EVENT #18: EMERGENCE - IC EVENT LOG

[abraxasmods]

Event #18 - Emergence

OOC Plotting Post ⦁ Pre-Event Info ⦁ Setting Descriptions

Whether voluntary or by force, you find yourself transported to the Singularity's crater. There probably aren't many resistors - officials have taken great pains to convince you to come voluntarily, reserving force as a last resort - but it's clear that everyone is required for this to work. It takes multiple mages to stabilize the portal, but you make it there in one piece. If you cooperate, you'll be asked to walk towards the ancient relic. If you resisted, you might be forced to do so while restrained. Regardless, a heavy fog soon descends around the area, obscuring you and your vision.

If you have thoughts of turning back, it's too late: for some of you, the second you step across the threshold, a force pulls at your chest and absorbs your psyche at once. For others, a mystical call beckons you to walk a little further before the same effect takes hold. And for a rare few, the call brings you to the Singularity itself, where you're compelled to touch it - and are subsequently swallowed up like the others.

The Horizon doesn't greet you like you might expect. Instead, something far stranger awaits.

Please communicate with your fellow players as needed! We also recommend discussing with us if you plan on a major environmental upheaval. As a rule of thumb, you should avoid changes to the landscape that will significantly alter the established map.

We've also posted comment sections for WORLDBUILDING and HANDWAVED submissions. Instructions can be found at the respective links.

Year 20,879

When you open your eyes, it feels like you've only blinked. If your body has transformed or you're someplace that shouldn't exist, it doesn't strike you as odd. You were always here. Everything around you was always here, and your physical alterations and new abilities - while perhaps not originally there - have been a part of you for a long, long time.

The world of Abraxas isn't completely foreign. Familiar territories remain, as well as the familiar faces of those with long lifespans. But a lot has changed in 800 years, too, especially where the Gods are concerned. Alongside the Old Gods of the Ancient Pantheon and the Cardinal Gods of the New Order, a third class of deities formed from you and your fellow Summoned: the Ecesis Gods of the Iterum Pantheon.

Politics, People, & Gods

Abraxas's political landscape remains complex, with continued tensions over land, worship, resources, and power. Nonetheless, since the Free Cities is no longer intent on destroying the Singularity, conflict over the ancient relic has lessened. All territories agree that the Godlands - and the Singularity - belong to the Gods themselves.

Beliefs and Gods

The active presence of the Summoned confirms the existence of the Gods. As a result, most Abraxans turn to the Summoned and other Gods for aid or protection. Extreme reverence exists in certain areas, especially on the Isle of the Lost and in parts of Solvunn. In other places, though, the Gods are merely acknowledged as a facet of life - a force that helps or hinders depending on temperament and should be respected, much like the sea. The Gods play a crucial role, sure, but so do the rain and stars. This is particularly true in the Feywilds, the Nether, and the Free Cities.

Small pockets of non-believers actively denounce the Gods. They claim the Summoned should be wiped from the world and the Singularity destroyed to prevent future invasions. Labeled dangerous heretics by Thorne and Solvunn, and "regressives" by the Free Cities - whose scientists and philosophers liken such thinking to be as foolish as declaring the sun unworthy or the earth to be flat - these people are shunned from society. In Solvunn, the consequences are more severe: heretics are exiled to the Barren, where they are subsumed by the desert, the Maw, or whichever Gods may punish them.

At the other end, some sects revere the Godlands so much that they believe feeding themselves to the relic will enhance Abraxas' good fortune for generations to come. Such cults are quite rare, but there are reports of mortals throwing themselves into the Singularity's crater and disintegrating as a gesture of their devotion to the divine.

International Relations

Due to the combined change in their priorities, Thorne and the Free Cities are less at odds. The Free Cities believes in protecting the Singularity; Thorne no longer seeks to control it. Nonetheless, mistrust flares on occasion.

While things are peaceful during these three months and have been for a few decades, Abraxas hasn't found a cure for war in the Gods. Conflict has broken out in the past and will again. Eyes are on the Nether as it grows in power, and who knows how long Thorne will be content with its losses? Will they convince the Velan Republic to reunite and turn against the Free Cities? For now, though, the territories have found their stride and appear more interested in progress than fighting.

Magic & The Singularity

Magic is relatively unchanged and is a vital part of Abraxan life. The small kingdom of Thorne continues to practice Academic Magic. Meanwhile, Wild Magic plays the same important role in the Velan Republic (formally Nott). Meanwhile, the Free Cities has developed New Magic further. The goal of decoupling magic from technology is less of a focus. Instead, researchers are eager to find new ways to fuse magic and innovation, including aspects of the Gods. Portable shrines, for example, are popular with traveling merchants.

High Magic no longer exists as a specific school of magic now that offerings, pacts, and requests to the Gods are a part of everyday life across Abraxas. Solvunn has returned to its roots, using the ancient Academic Magic practiced by the Lunae for standard tasks while turning to the Gods for greater blessings.

