call me out!

[cyclical]

CALL ME OUT



choose a character
call them out: put their name in the comment header
leave a prompt (picture, music, quote, etc!) or blank comment
no smut please! but all other tomfoolery is a-okay

Comments

[imprudency]

[ Ready is such a subjective term, isn't it? Klaus has never felt ready for anything in his life, no less this moment. Every day is a thundering, frantic stampede forward, even if these days it's tinged with alcohol. Hey, better than ex, right?

The thought makes him huff quietly to himself and he tips his head to one side, looking over at his brother. ]

Very poetic. The end of something. A perfect little envelope to the chaotic shitshow of a ballet that is our lives, non?

[ He raises a hand in false cheers, as though they're merely ruminating over the apocalypse that was, in a dark, smoky bar with crisp martini glasses balanced between their fingers.

They were never made for something so delicate, something so easy. That's the real punchline. ]

I was born ready. [ It's all bluster: smoke and mirrors desperately cast in an attempt to forge himself into something that resembles a human being. What else can they be, standing here alone at the precipice of everything they knew and everything they don't.

But he starts forward in the rubble, surprisingly steady and limber on his feet for a man drowning himself in yesterday's booze and sorrows, but his family is at stake here. Five beside him, he knows that whatever waits for them in Sweet Caroline, he can weather. Maybe he and his brother got off to a rocky start upon his return, but he can appreciate the understanding.

(The understanding that comes in a you did it, didn't you?, the silhouette of his brother cut against the door frame of the old house; In the flask passed between them in a burning great room, smoke and devastation as their backdrop; it comes in the quiet yeah and the way they both look out at the horizon instead of the definite wounds they have both become).

So he marches through charred bits of building and greenery, over gaping fissures in the sidewalks, and to the little, family-run bank on the corner. The facade is all but blown off, but inside, the marble counters and old teller stations still stand. Sweet Caroline is there— was she a clerk once upon a time?— behind the counter, looking as though she's counting money as she hums to herself. ]

Oh, shit.

[ He sucks in a deep breath and strolls right up to the spot where the ghost stands. There are nasty burns all along one side of her body, the pantsuit shriveling at her shoulder, but her face is made up as pretty as a daisy were it not for the piece of glass sticking out the side of her neck. Klaus swallows hard. He clears his throat and she stops singing, her head swiveling to him with a sick sort of wet sound.

Klaus winces and stares in the space across the desk, where, for now, he looks like he's speaking to plain air. ]

So sorry to bother you, you seem very busy and I just hate to interrupt. While I love institutional capitalism in its purest form— I mean nothing gets me going more than sexy little ledgers and account statements— I was hoping we could ask you a few questions.

[ The lady scoffs, turns her nose, but for the first time in all his time with the ghosts, this chick doesn't really get the choice. He clenches his hands together, knuckles white with tension as blue energy flares up around him.

The bank teller filters into view, shimmering and blue and still absolutely disgusted at the sight of him. What do you want, she huffs, looking Klaus up and down then, curiously, to Five at his side. ]

[fika]

[ ready was subjective. and the thing is, no one ever was.

how could anyone be ready for something like this? they spent their childhood preparing to be world's saviors in whatever plan dad had pulled the strings of. instead, here they were as the harbingers of ruin and sometimes five has to wonder if they were always going to be. if this was something they would never be able to outrun.

ruble and dust and corpses.

five steps in tandem with his brother, elbows close enough to brush and cannot help the wretched glance he throws at the horizon around them, half-expecting to see another silhouette carved from the backdrop (but she's dead. no more deals with the devil, and yet he'd make one every single time if it would spare his family standing witness to this.)

he casts a long glance at the side of klaus' face, curious. his brother was always good at smoke and mirrors, at wearing that bravado on his sleeves but the truth was - no matter how he wore it, klaus had always cared more than the rest, was sensitive in ways that made it easier to unravel into a mess, with blunts at the dinner table and alcohol in his drawers to numb the worst away.

five wonders if the alcohol cellars from his first stint at the end of the world were still intact in this one.

Sweet Caroline manifests herself in that sweep of blue, radiant and otherworldly from klaus' delicate hands.

five doesn't turn away from the carnage, from the mangled neck or the burned flesh, (he's done worse days ago. the glass in her neck was a quicker death than one would think.) but he is grateful there is no smell.

he can't help the scoff at klaus' introduction, though, and it almost feels like this would be just another mission. ] We won't take up much of your time. [ five clips out, professionalism worn as thin veil. how many times did he ask simple little questions by way of commission assignments? ] What's the date, right now?

[ her brows scrunch up, a flicker of confusion between the two of them, and five's irritation sparks bright hot because he never really could help himself. certainly not now. his next questions are through a clenched jaw. ] I know, not a question you hear a lot. We just - got into town. Lost track of time. [ his smile is so forced right now. serrated in ways that really dig home just how much he hates this.

april 3rd, is the answer, a frustrated little huff. ] Year? [ 2014? says the dead woman, as though the two men in front of her are the crazy ones. she turns to look at klaus: is your son okay? ]

Oh, screw this! [ it just slips out, frazzled nerves getting the best of him because he can't even begin to start processing it, his thoughts a jumble of possibilities that very loudly don't make any sense. ]

[imprudency]

[ Klaus can't add much to the conversation, all things considered. It's hard enough focusing on the energy it takes to keep his hands still, his heart rate slow, his breathing deep. Conjuring Ben had been difficult, but familiar after some work. And he's not really put this gift into practice much over the years with the cult.

But there's Sweet Caroline, looking incredibly unimpressed but at least she's answering the questions. Until they get to the year. The year's the tricky bit, that makes his heart leap into his throat, because if they somehow ended the world sooner?

He looks, wide eyed at his brother, and for a moment Sweet Caroline herself flickers with the lack of focus. ]

Did she say 2014? You've got to be shitting me— [ His head whirls back to her and he holds his hands up in mock apology. ] My son would sooner have you deepthroating the piece of glass you've so graciously embedded in that old gizzard of yours, but yeah, he's doing just swell babe.

[ The ghost lets out a shriek of disgust, a hand to her bloody chest. The silvery-blue of her fading away to nothing. ] But we got a situation. You're not supposed to be dead, this bank's supposed to be busy and filled to the brim with snooty, old, white bitches so if you have any interest in preventing your very dramatic, very tragic end, you'll want to tell us what happened.

[ The woman looks startled, the brilliantly blue outline of her flickering again. There's not enough alcohol in the world for this shit, particularly when she turns her nose up with a huff. Well, until she finally mutters I don't remember. I remember a man, with a funny hat. Oh, and one of those monocle things. Just before it happened. An explosion? I had to have been an explosion, but he didn't seem surprised.

She flickers away as Klaus turns slowly, painfully slowly, toward his brother. ]

Did she...?