on: ] Did Kirigan do this to you?

[pigeonblood]

[ She can feel Alina resist her guidance. Instinctively, she compensates. Being forced to stop stuns her the same as if she'd been thrown against a wall. Saints, she hasn't heard a thing Alina's said. Genya looks down between the two of them, attempting to ground herself in the connection Alina mercifully hasn't revoked from her.

When Alina speaks, albeit stumblingly, she listens. Her own questions immediately threaten to drown her out. Again? Must she do this again? In a situation no less hostile than her escape from Kirigan or his attack on the Spinning Wheel. In which she is no less lost, nor exposed.

It's disgusting.

Genya pushes it down. The sickness, the anguish, the offense. All of it. This isn't Alina's fault, and she can't help either of them by shrinking into the shivering wretch she was then. She shuts her eyes, shakes her head remorsefully. Her hands fall from Alina's shoulders as she meets her gaze. Unbreakable Genya Safin. That's who is needed now. ]

I tried to leave him. [ Her concern mirrors Alina's. ] Do you not remember?

AWAKENING — spiders

[dadyl]

[ His own horrible awakening has just chased him into her clearing when he registers her in his peripheral vision - just a pale blur snatching at the same shivering wave of spiders climbing on bare skin - just a second before she screams. The sound seems to hit Daryl's core, to stop him in his tracks. It's piercing, unignorable, and worse - as much a sound from home as Daryl could hope to hear. Moving towards it immediately is a habit, a compulsion. Something he does simply thoughtlessly.

Someone is in trouble. Someone who needs help.

That's what cuts through Daryl's own silent panic at waking up naked and disarmed, completely lost, covered in a field of spiders. It cuts through his twisted confusion. Nothing makes sense but that one single thing, a person in trouble, does. He bolts toward her and his embarrassing circumstances don't have time to overcome the instinct and so Daryl does something he'll later never be able to believe he did:

he scoops her up from behind the knees, the other arm under her back, and runs. ]

Hold on!

[pigeonblood]

[ Genya bats wildly at her calves, her thighs, her arms. Retreating steps take her nowhere: the spiders are all around. She can feel them gush under her heels, giving the very slightest resistance before bursting. They're only spiders, and they only tickle. They aren't biting. But in her panic, she can't tell that, or tell herself she's overreacting. Awakening stripped bare and lost, the swarm might as well be hands all over her.

It is a promise from this strange and vicious place: I have you.

She can hear nothing but her own frightened gasps and grunts. She's preoccupied swiping at herself when she's suddenly overtaken, grabbed up from the ground. She can't process it. As single-minded as a spider, climbing for no reason but instinct, she continues to brush them from her forearms and her chest. One falls from the top of her head, eliciting a cry. No more, no more, no more. She digs her hands into her hair and shakes it violently.

All of which can't be making her terribly easy to carry. ]

[dadyl]

[ She is absolutely not holding on, that's for damn sure, so Daryl has to do it for the both of them even while being slapped and elbowed by her repeatedly in the process of ridding herself of the spiders. But even with all that he's seen, with all that he's been through, Daryl can't blame her for the reaction. He can feel the spidery legs on his own skin, his body hair only helping to give them away, to make them impossible to ignore. But he also can't indulge in the same response as her right now or it would mean risking them both falling into the tide of spider followers that's still sweeping out from where he'd snatched her from.

Luck is still on his side until her kicking heel hits him in the gut just while he's gasping for breath and that makes his knee buckle just enough for him to know it's all about to crash on him real hard. ]

Don't--!

[ He can't get his foot over the next sudden rise in the ground in front of him and then they're both going down in an almost graceless tumble - almost, because Daryl at least has enough coordination and instinct not to land on her after he half-tosses her out of his own way and then eats the dirt. ]

[pigeonblood]

[ Somehow, "Don't" breaks through to her. A split second after it's uttered, as if to explain the drop of her stomach as the rest of her falls. Genya shrieks softly as she lands, hip and knee and thigh catching on the ground. The pain is dull; she hasn't broken anything. At worst, she'll have a broad scrape from an exposed tree root.

