{ so have a little mingle }

[falconing]

Who: Visitors aboard the S.S. Huntress.
Action: The Huntress.
When: It's a mingle!

[ create top levels, mingle, say hello to the recently awoken comatose pilot, etc ]

Comments

[nerdeology]

Honestly? I don't know for sure one way or the other. Seraphim tend to be so long-lived that we don't spend much time thinking about death.

You could say that we are a sort of afterlife; seraphim are born from elemental life energy that's returned to the planet and made manifest. In some cases, a human will be reborn as a seraph after they die.

[collegedropout]

Wow, got it... Usually for us, any lingering of the dead on the earth isn't a good thing. But we also have a god who created souls and made a place specifically for them to go once their physical bodies passed on. There are even special beings assigned to take souls once the person's killed; reapers.

[nerdeology]

Interesting... we have nothing like that. Seraphim will sometimes keep a vigil over graves or certain important locations, and that can give off the illusion of the place being haunted, but the humans themselves are gone.

[collegedropout]

Huh... So... they don't go anywhere? Human spirits?

When they die, I mean. Is that just it for them?

[nerdeology]

Sorry, I don't know much about that, either. I have seen hellion ghosts- generally, in dangerous ruins and battlefields, where one might expect humans to have died carrying a lot of conflicting emotions. They die and their souls become consumed by malevolence, so they can't pass on peacefully.

Once they're purified, though, who knows where they go.

[collegedropout]

... Then maybe there is more. I didn't know there was a heaven until I actually went there myself.

... Well, I mean, I believed it existed. Hoped.

[nerdeology]

[this guy leads one hell of a weird life, clearly. So he's dead too? just how many are there around here?]

I... technically have someone I could ask, but it would be unkind to do so. I'd rather not know than make him feel uncomfortable.

[He's awkward enough around Dezel as it is.]

[collegedropout]

Oh, that's alright; no reason to bring up something negative like that. They're probably not like me when it comes to dying, anyway. It's kind of — a weird thing for me, I mean. It always seems to spit me out.

[nerdeology]

....Are you some sort of immortal?

[He's never heard of humans coming back from the dead. If they come back at all, it's as a seraph or hellion and nothing else.]

[collegedropout]

[He laughs in good humor, waving a hand dismissively at the thought.]

Nope. I just have a hard time staying dead.

I blame it on the higher powers and a pissy overprotective older brother.

[nerdeology]

[what the heck, he makes it sound like it's so normal.]

You're implying that your brother can cheat death, somehow?

[WHAT IS THIS FAMILY]

[collegedropout]

[He smiles, but his smile is so very awk as he shrugs.]

Kinda... We both tend to outmaneuver it. Or, um. Back out of it, anyway. The short of it is we were... fated to be something we didn't want, so for a while, we weren't allowed to die.

... And then after that, we learned how to escape it ourselves.

[nerdeology]

Huh. I don't know anything about fate, but humans are pretty resilient, there's no denying that.

[Fragile at the same time, but it's how they deal with it that's the admirable part.]

[collegedropout]

[He gives a grin.]

You're fond of humans?

[It's not often he gets to meet non-humans who like them, okay.]

[nerdeology]

You could say that they've... endeared themselves to me, I guess.

[Okay, that's a little mean.]

I grew up with a human- Sorey- so I've been around at least one since I was a baby. He's about as good an example of humanity as one can possibly be, so he gave his kind a decent first impression.

[There's more fondness in his tone of voice than the words suggest.]

[collegedropout]

[He grins warmly at his words. He hardly sees it as mean - he's flattered.]

That so?

You remind me of a certain angel friend of mine; he's always had a soft spot for people. Humans, anyway. I think you'd like him a lot.

[... Not quite the Castiel that's here, but.

Both of them are great, in the end.]

[nerdeology]

Really... well, maybe we'll get to meet one day. And then I can see what all this angel comparison is about.

[It's honestly a little tiresome.]

[collegedropout]

[He chuckles softly.]

It's good, mostly. Angels from my world are - uh, varied in goodness.

But being compared to Cas? That's a good thing, trust me. He's helped save my world before, and he's saved my brother — and when I was trapped somewhere I thought nobody'd ever get me out of, he came for me. I mean... he kinda' botched the rescue a little, but he risked his ass for me; he risks his ass for humanity, even if we're a mixed bag.

I think he could use someone around here who might get him a bit more, y'know?

[nerdeology]

I think I know what you mean. Once I started traveling through human territory and understood how different it really was, well... there was this strange, otherworldly feeling. Like there was a big difference between what they believed and what the seraphim truly are. It's not as if I resented it or anything, but I'm not sure how I would have managed if I hadn't had other seraphim with me.

[collegedropout]

People tend to have a lot of preconceived notions that aren't entirely right. The only reason I really know anything accurately about the supernatural is because I was taught everything by my dad and brother...

I think a lot of it just comes from not interacting with other beings.

They have to kind of fill in the blanks themselves, and it's... usually not exactly right.

[nerdeology]

Oh, for sure. We had that problem when we were trying to restore the blessing of the Lords of the Land. Even in a town that was steeped in the legends of humans and seraphim cooperating, the church had completely lost touch with how it actually works. We had to search the whole city to find one person who would actually listen and follow our instructions. Most didn't believe we were actually among them- it'd been too long since anyone saw a seraph.

[collegedropout]

That was pretty much us with angels. I would have never guessed they needed vessels in a million years, from what I learned as a kid. Or that they'd want an apocalypse...

[EHEHEH.]

[nerdeology]

[That's never a good word to hear in conversation.]

Sounds like some of your angels are more like hellions than seraphim.

[collegedropout]

[He sighs.]

A lot of them weren't fans of humanity. They wanted paradise, but it would have caused the death of billions of people; a lot of them... they wanted guidance from a god that wasn't really there for them anymore. Wasn't there for anyone, really.

[Our god is kind of a deadbeat.]

[nerdeology]

[Oh geez, him too?]

I can sympathize. Back home we're investigating the disappearance of the Five Lords- they're elder seraphim, considered to have been present at the forming of the world itself. They're among the few seraphim still worshipped by humans, so they're as close as it gets to being called gods.

[Kinda sucks when the big bosses vanish on you.]