finalflight | OPEN POST; [ JAMES SUNDERLAND / SILENT HILL 2 ]

I'm a mortician.

[ BOY DOESN'T HE LOOK IT. ]

A... traveling mortician.

[ Hm. He really needs to rethink his cover story a bit better.

Maybe this is a good time for something to jump out of the fog at them. Wouldn't that be nice? You wanna talk about trauma... this place is probably crawling with weird death imagery by now. ]

[YOUR AWKWARD COVER STORY WON'T BE SAVED BY MONSTERS JUST YET, BUDDY

But maybe soon. The fog is getting thick, and it's only because James has the layout of this town seared into his brain that he's fairly certain they're heading the right way. Are those... moths he sees, fluttering in his periphery?]

You're a... traveling mortician.

[Help??? On one hand: yeah he can see it. On the other: what.]

...Sounds to me like someone who deals in death would be drawn to this town on principle alone.

[Up ahead, there is the sound of wings fluttering. Very, very faint for now. He assumes it's just the moths. This would be weird if he'd not experienced it before, and he tenses, but not enough to be worrisome just yet.]

[ Of course he's not going to get off that easily, but a man can hope. It's not often he has to make small talk with some random person on the street on his way to a job who isn't also dying. He's forgotten how! ]

You think so?

[ Maybe that's why he's all turned around. ]

Sounds to me like they have a bad bug problem going on.

[ All the moths, he means. ]

[James isn't exactly the master of small talk, either, so he's in good company. Or bad company. Awkward vibes might be off the charts sometimes, but he's doing okay right now.]

The moths. I think it's a sign of someone... [Dying.] Fading away.

[Whether that's because there's someone else here, or the town is picking apart notions from Ivan's mind... it's hard to say.]

Fading away?

[ Surely not dying, or he'd be able to sense it. One of the very cruel ironies of his station. He, a man who once feared death above all else, is now intrinsically tied to it. ]

Weakening. Diseased. Dying.

[Moths are symbolic of all of the above; he's sure of that. There's no room for doubt in his mind, after what he's seen.]

I saw a lot of them when I was here because... You know.

[Dead wife and all.]

[And maybe there would be more time to turn that over in their heads, but suddenly that sound of wings is louder, louder, and cutting through the fog is a whole swath of moths coming straight towards them.

There's nothing dangerous about just the bugs, though, other than how they nastily pelt into both men, one by one, as they try to wheel away. But no doubt they herald something even more dangerous, a large, dark figure approaching. Just hazy through the mist right now, but not for much longer.]

Ivan... Be careful!

Surely not-

[ Dying.

Well, the monsters are a bit late to save him from awkwardly explaining his occupation. Ivan throws his arms in front of his face to shield it from the onslaught of insects, but there's clearly something else lurking in the fog. Something that has James crying out a warning. Something that makes the hairs on the back of his neck prick in that way they do when he's speaking directly to Death.

Somehow, he doesn't think it's his boss here to give him a scolding for getting lost. ]

Stay behind me.

[ A strangely firm order coming from such a sleepy looking man. He beckons James behind him with one lanky arm, his other held at the ready for... something. He dropped his crowbar at some point when the moths started going crazy, but he doesn't seem to notice or care. ]

[Here's the thing about James: he's pretty brave for a pathetic, wet, sad man. Or perhaps he's just reckless, but either way, the result is the same.

The shape of whatever he sees is unlike anything he's experienced in this town before, but it's not enough to send him cowering behind Ivan. No, he survived Silent Hill and its baleful truths so that he could live for himself and others — how's he going to fulfill the latter by just letting someone else get hurt while he takes safety behind them?]

No, just— Keep on your toes!

[He will, in fact, take two steps closer to the thing in the fog. Which soon unveils itself to be a very awful-looking creature, indeed, stalking towards them with glowing red eyes. The look of it could not be farther removed from the monsters he's fought in the past.]

What the hell?

I said—

[ Hopefully James isn't keen on getting his ridiculous bangs cut, because the blade of a scythe swings down to block his path to the monster in the fog. ]

Stay behind me.

[ For his part, Ivan eyes the monster coolly, scythe in hand. It looks like something he might have conjured in another lifetime, a creature born of necromancy and desperation. That explains why it feels like death. It's made of death.

The beast stares at both men with glowing eyes, maw dropping open to exhale a puff of steam against the cool, foggy air. ]

Have you seen anything like this before?

[Leave his stupid bangs alone!

The sudden appearance of a scythe's blade makes James come to a sudden halt, digging his heels into the pavement of the sidewalk. A flash of confusion darkens his features... because where the hell did Ivan get something like that?

His fingers grip harder around the iron pipe, now held in both hands.]

No, nothing like that. [The ones he always saw looked made of raw flesh, distorted and writhing and faceless. Or it was something worse, dragging a giant knife behind each purposeful step—]

And I don't know where you got a scythe, but you need to let me help you!

I'll be fine.

[ Trying to keep James out of harm's way will ultimately be a distraction in the end. He can tell it isn't the other man's time to die, and he'd hate to have something happen to disrupt that timeline.

