St. Peter In Chains: The Collection. [OPEN!]

[meanwhileback]

Who: Penelope Lane, her models, her muses, her admirers, the curious and the critics. ANYONE. EVERYONE. GET IN HERE!!
What: Penelope's long-awaited runway show! Finally!
Where: St. Peter In Chains, abandoned cathedralish church.
When: Friday, June 29th! Eveningtime. Show starts at 7pm and goes... well. Until everyone isn't there anymore, I guess!! For whatever reason.
Notes: IMPORTANT: There's going to be a bunch of subthreads for different parts of the night. Feel free to tag around in them as you want! I'd like fabulous things to happen here, people. Fabulous. Things.
EDIT: NOW WITH ADDED TERROR!! SEE LINK BELOW!!
Warnings: Scary things, NPC death, injuries... horrors!!

The venue has been done up quite well for the occasion, all things considered. The old pews that were still salvageable have been repurposed and rearranged to face the aisle down the center of the enormous main room, where a raised runway has been set up. Lighting and temporary walls, and even an audio system have been brought in and installed for the occasion, and the impressive wreathed columns have been dramatically lit from below to emphasize the height of the room.

All told, it looks like it cost absolute scads of money to renovate an abandoned space to this level of elegance; whether this is actually true or not is largely immaterial. As with so much of society, it's the appearance of the thing that matters most, not the reality of it. Perhaps that's a statement Penelope Lane is making intentionally. Everyone knows the designer is one of the most outspoken members of her cohort, after all, and not one to misrepresent herself.

And she is, tonight, for one, brief, shining moment, entirely in control. Take plenty of pictures; it won't last long.

AND NOW: THE REAL SHOW BEGINS

Comments

[cestrumnocturnum]

Her own hand has found purchase on his sleeve, not quite shrinking up to his side, but certainly flinching closer as every near miss, until there are fine fibres in the air instead of shards. Benji is breathing shallow in short bursts of steam, but panic has finally started ebbing away, with fear on its tail. Fingertips to her mouth, her posture straightens some as she watches things disintegrate, that grip gentling on Wolfgang's arm before falling away completely.

She's still drained pale enough to make traces of makeup and freckles stand out sharply, eyes wide. The ashy remains of the thrown furniture cling to their clothing and air, and particles whorl through it as she gives an exhale of sharper relief.

The implications, of course, of all he just achieved aren't lost on her. It's why she isn't speaking right away.

[gramarye]

He notices that, how her hand drops. Whatever he feels about it, he's going to have to deal with it later, because now is not the time — he can hear someone screaming like they're hurt and not just scared, which he can't do anything about, and the room is thick with fear and, beyond that, anger. The crypt is finally starting to clear as people shove past each other towards the exits, and while things are still flying around the room as if being tossed by someone invisible, none of those things are coming near either of them. This does not seem coincidental, given how they veer sharply away at unnatural angles.

"We should leave," he says. His tone is —

Not calm. But not angry, either.

[cestrumnocturnum]

"Mm," is Benji's agreement, defaulting to normal, as if Wolfgang had offered her something across the dinner table, although she remains visibly rattled and staying close by the man's side. Raking hair out of her eyes, she either follows him or starts for the nearest exit that doesn't seem to be breaking at the seams beneath the crush of a crowd -- whichever comes first and has her remaining close by. Glancing after objects that are thrown and deflected, but no longer terrified, the low heels of her boots crunching debris against the hard stone floor as they go.

Swallowing, then, the words come as if forced out of her mouth, but very sincere; "Thank you."

[gramarye]

Wolfgang has no idea what to say to that. You're welcome? For? Anyone would have done the same — (ignoring the crowds of people doing nothing at all but running) — if they could. He says nothing instead and looks troubled, making his way outside despite every single instinct he has urging him to go back in and do something.

He won't leave her, he needs to know she's okay, but —

There are roughly ninety dozen people currently placing calls to the sheriff and Hellsing, and whatever he can do, either of them can do better - that, and he has little desire to still be here should Hellsing or, God forbid, the Militia show up to contain the situation. His fingers still itch with the desire to do something. Something beyond tearing the place down. He turns around to look at the building, gnawing on his thumbnail, anxious, and it's hard to tell whether it's due to the fact that fucking ghosts just came out of nowhere and tried to kill a bunch of people, or something else.

[cestrumnocturnum]

Maybe anyone would have done it, particularly friends for friends, but also maybe not. Maybe it depends on what 'anyone' you're referring to. Regardless, Benji isn't expecting response - she barely remembers she said anything by the time they're out, looking back towards where the injured are being pulled out, mostly blunt force trauma cuts, head injuries. It doesn't make sense that simply getting out of a building means the danger is done, everyone should keep running, but then again-- this is a haunting. Boundaries make sense. In a fictional narrative, that's how it would work. She glances down at her hands, sticky with blood from superficial wounds, but makes an effort not to get it on her dress.

