And we don't know where we're going and we don't know where we've been (Amnesia plot post)

[dredefulchilde]

23 February, Early Morning

He wakes up in the middle of a field - actually, a football pitch in Hounslow, but it seems vast and strange to him. He feels a nagging sense that he's lost something important, but he can't remember what it is. On further thought, he realizes that it's not the only thing he can't remember. He has no idea who he is, where he is, or why he's standing in the cold rain. The only thing he can remember is the feeling of an old ring hanging on a chain against his chest, under his sodden clothes. It's familiar and safe, and he knows that if he removes it something very bad will happen.

So the boy crouches in the mud and puzzles through his odd predicament.

A woman at a bus stop opposite the park is the first to see the small figure in the rain. She approaches the pale child and asks him what he's doing out so early, offering her umbrella, but he doesn't seem to understand her questions, growing increasingly agitated and confused the more she tries to help him. He's obviously lost, and the thinness of his arms and legs concerns her. She calls the police.

That night, the evening news broadcasts a picture of a boy, believed to be between nine and eleven years of age, who has been taken into care by Child Protective Services. They are looking for anyone who may recognize him since he does not seem to recognize himself. It generates a bit of buzz online, but it's hardly a leading news story with everything else going on in the world.

There's a follow-up the next morning, but this time it leads the program: a nurse in the mystery boy's hospital room was found dead late last night, drained of blood, her throat ripped out. The child is nowhere to be found.

[Specific prompts in the comments!]

Comments

OTA

[dredefulchilde]

The boy is terrified.

He hides in an alleyway, still wearing his hospital gown and covered in the nurse's blood. He knows he's done something unspeakably awful, but he has no idea why. She had been so kind to him! All he knew is that he'd been hungry. She kept bringing food, even several different varieties of candy bar (which he somehow recognized despite not even knowing his own name), but it didn't do anything to help. He was starving. And then something had come over him, something dark and terrible and strange. The next thing he knew, the nurse was dead and he wasn't hungry anymore.

He wants help. He wants to know what's wrong with him, why he can't remember, but he's so scared. So he keeps hiding, cold and exhausted and unaware that he's left a trail of blood behind him.

[stauncherhearted]

There are a lot of short-cuts in London, when you know the way. Alleyways to duck down, side-streets, twisting and turning cobblestone paths. Nancy saw London with a thieves' eye, and she knew her way around better than most. With soft steps, she wasn't afraid of anything that could possibly cause her harm, lurking in the dark. She had her witches' amulet, and by now most of the Nest knew her as Cooper's Girlfriend.

Or as a delicious snack and a fun lay.

Not to mention, a good amount of London had seen them together. Attacking the girlfriend of a Night Council Member was not a good idea. So she felt safe to wander through whatever alleyways she pleased, which was what brought her to doing probably one of the stupider things she'd ever done in her life: following a trail of blood into said dark alley.

It's there that she follows the trail, a gruesome trail of bread crumbs. Something's wrong, here. A bit of searching reveals the source of the blood. A young boy, the same age as his brothers. Boy, kid. Are you lucky you ran into Nancy.

"Are you alright, love?" she calls toward him softly. She bends down, extending a hand toward him and a warm smile. She was no threat to the boy. "Are you hurt? Come out here and let's get a good look at you."

[dredefulchilde]

The boy shrinks back when he hears someone approaching. He tries to squeeze into the space behind a dumpster, making himself small and invisible and hoping that the footsteps go away, but they don't. Someone calls out to him and he knows he's been spotted.

He looks up at the girl with wide, panicked eyes, too scared to speak. He's shaking from a mixture of cold and trauma, teeth chattering in his skull so loud he's surprised he hasn't brought the whole city down on himself.

[stauncherhearted]

"It's alright, you're safe with me. My name's Nancy, yeah?" She keeps holding her hand out. "What's your name, love?"

[dredefulchilde]

Cautiously, he takes the girl's hand. His hands are icy cold, though that can be explained away by the thin hospital gown he wears on a February night. Less explainable is the blood smeared across his face and down his front. It's a lot of blood, and none of it is his.

"I d-d-don't know," he stammers, on the verge of tears once more. "I don't remember."

