howtheyshine | Pumpkin Hollow IC Contact Post

He skirts around Crichton as much as possible as he enters, figures out the sofa by process of elimination and goes over to it. When he sits he's still got his coat on (overlarge, clearly made for someone bigger).

"...Yes." He frowns. "It's not made from dogs is it?"

He has one now, after all. Or a creature very much like a dog. It's even named Dog.

Crichton chuckles to himself at the question. This is like the early days of being on Moya all over again. He can't take anything for granted here the same way he couldn't be sure his crew on Moya would understand anything he said at first. Hell, none of them had even heard of a toothbrush. (They used teeth-cleaning bugs instead.)

"No. It's not made of actual dogs." He hopes. No one knows where these specific infinite box brand of hot dogs came from, but no one has dared to ask, either.

"Usually, they're made of pork or beef, or a little bit of both. They're safe, I promise. I'll have one too; it's about lunch time."

Crichton uses the pause to go retrieve his skillet to help school his expression and posture into something less stunned and more in control. By the time he sets the pan over his wood stove to heat up, he has his baseline back.

The sitting room is a straight shot from the kitchen, so Crichton leans in the doorway to face Yellow as he says, "I'm going to answer your question, but I think it might be smarter for me to ask you the same thing first. How much do you know, right now? About anything that's going on here."

He gives a quiet little grunt. "Good. I like dogs."

He's not sure what pork or beef are-- wait, no, he does know, the knowledge drifting to the top of his mind like bubbles breaking the surface.

...Hmm, not sure how he feels about eating pigs or cows either.

That is a later him problem.

He shrugs slowly, imitating the motion he's seen others make. He's afraid to admit how little he knows, how preoccupied he's been with things that have little to do with the Big Issue of why they're here.

"I know about... the ferry. I know there's a barrier. That people are stuck, that no one can die." He scratches his head, another imitative gesture. "I was at the party when that weird... person showed up and turned everything sideways, and when he made the woman turn into something else."

Which as far as he can tell didn't deserve that much fanfare, but, well, what does he know.

"I know there's someone in the water who knew what I was."

"Good. So do I. Don't trust guys that don't like dogs. Even better, don't trust guys that dogs don't like." Just some free (mostly good?) advice.

"Correction," Crichton says, holding his finger up like a teacher making a point, "No one stays dead here. You can die, it just won't stick. Still gonna hurt." Ask him how he knows.

"The weird person was one of the demons that's been wreaking havoc on the island, named Mendel. The party was a birthday party for Dahlia Leeds, she's the one you saw transform. Turns out, she's been doing night shifts as a monster called the Pine Devil and eating people. Makes sense when you think about it, now we know that she's actually the daughter of Aster--that would be another of the demons causing trouble around here."

That's already a lot to take in, so he pauses a moment to give Yellow some air before he asks his next question.

"Someone in the water? That one is new to me. What do you mean?"

He's going to go back to his room and write all of this down and then ask Sally if he has it right, because like hell he's going to ask Crichton to repeat anything.

As for his water associate, well. Yellow scowls.

"I tried to leave across the water when I got here. It... he... they... it was in the water, black, the darkest black I've ever seen, but I could feel it moving, like it was folding over and over on itself, swirling without stopping, and it had more eyes than I could count."

The scowl deepens. "It asked if I forgot it."

"You tried to... swim?" Crichton doesn't have to say how foolish he thinks that is because his eyebrows jumping up and down do it for him.

"Something dark and full of eyes asked you... Jesus..." Was Nyarlathotep himself? God, he hopes not. If it was, then they might have confirmation that the asshole really is snooping around the island keeping tabs.

"I... hate to ask but... Arthur did mention that John, his John, didn't have complete memories. Did it seem at all familiar to you? Could it be right about knowing you? I mean, you are uh... kind of cut from the same cloth, aren't you?"

The thing about being people-shaped is that sometimes his body does things when he's feeling A Lot. Like right now, for example. He's on his feet without intending to stand up, temper all at once incandescent.

"That's not my fucking fault, he asked for me that way! He wanted me without memories of the King. He took them and trapped me and then blamed me for not knowing--"

He verbally stumbles to a halt, not so much gathering his temper as realizing he's yelling things he doesn't want Crichton to know.

Yellow looks at the floor to try and keep from seeing Crichton's face and maybe keep Crichton from seeing the dismay on his own. He's breathing hard. He doesn't even need lungs. This is stupid. Bodies are stupid. Being here, coming here, that was also stupid. The little British voice in his head says Well, the choice suits you then, doesn't it.

Yeah he's gonna try and bolt for the door.

Edited 2024-10-23 19:42 (UTC)

See, this is why he didn't want to ask. He ain't even here and Arthur is still causing problems.

Wait. Arthur did what? So the son of a bitch has no qualms about manipulating other people's memories and he still had the fucking nerve to get onto Crichton for what he did in one?? Crichton can't believe it. He's actually starting to side with John...

