entrancelogs | Hush, little baby, don't say a word...

Who: Anyone!
Where: Anywhere inside, and outside, the mansion.
When: 1st - 3rd
Rating: Likely some disturbing imagery, at the very least.
Summary: Little fear gas dispensers have been left around Wonderland, by a particular scientist. Treat this as a mingle-party-gathering post. Even if you don't want your character to be gassed, you can come help someone who is. Or be attacked by them for your trouble. Heheheh.
The Story:

Overnight, on the grounds and inside the mansion, toys appear.

Small, innocuous, sweet things. Teddy bears. Ragdolls. Stuffed animals. All of them appear hand-sewn, and all of them are very appealing. That's the whole point of them, after all. Nestled into their neck, or their chest, under and amidst the stuffing, are small devices with a aerosol-delivered payload. Just the slightest amount of pressure will release a small dosage of Scarecrow's very best fear toxin. A new, lighter kind. He wants to know how long it will last, and how effective the housing is for grabbing potential victims.

Wonderland is, unfortunately, the perfect testing ground.

He waits just out of sight of them, placing them when most people are asleep, lurking in the darkest corners of the mansion with a small clipboard to take notes on. What do people from different worlds fear? He's keen to find out, in addition to everything else. He places them in front of doors, in chairs, on tables. Anywhere they'll look potentially out of place and worth investigating.

Everyone here is so good at investigating.

He's counting on you all to help him.

[ooc: I'll tag in for anyone who would like to run into Scarecrow. He's being a good boy and is keeping a distance from his prey, unless you want to come across him. (Said encounter could be lethal. For either!) Otherwise, tag in with what your character is seeing, etc, and where they are, and whether your post is reactionary or open for people to tag! Have fun! Tag around! Have feels! Be terrified! MUWAHAHAHA!

Also, you by no means need to keep things to this post, of course. Feel free to post network entries of fear gas results, or other logs! Have a ball.]

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Vincent can tell that Zack is shaken, but he doesn't quite understand the meaning behind the reaching back yet. The mention of that other name for Jenova, however, gives him a clue, and he nods slowly.

"... Jenova." Another pause. "... was that all you saw?"

"No."

He saw Angeal, but honestly, he's not sure how personal he wants to get in his explanation. It's not as relevant as what happened after.

"She was talking to me."

Wherever my children are, I will always be.

Suppressing a shudder, he rubs his eyes.

"I felt a wing manifest."

A beat.

"That never happened before."

"... an elaborate illusion..."

That probably isn't very comforting, but it isn't meant to be. He suspects that the wing very much bothers Zack, however, illusion or not.

"... you do not need to worry about that happening in reality. ... the wing, that is."

He can't really speak for Jenova and the way she talks to those who hold pieces of her inside.

"Yeah."

He knows it was an illusion; he knows that Jenova was dismembered and dispersed, and that even Sephiroth, for all his airs, will never be able to achieve his goals.

What he saw hit uncomfortably close to home, however, and for the moment, he's still trying to process it.

"How do you know?"

He's never really worried about it before, but after tonight, it's uncomfortable to think about.

"... you weren't born with Jenova already in your blood."

Simple as that. Well, Vincent could potentially go into more detail about what he understands of the mutagenic process of Jenova cells on development, but now probably isn't the time for that.

He's silent for a moment, absorbing that. Of course, it makes some sense even if he doesn't know the science behind it.

It makes him think of Genesis, Angeal, and Sephiroth -- the ones who test subjects before they were even born.

He sighs.

"Lucky me."

"... indeed."

Vincent isn't being sarcastic there, however. He does mean it. Zack is fortunate in that regard, at least, even if he is quite unfortunate in a good deal of other ways.

"... besides... as a SOLDIER you already successfully integrated and suppressed a smaller quantity of Jenova cells. ... I believe... like a vaccine... it offered you protection Cloud lacked..."

Comparatively speaking, he is lucky, he supposes. Losing his mind to something like that -- he really doesn't even like to contemplate the possibilities.

"You're well-informed."

The question he wants to ask goes unspoken, on the tip of his tongue: How do you know so much about Jenova?

He understands the unspoken question, however, and after a moment he offers an answer.

"... I witnessed many of the early experiments with Jenova... Gast discovered it shortly before my ninth birthday. ... both my parents worked for Shinra, and I joined the ... Turks when I was sixteen..." Teenage rebellion to join then and there, perhaps, but... he'd had other reasons, too. "... I was privy to a lot of information. ... and I was there for the experiments that... produced Sephiroth..." He takes a deep breath and lets it out in a sigh, ducking a little more into his collar. "... and since Meteorfall I have conducted... additional research..."

Into Shinra, Jenova, Geostigma and more... though Jenova and Geostigma and just -- reorienting himself to a world thirty years beyond what he remembered had taken up most of the past couple years for him.

An ex-Turk...

That's news since, much like SOLDIER members, Turks get too close to Shinra's secrets to ever really retire. The fact that Vincent looks as young as he does is also curious, but thinking back on their conversation on the beach, it makes sense. Vincent clearly has no love for Professor Hojo, and though Zack doesn't ask, he has a feeling he knows why Vincent is no longer simply human.

"Hindsight is 20/20, huh?"

It's thoughtful, as much to Vincent as himself. There were a lot of things he would have done differently if he'd known what he does now.

"At least things are getting better."

"Mm. Little by little..."

Hindsight... it is a cruel thing, in Vincent's opinion. To look back and know all that you would and could have done differently.

"Rebuilding is a slow process..."

And it is constantly hindered by things from the past coming back to bite them. Not that it matters right now, of course, not while they're here. Vincent closes his eyes and slowly sinks backwards onto the grass, lying down and opening his eyes again to look up at the sky.

"And some wounds never heal..."

"It's easier to destroy than build something."

He has faith, though. There are good people in the city of Midgar -- Edge, now, since Meteor. With Geostigma gone, he expects they'll pick up the pieces, and though it might take a while, eventually, the planet will stand strong once again.

He looks at Vincent, and he really thinks about that statement for a moment.

"There's always scarring." A beat, then- "Never is a long time."

Vincent doesn't look away from the sky, and he doesn't answer for a while, save for a noise of acknowledgement at Zack's statement about things being easier. He thinks about scarring and then he tries not to. There's a reason he's content to let his clothing always reshape itself to cover him completely, after all. And never... never is a very long time indeed.

He doesn't really want to talk anymore. Not about this. Not about these things. Mostly... he just wants to sleep right now, even if it means nightmares. He doesn't, however. Not yet. He does have one final thing to ask, he thinks.

"... do you ... think that there is... an end to everything in time?"

It's not a question he expects.

Sending a quizzical look Vincent's way, Zack leans back, thinking. There are a lot of things he could say about endings and beginnings, really. For instance- despite logically knowing that every soul eventually returns to the Lifestream, it was only when he became a part of it himself that he really understood what that meant.

He considers his answer for a long moment before giving it.

"There are things that operate in and outside of time."

The Lifestream, for instance, is so much more than what can be quantified or studied. ShinRa could pull the mako from the Planet and slowly make it decay, but they never really understood the workings of the Lifestream itself.

"When you pass outside of it, beginnings and endings...don't really mean much anymore."

"Hm..."

That isn't really the answer Vincent expects, but... it is interesting food for thought, all the same.

"... like this place."

In a way, anyway, it is outside of time. Beginnings and endings still have meaning here, he thinks, but time does not so much, it seems.

Hush, little baby, don't say a word...

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