recommence | 2 - {audio}

So! Uh. Hi, everyone.

Question for the masses.

[Bennett fidgets a bit with his communicator, fingers audibly shuffling up the side and back down.]

If, if I haven't met you yet, my name's Bennett Marrow. I was a professor and researcher, back home. I-- I had a little bit of a second job, too.

[Evasive, but he's getting to it.]

Um, my question is kinda... multi-part, bear with me here.

So, we've-- we've been here for a little while, some of us longer than others, and, uh. I'm, I'm always looking for ways to understand the world around me. Aaaaand, uh, obviously, there's-- there's a lot to understand here. So, if anybody has any information about the nature of the Black Tide, or-- or, the previous ship that I've heard about, the MS Elegante-- could you please contact me? I would love to interview anyone who would care to step forward so we all have a log of information about our, uh, houseboat. Boat-home. This will not be confidential and I will be happy to share it with anyone who needs it at any time.

Also, on the, uh, confidential side of things. I, uh-- I know there are some other nonhuman and supernaturally-inclined beings-slash-people on this boat. If you need any help-- if you need anything, please let me know, okay? I'm-- I'm never going to tell anyone, but I know how-- h-how terrible it feels to try and find the help you need all alone. I'm, I'm a werewolf myself. I, I ran into a few of you last weekend.

I used to run a network for the supernatural crowd so I could bring help to anyone who needed it. I might not have all the tools I used to, but I know I can build that network here again.

[He sighs and runs his hand through his hair, fiddling with the communicator again.]

This-- this got kinda long. Sorry, everyone. Anyway. Um, I'd normally tell you to meet me at my room if you didn't want to talk over the network, but, uh, it's-- it's flooded entirely right now, so I'm, uh-- you can find me in the back corner of the shopping area. I've made a little, uh, cave.

Hit me up if you need anything. This is, is, B-bennett Marrow, signing off.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

NO!

[She feels very strongly about the crew, and all of those feelings are positive. When she speaks, she speaks very quickly.]

B was my best friend! He was the mechanic, and he--My best friend, of all time. I loved him. A lot. And then--Kage, Kage was the first mate, and-- [She sniffles and wipes her nose on her hand. This time she really is crying. Good job, Ben. Her voice wavers.] He was like a dad to me. Except I didn't call him dad. To his face. Usually. But I still think of him as my dad. And everyone else, they were... Most of them, they were great. Meth was really pretty, she was... I... dunno what she really did, but she was great. And then there was Meifeng, and Jamie, and Pan...

They were my family. All of them.

[He writes very quickly. "B. Kage. Jamie, 'Meifang? Meifeng?', Pan." The waver in Lily's voice halted the pen immediately, and kicked off every alarm.

These people were dead, weren't they? They had to be.]

L-lily. Lily, we-- we can stop here. I'm sorry, I...

[What does he even say?]

I'm sorry for your loss.

[Truthfully, Lily... isn't certain that they're dead. Not anymore. She couldn't find any of the crew on the Shore. She searched through every single corpse, desperate, but she found nothing. The thing is, she couldn't find Chase either--and yet, here he is, on the Black Tide.]

[But... They might as well be dead.]

It's okay. [She rubs tears from her eyes.] What else do you wanna know?

Well, I-- I'll ask you one last thing, and-- and I can let you go.

[So he doesn't upset you anymore.]

Do-- uh, would-- would you say... you felt safe on the Elegante? Was it... was it dangerous?

Dangerous? Uh, sometimes. [Her voice no longer wavers, but she sniffles every now and then.] There was a pirate attack, and the cardinal thing, and... I accidentally freed someone that killed a lot of people. And someone dropped a stage light on me, I think she was a ghost. Then there was this witch Xamira, she killed me once, and some other people... That one wasn't my fault.

[Sigh.]

It was usually safe. It was a lot safer than where I came from, that's for sure.

[Bennett is alarmed for approximately a split second. Revival isn't unheard of, it's just expensive and hard as hell. What's scary is that the place where Lily was killed was more safe than wherever she originally came from.

Holy shit.]

...I-- I'm just glad you're safe now. I mean, a-- assuming we're safe. Safe-ish.

[He writes a little note: "Lily, while reliable and thorough in her info. might have a skewed perception of the concept of 'safety'."]

[Skewed perception of safety? Ben, try living in the Deep Underground for four years. Pirate attacks and ghosts and witches are nothing to her.]

The general idea on the Elegante was "don't kill anybody and don't break anything," but a looot of people didn't really... agree.

Do you get the same vibe from-- f-from our current set of passengers? Or, uh. Or do they seem a little more towards the 'safe and sane' side of the spectrum?

Well, nobody's dead yet.

Y-your inclusion of the word "yet" gr-g-greatly concerns me, Lily.

People die.

[She doesn't say it in a, "haha, that's just a fact of life," way. She says it definitively.]

[People die.]

[Period.]

[Ben suddenly tastes blood in his mouth and has to stumble to the mirror to see if his gums were bleeding, or what. His mouth is a clean, healthy pink.

It takes him another moment to reply as he tries to gargle out the imaginary flavor. It works for a minute or so.]

I-- I guess they do, don't they?

[It's all he can manage. He's just... going to go sit next to the toilet. He feels like he's going to throw up-- it happens every time he thinks about his brother.]

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