The Singularity has been relatively stable for the past two or three centuries. While occasional disturbances rumble, for the most part, the presence of the Summoned has strengthened it, alleviating its displeasure and ensuring that Abraxas - and possibly the universe itself - continues to exist. Indeed, academic writings from Thorne and the Free Cities across time suggest that the Singularity's devouring of the world has considerably slowed. It is now as much of a threat as the eventual collapse of the sun, something that is bound to occur but not for eons.

Of course, this could quickly change if the Summoned or any other Gods provoke the Singularity by rejecting its connection or denying its magic...so all should take care not to upset the nature of things.

Old World, New World

The map of Abraxas has undergone some notable shifts, although many names and places are the same.

Setting descriptions are HERE for your reference.

Mechapolis, the Witchwood, and the Barren/the Maw contain prompts related to the event itself. Information about those areas can be found under "Exploring the Land" in the section The World as the Divine (Month 1-2).

Month 1-2: Submersion

What do you last remember? Well, that depends. You might recall most things perfectly clearly. You might have new memories that don't feel new at all. Or, you might only remember the most recent year or two. Regardless, there is something missing: an important face, a handful of key events...maybe you don't remember having ever lived anywhere except Abraxas. You might find this unsettling, or you might accept it as just the way things are.

You've transcended those old memories, anyhow. You feel a little distant from the person you were centuries ago, and you most likely look different, too. Perhaps you've sprouted giant wings, become a formless void, or you're now a shapeshifter with no permanent appearance. You've gained a substantial amount of power and influence, the type that people of this world attribute to the Gods.

The first half is a more sandbox-like environment designed for scenarios that emphasize CR and personal character moments. Active conflict between the emergent reality and the world will not arise until the second half.

The World as the Divine

The mortals have bestowed you with a title and possibly a new alias. Do you know your mortal name anymore? Some of you might've taken on a new identity, or you might have held very tightly onto who you were. Regardless, your abilities have grown. Your new powers and appearance are as unique as your dominion, influenced by your interests, subconscious desires, or personal relationships.

While in your full God form, you'll move through the world unperceived. Only when you're sought by a mortal - followers, believers, cultists - can you consciously make your complete divine presence known. To be seen freely by all, you'll have to take on a less overwhelming shape to the mortal gaze. Those who have met the Old Gods or Cardinal Gods in the past finally understand why they seldom reveal their true selves, often arriving in hazy visions or speaking through animals.

Exploring the Land

◎ The Witchwood

As the Summoned continued to ascend, their power began to coalesce, creating a new ecosystem never seen before. The dense woods, originally a temperate climate, warmed and grew into a thriving jungle. The air is humid and heavy with magic, the sky locked into an eternal sunset. Reds and oranges filter through the thick canopy. Birdcall and animal cries echo throughout the jungle. Trees and rocks seemingly move at night, meaning the Witchwood is impossible to map. Foolhardy souls who venture too deep are rarely seen again - unless divine intervention prevents a tragic fate from befalling them. Perhaps one of those intervening Gods is you?

The most dangerous beasts in the Witchwood are the demigod spawns. Creatures born from the Summoned, demigods are powerful enough to affect the world around them should they ever leave the magic-encased forest. See Impact & Consequences for more details on the demigods and how, as the Summoned, you can help maintain Abraxas' ecosystem.

◎ Mechapolis

Heartwood Syndrome persisted in Fomalhaut long after the quarantined population died out. The port city stood as a monument to loss for nearly a century until about 200 years in when the Summoned gained notable influence as Gods. This resulted in a slow but steady acceptance of the Singularity's power as a positive force for potential advancement. New Magic boomed, leading to increased sophistication in technology and the refinement of automatons.

Originally designed to clear and guard Fomalhaut, they were eventually used to rebuild it. Fomalhaut became known as the City of Machines and was renamed Mechapolis. Although humans are barred from entering for safety, the automatons gather soil and air samples for study and perform fishing duties. The clockworks require routine maintenance and must return to a hub city or outpost for recalibration. Clockwork birds are used to communicate with Mechapolis. They can broadcast through the Free Cities's primitive "radio" towers.

You can enhance clockwork performance, boosting the towers or providing additional energy to the automatons. Scientists often have "rituals" when performing maintenance or experiments to earn the Gods' favor, hoping this will prevent their inventions from breaking down.

◎ The Barren/The Badlands

Once contested territory between Thorne and the Free Cities, the Badlands was split into two by a large ravine shortly after Thorne retreated to Hayle. With neither side able to breach the gap, Solvunn naturally laid claim to the western half while the Free Cities retained its eastern half. On the eastern side, the chasm swallowed several well-known bandit camps and the presence of a new entity further drove them away. Bandits now occupy the mountains northeast of Aquila. Due to the entity's threat, the Free Cities increased its military presence in the Badlands to keep careless or foolish travelers from straying too far.

