We're talking away I don't know what I'm to say

[filloryfanatic]

WHO: Quentin Coldwater + You!
WHERE: Red Wings + Dreamscapes + around
WHEN: March 15th-31st
WHAT: Catch-all! Quentin's memories and general hanging around.
NOTES OR WARNINGS: Mental illness, possible suicidal thoughts, character death, all will be marked! Spoilers for The Magicians season 4.



1. Red Wings, whenever

[Quentin is trying to come up with ideas to make Red Wings more popular, and he is still learning the ropes of how this particular city works in terms of PR and marketing. He's making some headway, it's just a process. He has always been better with social media and online interaction than in person, like any stereotypical Millenial. He can be spotted wandering around the place taking pictures; usually 'artistic' intended shots, making the pool table look cooler for example of a nice shot of the bar all stocked.

Outside of that off-hours, he is usually there because everyone else is, or if he's waiting for Eliot's shift to be over. He's fairly shy outside of the people he already knows, but he'll look up if someone comes in or says hello and flash a smile, eager to talk. Quentin doesn't like being alone, he's only not great at asking for company. Otherwise he'll be reading up on his neural interface and nursing a drink.

He can also be found playing pool, helping bust tables for the rest of the staff, cleaning off surfaces to be helpful.]

2. Mental Hospital Dream - TW for mental illness, possible suicidal thoughts

[It is a very drab looking place, the hospital. Everything is in subdued colors and people move like they're sleepwalking down the halls. Doctors in white coats and nurses in blue or purple scrubs walk around, gently assisting dazed individuals to their rooms or to the common room spaces. No matter what is asked of the nurses, they will reply with 'that is not permitted,' and occasionally continue on to say 'because you can harm yourself and others.' The most populated area is the game room where there are puzzles and games happening, but occasionally people do confusing things, shout, scream, or get ushered off by doctors.

There are groups sitting in a circle, their words all sounding nothing more than a strange humming, as if they're opening their mouths and talking but nothing is coming out. Quentin himself can be seen in the far corner, by the windows, a pack of cards in front of him. There are at least three packs of cards that are strewn about on the floor around him, covering the wood floors. He is in gray sweatpants and a shirt, dark hair long, eyes heavily circled with lack of sleep and general hopelessness.]

No, no, I'm telling you, I'm telling you. It's real. I did it. I did.

[His hands shaking, a little manic, he takes the cards out and shuffles them, his fingers moving fast and intently. He either is talking to no one, himself, or whoever is nearby.]

Watch. [Quentin abruptly throws the cards, and for a second, a long beat, they freeze in the air. They hover and stay, and then all of a sudden crash to the floor. It was a miss it and blink moment. He swears and goes to the ground, trying to pick them all up.] No, I can do it, it works, I'm not crazy.


3. Fillory Love Shack Dream

[It's a very peaceful and simple spot in a pastoral type of clearing. A patch of land with a small modest hut, laundry line, a bed outside, and most importantly a large square white space with a stack of multi-colored tiles that all put together can fill up the space. About half of them are already in the mosaic, the rest nearby. The rest of the space seems designed to fit around this square, as if it's all that matters.

A slightly older Quentin can be found sorting the tiles, his hair long and held back in a ponytail. Nearby on the bed a boy of about five or six is sleeping, a blanket pulled up to his chin. Quentin frowns and sets one down that he was working on, adjusting the wedding ring on his finger. He glances up when he senses someone nearby.]

Want to give it a try? It's supposed to reflect the beauty of all life in a bunch of tiles. [He reaches down to pick up a nearby basket.] Peach or plum?

4. Mirror World Dream - TW for Death

[The Mirror World feels unsteady the moment you exist in it. It's in grays and black and whites, it feels unnatural, upside down. Even people used to feeling in control might sense something wrong in this place. Its hallways are long and all in confusing gray tones. It seems quiet, until a scream pierces the air. The scream of someone who is about to watch someone they love die and there's nothing they can do.

No, Alice screams, as Penny pulls her away. It's too late and some part of her knows that, but she can't help her denial. In the hallway, Penny pulls Alice in what appears to be slow motions out into it, her fighting the entire way, and the room inside was once large and beautiful with a very large mirror.

