1 Chloe tries very hard to speak calmly and rationally about a plan involving her, a knife, and cutting life, soul, and whathaveyou lines. She starts many sentences, gets past a few words each time, and stops. After an embarrassed deep breath, she tries again. "It would be beyond idiosyncratic to walk into a pub and awaken a, randomness negotiable, girl, and then leave." "I don't know, fate pulls weird tricks with my life," Gegi points out. "You wandered near me, you got dragged into the bizarre storyline of my existence." "Plenty of people have wandered near you in here." "Yup let's see, Gabby got a strange phone call and disappeared, Plots Awakened and ran off to deal with his past, Garret got thrown across the room when the demon possessed me the first time, and then you saw what happened with Astaaroth" Chloe shifts uneasily. "I don't about Gabby, but if Plots ran off to deal with his past, he knew what the situation was, why it was. Garret understood why Astaaroth showed up, he owed him a debt. While, perhaps, I don't know, these events were precipitated by you, there was reason behind them. I don't see any reason for my problems." "I was just saying that standing near me didn't seem to be the safest place to be if you were looking for an uneventful existence." Chloe shakes her head. "And even if sheer terror be an idiosyncratic way to awaken someone, I could very well have done something foolish enough to get myself killed, which I assume is a fatal glitch in the awakening process, during that time, and she must have known that in this sort of place." "Actually, it seems to me that scaring someone silly is a common way of inspiring an Awakening, although I could be wrong about that near-death experiences opening new visions an all that, throwing the fledgelings out of the nest to teach them to fly I know Garret had to die to become a mage." "This wasn't some sink or swim test, because really my options ranged from running away screaming to attacking every Garou in here. I don't see anything that anyone could see as a beneficial, enlightening option in that spectrum." "Well, like I said, I think in many cases the terror is supposed to push you over the edge so you Awaken, get sudden access to magickal energies, and blast the place or use the power to escape." "And then, once I had these magickal powers, what value would I be to her? Why would she want me to have them?" "Well, if she really were your friend, to teach you to defend yourself, I suppose... and if she wasn't, maybe she thought you'd be grateful and use your new powers to help her. I don't know." "If this Lady was a future you," she looks at her apologetically, " - just to get all the possibilities out there, not that I believe this one - then perhaps the thought processes are the same and both Gegi's want nothing more than to cause me pain" Gegi shakes her head. "Obviously she wanted more than just causing you pain... there would be simpler ways of doing it, not involving so many people." "I didn't mean that that was all she had planned. I meant that's all she had planned for me. But it was a silly thing to say." Chloe glances at her again, then at the floor, mumbling an, "I'm sorry." Gegi smiles. "It's okay. We have to look at all the possibilities." Rhiannon talks of torture and corruption. Chloe bites her lip. "If she does thrive on torture, as horrid as that experience was, I'd prefer to be in the clutches of imagined monsters than hers. Could she not have provided more painful horrors?" To answer herself, "Except she said she'd be back for me later. Too many people watching." She rubs her head, her panic-suppressing powers slowly draining. "And again I wonder, why didn't she come back? She could have had you" "Perhaps she decided she didn't want me anymore. But then she could just break the lines, I suppose. Or maybe she doesn't want me until I'm alone. Or desperate. In danger, so she can gain my trust?" "But you thought you were in danger just a little while ago. If she'd shown up then, at the door, and beckoned to you, would you have gone to her?" Chloe stares at Gegi for a moment, thinking. She shivers a bit as she realizes the answer and lowers her eyes, shrugging. 2 "Trust me, you don't have to worry about me ceasing to care," says Gegi. "I know, I know. Trust you, you're a mage." She laughs. "Has nothing to do with being a mage. And that's not a good enough reason to trust someone. No, I'm just an overly emotional person. I care way too much about everything." Chloe tries her best not to look surprised at this. Gegi makes no attempt to hide her surprise. "You didn't hear me talking with Plots about my mood swings? Or notice me crying hysterically when the Dark Lady showed up and I though I was doomed to be a demon, or yelling" she looks embarassedly in the directions of Astarial and Kao-Liang, " or flashing with joy when I found I was a mage?" "When I feel, I feel intensely it's a little dangerous, and can be exhausting, but it's part of who I am. I love, and I need, and I care" "I did see all that, yes. But, when you can call this all a game, I guess - well, there's a difference between caring because you thrive on strong emotions, I mean you said yourself you're a 'emotional vampire', and just caring very much..." "The emotional vampire bit... vampire isn't really the right word. But that has more to do with me wanting -other- people to feel and to care just as strongly as I do. I'm an emotional person. People who are all logic and analysis and no feeling bother me..." Chloe tries to look comforting. "Can't you see they all want to help?" "They all want to help you," Gegi says quietly, but not quietly enough. Chloe blinks, not understanding where that comment came from, but recovers quickly. "Well, yes, thank goodness for that. But I want to help you, you know that, don't you?" Gegi blinks, then smiles at Chloe, looking more friendly then she has in a long time. "Thank you." Chloe presses on, all the mean looks and comments finally filtering through to the foreground. "You do you did know that, didn't you?" Quietly, "I thought you'd hate me" She bristles a bit with alarm, but continues to look concerned. "This isn't your fault, Gegi. No more than tis mine. Just because you were here, well, if I wasn't here, she wouldn't have corrupted me either." "She came looking for me." A flash of very restrained anger flits in her eyes for just a second. "How do you know?" She shrugs. "It just seemed that way. She knew a lot about all of us, apparently, but she managed to connect me to the other me... that couldn't have been easy. And she acted like the other nasty things have acted around me... oh, I don't know." Also quietly, "Of course I don't hate you, Gegi. Is that why you've..." she drifts off, hoping Gegi knows what she meant. Gegi just looks down sadly. "If I did something wrong" Chloe says softly. She smiles. "This certainly isn't your fault." 3 Show me how to suffer the mourning. Morning has broken. "Strength holds its own weaknesses" "God is love, love is blind, I am blind, therefore I am God" Michael grins and bites his bottom lip, seeming admonished and speaking childishly. "Oops. I think we lynched the wrong guy, then." Gegi smiles. "Call me a shirker of responsibility, but I really have no desire to be in charge, thanks." "Sometimes the world is a wonderful, beautiful place but then I get tempted to only sit and stare and forget how to speak." He smiles, remembered moments smiling with him in his eyes. A shake of the head. "Is that true evil? To sit and do nothing?" He smiles. "I call it getting your priorities straight. There's all this emphasis these days on doing stuff, on what people do for a living, and no one take the time to be, to concentrate on who they are, which is far more important." "Yes, but alone, there is little reason to be what's the point of a shared reality if you're not sharing? It's always good to take some time to ground... but not to forget how to come back out." She smiles. "They never say I've changed, they only say that they're seeing sides of me they hadn't noticed before no portrayal of myself would surprise them." He nods. "And yet change itself remains the only constant." "But if you take the change into the conceptualization of the pattern, the pattern remains throughout the changes." "There are people who think they are, aren't they? In love with the idea of their own darkness?" "Sure, but they usually do less damage than the people who think they're doing the right thing The people who end up doing what they personally think is wrong, justifying it by saying it's to prevent something worse Well, they're the people I'd class as being the closest to the evil everyone reckons exists." "We all do the best we can, really" She looks off at the wall, her eyes unfocused slightly. "He has been hurt deeply. He is attracted to