"H-ey! Where are you--?" Shit, we got a runner.

"No you don't!" Crichton springs from his chair to tackle Yellow to the ground, trying to sit on his back if he can manage it.

Crichton is very fortunate in this moment that Yellow opted to include lungs in his current shape. It means between the impact of the floor and the weight of Crichton on top of him squishing the air out of said lungs, he does not immediately try to shapeshift into something that can take Crichton's head off. He's too distracted by physical discomfort and the profound weirdness of physical discomfort.

Yellow squints his eyes nearly shut and growls.

"Get the fuck off me."

It sounds slightly less impressive, even in That Voice, when it comes out as a wheeze.

"I will if you promise not to run away immediately," Crichton says, without so much as shifting his weight. He's heavier than he looks. All that junk in the trunk.

"Fine!"

Is he hiding his face against the floor in embarrassment? Is he trying to figure out why said face feels hot when the rest of him does not?

Okay did not, but it's a good coat and he's getting overheated.

"Get the fuck off!"

Edited 2024-10-25 20:34 (UTC)

"Okay. Thank you." Crichton says in a tone of voice that may as well be 'was that so hard??'

He gets to his feet and offers a hand out to help John up off the floor. Any redness he sees very purposefully ignored.

"Will you wait right here, please? I smell the hot dogs burning." He's not just saying that. There is actually smoke in the air. Hope he likes his dogs well done.

He ignores Crichton's hand and hunches into his coat, like a turtle with a shell of outerwear. He is still chest-down on the floor.

"Fine, I'm waiting."

"Suit yourself." Crichton says with a shake of his head. Like talking to a toddler...

He rushes to the kitchen. One montage of sizzling sounds, banging cabinets and food plating noises later, he returns with two plates.

"Here. Don't have any ketchup so I put mustard on yours. You like the color yellow, anyway, don't ya?"

That prompts another muffled growl. But he kind of emerges from his coat a little, smells the hotdog, and then embarks on the awkward process of getting to his feet while trying to look like he is not either interested in the food or still embarrassed that he, a god, got tackled and sat on by this human.

Yellow takes the plate, retreats to the sofa, and stuffs food in his face so he doesn't have to say words.

It takes all the control he has not to roll his eyes. Correction, it's like talking to a teenager. Well, at least he's eating.

Crichton grabs a seat on the far side of the sofa, letting Yellow have some personal space. (Definitely not because he doesn't wanna get in a slap fight, shh.)

"So... you're really not used to that kind of body, are you?" It's extremely obvious.

"So what?" Said around a mouthful. He swallows, or tries to, winces slightly at the fact that it's too big a swallow, and powers through anyway. Yellow coughs and clears his throat. He glares down at the plate.

"I was trapped in Arthur's eyes, of course I'm not used to having a fucking body."

"Yeah. Can't imagine that was much fun for you." Secretly he's praying he isn't about to have to use the Heimlich maneuver. He's pretty sure his first aid certification expired by now.

"I could uh... give you some driving tips, if you want? For starters, you should consider taking smaller bites. The food ain't going anywhere, I promise. You don't have to put it all in your mouth at once."

"Not fun," he says, scornful. "Not fun. Being ripped from my kingdom, stripped of my memories, and imprisoned in the eyes of a liar. Not fun."

He doesn't really feel like eating any more. Yellow puts the remains of his hotdog back on the plate and sets it next to him on the sofa. He's glaring at the floor when he speaks again.

"I'm not John."

Crichton stays quiet for that outburst, simmering in his growing sympathy for the being he'd once actually been kind of... jealous of? Right up until that last revelation.

"Come again?"

Not John? What does he mean not John? Who is he if he's not John? How many damn spirits did Arthur have living in him anyway??

"Who are you then?"

"I'm--"

If he knew the way it would look to someone who's used to having a body, he wouldn't do it. But it makes him feel a little better, and he doesn't have the context to know it's embarrassing, so he scoots back on the couch and pulls his lanky legs up so he can curl into something of a ball on the sofa.

"I," sarcastically dramatic pause, "am what he got when he tried to bring John back from the Dreamlands. Save him from the King in Yellow. I'm... the wrong fragment."

A parasite. A mistake.

The way it looks to Crichton is... this man in front of him is being vulnerable. In his house, on his couch, and Crichton can't turn that away. Even if what he's hearing is horrific on several levels. Some things are also starting to make a lot more sense.

"Sorry. That's a raw deal you got. So... what should I call you? You're not John and you don't have his memories, so you deserve to have your own name."

He stares at Crichton.

"Are you making fun of me?"

It doesn't have any acid in it, though. It's genuine confusion. It seems strange and wrong and an about-face that Yellow doesn't trust.

"What? No." Crichton says in mild confusion. "No, I'm really asking. Do you have a name?"

"Yellow," he mutters, and watches Crichton carefully. "Arthur said--"

He smiles and looks away. "Arthur said I wasn't John, I was a parasite. So he named me Yellow, like the king he hates."

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