Murphy looks down at his new clothes. He just got a nice new outfit! A new outfit! In the apocalypse! Do you have any idea how hard that is to do? Newmerica and all or whatever they're doing now. I mean, it's an exciting time. People are actually shaving and wearing make-up or doing what the hell ever again!
Yes, he appreciates that these clothes are clean. Does he appreciate suddenly being in them? No.
"Warren!" He shouts loudly. "Doc!? ...Did I get kidnapped all by myself again 'cause I hate that. Great." Well, they were off in their various new lives, doing their new things. They weren't anywhere near him, he suspects. But you know what? Sometimes when someone is kidnapped they hope their sort-of friends are there with them.
A second effort, and a psychic wave comes off him. A shout out for anything. Vanilla Zs. Blends. Talkers. Anything between. Nothing. But if he listens carefully, he could almost swear there's something else.
The Train
Murphy's found his 'item', a leather jacket worn over his hoodie with "Murphy's Limbo" written across the back. He's now examining the train starting with his car, his room, and moving down it. Occasionally dragging his red hand around the wall, draping himself over a piece of furniture, getting into cabinets. Just stopping in various cars and giving his own little critical appraisal.
"Well, it's a step up from being kept in storage crates or wearing a shock collar. We get pillows and everything. Like living in the lap of luxury."
"Who makes a library without a built-in encyclopedia from 1977? What are you going to use when you need something to burn in an emergency. You people need to be better prepared."
"Oh, that's cute. A rock garden. Specifically made for a glass house near you."
"Do they even have the good drugs here or are we- what is this new age shit? Is there even any lab equipment on this thing?"
His commentary is rarely wholesome and probably only occasionally welcome, but someone might catch him making some wry remark as he gives his catty inspection of his new 'home'. He was even starting to get used to being in the same place!
Food For Thought
When Murphy had gotten on, he'd found an item waiting for him in Luggage. Brown-paper wrapped, specifically labelled for him. He'd sniffed, held a comfortable weight in his hands, felt a familiar but unnervingly fresh give when he gave it a gentle squeeze.
And kind of figured that this wasn't exactly a thing that most people get? No, couldn't be. But while he could, you know, just leave it here and come back. Probably better to put it in the fridge or the freezer. That's where he takes it.
"This is a big refrigerator, I bet you could hide two dozen bodies in there." He calls from the door of the big storage to whoever else he hears in there. As he does, he looks at the brown paper wrapped parcel in his hands. "Seriously, where are they getting this food from? And more importantly, do they have tupperware in here?"
[OOC: Prose or brackets are good. Murphy comes with some warnings. The first time Murphy won't label the brain in the fridge, so it'll just be in there with no explanation.]
[Murphy's in the store room by the ICP there, hand leaning on the wall beside it and he's tilted so he can point at the refridgerator. And he has very, very red skin and is wearing a red team uniform shirt but with a leather jacket over it.]
Hello! Hi. My name is Murphy, pleasure to meet you. Having a great time here, really. Loving the whole 'pre-apocalyptic civilization experience', that's always a favorite but.... Ummmmm.
[He purses his lips for a bit, makes a little popping noise, before continuing.]
Sooooo... there was a tupperware container in the fridge holding an item wrapped in brown paper. Silly me, I didn't think to label it. [Tiny wince. Oopsie doodle.] That item was a human brain. Pretty recognizably a brain. That is my brain, and I'm gonna need that back. [Big smile? Big smile. Come on, do him a solid.]
OOC: It was stolen by Jack, but its fine for anyone else to have balked at it or poked it or whatever.
He's found a nice airy white suit with a red shirt with white stripes to go with it, along with a skimmer hat he's wearing slightly tipped rakishly on his head. He's been wearing train polos, okay! He wants to wear nice clothes on the regular again. (And by 'on the regular' one means when his post-apocalyptic ass could come across it).
He's gotten a picnic basket full of foods that he's not seen in a while, and he wanders around searching for the blankets of people he's met while trying to also look at the sky.
This? This is like nothing he's seen. That's view is absolutely insane.
