VIDEO-ish (cw: torture and murder)

[bloomingdespite]

[Before the ICP flickers on, every passenger hears a resounding, deep voice thunder through every car in the train, carrying with it a deathly—if odd—proclamation:]

PENALTY GAME: HELL REVERSE!

[Moments later, every ICP turns on to reveal a figure shrouded in shadows, holding the unconscious body of Xue Yang with one hand as the Eye of Wdjat blazes on both of their foreheads. It's clear they're in the gaming car, but if anybody tries to enter from either end, they'll find the doors are impossibly locked.]

Passengers of the Voidtrecker Express, I hold in my hands an unrepentant murderer who slaughtered one of your very own: the victim being A-Qing, and the criminal being Xue Yang. While she has returned, this crime cannot go unpunished, and I have taken it upon myself to try and burn out the stain on his soul—or, at the very least, provide adequate agony for all of his victims, both on the train and off.

If you need to see proof of my justice...

Avert your eyes if you do not wish to see memories of the brutal death of a young woman in her prime.

[The screen flickers once again, this time showing A-Qing's murder, although it doesn't have any audio. ((OOC: Additional CW for graphic depictions of murder.))

When it returns to the interior of the Games Car, the shadowy figure is gone, but their voice and Xue Yang remain.]

I leave it to the council to dispense their own punishment, as meager as it may be.

Remember, passengers:

I am watching.

[The ICP clicks off, and the train is deadly quiet.]

Comments

video/action (threadjacking ok!)

[blue_ice]

Atem?

[ Kaiba 's face is very pale. He knows that eye. The voice isn't quite the same...but as someone who was once on the receiving end of this spirit's punishment, he'd know what was happening here better than anyone. He races through the rock garden and ends up breathlessly pounding on the gaming car's door, keeping an ear on the broadcast in each car the entire way through. ]

Pharaoh! What did you do? Answer me!

((ooc: feel free to send him a video message or meet him in the garden if anyone wants some answers))

Video

[mtsilver_conquor]

-You know who did this?

[Here, have a team Leader who's visibly shaken and Unhappy.]

Video

[blue_ice]

I'm sure of it...but it's impossible. It has to be. Or is it?

[ He looks shaken too, but for likely slightly different reasons. ]

His name was Atem. He was a young Egyptian pharaoh from thousands of years ago, but in order to protect his land from a sorcerer, he had to seal his soul away and that cost him his name, his memories...everything. I got to know him when he awakened a few thousand years later, enacting this brand of vigilante justice on the guilty through penalty games.

[ He takes a small breath. ]

I haven't always been the person I am today. A few years ago, I fell into total darkness...I never killed, but I came very close. Atem stopped me with one of these punishments. I was rendered comatose for a few months, forced to experience the sensation of death. I broke out of that total hatred and remembered my love for my brother, but...it took me a while to fully come around to trusting anyone after that. And I became obsessed with beating him.

[ He watches carefully, to see if she thinks he's nuts yet. If she doesn't yet, she will soon. ]

But it doesn't make sense that Atem is here. He's not on the roster, the object that contained his spirit isn't here, and even if he was...he grew past his vigilante justice phase a while ago. Or at least I thought he did.

Video

[mtsilver_conquor]

Nothing's impossible here.

[She nods as she listens, no judgement, no nothing on her face, just the mantle of a Champion, Leader, and Councilwoman. Her mind's already turning over what he's said, what he's told her and Eva can't say she likes it (even if she is glad it yanked Seto off that dark path, but still...).

It's vigilantism at best and a twisted sense of justice at worst.]

Just because the item's not here doesn't mean he isn't, meaning he needs to be found and fast. This kind of thing cannot be seen as acceptable on the train. Not when it could very well lead to an air of fear or paranoia, and we've enough troubles without adding vigilantism into the mix.

[She's done her best to keep her own crimes from everyone (no-one needs to know one of the Council and Orange Leaders is a thief (finders Keepers with the masterball is still stealing it and could even be seen as worse, given she never told anyone-), and a traitor to humanity (because she's protecting a sapient pokemon instead of turning it in to be destroyed) back home, but this..].

Gods. What a mess...

Video

[blue_ice]

I'll help you all look. Yugi and I know him best, and he'll listen to us...he hasn't been like this in a while. I don't know what went wrong.

But I know we can't let him be the sole arbiter of justice. Pharaoh or not.

Video

[mtsilver_conquor]

Good. Changed or not, he still crossed the line here and the faster we find him, the faster we get into his head that if he wants justice, it has to come through the Council and that our word on it is final.

[Eva sighs.]

I was going to ask for my laptop at the end of the month, but it might be wise investing in one of the smaller psychic pokemon instead.

[blue_ice]

I'll be there with you.

How would the psychic help? Does it read clues? Memories?

[mtsilver_conquor]

At most, it'd be able to skim surface thoughts, but that is invasive and people would feel it. It's more like it'd quickly get a 'feel' for a mind enough to know if something was 'off' about the person.

At worst, it likely wouldn't be any help, but either way, a person would feel the psychic's mental touch.

[blue_ice]

That's...terrifying. We'd have to only use it in the strictest of emergency situations.

[mtsilver_conquor]

It is?

[She honestly doesn't get it.]

Think of it like passive monitoring or a last-ditch attempt to find someone? It's not something I'd do lightly, either. Not with an untrained psychic-type given I know I won't be able to get Banki here.