Another spider tumbles to the ground, where she smacks it away. But it fall into dirt, not more of its horde. Her head whips around, unsure of which direction they came. The direction in which their pursuers are thickest. It's deeply unsettling, seeing them crawling in throng, all moving in tandem like the limb of one conscious being. But they aren't, and even in the gloom, she can't mistake them for anything but what they are. Spiders. Just spiders.

Scrambling to her feet, she rushes over to the man who must have carried her here. They're keen to claim him now that he's on the ground with them. Genya brushes them away, far less rough than she was with herself, and tugs him up by the arm. ]

Come on, get up!

wax

[morozova]

( genya jerks away from him, and in that moment of startled alarm, he hesitates, trying first to make sense of her being here and then.

and then — ) Genya, ( and, oh, there is a wealth of emotion in the name. horror and sadness as he takes in her face. )

What... ( the words stumble, falter. because where does he even begin? )

[pigeonblood]

[ Genya has spent years in his presence. His bearing is as indelibly set in her mind as the layout of the palace walls. She needs no more than a sliver of a glimpse to know it's him. The profound certainty roots her to the spot. Stood perpendicular to him, her fingers snagged on her dry bottom lip.

After a beat, they coil inward. A loose fist. She looks over at him, wet eyes searing with hatred and grief. She's so far beyond disbelief -- that he's here, or that he's unscathed. Unmarred by his precious children. ] You.

[ Does that answer the question? ]

[morozova]

( it does and it doesn't.

it's rare for him to be caught so utterly off-guard, but genya's recoiling from him like she's just been struck manages it. it's clear, immediately, that something has happened. something truly terrible, if she is still sporting the scars of it — and such scars. the closest thing he's seen was ...

he banishes the thought immediately. although the sour taste of merzost still lingers on his tongue: smoke and bitter ashes. )

Genya, please.

( voice soft, careful. so very patient. the voice one would use when they're trying to coax a frightened animal. )

You know me. You know I would never harm you.

heartbeats (diabel) | cw: death

[ultraviolents]

[ death hasn't robbed elektra of the hard ingrained instinct to survive. when the spiders had closed in, covering her skin and infesting in her hair, she had run, too; bugs don't frighten her but she's lived in enough countries where their bites are deadly within seconds to not want to remain among them for too long, and even if they're not the venomous kind, nothing swarms upon something without the intent to kill or feast.

she spends several minutes scrubbing her hands through her hair, pulling and shaking out clumps of dirt or arachnid corpses, and once she's as satisfied as she suspects she's ever going to be without the opportunity to scrub and scald herself clean, she starts rubbing down her skin. her hands linger over scars that should still be wounds on her abdomen; one long and gnarled at the edges, two smaller and round, several inches above it.

so she is dead. or at least, she should be.

so does that mean she's in hell?

a voice pulls her from her racing thoughts, and elektra's attention immediately focuses on her surroundings, stick's voice chiding her for losing focus in a dangerous situation. she swears in khmer under her breath, then listens for the voice as it speaks again and the footsteps accompanying it. they're approaching. ]

Who are you? [ they don't sound any better off than she is, but that doesn't mean they mean to help her. ]

[pigeonblood]

[ Genya is privately relieved it's another woman. She'll remain wary of cruelty and harm, the same as she would with anyone, but certain apprehensions she can put aside. The stranger is lean and muscular. The closer Genya gets, the svelter her definition. Like a Second Army soldier, not a first. Gleaning that, she encroaches no further.

This woman could simply enjoy exercise, or she could be dangerous. ]

Genya Safin. [ Some know her name. The Ravkan royal family and their nearest supporters. They'd see her tried for treason, if not killed on sight. Because she doesn't recognize this woman, Genya isn't overtly concerned about that, but she doesn't have the luxury of putting such concerns aside. What reason does she have to believe they aren't in Ravka, when she knows so little of the wilderness? ]

[ultraviolents]

[ genya’s instructs are good ones, though elektra’s never really liked cruelty for the sake of it. that doesn’t mean she hasn’t been less discriminating, especially under stick’s tutelage, but she’d been making an effort to do better after someone she cared for telling her he believed she could.

that had been before she’d died, of course, but no reason she can’t make the effort. ]

