Noise, Noise, Noise

[redraverfae]

"That." Red points to Eden Jones as she helps herself to a spiced apple brew from her bag, courtesy of Onjdre. "What Miss Jones said, all of that. Because for fuck's sake, why can't a girl have a happy ending in this town?"

She waggles her eyebrows at Kelsey for a second, and then twists the top off before swigging. She swallows and adds, "That's not a bad nor a good theory on replacing Jasper. It's the bad man, really, that I think is the most fucked up. I mean, the whole situation's fucked, really. Who the hell asks someone to inflict harm on another person they love, just so they can be ::air quotes:: inspired?"

Red sits her cold denim self down on the stone in front of the roaring fire, gesturing with the bottle as she talks more. "I'm happy the page I wrote hasn't happened, and I doubt it will, because it's just not scary or chaotic enough, given all the horror-riffic stories people have already penned. That said, we do have to consider all angles: other than keeping a lot of people up at night, and causing the most random fainting pains I've experienced, what is the Bad News Bears end result if *we* can't *fix* whatever's going on there with that odd Trio of Font and Fuckery: Mo, Jasper, and the Typewriter?"

She goes to drink again and catches Kelsey's look, and quickly adds, "Well I wasn't gonna include 'The Bad Man' in that threesome. That just sounds terrible."

[Henry Gondorf]

"Jasper's the sort of guy that can't handle the facts." Gondorf said as he appeared from the kitchen. He pocketed a dinged metal flask as leaned against the fire place.

"He thinks tragedy and talent goes hands in hand. Trouble is he was too young to realize no writer worth their ink has it easy. Seen one too many writing dens to say otherwise. Most the greats have trunks of 'scripts they can't part with but no one wants to print, not even when they got an award named after them."

Gondorf sank into though for a minute before coming back to the question Red asked. "Hate to say it but we all have a bad habit of widening the scope a bit too much when trouble runs across our path," He shrugged, "Doesn't help most times it is the right thing to do. This, however, might be a little less earth shattering but just as horrid. What if we don't get the story straight and we become part of the story forever. Just like Mo, Jasper, and Misery Man?"

[Owle Isohos]

Kelsey shakes her head, holding up her hands. "I don't know about whether you'll need blood as ink or not. I've only been tangentially involved in all this. I don't think so. The typewriter came with red ink when it was purchased." She glances at Eden. "Do you still have that sales receipt? Might be useful."

"I wasn't suggesting that the boy should come in to save Mo. I'm with Eden and Red here - I'd like Mo to be able to save herself, but I'm not sure she can. I'm not sure she wants to. She thinks she deserves all this, because she lived while her boy died. The purpose of bringing in the boy is absolution for Mo, not salvation. Once it's all done, once the torture is stopped, I think it might help if she sees her boy alive. Or, hell, even if she only talks to his ghost and hears him forgive her. I think it is important to have Jasper grow a pair, to not be the helpless observer, to take control back. I think it's important for Mo to do that, too, if we can get her to. Stories don't have to have only one hero, after all." She shrugs.

"The whole thing is fucked up." She nods to Red, acknowledging her point. "But, look, everything I'm saying here is conjecture. I was given a choice to be involved or not when Jasper came back into town last month. I chose not to bind myself to the story. So everything I know, everything I'm suggesting, is based on what I hear second hand."

[kimp]

Henry
:: Liberty turns her head in the direction of the kitchen ::
Anyone else back there?

:: She refocuses after a moment and turns to Eden, also acknowledging Kelsey with a subtle nod ::
I am all for women saving themselves. It opens an interesting direction for the story to go in.
:: a head cock ::
I appreciate the idea of the lover offering Mo absolution. That is not one I would have thought of
:: a quick quirk of her lips punctuates the next ::
Absolution is something I've only just started to explore recently. I suspect everyone here has more to add on that than I would.

:: She makes a hmm noise and says slightly under her breath ::
It came with red ink? I wonder if it was ever ink at all. And if not, whose blood was in the typewriter?

:: For a moment she's silent then she turns to Madrigus ::
It seems like the more input we give the further we get from circling back to your question. So, at the risk of completely losing track, I'll tackle it.

:: She casts a look around the gathered group ::
This is just my recollection. Anything I miss you should add.