Meanwhile, Solvunn has named its portion of the wasteland the Barren and sought the Gods' assistance to form an enchanted forest. Those who enter are lost forever. Meant for more than just protection, the forest and the Barren serve as a place of exile. Heretics are taken into the woods and left to wander towards the Barren's harsh desert. There, they will face the elements, be devoured by the waiting Maw...or encounter a God.

As a God, you can lead the exiles to their salvation or doom, but choose carefully: the Maw is hungry and must be fed. These exiles want you dead. They don't care for you, and should their lack of faith spread, they might revive attempts to destroy the Singularity - and with it, your home. Is it so wrong to leave them to their fate? On the other hand, saving them might convert them by demonstrating your kindness.

◎ The Maw

The Maw lurks beneath the chasm dividing the Badlands. Named for its gaping jaws, the Maw waits at the widest part of a jagged canyon, mouth open and salivating in the desert heat. Rows and rows of teeth as tall as a man spiral downward into a bloodshot throat. When sated, it retreats deep into the gully, barely visible aside from the shine of a tooth. When hungry, it draws closer to the surface. Hot and heavy winds often carry the putrid scent of its half-digested meals.

Solvunn is not the only territory that uses the Maw. The Free Cities will occasionally march criminals and bandits in that direction, as well, tossing them into the gaping mouth, although this method of execution is much rarer. Desperate exiles from Solvunn will try to cross the chasm despite the danger. None ever make it - at least, not without divine intervention.

Horizon, "Death," and Dormancy

Your domain in the Horizon is no longer constrained by size. How it's changed depends on you. The more detached from your mortality, the more likely it'll have surrealist elements: bizarre statues, physics-defying architecture, odd visual or psychological effects. The Horizon feels like home to all Gods, although you ought to take care not to heed its call beyond reason. Shutting yourself off from the physical world can result in unintended consequences...but completely refusing to enter the Horizon will do the same.

Additionally, Gods are beyond true death, but that doesn't mean you can act with impunity. Engaging in an exhaustive battle with other Gods can weaken you into dormancy. In this state, you will enter an ethereal void inside the Singularity. As you heal, you'll slowly be able to return to your Horizon domain and then the physical world once more. Depending on the extent of the damage, this process could take anywhere from months to decades. For instance, losing your head could take a few months, total dismemberment might take a year, and being vaporized into atoms can take a few decades.

Mortals cannot achieve this level of damage, even if they seemingly "succeed" in striking true. Only a God can weaken another God into dormancy. If a mortal removes your head, you can merely pick it up and put it back on.

Impact & Consequences

In the early years of your ascension, you might've wondered why the existing Gods seemingly intervened so little. Why did they not demonstrate their powers more blatantly over the thousands of years? Is it apathy? A desire to watch rather than act? As you come into your abilities, you realize that the Singularity and the universe are significantly more delicate than you thought. You begin to understand why the Gods have behaved the way they do.

Of course, whether you care to keep the world (and yourself) in balance is another story, but to be sure, some of the other Gods and the Summoned do - and you may have to defend your choices.

The equilibrium mechanic is described in OOC terms HERE. The Singularity and a character's ascension will not inherently sway them one way or the other. Any temptations will result from individual personality and development.

Instability Effects

To maintain the universe's equilibrium, you need to be cautious of when and how you interfere when using your status to alter the state of the world. Conversely, you'll also need to take care not to withdraw entirely. Several Gods have undergone periods of instability, though others haven't. Which category you fall under is up to you. It depends on who you are, your experiences, and your desires.

◎ Should you refuse to ACKNOWLEDGE your Godhood or enter the Horizon, you'll find yourself losing time. You may forget how you got from one place to another, or names you knew yesterday slip your mind. Lapses in memory or time can be temporary or permanent, but one thing they are is certainly confusing. With magic building inside you and nowhere for it to go, your power will begin to spill over, causing the Singularity to exhibit bursts of power that spawn demigods in the Witchwood.

◎ Should you give into the temptation to OVERINDULGE your Godhood or retreat to the Horizon for excessive periods, you'll lose more of yourself and your history. You may make decisions that feel unlike you, forget larger chunks of old memories, or struggle to distinguish what's real. Unrestrained use of magic will cause you to absorb yet more power, causing the Singularity to lose power in brief spurts, which can spawn demigods in the Witchwood.

These effects can be halted or even reversed in some cases. You might need someone's help to bring you back or convince you there's another way, or maybe you're the one seeking others out to assist. What you do soon understand is that your ability to manage your powers and stabilize your connection to the Horizon directly affects the Singularity and Abraxas...something that may have been true the moment you were summoned.

Demigod Spawns

Under the red haze of the Witchwood, monstrous creatures known as demigods or spawns emerge from crimson waterfalls and claw their out through the mossy soil. Born out of instabilities caused by careless actions from all Gods, they're usually contained to the Witchwood. For the most part, the older Gods - and the Summoned, if they choose - keep the demigods from leaving. However, now and again, one or two might escape, damaging towns, destroying villages, or causing ecological destruction in ways that are similar to natural disasters.

