[ Julie has spent over two weeks in a cycle. Go to the Singularity, guide their shared consciousness as they look for psychic scraps of the kidnapped Summoned. See something, get immediately thrown out of the Horizon to suffer the physical effects of allowing herself to be used as a channel. Sleep and eat for a while. Repeat once she feels any better.
It's a taxing loop, to be sure, especially after months of some remnant of the Singularity running amok inside of her head. Despite exhaustion driving her to sleep for hours and near insatiable hunger, there are physical signs that she's pushing herself too hard. Her eyes are dark, her skin sallow. Her nerves are frayed from the Singularity's neediness, the sheer effort needed to navigate its emotional magnitude.
But she still stubbornly returns each time, as soon as she can, to the big cushion on the ground that she's made her perch. The big white wolf from Kaer Morhen never leaves her side, remains even when she's forced out of the Horizon. The pink crystals on the collar it wears sparkle from under the thick fur.
It's here that it first happens. She's taking a bit of a rest, sitting with her legs folded lotus-style as the wolf tears at a rack of ribs beside her. Silently, she drinks from a bottle of water, but in her head, there is a back-and-forth happening.
The Singularity pushes at her -- it wants to continue its unceasing search for the connections it is struggling to find. But Julie does not have the energy of an all-powerful magical colossus. She tells it, as patiently as she is capable of in this moment, that it must wait. Give her a break or she's going to be too drained to come back. She can feel its ire rising, the frustration not unlike that of a toddler being told no.
With a sigh, she prepares herself to once more try and reason with a titanic numen incapable of human logic. But that's when she feels it. A familiar crawl under her skin, like an itch she can never hope to scratch.
The same itch she'd felt as others traipsed through her domain while she was lost between psychic planes, trapped. The itch that grew and grew, as it does now, the longer they'd stayed. But this time, it doesn't feel like slime coating her, like toxic ooze. This time, it feels tingles ghosting up her spine, oddly pleasant; she can't help but recall being a child with her eyes closed, listening to her friends softly chanting crack an egg on your head, let the yolk run down.
Without thinking, she rises to her feet and spins, looks around. The wolf watches her, clearly unnerved enough to stop gnawing the bone it still holds between its paws. Julie darts to the edge of the Singularity and looks around it. ]
Hello? Is someone there? Hello?
[ There's no response, but the sensation remains. She turns and looks out toward the rest of the Horizon, the various buildings and natural features that make up the domains. For a moment, she lets her eyes wander, as if she might suddenly see someone she's searching for.
No one appears. But still the tingles go on, and she abruptly begins to run in one direction, driven by nothing but pure instinct. She simply knows there's someone there, someone she needs to find. An absolute certainty, same as she'd found her own domain, pre-made for her. The same as she found Wanda with nothing more than a name to go on. It's a feeling she's only ever had here, in the Horizon.
Her heels pound the ground, and her voice almost echoes in the air. ]
Horizon | Week 3 start | OTA for the first few to return to the Horizon
It's a taxing loop, to be sure, especially after months of some remnant of the Singularity running amok inside of her head. Despite exhaustion driving her to sleep for hours and near insatiable hunger, there are physical signs that she's pushing herself too hard. Her eyes are dark, her skin sallow. Her nerves are frayed from the Singularity's neediness, the sheer effort needed to navigate its emotional magnitude.
But she still stubbornly returns each time, as soon as she can, to the big cushion on the ground that she's made her perch. The big white wolf from Kaer Morhen never leaves her side, remains even when she's forced out of the Horizon. The pink crystals on the collar it wears sparkle from under the thick fur.
It's here that it first happens. She's taking a bit of a rest, sitting with her legs folded lotus-style as the wolf tears at a rack of ribs beside her. Silently, she drinks from a bottle of water, but in her head, there is a back-and-forth happening.
The Singularity pushes at her -- it wants to continue its unceasing search for the connections it is struggling to find. But Julie does not have the energy of an all-powerful magical colossus. She tells it, as patiently as she is capable of in this moment, that it must wait. Give her a break or she's going to be too drained to come back. She can feel its ire rising, the frustration not unlike that of a toddler being told no.
With a sigh, she prepares herself to once more try and reason with a titanic numen incapable of human logic. But that's when she feels it. A familiar crawl under her skin, like an itch she can never hope to scratch.
The same itch she'd felt as others traipsed through her domain while she was lost between psychic planes, trapped. The itch that grew and grew, as it does now, the longer they'd stayed. But this time, it doesn't feel like slime coating her, like toxic ooze. This time, it feels tingles ghosting up her spine, oddly pleasant; she can't help but recall being a child with her eyes closed, listening to her friends softly chanting crack an egg on your head, let the yolk run down.
Without thinking, she rises to her feet and spins, looks around. The wolf watches her, clearly unnerved enough to stop gnawing the bone it still holds between its paws. Julie darts to the edge of the Singularity and looks around it. ]
Hello? Is someone there? Hello?
[ There's no response, but the sensation remains. She turns and looks out toward the rest of the Horizon, the various buildings and natural features that make up the domains. For a moment, she lets her eyes wander, as if she might suddenly see someone she's searching for.
No one appears. But still the tingles go on, and she abruptly begins to run in one direction, driven by nothing but pure instinct. She simply knows there's someone there, someone she needs to find. An absolute certainty, same as she'd found her own domain, pre-made for her. The same as she found Wanda with nothing more than a name to go on. It's a feeling she's only ever had here, in the Horizon.
Her heels pound the ground, and her voice almost echoes in the air. ]
Where are you? Please, I wanna help you!