:: That said she focuses again on Madrigus ::
There are two parts to this. What we have been told and what we have been part of. I'll start with what we have been told. At some point a boy named Jasper North lived near a girl named Maureen. They played together as children. There is a sense of poverty, possibly neglect, that I get from the telling, but I am reading that rather than having been told that. They would go into a neighboring house where there was a library and Jasper would read to Mo, as he called her. Their favorite author was Edgar Allen Poe. Time passed and they got older and there was a sense of them wanting to rise above their circumstances and leave the town. Jasper was a writer and planned to use this talent to bring about their plan of bettering them. Mo was an actress. At some point, undetermined as far as I can recall, he wrote a book and it failed to bring them fame or wealth. During this time Mo got a part in a play, a leading part, and Jasper shifted his hopes of elevating them to Mo. Mo met a man at a party or in the theater group or possibly a party for the theater group and she fell in love. She referred to him as "the one". Then one night, coming home from a party, there was a car accident and Mo left the man she loved for dead. They had both been drinking and she blamed herself for the death of her love. She ran back to Jasper to share what had happened. Seeing his hopes for Mo lifting them from their situation crash with the car, Jasper proposed that he would have to save them by writing a popular book. But, he needed inspiration. He needed Mo to be that inspiration - to be the victim of an individual he hired through an ad to torture her in front of Jasper.

:: Liberty's voice trails off for a minute. She closes her eyes momentarily, takes a deep breath, and continues ::
Somewhere in here Jasper went to an antique shop and acquired an old typewriter. He took that typewriter to an old mill that he and Mo had played in as children. There was a map created, we are assuming for the individual he hired to find the mill as Mo and he knew where it was. This individual came and bound and tortured Mo while Jasper sat there typing out the experience. He explained that at one point he ran out of ink and the individual, the Bad Man as Mo called him, provided more ink. Red ink. Jasper's plan was, he claims, not to have Mo killed. He claims the Bad Man got out of hand.

:: Another pause. Her eyes focus on the far corner of the room for the length of several blinks then she starts again in a monotone ::
So. We come in at the point of meeting Mr. North for the first time at the company picnic two years ago. You were there for that. He approached us, showed us the typewriter, asked for assistance with inspiration, if i recall correctly

:: she casts her gaze around the group ::
If I don't recall correctly jump in

:: with that she went back to the explanation ::
he told us of finding the typewriter in the antique shop. We typed out a collaborative story, each adding a sentence or paragraph. The original group was Eden, myself, you, Ness, the Professor, Sally, & Lou.
:: a head cock ::
Maybe Nick. Alice drew a picture and we incorporated it into the story but I don't recall her typing on the typewriter. I may be missing someone, but this is what I recall.

The next time he came was a the holiday party I missed. I understand he asked the gathered people to type out horror or exciting stories. I am uncertain of who was in that group although I think Herne, Billy, & Hana were involved along with others. The time he came after that I missed, so anyone that was there for that should add what was required of them that time.

Then, I believe, the next time was when Sally's story of the Butcher came to life while we were in the library and I think that may be the first time we met Mo and got more of the story of the torture and murder of her by the Bad Man. We also were told of the mill and the map and came to understand we had to put the map back together. With each story that had been typed on the typewriter coming true another piece of the map was made manifest.

After that came the picnic this year when we found, I think, 10 volumes of Poe. Jasper had each of us find a passage in a volume that
:: Air quotes ::
Spoke to us. While we read them aloud someone else typed them on the typewriter. Shortly after that the Poe volumes appeared in a circle on the porch outside the diner. There was a volume missing from the collection which Billy acquired from the owner. Once the group was complete it was given to Mr. North who then took us on an odyssey through his and Mo's history, where we experienced their past in vignettes and combated some kind of nightmare creatures that came along with each story.

Then there was the most recent encounter that you, Red, Sally, and I understand some others experienced most recently in which you were controlled by the story typed on the typewriter.

:: She stops. Blinks. Then finishes with ::
There has been conjecture about the elements of this. Is the typewriter cursed? Is, as Henry posited, Mo a tulpa, brought to life by the story? Are they spirits? Something more? Will finishing the story release them?

Then there are the questions that you may have the most expertise at suggesting answers. What do we do with the typewriter once we have the last piece of the map and find the mill and, we assume, the typewriter? Is it a real object or is it also a construct of the story? Also, do we need blood to finish the story on it? What are the ramifications of using blood as ink? Also, what are the ramifications of using the typewriter at all? If it is cursed, does using it curse someone else.

