Moritz Stiefel
- Masterful Virgin -
And then there were none.
Posts: 34
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Post by Moritz Stiefel on Apr 14, 2013 18:48:20 GMT -5
Okay, so Moritz hadn't been the best student in school. (When he'd actually BEEN a student.) What with failing his exams, getting kicked out, and the refreshing pistol bullet in the head to tide him over between depression and having nowhere else to go, it was pretty safe to be considered "less studious than average."
But even Moritz knew that he'd somehow gone from a random shed in New York City to... some fancy place in France, judging by everyone speaking French and wearing French clothes and how the signs were now in French as opposed to last night's English. And even with his lack of studying, he knew this was NOT how things should work.
God, he wish he'd paid more attention in French class. Although the migraine centered around his gunshot scar wasn't helping.
He had a sneaking suspicion that the scar was why people were avoiding him, but that was silly. Why on earth would people feel weird about a lost boy in a years-too-old school uniform with a mysterious giant scar where his neck and head met up?
He sighed and ran a hand through his hair, then winced as his scar protested. "Owowowow, that was BAD." All right, Moritz, time to ask someone directions. He walked up to the first person he could manage to keep up with--a lone woman by a cafe--and cleared his throat.
"Excusez-moi, madam...oiselle?" Oh good, she was flattered. ...And he was a liiiiiittle creeped out that someone old enough to be his mother was wearing the same clothes as most of the twenty-somethings, but no helping the midlife crisis right now. "Quelle partie de la France ce que c'est? Et où est cette partie de la France... ce que c'est... sheisse." Fuck. He made a run-on sentence, his accent was screaming GERMAN KID WHO CAN BARELY SPEAK FRENCH, and he cursed! COVER IT UP, MORITZ, COVER IT UP BEFORE SHE THINKS YOU'RE CRAZY.
He faked a wince, clutched his head, and then winced for real as his scar decided to stab him with tiny invisible knives. What was "Do you speak German?" in French? Parlez-vous something... ALLEMAND. Or allemandais? Stupid French and its stupid weird grammar. At least English didn't have tongue-twisters whenever you asked for directions.
Oh shit, she asked him something! "Plus lent, s'il vous plaît?" That was "again, please," right? ...Nope, he'd asked her to go slower and now she was talking like he was stupid. Oh god, why? On the other hand, talking slower did help with the migraine.
Let's see, he was somewhere by... the OPERA HOUSE? Fuck.
Well, at least he didn't need a cover story for groaning and falling onto a bench.
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Gabriel Zeiler
- Ingenious Pilot -
The Other Rosy-Cheeked Porcelain-Skinned German Boy%\0\%
Posts: 228
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Post by Gabriel Zeiler on Apr 14, 2013 19:41:11 GMT -5
Gabriel had a skill for stumbling into trouble even now, with a respectable criminal trade. He'd gotten up to some profoundly dodgy stuff in a rehearsal room with one of the opera house's newest residents, but nothing substantial had come of it, and the Russian had still paid him pretty lavishly. Now, slinking out for a disgruntled café au lait with a bruised throat and collar turned up, he practically tripped over another little farce scene -- some gawky farmboy gabbing at some unfortunate housewife in French that was not so much broken as completely shattered. What was with the schoolboy getup? Obviously, more than a few individuals out there were into it, but either somebody had been held back a few years or another of Paris' teeming community of exotically foreign imported rentboys had failed to resist the siren call of free absinthe and had himself a devil of a hangover impairing his faculties of speech. "Are you simple?" His commentary (from over at a black ironworked table) came completely unsolicited, in haughty but unmistakably Hanoverian-accented German. "This is exactly why the French are so convinced everyone else's absolute imbeciles. You all right, shock-head?"
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Moritz Stiefel
- Masterful Virgin -
And then there were none.
Posts: 34
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Post by Moritz Stiefel on Apr 16, 2013 20:29:00 GMT -5
"This is exactly why the French are so convinced everyone else's absolute imbeciles. You all right, shock-head?"
On one hand: YAY, ANOTHER GERMAN. On the other, said other German was clearly a jackass. And from Hanover, the most jackass part of Germany that anyone could come from. But at least the dude wasn't Russian. If he was, he would have a very high chance of just sitting by and watching Moritz crash and burn. A Polish guy might be worse.
