ghost by my side, so perfectly clear. [ catch-all ]

[insertdadjoke]

Who	"Jacob Kane" (Cain) & You
When	Month of September, barring plot explosions
Where	All around Keeliai and various establishments
What	Just one of those catch-all things
Warn	Will update as necessary. Please consider filling this permissions post!

Things were tense around the city. The breezy weather had subsided, and with it went some of the feeling of just waiting for something to happen. Now the air was humid and people were scrambling to collect what they could, prepare not only in case the air dried again but for whatever was to come when the Justicar appeared. No one had any idea what to expect. Cain certainly didn't, but he was more or less okay with that; he didn't need to borrow trouble rather than make sure his own interests would be all right should push come to shove.

To those ends, Cain was being a little more directed in his wanderings of the city. Places where the natives seemed more steeled than frantic, still appreciated foreigners or at least was willing to let individuals prove themselves, anything where he could make himself appear more solid. His carefree attitude was great and genuine, but if things went to hell, Cain wanted to make sure people would look at him and not question if he had to take some kind of control. All hail Romulus, father of the Holy Roman Empire. Ha, yeah right. Not that it would even mean anything to most people here.

He went about his business. There were places to be, people to bother, and plenty of things to keep up on.

Comments

[redlightgreenlight]

She looked at him suspiciously for a moment, before reluctantly holding out her hand for him to examine. The skin was smooth and flawless as always, as if the injury had never occurred.

"I don't heal like that."

No one she knew did, or at least, no one she knew of. It was so unnatural and wrong, that she wasn't even sure if it could be called healing. But somehow, Kane seemed to be the source of it and that made her wary.

[insertdadjoke]

"No, I doubt you do," Cain murmured as he ran his thumb over the palm of her hand. He didn't have any indication of where the cut had been specifically or even how severe. It was frustrating in a way that it looked like this magic was to spread his own healing to the people around him if they needed it, that he was sharing something that was never meant to be shared.

Inspection done, he let go of her hand and tilted back to regard her. Probably for the better that he was sitting to pretend that he hadn't just been exhausted from the simple closure of what appeared to have been a small wound. "You said before that you didn't want to share your powers with anyone, what they were," he said, head tilting in acquiescence, "which is fine and I won't ask. This, however, is what I do."

[redlightgreenlight]

She stared at him, one brow raised, uncertain whether she should be surprised or not, then pulled her hand back to look it over herself, unconvinced that the blood had just gone back into her veins, except, that's the only place it could have gone. She shivered.

"You move against time," she said, looking at him, "You turn it back instead of simply causing it to move forward at a faster pace." She shook her head. Moving against the flow of time instead of with it, this Jacob Kane was far more than he seemed. "You said that this is 'understanding in progress', but the lack of surprise involved...Who are you?"

Because he definitely wasn't a normal human of any kind, he didn't act like a human his age acted, nor apparently, did he heal like a human.

[insertdadjoke]

"It isn't against time so much as..." He paused, considered how to best word his own observations of what happened when he healed. One hand went to rest on the cover of the book he had been reading, fingers brushing up and down the closed pages. Fact of the matter was, it wasn't a bad way to explain it in layman's terms, but there was something so much more about it. Something grander that he had grown accustomed to in his time. "As returning it to its rightful state."

"I'm Jacob Kane," he said, his lips quirking in easy amusement. "Also go by Cain, as in the story you probably know." References she'd made in conversations previous hinted at her earth-like background, so he wasn't going to go further into it here. "What I'm still trying to understand is this whole part where I can apparently share the love with other people now."

[redlightgreenlight]

She crossed her arms, watching him, processing the information. Rightful state. Cain. The Bible. The first murder.

"So are you a man who exists outside of time?" She asked finally, moving to a chair across from him. She wasn't entirely certain if she believed that he was the original Cain, but with Eva's magic, and all the worlds, it was certainly a possibility. What with his knowledge of politics, systems of management and now, this, it was possible that he was a sort of immortal.

[insertdadjoke]

"No," Cain said, head tipping back as she moved. Once she was on an even keel, he changed his position and sat straighter. She wanted to turn this into a discussion and it was one he usually didn't mind having; in Keeliai especially, people seemed more easily accustomed to the weirdness of his situation, focused on the finer details more quickly.

After a moment, he shook his head to add emphasis to his statement. "I'm just a man who exists. Who will keep existing. There aren't many answers where I'm from, when I'm the only one like this, so I don't have many answers for you, either."

[redlightgreenlight]

When he put it like that, immortality sounded like a tragedy, and perhaps it was, continuing to live while everyone else you came to know died. But at least time was frozen for them in Keeliai, although that didn't mean that people couldn't leave you. But it seemed that they could still find relationships.

"You're the only one like you?"