While he's mesmerized for a bit and wanting to take it in, he ends up backing up into someone. Not hard enough to knock anyone over, but hard enough to startle him a little. "Woops, sorry."
the Endless River
Murphy wastes no time in sending a few of these stones. For one? They're pretty nice to help. He thinks at it like he would think at other undead even as he's doing the whole feeling thing, anyone telepathically sensitive catching the crowded edges of warm thoughts. And when he throws them? They're mostly nice. For all the hate and spite and greed and bitterness that can stew in this half-alive corpse, he casts pleasantries to his lovers at home. To Warren. To Doc. Just good vibes.
Okay, maybe with a touch of, Can you come save me now? To Warren but that's, you know, neither here nor there.
"I've never even imagined anything like this." He knows he's not dreaming because he can't actually dream anymore, and he knows he's not high because his mind is not this creative. This is Doc x 10 creative, this is not Murphy creative. It's crazy.
Look at all these people! How many are here? The last time he's felt this crowded is a horde and he's somewhere between hating the jostle of unfamiliar bodies and loving it because they're so alive. Sure they're their own brand of half-dead, subsisting on fumes as nearly nothing shambling hell-creatures, but they're alive, and he misses being surrounded by that.
Murphy has few credits, but he has a plan and he has a little bit of shitty food to get him what he wants. Not that he has a huge priority to solve any mysteries, he mostly wants to slip into a familiar role for a few days, but it's still a plan and the train can't bitch because technically? It'll help. And that's what it wants, right? RIGHT, TRAIN? RIGHT?
Take that.
He's going to go buy himself a new suit with the full knowledge that he's slowly going insane and mentally dolling himself up for sapient but only marginally communcative interdimensional vehicle whims.
Someone might find him in his new suit, possibly buying some fingerless gloves and boots to go with it, or getting his room. A little bit of strategic trading of some of his more garbage food and he's feeling 100% more like himself.
Flashy Bartender
The bar he's chosen to work at is bustling. Somewhere backstage there's a manager fully convinced that Murphy's just the funniest damn man he's ever met and charming to boot. That man hadn't even hesitated to try the drink that Murphy made for him when he was trying out for the job which really made that a whole hell of a lot easier.
He's been here for a few hours, taking his time with the drinks meant for the fighters. They get served quick and he works extra hard to make them perfectly. Just on the nose. Brilliant work. And once they get drinking? They love them.
He finds himself making a couple of the same drink for both a crew member and one of the local fighters, but when he puts them down he sets them far apart and without breaking his customer-pleasing smile even for a moment he says sternly, "Yours is on the right." So they don't pick the one intended for the competitor.
The Shutdown
Murphy is calmly partaking in some janky future earth rum, watching a fight, listening to the rattle of minds around him. They don't know he's listening, they're just passing by. Constant whispers, almost comforting in their familiarity. All of them attached, just a little reach away. A small shove and he has them where he needs them but for now he just listens, hoping one will say something interesting.
It's not something he expects, then, when suddenly one of the fighters is mentally just hating the man in front of him. A bitter, real, spiteful hatred for, what, someone he just met tonight?! No, that doesn't make sense. The other guy? The other guy has a sense of 'what are you doing here'?
Murphy doesn't know what was going on, but he turns his back to the crowd as if he's going to get a couple of drinks. Closing his eyes in concentration he finally uses that push he's been holding back all night. Look. Look harder. Hold back. Look harder. Look harder.
He can hear the tension in the crowd behind him shift to shock that the fighters have stopped. Murphy turns back to the bar then, wiping it down and getting ready to make another drink. "Come on, friend," he mutters to himself. Or rather, he speaks aloud the subtle inclinations he's sending towards the fighters. "That was a big surprise, wasn't it? Why don't you come have a drink with your nice friendly bartender, and we'll have a chat. That's right. Over here."
"...Your lines are bad and you should feel bad!" Murphy shouts uselessly at the sky to join the din of all the other yelling. But what the hell? He grabs his head at the feedback, as if he's a spider on a web and something just plucked every string at once. Every thread he has connected to someone shudders, right up into his core, and there's a pang in the very core of his brain.
That feels as bad as the River did.
He slams down some walls, pointedly closes himself off for a bit, holding his skull as if to stave off the headache until the Lord of the Tantrums has departed.