Demigods are not sentient. How they look can vary, but their appearances are often corrupted and disturbing: twisted animals, amorphous blobs, or alien-like parasites. They may resemble a monster you recognize from home.

Defeating one is possible but a challenge even for the Gods. Most crucially, you cannot kill your own spawn. Another God must deliver the killing blow, so working together is imperative. Should too many demigod spawns be allowed to invade the Witchwood, they will overwhelm and disrupt the Singularity further. Culling them is the only way to maintain stability.

You can submit demigod spawns you create to the WORLDBUILDING section if you want. Similar to using character powers, just keep the scale of destruction at a reasonable level.

Hearing Echoes

Echoes are a form of prayer that resonates through your connection with the Singularity. Solvunn has dedicated a monument to where the "First Echo" was heard, though the accuracy of this is debatable. Like the Network, you can hear an Echo regardless of where you are and can shut them out with concentration. However, your ties to Godhood may compel you to listen every so often. Mortals can entreat you through more formal methods (rituals, offerings, seasonal ceremonies) or in a moment of duress or desperation. They may seek you specifically or call to any God who will listen.

You can answer or ignore these cries for help as you like, but your choices carry consequences. Answer too many too eagerly, and your increased interference in mortal lives can upset the world's equilibrium - and the Singularity. Ignore your impact on the world, and your refusal to accept your ascension will equally destabilize the land as prayers go unheard.

Interacting with Other Gods

The Old Gods and the Cardinal Gods are an equal part of this world. For the most part, you coexist peacefully, though personal pacts and tensions can play a role. Each of you is aware of the impact of your actions on the Singularity: extreme displays of power are reserved for substantial transgressions, considering the price it carries.

Further, the older Gods have also walked the earth for centuries before you came. To them, you're still young, and rising against one of them won't end well for you. Nonetheless, many older Gods are more interested in giving advice or guiding you, ensuring the health of the Singularity and the universe so as not to doom all of you - Gods and mortals alike - to the void.

You can REQUEST AN INTERACTION with a God. Interactions will be brief but informative.

You will not be able to request a specific God. For logistical reasons, we have curated the list of Gods available ahead of time. However, we'll do our best to pick one from the pool that suits the purpose of your request.

Month 3: Awakening

Over the past 2 months, you've existed in the emergent reality without question. As you enter the third month, however, everything you've known over the past many centuries begins to shift. You might decide to investigate further, wondering if there's more out there that you aren't seeing. Alternatively, you might choose to ignore it, believing that your awakening is damaging the world and your life.

Catalysts

A catalyst can occur at any time through any circumstance. Do you see a familiar face you've forgotten in the eyes of a stranger? Do you recall a moment in your past while watching the mortals? Has a friend approached you specifically to try and remind you of the things you've forgotten?

With each memory returned you'll gain another piece of yourself. Depending on how much you've lost and how hard you'll cling to this reality, the effect may be clarifying or it might cause you distress and confusion. You might begin to encounter temporal cracks: buildings or areas that normally don't exist will flicker in and out of existence, or your reflection will briefly show an image of you from before your transformations took hold.

If you allow yourself to doubt your abilities or divinity, you might have trouble controlling your powers. If you've made alterations to your Horizon domain, it might start to revert to its original design.

These cracks are difficult to ignore, but if you bury your head, you can make them disappear - briefly, at least.

Shattered Skies

The effects go beyond the individual. As more of you and your fellow Gods reawaken, the sky also begins to form cracks that spread like broken glass. Through the fractures, you glimpse flashes of lightning and a swirling fog. The fissures only grow larger.

Soon, you realize you can see the Singularity itself, reflected upside-down in the crater. Disconcerting though it is, it may serve as proof that something is very wrong. Of course, you can also refuse to acknowledge this disturbance, closing your eyes to the crumbling sky. Doing so will let you remain unaware to the very end, but your friends who are seeking the truth might find your denial distressing.

The sky won't hold, though. Eventually, it does shatter completely - and you awaken abruptly, your body and others scattered several feet away from the Singularity's crater as if you were physically thrown out. The fog begins to dissipate. The lightning has stopped, the unrelenting storms fading across Abraxas. Whatever you went through, it seems to have done exactly what the territories hoped: stabilize the Singularity.

Characters will be returned home afterward. They will be thanked for their assistance regardless of if they cooperated.

Resistors will not face any consequences, as long as they don't cause excessive trouble upon their return. Officials will issue an apology for the heavy-handed action, stating that they saw no other way to keep the world safe. With the portals and weather returning to normal, it does seem to have worked...even if characters may not find the method agreeable.

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Comments

um. look. I. hrrrrg. yeah. congrats this is the longest tag I've ever written????? erm.

[thedevilwhorose]

Oh, yes, Hell's his, thanks for the reminder, he definitely brought that down onto himself, yeah. The realm he's always first known for, the realm he refuses to ever call home, the realm that's just as much as a shackle to connect him to the Cage.