All movement seems to be slowed down to a fraction. The mirror mends, the man diving toward it dies, and the room explodes into eerily beautiful sparks of light. They are blinding as they shimmer throughout the room. Quentin is turned toward Alice and Penny as they escape and then he is torn apart by the light until nothing remains. The room freezes. It rewinds. It starts the memory over. Every time Quentin repeats the action that leads to his death, but if anyone else tries to get in the middle, it all will freeze in time at once. ]

5. Wildcard

[ooc: grab him on the street or somewhere else you want him to be, or message me at waftingcurtains on plurk to talk]

Comments

red wings

[kgbs]

( illya is not much for going out at night. he likes to stay at home and he likes to be with daisy and his friends but he's been trying to do things a little differently lately.

he's been doing that a little more lately, taking on assignments for the petrovs under the guise of sussing out possible assets. that's why he's here and his attention's been caught by the young man playing pool for no good reason.

he gets up and moves over to the table, watching him. )

You are not bad.

[filloryfanatic]

( Quentin didn't realize he had an audience but it doesn't bother him; the very rare time he doesn't lose his cool and get flustered is when he's playing games. Poker, chess, pool, any type of game or puzzle, he stays pretty calm and sharp. He is slightly taken aback as the man is, well, giant. Impressively so. Like wow, he definitely works out, and also he looks like he should be playing football or basketball, anything that requires height and size. )

Thanks, I used to play a lot. It's cool to see the game hasn't apparently gone out of style.

( He's not exactly a shark, but he knows tricks and has an incredible skill for math equations which is integral to the experts in billiards. )

If you're good at math and precise with your movements, you can become an expert pretty quickly. It's all about angles.

[kgbs]

I have played once or twice.

( but chess was more his game. so, he doesn't do much more than continue to look on as quentin pokes the balls around the table. )

And math has never been my strongest subject. You do equations while you're playing?

[filloryfanatic]

( Quentin spins the stick in his hand thoughtfully and nods.)

I kind of do, yeah, a mix of math and instinct.

( He leans over and points toward the ball. ) See I know if I hit it at this angle, with the right amount of force, it will spiral an inch to the side before rolling the opposite direction. It's more like estimations. You still have to hit it correctly or none of the math matters.

( Quentin leans over and hits the ball with a short burst, making it jump over the striped ball between it and the solid beyond, so it only hits the solid and goes in.)

Games are sort of my thing. I nerd out big time about them, sorry.

[kgbs]

There is no need to apologize. I do something similar with chess. Perhaps there are not as many mathematical equations involved but there is still a lot of thought involved.

( he eyes the pool table, trying to picture what quentin was saying before nodding. )

And how do you account for things out of your control? Someone bumping the table or bumping you? Or do you account for those?

[filloryfanatic]

Not really, sometimes something unexpected just ruins the shot and it happens. I'm normally pretty good at gauging when everything is still around me though.

( Quentin grins.) Or if I know I'm around someone who looks like they're going to cheat, so I fake them out. ( He knows bad players when he sees them. It happens when there's money involved, so a lot of the time he just doesn't play for money. )

I love chess! I'm not like a ranked player or anything, but I enjoy it.

( He's far from a master, but if he spent enough time on time he might be able to be. Quentin doesn't have a competitive enough spirit to be as good as most people. )

Have you ever played life-sized chess? In this book series I love, there were like, pawns and rooks as big as a person and you had to magically move the pieces.

[kgbs]

Life sized chess?

( safe to say that he hasn't heard of anything of the sort. he gives quentin a dubious look but it's quickly wiped away because of course life sized chest would be a thing in someone's world. )

And when one piece took another piece, was there an actual battle?

[filloryfanatic]

Well wizard's chess is when people magically move the pieces and yeah, they tend to destroy each other. They act like living pieces.

( Quentin always planned on doing something like that, hopefully, once he became a master magician and had more time. And that never came around, alas. His eyes are bright though, as they usually are when he's talking about something that he's enthusiastic over.)

In the story, a giant chessboard was made with life-sized pieces and they were lethal. ( He shrugs. ) But three eleven year olds beat the system so it wasn't that bad, I guess.