DRINKS ON THE HOUSE | cw: talk of zombie things
Murphy is in the kitchen car with a couple of milk crates full of bottles of various boozes. He'll give you a bottle. He'll mix you a drink. He'll even listen to a problem if you really want him to. Mostly he's just there to be the friendly neighborhood zombie-blend bartender.
He's drinking his own ungodly thing that looks like a mojito but he's put frozen brain cubes in to act as ice and just waiting for people to come by and hand out the goods.
[Murphy's in his cabin so he's not using video, just talking at the ICP. So everyone is deprived of his Satan-hued face. Poor them, right?]
So I am bored as Christmas, and I just so happen to now have the relatively newly found talent to make jewelry out of scrap metal. Not super helpful, I know. But if someone has some tools I could borrow, I'd appreciate it, just in case anyone wants something to go with the new pendants they got.
No charge. Out of the sheer generosity of my large and soft heart.
[He's so, so bored. His head is too quiet. Sure, he could have gotten off the train and did the cave thing or whatever but that would require a level of initiative he simply doesn't have.]
[This, though? Somehow he can find a little drive for.]
He sleeps at normal hours. What are you chumps that stay awake forever? Come on... He's pretty lanky though so he kind of just tetrises into his bunk.
✨ Room use habits?
He doesn't, actually. Instead he keeps most of his stuff in his rucksack unless he needs to grab it and run. He's from the apocalypse and always expects to have to make a getaway.
✨ Bathing habits?
He does bathe and uses cologne and would use the spa if he didn't think people would come in at random. But his body is such a mess of scars he doesn't want to show many people unless proving a point because scars shaped like human mouths are a bit much.
🚆 What are choo up to?
✨ Chore habits?
Nope! Good luck with that.
✨ Eating habits?
He eats normally and regularly, but diet is enriched by either additions of train-provided brain to his cuisine or he makes cookies that have brain in them. Either way, anything Murphy has made especially for himself he now labels as 'for Murphy'.
✨ Exercise habits?
He plays cards and walks from place to place. That's it. If he gets his sword cane then he'll be practicing with that at some point.
✨ Entertainment habits?
Mostly he's in the library or the kitchens, maybe the rock garden or watching schlock in the cinema car.
✨ Media preferences?
Absolute trash that he can backtalk. If it's gaudy and terrible he wants to sit and watch it, please, please give him filth. He needs 'Orcapocalypse' the movie about Killer Whales invading land after a tsunami or a romance novel that makes you wonder if the author has ever even had sex because the words 'button', 'petals', and 'moist' are used as weapons against the senses.
🚆 A day in the life of...?
✨ Notable train-bound activities?
He'll just try to hang out with people he kind of likes and might be like, 'I'm busy doing something else right now' for people he doesn't want to talk to right then.
✨ Notable physical traits/scents?
He smells like cologne but despite his better efforts he sometimes smells a little dead. He bathes, he grooms, he takes care of himself. But with heightened senses, you can tell he's dead. He might be able to cover it up for normal senses.
✨ Notable non-physical traits?
Enhanced Zombie vibes. He's undead, but will be trying to learn more about necromancy and cultivation because of that very thing. He's got the vaccine connection to zombies, but there is other undead he needs to reach out for too.
✨ Fun train-related character trivia tidbit(s)?
He keeps forgetting to ask the train for dryers. He wants to live in true luxury.
✨ Free space!
No petty vengeances, he's just Murphy.
🚆 Welcome to the Voidtrecker Express! We hope you enjoy your stay.
By popular request Samson the forklift operator is back to talk about how to cope with discovering your significant other is an adulterer. Murphy gives info on how to balance affection and attention in polygamous relationships. He also analyzes the Void Trecker search order for the city, and why it's so important.
It's also dramatic reading time again! The theme this time is "Sexy Voices". Send in your business reviews. Love the place? Have a bone to pick? Have a hilarious story? Let us know and choice offerings will be read by Murphy or one of his assistants in their best 'hope your boss has a sense of humor if you listen to it at work' voice.
Earlier that day an entire warehouse and its contents disappear. One moment Murphy's back is turned as he directs a driver, the driver gasps at the wondrous bullshit that happens behind him, and he turns to observe an empty space.