her, but fears... fears her, fears bringing the pain again, fears himself, for he is as she is, a little mad... and so she waits, ever close at hand, but never pressing, for him to come to terms with himself, in hopes that some day he will reach to her..." He closes his eyes sadly and starts to sing softly, a strange melody that mourns and cajoles, questioning its own fustration. "Angels of darkness Demons of light Nothing's as simple as it seems on first sight. The graveyard is empty, the city at night, The smile on your face fills me with such fright" it wishes, pleads for more, but dare not hope, dare not dream. Almost. Almost ready to try again. "And I just want to touch you, to hold you in my arms, To reach out and caress you and keep you from all harm, But I'm the one who'll hurt you, I'm the one that you should fear, I'm the one who has to back away whenever you draw near" But she can't, and she mustn't, she's poison, she's wrong "Crying in gladness, laughing in shame, Sitting in silence when you call out my name. How do I tell you? What do I say? When you let me near how could I turn away?" the anger and frustration turns inward, self-destructive, never threatening. She stands too near the edge, ready to fall. "And I just want to touch you, to hold you in my arms, To reach out and caress you and keep you from all harm. And I don't want to hurt you, it fills me with such fear, But I don't think that I can turn away the next time you draw near" He opens his eyes, anguish fills them, understanding, sorrow, and utter, utter despair. Her eyes meet his, blue and trembling. <* Do you realize what you're doing to me? *> I gazed into the abyss for so long that I saw it was a mirror; parts of my soul are as black as the gaps between the stars and more alone. Look up, little one, look up and see the stars 4 "Cutting it out of her is going to be painful. She needs to know that beforehand." "As I understand it, t'essence of magery be a belief that what one attempts be possible." "Yes, but unless you're a Maurauder, you still have to compromise with other people's beliefs." "I wouldst suspect that to a mage who dost nay believe that pain be a necessary component to break a binding, it shouldst nay be required 'less Chloe believes it herself. And without exact knowledge, 'tis my thought that attempting spells that do nay require such pain be of advantage to try first, as pain be there for a reason." She cocks her head in thought, "And truly, why shouldst a consent to a demon-worshipper, assuming t'lady be that in sooth, be worth more than a consent to a mage who be nay so?" "They doesn't always let you take things back..." Chloe looks up. "Why should not throwing something immediately away that was slipped into my hand or standing still -- I even flinched a little, I did..-- when someone kissed my forehead, be binding consent? Why, that seems to say that anything considered consent by some evil being qualifies. And then, one such being could say my very breathing or talking or existing is binding consent. That's more than misinformation, that's..." she frowns. "Well, it doesn't seem right." Academically, "Although given that Gegi didst aver that she knew not t'mind of t'lady as t'lady was not her, one wonders why t'assertion that t'spell needed thy consent to work be so popular. In sooth, there be some spells that wilt nay work 'less t'other agrees, but there be far more wherein they shall will-he or nill- he consents. And shouldst one have t'skill and power, 'tis possible to redesign those spells anyway so that another's consent be nay needed in t'first place. At least with Kindred witchery, 'tis my thought that t'spells that require consent were simply designed that way as they be easier to cast, and belike t'same be true with magery given t'emphasis on belief." "That's my thought. It would be -easier- to cast something, particularly something as weird and complex as they're describing, with consent," says Gegi. She shrugs, "Given that 'tis magery, and assuming that t'mages be correct when they say 'tis a matter of belief, then an t'lady thought thy consent was needed, then anything she couldst interpret as consent wouldst be all that was necessary. 'Twould possibly give thee an opening, as if thou couldst believe strongly enow that thou didst nay consent, then t'spell wouldst fall apart as t'belief was nay necessary." "Right. It should at least weaken it." She looks thoughtful. "But then, there be some evidence that actually following a paradigm be nay important, 'tis whether or not a mage thinks he be following it that be of import. So maybe not. And of course, an consent wasn't needed in t'first place, then 'tisn't any reason to think on it." Gegi shrugs. "It does no harm..." Gegi might get the idea Rhiannon's next words are as much meant for her as Chloe, "T'essence of life is free will, which means all canst choose. T'farther down a path one follows after a choice, t'longer and mayhap harder 'twill be to retrace one's path and try again, and t'memories shall always be there, but t'option is always available." "What if she's not going to let me have that option, and I'm not in a position to seize it, miss?" asks Chloe. Gegi sighs. "They told me/her on the other side that she could never be cleansed, though... and Astarial seemed to imply that I'm fated to be doomed here too. I have no intention of just giving in, but I'm not greatly hopeful either." "Her motives are certainly confusing... but she's -not- me. I would have known." Rhiannon, an intent look on her face, asks, "Then why be it thou thinkest thou knowest how to break t'spell she laid? Hath thou tested thine own memories to ensure that she didst nay lay a spell on thee as well?" "Astarial scanned me and didn't find anything, I thought..." She stops and looks confused. "She's not me. But I know her somehow. Or I will know her. Me and my time problems. She's someone..." Dryly, "Aye, she's someone. But how accurate are thy prophecies, and have they ne'er been wrong?" "I don't prophesy... I don't see the future. Sometimes things look familiar that will be later, though. Suggestions. Hints. And things tend to turn out. I don't claim to know what's going on..." Rhiannon describes one reasoning for why the Dark Lady might have acted as she did. Gegi smiles bitterly. "Well, that's a new theory." "'Tis a common trick in poker - an one wishes to pull a fast one, it helps an one canst distract t'others watching one as to thy true goal - and t'way Chloe was acting, she was a fine distraction for a time." Calmly, she adds, "From another point of view, mayhap her actions were aimed at thee - she bowed to thee, then enchanted Chloe such that t'reaction of all t'mages herein was Nephandi. 'Tis certes possible that t'lady was endeavoring to isolate thee as a first step towards making thee turn to her, by making t'rest of t'mages distrust thee. What wouldst be thy normal reaction when some thou hast been considering friends turned against thee for no good reason?" "Cry?" She sighs. "Or fight back." 5 "There's more to death than being frightened of one's own mortality, sir," says Chloe to Garret. "There are people, loved ones, mortality to grieve for. If one wishes to laugh at their own death to ease the pain, I suppose I can understand that, but to laugh at another's death... well, that doesn't seem right at all." "Well, not right away. But nothing ever really dies, you know. It just changes form. Mortality is really not something worth grieving over." "Can you not grieve over the lost form then, sir?" "Yes, if it helps you get on with your life. The dead are dead and the living are alive. I can't understand why both want so badly to emulate the other. I was more referring to laughing at your own death, though. It's much better than living in fear of it." She shrugs slowly. "Perhaps, though I wouldn't want to take death too lightly, lest I make foolish, rash decisions. There must be something suitable somewhere in between laughter and fear to regard death with." "Well, death is frightening, but that's why you have to laugh at it. Let it scare you, and you'll never get anything accomplished." 