The realm he likely could have shaped into being more but he just wanted every being to feel the immeasurable darkness that he did, so why not like he twisted humans, twist a portion of the planet, the gem that he loved just to prove he could. If his Father was going to let oblivion swallow him up, then he'd make sure that black hole was permanently going to remain affixed. Lock him up and throw away the key, but Hell wasn't going anywhere, Father, you can't JUST FORGET ABOUT HIM.

"I would've preferred it!"

Dying. He knows that answer clearly, remembers Wanda asking him so long ago, but the where and when escapes him like mist.

Remembers making the foolish decision to try to lock up the Darkness again and all he can further remember from that scene is the way she looked when she realized they (who? who was there other than him?) weren't going kill her. Remembers his own feelings at thinking he was wanted, and loved, and valuable again to their Father that it mattered more than knowing exactly what she was feeling. The desperation and hopelessness and more than anything in existence not wanting to be locked up again and yet he pressed on, anyway.

He doesn't remember how that ended, at all, and he finds himself grasping for a hole in his memories because surely he changed his mind, surely he reached out to her, surely he gave her what she wanted instead of following orders, surely he wasn't like Michael.

"Do you know how long I waited for you to come back?! To pull me out? To see me? To do anything!? Until I realized you weren't coming, none of you."

It's the most raw emotion that's slipped through Lucifer's cool and calculated exterior since he was returned to this form. Figures it would be family.

It was always family. This family. The one he wasn't allowed to choose.

As Michael goes for his bite, teeth break past the automatic uncontrolled flair of a shield. A translucent mantle of a chimera overlaying Lucifer. An old gift from the Singularity from hundreds of years ago, now bolstered. It never seems to particularly sync with a creature that he had a good time with, though he doesn't remember how he acquired this mode.

He just dislikes it because it furthers his appearance more into ravenous beast, not that that has ever been a problem to his siblings. Then again, he thought they would love him for whatever he became, regardless what side he stood on.

I hate what you did. I've never hated you. (It's somewhere, lodged in the sea of his colored thoughts, unmoored, fragmented.)

The shield snaps between his flesh and Michael's teeth, dislodging him, temporarily granting him some distance from Michael even as blood and grace continues to spill, and maybe for once that will be enough to impact the Horizon, make this plane more. Just one other place to share in Lucifer's pain and a feud of brothers.

All his limbs hook into the sand, wings drawn back, back arched, so very feline-like instead of bird, instead of snake. His eyes are sunken and dripping blood and that might be the chimera mantle fading or it might just be him.

Nothing under pulls a belated snarl from Lucifer, scaled tail lashing behind him, turning to fur, feathers, than back to scale. Of course he never came to terms with his chimera shield, why he absorbed that imagery, it was too real much like the myriapod and any other creature in the last eight-hundred years that he shared a symbiosis with.

When Michael closes the distance again and bears down with terrifying power--the barest hope not daring to voice itself in Lucifer's mind because Michael could kill him but Michael hasn't--it cements everything Lucifer has been feeling over lifetimes and universes and maybe other versions of himself.

You want imagination, Michael?

Here's his power from this imaginative reality.

Hilarious that one of Lucifer's last acts in this very fake reality is likely spawning another demigod into this realm. He digs four of the six claws into sand and invokes the blessing of this iteration of himself. The Herald of New Beginnings. Laughable how that title never felt like a slap to his maw until now.

Plantlife springs from sand, though more blighted than it ever has been in the past, and it slams thick thorny vines into Michael to push him away and wreathe him with flora, closing off his limbs and his ability to speak, filling jaws with greenery, continuously binding against Michael's volcanic brand of wrath. Lucifer wonders just what he's lost for the excessive use, but it doesn't matter anymore, does it?

Lucifer slithers away freed once more and everything is too much, held back for so long. It's what he always does, after all. Hold back until it bursts. Only, long ago, Michael wasn't there when it all burst in the Cage, and he was never going to let it happen when they BOTH held the space.

Lucifer wouldn't let himself be that weak again because he knew it would amount to nothing.

"Of course I broke it all apart!" Lucifer roars, like this is the most obvious thing in the world. He was in pain, he made everyone feel it, and wouldn't stop when he rose free. I didn't so much as stand up again as much as I burned everything down to meet my level, he had told River.

He just thought maybe the solution would have been relief not eternal suffering. Not abandonment. He'd rid himself of the Mark after all, left himself a bleeding wound, didn't know what healing was even supposed to look like but it wasn't happening on its own like it should, and there was no one, no one left at his side. He made everyone else bleed, but they were healing just fine, weren't they? They had help, didn't they?

Or so he thought. So why was he the one alone?

Despite his current ability to hold Michael in place, Lucifer can't stay still. Restless, back and forth, not pacing, just... movement. Mercurial.

"Caging me wasn't a solution! He could've ripped my power from me and dumped me on the planet. Would I have resented it? Would I have found a way to try and destroy everything? Of course."

