[Terri]

Bascutte

"Tours," comes the drawl.  "Tours, folks, authentic tours!"

The Rabbot sits hunched on a fallen bit of cement--or rock or brick or zol or whatever--that seems to have tumbled from the once-impressive arch decades ago.  He doesn't know how long ago this place fell but he'll tell you it was sixty-seven years ago in the Great Battle of the Trickies and the Florana.  Those seal-like-and moth-like critters can get ferocious, he'll tell you, with their evil eyes and their fire-spitting miscellaneous body parts.  He'll only charge you four keystones apiece, and in exchange you'll get a guided tour of a place he knows nothing about.

Doesn't sound like your thing?  Don't worry.  He may look gruff but he's just trying to survive past his prime.  He only looks like a lumberjack because he can't afford a non-flannel shirt, and he would have shaved this morning, honest, if he'd had a razor and a sink and, well, a home.  Ah, well.  Help him out, why don't you?

"Hey, you," he says to a hallucination.  "Come let old Bascutte give you a guided tour of these creepy old ruins!  The old Cathedral holds many secrets and they're all EXCITING!"  He gives a harrumph when his audience dissipates into the early-morning mist and he scratches his stubbly chin.

[Waffle Waif]

Dren

His footsteps click on cracked stonework as he wanders aimlessly toward the large building that barely registers in his mind or vision. It was obviously once an impressive work of craftsmanship and design, but time has vandalized the ornate sculptures and soaring towers. Despite the slow-motion movement of the decay, if he stops to stare, he can almost imagine it is moving apace before him. His foot brushes a scattering of colored glass shards, faded from the remorseless assault of the sun, and it brings him out of his reverie.

"What am I even doing here?" he mutters to himself. He feels resentful, but if it should be directed toward someone, who doesn't know who. Himself? Maybe it's just one of those days. His already present frown deepens at the thought. He dislikes irrational moods and persistent emotions. When there is no reason for a feeling, why can it still be felt?

Maybe he went for this walk to distract himself. He can't remember. He is distracted, though. There's someone sitting there, near the top of a pile of dusty debris. A massive collection of smaller fragments, like a giant stopped for a moment to try to clean up and swept aside a particularly bothersome swath of rubble. The figure is perched on one of the few larger pieces. He's saying something, but the words are muffled, and Dren cannot tell if he's talking to himself. He must be, because no one else is here except for them, and the figure hasn't seen him yet.

With a sigh of resignation, he adjusts his wandering course and approaches. He doesn't move any faster; he has nothing else to do, and that one doesn't look like he's going anywhere. When he finally gets to the base of the rubble, he looks up and cocks his head, listening. He can make out the words now. Secrets, huh?

"You must spend a lot of time around here if you've found anything like that. Looks like there's nothing here but a mess that needs to be cleaned up."

[Terri]

The man scratches at his chin some more, the back of his hand reddened from the stubble.  He keeps muttering even though he's sure nobody will actually listen.  A little family of bubbles and happiness crosses in front of him and he calls out, offers to tell them all about the intrigues of this place and why they should pay him to show them first-hand.  They ignore him and disappear into the mist, flitting in and out of his head as he wills them to return.  Perhaps it's dementia that causes him to call out after those who he knows are nothing but hallucinations.

"Tours," he drawls from under his old-man hat.  "Come get your tours!"  He watches the slow advance of one of the figments of his imagination and tilts his head.  What does it mean for his mental state when his hallucinations stop to acknowledge him?

"Why yes," he says to this interesting new incarnation of loneliness.  "I do spend plenty of time here.  Lots of old years sucked into this holy little shit-bowl.  And a mess, you say?"  He hauls his head around to glance at the entrance to the old cathedral.  He takes in the dust and the weeds and the subtle art of the macabre concrete.  "I suppose it is, then.  But I don't what moron would want to try cleaning it up."

He's timing this illusion.  They've never stuck around before.

[Waffle Waif]

"Certainly not you," he retorts. "Nor anyone else for that matter." This strange character puzzles him. He is gruff and worn, and it is no hard thing to imagine that he has remained here for years, unmoving. How has he survived? Do people actually pay him for these proclaimed tours? He can't see how the man could afford basic necessities even if it happened now and then.

His voice is rough and direct like the stone that surrounds him, but there is something in the way his eyes move that makes him seem unfocused, as if he is looking at things that aren't there. He sits solidly, yet looks like he could be pushed down with mere words. Yes, an odd figure, this. Contradictory, at odds with himself.

He doesn't even seem to enjoy this location he has chosen to haunt. Doesn't seem to believe in what he's selling. Has he been here that long, become that apathetic, that he just mindlessly drones the same mantra without caring if he ever receives a response? Well, he has received one today, however skeptical and ill-tempered.

"So, shit-bowl, huh? What kind of secrets can be found in a shit-bowl? Nothing good, I'd wager." He taps his foot on the ground, an irregular rhythm accompanied by the skittering of pebbles.