Chapter Text
Clear skies felt a bit like a joke after everything. Memorial had seen the sunlight glaring through the windows on the way to the basement. The world isn't over! it seemed to cheer, as if those clear skies hadn't held doom only days ago. They didn't know the details, obviously-- they didn't recall looking up on that fateful day. Still, it was perhaps their first time seeing genuine sunlight in years-- no, weeks? Who knew anymore.
The basement was far more tolerable. There was clear signage courtesy of someone with a lot of duct tape, and nothing seemed to loop endlessly. It took maybe fifteen minutes to get from the edge of that warzone to a door that muffled some sort of music. Of course, it had taken from a few hours to multiple days to leave the warzone itself. Their sense of time was long gone, but it had been miserable. They kept expecting something to go wrong, and they got turned around more times than they could be bothered to count.
The door.
They focused again. The door in front of them that they could hear music on the other side of. With a deep breath that was mercifully free of the stench of gunpowder, they pushed it open. A few people glanced over, but mostly the crowd in the camp seemed absorbed in their own activities. An older woman with wings waved at them, and Memorial wandered toward a table covered by a cloth stained various colors. Something that might've been a mushroom was sat next to it, fussing over a notebook, and a four-armed man leaned against the leg of the table.
"You!" The mushroom pointed a tendril at them. "Are you a fungus nerd?"
Memorial shrugged to the best of their ability. "I don't think I was."
A few of its faces scowled and it scuttled off to the winged woman with notebook in tow. They turned their attention to the man on the ground with mild curiosity, and after a moment he noticed their gaze and waved a hand. The ground where it had rested was now stained a sludgy mix of brown, gray, and blue, so they opted to sit with a bit of distance between the two of them.
They half-closed their eyes and focused on the music. Their old memories gave the impression that they'd heard far better, but compared to the sirens and echoing gunshots of that hell, it was the best music in the world. The person playing it faltered periodically, but one of the other residents commended them for "finally getting that down" after a few faster notes in succession so it was clearly an improvement on earlier attempts. It made sense. The musician didn't seem to have hands anymore. If only Memorial could lend them a pair.
Ha.
They could hear the trio closer to the door chatting with the occasional excited outburst about cards. Oddly enough, they heard four voices, and a glance over confirmed that one of them seemed to have an entire second face that spoke separately. It was strange, but overall seemed benign.
"Are you doing alright?"
Memorial jolted, gaze darting back to the four-armed man. "What?"
He held up two hands slightly defensively, now more fully turned to face them. "You seem exhausted." Ouch. It was true, but they'd hoped it wasn't blatantly obvious. "Is there anything we can do to help you?"
They hummed in thought, turning a few dog tags over in their hands to examine the text and smudges. "It's mostly a 'me' thing. You?" Memorial glanced at him. Between the smell, stains, and paintbrush he fidgeted with, the man was probably either made of paint or an incredibly messy person. He sighed and shrugged in response.
"It's hard to say. Musette's soup helped, though. You'd think her curse was to be a good cook, really." His small grin didn't do much for reassurance, honestly. Still, they hadn't eaten anything beyond rations in a long time. Or perhaps they ate real food less than three weeks ago. Who knew. Soup sounded nice.
Once Memorial retrieved the soup and sat back down, the man introduced himself as Frederic. He didn't say much on his own condition, but was very careful when examining their dog tags and only left a few paint marks, so they didn't particularly feel the need to pry. Instead, they did their best to explain what they knew about the ones he singled out and showed off some of the more interesting examples.
By the time they finished their soup, Frederic had learned about a few dozen dog tags and closely examined a third of those. As the conversation went on he left bigger stains, and at one point when trying to look at one accidentally bumped his own face with a hand, but overall he was remarkably mindful. It was nice to see someone else care, and when the conversation wound to a close they felt a bit more real than they had earlier. Instead of some abnormality in hell they were just someone in a boiler room having a conversation.
With this in mind, they nearly jumped out of their skin when the door opened again. One of the people who had visited them before was carrying rolled up fabric. Most of the people present capable of speech said their hellos, Memorial included, but they frowned slightly as they wracked their memory for the person's name. This obviously wasn't Sam, and they were cloaked.
Before they could figure it out, the person hurried over to them and dropped one of the bundles of fabric at Memorial's... feet? hands? and another at Frederic's. It appeared to be... bed rolls? A few larger ones went to those who had ended up bigger, and the stationary guy in the corner just got a blanket. The spares were piled against the wall, but when they began to leave, the mushroom waved a tendril to get their benefactor's attention. Their third eye glint as they turned and memories clicked into place. "Morton!"
"Ehhhh yes? Did you need something? I am... busy right now." Their odd manner of speech was honestly the most recognizable part of the cricket.
They really hadn't needed something, but now they might as well ask someone who was likely to know. "What happened to Sam?"
Morton stared for a bit longer than felt necessary before replying. "He is ehhhh titanic now." Oh. "He remains lucid." Okay.
"That's good."
"Indeed." The cricket left without another word, and Memorial was left staring in mild shock. Logically, it made sense that he'd look outside at some point. The guy went around a warzone finding dog tags for them despite the obvious danger, and his companions seemed unsurprised by this behavior. Still, it was odd to think about.