A Fallen Guardian - Part One (June)

[protagonized]

With the perfect life
Westminster, 18 June (1:19 am) - Open to first responder only

Simon had been out with friends. For real, this time, celebrating the end of uni and the beginning of the rest of their lives. They'd gotten heartily drunk at a favorite pub, then gone to a club and done some more drinking. The only reason he hadn't stayed out all night was because he had to be at the Night Council early-ish the next morning, even though it was a Saturday. Unlike the rest of his friends, he already had a career--one that had very little to do with the degree he'd just spent the last three years of his life working towards.

And that was, ultimately, what killed him.

Later, he'll dissect every second of his death, or at least the ones he remembers, wondering what he could have done differently. Wondering how he could be so stupid as to be drunk and alone when he'd known for some time that the vampires were out hunting werewolves and shapeshifters to please their new leader, not to mention the fact that being a Guardian already put a target on his back in some parts of the supernatural community. At least it had been quick. Just a halfhearted fight (and he'd gotten some good hits in, he thought), a searing pain in his neck, and the warmth of his life blood seeping into the pavement.

And that's how he'll be found some moments later, when the vampire (newly turned and a bit of an idiot) hears footsteps coming towards them and spooks, leaving his dying victim crumpled against a wall.

Simon hasn't got long.

Where you never die
Westminster, 23 June - Open

There'd been a vigil two days after the murder, which was quite nice. Flowers and candles and people who'd never known him but thought he looked like a nice young man (plus his parents were quite famous, weren't they?) all standing next to the police tape that hadn't come down yet, crying about a boy with such a bright future ahead of him. Only the sensitive would have been able to tell that the boy hadn't quite left. A cold spot on the pavement, a certain prickling on the back of the neck, were certain indicators that a ghost lurked nearby.

Because that's what Simon figures he is now: a ghost. It's actually not as bad as he'd thought it would be. The first few hours after his death had been particularly traumatic, of course, watching his body be photographed by police and then carted away in an ambulance and wondering what would happen to his family and friends without him around anymore, but now he's gotten a little more focused. He's seen his Door. He knows that there's still something he needs to do to get to it and whatever lies beyond, and he's pretty sure that something is finding whoever it was that did this to him and making them pay.

Now if only he can figure out how to tell someone all this, he'll be well on his way to accomplishing his goal.

You just press rewind
Westminster, 30 June - Closed to Natasha

All right. He's made contact. Sort of. Now he just needs to make the right sort of contact. He has friends; they're going to have to help him sort this all out. When one of them approaches his little patch of pavement, he concentrates as hard as he can until--there.

A pale, shadowy figure materializes out of the air.

"Pleasant evening, huh?" Simon's ghost grins.

Comments

[protagonized]

"As much as I can be, yeah." Simon sticks his hands in his pockets (which he still has, oddly; he died in jeans and a hooded sweatshirt and it seems that's what he's going to be wearing for the rest of eternity) and shrugs.

"Though I've got to say, it's a lot easier to talk to you than anyone else who's come to visit me so far. Is it because we're both, you know, dead?"

[outstandingbalance]

"Something like that." Natasha rarely thought of herself as dead—she was physical, and for the most part there weren't many things living people could do that living people could do that she couldn't, and her limitations often felt more arbitrary than related to being living or dead. Then there were times like this that reminded her that whatever she was, it wasn't quite alive.

Maybe that was why she didn't often look for ghosts.

Just now, it was a blessing though. "I'm not going to ask if you're all right," she says. At least he understands what's happened to him. Ghosts who can't process that they're dead are sad things. "Is there anything you need?"

[protagonized]

Simon gives Natasha a slightly exasperated look. "I'm glad you aren't going to ask me that, because I'm not okay. I'm a fucking murder victim. A vampire ripped my throat out and didn't even have the decency to stick around long enough to get caught." His voice grows increasingly bitter and the surge of emotion that he allows himself to feel interferes with his ability to manifest. His face goes fuzzy and indistinct for a moment before he takes the ghost equivalent of a deep, calming breath and shakes his head.

"What I need is to pass on, but I can't do that until my 'unfinished business' gets solved. So unless you're willing to go vampire hunting, I'm stuck haunting this little bit of road. It's boring. Can't exactly read a book or watch television to pass the time."

[outstandingbalance]

"You say that like you don't think I'll say yes," Natasha says slowly. There's no reason for him to know that she's killed other vampires regularly, for one reason or another. Natasha's killed more vampires in her time than most vampire hunters. "If you want to move on..." She shrugs one shoulder. Not all ghosts do. Sometimes the fact they're afraid to is what keeps them around in the first place. Simon seems to know what he wants, though. "I'm not saying no."

[protagonized]

"That's a relief." Simon sits down at what he's come to consider "his" wall, leaning against it. Or pretending to lean against it. Nearly two weeks dead, and he still hasn't figured out how physics works for him. Being incorporeal is really frustrating.