6 Gegi explains her unusual background to Astarial. "Now that's interesting, or certainly poses some interesting questions. I mean, in effect, you're newborn - newly created - here, so I wonder where your potentially unpleasant destiny comes from. Usually, there's something in a past life which would set your future destiny, but if you *have* no past lives in this reality...?" "Someone very similar to me did, though, according to Gabby. My name and history, with slightly different results... there may be other me's floating around out here. It's all very confusing." They discuss magick. "Weatherworking, hmm. I don't know if I could show you that. Your technique seems to use Entropic effects, and the weatherworking I know uses manipulation of the forces in the atmohydrosphere." "Well, it would be nice to learn Forces, even a little... tk has never been my thing but being able to specifically apply a little push might be easier than having to twist chance and hope that it works out right." "Well, let's try, shall we. The first step in Forces, as in all the Spheres, is learning to perceive them. After all, you can't manipulate what you cannot see, at least not if you want to achieve any degree of success. I should perhaps mention at this point that you're likely to end up with quite a headache at first, as the Patterns of most forces change continuously and very quickly. Until you're used to them, you tend to fall into the trap of trying to see every individual state they pass through. It's the flux and change that's important with Forces, not the individual static states." He searches briefly through his pockets... "Now, some say that it's best to start with heat, because the Pattern stays in one spot, but some say it's better to start with gravity, as flames flicker and can fool a beginner into thinking she's seeing something when she isn't, but the Patterns of gravity only last for a moment while the object falls. Myself, I prefer to start with static magnetism, as it's as steady a Pattern as Forces patterns get. Unless you'd rather try something different?" He produces a small bar magnet. "Magnetism sounds good." She smiles. "Flashback to physics class and remembering which fields spin which way with which flows... drawing pluses and minuses on our hands to keep them straight." They turn to her future again. "But the elf -said- my aura was tainted... well, look for yourself." "I did, remember?" "And it is, isn't it." "Well, sometimes. It fluctuates. To be honest, you have one of the strangest aurae I've seen." "Is this a good thing or a bad thing?" "Either. Or both. Or possibly neither. It's hard to say without extensive research. But I'd wager it's not a good thing if you want the quiet life." "Eh, quiet is boring. Melodrama is more fun." He looks at her through the lens. "There's something there that is to say, there's definitely a nasty twist or crossing in your destiny, but I can't tell if it's imposed or who imposed it without considerably more extensive analysis." They speak of inevitability. "It's not putting all your energy into avoiding it, it's taking reasonable precautions. Being somewhere other than where you're going to die, for example." "So you avoid a certain place for the rest of your life? Then fate is -bound- to make it so that you'll have to go there, or watch someone else die... fate is mean that way." "Just at the specific time you're fated to die there, would do. But fate doesn't work with individual events. There're always minor events in fate's tapestry that lead up to the events in *your* fate, and events that cascade from it. Trace and change the events which lead up to it, and you can change it." She shakes her head. "I still say it's a lot of effort to put in, especially if things -aren't- certain ahead of time. Why worry? Live your life..." "Because if you don't worry you'll stop having a life to live!" "I don't know, I've been amazingly lucky all my life... strange things happen when I'm around. When I don't worry about it and just let things flow, they turn out much better than if I work myself up worrying about them. Following my intuition..." "And maybe at some point in my life I'll have to pay for all I've been given with a terrible defeat or a painful demise. To keep the balance. Everyone has to die sometime. And yes, I'm vain, I'd rather go out saving another, but sometimes things happen..." She looks around for Garret. "Your tradition knows more about the ways of destiny, no? What do you think?" "I don't intend to take anyone else down with me." "You may not intend it, but how can you be sure of it? And if you're damned, how can you be sure you'd care?" Quick as a wink, she flashes from calm depression to anger. "Be -sure-? How the hell am I supposed to be sure? I do the best I can! I'd give my life to save another in a second, and you know it! What am I supposed to do? Go hide in a cave somewhere where no one can see me or find me or worry about me so that I won't be a danger to anyone else?" Astarial recoils initially from the mental impact of her anger, but remains calm. "Because I can, if that's what you all want me to do... I -will not- burden you with my existence if you don't want me to." "If I thought the world would be that much better off for the lack of your existence, I'd be firing up the Rite of Eternal Oblivion right about now." She laughs, switching into the twisted amusement that's been hounding Chloe. "Rite of Eternal Oblivion. Sounds straight out of Willow." "The fact that I'm *not* should say quite a bit about what I think of your chances for eventual damnation. I'm just trying to encourage you to keep doing the best you can. Not give up. And maybe try to keep a more positive outlook, hmmm?" She smiles sweetly. "I'm working on it." "And if death is inevitable, at least choose to die somewhere and somewhen meaningful." "Does death really ever have meaning? You're still dead. Maybe it makes those you left behind feel a little better, but... and the person I am now doesn't have too much to leave behind, except the Pub." "Of course! If you can save another's life, strike a blow against your enemies, or even just die in bed as the ending to a long and fruitful life, that has meaning. I haven't been cheating death this long because it's meaningless, I've been doing it because I'm needed. And, to be honest, because I enjoy living." "But does it -really- have meaning, or do we just think it does? How much does any one person matter to the universe, really?" "Blast the universe! It matters to *people*.", Astarial says, in a rather irritated, if not actually angry, manner, "If you go off and get yourself killed, or worse, corrupted, or damned, or whatever, then it damn well does matter! It matters to *me*, because - strange as it may seem - I rather like you. I'm fairly certain that Chloe, for one, and Garret, and that charming lady who introduced us - Gabrielle, wasn't it? - and probably more than a few other people feel the same way." She tears up. "Thank you," she says quietly. "As long as you try, that's the important thing. It's giving up that's fatal." She smiles. "Fatal? Really? I wouldn't say that... I've taken all the options. I've given in. I've gone over. I've resisted. I've chosen to destroy myself rather than risk harm to others. I've tried them all. And yet I always end up back in the middle again, back with the choices looming, never able to escape, but never quite able to end the cycle. It's all just preparation for some final, more binding resolution, I suppose..." "All in one lifetime?" She shrugs. "Live intensely and suck the marrow out of life?" "Fate's playing chess, and you're the Queen? Of which color, now, that's the question..." "I told you, I'm not the Queen." 7 Michael grins and bites his bottom lip, seeming admonished and speaking childishly, "Oops... I think we lynched the wrong guy then..." She smiles. "Call me a shirker of responsibility, but I really have -no- desire to be in charge, thanks." "You're sure, now? You're not just saying that so I _won't_ lynch you?", he seems almost eager, almost hoping she'll change her mind. She smiles. "Well, I have no great desire to be lynched, either... having some power is nice enough, lets you make a change, try to help. Having/Being the -ultimate- power? Would make everything your fault, wouldn't it? That could be a heavy burden..." "What's the point in shared reality if _you're_ not sharing?", he shifts the emphasis, "If you're not yourself, you're probably just part of someone else...", he blinks, continuing with his train of thought, but obviously losing conviction, "and that's no fun at all..." "All connected, and not alone..." "We all do the best we can, really..." "No. No we don't." "Don't we?" "Crying in gladness, laughing in shame, Sitting in silence when you call out my name. How do I tell you? What do I say? When you let me near how could I turn away?" the anger and frustration turns inward, self-destructive, never threatening, She stands too near the edge, ready to fall. She stands too near the Edge, ready to fall. Or to Fall. "And I just want to touch you, to hold you in my arms, To reach out and carress you and keep you from all harm. And I don't want to hurt you, it fills me with such fear, But I don't think that I can turn away the next time you draw near..." He opens his eyes, anguish fills them, understanding, sorrow and utter, utter despair. Her eyes meet his, blue and trembling. <* Do you realize what you're doing to me? *> His eyes are almost bleeding, loss so intense, ancient wounds reopened, a silent