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Home > Expos > Event 10 > Page 53
POST-MORTEM▼
POST-MORTEM
[No More Goodbyes - Polar Bear]
Wolfgang
"I can walk myself, you know."

Wolfgang itches the side of his neck.
Percival
"You know damn well I won't allow for that, at least until I'm sure of your condition."

The sound of creaking wheels fill the halls as Percival pushes his twin to his destination. It was an old wheelchair, probably hasn't seen use in quite a while. But it was a small mercy that he was grateful for, even if his brother wasn't as much.
Percival
A few knocks before the pair would enter anyways, Perce wheels Wolfgang into the room, one that he had been noted that his company had been waiting in. He glances at LS from across the room.

"...Mh. I'm seeing about the possibility of getting us off this rock. Rest assured the boss is not going to be terribly happy with us. Keep an eye on him for me, I'll be back with more information."
Leaping Star
Leaping Star had been waiting in a guest room for the brothers. Idleness suited her well, but lately she'd found herself easier to rouse into fits of anxious pacing back and forth, and today was no exception. A small table set with a fancy cloth and a small tea set stood by a large window, Leaping Star was worried it would go cold before he arrived.
Leaping Star
She hangs off of Percival's every word, he'd cut in so quickly she missed the chance to greet them properly. Thinking it'd be foolish now she finished her pacing and crossed the room to meet them, standing by Wolfgang in his wheelchair so she could take it in Percival's stead. "I'll look after him, don't you worry!"
Wolfgang
"You seem to be doing well...!" Wolfgang smiles back as she approaches, hands neatly folded into his lap. Suddenly he didn't mind being fussed over so much.
Percival
Percival nods. "Thank you. Hopefully we'll be taking our leave soon..." He mutters before shutting the door behind him.
Leaping Star
She waited, listening for the sound of Percival's footsteps growing further and further away until they were faint far off taps. Now sure he was gone she takes the wheelchair in her hands, leading Wolfgang to the table. "You think so?"
Leaping Star
There was a chair already set where she ought to wheel Wolfgang to. She stands in silence as she puzzles over the simple problem before her.
Wolfgang
After all that's been done, he was almost startlingly... normal. None worse for wear. There were some stains left over from the amount of blood he had lost, but other than that and the mandatory wheelchair.

"I'd hope so! Oh- is this tea for us? That's so sweet..."
Leaping Star
"Oh, yes. I'd asked a maid to bring us some, I thought you might be thirsty for something with a little more flavour." Leaping Star abandons the wheel chair for a moment, hauling the now spare seat away before guiding Wolfgang into place. She sits opposite him.
Leaping Star
"Can you... Pour for yourself? I can pour for you, if it's difficult."
Wolfgang
Snrk.

"I'm fine, I'm fine dear!" He leans over to pour for Leaping and Himself.

"You're too kind, I hope the castle staff has been treating you well. They've been a biiittt standoffish around me and my brother for whatever reason. Might be Percy scarin' them off~"
Leaping Star
She folds her hands on the table. She can't quite snicker in return. She glances out the window for a moment, not really trying to discern the shapes in the dark.
Leaping Star
She'd already forgotten what Wolfgang had said, there was a simple question burning a hole in her mind. "Are you okay?"
Wolfgang
"Doing just fine!" As if nothing ever happened. He takes a sip of his tea.

"I'd say I'm more worried about you. It's been.. pretty hectic between point A to point B, I'm sorry about how messy this has all been for you. Also given that me and my brother will be leaving as soon as made possible..."
Leaping Star
She looks down into her own tea, at the vapor rising from it. There's an involuntary flexing of muscles beneath her faceplate, almost like a grimace, but she tries to not let it show.
Leaping Star
"We..." She taps the back of her hand, anxiously. "We don't have to lie to each other."
Leaping Star
"If you do not want to talk about it, that's okay."
Leaping Star
"Just..." She reaches one of her hands across the table. "Don't lie."
Wolfgang
Sigh. He places his hand onto hers.
Wolfgang
"I appreciate the gesture, I do. But... Well, it's not that I'm a lliitttlllee shaken. But- look at me! Complete recovery! I look as well as I did stepping onto this planet!"
Wolfgang
"Aside from.. theeessseee.. these will have to go eventually. It's unsightly. But It's nothing I'm not used to, it'll be like nothing ever happened in due time!"