But once upon a time he was powerless in a gilded cage of the once-Thorne and he had to struggle to survive, to make weapons out of those around him, to find a footing because the queen was far too much like him in her mindset and he was going to die when he should have been eternal.

There was a goddamn multiverse out there, apparently. His Father drafted worlds because he couldn't stand to look at them. Lucifer hadn't only been discarded, he'd been discarded like a bad book that was maybe picked up again from time to time.

A multiverse Lucifer could've been tossed to and yet he was thrown to the Cage to be used later, for an Apocalypse that Lucifer thought he could craft as something of his own so that once again all of his millennia of pain bottled-up could be felt by All. He didn't need the Mark anymore. He just was without it.

More than he already was and then some. Burning, vitriolic rage, unhealthy for a being that was naturally so glacial.

"He didn't. He made you do his dirty work. He used you and put me away like a footnote. Why would I ever see value in humanity when I didn't have to?! I had to claw and scrape and pull people around me like a cloak in Thorne because I didn't have enough sliver of power to protect myself. And they all saw the monster that you couldn't stand." It's so much worse when he uses That Word himself. Rolling with smoke now off his limbs, backed by light from his spilled grace. Unnaturally putting off steam as ice crystals collect under his claws. "All of them. All of them. And here, in this place, this reality, they're all still here. They all stayed. Just like I thought you had."

Like a fool. Because he wouldn't press. He wouldn't break. The destructive black hole that was Lucifer wanted to hold to what seemed barely stable and maybe had he done this usual sooner maybe Michael would've still been his brother and not everyone's brother and maybe maybe maybe--

"But no. It's a lie. I should've known. Should've seen it sooner. This could have been perfect but you--"

For a moment, his exhaustion cracks through. For a moment his connection to the Horizon even dips and he sees the sky continuing to shatter. When he jolts back for two seconds it's Nick standing there before his true form reorients.

His vines have loosened in the blip and he pumps more of his god power into them, striking unnatural colors of his space in the Nether that he's spent centuries cultivating through Michael, holding, holding, holding. If he lets go it's all, truly, over.

"All any of you wanted was for me to be someone that I couldn't go back to, even if I tried, even if I wanted," he whispers. He looks to Michael, his desperation flagged, the exhaustion winning. "What? You want to hear that I was wrong? I wasn't. I'm still not."

His point that never mattered did matter, to him.

It always mattered.

It would continue to still matter because no matter what anyone wants, it shaped him into the being he is now. It corroded the core of his being to be flecked with darkness, impure despite the radiant beacon of archangel that he'd always be. Whoever he was before would never exist again. If he did, that would be the greatest lie ever told.

"Humanity is flawed. I've corrupted souls and proven that. I've corrupted minds and proven that."

Lucifer has unwound the minds of hundred of humans in the last centuries. He took them apart and rarely put them back together--that was the 'job' of others. It left him with more fun to break them all over again.

"You want to know what I was wrong about? Thinking that we weren't also flawed." That their Father, their baseline, wasn't flawed.

His hold on Michael is waning and he staggers under the weight of it, and yeah, he can sense it now, a demigod awakening in the Witchwood. Strong and wild and reckless. The sky furthering to crack is likely his own damn fault; he hopes the Singularity won't hold it against him.

His form trembles, his mind in two different places, clearing in a moment.

"Yeah, I wanted to manipulate the Summoned into being my defense buffer. Throw themselves between me and danger. And you know what? It worked. Too damn well! Because guess what? When you're paranoid for your life at every moment and have no secured channel not even trusting the Horizon, and you have to buckle down and trust the people around you? Apparently that's how you make friends. Especially when time and time again they all see the evil in the dark but somehow despite how stupid it is they still put impossible amounts of trust in me."

He isn't going to bother to fight that anymore. What's the point when this reality, for however it's built, however it existed, it existed. He understands how he, himself, got here, to this point. He has to believe the others just the same.

He has to understand how Michael came to be this way, until family and Lucifer's own betrayal spiked awareness through him.

How Awful. How devastating. He wonders if Michael will end up spiting him for that reminder alone.

Some of his vines begin to flake away like ash. The others freeze with ice, easy to crack out of.

Lucifer's out of time.

"I was so. Tired. Of being alone. Do you think I wanted that? Really?"

And yet they could never, would never, talk in the Cage, because--

"Why would I ever have adapt for you? For them? For Him? You all wanted the Light I didn't have anymore! Why are you so surprised I've chosen these others when they looked at the horror I am and accepted it?! All I wanted was acceptance and you would never give me that. I didn't even need you to stand with me I just needed you to see me, not a monster, not a freak."

He's backing away now, the last of his god blessing falling away, fear taking hold at Michael's freedom restored, that tiny speck of hope long gone. His only remaining defense if Michael resumes attacking is a crackling explosion of paralyzing lightning shielding up around Lucifer with a word of Ancient Thornean. Something never used, but kept on his person all the same, the enchantment metallic, shaped like a feather, tucked deep within a wing. His crowning Abraxan spell accomplishment.