cry (from deep inside) "Do you realise what you're doing to _me_?" <* Should I be sorry? *> His eyes, cavernous (falling) a man who loved his God (and killed him) because he thought it was all he could do. A man whose memories are ashes (crumbling through his hands. Lost.) who destroys everything he touches (even the world) who destroys everything he loves (even the world) Destroy me, I won't mind... turned about, to face himself again (reflected in another) his mouth speaks, but words will not crystallise, "I don't want to hurt you.", are the words he does not say. "I don't know how to help.", are the words he finally does. He bows his head, shudders a moment and returns, "Georgina... The danger is not what we expected, I'm... I think, perhaps, the two of us shouldn't continue such an..." "This isn't what we thought we'd started..." she says to herself. A pause. A search for words. (Ruffling through the mind.) "Emotional... conversation. Feedback too intense, building and building and building..." "I don't think it's safe.", he states with sincerity and concern. "Safe for whom?" she whispers. A sudden realisation strikes. He stops. And it all rushes in... The conversation, his response, perfectly predictable, exactly what they were speaking of... The result: Sudden laughter touched with tears. He smiles warmly. The concern remains, the fear is gone. "I've decided I don't care." "Don't care?" (Don't you?) "The choice is yours." She holds out a hand to him, palm up, and says nothing. Caught in your eyes Lost in your name I will never be the same... 8 Gegi, Chloe, and Illyana have been talking together. "I wish it were that way in my world," Chloe says softly. "Well, among friends, it is, isn't it?" Gegi asks. Chloe looks away. "Quentin was more than my friend." "Quentin?" Gegi asks confusedly, having had too much stress lately to keep Chloe's background straight. She shakes her head. "A friend would not feed from you without permission." She pauses. "Unless the need was dire, or the Beast out of control." Chloe takes a moment to breathe. "Father opened the door and I think... yes, I wished them both bonne nuit, still half in slumber. But I knew something was wrong, Quentin moved so fast, much too fast, and I could see the fangs and that look in his eyes, it was not of him. And he wouldn't stop, even when I screamed and begged him, he only got angrier, hungrier. I thought he would rip my limbs apart, if he didn't drink every last drop of my blood first. I thought it the most horrible nightmare, but it was so much worse." "He was...he was a... My father kept telling him that, and he was. He was a monster. Father, father, he kept laughing the most awful laugh, while Quentin..." she shudders. "Have you ever seen someone cry blood? When Father finally ripped him from me, ripped my flesh from his horrible fangs, Quentin looked at me like it, like it was my fault. Like he was angry with me for...being. And I was so sorry." "What happened to him... after that?" She smiles. It's an awful, bitter smile, completely alien to and almost revolting on her pure, sweet face. "A kindred's relations are not fair game. He decreed it himself." Her expression melts back into a distant pain. "But that was not enough to claim his soul. No, the night must be revised for that. But who to write the story, with such 'royal' involvements, and such a fragile little head..." Gegi looks greatly alarmed. "Chloe, you don't sound like yourself..." Chloe closes her eyes, the pain starts to look vaguely physical, "Do you have any idea what it's like to have your mind pulled from all sides at once? I tried to please them all, I really did. I did not wish to fight." "Oh, I know how that feels, all right..." She looks around for the nearest Astarial. "We may have more problems here than we thought." He is watching Chloe with carefully guarded concern. "Sometimes there's nothing you can do. Really, it couldn't have been you, not at all. I...", he finishes, realising there's nothing he can say or do. He looks more pained at this inability and concerned than angry. But his eyes are still burning. (to Gegi, in a mental tone hard as stone) <* You wouldn't happen to know who her father is or where I might find him? I'd prefer not to tell her this, but there's someone I'd positively *delight* to kill. *> <* Not her real father... and I think he's dead, but I don't remember very well, it's been a rough month. She has a vial of his blood - he was Ventrue - and we've both been ghouled off of it... you could use that to trace him if you really wanted. But I think it's more important to try and help her now than to make him pay for it... *> Chloe sits quietly, distantly, for a moment, then remembers herself. She looks back to Illyana and Gegi, her cheeks suddenly flushing as she realizes that was probably a lot more than they wanted to hear. Awkwardly, again glancing to the bane, she mumbles, "I'm sorry, I just--". She tries a nervous smile, "I don't suppose that's the sort of story that gets one a drink." Gegi smiles a little, trying to look supportive. "It counts, if you want one..." and looks at Illyana with You-have-proven-to-know-more-about-bars-than-I,-get-her-something? written on her face. 9 "Right, so, how's this for a plan. Karieta has warded the area, so we don't need to worry about that. First, I set up wards around the crystal against any means it might have to attack or communicate - except for the existing link-flows to Chloe, of course - and also set up wards around Chloe in case the 'lady' returns. A device I gave her should help with that, and you match the resonance of some stored Prime to her resonance," says Astarial to Garret. "It sounds feasible. I know I can do my part, anyway." "Then, perhaps I could link with Chloe and monitor for any unforeseen problems, if you could splice in the new source and cut the old links of the weaving to the crystal, then reweave the weaving to itself to prevent any backlash." "Yes, I can do that. Karieta? What do you say?" "Um...Astarial, Garret?" Chloe interrupts quietly. "I beg pardon for the interruption, sirs, but if I could just ask a few things?" She continues. "The safety wards..." she glances nervously to Karieta, "are you very sure of them, because... well, are you? And where are we going to get Nephandic Prime from? What of the lady and the crystal, how will we know that she'll never bother get to us again?" After another moment of thought, she puts on her best I'm-not-a-wimp face. "Just one more, sirs, if you please. It's not that I don't think I can handle it, and you've certainly suffered more than should have on my account, but... well, just so I am prepared, do you think this will hurt very badly?" "Not if you don't want it to," says Gegi. "I don't believe physical pain is something one wills on oneself.." "Yes, well." She pauses. "There's the issue of fear in there. If you're afraid to do something, your subconscious might start causing you pain to try to convince you not to do it. Or something. If in the back of your mind you think you can't do something, you yourself might handicap yourself, causing you pain and distracting you and making you fail. It's rather like a more personal form of paradox..." "But I know my conscious at least dearly, dearly wants this horrid binding removed. As to thinking I can't do it, it rather seems like I only be calm and brave and trust these good sirs here. I do want this taken care of, even if it will cause some great discomfort." "But why do you want it removed? And why do you call it horrid? I'm not saying it isn't, or that it is. Only asking you to look for the reasons for why you feel the way you do. Nobody's sure what the spell is meant to do to you. Nobody knows why it's there. Nobody knows what the Dark Lady's motives were, or even whether or not this is -her- spell... didn't someone say that it might have been prepared elsewhere and only delivered by her? It doesn't match up with the other magics that were put on you, certainly..." Chloe looks taken aback. "I suppose I'm not really separating this spell from the horrid thing she did to my vision. I don't know that there is a need to either. As we can't seem to find one motive yet, it's seems odd that she would have two separate agendas." "Perhaps no one can make sense of her motive precisely because there was more than one agenda..." "And her warning, 'They'll try to destroy you' certainly wasn't..." Chloe stops, flinching at her own words, an alternate logic just made apparent. "It's always possible that she didn't break your vision, that -I- did, and that all of us here are evil and out to destroy you. I don't happen to think it's true, but what would I know? You have to judge." Eventually, "No. I was fine before she came. I was not fine after. As I understand it, I had potential for magic powers before, and now my potential