Certainly Not Halloween Town [Active]

[raggedysally.livejournal.com]

Character(s): Sally, Mia Fey
Content: Sally arrives in Paixao. Mia Fey arrives moments after.
Setting: Vanaheim Gate
Time: afternoon
Warnings: none


She wasn't certain how she had managed to get quite this lost. Just moments before, Sally had been picking herbs--she was running low on deadly nightshade, amongst other things--and what had been perhaps one wrong turn in the graveyard on her way back home had led to... This.

"This" being a large gate formed by two large trees, with a short line of blond-haired humans waiting to get in whatever was inside the gate. This certainly wasn't Halloween Town, and of what little she knew of the surrounding area, it wasn't that, either. Unless she had gotten spectacularly lost in an extraordinarily short amount of time, which didn't seem possible given she had not traveled for more than ten minutes.

As there was no other sign of a place which might help her, she fell into line to enter the gate. She peered at the city inside the gates as she waited. The entire place seemed to sparkle, and Sally couldn't help but be a bit awed at such a place. It was nothing like Halloween Town, that was certain.

"Name, please?" a man, presumably guarding the gate, asked, startling her out of her reverie.

"O-oh! It's Sally," the rag doll said, smiling uncertainly. "U-um, do you know where this is?"

"This is Paixao," the gatekeeper said, handing her a thin violet machine and a few papers. "That's your journal, and some information on the city. Enjoy your stay."

She was shooed into the gate before she could ask anything more. And now, alone, with nothing more than a strange machine, a brochure, and pockets full of herbs and thread, she stared at the city before her and had no idea what to do now.

If Jack were here, Sally thought, he would know what to do.

Comments

[mia-clawed.livejournal.com]

Mia stood before the huge gates, looking up at them with unabashed awe. She had never seen anything quite like this place; Los Angeles, while a nice enough place to live and work, had no such impressive monuments, unless one counted the Hollywood sign—and her own apartment and office had been dreadfully, regrettably boring. What she could see of the city beyond the gates looked fantastic, another world of spires and strange buildings and cobbled streets under what seemed like a great dome—what a place this must be to live! Was this really heaven? Mia had always pictured clouds and halos and fat, naked cherubs, but there seemed to be nothing of that variety around.

With some slight trepidation, but overcome by curiosity, Mia moved forward to join the line queued in front of the gates. These must be the recently dead, like she was—well, not that she was recently dead. And there were some awfully strange figures among the crowd, men and women dressed in fantastic clothes, and—was that a talking chipmunk? But the creature was gone through the gates before Mia could get a better look.

The line was moving along efficiently, and it wasn’t long before she stood at the threshold of those great gates, so amazed by the sight of them that the woman who seemed to be directing the line had to say “hello” twice before Mia realized she was being addressed.

“Oh! Sorry. Hi.” Mia smiled at the woman, who smiled back. St. Pete she was not, but she seemed friendly.

“May I have your name, please?” the woman asked.

“Of course—it’s Mia Fey.”

“Thank you.” The woman handed her a little device that reminded her of a Palm Pilot. “This is yours. It’s an electronic journal, and you can use it to communicate with anyone in the city. Please proceed when you’re ready.”

And that was when it suddenly hit her—this was it, she was moving on. Mia Fey was really and truly moving on. Some new certainty told her that Maya wasn’t going to be able to channel her anymore; this was a place beyond the life she had known as a defense attorney, beyond the people who had been her friends, her family, her supporters. Once she walked through those gates, there was no going back.

She had few regrets. She had died young, it was true, but she had the satisfaction of helping to jail her own murderer, and knowing that her work would be continued long after she was gone. But to truly let go—especially of the people she had loved, and still loved—that was far more painful than dying.

But Mia had already learned, years ago, what it was like to have to let go of a loved one. Squaring her shoulders, she said one last, final goodbye in her mind, hoping that her voice would be heard by the people she’d left behind, and walked forward into the city.

[raggedysally.livejournal.com]

Sally watched the Mia's reaction uncertainly--she had never gotten surprised looks at her appearance before. But, she reminded herself, this wasn't home, and the people here did seem to all look far more similar to one another than she was used to. Maybe rag dolls weren't all that common here. When Mia smiled, Sally offered a smile in return.

"I'm Sally," she said. "I just got here, too, though I think I got lost somehow... Unless I'm supposed to live here now?"

The thought was a distressing one. Sally liked living in Halloween Town; the idea that she might one day have to leave wasn't one she had considered. It didn't seem possible for her to be so far from home.

"Do you know anything about this place?" Sally asked, feeling a bit helpless.

[raggedysally.livejournal.com]

Sally accepted the handshake, glad to have found someone friendly right away. The rag doll was not so naive as to think everyone in the city would be so nice to a complete stranger.

"I'm from Halloween Town," Sally said. "I took a wrong turn, I think, and then I ended up here... Where were you from?"

"That would be nice," Sally said, smiling a bit more. She had gotten lucky, finding someone she could explore with right away. She didn't want to be in a strange city all by herself.

[raggedysally.livejournal.com]

Sally smiled, the fact that Mia knew about Halloween making her more confident somehow. Of course, she had never met anyone who didn't know what Halloween was, but this was a different world, or something, so she couldn't be guaranteed everyone would know.

"Halloween Town is the place that creates Halloween," Sally said. "I've never heard of Los Angeles or Kurain, but perhaps Jack might have--he travels to different worlds sometimes. Do you know how you ended up here?" Sally certainly had no idea how she had.

Sally nodded in response to the question. "There's no sense in standing around here."

[raggedysally.livejournal.com]

"Everyone in Halloween Town works toward bringing Halloween to other worlds," Sally said, hoping she was explaining properly. It hadn't been that long since it had been explained to her, actually. "We work all year toward making Halloween, led by Jack--he's the Pumpkin King." A brilliant Pumpkin King, in Sally's opinion.

Sally listened to Mia's explanations curiously. "It sounds interesting. I've never been to a big city before," Sally said with a smile.

She fell into step beside Mia and then frowned. "You died? I'm sorry!" She didn't seem entirely surprised by it, though--many of the citizens of Halloween Town died and then came there. "That could be why you're here, though some people come to Halloween Town when they die, so I don't know why I would have left there..."