[PRP] how's your mind (shun & jeremiah)

[azuredreams]

Jeremiah's shoulders rolled, a breath let out as he continued to work on and salvage his garden. While it was in bloom once more, it was torn up in places and he was having to repair and save what he could after he got out of work.

A hand was wiped across the back of his forehead, the Chief of Police pushing himself up and ignoring the fact that there was at least one neighbor who seemed to stare at him. As if they couldn't quite believe he was doing this by hand. Not that he did not understand why - not with the shift in the world they were in now - but it was still a little grating.

It was ignored.

His watch was checked, expecting that Shun would be due any time now, and he gave his garden one last check over.

Blade Kuroda

gonna assume they had a brief text exchange and set this up!

 

[Blade Kuroda]

Sure enough, Shun had arrived before long. As he made his approach to the front steps of the Mercer household, he idly looked around to see if there was anything different about this place. He hadn't spotted the garden yet.

Coming on up to the door, he let out a breath and rang the doorbell.

There was a lot to cover.

And it wasn't all that pleasant over all.

Azuredreams

 

[azuredreams]

The garden was hard not to notice considering it sprawled most of the property. It was bloomed wildly but there were signs of it being torn up in places and that was what Jeremiah had been trying to take care of.

Salvage the plants that he could.

He had just stepped inside to start a pot of tea when the doorbell rang, Jeremiah cleaning his hands on a towel and going to the door to answer it.

"Shun," he greeted with a slight incline of your head, "come on in." The house was mostly the same from the last time that he had been here. Except that there were more pictures on the walls and they clearly were of younger Jeremiah and Algie together in Ashdown.

Sometimes there was a younger Zac with them as well.

He waited until the young detective was inside before he closed the door.

"We didn't come home to the reality we left." Best to be straight to the point. He was moving towards the kitchen. "I just put tea on, so you're welcome to have a cup while we discuss things," he added.

Blade Kuroda

 

[Blade Kuroda]

While he stood around waiting, Shun spied the plants that sprawled all around the area. It seemed like a number of them had been damaged, however.

He lifted his head to Jeremiah as the older man answered the door, "Jeremiah."

Stepping in, he took a quick look around the interior of the house, noticing a few of the "newer" pictures that now hung on the walls. Despite the fact that they appeared to be new to him, he noticed that the Mercers looked younger in some of them.

"Yes. That is the best way of putting it. And there has been... a number of different changes. I am certain you are aware of a few of them..." he sighed, "Some tea will be nice."

Once in the kitchen, he asked, "Where would you like me to begin?"

Azuredreams

 

[azuredreams]

"Would you prefer to discuss the reality shift first? Or what happen within the rift?" Jeremiah gestured for Shun to have a seat on one of the stools at the island in the kitchen, pulling things down to make tea.

"I have a vague idea of what happened but not more than that." What occurred in the rift as he really only had his assumptions, the things they had picked up when they weren't busy keeping the way back open.

Blade Kuroda

 

[Blade Kuroda]

Shun took a moment to consider that. He supposed it might be easier to start with what occurred within the rift. Maybe it would give a little more context to what was going on now. Maybe.

"Right..." he took in a deep breath, taking a seat on one of the stools at the counter, "Upon going through the door, the group seemed to have split up into three different eras. The 80's, the 60's, and the 20's. I am not certain what went on in the other two, but I ended up in 1969 among a few of the others."

The now-detective lieutenant folded his hands over the surface of the island.

"1969... at least that version of it appeared to have been some previous cycle, after the cage had been in place. Algernon was a student at the college... Leila was a highschooler, and Vivien was a little girl. A few others we know were around during this time. At certain points in time during a concert at the beach, the pressure shifted drastically and... the memory reset, though in a worse state each time it happened. The source of the instability was another rift, which Vivien and Sunny guided us into. It was not until we went through that where... I suppose you could say things became more clear as to what needed to be done."

Azuredreams

 

[azuredreams]

Jeremiah blinked, then shook his head at the mention of a different Algie, Leila, and Vivien. It wasn't like he didn't expect it, just that the times certainly didn't match up.

"I suppose that supports my theory that it's not linear, the cycles we're apart of along with the reality shift." He moved around the kitchen, pulling things down before he went to the refrigerator to see what was in there for snacks. The eating habits of the Jeremiah he replaced clearly weren't the same (and he clearly did not have the same experiences).

"Did you learn anything in that time? Something that was meant to help? I can't imagine it was without purpose." He looked up from the fridge, eyes bright. "Where did the second rift lead you to?" ... and how did things become clearer was the unspoken question.

Blade Kuroda

 

[Blade Kuroda]

Shun sighed, "Not much, really. The teenage trio were missing there, and there were two other kids that ended up dead. Ming and Jennifer. The notable thing was that the trio apparently appeared out of nowhere and then everyone acted as if they had always known them. Algernon was the only one to have noticed that bit."

Given how things happened here, he had to wonder if their appearance marked the start of a new cycle or something along those lines. It was hard to tell, really.

"The rift led right back into the void. All groups reconvened here. It was a pretty empty room, save for a knife, marker, and Heliodora's old notebook on the ritual process. We had to find a way to rebuild the pillars of reality, without recreating the cage. Different sigil. I had.. and still have some concerns about this, but little other choice was given at the time."

Azuredreams

 

[azuredreams]

"Ming and Jennifer?" Jeremiah blinked, the names niggled at his memory but- "Somehow it isn't surprising that Algie would be the one that noticed things weren't quite right." Even in another cycle. "Though on the topic of the three ...