2

[heartstings]

[ It's a strange feeling to drift off to sleep and wander through her own dreams only to find things shift around her and end up in an unfamiliar place. It's unsettling and she just wants to wake up.

Instead, she finds herself wandering through the area while trying to avoid contact with the patients and staff alike. A familiar voice cuts through it all, however, and she decides to focus on it. Making her way toward Quentin as he tosses the cards into the air. She's not sure if it's just a trick of the dream or if somehow he's really managed to make the card stop in the air for a moment, either way it's neat. ]

Q? Quentin? What's going on? [ She squats down to help him gather up cards. ]

[filloryfanatic]

[ This is more like when Julia made him hallucinate being delusional and in the hospital than his actual stay in the hospital. The two times he was in one, he mostly stayed in corners, barely able to get out of bed, walking like the zombies in this place. His anxiety did get out of control at times and he didn't want to leave the room at all, but it wasn't this frantic feeling that he was crazy and everything was wrong. Alice, Eliot, they were patients, and magic? Was a delusion.

There is no Shake It Off dance party that's going to save him this time. He's caught in the loop that says he'll never get out and he deserves this. He looks wild-eyed and nervous as he glances up at Kenzi, confused as he recognizes "Toni" but it doesn't fit into this hospital. Into this version of his life.]

Toni. Toni! [ He shakily drops the cards. He reaches out to touch her hand, and in a dream it doesn't cause an empathy moment, so she feels real and not real at the same time. Quentin abruptly lets her go and goes back to the cards. ] No it isn't real. It's all in my head.

[heartstings]

[ She smiles when he grabs her hand, though it's short-lived as he quickly lets go and goes back to picking up the cards. She notes the glow doesn't happen, the connection of emotions doesn't exist here. ]

Hey, no, I'm real. I'm really here...in your head. I guess?

Hey! [ She shifts closer, snapping her fingers as close to his face as she can. ]

Look at me. I'm real!

tw: mention of character death and mental health

[filloryfanatic]

[ Quentin's fingers shake so hard they can't seem to keep a hold on the cards. He hums under his breath and it can probably be heard as the tune to Shake it Off by Taylor Swift, so it's that level of strange. But Penny's not going to come and save him this time. She only confirms she's in his head but it feels different. It's so vivid. It feels real and that only seems like it's going to be worse when the rug is pulled out from under him.

He plans on ignoring her but she snaps her fingers in front of his face and he focuses on her. Would he come up with a delusion of her? Possibly. She's his friend, his imaginary one maybe. You think you're special so you made this whole thing up. He rubs his eyes, trying to breathe.]

Do you think it's better? To be crazy but alive? If I'm crazy, it means I didn't die. But this isn't living either.

[ He isn't in control of what he's saying so he's revealing too much, like his future.]

[heartstings]

[ She doesn't recognize the tune but she recognizes that Quentin isn't all right, not just because this is clearly a place for people with mental health problems. And what he has to say only confirms that. ]

Quentin. [ She reaches out and grabs his hands, it's nice to be able to touch someone without the empathic link getting in the way. ]

Hey! I'm really not sure what you're talking about but I'm pretty sure we're asleep. So, like, if this is a nightmare of yours maybe we can change it? Maybe we can go somewhere nicer?

[filloryfanatic]

[ He's startled when she grabs his hands and freezes, staring at her with wide eyes. No empathy link is nice, but it's also a little unnerving, as he's associated certain faces with that now. He's frayed at the edges and stuck in the place he was here, in this mini-hell of his. Quentin takes in a deep shuttering breath and lets it out, still trembling and so pale he looks close to passing out. ]

There are two possible delusions. One is that magic and Fillory and New Amsterdam, it's all in my head, something I made up to feel important. The other is that I'm stuck in a hallucination making me think I'm deluding myself. [ He breathes, closing his eyes. ] I still don't know which one it is.

[heartstings]

[ She squeezes his hands in response and offers a small smile. It's hard for her to have the patience for this kind of thing but he's her friend and he's clearly hurting. She wants to help but she's really not sure how. ]

If this is a delusion then what does that make me? I'm not from your world so how do I fit into all of this?

