gistful: ([Midnight Hotel])
Anton Shudder ([personal profile] gistful) wrote in [community profile] tushanshu_logs2015-06-02 03:00 pm

[Midnight Hotel] June catch-all

Characters: Anyone, everyone.
Date: Month of June, 2016.
Location: The Midnight Hotel.
Situation: Catch-all post! Feel free to use this post for anything that happens within the Midnight Hotel during the month, using the subject header to label specific rooms or for specific people. See also the OOC note at the bottom.
Warnings/Rating: Mark your threads if content warnings become applicable, please!

The Hotel’s numbers have dwindled slightly since last month, but there are some new additions of note – firstly, Jintou, an ex-Snake kedan brought there by Aqua and Akito’s Chihuelan mugger Marcil, the one with a noticeable scar on his cheek, who was recently bargained out of the Snakes’ imprisonment. Jintou, while still skittish, has relaxed enough to start getting bored by being limited to the Hotel, as he’s not allowed out unless escorted. Malcil, on the other hand, is lean and bruised like he came out the worst in a fight and has no desire to leave at all—he barely leaves his room, in fact. Any interrogation will make him clam up and back away.

For the most part both are given a decently wide berth by the other kedan in the Hotel, though the kedan are more likely to recognise Malcil as Chihuelan than Jintou as a Snake and he, therefore, bears the brunt of both dirty looks and intense curiosity.

Another notable newcomer is the unfairly gorgeous man who has been making himself known on the network recently. He can be seen around the Hotel, wearing a frilly maid’s apron and doing some cleaning, with varying degrees of skill but with a magical talent people may recognise as the same discipline as Skulduggery Pleasant – using air to lift furniture to vacuum underneath, conjuring water in his mopping bucket, and so on.

If anyone asks, Anton will just say he summoned a cleaning faerie.

It’s notable that this unfairly gorgeous man doesn’t have a room of his own – he can be seen coming in and out of Anton’s private bedroom. They obviously know each other well, since Erskine has a habit of stroking Anton’s hair given the opportunity. Several times throughout the month Anton will be slightly late for his shifts and emerge with his hair still damp and unbound, only for Erskine to come by a bit later and sheepishly plait it for him while he’s working at the desk.

While there isn’t much physically different about the Hotel this month, aside from the newly settled exit into Sky Sector, Anton himself is more protective. He’s more watchful, more inclined to look up even at minor signs of tension – though he’s no more likely to interfere than before. He will also regularly scout the Hotel's entrance for anyone who seems to be paying undue attention, thanks to Sokka's mugging right outside its door.

Anton's alert, and no wonder given the Hotel is now housing two essential fugitives.

[ooc: The Midnight Hotel’s status page is available here, with the rules at the top and ongoing status at the bottom. PLEASE POST TO THE STATUS PAGE IF YOUR CHARACTER WOULD LIKE A ROOM, JOB OR AREA IN THE GARAGE, OR ARE MOVING OUT. Anton will manufacture means of payment until Foreigners are able to properly offer recompense or choose to move out.

[Both Jintou and Malcil can be threaded with by request to the mod account, though Jintou will be more open; however, any new information will need to be bought with reward requests.]
edgeoftheknife: (pic#9143708)

Erskine | First half of June | OPEN like an open thing | Possible spoilers!

[personal profile] edgeoftheknife 2015-06-02 06:28 am (UTC)(link)
Erskine doesn't really leave the Hotel. Ever.

And for those who've witnessed his idiocy goofiness on the network, the reality of his situation in the Hotel might be something of a surprise. Yes, he banters with Anton from time to time, teasing the other sorcerer and petting his hair (Anton is a precious cinnamon roll, okay?), but the majority of his time in the Hotel is spent much more quietly. One might even begin to suspect the personality on the network is a bit of an act on his part. (Or a LOT of an act.)

A) He cleans. Poorly, at times, but he tries. Chairs levitate out of the way of the vacuum. Water condenses out of the air for use in washing windows. He might even levitate a book or another object of yours if it's in the way, although he'll be polite about it.