He lightly glides his hand just over the stitches in his neck. It didn't hurt at least.
Leaping Star
She eases a little, flashing her buck teeth in a non-threatening smile. With her free hand she gestures to her own neck, mirroring Wolfgang's brushing of his stitches. "You've healed so well, it really is a miracle."
Leaping Star
"It was so awful, Wolfy." She speaks calmly as if recalling a dream, and not the reality they'd both suffered. "There was so much missing, and it was all so mangled, I didn't think it would..." Leaping Star clamps her hand around her neck, feeling a phantom pain that didn't belong to her.
Wolfgang
"Don't worry yourself over it, dear, it's in the past. I'm just happy to be alive right now." He strokes her hand to comfort.
Wolfgang
"You've been a wonderful help, if there's anything we could offer to repay you~ I'm sure Percy wouldn't mind, after all, you had a hand in saving my life."
Leaping Star
For the first time since they sat down, she laughs a little. The thought of some reward for all of this seemed so wrong it became laughable. She turned her hand over, taking his own and gently squeezing it. "I'm just glad you're okay."
Leaping Star
She draws her hand back, picking up the tea and raising it to her mouth, though she doesn't sip quite yet. "So! What do you think you'll do once you're out of here? Where will you go? Somewhere nice I hope."
Wolfgang
"Well! This has simply just been a business outing- albeit, one that's gone all sorts of wrongly. After this I'm to head back home~"
Wolfgang
2025-11-01 20:30:02
Wolfgang Profile
Posted by ID #3
Last edit: 2025-11-01 20:48:10
He pauses to take a sip of tea.

"I've got a lot on my plate when I'm not gallivanting on some vampwelf planet. Founder and Owner of a few makeup lines, skincare products. I've already missed a few meetings for this, important meet up with.. eugh, Boris and the like."
Wolfgang
"But it's much nicer than here! What of you, Miss Star? ...You're not staying here, are you?"
Leaping Star
She lifts the teacup ever so slightly, speaking in to it with a softer cadence. "Where else might I go?" With that, she sips.
Leaping Star
"That all sounds very exciting!" Even though some of the words and how they were arranged left her puzzled. "Ever since meeting you and your brother I've felt a little more curious about the lives of aliens and where they came from."
Leaping Star
"What sort of world could produce a pair such as yourselves?"
Wolfgang
2025-11-01 20:46:48
Wolfgang Profile
Posted by ID #3
Last edit: 2025-11-01 20:48:01
"Newest Jersey, dear. Home grown sort of drattle. I'd find it hard to say that it's thaattt glamorous of a home planet, it's certainly not where I'm stationed nowadays." He waves his hand.
Wolfgang
"...If you haven't anywhere to go though, dear. Me and my twin will be picked up if all goes correctly. We can offer you a ride, if you'd like. I'm unaware of any contacts you may have or relatives, a home planet you may return to... But the offer stands!"
Leaping Star
She nurses the cup, letting the heat soak into her palms.
Leaping Star
"You'd better lower your voice talking like that. If Bela heard he might think you were trying to steal me away." She giggles the last words out.
Leaping Star
She shifts in her seat, getting slightly more serious. "I... I think I'll stay here."
Leaping Star
"I've been thinking about it and, while I miss my family, my home, my people..."
Leaping Star
"...I don't want to go back there."
Wolfgang
"Oh, no? Worse than here? Hard to imagine- more tea?"
Leaping Star
She takes another sip, a longer one, then offers her teacup out to him to refill. "Not... Worse. It's sweet there. I'm worshipped, I'm adored, I can do no wrong and what I ask for I often find I get."
Leaping Star
"But it all just feels... Wrong somehow."
Leaping Star
"I'm not a good rabbit, Wolfgang. No matter how much plenty I had, no matter what praises and love blessed me, I wasn't happy like a rabbit should be."
Wolfgang
Admittedly, it's difficult for him to understand. But he listens, sipping on his own tea and occasionally petting Leaping Star's hand as offered to him.