[ Maybe some questions will help break through to a more rational side? She certainly hopes it'll help. ]

[filloryfanatic]

[ Quentin appreciates the squeeze and the grounding. Normally he would already be panicking about making her a part of any of this, it's not exactly the type of thing he likes people knowing about him, but he's still so deep into his own head and paranoia. He sucks in a breath and lets it out.]

Why would I make you up on top of the magic and Fillory? Why would I imagine what happened there and then make up this new world?

[ He's saying that out loud, so his logical mind can hear it and understand ... he wouldn't. Magic and Fillory made him plenty special. He wouldn't then lose his magic and end up in their situation. A good delusion is something you want. He pulls away from her only to get into the chair at the table and sit more properly, running fingers through his longer hair. ]

Sorry. Fuck. Sorry. I hope this isn't real.

[ Now he's getting to the embarrassment, rubbing his hands over his face. ]

I was ... put into a hallucination spell once. It stuck me in this place and I thought everything I experienced was made up.

3

[strove]

[In truth, Clarke almost misses what it is that Quentin has to say. The meaning resonates, but she's distracted—albeit briefly—by the presence of a boy, blanket pulled up to his chin. Her motherly instincts are specific to Madi, but she notices them and connects with them in other people. In budding friends.

Quentin's voice is finally viewed for what it is after a few long moments, and she looks back toward him, eyes processing the basket full of fruit.]

A peach, I think.

[The rest? She might need him to repeat.

Clarke trots closer, coming to squat on the ground near the tiles, hand outstretched for the peach.]

Do you know who I am?

[By now, Clarke knows a dream for what it is.]

[filloryfanatic]

[Quentin smiles and picks up the best peach, offering it over to her. He knows in this world the barest details about peaches, the best kind, the juiciest, the ripest. He's had to hear about it for years. He looks very relaxed and at home at the moment, many of his anxieties stripped away from a simple life, so even though years have passed, he somehow looks younger with less emotional weight on him.

He sits on the ground and looks at Clarke instead of at the tiles. They'll always be there. It'll take decades more before they make any real sense to him.]

It's an interesting dissonance, having you Clarke in this memory, but it's nice too. This place makes a lot more sense than what we're used to.

[After a pause he makes a face and chuckles.] Well, in some ways. The puzzle, not so much. [He glances over at Teddy, caught in time and in rest.] It took me like forty more years from now to finish it?

[strove]

We can only hope that it won't take us forty years to solve our puzzle. [It hasn't even been a year yet, but Clarke's used to scenarios where she solves a lot in a very short period of time. That may be why they were naive as they slipped into cryosleep, truly believing that they would be able to wake up in ten years and see the Earth revived again and waiting for them.

And "naive" isn't a word commonly applied to Clarke and her people. They left that behind before many of them were even born.

As it is, a long puzzle like that makes her think of Monty—of the years he spent trying to solve a problem, trying to seek out a solution.]

What were you trying to accomplish with it? [Goal oriented to the end. Clarke turns the peach over in her hands, taking a bite out of it only then.

(A little note to keep in mind: Clarke isn't the type of person who "cleans" a fruit in her shirt before she takes a bite. It's not a learned habit of hers.)]

[filloryfanatic]

It wouldn't really work as well with us trying to scale puzzle walls and avoid yellow-eyed monsters at eighty. Hopefully by then somehow the world will be calmer. [Quentin has no choice but to hope, but that's been him, through and through. The believer. The hopeful one. The ridiculous optimist who only recently started to lose sight of it. It's easy to remember though, in this place. In the happy life he managed to steal.]

The puzzle was for the mosaic to reflect to the beauty of all life. [Quentin whistles and smiles.] Easy, right? And not at all vague and confusing. [He doesn't mind that she doesn't wipe the fruit off, it's not as if this is real, although he thinks the fruit may taste very real. And very fresh.]

It was an illusion. The beauty of all life couldn't be made in tiles. It was made after living a lifetime of beauty. [He offers her one of the tiles to looks at, colorful but rather simple.] Tricky, right?