B) Sometimes, especially at meal times, he has a tendency to freeze up and fail to make even the most basic of decisions. You may find him staring at two meal options and completely incapable of deciding between them, eyes wide as if the lack of decisiveness is causing him a fair amount of distress. Please help him out if you find him like this. It would be appreciated.

C) Sometimes he just spaces off in the middle of doing something. The vacuum might still be running while he does this. He doesn't really notice.

D) Or he might fall asleep in the common room or the lobby, in any of the chairs, possibly while still on the job. On the mornings when Anton is late to work, Erskine actually looks better rested than usual, but he has perpetual dark circles under his eyes and his hands tend to shake as if from exhaustion. You might find him levitating objects randomly because his hands are shaking too badly to hold them steady otherwise.

E) One morning he'll be cleaning in one of the hallways and stop to stare at something on the floor near the baseboards. Abandoning his feather duster/vacuum/whatnot, he crouches down and holds a hand out, as if to a cat or some other kind of small animal, except it doesn't really appear that there's anything there... unless you get closer.

"Come on, let's get you somewhere safe."

F) Or feel free to request something different, or respond to any of the prompts given in the Hotel post regarding Erskine! Let us know if you'd like Anton to drop in as well ♥

[Major spoilers highly possible, please let me know if you'd rather avoid them!]
Edited 2015-06-02 06:35 (UTC)
ruinsprofessor: (calm)

C? June 1 or 2

[personal profile] ruinsprofessor 2015-06-02 09:15 am (UTC)(link)
The first time Raine had tried to track Erskine down, she'd found him asleep in the common room, and hadn't the heart to disturb him nor the inclination to wait for him to wake, with no indication how long that might be. This time she found him mid-vacuuming, which was an improvement by virtue of his being awake, though a little concerning in that Erskine appeared to be mentally somewhere else entirely.

Raine considered again the possibility of not having this conversation, which was going to be uncomfortable no matter how she framed it, but-- no. It was necessary to build any kind of foundation going forward.

"Erskine?" she prompted, from a distance where she could evade any negative reaction to being startled.
edgeoftheknife: put your shirt back on you're upstaging me (goddammit Dexter)

let's just go ahead and get the HUGE SPOILER WARNING out of the way

[personal profile] edgeoftheknife 2015-06-03 03:07 am (UTC)(link)
He could count on two hands the number of times in his life he'd vacuumed anything, and the vast majority of those times had been here in the Hotel, in Keeliai, over the last week or so. Thankfully there seemed to be very little to it. Unfortunately the task was so monotonous that it was easy to get lost in thought while he did it, between the simple pushing motion of the vacuum and the droning noise.

He'd joked before that he didn't care for introspection. It had been true then, but it had never been more true than it was now. Too many things to think about and none of them pleasant. Cleaning was meant to be a distraction--or so he assumed, judging by his own guess at Shudder's motives--not an invitation to brooding. Easier said than done.

Ravel flinched at the sound of his own name, jerking slightly as though he'd been struck. It took him a long moment of blinking to clear his vision and deep breaths to steady himself before he turned to look at Raine--

--and then immediately looked away, turning his attention back to the vacuum.

"Miss Sage."
ruinsprofessor: (stare)

[personal profile] ruinsprofessor 2015-06-03 08:27 am (UTC)(link)
Raine wondered, briefly, if that was fear she was seeing. It certainly wasn't anything resembling being pleased to see her, but she'd expected that much, if Erskine was conscious of all that she and Valdis had been told.

She hadn't expected to have to navigate a conversational dragon's nest quite so soon, either. Did she want to enforce a return to formality, knowing what she knew now? Raine studied him a little longer, then sighed. "If you insist on maintaining a title, Master Sage or Healer Sage is more technically correct," she said, and her tone was a little cool, but not unkind. "However, I believe I told you to call me Raine."

Her staff was in hand, but carried out of the way, behind her. Not in a position to be used immediately. A compromise between being unarmed and being outright on guard. "I'd like to speak to you," she added. A brief pause, considering the vacuum. "When you're not busy?" A bare uptick in pitch made it a question rather than a demand.

