disabling comments while i sort myself out

mission: felt successful until jenny slit her throat. skulduggery's seriously on the fence about having "saved" her, but friday got to him. and part of him thinks this might've actually saved jenny, assuming her mind isn't so fractured that being bound to the ship again doesn't cause serious lasting damage

captain: skulduggery is going to play the truth closer to his chest than we all probably expected, at least at first. people he trusts to understand the Problem he's having, like mb, ava, tbh probably max -- people who are familiar with the idea of being held captive and being turned into tools. others will get a more nebulous half-answer tbh

his dumb gay heart is telling him that he has to protect whatever free will the captain has, his dumb hero heart says that appealing to the captain's softer side will save all of them, and of course his dumb rational brain is like "well we have literally forever to figure out what to do next so why rush"

skulduggery didn't make any effort to explain his motives to the rest of the heist crew, which is probably going to bite him in the ass when he tells them "yeah we're still trapped"

BUT!!!!!!!!!!!!

skulduggery has learned some extremely important and valuable information that will help a LOT of people start to figure out where they actually want to be

in theory they could, potentially, live anywhere they wanted, aside from the exact moment they were taken from. they cannot, technically go back to their own realities because of the past/future self paradox

in practice the ship can maintain them pretty much forever, so long as the captain is alive. to skulduggery, that means that they have as much time as they need to figure out if it's actually possible (not just theoretically), and to convince the captain that they should be allowed to do so

and he definitely thinks the captain can be convinced. it's just a matter of proving that there's a better use of his time and powers than just... tilting at windmills because that's all he knows how to do

(meanwhile in the back of his head there is fuzzy static growling from his death-oriented alter ego. it's fine! he's ignoring it and it's fine!)

(vile is still a deep subconscious thing, but every moment of tenderness and every moral rule skulduggery bends for the captain, the worse it gets. i'm still trying to decide on some stuff here but yea thats a thing)

anyway. skulduggery's new questions involve:
1) since the captain likely created the eterna after escaping servitude, he wants to know the how and whys. if he was already "free" then he wouldn't need the ship...
2) which is why it's obvious the captain isn't actually free from anything. it turns out the power vacuum he should have worried about...

3) ...is the one of who gets to control the captain. b/c man, BEFORE the eterna he was probably a useful tool but now that he has all of this power???? JESUS

the idea of some human just like. shackling a dimension-building jinn with access to all of reality????? HAHAHAHA BIG FEAR BUDDY

4) that is, of course, assuming that there isn't someone already out there looking for their missing conduit :|

okay so i THINK that's all the stuff that's going on with skulduggery and why he might be picking and choosing how much of this info to disclose right away

obviously once he tells some people, more will find out. but he's going to TRYYYYY to limit that at least until...... idk. he can convince people to just fucking vibe for a minute i guess lmfao

anyway yes okay opened up for comments and input and talk about how this is going to tank hella cr between skulduggery and other characters

the whole captain/skulduggery thing is bound to end in either excruciating tragedy or painfully romantic and i'm here for it

I am still working on the wiki but I don't think I will be able to get all the info on there before it's supposed to go-live so I will leave filling it in up to other users as is the nature of a wiki. but design is almost done I think

Max is where plot points go to die. So feel free to tell him literally anything

I think the only person he's even told about them being copies is uh..... Rich

he's known that for MONTHS

I wonder where the "crossing realities takes toll on the mind" thing fits in. natsuno really started to like the idea of going somewhere else but the possible insanity pretty much ruined it

man following all that info reveal was so fun though

I kinda want to request that Skully hits MB after its meeting with Max so it can go ‘Max and Darcy were with you, right?’

sillysymphony: IKR, right now it feels like it might be the actual act of like, going between the realities? not necessarily living in them? but that's just what i've been thinking, i havent sent skulduggery down the rabbithole yet

divinesaber: im glad to hear it!!! we had no idea what to expect, but i didn't expect all of this!!! jenny! jinns! potential escape routes! lots of good shit

tons to unpack for sure

darkersolstice: i can aim for that! i'll set up a response to the inbox thread to account for a few days delay before they meet
max is going to need a couple days before skulduggery will be able to talk to him i think (gotta ask filledwithstraw on that front)

yiiiikes yeah i don't think anyone needs control over a jinn actually even if sure a couple ppl on the ship would love to have that i glances at ebalon

so much good stuff!!

Max will talk to him a few days later but just can't guarantee the convo will be you know... *good&

pretend I didn't fuck up those italics

he is not having a good time.

bentsage: Yeah, my assumption has been that it's the transition itself? I figured that was why going to or from the diner gave people headaches.

if skuls ever tells rita about some of what he's learned (like how killing the captain would basically delete the reality and kill them all, etc) and convince her the only way they're getting anywhere is to cooperate with him, I think she's at a point where she'd (reluctantly because she still hates him though lmao)-

go for that, because wanting to her friends on the boat to live would be the stronger goal

that's definitely going to be the information he DOES widely share with people
like "please for the LOVE OF GOD do not murder him solely because we will ALL DIE"

Good call

and then some jackass is like "~i don't care~" and he gets to rant about how "one person's apathy doesn't negate the wishes of almost a hundred other lives" lmfao

cameoappearance: and YES that's also why i figured we all got knocked out on the tenders going to the br/camp/island excursions, either so we don't experience the madness inducing effects, or so that we don't notice

penbee: really do not owrry about it, again i don't think we even need to fill it in until after the info sharing event has died down which will likely be mid-october

YES GOOD very important info lmao

it's a bit "the jaunt"

oh no not the jaunt

no one try to stay awake

natsuno is the jackass who ~doesn't care~ about everyone dying but luckily there are like... 6 people he's actually invested in, so FINE no murder

natsuno also being the person rita's probably most invested in keeping alive...since he'd be completely dead otherwise

she wants him to live

i love rita so much

aww I'm glad...she can be a disaster but also cute

she's a gregarious and vivacious youth with lots of passion and confidence!!!!!! whats not to like

She's got pep!

pep and fireballs

🔥🔥🔥