By now he knows, he's just been hanging with it because he doesn't particularly have the want to bother with it. It was an easy ruse to play along with, but this is too much. It's that that makes him drop his clipboard and barcode scanner right there on the concrete and just walk off. He's done! He's out! Bye bye!
By the time he finds someone on the sidewalk, he's in back in the trappings of a black suit with a red shirt, his theme being fully on. "Look, I've played along with powerful dick's bullshit before? But I know when to get out. This is 'getting out' time."
LET LOOSE
There's a whole flock of bipedal ostrich things with snake heads, and he is not about it. Nope nope nope. He's not had to run like this since bounty hunters were after him.
He runs into a corner store to get away from them, shoving a magazine rack in front of the door. Then backs away slowly as the bipedal snake headed whatsits gather outside, looking in through the window menacingling.
Murphy stares through the window, before spreading his arms and shouting a dramatic, "The fuck?!"
"...Wait are you the guy from the podcast?" whispers a mortified teenager from behind the register, glancing between him and the window. "...Big fan."
"....Thank you?!" replies Murphy, before he starts looking for weapons that he can improvise. This is what he gets for not just having his sword cane on him.
Wildcard
[Hit me with whatever. Replies can be either prose or brackets.]
Murphy's having one of those 'He's had it with these motherfuckin' snakes on this motherfuckin' plane' moments. Just replace 'plane' with plane of existance there and replace snakes with just eat his whole ass. Every last bit of it.
He notices early on that finally he can do something. He can imagine his sword back. He can imagine up a wall where he needs to. And that's when he's finally really ready to fight himself, and not just piggyback off enhancing others.
Someone's about to fall into one of those tricky sinkholes when he holds out a hand and weaves a bridge under them. "I don't feel stoned enough for this, but I guess we're goin' anyway."
HINDRANCE OR HELP
Murphy doesn't care all that much about civilians. Maybe. Probably. Okay, he cares more than he used to, and that's a small little something. But he's out there actually swinging for once, ready to move in and get someone's back. Now, he's not going to mess with any big monsters. Not unless he's dragged into it. No thank you, someone else can handle that. But he'll be here picking off little guys.
Okay, maybe not guys that are too little. He winces as he watches a little... what is that? What the fuck is that? They're helping, not like some of the other things, but what in this fake-ass world are even those?
"Are those Nymph Oompaloompas?" He asks the person next to him.
You know what? He's just... gonna go back to stabbing.
[For those that don't know Murphy, the man on the screen outright just looks likes Voltaire wet dream, complete with red skin, Satan aesthetic, black suit with a red shirt and he's got the voice of a story-telling podcaster.]
Moral Quandary Time! Where do you draw the line in killing people? Are you a 'no, never' person? A 'only in self-defense person'? A 'the world'd be better without this person' person? Maybe even a 'You killed my father, prepare to die!' type. Or, maybe? All it would take is something that'll line your pockets.
Maybe the setting counts. Somewhere like my world, where billions of undead roam hungry and the living trample each other to survive. Definitely one where even the softest heart would be hard-pressed to stay their hand. Or you go to one of those colorful, magical places where the grass looks like astroturf and there are rainbows with no clouds. But you found out all the cute, adorable fuzzy things there were slowly going to cause the extinction of five other species.
This isn't just a question about murder philosophy. Missions are tough and some just want to help and some of us are desensitized. You might need someone who can easily do what you'd struggle with. Then again, you might need someone with a little more patience so you don't snap someone's neck.
[Murphy withholds the question about whether someone would rather him get information one way or the other if it came down to a choice. He'll wait on that one 'cause he's sure the initial answer would be, 'I would rather you do neither.]
Also hello to the new people! Hiiii. Yeah. You might get mindfucked. There's a lot of that recently. I'm sure someone else with a healthy dose of PTSD can fill you in on how that went.
It was an inevitability Murphy hadn't wanted to face. He'd been being careful- kind of careful, anyway. You know, as careful as a guy that mostly gives a fuck about crossing the wrong people can be careful. He's in the dining car, having lingered around to read. Living in his own little world. Not knowing the difficulty that's about to befall him because this is- okay, not the worst time for something like this but it's very inconvenient.