"Such a guilty conscience for such a lovely rabbit. Forgive me, I'm not... mm, well acquainted with tailed culture, but isn't this all your birthright? What I'd give..." He trails off.
Wolfgang
"What do you want, if not a life of luxury?"
Leaping Star
Leaping Star sets down the teacup, watching as the drattle's soft green hand gently caressed her own.
Leaping Star
Her mind goes utterly blank, a dark spot where once thoughts flowed freely. What more could she possibly want out of life? What more was there that she could dare to claim?
Leaping Star
Her heart ached, she'd found an answer, but even she didn't sound sure of herself. "Love?"
Leaping Star
2025-11-01 21:16:28
Leaping Star Profile
Posted by ID #107
Last edit: 2025-11-01 21:17:10
"It's... Hard to love, when the first thought that greets you in waking is, 'Is today the day?'" She pauses, studying the patterns in the tablecloth.
Leaping Star
2025-11-01 21:16:50
Leaping Star Profile
Posted by ID #107
Last edit: 2025-11-01 21:17:15
"'Is today the day they kill me?'"
Wolfgang
"Mhh.. Rabbits and sacrifice, I see what you're saying." He rubs his thumb against her palm.

"I can see why going home would be.. Leesss than ideal. Judging by my own recent, er, encounter and how easily blood is shed on this planet. I fear for the worst of you here. But you know what's best for you, Miss Star."
Wolfgang
"Love comes. You'll find it. I find it hard to imagine there isn't someone out there eager to court such a sweet rabbit as yourself." He winks, his attempt to lighten the mood.
Leaping Star
"Don't fear for me." She withdraws, hands to herself, picking up the teacup once more.
Leaping Star
"Perhaps I'll die here. Perhaps I'll address the wrong man, or perhaps one night in bed Bela might realise he's grown tired of me."
Leaping Star
She sighs softly, almost as if relieved. "At least I won't die by the hands of those claiming to love me."
Leaping Star
She looks out the window once more and sips her tea.
Wolfgang
There was a pause between Leaping's admittance and Wolfgang finishing up his tea.

"You don't have to die, you know. Not by a vampwelf's hand, nor your family's. I.. well, this is a culture I am not well versed in, Miss Star. If you could do it differently, wouldn't you?"
Leaping Star
She turns her head slightly, looking at him out the corner of her vision. "Do what differently?"
Wolfgang
"Well, anything at all really. You're born into something, but you hate it, yes? So you walked away from it. Who says you should die for any reason at all dear, or anticipate the day that it should happen? Rabbit or not.. you should simply enjoy living. As most people do!"
Wolfgang
"Example; me and my twin. We were born attached from the side. We were separated, but the doctors at the time told us.. there wasn't much they could do, in terms of corrective surgery. I'll always need a crutch or wheelchair. Doomed to, a homely face, misshapen body..."

Wolfgang drums his nails against the arm rest of his chair.
Wolfgang
"You'd never guess it, I was so unhappy with myself and my future. But I could change it! Why confine myself to a life with a body that makes me miserable?"
Leaping Star
So you walked away from it. Her ears folded away from the words, as if embarrassed to receive them.
Leaping Star
Setting her cup down she extends both index fingers, drawing them together to meet at a point. "You and your brother were both... One?"
Wolfgang
"Exactly! Not that anyone can tell at this point of time~"

"I owe a lot of... this." He gestures to himself with a hand wave. "To my brother. You could say we both grew into interests in cosmetics, in our own ways."
Leaping Star
"You seem happy." She stresses the 'seem', perhaps to indicate a level of doubt, or perhaps to elucidate how candid his joy was.
Leaping Star
"But your brother, it feels like he's missing something."
Wolfgang
"Oh, I'm not blind to it either. I can't say I know eexaaacctttllyy what he wants, but he won't let other doctors touch him. He's... Picky, about that sort of thing."
Wolfgang
"It's a shame really. But, I can tell you he's rather proud of his work, even if he doesn't say much of it. If you know that this is all the work of one man.. well. You know who to talk to then if corrective surgery is something you need."
Leaping Star
It couldn't even occur to her that she might be able to have her ears modified, to have any trace of her rabbitness removed. Mirroring the man opposite her she makes a flamboyant gesture of putting her hand to her chest, "Hardly necessary, I was born perfect."
Leaping Star
She sticks her thumb up into her buck teeth, highlighting them. "Even my flaws are perfect in their own way."
Leaping Star
She sinks back into her chair. It had been a moment since he asked the question, but she was finally ready to answer. "...No."
Wolfgang
He did think her buck teeth were utterly adorable, but he was caught off guard too soon to follow up.