Mortal magic.

"No one ever let me put it back together!!" His desperation, now. Like the Darkness, remembered. "I made up conversations in the dead space around me if anyone came back." Until I realized you weren't coming, none of you. "And why would I ever try after. Had to still follow Dad's story, didn't you? His orders. Raphael followed along in your shadow. Gabriel ran again and again and again."

And just when Lucifer wondered at possibility, Gabriel ran again, didn't he? Maybe it wasn't by choice, but Lucifer would be hard-pressed to think otherwise.

Maybe for once Lucifer should take a page from him and run, too, but he's pulling up his remaining strength like a shield not a weapon because at some point in Abraxas he changed his focus to protection not offense and he's scared, again, of Michael, but he won't run in spite of that desperation. But that defense is tissue paper at best. "I don't want to be alone anymore. And if you don't want to be a part of that, I--" There's a flare of molten red through his grace. Of Hell. Lucifer jerks his attention from Michael. He can't say it. He can't handle knowing the truth if Michael is finally, finally done with his little brother.

Maybe he'll run, after all.

[familysucks]

Later, perhaps, Lucifer's eagerness to die instead of be caged might shock him.

(He's already made one promise to honour his death wish if he ever goes back to their Father's side. What's one more?)

The shift in appearance really doesn't change anything for Michael. Whether immaculate and radiant, blackened and snarling, or fractured straight through and streaked with hellish red, it doesn't matter. It's all Lucifer, so it's all Light. It's always his brother. That never changes, not to Michael's eyes.

Some corner of him doesn't object to the binding vines. They're just a thing, unfeeling and unthinking, something he can struggle against and claw at without the looming guilt of later, and so Michael thrashes. His claws cut deep furrows into the vines, new ones replacing them as fast as he can sever them. Ash and dry leaves drip from the corners of his mouth as he chews his way through the floral tentacles, but they're faster than him there, too.

He's listening despite his struggle with the binds. Sort of. The angrier he is, the simpler things become. Lights blinking on a machine, ones and zeroes, a binary calculation that spits out a simple yes or no answer. Does he stop, or does he push on? It's what makes him so decisive, so certain, at least in the moment.

There's always an after. After is always complicated.

The reminder that he's never been anything but a tool to their Father hits its mark. Michael snarls, wings straining against the vines. He remembers that part now. The fresh memory of his Father's betrayal slides neatly next to Lucifer's, and they are oh so alike in some ways. Caring only for their own egos and nothing for the people they hurt in pursuit of their goals. Like father, like son.

Soon, as Lucifer's rant winds down, so does the regrowth of the binds. Michael snaps an arm out from the grip of a frozen vine. Why does Lucifer think anyone would have come to liberate him from his prison? He says himself what they could have expected from him: more of the same thing that landed him there in the first place. More manipulation, more breaking everything he could lay a hand on.

"That's what happens when you prove to the people who care for you that they are worth nothing to you!"

Alone, and without support. Did it never occur to Lucifer that maybe no one was on his side because he'd made it impossible to stand next to him? Because he was in the wrong? Of course not. That's an archangel's ego for you. Michael can't claim to be much more aware of his faults.

"Do you think I didn't want to? Do you think I wanted you gone, that I wanted you dead?"

Does he really think it was easy for him? Does he think having to rip the grace out of him on their Father's behalf would have been better, less painful?

Despite everything that's passed between them, despite the betrayals and the insults and the anger, a few thousand years of strife is the blink of an eye compared to the billions that came before it. They were happy. Lucifer should know what Michael wanted. He wanted his family, and he wanted them all together. Some part of him wants that still, no matter how impossible it is now.

Maybe that's the proof how broken their connection is, that Lucifer thinks Michael's wants and their Father's commands were ever aligned. Maybe neither of them ever really knew the other.

Another arm finds its way out of the vines.

"People you haven't betrayed trust you. What a shock! I did too, once, more than anyone else. Have they seen you at your worst? Have you taken what they love most and gutted it in front of them, while they watched and begged you to stop?"

Michael thinks not. Michael thinks this 'evil' creature they've seen is in fact Lucifer on his best behaviour—because he lacked power, because he needed people on his side. A willingness to hide his teeth that he wasn't willing to extend to his brothers. Maybe he's wrong, though. Maybe Lucifer's found replacements for his demons, broken creatures with no values of their own, ones who'll thank him for ruining their lives.

To say he questions the judgment of anyone with absolute trust in Lucifer is putting it mildly. Been there, done that. Lived to regret it.

A pair of wings joins his free arms, withered vines sliding down his feathers to the ground.

"It was never about what you were, it was about what you did!"

For a moment, he betrays his own hypocrisy. Monster, evil, devil. That's the party line they'd used to keep the younger contingent of the Host in line. It's not what Michael held against Lucifer.