"Or Swiss..." Moritz coughed. "Before you get any ideas, I'm perfectly fine. Mentally, I mean. It's just that I'm... really, really lost."
He decided to leave out the detail that he was so lost, he should be on an entirely different continent. Because no matter how stupid he sounded, it was better than sounding crazy. Or like an addict on a bad trip. And from what Ilse told Moritz five minutes before he shot himself, addicts could have REALLY bad trips.
He winced again, as much from the headache as from the only recent memory he had. ...From three to five years ago. Joy.
But that was replaced with the rather more pressing matter of the woman shrieking and grabbing him, because Moritz's innocuous head-turn in response to Jackass From Hanover meant she'd managed to see the full extent of the scar. And hugs were okay, but not when the act of hugging meant "someone's arms are squeezing the unfortunately-placed scar on your neck."
"Gahhhhhhh--oh god, let go!" Moritz was pretty sure the white stabbity-stab feeling at the back of his eyes wasn't good. "I--ow--laissez-moi, s'il vous plaît!"
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Gabriel Zeiler
- Ingenious Pilot -
The Other Rosy-Cheeked Porcelain-Skinned German Boy%\0\%
Posts: 228
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Post by Gabriel Zeiler on Apr 17, 2013 20:04:51 GMT -5
Gabriel made a face of simultaneous distaste and sympathy, but it had the unfortunate side effect of making him look like a haughty possum. What was that? How did that happen?
"Hospital's that way, knee-socks--" Asylum, too, though they'd knocked down the big one or something, or let it burn down. Maybe he'd escaped, and that's why his short pants didn't fit right.
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Moritz Stiefel
- Masterful Virgin -
And then there were none.
Posts: 34
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Post by Moritz Stiefel on Apr 18, 2013 0:30:07 GMT -5
With the woman safely disentangled from Moritz's neck and now too stunned to do much, Moritz resisted the urge to awkwardly rub the back of his neck (again). "It looks a LOT worse than it actually is. Really, I can turn my head and everything." Of course, even that needed to be done carefully, but it wasn't too bad. "Not like I have the money for a checkup, anyway."
Of all things he could have kept with him in his weird potential-resurrection, he had three: The letter from Melchior's mother, which seemed a lot less unhelpful than he remembered. Emotionally, at least--result-wise, it still boiled down to 'I'll try to talk to your folks, who already kicked you out and have made no bones about not wanting a failure for a son.'
Then there were a few of Ilse's flowers--woodruff, primrose, purple summer--and somehow they hadn't wilted in the years he'd spent either unconscious or dead. They were still their fresh-picked shades of white, pink, and purple, so after being creeped out for the first couple of days, Moritz just found an old picture frame, some glue, and a Bible to press them. Fucking Bible and its SINSINDEATHPENANCE. Moritz (nearly?) killed himself because of that.
Then there was that damn pistol. It still had five bullets left, but Moritz had literally shot himself before even thinking about robbery, so right now it was just a lump of metal hidden in his jacket.
Obviously, none of those things were money, and he had no intention of telling jackasses from Hanover about them. He pieced together something that resembled 'Thanks for the help, but I'm fine' to finally get the woman off his back, and then somewhat regretted it as it meant he and Jackass From Hanover were now alone.
"So, Hanover Man, do you have anything that could actually help me? Hotels? You know a guy? The way to America?" (That last one was actually worth a shot.)
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Gabriel Zeiler
- Ingenious Pilot -
The Other Rosy-Cheeked Porcelain-Skinned German Boy%\0\%
Posts: 228
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Post by Gabriel Zeiler on Apr 19, 2013 23:29:31 GMT -5
Gabriel laughed rather wickedly. "I know a guy. In fact, I even know a girl. You're a fugitive, aren't you, my good brother? I bet you robbed a bank. You scraped out the parish donation fund at your shitty little church and it fell out a hole in your pocket. Now you're in the city of sin."
Nico would absolutely devour the kid alive and spit out only the largest of bones, if ever the two met or it was her bosomy good fortune to have him trip on her skirt and babble mam'selles at her, but Gabriel knew that feeling of finding oneself in a new city and absolutely flat. Though he tried to be cannier about it than this kid did, and would never acknowledge it.