"Ah, no?"
Leaping Star
"I don't think there's anything I would change." Both her hands rest clasped together on the table in front of her.
Leaping Star
"I know that however much I might want to live, if the time came and I was to make an offering for the gods..."
Leaping Star
"Well, I wouldn't fight it."
Wolfgang
"I see..." He still didn't really understand it. But it was time he let go.

"You're a unique one, Miss Star."
Wolfgang
"I don't suppose I could offer you my number too~ I have plenty cards, but I'm afraid technology as simple as cell phones may be hard to come by."
Leaping Star
"I'll accept." She offers out a hand, ready to receive.
Wolfgang
"You're a peach~" He carefully reaches into his robes to fetch his wallet, handing off a pink card to her.
Leaping Star
As the card slips into her hand she continues talking, as if the detour hadn't happened. "I want to live, but it feels so selfish."
Leaping Star
"That poor dragon... It broke its neck trying to attack me, all because I agreed to play some silly game with a child."
Leaping Star
She sighs, "And you, Wolfgang."
Leaping Star
"Maybe if I'd just... Stayed in hiding, if I didn't walk out into the open, and let them take me."
Leaping Star
"I could've gone home. They could've found a use for me... Fulfilled my purpose."
Leaping Star
"Maybe then you wouldn't have died."
Wolfgang
His stitches itch.

"I don't blame you, dear. I'm here now, that's what matters, isn't it?"
Wolfgang
2025-11-01 22:48:44
Wolfgang Profile
Posted by ID #3
Last edit: 2025-11-01 22:50:26
It did nag at him. A terrible scratching at the back of his skull, those fleeting memories just before he fell unconscious. The depths of nothingness that awaited him in the hours that he was no longer in the living world. A vast abyss that clawed upward to meet him, the hands of blood relatives that beg to drag him under with the rest of them.

Waiting for his arrival.
Wolfgang
Wolfgang pours more tea for himself. It's gone a bit cold by now.

"I'm lucky that you had Bela at your side. But... I think this whole, encounter? Shall we keep it between us?"
Wolfgang
"I'm, artwork. In a way. Expensive artwork. Now, I don't know much of the ins and outs of this whole... bringing the dead back, but it may be better that I say less of this. I have a reputation to uphold, is all."
Leaping Star
"I understand," she nods. "Not everyone takes kindly to necromancy. People may look at you horribly."
Leaping Star
He was a dead man walking. What a horrific fate. There was an uneasiness she felt sitting across from him, an uneasiness she'd only felt in the stables with Gretel, or when spending too long with only herself as company.

He should be dead.
Leaping Star
Moving her hands into her lap she anxiously fidgets with her robes, bundling up the purple, blood free fabric in little fists.
Leaping Star
"Can I.... Hug you?"
Wolfgang
"Of course, dear! I hope that this isn't the last time we come in contact, you've only been lovely this entire time~"

He fiddles with the wheelchair, in spite of himself he didn't actually want to rise from his seat. He simply pushes himself back a bit to give some space.
Leaping Star
She makes her way over without a fuss, bending down by the chair to wrap her arms around his shoulders. "I hope so too."
Wolfgang
He readily accepts the embrace. She was so soft, it was like wrapping his arms around a silky pillow.
Percival
A knock at the door is followed by Percival poking his head in, mouth open to say something but stops before he could start.

"...I'm interrupting."
Percival
"We'll be departing soon-ish. Wrap up whatever you two are up to." He gestures with his fleshy tendril hand.
Leaping Star
2025-11-01 23:12:51
Leaping Star Profile
Posted by ID #107
Last edit: 2025-11-01 23:15:24
She wasn't sure why, but she felt like she ought to be embarrassed caught like this. She made a timid move to pull away, surprised to find Wolfgang had more strength about him than she'd thought. She was utterly trapped. "Um..."
Wolfgang
Too caught up in how pleasant Leaping Star is. He doesn't quite let go juuussttt yet. "Of coouurrrssee of couurrrsssee~"
Percival
"....Alright then." Percy sighs, and leaves the pair to their business. Percival had a headache, and all too much on his mind to worry about.
Percival
2025-11-01 23:20:13
Percival Profile
Posted by ID #3
Last edit: 2025-11-01 23:27:27
Was this the right thing to do? Was this the only thing he could of done? Why did he go through with this? Losing his life's work twin would of crushed him, he couldn't of let him go. He had been dead for hours. He should be dead. What was he going to do now?
...One thing was for certain. He wasn't going to let Montgomery know, if he could help it.
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