[open]

[churchbelle]

Who: Hazel and u
What: small priest is heckled by trees and literature
When: May 21~23 or so, flexible
Where: Far Shore places
Warnings: hazel and jae-ha have an active sex life
Summary: heckle

I. spooky trees
[It is what it sounds like: somewhere on the Far Shore, anywhere on the Far Shore, where Hazel is and where you, the witness, also happen to be, Hazel is making his way downtown around minding his own business like a man being followed. Or: he keeps looking over his shoulder, or stopping abruptly to look suddenly off to one side, or do all manner of things that look very much like he's trying to catch someone sneaking up on him.

But there isn't anyone there, because of course there isn't. Eventually, exasperated, he just comes to a natural stop and announces to the air:] Even the dang trees're nosy.

[have you ever been stalked by a spooky forest]


II. what kind of dewey decimal is this
[There's a library and new gods are being invited to come. That's enough for Hazel to finally nose around in there, after staying very much away from anything involving being within spitting distance of the old gods before now. He's a sight to behold when any individual old god passes by and expects a greeting, all manners and flattery and unpleasant looks the moment their backs are turned. He'd give them a rude gesture for the road, but that's far too improper for him.

But when he's not making childish faces at other gods' backs, he's trying to find... anything at all worthwhile in this place. There's nothing in order. It's a wreck. He can't find a single thing, and for all his practicing there are still plenty of kanji he's never seen before, so the older books in particular are brutal...

He pauses, picks a book up off a shelf, and frowns at it.] I can't even remember lookin' for this, it was so long ago.

[He has been here for Hours.]


III. wildcard
[hello what would you like to do? please ask and I can deliver]

Comments

[reformedsinner]

Oh, I see!

[Well, that's less helpful than Hakkai had hoped, but there's no reason to think Jae-Ha's god has found anything more interesting than Hakkai has managed to. In all this time....

It's frustrating, but he still isn't sure which angle might bring the problem into the right perspective.]

I'm sorry, I'm not quite sure what deity you are.

[churchbelle]

[He's flipped the book open now, skimming it to see just how useful it actually is. Well... "useful." He doesn't really want to know anything about his predecessor besides where he went, and that probably won't be in here.]

That's surely because I'm not. I already said, the name's Hazel. [A brief glance up; he has bitterly clung to these semantics from day one and he won't stop now.] But they're missin' a fella called Aengus, and I guess I've been runnin' his errands for him in the meantime.

[reformedsinner]

That's a very modest way of looking at it, isn't it?

[They're obviously not the originals of the gods whose roles they've assumed; in fact, some of the people drawn in here have been other gods. That doesn't mean that they aren't given divine power and responsibility, though.

And the job of answering whenever someone calls the old gods' names, of course.]

Although I can't argue on principle.

[churchbelle]

Hmm. [Is it modest? He doesn't know about that, just that it bothers him that he's been ascended to godliness or whatever very much without wanting to be here. How tacky.]

Well, that's all there is to say about that, I reckon. Wish I knew where he went off to on vacation, leavin' me here with his work.

[reformedsinner]

It's something I'd very much like to know myself! After all, it's quite troublesome having so many new gods here who have to learn the job all over again....

Although personally I suspect they're all dead.

[Separating the divine nature from a human soul forced into a god's position is one thing, and even then, Hakkai can't remember anyone here becoming a shinki when they had once been a god. From shinki to god is a different prospect entirely, and not that different from pulling in mortal souls to imbue with divinity.

But separating the divine nature from a god, Hakkai thinks, must effectively mean destroying the god.

Theoretically. Maybe he should ask Konzen about that, later.]

[churchbelle]

Dead.

[Huh. Well. He supposes that's a possibility, which he considers as he looks down at his book again. Dead...]

That's an awful lot of gods dyin' at once. Is there somethin' in the holy water?

[reformedsinner]

Poison? I'd be very surprised if this is happening accidentally.

[He shrugs, very slightly, and strolls a few feet down the packed shelves, glancing down the row of books. No sign of his quarry yet.]

[churchbelle]

[...Hmm. Hazel doesn't follow, but after a short pause, he's aimlessly(?) wandering in the same direction, not trying to catch up much at all. Just. He's still here, talking.]

And do ya think were still bein' poisoned, now that they've thinned the herd some?

[reformedsinner]

[Hakkai notes the not-quite-aimless wander, but politely avoids bringing attention to it, running one hand along a shelf instead and tutting under his breath at the dust that gathers on his fingertips.]

It's still thinning, isn't it?

[Gods are still disappearing. The rate may be unpredictable, but new gods are appearing and old and new gods both are vanishing. Hakkai wishes he knew more about why, or who might be behind it; there are too many questions and too little evidence, though, in the end.

He can at least say with certainty that it's still going on.]

[churchbelle]

Well, I reckon everybody dies eventually.

[Eventually. Without interference. Everybody dies, probably.]

If ya ask me we're doin' an absolutely terrible job, but most of us are still kickin'.

[reformedsinner]

Indeed we are, whether or not we're still alive.

[He laughs, artificially, and stretches onto his tiptoes to check another shelf... no. Not there either. Maybe Hazel is right, and it'll turn up when he stops looking for it. He's not going to stop looking just yet, though.]

Ah well, who can speak to the motives of our... unknown problem?