is conditional. That is why I think her intentions horrid. Am I flawed in my thinking?" "I'm not passing any judgement on your thinking... but you have only our words for it that she's done anything to your magickal powers, if you have them. Just -know why you're choosing-. You need to be -absolutely- certain that this is what you want. Be strong of faith, and her magic cannot hold you." Definitively, "Oh, I am quite sure that I don't want to be a demonic servant, Gegi. Of all the choices, that's certainly the easiest." "But are you sure that using the crystal will make you a demonic servant, instead of giving you a gift? And are you sure that cutting it off of you will not harm you? You have to be -sure-." "I cannot be sure, it seems. But as I understand it, which admittedly could be in a rather flawed manner, this gift you speak of, is something already within me. To put a condition, now or never, or, demonic servant or nothing, on it seems not a gift, but a hindrance. Or is it otherwise?" "Don't ask me, I don't know any more than anyone else does... I'm just asking you to think about it and be sure you know why you're making your decisions. You've had your mind changed an awful lot recently..." She looks hurt by Gegi's words. In a pathetically defensive tone, "By her, most recently.." "I know, and it wasn't your fault. Just be sure that you're thinking clearly and aren't being swayed by all of the madness that's been rushing around here." 10 "She came looking for me." A flash of very restrained anger flits in Chloe's eyes for just a second. "How do you know?" She shrugs. "It just seemed that way. She knew a lot about all of us, apparently, but she managed to connect me to the other me... that couldn't have been easy. And she acted like the other nasty things have acted around me... oh, I don't know." "Well, then, if she did come looking for you, then why did she not converse more with you, or take you from here, even?" "I think she wanted to influence my destiny... Garret said our fates were all tied together, and she might have had something to do with it. And she -did- change my destiny... if she hadn't come, and I hadn't panicked, I might not have become a mage..." "It seems the others think that there are many other ways to become a mage besides fright..." "Not because of fright. Because of the magick that Bavin and Garret worked on me. Which they probably wouldn't have done if it hadn't been for her. But you were rather -- distracted -- at the time, and it's a complicated story." Gegi just looks down sadly. Chloe fails miserably at trying to meet her eyes, so she just sits down in a nearby chair and touches Gegi's arm lightly. Under her breath, "If I did something wrong, Gegi..." She smiles. "This certainly isn't your fault." She's still distressed, trying so very hard not to press the issue. "But if I've upset you.." "What could you have done to upset me?" She seems a bit more nervous, as if Chloe's touch is distressing her ever so slightly... She pulls it away just a few inches, the look on her face as if Gegi's just supported her own worries. "I don't know, I certainly did not mean to. It's just, well, like when..." "When what?" She blushes. "That wasn't your fault. That's just a long-running sore spot. And it's silly of me to still be upset over it..." She gestures to the shirt she's wearing. (Woman in robes dancing under moon, title 'Luna'.) "I'm a lunatic. At least I claim to be. The moon is water and intuition and woman and secrecy and inner knowledge and psychic powers... and I want all of that, I want to -be- that. But I never draw the moon. And I'm an Aquarius, not a Cancer, although I claim both, and my numerology comes to... 1, I think, not 7, and so on. It never works out. And those are just silly old patterns made up by silly people to sell books and have nothing to do with real people, and when I've dealt with psis personally they've said I was gifted, and I'm a mage now, so I have absolutely no reasons to be upset over not fitting in the pattern perfectly." She sighs. "But when he drew the Moon for you and talked about you having the inner knowledges, the deeper sight... and at the same time your head was all messed up from the Dark Lady's spell, and it was -her- that was making you see things, not you... I was annoyed." I was jealous, she does not say, but makes clear anyway. She thinks for a moment, making the subsequent emphaticism seem a bit forced, "He said I was blind, Gegi! Willfully ignorant!" "You -were- blind. And refusing to see... could be only a reference to the mental blocks that others have put in your head..." she offers apologetically. "He said you were beautiful, with a great strength, and important to this world." She can't meet Chloe's eyes. (You say I only hear what I want to...) She looks like she might cry... "It was extremely petty of me, and I'm sorry." She shakes her head, looks ashamed herself, "No, it's all right, Gegi. I'm glad you told me." "I've been.... cruel to you, occasionally. I don't mean to. I don't understand it. I think you remind me of... people from back home. Of my childhood. And I -hate- my childhood. Completely and irrationally. I'm sorry. I do strange things..." Chloe looks at her pointedly. Questions remain, unasked. "If there's more you want to say, go ahead." She looks tired, defeated. Quite willing to admit to her sins. Quite willing to submit to the paladins who might drill open her head to let the demons out. She speaks plainly, "Astarial's kind words, muttered comments, strange looks..." She shrugs, not nonchalantly, just defeated, "It doesn't matter." Gegi sits silently, tearing up as well. 11 Gegi sighs. "But when he drew the Moon for you and talked about you having the inner knowledges, the deeper sight... and at the same time your head was all messed up from the Dark Lady's spell, and it was -her- that was making you see things, not you... I was annoyed." I was jealous, she does not say, but makes clear anyway. She looks horribly embarrassed. "It was extremely petty of me, and I'm sorry." Garret sighs. "Gegi-" <* I -said- I was sorry... *> Suddenly, without any warning whatever, a slight young lady with blind blue eyes is standing in front of him. Garret jerks backwards in surprise. "Hello, Georgina." she says placidly, staring at a point just to Gegi's left, yet clearly adressing her. Gegi bows, not surprised. She shuffles her cards, and plucks out the Moon, showing it to Gegi. "If you remember, that is exactly what Lachesis did *not* tell Chloe. About the deeper sight. In fact, the card of the Moon signifies confusion, an unwillingness or inablity to understand. It signifies power, but power that the person has not yet learned to control." Gegi smiles. "Which always seemed to fit me perfectly, really... out of control, a little crazy. But my book marks the moon as trickery, false friends, and falling into traps... which, I suppose, would be most appropriate for her under the circumstances. As I said, it was an irrational response..." She shuffles the moon card away, and plucks out the card of strength, again, showing it to Gegi. "Lachesis gave you tools, not definitions. He called attention to parts of yourselves that you would need, or that needed tending. Do you know what the woman holding open the jaws of the lion symbolizes? Moral strength. Conviction. Understanding what is right, and doing it, despite what your darker emotions demand. In essence, self-control." Gegi nods with a smile. "I'm working on it." In the blink of an eye, the card changes to that of the High Priestess. "Intuition. Occult influence. The power of dreams, like the Moon, but deeper now, because the dreamer knows herself, and is therefore master of her dreams." She holds out the card to Gegi. "Take it, if that's what you want. Live it. Be it. Why not?" She holds up her own deck and plucks off the top card, which coincidentally happens to be the Popess. (My deck's version of HP, and a lovely card, it was this picture that sold the deck to me...) "I will be what I am." She puts the card back down. "But not because of the cards, or the stars, or the peacock's eye in my fingerprint. Because I choose." She turns the deck around laterally, then begins cutting it, cycling through the cards. "I have a journey to make. To find love and a point of stability, so that from there I will feel safe to stretch out and explore, myself and the world. To become." She stops and turns over the top two cards. Ace of Cups, the Sun. She smiles. "I think I know who you are now," says Garret. "We've never met..." "But I've been watching you." finishes the woman. "Yes, I know you well. And you, Georgina. And you, Chloe." She makes an old-fashioned curtsy, which looks very out of place considering her ripped jeans and amorphous black sweater. "I am Black Anne. Like Lachesis, who I well know, I dance the