Slowly calming down and pushing her hair behind her ears, she tilts a look up at Wolfgang, unsure how to interpret the anxiety visible there; he had seemed like the calmest person in the room. Still a little fluttery in tone from nerves, she offers; "I can wait here. if you were wanting to go back." Benji does not consider herself a hero, but is used to being friends with them.

A crooked smile follows as she adds, "I'll wait." Because she isn't going anywhere alone.

[gramarye]

He wants to go back in and help, every instinct he has is screaming at him to do it — his Avatar, meanwhile, he's not sure if that's her voice or something else, but she's calling him an idiot and telling him to stay put — and beyond that he can hear. People talking. Or thinking. Listen with your mind, not your ears. It's hard to shift focus away from the physical senses, but he manages, and blanches. "The Militia are on their way." That's real fear in his voice. Ghosts don't scare him, but the police do.

He turns, looks at her — his eyes are drawn down to the brightness of all that red against the blackness. "Oh — your hands. We should... a doctor. Or." First aid, or something, but he doesn't. Have anything for that and they're an awful long train ride from home.

[cestrumnocturnum]

Adrenaline will give way to the throb of the cuts and scrapes on her palms, and already is; her nose wrinkles, more annoyed at the inconvenience of it than any pain or worry about damage. "It looks much worse than it is, when it gets everywhere--" But she isn't so distracted that she doesn't pick up on that tone in his voice. She understands, she thinks; for instance, she knows by now what the mark on Wolfgang's hand means, and she understands fearing the police.

"Shall we go? I can clean up a little at the station on the way, I'll be fine." If it was worse, she'd feel increasingly silly for insisting she have a chaperone of any kind, being older than her companion, having lived in a more volatile world than Baedal, but for the sake of some cuts, she can let her anxiety win out.

[gramarye]

"Yes." There's another moment of hesitation before he turns and starts to walk away. He feels like a stupid coward for walking away, but it's not his problem and nobody but himself expects him to try to fix everything in the world. No one's dead, there's nothing here that can't be taken care of by the people present.

And she says she's fine but maybe she's not. Hands are tricky like that.

"Sorry," he says, and it ends rather clipped as it occurs to him that it's not actually his fault a bunch of angry ghosts appeared out of nowhereand tried to murder everyone even though he's the one who invited them and he's. Doing that thing again, apologising for things that are literally outside of his control. He starts fidgeting instead.

[cestrumnocturnum]

It's a relief to be walking away, which Benji doesn't feel great about either, but neither would staying. She casts one last look backwards towards the chaos spilling from the inside out, then focuses on leaving, her hands clasped together as if to protect them somewhat, or conceal. They have antiseptic at home. Adhesive bandages. Some wine. The 'sorry' has her glancing up, uncertain as to its purpose, but smiles crookedly when no explanation is forthcoming and so filling in the answer.

"Me too. It was such a nice night up to a point."

[gramarye]

"The murder point." He stops at the train station, they'll have to wait, and - it's going to be crowded, it's them and roughly a billion other people all desperate to just go home already after that disaster. But there's not the same level of overarching fear and sadness and despair and anger over St Peter's itself, it helps to not feel... that.

"This city," he says, like he would laugh if it were funny. They're all fucked, there's no way out, and it's one major, life-threatening disaster after another until you die, apparently. He rubs his hands over his face and makes a frustrated noise. "Poor Penelope."

She scares the piss out of him, but he does sort of like her in spite of that, and this. Isn't great for her.

[cestrumnocturnum]

"Is it true, that even bad press is good press?"

The sentiment of this city is one she can echo in the form of a wordless sound of sympathetic agreement, except she's only scraping the surface of it. It's a combination of knowing how bad it could be, and not knowing how bad it is. Still, she has no compulsion to be its champion now; this was awful, and part of her exhaustion is from being terrified for the time it took to get out.

[gramarye]

He can't help it - he looks down at his hand, the one with the silver scar. He's always visible in the dark, stumbling down the stairs or coming in trying to be quiet at 3 in the morning. He's thinking that as much as he uses his quote-unquote friends, it's a mutual thing. He's an accessory that says fuck you mom and dad.

"Yes." He waves his other hand, the unmarked one, gets on the train and sits with his knees pulled up to his chest even though that's Not Proper and generally he cares a lot about that, following rules. He keeps glancing at her hands to make sure she's not going to bleed to death anytime soon, but he worries too much about everything anyway. "She'll be fine, it wasn't even her fault. Her name in all the papers, she'll like that."