The creature tenses as if to pounce, but Ivan moves first, and quickly, to close the gap. He's fast, but so is the monster. It's also quite apparent that Ivan clearly does not give a damn about whether or not he gets hurt. In the course of their quick and brutal dance, he simply leave himself open to attack in order to get an attack off himself. He takes the thing's head off eventually, but not before he takes a couple of thorny vines right through the shoulder. They're still there even as the monster drops dead. ]

[James has seen monsters display strength and speed that shocks and terrifies; he's even been on the wrong end of both. But he's never seen a human wield the same against an enemy, ending the threat before them with a quick beheading. It stuns him to watch it. He does little more than stand there with his heart beating his chest for a few long moments, gawking as a bit of blood ekes into Ivan's clothing at his shoulder.

Then, once more, his mind catches up to him, whip-like, and he grips his iron pipe harder — for what little good it might do, regardless of what's actually happening now.]

How did you—

[-do that? Is he even... human? Unease coils tightly around his stomach.]

What are you?

[Suddenly, the dead and crumpling monster is not the priority here.]

[ Still with scythe in hand and breathing hard, Ivan lifts his free one to grasp the vines puncturing his shoulder. He grits his teeth against the pain, against the sting of thorns slicing into his palm to draw blood anew. ]

The hand of Death.

[ With a grunt, he tugs the vines free, sending a fresh splatter of blood across the pavement. He tosses the vines aside, and they land with a soft, wet sound. ]

Come to take those who meet their end.

[ A beat. ]

Don't worry. I'm not here for you.

[He watches with the same frown and now a grimace as those vines tug free. The blood and violence doesn’t really faze him as much as this information does — something so succinctly spoken but also somehow tells him not much at all.]

Of Death?

[What. The actual fuck.]

You’re going to have to explain more than that, Ivan.

[ Oh, come on. He sounded so cool and everything.

Ivan sucks in a breath, pressing his bloodied hand to the gaping hole in his shoulder as it knits itself closed in a matter of short moments. ]

I'm a grim reaper, James.

[ As if to punctuate his point, the scythe still in his other hand dissipates into a whisp of shadow. ]

I collect the souls of the dead and ferry them to the other side.

[He's seen a lot of unexplainable things in this town, and probably to the same degree as what he's being told now. However, this is a different kind of unexplainable, and James can't help but feel wary. Wondering if it's the full story. The way Ivan's wounds simply stitch themselves together add an eerieness to the whole ordeal, and maybe once this all sinks in, James will understand why a pipe to the head was so ineffective against him.

But right now, it's hard to... entirely trust anyone that looks human but clearly isn't. Like, bro, are you just in his head or something—]

Then, wh-what? All that about your dead wife was just a cover?

No.

[ Ivan tugs James' handkerchief back out of his pocket to wipe the bloody mess from his palm. There's not much that can be done about his suit. ]

That was true. The mortician thing was the cover.

[ The really, really bad cover. ]

[A fucking terrible cover. At least his instincts regarding that weren't wrong, he just didn't know how right he was.

James isn't sure how much the rest helps, though. If it eases him, or makes it all the more hard to understand how to feel about this. This is an agent of Death itself, apparently, standing so close to him—

It makes him feel weirdly vulnerable, slightly hollowing, and definitely a bit defensive to start.]

I still don't understand. Is what's happening with the town this time because of you?

Mm. Could be.

[ Like the idea only just occurred to him. That thing he just fought reeked of death in a way that was almost targeted.

Still, that doesn't explain what's really going on. He's not used to having much influence in the living world, so either his boss is being funny again or there's something here that can touch even an agent of Death.

Regardless, he's definitely picking up on James' vibes. ]

I know I'm not the most desirable of company, but you'll likely be safest with me.

I don't care about being safe.

[It's out of his mouth before he realizes, and he regrets it a moment later. He doesn't mean it — wholly, not anymore. But James closes his eyes, shaking his head slightly, looking So Tired.

He brings a heel of a palm to rub at his eye. He mutters, sounding absolutely miserable:]

I just wanted to head back to the hotel. I wanted to update my wife on how I'm doing...

[Not get dragged into this all over again. With someone claiming to be a reaper, at that, skulking about to do his "job." What, then? He's supposed to stick with him as he goes to claim the soul of a dying person? Wouldn't that be just dandy.]

[ They can both look tired, though that seems to be Ivan's default more than anything. He arches a dark brow. ]

Then we head for the hotel. If we find it relatively safe, you can hunker down there, and I'll finish my business and leave.

If I'm at fault for the town being the way it is, then my leaving should fix it, right?

[ This is a very easy solution that will absolutely and totally work! ]

[James drops his hand and looks at him, scoffing. He steps closer.]

No. That's not how it works.

[And steps closer again, pointing his pipe at the dead monster on the pavement. Whatever shock he first experienced upon seeing its wretched form, it's gone now.]

This came from you. [It's definitely not James'!] This town brought you here for a reason, and that's not just for your work. Whether it's something holding you back, or something you're denying yourself, or a past anger, or hurt—

[With a man who works for Death? It could be anything, he thinks.]

But it's your job to figure it out. You can't leave until you do.

[ Ivan can't help but look a little taken aback at the... not quite an outburst, but certainly close enough coming from a man as quiet as James has been. ]

I've been alive for a long, long time. I'm out of lessons to learn and things to process.

[ Lie. He's simply stopped acknowledging those things and called it good enough. ]

[James is often quiet, but rarely is he passive. For what it's worth, what fire he had seems to drain from him just as quickly, and his arm goes limp by his side again.]

You actually believe that?

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