WEEK 2

[grimgrinningghosts]

[One week. One week spent in the Haunted Mansion, and nothing seems to have changed. The hinges still creak in doorless chambers, strange and frightening sounds still echo through and you still occasionally catch a flicker of candlelight out of the corner of your eye. You might be slowly becoming familiar with the mundanity of this communal life, and we've recognized that possibility.

Something has to give.]

[SUNDAY MONDAY TUESDAY WEDNESDAY THURSDAY]

{ooc: Don't forget to turn in your week 1/intro AC! As per murdergame tradition, this begins our new weekly schedule - Tuesday and onwards are locked for the motive. Everybody's just working for the weekend.

Additionally, a few people this week are going to get tagged by...something. If you'd like to opt out of this, please let us know.}

Comments

[folkscallmewander]

As much as you like! [He's not going to restrict Fiddleford's desire for delicious bacon.] Don't worry about me, I'm vegetarian.

[He dunks a corner of the toast into the gloopy egg yolk and bites into it.] Wanna [bits of toast fly out of his mouth.] wanna join me for breakfast? There's fruit and hardboiled eggs.

[terribibble]

Oh! Well, nothin' wrong with that, my wife was a vegetarian.

[... Ahahaha wow he probably should not have said that, huh, hahaha, let's just bulldoze right on past it.]

Anyway. Anyway, sure, yes.

[He busies himself making a plate and then, when he realizes there isn't already coffee on, with setting that up. Good lord he could use some coffee right about now. He has to clear the cobwebs from the coffee maker; no matter how many times he does, they keep coming back. He is beginning to think it's some sort of calculated attack on him specifically.]

Will you be wantin' a mug?

[folkscallmewander]

[Wander raises his pencil-thin eyebrows. Fiddles has a wife. Or had. That sounds like something that should not be brought up during breakfast.

But. Coffee. Coffee and Wander do not mix. Do you want Wander running up the stairs all day to shed off that energy?]

I prefer tea myself, if it ain't too much trouble.

[terribibble]

Oh -- well I'm sure there's tea around here somewhere. Gotta be a kettle if there's a coffee pot...

[Not like ghosts drink either but he doesn't want to think about that too in-depth, okay. Sure enough he finds a kettle, just as old as the coffee pot and kind of dented, but serviceable. There's even tea to go with it.

He's glad for the distraction. Sometimes his mind goes far faster than his mouth and it results in him saying stupid, stupid things like my wife was a vegetarian before his brain catches up and remembers free association can get him in trouble. Ugh.]

Don't think there's any sugar but there ought to be milk if you need somethin' to cut it.

[folkscallmewander]

[Fiddles is kind of jumpy, might be the coffee. It would be best if he also had some calming tea, did some meditation exercises, sat down and talked for a while. Wander slides off his chair to retrieve the milk from the fridge.]

I don't meet lots of other folks that drink milk with their tea! Sylvia thinks it's weird, hardly anyone asks when we visit.

[He slides the quarter full carton onto the counter, which Wander scales up by gripping the edge of the countertop and walking up the wood paneling until he's high enough to pull himself over the edge.]

What kinda tea you like best with milk, Fiddles?

[terribibble]

Oh, I. Ah. I'm not much of a tea-drinker myself if we're bein' honest. Chamomile's not bad? Y'know, for before bed. Helps me sleep, sometimes.

[Only sometimes. Most nights he can still barely manage to get his eyes shut before it's time to get back up again. But, hey. Can't hurt to try, right?

He is going to pour a little of that milk into his coffee, though. Just a dash. Just enough to turn it from dark brown to a slightly less-dark brown. It's almost more to cool it than it is to change the flavor.]

And, ah. It's Fiddleford.

[He's not trying to be rude, especially since Wander was kind enough to share breakfast, but... Fiddles?]

[folkscallmewander]

[Wander makes a face at "chamomile and milk", which he hides by turning away from Fiddleford and grabbing a stirring spoon.]

Fresh air helps when you're fixin' to relax. That's why me and Sylvia normally camp out at night when it's nice.

[He turns around.] Black tea, please.

I know your name, just that you and Stanford need different nicknames. Well, he doesn't want to be called Stan so that's out of the question but you're [pokes him.] are Fiddleford. So, Fiddles!

[terribibble]

[Black tea. Okay, he can do that.]

It just... it sounds awful silly, is all.

[folkscallmewander]

[Wander laughs. He's been given weirder nicknames in the past, but he would have been honored to be named after an instrument, no matter how brief that alias would have lasted.]

It's cute! I play the banjo, but the fiddle's one of the nicest instruments to play with [Every instrument is great.]

[terribibble]

[He's a forty year old man so perhaps 'cute' isn't exactly what he's going for, but he's starting to get the impression that he can't argue this. It's meant with a nice sentiment anyway. He probably ought to just let it happen.]

So do I. Play the banjo, I mean. [He remembers seeing that on Wander's profile, actually. It's one of the things that stuck with him. His mind loses things like sieve, but it can keep hold of the things he finds particularly noteworthy.] My older brother plays the fiddle, though.

[He manages what is trying very hard to be a smile.]

Y'know the funniest part of the whole thing is his name's Banjomin.

[folkscallmewander]

[He clasps his hands together.] That's amazin'! Your parents musta been surprised with what you two ended up playin', unless you're fixin' to switch names around. [Just change names, it's easy as hearing someone call you a wandering weirdo and introducing yourself as Wander.]

Would you rather have your nickname be 'Banjo' instead?

[terribibble]

N-- no. No thank you. If it's a choice between the two I'd like Fiddles better.

[At least it's still part of his name, even if it sounds silly.]

[folkscallmewander]

[Excellent. Wander has won. He shimmies over the countertop and watches Fiddleford prepare the tea.]

Does your brother still play the fiddle? Have you two considered becomin' a two man gentleman band?

[terribibble]

I think so? I haven't seen him in person in... in a while.

[He's bad at dates, at estimating time. It's fine. There's probably nothing insidious about that, he's just a little scattered, that's all.]

And naw. Playin's a hobby. I wanted to go into electronics. Computers, y'know.

[folkscallmewander]

[S'cool.]

Oh, neat! I'm not a tech-minded fella, but dealin' with computers sounds extra hard. [They control spaceships and holograms and robots and everything a sci-fi story needs.] You are Ford sure are the resident science geniuses, huh?

[terribibble]

[At the mention of Ford his expression falters a little, but this morning's been almost nice so far and he doesn't want to ruin it by putting himself in a bad mood.]

Suppose you could say that. We went to school together and all.

[Play it cool. Neutral. Don't get petty, that isn't kind.]

[folkscallmewander]

[Holy shit.]

Imagine that! You two were brought here for a reason, and that reason is to work together and help us find our way out! [While Wander befriends the ghosts as a distraction and hopefully bring them onto the good side.]

[terribibble]

I don't... I'm not so sure that's it, exactly, but that's a nice thought.

[He really doesn't want to have to come out and say 'I don't trust Stanford Pines as far as I could throw him, which is not far at all because my arms are noodly as hell'.]

[folkscallmewander]

Least we got two smart folks on our side, isn't that great? [Positivity, Ford! Positivity!! Wander waves his hands around for effect.]

You can share old school stories, work on inventin' a way to see the other ghosts, write code to hack the stairs!