It's the distraction with the book in his hand suddenly looking like gibberish that makes him drop the glass and said glass slips and breaks on the edge of the table. He doesn't notice that the shattering has already happened when he reaches in a futile effort to prevent disaster and not make it worse. When he feels the sting of glass in his fingers he realizes how wrong things have gone at this stage.
He tosses the now unintelligible book off to the side as he scrambles for a napkin, a paper towel, anything, panic obvious in his wild-eyed expression.
"Shit, shit! I need a bandage and some alcohol! Fucking bleach or something. I can't walk through the train like this!" It's at least eerily slow as it leaks out from between his fingers as he tries to hold the cut shut until he gets some help, dripping in lingering too-thick drops.
Oddly Homey - Standard Coach
He's more than a little shaken after the previous encounter in the Dining Carriage, a lot of his pompous exterior having faded to something less aggressive. He's just distracted, tired, and when he enters the Standard Coach he finds himself wavering.
The din of noise is... almost welcome. It's white noise, a crowd of voices, something that he remembers fro the psychic din of the undead.
Murphy passes through the Coach, walking slowly and staring at the conversing shadows. Are these people all that remains of what was before? Souls adrift in the void? The zombie stares at them as he passes through.
It's not the same, but it's close enough that he finds he misses the empty companionship, the traces of lingering presences. He doesn't even notice anyone else when they're walking by, nearly stepping into them.
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Murphy looks down at his new clothes. He just got a nice new outfit! A new outfit! In the apocalypse! Do you have any idea how hard that is to do? Newmerica and all or whatever they're doing now. I mean, it's an exciting time. People are actually shaving and wearing make-up or doing what the hell ever again!
Yes, he appreciates that these clothes are clean. Does he appreciate suddenly being in them? No.
"Warren!" He shouts loudly. "Doc!? ...Did I get kidnapped all by myself again 'cause I hate that. Great." Well, they were off in their various new lives, doing their new things. They weren't anywhere near him, he suspects. But you know what? Sometimes when someone is kidnapped they hope their sort-of friends are there with them.
A second effort, and a psychic wave comes off him. A shout out for anything. Vanilla Zs. Blends. Talkers. Anything between. Nothing. But if he listens carefully, he could almost swear there's something else.
"Well, it's a step up from being kept in storage crates or wearing a shock collar. We get pillows and everything. Like living in the lap of luxury."
"Who makes a library without a built-in encyclopedia from 1977? What are you going to use when you need something to burn in an emergency. You people need to be better prepared."
"Oh, that's cute. A rock garden. Specifically made for a glass house near you."
"Do they even have the good drugs here or are we- what is this new age shit? Is there even any lab equipment on this thing?"
His commentary is rarely wholesome and probably only occasionally welcome, but someone might catch him making some wry remark as he gives his catty inspection of his new 'home'. He was even starting to get used to being in the same place!
And kind of figured that this wasn't exactly a thing that most people get? No, couldn't be. But while he could, you know, just leave it here and come back. Probably better to put it in the fridge or the freezer. That's where he takes it.
"This is a big refrigerator, I bet you could hide two dozen bodies in there." He calls from the door of the big storage to whoever else he hears in there. As he does, he looks at the brown paper wrapped parcel in his hands. "Seriously, where are they getting this food from? And more importantly, do they have tupperware in here?"
[OOC: Prose or brackets are good. Murphy comes with some warnings. The first time Murphy won't label the brain in the fridge, so it'll just be in there with no explanation.]
no subject
Hello! Hi. My name is Murphy, pleasure to meet you. Having a great time here, really. Loving the whole 'pre-apocalyptic civilization experience', that's always a favorite but.... Ummmmm.
[He purses his lips for a bit, makes a little popping noise, before continuing.]
Sooooo... there was a tupperware container in the fridge holding an item wrapped in brown paper. Silly me, I didn't think to label it. [Tiny wince. Oopsie doodle.] That item was a human brain. Pretty recognizably a brain. That is my brain, and I'm gonna need that back. [Big smile? Big smile. Come on, do him a solid.]
OOC: It was stolen by Jack, but its fine for anyone else to have balked at it or poked it or whatever.
no subject
He's gotten a picnic basket full of foods that he's not seen in a while, and he wanders around searching for the blankets of people he's met while trying to also look at the sky.
