towerofanimus | 05. those hours that with gentle work did frame

Entry tags:

05. those hours that with gentle work did frame

Characters: England and you!
Setting: Floors 5, 15, 28, 29, 33, and 35 specified -- wandering to all the other places!
Format: Starting action, will match.
Summary: England explores the new floors, stops by some old ones, and is reminded of a few things he may have been avoiding.
Warnings: Probably language; mentions of aquaphobia, genocide, and alcoholism; potentially England getting drunk and being an idiot; nation woes. Will edit for anything else.

Floor 15
[Sewing? England sure is. He needs a new dress shirt. The ones that came with him to this place are a little dingy and getting noticeably worn, and he prides himself on being presentable, thank you very much.

He's already got the barest minimum of an olive green shirt constructed. It has no pockets, sleeves, buttons, or collar yet. But it's coming along nicely! There are a couple things in a repair pile next to him, too. Maybe he'll fix something else too, if he's asked nicely.]

Floor 28
[Even before he sees any of the floors above this one, England is confident that this is the Tower's best new addition. He immediately feels at home when he finds himself among the instruments, though there is also a rush of awe at just how many of them seem otherworldly. Part of him wants to investigate them close-up, to hear their unique timbres of sound. He doesn't want to risk breaking any of the beautiful instruments out of ignorance, though.

However, most of them he finds very familiar. Particularly when he passes a section of classic string instruments -- and, not too far ahead of those, guitars.

Needless to say, anyone who stumbles upon England on the twenty-eighth floor will find him lounging against the wall, strumming away at the bass plugged into the amplifier next to him and having the gall to actually look content while he does so. Some of the bass lines he's playing are recognisable, to those who know British Invasion bands well.]

Floor 29
[At first, England thinks the twenty-ninth floor is merely a garden, from all the beautiful plants that greet him at the top of the staircase. It isn't until he starts down one of the paths created by the winding hedges that he realises it's a maze (which he discovers he's actually in the center of), and quickly backtracks so as not to get lost. It's a beautiful place, but-- well, he doesn't trust any maze created by this Tower. Perhaps he'll brave it at some point when he has a plan of action and a reliable companion.

For now, he'll just be surveying the exotic plants in the middle of the maze close to the staircase, wondering at how he can't seem to place any of them as being from home.]

Floor 33
[Is it? Is is. Dirt. Honest-to-god dirt that doesn't have murderous plants growing out of it or mutant animals roaming it. And there's a shed over there. A shed that England finds actually has tools.

Yes, he'll be hard at work here on a small area he makes for himself close to the shed, planting seeds for as many kinds of flowers as he could find in the tiny wooden shack's stock. Though he'll also be keeping an eye on the staircase. He doesn't want to get run off the edge of this bizarre floating level.]

Floor 35
[He needed water for his seeds. He didn't expect to find a whole lake full of it not three floors away.

It looks stagnant. Dead. Water shouldn't look dead. Water is supposed to sustain life. England carefully toes the shoreline of the lake for a few feet before he gingerly lowers himself to his knees and rolls up his sleeve. There's a moment of consideration before, with caution, he first submerges his fingers in the water. When nothing bites them, eventually his hand goes with it. And then he's in the water up to his elbow, and noticing that there is suspiciously no muddy silt beneath his fingers even though he should barely be in the shallows. There's far too much depth for being so close to the shore.

He pulls back his arm sharply, reminded of the last time he was anything close to submerged in water in this tower. He aches for the oceans of home. They're a monster he's at least familiar with. This is like staring into the uncanny valley of how he's most afraid of dying.]

Floor 5
[He's always sped past this floor because the Tower workers unnerved him to a degree that he couldn't ever hope to explain. The truth is, England has never noticed the viewfinders in the outer ring. It's curiosity that takes root and finally makes him step away from the staircase so that he can peer through one -- after he surveys the thing to make sure it won't take out his eyes.

What he sees is strangely desolate. He's seen areas look more lively even after thorough bombing. He doesn't understand at first. He just watches, some alien pain gradually creeping up on him as he sees more and more of the wasteland through the viewfinder.

The pain gets worse the longer he looks through the port. Or maybe he just becomes more acutely aware of it. It comes to be so bad that his knuckles go white holding the sides of the device. He feels empty. On the verge of collapsing from the inside out. He feels such overwhelming loss that it eventually brings him to his knees like a blow to the stomach (or an attack on his people).

It stops hurting once he crumples away from the viewfinder, a hand clutching his chest like he's worried his heart will fall clean out of it. The ache is gone, but he feels short of breath regardless, as if the wind has been knocked out of him. He vaguely registers that his eyes are wet.

That was his world. His people-- his history.

Or what was left in its wake.]

Wandering
[Anywhere else that England might be found, he looks investigative -- curious, but cautious in the way he approaches things, especially in the newer floors. It's probably best not to sneak up on him. He's not bothering to hide the knife sheathed in leather at his belt, and surprising someone who's armed and used to danger is likely a pretty bad idea.