[strove]

[Clarke nods as she takes the tile, turning it over in her hand. The beauty of all life is living a full life. Difficult to conceptualize. When she had lived with Madi alone, she thought she understood what it was like to find peace. The truth was that she had only pressed pause on who she was, who she would always expect herself to be. The moment the Eligius IV prisoners touched the ground, she slipped into bad habits all too easily.

They were habits that Clarke knew all too well. All too easily. They're the ones she's fighting against day in and day out.]

I can only hope I can get there one day myself, [she admits. Her fingers curl tightly around the tile, not ready to give it up.] Not live to be there, but—be ready to open my eyes when it's time. I thought—[A pause.] Well, I thought I had it figured out once. I was wrong, so I'm working on it.

[Because beauty is really a metaphor for happiness and accepting that, even with all the hardships around it. Right?]

[filloryfanatic]

I'm sure my face when I realized this is what the point was all along was hilarious.

[Quentin remembers the understanding washing over him and there was some bitterness in it, but not that much. Just enough for a life well spent with tragedy and joy. He is feeling very calm right now, in this peaceful place, with Clarke also seeming to be opening up. ]

It's not all on a straight line, you know? We figure it out, we're wrong, we try again. I think what I love about most people is there's this instinct we have to be determined stubborn asses and keep pushing through hardship.

[He does love people, it's there in his voice. Despite all the ways they've let him down or he's let them down, the enemies in his life, the frenemies, whatever, Quentin's never lost his belief in good. Maybe not perfect untarnished good, that's dead and for the better, but he feels it now stronger than ever.]

Working on it is a big deal, you haven't given up, that's really important. We're still so young, you know? Being old just made it clear that no one has all the answers at any age.

[strove]

[Clarke hopes she has this clarity, but she knows that she has a lot of goals, ambitions, and outlooks that have no immediate, visible path. She knows that she needs to have answers for some of them. She has time here to think about how to help her people on Sanctum, but she hasn't come up with anything better than to take them away. She knows that she needs to make up for her mistakes, but they seem never ending. She knows that some part of her is selfish to live on, but she can't give up.

She even knows that the Monty who saved her wasn't really Monty, but herself. It's a fact she struggles with, but doesn't vocalize.

Besides, his message is what saved her. Hopefully it keeps working.]

How do you handle not having the answer when people expect it? How did you handle this? You look like you've found peace in life itself, but you knew you had to find something here. [She almost adds that she tried that with Madi, and only came out the other end worse for it.

Almost, but doesn't. The hint is in the question itself.]

[Mirror World]

[formerhighking]

[This would be where Quentin was stuck, looping, and where Eliot was forced to see. He'd wanted to know what happened, while he was busy recovering when he should have been here, with Q. This is some fucked up monkey paw of wish fulfillment.

Eliot arrives just in time to see the brutal flash of light that rips Quentin apart, and he cries out, watching helplessly. And then it just resets, Alice screaming as Penny pulls her and the same cycle, starting again. The exact same scene, Eliot about to lose Quentin, Quentin about to lose everything. He knows this is a dream, but that doesn't make it any easier to watch.

It's probably fruitless, because it usually is in dreams like this, but Eliot flings himself toward Quentin, between him and the light rushing for him.

As soon as he does, it all stops - everything freezes. Eliot's breath caught and he closed his hands around each of Quentin's biceps, voice urgent when he spoke.]

Q? Quentin, can you wake up for me? C'mon, baby, let's not do this part again.

[filloryfanatic]

[Quentin was often lost in loops. Usually of anxiety, of obsession, of thinking about all the things he didn't do right. He didn't expect to be stuck in a loop of something he did do right. There were so many other ways they could have died over their time together, and a just death, a heroic one, was something he used to dream about. But he was really stuck on the thought that maybe he wanted to die and he finally found a way.

He looped. It started over. But Eliot was there, and he waasn't supposed to be. He saw him in a bright flash before one of his deaths, but now he was there for real. It wasn't Eliot's grip that managed to get through to him, it was the panic at thinking the light was too close to Eliot. He couldn't lose him. This was all to keep from losing him.

Quentin's eyes fluttered and the room stayed frozen, along with the rest of Quentin, although his facial expression moved. Softened. Grew worried.]

El, you have to go. You can't be here.