Who: claude & YOU!
Where: various locations around aldrip -- outskirts, apothecary, "please stop flying your huge fuck-off dragon around town, it's scaring everyone off", etc etc
What: The aftermath of Gnosia stuff, and anything else that ought to be shoved into here, glitches and hijinks and all!
Warnings: discussions of death!



i. rebuilding.

[ Claude died.

This is a fact that he doesn't believe to be particularly noteworthy to most people who weren't in the room where it happened. Most people had died, after all, and he doubts that many were even able to notice when faced down with the grim reality of their own deaths, or the deaths of those closer to them -- their lovers, their roommates, their best friends, their allies from home, the list goes on and on and on. And so he does what he does best, which is to carry on as though it had never happened in the first place. If people haven't realized it on their own, he has no desire to tell anyone about it. What would even be the point? It's stupid, it's depressing, and it doesn't even matter anyway. Not when he's here, hale and hearty as he's ever been.

And so he gets to work. Whether you're here to visit Claude himself, who lives in the apartment above the Apothecary, or you're here to grab some needed goods from the Apothecary itself, you'll see the unfamiliar sight of the shop closed entirely, and for good reason: the man of the hour is perched on the rooftop, hammering some planks of wood over an enormous hole in the upper corner of the building, the edges blackened and scorched, the Apothecary itself a mess of shattered glass and stained floorboards. He's not doing... a wonderful job, it must be said. He's largely just trying to make sure he doesn't get rained on while he's sleeping until he can hire someone to fix it up properly.

As he sees you approach, he'll glance over and shout down: ] We're closed! [ He sighs, shifting on the rooftop to regard whoever's here more seriously. ] But if you really need something, I can check if we have any left in storage.

ii. recuperating.

[ Otherwise? Claude is just trying to get back to normal.

If you happen to be someone he already knows, he may well reach out to you first, provided you weren't present during his death, something that he feels ample embarrassment about, even if you and him were foes during the whole nasty Gnosia business. He may visit you at your home, your place of business, the outskirts where you like to train, bounding up to you with a cheerful wave, and a quick: ] Hey! Just thought I'd check up on you after all of that.

[ If you're not someone he already knows, you can find him around town, doing what he always does. He may be training on the outskirts of town with his enormous bow, eyes narrowed and mouth pinched into a frown as he trains with more ferocity than usual, or perhaps at a variety of shops as he works on replenishing his stores, overencumbered by bags and bags of goods that he looks like he's barely managing to carry on his own. Or, rarely, tucked into a quiet bar -- he's not a big drinker, but even he thinks he deserves a drink after all of that. Just one. Just enough to soothe his rattled nerves.

Or, if you prefer to run into him and his wyvern, the great white beast that she is, you'll spot them flying overhead with far greater regularity than normal, taking refuge in the sky, where you can wait for them to inevitably land. If you instead run into them on land, you may find yourself confronted with a mouth tugged into a snarl, one wing slung protectively over Claude where he'll push it off with a laugh and hasten to say: ] She won't bite, I swear! She's just a little more protective these days. [ He'll swat her in the side, shaking his head. ] Cut it out, Zaffy. It's fine.

iii. everything else.

[ Hit me up with anything! You know the drill! ]