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redlightgreenlight: (Default)

D | June 3rd | SPOILERS

[personal profile] redlightgreenlight 2015-06-04 01:33 am (UTC)(link)
Having just finished up teaching at the Dojo for the day, Valdis was on her way back to her room, which thankfully no longer smelled like vinegar. Revelations at her side, the red gem glowing steadily, a new development for the blade, but she didn't mind as long as the gem didn't go dark. Erskine was asleep in a chair as she passed and she paused, a small frown forming on her face. It had been amusing to flirt him with over the network, and she had been surprised at his responses, but it was all an act. The man was not together, he was apparently not sleeping well either. She sighed, grabbed a blanket from the back of another chair and spread it over him. She wanted answers, but she wasn't going to wake him to get them.
edgeoftheknife: (pic#9143708)

[personal profile] edgeoftheknife 2015-06-04 03:35 am (UTC)(link)
It would have been clear that Erskine hadn't actually intended to fall asleep in the chair. He'd finished with most of his cleaning duties for the day and had been dithering about either attempting to find some food in the kitchen or possibly skimming the console for anything interesting on the network. Except dithering had led to sliding down sideways in the chair to rest his head on the arm--purely for comfort, of course--and resting his head on the arm of the chair had led to one very passed out sorcerer, all almost-six-feet of him cramped sideways and sound asleep not two minutes later.

Exhausted as he was, he showed no visible reaction to the blanket spread over him. A handful of minutes later, however, a worried look crossed his brow. A minute later and his breathing was fitful, the worried look turning pained.
redlightgreenlight: (Concerned)

[personal profile] redlightgreenlight 2015-06-04 04:01 am (UTC)(link)
Valdis had sat across from him, crossing her legs and settling down to read a book, but the shift in emotions caused her to look up. His expression matched what she was feeling, pain among other things. He was dreaming and it was not a good dream.

"Erskine," she said softly, briefly looking around the room to see where everyone was. It was mostly empty and so she rose, placing the book aside and slowly moved over to the man, gently placing her hand on his arm. "Erskine?" she said again, "Wake up."

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edgeoftheknife: (pic#9122403)

[personal profile] edgeoftheknife 2015-06-06 04:10 am (UTC)(link)
He watched the little ball of light drip down her arm, slide down to her fingertips.

Pain, she'd said. Death was too good for him.

Yet he stood there, in some combination of disbelief and confusion and curiosity, because what the hell else was he supposed to do? He was shackled, he was beaten. Where was he going to run, with Skulduggery and Darquesse right there?

She tapped his forehead, and for a second only shock registered. The shock of anticipation and dread and what the hell was she...?

And then agony.

And he screamed.


And he screamed, because he wasn't in a normal, comfortable bed in the Midnight Hotel, and he wasn't within arm's reach of one of the Dead Men, he was on the floor writhing in agony again and it was never going to stop, and somewhere along the way he woke up but the screaming didn't stop.

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skeletonenigma: (headtilt)

Closed to Anton | Early June

[personal profile] skeletonenigma 2015-06-03 07:11 am (UTC)(link)
Skulduggery would never, ever admit it to Solomon, but once the violin stopped being an incessant whine in his ear, he almost missed it. There was something freeing about being dragged into someone else's vengeance vendetta. It meant Skulduggery had a reason to be angry that wasn't, strictly speaking, his.

Now the violin was gone. Now his own thoughts returned. And his self-imposed exile from the Hotel was cut short by Anton calling him back over the radios.

Skulduggery wasn't entirely sure how he'd react when he saw Ravel again. Actually, that wasn't quite true - he knew exactly how he was going to react. He would ignore Ravel and carry on with whatever he was doing. Ravel would probably do the same. But he didn't know what he would think, and that prospect was worrying enough for Skulduggery to be quietly grateful when the man wasn't anywhere in the lobby.

He walked up to the front desk after making sure of that, and nodded to Anton. "You called?"
skeletonenigma: (darkfirewind)

I FORGOT TO SPECIFY THAT WHOOPS

[personal profile] skeletonenigma 2015-06-05 06:39 am (UTC)(link)
If Anton's expression wasn't enough to tell Skulduggery exactly what this conversation was going to be about, leaving the Hotel's sphere of non-violence clinched it.

And he'd been so determined to keep this month free of broken bones.