That in itself wasn't entirely strange, after all, she was the only one of her kind with a soul, but the way he said it made it seem different.

[insertdadjoke]

Cain nodded. It was odd for him to think that there might be other people in situations like these, in those other worlds, that had more like them. That something so fantastic and strange might be a group endeavor. Even his children, grown and eventually passing into the afterlife once they served as an Enforcer, didn't last as long as he did. Only Abel, and Abel was a completely different sort of case. They'd made a promise; Abel was keeping his side of it, even if Cain had no way to hurry his own along.

"The only one," he confirmed. It wasn't that he considered his own life to be painful, or meaningless, or too long. This was just a fact that he would have to keep going on with no choice of his own in the matter, and he'd accepted it for now. Embraced it. That didn't change the facts. "No one else lives like I do. One of life's many mysteries."

[redlightgreenlight]

It seemed that the more she learned about the people here, the more she realized that she wasn't entirely alone. She had always kept secrets, fearing repercussions based on the nature of her magic, of what she was. But Anton knew and so did Wan, and to an extent, Dante also knew, and none of them had been disgusted or horrified. But there was always that chance.

"I know what that's like," she said softly, "Watching the world change around you while you remain unchanged. Not know exactly how your existence began, but knowing how it will end...or knowing that it won't."

[insertdadjoke]

Watching Valdis, gauging her reaction, Cain nodded slowly. There had always been something about her, her clock in particular and its friend that didn't belong on the same person at all, that told Cain there was much more to Valdis than was readily apparent. Her naivete had nothing to do with how old she was, merely how experienced she had become in that time, and having someone who could partially understand how he felt was both freeing and aggravating at the same time. As it was with all sympathetic experiences, it was close but not the same, and he almost wanted to hold onto the feeling for himself and guard it jealously.

But he wouldn't do that.

"Yeah," he said, his demeanor somehow still the same as the young man he often presented to the world. He was young, in mind and body, if not in spirit and life. It was an odd mix. "I got that feeling about you. Even so, you're something different. However it is you live isn't quite the same as me if you're surprised by that." He nodded toward her hand, to highlight his point.

[redlightgreenlight]

Just as Cain was gauging her reaction, so was she gauging his. He was definitely far older than he seemed, older than she was, perhaps even older than Bakura. His mixed emotions on being understood were not unexpected, but it still set her on edge, especially when he called her 'something' as opposed to simply 'different', but he wasn't wrong.

"No," she replied slowly, "I'm not surprised." She lived by being a monster, he did not. "You are more like an angel than a demon."

[insertdadjoke]

It was almost like they were facing off, not having a simple conversation over a reading table in the Hotel lobby. To any outside observer, it probably looked rather casual. Especially with how hard Cain was fighting off slouching or otherwise appearing as tired as he truly felt for all that this new magic utterly drained him. He had to figure that part out, along with everything else. He'd have to contact Raine soon, be ready to practice even if he wasn't so sure.

"Angel?" Cain couldn't help but laugh at the comparison. "No, I'm really not. I'm just a person... who heals. Nothing angelic about me."

[redlightgreenlight]

"It was simply a comparison," she replied, raising a brow when he laughed, "I've met some angels and you aren't one."

She was still interested in his healing, and the fact that he was immortal, but in a different way than she and Bakura were immortal.

"Forgive my bluntness," she continued, "But can you die? I mean, some immortals will live forever unless killed, some can't be killed and some revive from death. So which one are you?

[insertdadjoke]

"Of course you have," Cain said, more of a mutter than an actual comment. Angels and demons weren't really things where he was from. Unless one counted angels of death, the Reapers, and they were really their own category entirely. Nothing divine about them, simply intrinsic to the workings of the universe. Life was left up to the living for as long as they were in that realm. It was as simple as that.

That question was an astute one, and Cain quirked his lips partway in response. "Someone once told me that it's less that I don't die, so much as I repel death itself," he said. It wasn't an outright answer, although it was close to an explanation. Cain wouldn't die, that much he was certain of, but he could still feel pain. Experience the loss of consciousness as his body gave out entirely. But he would never die. "What about yourself?"

[redlightgreenlight]

It wasn't a real answer, but since his healing turned back time, it was possible that he recovered from life-threatening injuries by doing the same thing. Hence, death never actually took him.

Her eyes narrowed for an instant at his question, but he had answered hers so it was only fair for her to answer in return.

"I do die," she replied, "But as I possess multiple lives, I am able to revive. But there is a limit to this, although not even I know what it is."

[insertdadjoke]

There were a lot of things Cain had yet to come to understanding, especially in regards to himself. Some things would likely never be answered and he had contented himself with simply being alive in the meantime and using the time rather than fussing over how he might make the best possible use of it. That seemed like enough.