[stauncherhearted]

He's shivering. Nancy immediately takes her coat off and drapes it over his frail shoulders. "Do you know where your mum and dad are? Are you hurt?" Cooper didn't live too far from here, she could take him back to their flat until they could figure out what to do with him, or where he came from.

[dredefulchilde]

The boy shakes his head, no. "I don't remember," he says again. This time he does start crying, his tears leaving tracks in the blood on his cheeks. "I don't remember anything. Just the hospital and the nurse and--" he's sobbing so hard now that what he says next is completely unintelligible. After a minute or two he calms down enough to gasp out: "H-help m-m-me."

Closed to Cesare

[dredefulchilde]

The police have him again. This time, they're not as friendly as they were when the nice lady with the umbrella called them. They have him in a small room and they've given him hot chocolate, but they won't leave him alone and they keep giving him hard, angry looks.

He knows he deserves it. He's done a terrible thing.

But he doesn't like this room. He doesn't want to be here. He doesn't like the way that one of them keeps asking him the same questions over and over about what happened in the hospital, even if she pretends to be nice about it and gives him breaks when he wants them.

"I don't know," he keeps crying to her. "I don't know. I don't remember."

But then the door opens. "His father's here," says a man and the boy sits up in surprise. It never occurred to him that he might have a father.

[longterm]

"Fuck," Cesare had cursed loudly when he saw Joscelin on the television. It had been a fluke that he had seen him in the first place, to be honest, his eyes glancing to the screen while he had been feeding on his latest meal.

Soon enough he's contacting a guy who knpws a guy and documents are forged, identities created and Cesare becomes a proud father. Again.

When Cesare walks into the room, he's standing more awkwardly than he otherwise would have liked. He gives Joscelin a wry smile and holds out a hand.

"Come on, son."

[dredefulchilde]

The boy had been hoping to remember something when he saw the person claiming to be his father, but those hopes are dashed as he looks curiously at the dark-haired person standing in front of him. Nothing about him seems familiar, except perhaps his smell. He smells a little different than anyone else that he's come into contact with in the last few days.

Maybe that means he really is my father, he thinks, and takes the hand that's held out to him.

"I think I did something bad," he says as the man leads him away. "Don't bad people go to jail? Am I going to go to jail?"

[longterm]

The fact that Joscelin seems not to recognize Cesare is...concerning. Joscelin suddenly seems so much younger and the Borgia smiles wryly, shaking his head.

"No. You're going home, where we can sort all this out." He means fixing Joscelin's predicament, not whatever bad thing he's talking about, although Cesare can guess exactly what that is.

"Do you....have your mother's ring?" he asks, trying to figure out exactly how to ask about the daylight jewelry without picking up any attention from the officers next to them.

[dredefulchilde]

Oh, he knows about the ring. His mother's ring. That feels right. Suddenly confident that this stranger can be trusted (because why else would he know about the ring, and how special it is?) the boy reaches under his shirt and lifts it out, still suspended on its gold chain.

"They tried to take it but I wouldn't let them."

[longterm]

Cesare gives Joscelin's hand a little squeeze and nods. Thank god. Cesare was not looking forward to the prospect of getting Joscelin to The Angelo during daytime without a daylight ring. It would not have been ideal.

"Good. Don't lose it. Keep it on, ok? It's important. Now, shall we take you home?"

Closed to Natasha

[dredefulchilde]

The boy doesn't know if he likes or trusts Cesare very much, even if Cesare got him away from the police and brought him to this nice hotel, especially because he now knows that Cesare was only pretending to be his father. Mostly, the boy is getting frustrated that he doesn't remember anything. Sometimes he'll touch the ring and get brief flashes of something, but it's not enough for him to make any sense of it.

It's been four days since he first woke up in the rain and he's still no closer to figuring out why he can't remember who he is.

The television in his room is on, playing a cartoon that he finds vaguely irritating but also rather funny. He doesn't notice the door opening behind him until he smells something--or someone, in this case--familiar in a way he can't quite place, the same way Cesare is familiar. He turns around to find a red-haired woman in the room.

"Who are you?" he asks, curiously.

[outstandingbalance]

Natasha isn't sure exactly what she expected. She hadn't consciously predicted anything when she'd heard Joscelin's state. Still, what she finds strikes her as... strange. Joscelin's bearing is different, subtly but also markedly.