This? This is like nothing he's seen. That's view is absolutely insane.
While he's mesmerized for a bit and wanting to take it in, he ends up backing up into someone. Not hard enough to knock anyone over, but hard enough to startle him a little. "Woops, sorry."
Okay, maybe with a touch of, Can you come save me now? To Warren but that's, you know, neither here nor there.
"I've never even imagined anything like this." He knows he's not dreaming because he can't actually dream anymore, and he knows he's not high because his mind is not this creative. This is Doc x 10 creative, this is not Murphy creative. It's crazy.
Permissions Form Base
no subject
Murphy has few credits, but he has a plan and he has a little bit of shitty food to get him what he wants. Not that he has a huge priority to solve any mysteries, he mostly wants to slip into a familiar role for a few days, but it's still a plan and the train can't bitch because technically? It'll help. And that's what it wants, right? RIGHT, TRAIN? RIGHT?
Take that.
He's going to go buy himself a new suit with the full knowledge that he's slowly going insane and mentally dolling himself up for sapient but only marginally communcative interdimensional vehicle whims.
Someone might find him in his new suit, possibly buying some fingerless gloves and boots to go with it, or getting his room. A little bit of strategic trading of some of his more garbage food and he's feeling 100% more like himself.
He's been here for a few hours, taking his time with the drinks meant for the fighters. They get served quick and he works extra hard to make them perfectly. Just on the nose. Brilliant work. And once they get drinking? They love them.
He finds himself making a couple of the same drink for both a crew member and one of the local fighters, but when he puts them down he sets them far apart and without breaking his customer-pleasing smile even for a moment he says sternly, "Yours is on the right." So they don't pick the one intended for the competitor.
It's not something he expects, then, when suddenly one of the fighters is mentally just hating the man in front of him. A bitter, real, spiteful hatred for, what, someone he just met tonight?! No, that doesn't make sense. The other guy? The other guy has a sense of 'what are you doing here'?
Murphy doesn't know what was going on, but he turns his back to the crowd as if he's going to get a couple of drinks. Closing his eyes in concentration he finally uses that push he's been holding back all night. Look. Look harder. Hold back. Look harder. Look harder.
He can hear the tension in the crowd behind him shift to shock that the fighters have stopped. Murphy turns back to the bar then, wiping it down and getting ready to make another drink. "Come on, friend," he mutters to himself. Or rather, he speaks aloud the subtle inclinations he's sending towards the fighters. "That was a big surprise, wasn't it? Why don't you come have a drink with your nice friendly bartender, and we'll have a chat. That's right. Over here."
no subject
That feels as bad as the River did.
He slams down some walls, pointedly closes himself off for a bit, holding his skull as if to stave off the headache until the Lord of the Tantrums has departed.
He's drinking his own ungodly thing that looks like a mojito but he's put frozen brain cubes in to act as ice and just waiting for people to come by and hand out the goods.
Llama 25
So I am bored as Christmas, and I just so happen to now have the relatively newly found talent to make jewelry out of scrap metal. Not super helpful, I know. But if someone has some tools I could borrow, I'd appreciate it, just in case anyone wants something to go with the new pendants they got.
No charge. Out of the sheer generosity of my large and soft heart.
[He's so, so bored. His head is too quiet. Sure, he could have gotten off the train and did the cave thing or whatever but that would require a level of initiative he simply doesn't have.]
[This, though? Somehow he can find a little drive for.]
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We hope you enjoy your stay.
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Free Download | Former Issues | Today's Sponsor
Issue 122
Home Wreckers and Void Treckers
By popular request Samson the forklift operator is back to talk about how to cope with discovering your significant other is an adulterer. Murphy gives info on how to balance affection and attention in polygamous relationships. He also analyzes the Void Trecker search order for the city, and why it's so important.
It's also dramatic reading time again! The theme this time is "Sexy Voices". Send in your business reviews. Love the place? Have a bone to pick? Have a hilarious story? Let us know and choice offerings will be read by Murphy or one of his assistants in their best 'hope your boss has a sense of humor if you listen to it at work' voice.
