The Cabinet of Curious Cosmos

10th_13thdoctor

Joan:



“These streets are not the safest place at night,” Joan said. “I should know – I live around here.”

Evelyn:

Insomnia had crept relentlessly upon Evelyn again this night.  As she had found herself in the habit of doing more and more, she had taken to the streets of her aging neighborhood, wandering half-aimlessly and waiting for her mind to relax enough to actually rest tonight.

She had seen the person approaching, illuminated by the streetlight, a tall woman with braids in her hair.  She smiled and shrugged.  “So people keep telling me.  Hasn’t stopped me yet.”

kimber_mcleod

Kimber:

 “So, what you’re telling me is that there’s some kind of ghost murderer following us that I can’t see?”

Evelyn:

“I know how it sounds.”  Evelyn drew a deep breath, rubbing her arms with chilled hands.  “But I know I saw… something.  I don’t know what.  But those people didn’t just die in random accidents.  Even you have to admit how… how unlikely those deaths were!  Just out of the blue, like something out of… out of Final Destination or something.  Can’t you see the pattern forming?  I know there were only two of them, but…”  Pleading eyes turned up to her friend.  “You have to believe me.  Something was there with them when they died.  I saw it.”  Glancing over her shoulder, she clenched her small hands into fists, pressing her fingernails into the skin of her palms.  “We have to do something before it happens again!” 

( Trigger warning: depiction of possession that resembles mental illness. )

10th_13thdoctor (this is Evelyn's "You're safe here" thread)

The Doctor: 

"You're safe here."

Evelyn:

It was something small.  Innocuous.  The proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back after months of a slow widening of the fissure that sliced through the layers of blockades concealing her memories, which had been allowing bits of bleedthrough here and there.

multiversebleed

The Doctor:

The door of that little curiosity shop swung open, and an equally curious gentleman strolled in, the rubber soles of his shoes padding on the floor as he went.

He was curious in a few senses of the word.

He was curious in that he was odd. He had an air of the peculiar about him, eternally out of place, like an “H” wedged into the “S” section of an otherwise meticulous alphabetization.

He was curious in that he was well-made, at least, to some means of reckoning such things. He had a handsomeness to him that, while not precisely conventional, wasn’t especially hard to see, either.

He was curious in that he was difficult to comprehend, he muttered things to himself that one might strain to hear and yet wonder what language it was when one did hear it.

And he was curious in that he was looking for answers, one could see it on his face, in the scrunch of his brow, in the way his questing fingers trailed over shelves and over objects.

As he approached the counter, he smiled gently but a little warily at the shorter, dark-haired woman who waited there.

“‘Ello,” he greeted her. “Sorry to bother– erm– looking for Evelyn Alvar? Was told I could find her here, is she about?”

multiversebleed

Evelyn:

New Orleans.

Evelyn Alvar steps out of the coffeehouse where she had met with an acquaintence with contacts in the publishing world and shivers in the surprisingly cold weather, tugging her flimsy sweater closed and wrapping her arms around herself.  A small, husky chuckle emanates from her throat at the thought of the earlier conversation.   It seems she may have a new book deal.  She rather hopes so– since quitting Alice’s shop after they had a falling out, she's been subsisting entirely on freelance work, which is scarce these days.  Her savings are close to being depleted, she's been living on ramen and peanut butter, and she has been considering the merits of returning to the retail industry, albeit with a different company.  The thought does not appeal to her.

It is near the end of September, and the storefronts are plastered with pale ghostly figures, witches in tattered black robes, dancing skeletons.  A gust of icy wind tousles her hair and raises gooseflesh.  She has never known it to be so cold in Louisiana this time of year; they usually still have one foot nudged to the edge of the sultry oppressiveness of summer heat.

For reasons she doesn’t fully understand, every cell in her body begins to tingle with alarm.

And then she notices three things, one right after the other.  One:  the streets and sidewalks, usually bustling with people, are deserted.   No cars in the road, though the parking lots are still full.  Two: the scene before her is slowly becoming obscured by a flurry of white particles.  It actually takes her a second or two to realize that it’s snowing.  Three: a rapid succession of footfalls echoing behind her as somebody runs towards her.

She spins on her heels and braces herself.