"Natasha Romanoff," she says, shrugging out of her jacket and setting hanging it on the back of a chair. "We've met."

[dredefulchilde]

"Have we?" The boy--Joscelin, he reminds himself, though that name still hasn't any meaning for him--gets up and walks eagerly towards her. His smile is warm and genuine--a little excited, even. There's something very familiar about this new stranger, and that's comforting.

"I don't remember very much," he admits a little sheepishly. "I'm sorry I don't recognize you."

[outstandingbalance]

His excitement, the fact there's warmth in his interest in her instead of jaded curiosity, take Natasha somewhat off guard. Not that she had assumed his attitude was intrinsic to his personality, but she didn't realize that he would be so childlike without his memory.

"I very much doubt this is your fault. Don't apologize for it." She smiles at him a little, encouragingly. "How much do you remember?"

[dredefulchilde]

Joscelin shrugs. "I hear I'm called Joscelin. And I've got this." He shows her his ring. "Cesare said it was my mother's, when he first got me from the police, but I don't remember her."

He doesn't mention his fears about why he can't remember anything, or why he's so hungry all the time.

"May I ask you a question, Natasha? How do you know me?"

[outstandingbalance]

That feels like a loaded question, implying how much he doesn't know. She's not sure where to start explaining that one. But she'll do her best to answer his questions, especially when he can't quite hide the concern behind them.

"We move in similar circles, I guess. We keep running into each other."

Closed to Jean-Claude

[dredefulchilde]

There are few things that Joscelin has learned in the last several days. First of all, his name is Joscelin. That doesn't tell him much, but it's nice to know that he's got a name. He has friends, he thinks, but there's something wrong with him. With the hunger he feels. With the blood that he drinks.

Despite Nancy's kind words that first night, he knows he's a monster. That's why he killed that nurse. That's why he has to wear the ring all the time. He's not human.

He locks himself in the room at Cesare's hotel, confused and worried that he is a threat to others, someone who could kill again. He doesn't remember who he was before he lost his memories, and now he's not sure he wants to.

He flinches when he hears a knock at his door.

"Go away," he yells through the latch.

[baisant]

Jean-Claude leans against the door, listening to the sound of the other vampire's voice from just inside the room. When Natasha had asked him there, he hadn't known quite what to expect. So far, it still sounds like him. But that hardly means anything, all things considered.

"Mon ami," he says quietly. "Will you not let me in?" He has the key of course, but there's no reason that he cannot try to coax his way in without force at first instead.

[dredefulchilde]

Even through the door, the voice sounds...familiar. Joscelin creeps over and looks through the peephole and sees someone completely foreign to him, but...not. He opens the door, keeping the chain in place. He looks smaller than normal, more disheveled that the usually fastidious vampire allows himself to get. And very young. "...hello?" It's a question. Uncertainty is written all over his face.

[baisant]

Jean-Claude fights to keep his face neutral, though the concern is written in his eyes. Whatever has happened, the evidence is clear. Joscelin is changed, that much is plain to see. He steps back from the door and tries to take in his full state of being, but it is difficult to see the full extent of things through this crack in the door.

"Hello, mon ami," he replies. "It is Jean-Claude. May I come in?"

[dredefulchilde]

"...okay."

The door closes, the chain rattles, and then it opens again. Joscelin's room is a bit of a pigsty, sheets thrown off the bed and plates of half-touched food piled in a corner. He's still wearing Nancy's too-big hoodie because it makes him feel safe. He's wide-eyed and very pale; he hasn't had any blood in days.

"And how do you know me, Jean-Claude?"

[baisant]

Jean-Claude has always been more of a sentimental vampire than is expressly wise for survival. He cannot help the twinge he feels in response to the sight of the room around the pair of them, as he is let inside, or the way that Joscelin keeps looking at him, his eyes so wide and uncertain of himself.

He makes it a point to move slowly as he steps in through the door and close it gently behind himself, moving to turn to the other vampire and smile gently down at the question in turn.

"We are friends, you and I," he replies to the little vampire, the expression perhaps a little sadder than it should have been. He does not know whether Joscelin would ever truly admit to being his friend, under normal circumstances after all.

He gestures to the edge of the bed, which is a mess, but he will brave it for the sake of the boy's comfort. "May I sit?" he asks.