shatterverse | (no subject)

Entry tags:

(no subject)

Maybe she thought to surprise him. Or maybe she was just curious to see who else lived in the Cooper household. Either way, Chloe pulls her Volkswagen Beetle up in front of the house. She checks her reflection quickly in the rear view mirror before smiling and stepping out.

As she walks towards the front door, she can't help but look around for that supposed space ship. If Clark is home, she's totally making him show it to her.

If he isn't? Well, she can totally have fun getting to know his friends at any rate.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"We have an expression where I come from: curiosity skinned the cat. I'm told it's different around here, but I'm pretty sure the meaning's the same. There's some stuff you're just better off not knowing."

Dreamer doesn't want to traumatise any livelings today.

"Curiosity killed the cat," Chloe responds. "And it's something I never really brought either."

"Yeah, well, back home overly curious people sometimes ran the risk of actually getting skinned."

Shrug.

"I'm not from a very nice place, okay?"

A godless urban Hell about sums it up.

A shrug. "So?"

"So your boyfriend's been telling me I should pretend to be normal and I figured I'd give it a shot. Looks like I'm even worse at the job than I figured."

"I'm kind of good at spotting things a lot of people miss," Chloe replies, trying to offer Dreamer a reassuring smile. "You'll probably have better luck with the local population."

"Oh, fuck the local population," she says irritably. "I've spent the last half century learning how not to act like a liveling, and now I've got to learn everything back the other way around again." Short pause - then, by way of explanation: "I'm dead, see."

"Okay, that explains a lot of it." Chloe grins. "Wasn't so hard, was it?"

"Yeah, well." Dreamer shrugs. "The rest is the tricky part. The reason I'm trained to ignore pain is because where I come from people get sentenced for torture, and only some of them deserve it. My job's to find the ones that don't and take their sentences for 'em. Or it would've been, but I was brought here before I took my first contract."

"Wait," she states as she shakes her head. "Go back a bit. How does that work? Replacing them?"

"Yeah. Sentences given have to be served, but not necessarily by the person they're given to. Anybody who's--" She pauses to flash a smile. "Crazy enough can sub in for 'em."

"Seriously? What sort of world do you come frmo?"

"Downside. Like I said, I'm dead. It's an afterlife. And the administration sucks."

She nods slowly. "So all these people are dead?"

"Everybody I used to know, yeah. Y'get used to it after a while."

"Weird," she answers, but there's nothing condescending about it. "I gotta say, Clark's definitely living with some interesting people."

"Sure is."

Tiny smile.

"Y'better rescue him before we convince him to start being weird too."

If Dreamer knew Clark had superpowers, she's forgotten it.

Okay, if she doesn't know, Chloe's not going to be the one to tell her anything.

"I'll try my best," she jokes. "But so far, he kind of seems as normal as they come."

"Oh, I wouldn't say that," she says amicably. "Pulled me out of some damn cave. That's got to count for something in the weird department. In a good way, of course."

"Kind of like a hero, isn't he?"

"God, don't you start. And to think I figured I was getting away from chicks with knight-in-shining-armour complexes in this brave new world."

Dreamer grins broadly.

"Sorry. Joke on an old girlfriend of mine."

Chloe shrugs, grinning. "It's okay. Exes deserve it sometimes."

"Oh, I gave her shit about it even when--"

She breaks off with a sigh.

"Yeah. Was a thing. Used to tell her she was only dating me 'cause I'm half a foot taller than she is and know how to hold a sword. Hold, mind, not use."

Chloe nods. "What happened?"

"I was out with her celebrating my newly acquired contracting badge, took two steps away and walked into a fucking cave in the middle of Kansas."

Dreamer takes a breath.

"Ain't exactly the best way to end a relationship, I gotta say."