"They don't exist, so far as I can tell. Not here. There's no mention of them anywhere and they never went missing. I never even had a case like that this year." Jeremiah pulled out what looked to be small sandwiches and set them down on the counter for Shun before he turned to the tea pot that was boiling. His hand hovered a moment, bright eyes flicking to the young detective.

"I would assume the cage is still in effect and that you did as you just stated. Rebuilt the reality but with a different sigil since those tied to the previous one all died." A hand was raked through his hair (failure still stung), his shoulders rolling as he brought the teapot over and a few selections of tea. Most of them were strong black teas. "... and likely different people chosen to uphold it as it was before." His expression was somber, lips pressed to a thin line. "What are your concerns? As you are right, there was little choice and little time. The damage had to be fixed or we probably would've faced reality fracturing even further."

Blade Kuroda

 

[Blade Kuroda]

"Heliodora mentioned Ming as one who helped them 'vanish', and he ended up dying. I assume Jennifer had some similar role in that regard," he explained.

"Unfortunately yes..." Shun sighed. While they didn't have much other choice at the time, he still couldn't help but feel as though he had let Heliodora down. They weren't quite right back where they had started, but he wasn't sure they were much better off.

"For one... Renard assisted with the casting. I do not know how much of an affect he has had here. There really was no way to keep him from doing so either. The void prevented any physical conflicts."

Taking out a piece of paper, he made a rough sketch of the new sigil.

"Tree, keys, and a trinity knot. I do not know who ended up taking the place of the three teenagers. A lot of people were casting," he stated. Glancing over at the little sandwiches that had been pulled out, he just tilted his head but didn't take one just yet. He could wait for the tea to be finished first, "I also cannot help but feel there could have been another way. I just... do not know what."

Azuredreams

 

[azuredreams]

"I wonder what was different about their deaths then, as they have not come up or been seen." Jeremiah was pouring the tea, a cup offered out for Shun to take. His own is poured and he takes a seat to add a small dash of cream into his tea.

The only thing he ever puts into it.

He let out a hiss of breath at the mention of Renard assisting with the casting but let it go as he leaned to look at the new sigil. His lips pressed together and he wondered just how else these new aspects would influence the world.

"We're past the point that everything is clear cut," Jeremiah said quietly, "including why Renard is The Enemy and why he was caged, us along with him. It's never been about good and evil, right or wrong, and because of that it makes it that much more difficult to see the path we need to take." His fingers raked through his hair, rubbing at the side of his neck briefly. "... the magic likely picked those it thought would serve best as those aspects but, as you said, it was a large gathering and many assisted in the casting."

Softly glowing eyes glanced up from the sketch and focused on Shun. "There may very well have been but we didn't have time to find it. Now all we can do is ... adjust to this new reality."  

[Blade Kuroda]

Shun took the tea and nodded in thanks. He added nothing to it. After giving it a moment to cool, he took a careful sip while he listened to Jeremiah. He really supposed there wasn't too much more they could have done in that case. He still wasn't completely satisfied with how it all went down, however.

"I just hope that this redesigned cage does not also bring the cycles back into play. I would rather not go through all this s**t again, complete with having to relearn everything," he grumbled, "Worse yet, some other incarnation of me could be something less than useful."

Like being a little kid or something while everything is going down.

"Speaking of the new reality... Do you know the case that is my current priority?" he asked.

azuredreams

 

[azuredreams]

"So far as we know, that is still in effect. We do not know what the trigger of the reset is and that may, in all honesty, be something we need to be focusing on going forward. If we can understand the magic that created all of this - including the cycles - then it would likely be beneficial to putting this all to an end." Jeremiah's fingers touched lightly to his tea cup, a touch of his cold escaping and cooling it so that he did not scorch his tongue.

The idea of another him had been something he thought of often and he still did not know how he felt about it. "If there's to be another me ... I am certain that I'm leaving quite the pile of issues to deal with," he snorted. The mention of the new reality and case had him looking up sharply.

"Congratulations on the promotion, by the way. Hopefully the desk on my old office doesn't still have the hand scorch on it." He let out a breath. "I saw some of the case notes on my desk and looked through them but-" The look he gave Shun said that the notes were sparse, sparser than he would've expected.

"I cannot quite believe the name listed."

Blade Kuroda

 

[Blade Kuroda]

"Agreed," sighed Shun. Their attempts to break the cage didn't work. But maybe the new format would make things easier on them. It was hard to tell right now.

"Ah... thank you. It was a bit unexpected, as you might imagine," he started before drawing in a deep breath, "As for the case, yes. It is an odd one. We saw Sunny that morning, yet apparently Ascension Shore had been murdered a few weeks prior to the 18th. I am not certain if you heard anything yet, but according to my notes, you, along with Algernon, are some of the suspects."

The now Detective Lieutenant furrowed his brow. It was impossible for them to have done it. Or anyone else who had crossed over into this timeline. But that said nothing about what any of their previous counterparts might have done.

Azuredreams

 

[azuredreams]

"Well, considering that I myself was promoted before the fairy ball in our reality ... Somehow it isn't surprising to see that you were promoted but you've also been in town longer, haven't you?" Jeremiah was still adjusting to all the small changes that were not necessarily so small.

The mention of himself as a suspect had him snorting and then sighing. "Why is that not surprising?" Which meant he had not heard anything. It was also not surprising given what had been stated towards Sunny and given that she was the stuff magic was made of ... "Algie as well? I suppose that may be through association as no one is aware that he has any magic at all."

Blade Kuroda