[bloomingdespite]

[Wester had already slipped through the door by the time Kaiba arrived... but they didn't leave fast enough, since out of the corner eye he can see the mysterious stranger from the party watching both Kaiba and the video almost mournfully, the melancholy on their face almost the polar opposite of the pure rage the specter displayed on the ICP.]

[blue_ice]

[ Kaiba felt another shiver on the back of his neck, and stepped away from the panel before addressing them. ]

Dionysus. You wouldn't give me a name, so I had to draw from a myth I was fond of.

...was that you, just now?

[bloomingdespite]

Yes... and no. It's complicated. I- we're the same person, but... not, too.

[Wester looks away from Kaiba, biting their lip and looking truly regretful as the full weight of their actions finally sinks in.]

[blue_ice]

...is that why you were so familiar with me, but denied that I knew you?

[ He looks...worried. ]

I know what you showed us was the truth...you wouldn't lie. I understand why you'd feel so strongly about the murder of a child.

[bloomingdespite]

I'M NOT HIM, KAIBA!

Please... stop acting like I'm your friend, or your rival, or...

[Those are definitely tears falling from their mask.]

The fact is, if you knew, if you knew what and who I really was, you'd hate me with every ounce of your being for taking him away from you!

Away from everyone!

I don't even have any of the good parts, the nobility, the restraint, the principles... just the ugly drive to hurt people who I think deserve it.

I'm not the hand that helped you get back up. I'm the one that pushed you down in the first place.

So please... just leave me alone and save your compassion for people that deserve it.

[Shadows flicker all around them like flames. They're moments from disappearing.]

[blue_ice]

[ Kaiba flinches a little. So Dionysus was involved with Atem...they were linked, but not the same...he was getting a headache here.

But he locked eyes with them and stood strong. ]

But whoever you are, some part of you cares about me. And I know how rare that is.

If I'm not beyond redemption, why are you?

[so_dark_a_road]

[ Curufin is at the opposite entrance to he Gaming Car, similarly pounding on the door and delivering a few ferocious kicks to it. Since he can't get in, he stops and checks the nearest ICP again. ]

Kaiba? I knew a Pharoah Atem in another world. You think that shadowy figure is him?

[blue_ice]

The one I suspect almost looked like he could be Yugi's identical twin. Same hairstyle.

I don't know what happened. I've heard stories that he was like this early on, before we knew each other too well...and he performed this same punishment on me once.

Xue Yang will recover, but the pain he's in might make him try to lash out again. We have to keep close watch.

[so_dark_a_road]

Yes, that's how I remember Atem. He looked like Yugi. But the one I knew never did anything like this. Different worlds make the same person different, I guess.

You were subjected to this sort of torture, Kaiba? [ He shakes his head, not in disbelief, but in sympathy.

That is my belief. Revenge such as this does not deter the wrongdoer, it makes it more likely that such wrongs will happen again. I'm volunteering to be on that watch, as I've tried very hard to befriend Xue Yang since he arrived. He has so much darkness in him, and as I am similar but have changed my life radically, I thought I could help him.

[blue_ice]

Something's different...they don't sound identical, and something's off, but that voice and those actions are distinctive.

The Atem I knew eventually stopped that kind of behavior with Yugi's intervention...I wonder if there's time distortion in play.

And I deserved it. I didn't kill anyone, but I came very close. Hate consumed me, and I'd completely abandoned my humanity until I was forced to face what that meant.

I messed up the html in my last post, so I'm repeating what I meant Curufin to say aloud.

[so_dark_a_road]

That shadowy being didn't sound at all like the Atem I know. But there could be time distortion, or so I think. If Atem and Yugi are somehow connected, there's already something very strange going on, and an Atem emerging from the past could be possible. Anything is possible, in the multiverse.

[ He shakes his head a little, not to disagree but to indicate he feels the same way about the seriousness of the situation. ]

Maybe you did deserve it, but the best thing that can happen is not always that we get what we deserve. In my world, I too was consumed with hatred, until I was no longer capable of behaving like a human being. I did kill people. It was only in the last hours of my life that I faced what that meant, and that's when I resolved to make a change.

What you said about pain possibly making Xue Yang lash out again. . . that is my belief as well. Revenge such as this does not deter the wrongdoer, it makes it more likely that such wrongs will happen again. I'm volunteering to be on that watch you spoke of, as I've tried very hard to befriend Xue Yang since he arrived. He has so much darkness in him, and as I am similar but have changed my life radically, I thought I could help him. Maybe. . . maybe I still can.

[blue_ice]

I feel the same.

[ He nods. ]

For what it's worth, I don't think any differently of you. Redemption is possible, we both have every reason to believe that. That doesn't mean it will always happen, but it's worth trying.

Let me know if I can help you at all.

[so_dark_a_road]

[ Curufin manages a small smile. ]

Thank you, Kaiba. I don't talk about my past to everyone, anymore than you talk about yours to everyone. I don't think any the worse of you, either. This is a good thing, that we both believe in redemption. I think it's always worth trying for.

Thank you, and I think you can help me. Have you spoken to Xue Yang since he's been on the train?

[blue_ice]

I haven't, but I'm willing to.

[so_dark_a_road]

Oh, good. Let's both volunteer for that security detail? Or at least for the task of talking to him when he wakes. And I'll volunteer to try to wake him, if the Council is willing.

[ They trust each other, and that's really important. ]