Elektra Natchios. [ genya may or may not be relieved to realize elektra’s got no idea who she is. an enemy or victim (likely both) of someone is evident from her appearance; scars mark her skin like an ingrained pattern and there’s damage to one of her eyes.

she doesn’t acknowledge either, except to let her hands fall at her sides, exposing her own scars to the other woman. ]

I woke up back there. Alone. [ she gestured back to where she’d run here from. ] Was it the same for you?

room & board

[ludomania]

[ it's obvious that he interrupted something, but he can't tell what it was. it wasn't his intention to disturb a woman having a moment, but he got here late and all the other rooms were taken. at least he's managed to find something to wear (even if it covers very little) and there are only some scratch marks on him – things could be much worse, considered the day he's had so far. ]

A friend? Felipe is my name.

[ he offers, his voice kind and his manner apologetic as he hovers overs the doorstep. he could still turn back and leave her to whatever it was she was doing. in fact, he gestures back at the hallway. ]

I'm sorry. Were you waiting for someone? I can find another room.

[pigeonblood]

[ She takes him in. His height, his build, any marks she can distinguish in the lamplight. She ought to have lit the room better instead of indulging her moroseness. Genya weighs the risks of allowing him to stay. By the number of naked wanderers she saw, losing the luxury of a room to herself seems inevitable. And by that same token, the rooms around her will fill with plenty of potential witnesses. Were he to attack her, and she find her combat abilities bested, a dozen boarders would hear her scream.

She trusts those odds over the air of charm he has about him. "A friend?" will remain a question for some time. ]

I wasn't. [ Genya holds his gaze. Nothing predatory lurks in his eyes -- active nor patient. She'll be vigilant for any shift thereof. ] Come in, then. You may have that bed. [ He nods towards the one against the far wall. The sheet around her was claimed from the one nearest the door. ]

[ludomania]

[ perhaps Felipe should have done a similar risk assessment before opening the door, but he likes to take chances and it looks like it paid this time. she seems welcoming enough and he trusts that they'll be buddies by the morning. the living nightmare hasn't affected his confidence in the least. ]

If you're sure? Thank you, miss.

[ his face lights up with gratitude and he reaches to close to door after himself – a closing to the deal. ]

After this morning I hardly remember what a bed feels like. This will be a wonderful reminder.

[ he mutters as he moves across the room, lightly shaking his head to himself. it's been a lot to take in and he hasn't quite accepted everything yet. when he's about to pass her by, he stops and turns to her, giving her a proper look. there's no malice in his eyes, only curiosity and compassion. the woman seems perfectly capable to handle the situation, but there are signs of something that has been wearing her down way before she came here. ]

Truly, your kindness means a lot to me.

Room and Board

[nootherway]

[ There's a woman in the room, a woman with a scarred face and a wary stance, even with only a sheet wrapped around her. Leah regards her from the doorway, her own face impassive as she calculates the distance between them and how quickly she would need to move in order to bash this woman's skull into the wall. She hasn't yet found a knife and here she finds herself surrounded on all sides by strangers, all of them enemies or dead men. So it goes.

She doesn't say a word. Just tilts her head to one side, and then the other, and steps inside to examine the room and see what she might take from it. ]

[pigeonblood]

[ Impassivity doesn't betray nothing. Nor does silence. The straight line of Genya's brow stiffens. She's used to being disregarded, but she lacks the graciousness to tolerate it in this moment. ]

You won't find anything of value. [ Genya turns her attention back to the window. Her eye is trained on the room's reflection, watching the stranger's silhouette upset the stillness. Underestimation, she never minds. If this woman thinks there's something to be gained from attacking her, they can find out together exactly what that is. ]

[nootherway]

People say that.

[ Her voice is quiet, and a little rough. She's unused to speaking. A body can do that, become unaccustomed to language. Isolation takes many tolls.

Yet, there is opportunity here. Leah learned to be a scavenger a long time ago. Anything worth taking in the world has to be taken, or pulled kicking and screaming from its hiding place.

She keeps an eye on the other woman as she steps further into the room, though. That's only practical. ]

Couldn't find clothes?