"Multiple lives," he said quietly. Although his gaze didn't move, he drew his attention back to the second clock on her neck from his peripheral vision. "Then how do you know there's a limit?"

[redlightgreenlight]

Her expression instantly shifted from open to guarded. There was no easy answer to that question and any evasion would be far too obvious. She simply stared at him, uncertain of how to answer, despite being certain that he probably wouldn't like any answer she gave.

"Do you truly want the answer to that?" She said, looking him steadily in the eyes, noting that though his gaze remained on her, it wasn't entirely focused, "If you do, then I won't lie to you, but you might not like what you hear."

[insertdadjoke]

Perhaps unfortunately for them both, Cain was far from the type who would shy away from adversity or difficult subjects. He had little patience for shielding oneself from uncomfortable things just because someone might not like them; that was their own decision to make and it was probably better to put out in the open besides. Valdis' reaction only made him more certain he needed to hear this.

"I'd be a very different man if I ran away from anything I might not want to deal with," he said, patient and stern. Nothing overly powerful but enough to show his resolve. He'd run from things before, sure, but only once they'd become unbearable and he saw no other option. Abel was the exception to that, as he always was. "It won't change the facts whether or not you tell me, will it?"

[redlightgreenlight]

"No," she replied, "It won't."

His response wasn't what she wanted to hear, but true to her word, she would explain as best she could.

"I've been called many things over the years, one such title would be Soul Reaper." She took a breath, still meeting his gaze, but her confidence continued to fade, "My kind traditionally do not possess souls, so I suppose it was mere instinct that drove us to hunt something that we did not have. We gain a life for each soul we consume and I lost track of mine several hundred years ago."

She had been a monster, and she supposed that, despite everything, she still was.

[insertdadjoke]

Traditionally do not possess souls. Cain could tell she was already the exception to the rule, almost like Cain was to other mortals, simply due to the existence of her own clock and... the second clock suddenly made sense. Suddenly made sense and his expression closed, lips pursed and more emotionless than judgmental.

"What happens to the souls you consume?" he asked carefully. He couldn't just believe they would be wiped from existence and yet that seemed to be what she was implying. Every soul was sacred and had its own part in the balance. This was a disruption of that balance, it had to be, and yet Cain wasn't sure how it should fit if it was true that she was some sort of Reaper meant to collect these souls. It was frustrating how he just didn't have enough information.

[redlightgreenlight]

His expression told her everything she needed to know. He was unhappy with what she had told him, but she had warned him, so it was really his own fault.

"It's complicated."

She didn't want to confirm what he was probably thinking and she had told him she wasn't going to lie. She was starting to wish she hadn't. Lying had been what had enabled her to survive for so long. Not to mention that she was concerned by the frustration she was feeling from Jacob, most people would have simply been horrified.

[insertdadjoke]

Unhappy could mean a lot of things. Her reticence to explain further only made things more difficult from there with the half-information he had been given. Without knowing what happened to the souls that she used to sustain herself, it was easy to assume the worst. That didn't mean she wasn't telling the truth: there could easily be more to it that simply wouldn't translate well and make it sound terrible before it sounded better. Maybe it really was just something she couldn't talk about.

Either way.

"The sort of complicated you can explain? Or the kind you don't want to?" he asked. They weren't necessarily different answers, but the way in which she replied might tell him more.

[redlightgreenlight]

It was definitely the latter, but seeing as he hadn't left or turned against her yet, she supposed she could try to explain.

"As far as I know, nothing happens to them until I need the life energy that they possess."

After that, she was certain that they ceased to exist.

"And that isn't something I can entirely control."

[insertdadjoke]

Uncontrolled consumption of energy collected on powerful instinct, possibly beyond her control. It was not a pretty situation and, even though Cain was making heavy assumptions to fill the gaps of what she was refusing to say, there were still things that just did not sit well with him. The frustration sat poorly in his gut, along with the begrudging understanding and a curiosity he would never be able to sate.

"Energy doesn't just stop existing. To use that energy doesn't mean..." He paused, took a breath, found himself leaning on the table once again. Such a tiny wound had taken far too much out of him and he still wasn't sure what was causing the drain when he healed. "I understand things being outside your control. What about releasing them, then?"

[redlightgreenlight]

She wasn't quite certain what to make of Jacob Kane at the moment, the emotions wafting from him seemed conflicted, but she knew that he was frustrated and she didn't know why. She leaned back in the chair, growing more and more wary with each breath.

"I can't release them," she replied, "because I'm not the one holding them." She took a deeper breath, "There's a creature living next to my soul. That creature is the source of my powers and it is extraordinarily resilient. To put it in perspective, there was a weapon created specifically to destroy my kind, and that weapon failed...if you can't destroy the prison, then you can't release the prisoners..."