Threaded | Flat

[Morbid curiosity had brought her back to this floor, urging her to look through one of those horrid viewfinders again - to assess if it truly was real or not.

She didn't expect to find the male England there though, and not so obviously distressed.

She comes up behind him and puts a gentle hand on his shoulder, pretending not to notice how his eyes are shining with tears.]

Allons-y, mon cher - don't be fooled by their trickery.

_{[Marceline's been in a vaguely grumbly mood all day; one of the monsters snuck up on her the previous night and made a string on her bass snap trying to kill it, so she'd had to dig into her stores and re-tune the instrument. Her favorite shirt had a hole in the side where something had caught it, and she'd had to find a different shirt for the day. It's very minor stuff, but she'd been on edge for weeks waiting for the next major mess they were going to be put through, and frankly, it's grating on her nerves. But there were new floors to explore now, and she intends to take advantage of them.

The instrument floor was certainly something else, she marvels, and she pauses to pull the overlarge sunhat off her head (protection from outside floors, though she was going to have to find a parasol soon or something for variety), noticing the low tones of a bass. It could be more of the tower's craziness... or it could be a person. Either way, she's off the staircase and headed toward the sound, ready to pull her own bass from her back if it turns out to be bad, smiling when she sees who it is.]

Arthur! Hey, how's it been?}

[Zelda would have to agree with Arthur on this being one of the better floors to date. Even without the richness of magic empowering the notes of the instruments found within, there's something comforting and marvelous about having such an array of tones and styles to choose from.

But, of course, she's quite unfamiliar with many of them, including the bass Arthur plays. So when she finds the source of those thrumming lines, she stays back, listening quietly and trying to piece together how it works.

She'll... probably be there a while without intervention, but hey, the music is pleasant enough.]

[Taiki liked these new floors, the ones that were outside the tower. Even though they were still part of it they felt different, felt like they were actually outside unlike the meadow or the forest or even the floors open to the outside.

He was slowly getting stronger again, he was still pale and shaky but his fever had gone. He was mostly trying not to think about what had happened but he found it impossible to forget. He was terrified every time he left Eridan on his own, even though he knew he would not be much use in protecting him. He couldn't even fully trust Gohran since it seemed the tower could sever the connection between him and his shirei.

When he saw mister Kirkland he managed a small smile and went over.] Hello mister Kirkland...

[she comes up here sometimes to make little stuffed things, items of no real importance beyond keeping her hands and mind busy. when there happens to be someone else at work on the floor (which there often is) she'll abandon that idea and observe them instead, more interested in their projects than the glint of her sunglasses would betray.

such is the case with England, who she watches impassively for a time before commenting.]

Shit, I'm starting to think that everyone in this tower can sew. Wasn't it supposed to be a dying art?

[Ew. Ew.]

[Of all the people Equius expected to be reaching into a lake when he entered the thirty-fifth floor, England was not one of them. He always seemed like a reasonable human. Apparently not, however, as that sure is him with his sleeves pulled up, sloshing around in dirty water. He doesn't quite succeed at keeping the disgust out of his voice.]

What are you doing?

Sakuya made her way quietly around her new surroundings -- it was easy, when you were barefoot, to avoid making unnecessary noise. It was only by chance that she came upon England, back turned, working on... something. A piece of cloth? She came up behind him, trying to peer over his shoulder.

"Hello. My name is Sakuya. I... do you know where this is?"

[Minako curiously peeks into the room, an interested hum leaving her as she notices all of the things in the workshop. Most of the things here she doesn't even recognize, so for a while she's just wandering the floor, curiously inspecting everything.

After a while she arrives at the sewing crafts area, pausing to see the familiar sight of a person hunched over a sewing machine. How nostalgic it was to think of Bebe at a time like this... She smiles a little before slowly approaching the space. And then notices England.]

Ah, hello, sorry, I didn't see you there!

[Ivan tended to come back here every now and then, for one reason or another. Mainly it was because even if this land he saw through the viewfinders wasn't real, the feeling, the brief connection, no matter how much it hurt... that was better than nothing at all. Better than the ache of nothing.]

[However this time he saw England, and despite their history, he smiled a little, noticing the clutching of his chest, and he moved to slowly sit beside him.]

I am not thinking it will be falling out... only my heart is falling out. So do not hold so tight, or you are going to be leaving marks. This tower is hurting enough, without you doing too.

_{[Sayaka's spent the better half of an hour chasing a phantom melody in here - a far too familiar song in a far too familiar playing style, drifting through the air in just the right direction for her not to be able to figure out where it's coming from at all.

She hasn't even seen any violins. Cellos, violas, banjos, ukeleles, mandolins, lutes, guitars, every single wrong string instrument. No violins, and certainly not the violin playing the song Sayaka's searching for.

When she finds England strumming away, she huffs.]}

At least somebody found what they're looking for.

Threaded | Flat

Floor 5

Floor 28. Might come back later and tag 15. XD;

Floor 28 because Zelda characters and music 8|b

Floor 33

floor 15

Floor 35

Floor 15

15th floor

Floor 5

floor 28 - choo choo it's the backtag train