"I thought it'd be different, dying. I don't know what I expected, but it wasn't this."

[outstandingbalance]

"I don't think dying is ever what you expect." She crosses her arms as she says it, inclining her head slightly. If she notices a chill, she doesn't give a sign of it, but her posture does seem tired. She didn't know Simon that well, but there is a sense of loss. And a sense of responsibility.

"Do you remember how it happened? Any details about the vampire who did it?"

[protagonized]

Simon shakes his head. "It was dark," he admits, "and I was piss drunk. Not my finest hour. It was a man, that much I remember. Fast, and that was surprising because I'm fast." He blinks, rubs his temples and tries hard not to think about how weird it feels to do that since he doesn't actually have temples to rub any more. "Was fast. I guess. Not fast enough. I think he was a bit shorter than me; he had to reach up to grab me. Dark clothes. Sharp teeth."

That's not much to go on. He's a pretty poor witness to his own murder.

"I know I punched him a couple times before he got me, but I reckon that's probably healed by now. Oh. One more thing. He smelled like smoke. Not cigarettes or marijuana or anything like that--wood smoke. Like a campfire. It was in his hair and his clothes."

[outstandingbalance]

It's a start, but a pretty weak one. There are things she can infer for the time being that will help narrow the search down; the killer was almost certainly young and trying to curry favor with the new leader by way of a shortcut, he wasn't too smart and he didn't have any position to speak of at the moment, and he may be claiming credit for it otherwise what was the point?

That probably described a lot of young vampires right now, though.

"Campfire smoke?" she repeats, a faint frown puckering her brow. "You're sure?"

[protagonized]

"I used to have a pretty good nose," Simon points out. Not anymore, though the one bright spot in all this is that he doesn't have to smell the overflowing dumpster from the restaurant across the road, or the pee on the wall from all of the shitfaced drunks coming out of the same club he'd been at before he died. His little spot of pavement isn't in the best part of town.

"I'm definitely sure it was campfire smoke."

[outstandingbalance]

"I believe you. I'm just not sure what it means yet." Her lips tighten briefly. Of course, if this were easy, Simon probably wouldn't be a ghost if it were simple. He'd know what had happened to him—and he'd have a direction, there wouldn't be a mystery. He'd already have been able to let someone know, if it was anger alone that motivated him.

"I'm going to find out, though."

[protagonized]

Simon smiles at that, a little sadly. "Thanks. I'd do my own snooping, but..." He gestures vaguely at his semi-transparent torso. "Don't know what I'd do even if I could move away from this spot. I'm suddenly very popular as far as death tourism goes, and it turns out a lot more supernatural-type people can sense ghosts than I thought. Don't think I'd be all that effective."

He laughs. "Which is kind of bullshit, since I'm literally invisible."

[outstandingbalance]

"Ghosts can be more effective than you'd imagine, if they put their minds to it."

She says that, but not as encouragement. Natasha would really prefer he not turn into the angry, hungry kind of ghost. Simon had struck her as a pretty good kid in life, a little awkward maybe, a little anxious, but generally decent. Not someone who deserved to die, and not someone who she wanted to see twisted by death.

The hazards of being a vampire: she'd seen what being murdered could do to a person.

"Just hang tight, okay?" Not that he had a lot of choice but to be patient. "I know some people. They might be able to help. And maybe if you give it some time, you'll remember more."

[protagonized]

"If you know how, I'm all ears." Simon's voice is dry, sarcastic. He doesn't necessarily like this particular line of questioning because it brings to mind just how damn powerless he is. "I can't even fucking haunt properly. Was there some sort of ghost school I was supposed to go to?"

He can't even tip a bin or blow paper along the pavement. He'd love to be able to influence his environment even a little, but that seems entirely beyond him. He's not exactly going to be Poltergeist of the Year.

"I'm a shitty ghost and I was a shitty Guardian."

[outstandingbalance]

"I don't know how, no." She doesn't think he was asking in seriousness, but she answers anyway, calm and a just a little grim. "And I don't know that it would make you a better ghost if you could."

She'd say something else, but his last statement distracts her from pursuing the first line of conversation further. "You were a Guardian?"

[protagonized]

Simon blinks. "You didn't know?" He thought it'd been common knowledge that he worked for the Night Council in addition to whatever the hell he did for Redbright.

"I got the job around New Year's. I'll be fucked if I know why I got nominated for it. I wasn't very good at the job."

There it is again: the past tense.

[outstandingbalance]

"Well, it's not like you brought it up at the bar," Natasha comments wryly, maybe a little regretfully. Natasha had tried not to be too aware of some things. It had seemed safer at the time. She regretted that choice now, though.

"Someone must have thought you'd be a good fit for it."