after vivarium

[fairsfair]

after vivarium!

It may have been weeks, months, or even years, but finally, everyone makes it out of the warehouse just fine. The authorities have broken in and let everyone out, or maybe the characters managed to escape on their own. Either way, Zero and Calhoun vanish without a trace and they still haven't been caught to this day. It's infuriating, but the important part is that they're now free. What exactly entrails after that ending though? How to Play: ✖ Make a top-level comment, either blank or filled with some info/prose. ✖ Tag others, whether it's shortly after the escape or much later. ✖ Action, text, video, whatever, it's all good. ✖ Have multiple threads? ✖ Done!

Comments

fucking hell this got long

[amphibian]

[DIFFICULTY HAS NEVER DETERRED AOI BEFORE AND YOU'RE DAMN RIGHT SHE'S GONNA HAVE A HELL OF A TIME TRYING

Because eventually, she gets better—she spends far too long going from hospital to hospital, and no one is sure what to do with her. One day she's up and at 'em, striding across the hospital room to get a donut from the box on the other side; the next she can barely breathe and her family keeps vigil by her bedside and waits for her to die.

But her good days get better and better. Her best days get more frequent. And she starts to stabilize. Her heart can't quite handle the strain of her old athletic routine—the doctors end it there, but she adds yet; she takes things slow, pushes herself a little further each day, and tells everybody who asks and most people who don't that she'll be back in top form in time for the next Olympics. Aoi Asahina has never given up on anything that mattered to her.

And that's why she's spent so long trying to find Clive.

It shouldn't be this difficult to find someone so swarmed upon by the media, and yet. She spends entirely too much time trying to track him down—the gaps in her memory make it difficult; most of the memories Zero took of life before have been brought back by the miracle of modern medicine and therapy, but no matter how hard she tries to bring them back, huge pieces of the nonary game are missing. Gone.

There are too many false starts and wrong numbers, but she keeps trying. She'd be the last to call herself smart or clever or resourceful, but if nothing else in the world, Aoi is tenacious. Two, three, five, ten failures, and she tries again. And she finds a number.

And that, Clive, is why your cell phone has been ringing nonstop with calls from the same number for the past ten minutes.

The first time she left a voicemail—Clive? Clive, I know it's you this time, I, like, triple-checked twice so please call me ba—ugh, no, I'm not waiting!—and she called again, and again, and again, left another message (Clive! Pick up! If you're asleep then you better wake up, I sw—). Again, and again, and I'm at the airport, like, right now, that's how hard I made sure to check, please, please pick up! I'm— voice strained, and she hangs up, and goes right back to calling, again and again and again.]

[vengefulyears]

[Clive is pulling the usual ignore his phone while he gets shit done routine, but his phone is going off so much more frequently than usual that he can't help but finally pry his eyes away from his computer screen to see who the bloody hell keeps calling him. They're all from some number he doesn't recognize, and there's about as many voicemails from that same number as missed calls, too. He doesn't even have time to listen to the first voicemail before his phone starts ringing yet again. And it's the same number calling him, surprise surprise.

He isn't sure how to feel about this. He's never had an unknown number call him so persistently before - not even telemarketers or scammers call him this much. This person likely isn't good news, but he should probably answer anyway, if only so they'll stop blowing up his bloody phone. If it goes in a direction he doesn't like he can always just hang up and block their number.

So Clive finally resolves to push that green call button on his phone's screen, holding it up to his ear and giving the standard phone call greeting, sounding just a little annoyed.]

Hello?

[amphibian]

[She doesn't answer right away—there's a moment where she doesn't quite connect the sound of his voice to reality; she's been met with automatons and dull beeping for what's felt like forever—

If she doesn't answer, she's going to lose him. There's a block in her throat she has to force her voice past—] Clive! [And that's all it takes.] I've been trying to call you for so long, that—that had to have been twenty tries, at least, and, and I was almost worried I had the wrong number because you wouldn't pick up and I'm already all the way over here because I was so careful this time, and I—I— [She cuts off short, breathless, chokes again on what might be a sob before she can speak again.]

It's me. [She's afraid that she'll say it, and it won't be right. He won't know. Everything has felt so fleeting, with her memories so broken.] A-Aoi Asahina.

[vengefulyears]

[As soon as he hears that all too familiar voice on the other end of the line, Clive just completely freezes up in shock. It's been so long since he's heard that voice, but he hasn't forgotten it at all, and he never expected that he would hear it again like this. The irritation and wariness he was feeling earlier disappears in an instant - is this even real? Did he pass out at his desk and is dreaming this right now?

No, god no, please don't let this be a dream. He's already had all too many dreams of seeing Aoi again - and Kotetsu, too - he actually pinches himself as hard as he fucking can just to make sure that this is the real world. His nails dig deeply enough into his skin that blood starts seeping out from around them, and all Clive does is just sit there and watch it gradually run down his arm. Nothing's changing. He isn't suddenly jolting awake to a keyboard imprint on his face and the overwhelming disappointment that he was never actually called by a number matching Aoi's at all. Does that mean... this is actually real?

He suddenly realizes that he's been silent for quite a while himself, forcibly snapping himself out of the shock long enough to finally say something.]

A... Aoi... Aoi! Oh my god, it's really you! I can't believe it! I was afraid - so, so afraid that this was just a dream - I've dreamt about this moment for so long, but I-- [He just keeps talking faster and sounding more and more hysterical. He has to stop himself as tears begin streaming down his cheeks and onto some of the papers on his desk. This is just unbelievable. But he has to calm down for at least long enough to ask the important questions.]

Wh-what do you mean you're all the way over here? Where exactly are you?

[amphibian]

[And that's all it takes—he says her name and it's him, and he remembers her, and her heart stops swelling up in her throat where it had leaped in those moments of awful silence, and she starts to sob. Finally—finally.

She doubles over where she stands. What a mess she must look like to everyone else, crouched on the ground in the middle of the airport, clutching at her phone because it brings her closer than she can ever remember being to something stable and whole and real, sobbing and laughing and utterly incomprehensible. Her whole body shakes so hard she has to clutch her phone with both hands; if it falls, it's gone, it's lost, it isn't real.]

It's me. It's me. [Even she has to be reminded sometimes. She sniffs, wipes her nose on her sweatshirt sleeve (blue; red sweatshirts like her old one will always feel grungy and filthy no matter how new they are, how many times she washes them).] Ai—airport, I'm at the airport—I found a phone number but not an address except fo-for your newspaper's offices, so I'm at the one right by there... Are you there? Whe-wherever, gimme an address, I brought cab fare—a-and I should probably get outta here, anyway, before someone calls security o-on the hysterical foreign girl. [She tries to laugh and it's a little raspy, a little broken, but it's something.]