:: She slants a glance at Henry ::
And now Henry adds another element to this. What if we fail?

:: there's a pause then she adds ::
One last thing - I am uncertain if we are looking for the typewriter or the original manuscripts which I understand was never completed. Are we to find the original story and finish it, with a
:: Air quotes ::
happy ending or is our end goal the Cursed Typewriter. Anyone have more of that?

[Henry Gondorf]

Henry smiles at the acknowledgement. He checks over his shoulder at Liberty's request.

"Nah, no one besides Harvey the Rabbit there." Henry said with a smile. "And give credit where credit is due. Red here mentioned it first. I just happened to see there was no old coot waiting to offer the ominous warning."

Henry listened as the ideas bounced around over the hows and whys behind ending this tragedy. He has no interest in who the protagonist becomes at this point. It is the means that bothers him. How many authors were there to start? How many developed a narrative even tangentially similar? So far only Eden, Red, and Lou seemed to have a common thread in their stories. It seemed that a meeting of the minds cannot come quiet soon enough.

"I think that brings you as far up to speed as us authors," Henry gives a nod to Liberty, "Our stories have become a playground for whatever force drives the typewriter. Some have come true, others yet to come about. We may not ever see them all come true... I think that map is going to point us to the original manuscript. As of now all we have is paraphrasing from Jasper and Mo. Without knowing what is on those first pages we have no idea to what lengths it will take to undo this...crap..Geese? Grease? No..Geis! There we go."

"Tulpas,Typewriters, and Geis, oh my."

[redraverfae]

"What the fuck is a 'tulle-pah'?" asks Red, taking a swig.

[Henry Gondorf]

"Have you ever wanted an imaginary friend that was real? Well, there you go." Henry said with a small flourish of his hand.

[kimp]

:: Liberty's lips quirk as she slants Henry a look ::
I was going to reference Tibetan Buddhism and thought constructs, but, sure, imaginary friend. Very concise.

[redraverfae]

"Ah, so like Drop Dead Fred. Gotcha, Gondorf." Red's brows furrow a bit on her forehead as she actually seems to be considering something.

"What if they're all tulle-pah, then, yeah? Not like actual ghosts, but if and when we re-write, they were all fake? Is that an option we could do? Would that fuck anyone up or over?" she asks, looking at Liberty, then Kelsey, then Jones.

[Owle Isohos]

Kelsey blinked. "You mean, have the story be that it was all a fabrication of the typewriter to begin with? The 'It was all a dream' ending? But whose dream?"

She frowned in thought. "I think you'd need to do it in a way that didn't erase anyone from existence. I mean...CAN the typewriter erase people from existence? That's fucking scary, if it can. But..." She waved a hand in the air. "What if, it never was real? Mo's boyfriend never died; they were in love and happy together, and as a result Mo drifted away from Jasper, the way sometimes happens. Mo found her own happiness with her boy and forgot her childhood dreams of wealth and power, leaving Jasper alone in town still clinging to those dreams. He snapped - his mind buckled under the strain, concocting this elaborate fantasy where Mo's boy died through no fault of Jasper's, Mo came running back to Jasper, and Jasper had to be the hero who would save her. But, as nightmares do, it went awry; he knew, deep down in his heart of hearts, that he'd lost Mo to a man who'd appeared seemingly from nowhere. It was easier to think he'd lost her in blood and pain than to believe she'd left him of her own volition because she was happier somewhere else, and deep down in his psyche he'd always believed that her leaving him was his own fault.

"And this, all of this, this entire journey with the typewriter and all of you as authors, is him struggling to come to terms with the truth. Working through the nightmare so that he can face the reality. That Mo is alive, and happy. That she succeeded where he failed, that she didn't need him to live happier ever after. In the end, Jasper finds a way to accept that, and is able to make peace with himself, forgive Mo for leaving him, and move on with his own life."

Kelsey tilts her head to one side. "Then again, the idea that the typewriter can bring people back from the dead is almost as scary as thinking it can wipe people from existence. But...what if it was true all along? The Mo we see is just a construct of the typewriter and Jasper''s mind, and the real Mo went on to have a happy life somewhere?"