[OPEN] You can't be too careful anymore.

[atalanta cyrene jaeger]

She sat cross-legged on the shore of the lake, staring at it with wide hazel eyes. Hunter had spent two days trying to unpack, and she was dying for a swim. But was she alone? She'd heard rumors of merpeople living in this lake, and she didn't know anything about merpeople--she'd never met one before. How could you tell if they were there?

She huffed impatiently, leaning forward on her elbows, head in her hands. She wanted to swim. She wanted to relax and have some fun. She wanted to shift. Her skin itched, made her even more restless than she was normally. She hated her human form. It was so... restrictive. Laws. Words. Social norms. 'Clothing.' She scratched the back of her neck where the tag of her shirt was. 'Not warm enough when it's cold out, not cool enough when it's hot out. And soo uncomfortable.' But she couldn't shift in daylight. Her parents had drilled that into her head since she was born, and even so far away from them, it was hard for her to let go of that single rule. So, she focused on the sun's reflection in the water, waiting as it slowly moved towards the western horizon.

[mathieu 'mat' darren blank]

Mat found himself wandering through the woods, memories of Dylan running through his mind. He twisted the wedding band on his hand, walking down stream with the water. There was a merperson here who's soul he had came to claim. Now if only he could find them. His eyes flashed from black to green and back again at a dizzying speed. The voice inside his head had been quieted for the time being. He tumbled with one of the latches on his vest when he spotted a girl. 'Not her..' The voice said, and he bent over the water.

"It's too fucking foggy to see. You mind telling me what I'm supposed to do?" He asked the voice in his head, but there was only laughing. "Fuck you too.." He grumbled, sitting down at the water's edge. He guessed he would wait for the water to clear, or the dead body to float. Whatever came first. He looked over at the girl again, eyeing her up and down. She looked normal. But anyone looked normal compared to Mat, in his vest and tie and makeup.

[atalanta cyrene jaeger]

Hunter sat bolt-upright when she heard the voice. 'Who the heck?' In her surprise, her eyes brightened from hazel to yellowish amber, their pupils elongating vertically. Quickly, she scooted backwards until she could observe him from a safe distance, and pulled her knees up to her chest, staring at him.

He was rather strange. 'But then, everyone here is strange. Right? That's why I moved here.' She took a closer look at him, warily eyeing him up and down.The makeup was cool. And the vest. But it was odd to see someone wearing a tie, especially with a vest like that. Plus, he seemed to be talking to himself. That was pretty sketchy. There was something else weird about him too, but she couldn't put her finger on it. Frowning, she wrapped her arms around her legs and rested her chin on her knees, watching him.

[mathieu 'mat' darren blank]

Mat saw her watching him, watched how she moved further away. If he were looking at himself, he would move away too. Hell, he would run. He twisted the wedding band around on his finger again, his eyes never leaving hers. The green gave way to black, then the black swirled back into his pupils. They continued to do this, almost hypnotic.

She wasn't human, he could tell. But she was dated. She could die. She wasn't immortal. And neither was he. Once the grim reaper lost his boyfriend, Mat was gone too.

"Do you see something you like, or do you tend to make it a habit to eye dead guys?" He asked, still twisting that wedding band on his finger. He could hear that horrible tune being hummed in his head, Death waiting for his chance to come steal the poor mermaid's soul.

[atalanta cyrene jaeger]

Her eyes widened. 'Dead? That explained her weird feeling about him. She opened her mouth to say something, but before she could utter a word, she suddenly noticed his eyes. 'How strange...' Enthralled, almost hypnotized, she let go of her legs and moved just a bit closer to him, tipping her head to the side, staring as black swirled in and out of his green eyes. "Can all dead people do that?"

She leaned back again, away from him. 'Curiosity killed the cat.' But his eyes were so fascinating, and he might know if there were actually merpeople or if it was just a myth. She sat on the ground a short distance from him, still staring. 'Satisfaction brought her back.'

[mathieu 'mat' darren blank]

"Depends on what kind of dead you are, babe." He said with little emotion. "This dead you can't touch. Unless you're itching to see if there's really life on the other side. And let me tell you- blowing the fuck up in front of like, a hundred people on stage is a terrible way to die. I know. There isn't shit on the other side. You become an angel or you go to hell or you float around as a spirit no one can fucking touch." It still angered him he had gotten the short end of the stick. 'Hell would have been better than my hell..' He thought, bending over to look into the water. But it was still clouded over. He thought it might be ice, but he doubted it. It hadn't been that cold. Or had it?

He touched the surface and realized there was just a fog over it. He sighed, sitting back down in his spot. He stretched his legs out in front of him, chewing on his lip ring as the black continued to swirl in and out of his eyes.

[atalanta cyrene jaeger]

"So... You're a ghost?" As she watched his swirling eyes, her slitted pupils had dilated until they were almost round, like a playful kitten. "Why didn't you become an angel? Or go to hell?"

Her pupils shrank back to slits when he looked away, but she left them feline--she could see better this way, and changing her eyes helped the itching under her skin a little. He was looking into the water now, so, reluctantly, she went and sat next to him--a couple of feet away. "Why are you here?" She asked. She couldn't decide if she was curious or if she just wanted him to go away, and the tone of her voice ended up halfway in between.

[mathieu 'mat' darren blank]

Mat shook his head. "No. Not a ghost." He didn't know what he was. He just knew he was only here for a short time. "Well, when you're alive, you fuck things up. And sometimes when you fuck things up, you fuck with people's heads. You hurt them beyond repair. And you get stuck in limbo, unable to touch anyone. And you don't figure out where you go until you finally fix it. Not that everyone goes to limbo. Just screw ups like me."

He tossed a stone into the water, watching it disappear. "I'm here because I loved someone so much I just wanted to touch him. So they gave me this stupid fucking job of collecting souls the grim reaper can't come get. Not that either of us can touch anyone. Well, I can touch Dylan and he can touch his boyfriend but that's it. Everyone else we touch dies." He reached over, picking a blooming flower. He turned around to her and it was already wilted and dead in his hand. He tossed it into the water with a shrug. "I don't know why the hell I'm still here. All I know is I'm going to hell after this."

[atalanta cyrene jaeger]

She ignored most of what he said. "You collect souls?" A chill ran down her spine when she saw the withered flower in his hand, the one that had been blooming moments before. Her fingernails lengthened into claws, unbidden, and she scooted back a little bit more. 'No offense,' she thought, 'But I don't particularly feel like dying today.' Warily, she eyed him, eyes narrowed, almost glaring. "...You're not here to collect my soul, are you? Cuz I just got here, and if I die before Edon gets here, or before I meet someone else like me... I might have to kill someone."

She recognized the nonsense of her words as soon as she said them, and blushed a little bit. But was it nonsense? He was dead, after all, and he could kill people just by touching them. 'That must suck. To not be able to touch anything living.'

[mathieu 'mat' darren blank]

Mat couldn't help but laugh at how scared she had become. He smirked a bit, shaking his head. "No, kitty kitty. I came to get one of them." He said, pointing down into the foggy water. "And I can't see them, so I can't them. And if I get the wrong mermaid, I'm going to be fucked. So I gotta wait until the water clears up." He shrugged, humming the Wedding March as was Death's favorite tune. 'How ironic.' He thought.

"I don't see you dying anytime soon. You know, granted you don't decide to come brushing up against me. And then that would be like, a weird way to commit suicide." He thought back to the night he was tempted to hang himself with his tie. 'Too bad I couldn't have touched myself.' He thought, twisting his ring again.