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Moritz Stiefel
- Masterful Virgin -
And then there were none.
Posts: 34
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Post by Moritz Stiefel on Apr 20, 2013 12:21:10 GMT -5
"I'm not a fugitive, I just got kicked out." And shot himself. And ended up in New York City. And then Paris.
Moritz sighed and rubbed his temples as the migraine started up again. "Besides, the church was perfectly fine. Stained glass, shiny candle-holders, and we can actually hear what the pastor says. Better than those cold-ass warehouses you probably have in Hanover."
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Gabriel Zeiler
- Ingenious Pilot -
The Other Rosy-Cheeked Porcelain-Skinned German Boy%\0\%
Posts: 228
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Post by Gabriel Zeiler on Apr 23, 2013 7:37:20 GMT -5
"Ohh, oh." Gabriel nodded sagely, lighting a cigarette. "Never mind me, you're a good boy." The obvious line of questioning involved what happened, but that would have opened the corresponding question for Gabriel as a matter of courtesy and he'd rather not spill that so soon. "You sit still for all the sermons, right?"
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Moritz Stiefel
- Masterful Virgin -
And then there were none.
Posts: 34
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Post by Moritz Stiefel on Apr 25, 2013 0:38:02 GMT -5
"Yeah, but I got sick of them for the past... month. Or five. Somewhere around Christmas, where the sermons were getting even more repetitive. But I just asked Ernst what his opinions were, and then I could make up shit to Mother."
Melchi wouldn't have been much help. He'd stopped going to church entirely by then.
"And considering Father, you'd think 'good' meant 'successful.'"
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Gabriel Zeiler
- Ingenious Pilot -
The Other Rosy-Cheeked Porcelain-Skinned German Boy%\0\%
Posts: 228
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Post by Gabriel Zeiler on Apr 26, 2013 0:04:15 GMT -5
"Well, of course, all good boys dream of growing up and running the greengrocer's shop or whatever the fuck you do."
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Moritz Stiefel
- Masterful Virgin -
And then there were none.
Posts: 34
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Post by Moritz Stiefel on Apr 26, 2013 13:01:50 GMT -5
"Or at least passing exams." Moritz groaned and searched his pockets; he still had a few cigarettes of his own, thank god, but after a few attempts it was confirmed that his lighter was out of fuel. "Damn. Do you have a light, or is it too sophisticated for a Hessian guy?"
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Gabriel Zeiler
- Ingenious Pilot -
The Other Rosy-Cheeked Porcelain-Skinned German Boy%\0\%
Posts: 228
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Post by Gabriel Zeiler on Apr 26, 2013 18:06:12 GMT -5
He waved a matchbook between two fingers. "Come here and find out, country boy."
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Moritz Stiefel
- Masterful Virgin -
And then there were none.
Posts: 34
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Post by Moritz Stiefel on Apr 26, 2013 21:38:39 GMT -5
"Matches? I would have thought they were too backwards for you. But you being Hanoverian, that might just make them old-fashioned."
Of course, after lighting his cigarette and getting an awful lot of jitters out after the first drag, he shot another glance over and sighed. "Okay, thanks. But do you have any help that lasts more than five minutes?"
After another pull, he was forced to amend it. "More like two."
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Gabriel Zeiler
- Ingenious Pilot -
The Other Rosy-Cheeked Porcelain-Skinned German Boy%\0\%
Posts: 228
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Post by Gabriel Zeiler on Apr 27, 2013 0:13:04 GMT -5
"They're from a bar," he began, somewhat incredulously -- and to him it did seem like kind of a snazzy idea -- but watching the kid shake and smoke and grumble about everything gave him pause. "That depends on what kind of problem, I guess. You need somewhere to lay your head, I'm assuming?"
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Moritz Stiefel
- Masterful Virgin -
And then there were none.
Posts: 34
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Post by Moritz Stiefel on Apr 27, 2013 23:30:32 GMT -5
FINALLY, something Moritz had a high chance of needing in the immediate future! But in Hanover Guy's defense, Moritz probably shouldn't have kept digging at him for being Hanoverian when Hanover Guy was the most likely person to help.
So instead, he nodded. "Pretty much. And hopefully a place that's either free or accepts work as payment."
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