threads of fate and time, and skip from here to eternity and back. I am a follower of the Hollow Tradition, the ragmen, the guardians of bones, the keepers of corpses. In other words, a Hollow One." "There is shadow under this red rock." Gegi smiles again. "Well met." 12 "Oh, I know how that feels, all right..." She looks around for the nearest Astarial. "We may have more problems here than we thought." Chloe shakes her head emphatically. "No, I am fine. Really. I'm sorry if I've disturbed you, Gegi." "You're about as fine as I am, dear." Astarial nods in agreement. "You've been through hell, and what sounds to me very much like some form of mental control. Now while many think that burying these things away inside helps, personally I believe that it just makes things harder for yourself. Let us help, if we can." He glances at Gegi. "We both want to, right?" "Of course we do." And she seems quite sincere in the desire to help. "I don't know what to suggest to you... we could block off the memories again and make you think you had a happy upbringing and start your life again from here, but I don't think that would be fair to you... "I don't want that, not at all." She shakes her head, "I'm sorry, I thought you wanted to hear the story. I know I did." "I -do- want to hear the story. I just don't want it to hurt you." "It's better to be sore than numb, I believe.." "True." Astarial mentally asks Gegi how to track down Chloe's father and destroy him. She responds <* I think it's more important to try and help her now than to make him pay for it... *> <* Absolutely, at this moment. But it may be some considerable time before I am able to leave this reality... and [rising anger] what he did was an abomination! Such as he cannot be allowed to escape paying the blood price for what they have done, especially if he lives and might return for her! And to that end, I WILL SEE HIM DEAD! *> <* [somewhat pained] Protect her from him, yes. If he comes after her again, perhaps destroy him, yes. Sometimes we have to. But bloody-minded revenge doesn't help anything... and people can change. *> <* [unnaturally calm and quiet] This is no mere revenge. That one committed a crime among the vilest against her, and yet lives. By right of oath and the laws of the Eledhri, his life is mine to take. For the ends of justice, and the perfection of the world. *> <* [strained] And if he begged forgiveness, and truly meant it? What then? *> <* [calming] Sorry. Didn't mean to 'shout'. *> "I think I'm getting a headache." <* [more normal voice] Besides, I might not be there when he returns for her. This is the only way to be sure he causes her no further harm... as the terms of my oath and duty demand. *> "There are no ways to be sure." 13 She thinks for a moment, making the subsequent emphaticism seem a bit forced, "He said I was blind, Gegi! Willfully ignorant!" "You -were- blind. And refusing to see... could be only a reference to the mental blocks that others have put in your head..." she offers apologetically. "He wasn't talking about what others had done, were doing, planned to do..." "He might have been. Readings are always open to interpretation. Ask her." She nods to Anne. "It was my card, not the others.." "But we're all intertwined." "He said you were beautiful, with a great strength, and important to this world." She can't meet Chloe's eyes. (You say I only hear what I want to...) Chloe smiles very gently, "It's true, you know.." She doesn't hear. You said I said you only hear what you want to. Just have that song dancing around in my head... You mean there's any room left in there? I had a vision of the Qlippothic Correspondence point in there earlier. There's room for everything. Just a little disjointed "And I hate my childhood," Gegi says. "You think me just like...?" She stops, the questioning tone already established. She blinks back humiliated tears. "Oh." Self-conscious suddenly, she wraps her arms around herself tightly, looking away. "I suppose it makes sense." Please don't cry... "No, no, it's not.." Cry? Blink sniffle whimper plead beg scream, maybe. Probably not in that order, though. Cry, though? There are some things Father just wouldn't stand for. Even from a girl. Sniffling nobly while bravely trying to hold it together sometimes works even better than collapsing into hysterics. She winces. "No, no, I don't think you just like anyone, except yourself. You -remind me of-. Not you -are-. Everything reminds me of other things. I'm always walking with ghosts. The connections don't always make -sense-, but they're hard to break... I disliked a skater because he looked like a diver that I disliked for some silly reason that I can't even remember." Chloe nods, because it seems the right thing to do. In her eyes, her expression, it's obvious. Too little, too late. "But why do" she stops, and said it softly enough that the silence is more natural than awkward. The question tone was again there, along with the end 'dislike me', unspoken. "I -like- you, okay? Would I have bothered telling you as much as I have if I didn't? You just bring out the dark side in me." She frowns, the insults just getting worse and worse, and steps back a bit. Is that better? Don't cringe or we'll have to hit you. Don't hit me, I'll have to cringe. It's a rule, you know. Back in the game again, and I don't play by the rules. "Quentin said I had no dark side. Why would I bring it out in you, for surely there must be some reason you can identify..." Chloe asks. "I don't know. I'm crazy. I don't know. It's not your fault." (Well, this is a depressing conversation. You want a hug? And give your slimy tentacles a chance? I don't have any slimy tentacles. I'm soft and cuddly and supportive and fun to hug. Really. You just keep telling yourself that, dear... I'm not going to eat you anymore, not now Why, do they taste better after you destroy all of their self esteem? They taste better when they scream and struggle. Once they start crying, though, the game is over. But who wins? Depends on who's scoring. Who do you think is winning? Good always wins they promised me that. In that case, love, you lose.) 14 "If you remember, that is exactly what Lachesis did *not* tell Chloe. About the deeper sight. In fact, the card of the Moon signifies confusion, an unwillingness or inability to understand. Chloe sighs softly and looks at the floor. Her lips and face set try to look annoyed, but her eyes are too sad for that. Somehow, Anne seems to notice. She lifts her hand touches Chloe's hair softly. "I'm sorry." It's unclear exactly what she's apologizing for. Chloe raises her eyes, but not her head, to look at the woman. "I wish you wouldn't be." "Then I will stop," she says simply. "I think I know who you are now," says Garret. "We've never met..." "But I've been watching you." finishes the woman. "Yes, I know you well, and you, Georgina. And you, Chloe." Her head snaps up in surprise. A double-check, "Miss?" "Anna, Chloe. I'm not a 'miss', and hopefully, never will be. Lachesis and I know one another. And Garret and I have been...acquaintances for some time, although this is the first time we've ever met in person. I can see things that you have done, and things that you will do. So I know you, although this is the first time we've met." Chloe curtseys. "Most pleased to meet you, miss. If you know of us, do you know... of her?" "Yes." Chloe doesn't know how to react to this. "Will you help me know of her, then, please?" "You want unkind answers. Have courage, you will not see her again. And she is not what you think." "Unkind, kind... I just want answers. She will not come back for me, then, as she said? She's not a demon, to enslave me, then, as they said?" Gegi looks over curiously. Anna sighs. "You will not see her again while you are here. Whether she wishes to enslave you I cannot say, but what she has made herself seem to be and what she is are separate things." She muses over this aloud, "While I am here... you cannot -say-... separate," and adds herself, "motives." "No, I cannot tell you. I can see it like a shape behind a curtain, but it is not clear to me." Plainly, Chloe says, "Garret is not a demon. I don't believe he ever was. And yet they know their own." "There's a little demon in everyone. We made them out of ourselves, you know. He knows his shadow well, that one. He has spawned demons as well as vanquished them, and not all are in a form you can touch." She pulls a card again. This one is the Devil. "He is full of guilt, Chloe. It's a monkey on his back and a serpent in his ear every day of his life. What he does, he does out of penitence. He thinks he's beyond it, but he isn't. It's too much a part of him. And what is a demon but a collected guilt-complex?" "A demon... why, I always thought a demon was a lack of penitence. A lack of everything that stops cruelty, and inhumane behaviors. Perhaps he just likes to think that. Likes to makes us think that." She stops for a moment, then nods, "I think I think that." "And is cruelty to oneself any less evil, Chloe? Perhaps he does like guilt. Many people do, you know. Negative emotions can be...acclimated to...until they become comfortable. Normal." "Hating yourself can be addictive... and hurting yourself seductive," Gegi murmurs. 