"The Water Sector, then," Skulduggery said with a nod, and he turned to lead the way out the Hotel's front door. A brush of a sigil on the inside wall, and the door opened onto a street bordered on one side by a canal. Skulduggery crossed over to the water without saying anything, then turned and waited for Anton to speak first.

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merb: (✈ looking for a new set of tools)

Early June; closed to Anton

[personal profile] merb 2015-06-05 04:58 am (UTC)(link)
Following this conversation, true to the proprietor's word, the prepped food in the kitchen started being marked with which contained processed ingredients or preservatives, and right away, Stork could tell the difference. He'd developed a certain tolerance for both during his years in the Wastelands, and subsequent time on the Condor, but it was still a nice change.

And he'd found the cabbages as the man had promised, and enjoyed every one of them. This morning he was down to the kitchen, hoping to catch Anton during his morning meal prep.
merb: (✈ occasionally just need to hang out)

[personal profile] merb 2015-06-11 06:44 am (UTC)(link)
Stork slides into the room, his habitual hunched posture making it look like he was expecting an attack all the time. "Hi," he replied, because it hardly felt like morning when he barely slept most days. He missed his trance helmet really badly.

"I wanted to say thanks for making the changes with the food," he said. "And, um, I made you something."

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skeletonenigma: (tie)

why did you have to use the hat Anton

[personal profile] skeletonenigma 2015-06-10 10:26 pm (UTC)(link)
Skulduggery was grumbling about a lot more than just the loss of his hat. His hat, however, was the only thing he felt even halfway justified grumbling about, so they were the only audible and coherent grumbles - at least until Anton ordered him to unlock the office door, at which point he went silent with the pain from his spinal column.

He'd thought about pointing out he was perfectly capable of moving on his own, but the trouble was that Anton wouldn't care. He'd thought about asking for someone to go back to the store and bring him his missing leg, but eventually decided that also wouldn't go down well. Skulduggery could live without a leg. Legs were overrated. He could fly, for God's sake. He didn't need either leg.

Apart from the fact that he did. But he could always make something else work. A wooden peg, perhaps.

Skulduggery did as Anton asked, trying and failing to ignore the pain at the top of his spine, then pushed the door open and dropped the key back into Anton's pocket.
Edited (whoops Anton doesn't have hands) 2015-06-10 22:32 (UTC)
aquanimity: (Gasp)

Because you're not going to respond to standard methods of scolding

[personal profile] aquanimity 2015-06-10 10:54 pm (UTC)(link)
When Anton asked her to take charge of the Hotel for a bit as he hurriedly stepped out, Aqua had found herself concerned. No elaboration was given - Anton simply left without explaining why he was suddenly rushing out - and that alone was enough to warrant a level of worry. A degree of which was justified the moment Anton returned, carrying a very injured Erskine and a one-legged Skulduggery.

She only hesitated for a moment to stare in wide-eyed horror before wordlessly dashing off to bring the requested sheets. Something very wrong had occurred, that much was obvious, but precisely what she didn't know. A mugging, perhaps? Unlikely, she thought, as she raced back to the office with newly cleaned sheets (the first ones she could find). Not with the tone in Anton's voice and the expression on his face.

The office was open by the time Aqua returned, and she was quick to spread the soon-to-be dirty linens over the seats. Then she returned to Anton's side, right as her words finally found themselves and began pouring out in a frantic jumble.

"Anton, what happened? How did this- here, let me help-" she reached out, an offer to help support Erskine and relieve Anton of some weight.
edgeoftheknife: (pic#9230054)

[personal profile] edgeoftheknife 2015-06-11 01:38 am (UTC)(link)
The walk back to the Hotel hadn't been fast by any stretch of the imagination, with Erskine having to lean heavily on Anton just to keep upright and stumbling in a vaguely forward motion. Funny, if he stopped thinking about the fact that Skulduggery had been one unhappy thought away from assassinating him, he could almost believe that this was just another day in the war--Shudder the one still standing, the others alive but in various stages of injury, limping through St. Petersburg or Dresden or Lisbon. Except they were a few men short, weren't they?