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By now he knows, he's just been hanging with it because he doesn't particularly have the want to bother with it. It was an easy ruse to play along with, but this is too much. It's that that makes him drop his clipboard and barcode scanner right there on the concrete and just walk off. He's done! He's out! Bye bye!
By the time he finds someone on the sidewalk, he's in back in the trappings of a black suit with a red shirt, his theme being fully on. "Look, I've played along with powerful dick's bullshit before? But I know when to get out. This is 'getting out' time."
He runs into a corner store to get away from them, shoving a magazine rack in front of the door. Then backs away slowly as the bipedal snake headed whatsits gather outside, looking in through the window menacingling.
Murphy stares through the window, before spreading his arms and shouting a dramatic, "The fuck?!"
"...Wait are you the guy from the podcast?" whispers a mortified teenager from behind the register, glancing between him and the window. "...Big fan."
"....Thank you?!" replies Murphy, before he starts looking for weapons that he can improvise. This is what he gets for not just having his sword cane on him.
no subject
He notices early on that finally he can do something. He can imagine his sword back. He can imagine up a wall where he needs to. And that's when he's finally really ready to fight himself, and not just piggyback off enhancing others.
Someone's about to fall into one of those tricky sinkholes when he holds out a hand and weaves a bridge under them. "I don't feel stoned enough for this, but I guess we're goin' anyway."
Okay, maybe not guys that are too little. He winces as he watches a little... what is that? What the fuck is that? They're helping, not like some of the other things, but what in this fake-ass world are even those?
"Are those Nymph Oompaloompas?" He asks the person next to him.
You know what? He's just... gonna go back to stabbing.
no subject
[For those that don't know Murphy, the man on the screen outright just looks likes Voltaire wet dream, complete with red skin, Satan aesthetic, black suit with a red shirt and he's got the voice of a story-telling podcaster.]
Moral Quandary Time! Where do you draw the line in killing people? Are you a 'no, never' person? A 'only in self-defense person'? A 'the world'd be better without this person' person? Maybe even a 'You killed my father, prepare to die!' type. Or, maybe? All it would take is something that'll line your pockets.
Maybe the setting counts. Somewhere like my world, where billions of undead roam hungry and the living trample each other to survive. Definitely one where even the softest heart would be hard-pressed to stay their hand. Or you go to one of those colorful, magical places where the grass looks like astroturf and there are rainbows with no clouds. But you found out all the cute, adorable fuzzy things there were slowly going to cause the extinction of five other species.
This isn't just a question about murder philosophy. Missions are tough and some just want to help and some of us are desensitized. You might need someone who can easily do what you'd struggle with. Then again, you might need someone with a little more patience so you don't snap someone's neck.
[Murphy withholds the question about whether someone would rather him get information one way or the other if it came down to a choice. He'll wait on that one 'cause he's sure the initial answer would be, 'I would rather you do neither.]
Also hello to the new people! Hiiii. Yeah. You might get mindfucked. There's a lot of that recently. I'm sure someone else with a healthy dose of PTSD can fill you in on how that went.
no subject
It's the distraction with the book in his hand suddenly looking like gibberish that makes him drop the glass and said glass slips and breaks on the edge of the table. He doesn't notice that the shattering has already happened when he reaches in a futile effort to prevent disaster and not make it worse. When he feels the sting of glass in his fingers he realizes how wrong things have gone at this stage.
He tosses the now unintelligible book off to the side as he scrambles for a napkin, a paper towel, anything, panic obvious in his wild-eyed expression.
"Shit, shit! I need a bandage and some alcohol! Fucking bleach or something. I can't walk through the train like this!" It's at least eerily slow as it leaks out from between his fingers as he tries to hold the cut shut until he gets some help, dripping in lingering too-thick drops.
The din of noise is... almost welcome. It's white noise, a crowd of voices, something that he remembers fro the psychic din of the undead.
Murphy passes through the Coach, walking slowly and staring at the conversing shadows. Are these people all that remains of what was before? Souls adrift in the void? The zombie stares at them as he passes through.
It's not the same, but it's close enough that he finds he misses the empty companionship, the traces of lingering presences. He doesn't even notice anyone else when they're walking by, nearly stepping into them.