15 Sniffling nobly while bravely trying to hold it together sometimes works even better than collapsing into hysterics. Especially if the floor is all dirty. Ah, but it's art! A pretty, fragile blonde, marred with the dirt and ashes of the world... No, blood has a much sharper contrast on a clean dress. Blood is too immediate. Raises either the hunger or the pressing need to clean and bandage. Dirt and bruises blinking at you helplessly can simply freeze you in your tracks... But it's so much more frightening when the one who cleans and bandages is also the one who drew the blood. Trust me, I'm a... well, I would know. True, true. If we're putting two people in the painting, blood can be effective. Poor little thing. Let me kiss it and make it better... But I'm not even bleeding Oh. Ah, do not fear, ma cherie. Put your hand in mine and all will be well... think of the wonders you'll have to tell to your grandchildren! Quelle histoire, n'est-ce pas? "Quentin said I had no dark side. Why would I bring it out in you, for surely there must be some reason you can identify" Chloe says. "I don't know. I'm crazy. I don't know. It's not your fault." "That doesn't make me want to understand any less.." Gegi smiles a little. (Self. Calm down. Be good now.) "I'd like to understand too. I don't like not being able to trust myself." She doesn't say, "I don't like not being able to trust you either." Well, not aloud anyway. What do you think I might do? Prove me right. Reach out and take my hand Chloe speaks... tenderly, like treading on unstable ground. I'm unstable, please don't walk on me... "Perhaps there is something specific you can identify. I do so want to work this through, Gegi.." She nods softly. "Any suggestions?" Chloe fidgets, uncomfortable but persevering. "Well.. is there something specific about me that brings it out? Did you notice it at any special point?" She smiles to herself and sings quietly, distracted, "Nothing, your hair in the moonlight..." She pulls herself together and back to Chloe. "I was frustrated with you after she cast the spell, when you wouldn't listen to me... but I didn't really feel anger until the moon. You threatened me, you know. You had a knife. You scared me. That was dangerous." Her eyes have an odd quality to them, such that one more modernized than Chloe might attribute it to too little sleep and too much caffeine. Chloe seems sad. Little lost sleeper left all alone. She doesn't have to be. If you trust me, you'll find that you can. If you don't, watch your back, because I'll know... If only I was capable of lying... Look into my eyes and tell me what you're thinking... Lesson number one when growing up in a house of Ventrue: The floor is our friend. Pay attention to the floor. Look at the floor. Easily solved... all I have to do is look pitiable and sing a sad little tune, and she'll be looking for my eyes again... Don't hit me, I'll have to cringe. It's a rule, you know. Back in the game again, and I don't play by the rules. It's my cringe, though. And I always play by the rules.. How about if I stroke your cheek gently and ask you not to be afraid? Big blue eyes looking into big blue eyes... That would merit an I-really-want-to-cringe-but-know-I-shouldn't muscle tightening. Would you like one of them? Oh, I have enough confused reactions. I really should walk away from this possibly fatal encounter, but I won't, I really should flee in terror from the demonic entity, but I'm not, I really shouldn't press the red button but I will anyway, I really should sacrifice this cute little blonde in a long and painful ceremony but I don't think I'm going to. If I may say so, miss, your last premise is rather faulty, but I do agree with the conclusion. Don't worry, little one, I wouldn't hurt you. But we really should get you out of here. It isn't safe. There are all sorts of monsters around. 16 Anne stands quietly, looking in Chloe's general direction. Her cards are gone, you're not sure if she put them up or if they vanished. "This world is dying. I see little point in using the last days to torture yourselves. Why can't you just accept your sorrows and Be?" She frowns and narrows her eyes. Gegi and Chloe get the distinct impression she's no longer aware of them. "The Hanged Man in the House of Bone...a Silver ship departs for the stars...the circle is made complete. Excuse me." She turns and moves unerringly towards wherever Rhiannon is standing, and approaches her somewhat hestitantly, her blind blue eyes staring off to Rhiannon's immediate left. "Rhiannon of the Birds?" she nods her head sharply, as though she's answered her own question. And unexpectedly, she puts her arms around Rhiannon in the most tender, supportive gesture she's made so far. "I'm very sorry," she says, and the sincerity is almost painful. "For what?" she asks, her voice disciplined into its usual calm, though her eyes revealing the lie. She looks up directly into Rhiannon's face. Her blue eyes are like mirrors, offering no purchase whatever. "There are some fates that are ordained, and some fates that are chosen. Changing a fate that is ordained is hard. Changing a fate that is chosen is impossible, because someone *cares*, you see? So I know I'm right." Gegi casts a glance over to Astarial. Fate. Happens. Anna shakes her head. Fate is Chosen. She lets go and steps back. "But he was right in the end. What goes around comes around. You can't steal what requires sacrifice without paying the price. It angers the gods, you see. But those who live in arrogance die in it as well." "But...I am sorry for you." (I'm selfish. I don't want him going any time soon... but it may not be soon that she's seeing. Yet for Rhiannon, the time might move faster... and so I am sorry as well. Even if it is the right ending to the story.) Thought, not said. Gegi turns away, pretending to be untroubled. 17 "What's the point in shared reality if _you're_ not sharing?", he shifts the emphasis, "If you're not yourself, you're probably just part of someone else...", he blinks, continuing with his train of thought, but obviously losing conviction, "and that's no fun at all..." "All connected, and not alone..." "All broken and strewn across the galaxy...", he says with some sadness and a pinch of pain. "There's more than a galaxy to be strewn across... but can what was once whole ever truly be parted?" "We all do the best we can, really..." "No. No we don't." "Don't we?" "Some of us try... But not all of us...", melancholy settles over him once more. "I try. You try. Don't we?" "Crying in gladness, laughing in shame, Sitting in silence when you call out my name. How do I tell you? What do I say? When you let me near how could I turn away?" She stands too near the edge, ready to fall. She stands too near the Edge, ready to fall. Or to Fall. As some have done before. For him? "And I just want to touch you, to hold you in my arms, To reach out and carress you and keep you from all harm. And I don't want to hurt you, it fills me with such fear, But I don't think that I can turn away the next time you draw near..." He opens his eyes, anguish fills them, understanding, sorrow and utter, utter despair. Her eyes meet his, blue and trembling. <* Do you realize what you're doing to me? *> His eyes are almost bleeding, loss so intense, ancient wounds reopened, a silent cry (from deep inside) "Do you realise what you're doing to _me_?" <* Should I be sorry? *> He smiles through the tears, "Sorry? By this I know that I still live... No regrets... We move only forward... On." It hurts to look and hurts to look away. She does not speak. His eyes, cavernous (falling) a man who loved his God (and killed him) because he thought it was all he could do. A man whose memories are ashes (crumbling through his hands. Lost.) who destroys everything he touches (even the world) who destroys everything he loves (even the world) Destroy me, I won't mind... Give it time. Time and I don't always align well. He bows his head, shudders a moment and returns, "Georgina... The danger is not what we expected, I'm... I think, perhaps, the two of us shouldn't continue such an..." "This isn't what we thought we'd started..." she says to herself. "And the rules are not the same..." She smiles a little. "So what are the rules now?" "The choice is yours." She holds out a hand to him, palm up, and says nothing. He looks at her hand and meets her eyes (and smiles) shyly. Reaching out he places hand on