He was pale by the time they made it into the Hotel. Not quite ashen, which would have signaled the onset of shock, but with the amount of blood soaking the back of his shirt and the leg of his trousers it couldn't be far away. He glanced down at the little patters of blood trailing behind them across the floor with a hazy sort of distress.

"I'm going to have to clean that, aren't I."

At the gesture of support from Aqua he eyed her warily. Not that he didn't trust her (if Anton trusted her that was good enough for Ravel) but was she really going to be able to support the weight of a full grown man barely able to stand on his own? As tentatively as he could manage, being not quite all there at the moment, he transferred some of his weight to her, ready with his good hand to push at the air to keep them upright should it become necessary.

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IT'S A ONE HIT K.O.!

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skeletonenigma: (pencilskul)

Around the 13th | Closed to Erskine and possibly Anton

[personal profile] skeletonenigma 2015-06-16 11:44 pm (UTC)(link)
Skulduggery wasn't a stranger to cleaning. He'd had his own house, after all. But he was a stranger to cleaning the old-fashioned way, which was something Anton had insisted upon before leaving the Hotel in the capable hands of its few employees.

His magic wasn't bound, but Skulduggery obeyed the request anyway. Irritating Anton wasn't a wise move to make, even in the best of times.

They were nearly done for the day and finishing up with Anton's office. Through unspoken agreement, they'd done the common areas when the least amount of people would be available to gawk, and left the private rooms for when people started coming home. Not that it made much of a difference; in the few days since the fight, practically everyone important had discovered the circumstances of the chain. Even so, Skulduggery had his pride, and in this particular instance he was willing to share it.

He moved for a corner while Ravel went in the other direction, drawing the chain taut. Skulduggery sighed. "You're not paying attention again," he said over his shoulder.
edgeoftheknife: (pic#9230054)

Also major spoilers warning pretty much goes without saying

[personal profile] edgeoftheknife 2015-06-18 04:36 am (UTC)(link)
Days. It had been days now since Anton had chained them together, and Ravel was inclined to believe that they were quite possibly the worst days since he'd been ripped free of Darquesse's curse.

He hadn't exactly been sleeping well since coming to the turtle, but not-sleeping in Anton's bed with music in the background (and occasionally Anton singing) blew their current arrangements out of the water. And by "arrangements," mostly it was Ravel having to catch an hour of two of exhausted sleep whenever he could convince Skulduggery to sit down in the common room and stop moving. The Dead Man--the only real dead man among them, at least at first--didn't sleep; he meditated. And not regularly enough for Erskine.

And when Erskine wasn't catching a blessed few hours of rest (or not; the nightmares hadn't ceased) there was silence. Awkward, painful silence. There was too much between them. Too much hurt, and anger, and betrayal, on both sides. Too much to close the distance in a few short days of being chained together. Ravel fought to keep himself together, despite the stress and the lack of sleep, because the last thing either of them needed was a panic attack on one end of this bloody chain.

So when Skulduggery chided him for forgetting the chain, Erskine was half a world away. "Sorry," he muttered--and then realized he'd just apologized to Skulduggery. Which didn't stop him from backpedaling to give them both a bit of leeway on the chain again. He could find something to dust or straighten just as easily on this side of the room anyway.
Edited 2015-06-18 04:37 (UTC)
skeletonenigma: (tie)

[personal profile] skeletonenigma 2015-06-18 05:28 am (UTC)(link)
And just like that, silence again. Skulduggery would have almost preferred an argument.

He didn't pursue one, though - just got back to work, moving an open ledger book off of Anton's desk and putting it back where it belonged on the shelf. A mixture of curiosity, practicality, and low-grade vindictiveness moved Skulduggery into opening the drawers of the desk; pens and pencils and miscellaneous work implements rolled around in one, and a stack of papers sat in the other.

Skulduggery's hand hovered over the papers. That was odd. Anton was a very organised individual; all of his work papers were bound together in notebooks and binders either here in the office or below the reception desk out in the lobby. There wasn't a reason to keep anything unbound, even tucked away in a drawer as it was. Skulduggery took the papers out and dropped them on the desk to look through them, and, after a few moments, chuckled.

"Comic books," he murmured. Not the sort of thing he thought Anton might enjoy, but to each their own.

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