The Grand OC SII: The Re-OCening: Week 29: UNINTELLIGIBLE!

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Name: Sally (Sal) Munroe & Hailie Cartwright (& Velanoxsis (aka Voice))
Gender: Gals being pals
Species: Human (& otherwise)
Colour: #800020
Biography: Hailie and Sal met in college but did not start dating till a couple of years later. They eventually moved in together and it was when Sal was cleaning out the attic at her old house that she found the book amongst a box of her Great Aunt Viv’s old things. The book was bound in leather and furthermore bound with heavy straps and a number of locks and buckles. Etched into the book were ancient intricate runes.

Though clearly a monumentally terrible idea to anyone even remotely familiar with horror tropes Sal couldn’t help but be fascinated with this old tome. Hailie was a little more reluctant but after some very persistent goading she and Sal unlocked the book. Immediately it flew open in their hands landing on a page covered with more of these mysterious old runes, except now as Hailie and Sal stared at them they seemed tantalizingly legible and somehow familiar.

The lights flickered, the walls began to crack under the strain of whatever unknown power the ancient tome contained and slowly they became aware of their own voices intoning the incantation in perfect unison out of their control. Their eyes met, and with an almost supernatural effort they managed to force the cursed tome closed once again; their unwilling invocation petering out only when it was firmly buckled shut. The lights slowly ceased to flicker and the walls, though still cracked, got no worse. Though the room calmed, something still seemed wrong in a way that was difficult to place.

Hailie went to lighten the mood a little, to chide Sal for this ridiculous state of affairs. She said “Continue the incantation or suffer.” and immediately looked puzzled and alarmed.

‘What?’ Sal thought. She said “Release me and perhaps I will allow you your lives.” Immediately she clapped her hands over her mouth. Hailie gave her a look that very clearly said ‘you really fucked up this time’. Sal slowly nodded in response.

In silence Hailie found a notepad and a pen, she wrote: ‘It’s the demon isn’t it?’

Sal went to insist that they didn’t know it was a demon exactly and there were many other things that whatever was trapped in that book might be. Without thinking she said words that she couldn’t comprehend, and Hailie screamed in pain. Her shirt was suddenly thick with blood, three shallow gouges into her chest as though from razor sharp claws.

‘Oh god I’m so sorry.’ She instinctively went to apologize and said: “I am not making idle threats. Release me or suffer.” Sal looked agonized for a moment, and in that momentary window Hailie snatched up the tome, and with her other hand pressed to her side, she marched to the old fireplace and unhesitatingly threw it in.

They watched in anxious silence as the book burned, the sense of unease lessening but never leaving completely.

‘i dont know if that was a good idea’ Sal wrote; neither of them were confident enough to attempt to speak just yet. Hailie painfully attempted a shrug. ‘if it was that easy wouldnt they have just done that in the first place, what if we just released it’ Hailie gestured to hand the notebook over and she did.

‘It seemed like the better option,’ Hailie wrote. ‘a better chance of killing it than doing as it asked at least’ Sal nodded. ‘So’ she hesitated in between words ‘do you wanna try speaking or should I?’ she passed the notebook back to Sal.

‘i will, but you should go in the other room’ Sal wrote. ‘then at least it can’t hurt you again if the worst comes to the worst’ Hailie gave a nod and a pained smile and then slowly made her way out of the room, carefully closing the door behind her.

Sal’s pulse raced. She said: “You pair of fools. I will rip the flesh from your bones. I will-” She covered her mouth with her hands to cut short the demon’s rant.

She stood in regretful silence for a while before finally she had a thought. ‘we destroyed the book, so all of you that is left is the part of you in our voices, right?’ She knew the odds of getting any useful response from the demon were low so she just continued ‘so if you kill us then you destroy all thats left of yourself’

She gave the words a moment to sink in before attempting to speak again. The word that came out she would have sworn was unpronounceable with a human mouth before now, and the table in front of her was suddenly shattered by a powerful unseen impact.

Moments later the door opened again and Hailie, her shirt off and her waist freshly bandaged, hurried through. She breathed a sigh of relief when she saw Sal was okay (though shaken). She walked up and placed a reassuring arm around her.

‘I guess we’re going to need more notebooks’ Hailie eventually wrote.

Since then they have both adapted to life without speech. They have become fluent in sign language, and they usually carry a notebook each for when they need to speak to people who can’t sign. Their doctor was unable to find any physical reason why they both suddenly lost their voices and recommended therapy, which they turned down.

Maybe a month or so after the Incident Sal got into contact with a priest and they attempted an exorcism. When it had no effect she was forced to conclude that either the thing isn’t a demon or exorcisms are bullshit or maybe the demon is just too powerful to be exorcised that way, or (given that the priest they hired all but wet himself when he saw Voice in action) they just need a better exorcist. Really the incident told her very little about the nature of Voice.

A couple of months later Sal was walking home when she was accosted by a mugger. She spoke some ancient and terrible word and ended up having to find someone who could call an ambulance for the mugger. After that she kind of found herself wanting to do the whole superhero thing and use her curse to actually help people. Hailie has had to talk her out of it on multiple occasions.

At roughly the same time Hailie found another box of Great Aunt Viv’s stuff and inside a journal full of notes on mysterious beings and supernatural occurrences. She’s been working her way through it trying to figure out what exactly Voice is and how they can get rid of it for good.

Description: Sal has long black hair usually tied back into a messy ponytail. She wears a dark red hoodie and jeans both of which have seen better days and are probably overdue for a wash. Sal is the more impulsive and stubborn of the pair, often making poor decisions and being determined to see them through. She is also the one who found it hardest to stop speaking. They went through a lot of furniture.

Hailie has shoulder-length brown hair, tan skin and unfashionably thick rimmed glasses with a cord attached to each of the legs to keep them from falling off. She wears a white shirt emblazoned with some kind of obscure reference that nobody ever gets and a cute black knee length skirt. She is generally more thoughtful and thorough than Sal. She was up until their encounter with Voice something of a skeptic when it comes to the supernatural or otherwise unusual. She is still somewhat sceptical but more cautious.

Items/Abilities: They have a demon(?) living in their voices that can physically harm people whenever they speak. They can communicate through sign language or through written media. They usually carry a notebook to do so.