hers, a gentle squeeze. She squeezes back, lightly. (Blush? Haven't we done that before?) "So," she starts and stops. "So tell me about Michael Edge, the mage I only slightly knew, in a Cafe and a Pub long ago..." 18 "Our fates are intertwined" says Chloe to Anna. "Everyone's fates are intertwined. Like a haiku" "But she wrote the haiku, she holds the choices," protests Chloe. "She did not. your choices are yet yours to make. In fact, they always are. That is the great secret of the infernal. You can be free of them at any time, but you must *want* it." Gegi touches her necklace, looks over to herself and Edge, and says nothing. And gets a sense of...awareness from Anna. She doesn't look at her and doesn't change her tone, but she gets the impression that Anna caught that. (If he's technically... and I'm... does that mean...) (The important thing is, what does it mean to you?) (Too near the Edge, ready to Fall, but he's not a -bad- kind of infernal...) Anna sighs. "You will not see her again while you are here. Whether she wishes to enslave you I cannot say, but what she has made herself seem to be and what she is are separate things." "What is she, then?" she asks quietly, not speaking to or near Anna, but sure that she will be heard anyway. "Are you quite sure you don't know?" asks Anna carefully. She looks in Rhiannon's direction. "She is -not- me. I am sure of that. But I think she has something to do with me... someone I'm to meet again, or have met before and can't remember, someone who will be important to me. There is a familiarity, but it's not of this time..." "Yes. She is...like you." "She is not a future me. She is -not-." "Again: Why are you so sure?" "Because I've had a bit of experience with running into myself lately. Different me's and different worlds and different times. If she were -me-, I would know. She isn't. She's someone else. Close to me, but not me." And her words have the ring of truth... Anna smiles. "So. You know she is not you. But she is connected to you, somehow. she knows you. And she knows Chloe, and Garret. She is not Nephandi, although she pretends well. She is not Technocracy, although she pretends well." Gegi blinks. "She's not a Nephandi? She didn't come from..." Frederick, long quiet, speaks again. "Nephandi usually do not appear in all their corrupted glory. Only dimwits like Nephwrack do so. Anything that looks like what you expect a Nephandus to be usually is just trying to have you believe they are Nephandi. Not that they could not be, of course." "One wonders why anyone would wish to be mistaken for Nephandi... well, it could be protection, in any place but here. In some circumstances, looking like an evil and powerful person can convince others to leave you alone..." She looks at Chloe, distracted. "I couldn't wait to escape from my reputation, but once I found myself free of it, I didn't know how to act outside of its framework..." Anna goes on. "She is none of those things. What does that leave?" "I... I don't know." "There are only two other factions, if she belongs to one at all, that could own her. One is the Council of Nine Traditions." "And the others are the Marauders. Which could explain why nothing seems to make sense." "But she was evil!" protests Chloe. "She is not Nephandi, Chloe. She acts well. She's walking crisis. She's a disaster waiting to happen, the way tectonic plates slam into each other and build up heat and pressure inside the earth." "But why?" "Because of fate, if you like. Or because twenty green aliens crashed on the moon in a spaceship twenty-thousnad years ago, and a butterfly beat its wings in the amazon rain forest. If she is what I think she is, she has no need or want for causality," says Anna. "Cause doesn't always precede effect," Gegi says, half to herself. Chloe sighs, wrinkling her brow up in frustration with herself and her inability to decipher this puzzle. "Maybe..." says Anna slowly, "there *is* no answer. Maybe we're just wasting time looking for answers that don't exist." 19 Reach out and take my hand. You know you want to. I do so beg to differ. You've been so brave. We're very proud of you. But the time is coming for us to depart. Come with me, little one... Chloe fidgets, uncomfortable but persevering. "Well.. is there something specific about me that brings it out? Did you notice it at any special point?" Gegi smiles to herself and sings quietly, distracted, "Nothing, your hair in the moonlight..." Chloe frowns and instinctually goes to resettle her lovely blonde ringlets on her fragile little shoulders. She doesn't look at Chloe. "Lindsay was blond, you know. But you're much nicer than she was. She was my best friend, and she betrayed me, and I loved her still, but I won in the end... I'm a bad person to cross. Connie was blond, too. But -she-" she sighs. She pulls herself together and back to Chloe. "I was frustrated with you after she cast the spell, when you wouldn't listen to me... but I didn't really feel anger until the moon. You threatened me, you know. You had a knife. You scared me. That was dangerous." She lowers her head in shame. A forgotten apology. There were so many to make. "I'm so sorry, Gegi, I was crazed with terror, I didn't mean to threaten or scare you. It was dangerous, I know, but really, I was just thinking to protect myself, I wouldn't, I couldn't have hurt anyone! I'm sorry." She seems to say that a lot. "It wasn't your fault. You did the best you could." Somehow there is the vaguest implication that her best wasn't very much. "I just - react badly, sometimes, if I feel threatened. You didn't get that close to me, luckily. I might have hurt you, otherwise." Her eyes have an odd quality to them, such that one more modernized than Chloe might attribute it to too little sleep and too much caffeine. Fortunately for this lovely storyline, Chloe can safely attribute it to dark and demonic intentions. Eyes of night... Ah, do not fear, ma cherie. Put your hand in mine and all will be well... think of the wonders you'll have to tell to your grandchildren! Quelle histoire, n'est-ce pas? Oui, n'est-ce pas. I'd not tell children such stories... They will cluster at your knee and beg for the stories of the great Lady Chloe and her adventures, how she found the magic within herself, how she traveled to faraway lands, how she rescued her prince and how they loved... and how beautiful she was, and how brave! It is time for the beginning to end, and for you to move on... come with me! "You don't have to hide being afraid of me. Really. I'll know anyway. Isn't it better for us to be honest with each other?" Defensively, Alice to the Jabberwocky, "I'm not afraid of you." Sure, she has to be honest with others, but that doesn't mean she has to be honest with herself. She reaches out her hand to touch Chloe's cheek. Just the barest brushing of fingertips, a soft caress. Her eyes, blue, wide (Benefits of being farsighted. The glasses magnify.), pleading. "Aren't you?" Her voice, quiet, melodic, sorrowful... Lesson number one when growing up in a house of Ventrue: The floor is our friend. Pay attention to the floor. Look at the floor. Easily solved... all I have to do is look pitiable and sing a sad little tune, and she'll be looking for my eyes again... Well, congratulations, you've just upped your cruel, manipulating and insensitive factor.. I resent that. I am very sensitive. It helps me know just where to stab. Would you like a sticker, or a table to sacrifice the virgin on?) I don't believe I know for certain that Chloe is such (Although I could take a safe guess) and sacrificing myself at this juncture would be silly. (I'm perfectly innocent. Really.) Why don't you come with me, little girl, on a magic carpet ride? 20 The jukebox starts to crank up, and the strains sounding from it's speakers is recognizable as the Alice In Chains' son _Rotten Apple_. The people in the pub start getting these, well, flashes, like memory, just recalled, but it's of scenes most would never have seen. "Hey ah na na Innocence is over Hey ah na na Over" "Hey ah na na Ignorance is spoken Hey ah na na Spoken" "Hey ah na na Confidence is broken Hey ah na na Broken" "Hey ah na na Sustenance is stolen Hey ah na na Stolen" "Hey ah na na Arrogance is potent Hey ah na na Potent" "What I see is unreal I've written my own part Eat of the apple so young I'm crawling back to start" "Hey ah na na A romance is fallen Hey ah na na Fallen" "Hey ah na na Recommend you borrow Hey ah na na Borrow" "What I see is unreal I've written my own part Eat of the apple so young I'm crawling back to start" "Hey ah na na I repent tomorrow Hey ah na na Tomorrow" "Hey ah na na I suspend my sorrow Hey ah na na Sorrow" [Fade out] A Gegi, who had previously been hiding somewhere behind Karieta and Astarial, blinks. Her face goes blank as she sinks into a chair, where she remains, unmoving.