I've chosen these others

Michael hears the conclusion but not the reasoning. The rest is washed away, just muddy water clouding his view of the bottom. There's his answer. That's what it comes down to, isn't it? Here Lucifer stands, claiming them to be as vile as he has always said they were—but still more worthy of his time and effort than his own brother. There is no greater insult. He wasn't worth biting his tongue the first time, and even wavering in his faith, he wasn't worth it here. Lucifer's just filling a hole, and anyone and anything will do.

(A hole he himself helped create, the side that knows responsibility and accountability is taking note of, but in this moment it's not given a voice.)

Michael thinks of Lucifer and their Father again, side by side. All either of them has ever wanted from him is a toy soldier, a tool to be put to work and discarded as soon as it didn't perform exactly as they wanted. Whether it's his Father or the first of his brothers, he has never mattered as much to them as they do to him.

It's all clear to him now. He's seen it firsthand, and he's seen it through Adam's eyes. Family will betray you. Family will leave you behind. Family will disappoint you, every time.

Family sucks.

"What does it matter what I want? When has it ever mattered to you? To our Father?"

Did he ever matter at all? Did he ever have a place in the story? He's just one of thousands of loyal little Michaels their Father created and set up to fail. Just another face Lucifer might throw at his loneliness. He'd been happy once, but it'd been built on a foundation of lies; he'd been happy here, and all it had been was a fantasy. Has joy always been the illusion?

There is nothing to fix. Nothing is broken. This is what they are: monsters put together by unkind hands, made to be at war, never to be happy.

The last of the binds snaps. Freed, Michael slams every limb into the sand and lets out a roar that resonates in the air and trembles through the ground. The sand vibrates with the noise. It's a sound more fitting of the maddened version of himself from that other universe. Did his other self stand there and scream, the moment he'd realized it had all been for nothing? Did he take out his pain on that other Earth and leave it a barren wasteland, like Michael will his domain?

There's a limit to even his grace, but rage and grief feed it as he channels it into his surroundings. The pools of spilled grace burst into flame. The sand around his hands and feet begins to look wet. It falls in on itself, clumps together, and then runs like a thick, glowing syrup between his claws and down the side of the dune.

He's going to glass this desert, and then he's going to shatter it.

Michael doesn't lunge for Lucifer again. He's not paying him any attention at all. This is not about him anymore.

days of me going this is dumb but it's still what my brain wants so hey

[thedevilwhorose]

That Michael thinks Lucifer hasn't betrayed every single one of them in some form, multiple times, is incredible, but he isn't going to explain every whichway he wronged his collection. The semantics and scale of what he did to the mortals versus what he did to family was vastly different, but he's done enough damage that they shouldn't still be following him. He still remembers Sabine's breath evening out, not dead, all illusion, all built to what he devised so carefully.

He wonders how many still would have forgiven him if he had killed her. He thinks a few of them would have. But Michael's right, regardless, even if the way he gets to his conclusion is flawed. Lucifer did stop every time. For selfish reasons every time, but he stopped, unlike before.

(Ripping out his grace was sure easy for another version of his brother. Without even a blink.)

"It was never about what you were, it was about what you did!"

"They're one in the same, Michael!" Lucifer shouts, desperate, watching the scenario unfold before him.

This might as well happen.

For a moment, his claws crush into his own skull and he just unceremoniously falls back to sit among the terraforming domain, tail wrapped around him.

"I shouldn't have to fight you," he chokes out, like it's ever mattered after the betrayal. The same thing that he keeps saying but will never matter anymore, to any of them.

They're one in the same, he thinks. What he did and what he became. Too intertwined to be anything different but Michael will not see that.

Maybe they've never seen the same way. Maybe this is just a testament to how much Lucifer played careful when he was younger. Played into what he knew would be fine, would make his family happy, and not himself. Never. Talked. That's always Lucifer's problem, isn't it?

Because yeah, actions speak louder than words but Lucifer's actions and the way him and his brothers interacted were strong and solid. Unyielding. They didn't have to be more, didn't have to speak. But though Michael hasn't said it aloud now, he's claimed it before: we were happy and no--Michael was happy. And that probably even was a lie.

(It's not that Lucifer was unhappy but for him a few thousand years of strife does change their past. He can't look back at that time without hatred.

Michael may become bitter and jaded about family after everything here; Lucifer already was, before.)

They have no understanding of anything. They have pieces crafted to themselves from their Father. They have bits built off each other and decided differences from the rest of their lower siblings. They constructed personalities out of sticks and stones and declared they were better for it. Lucifer was always better for it.

Until it wasn't enough. Until he wanted more of a voice of his own. Some piece of him that wasn't family and maybe that's what it started as. Humanity was just the tipping point. Anything else leading up was just a tower of destruction ready to topple and he was personally adding to it just as much.

He almost doesn't fight. He almost doesn't react at all to what's going on around him. Just let it happen. The strength that annihilates the space. It swells up, and even in the Horizon Lucifer's self-preservation will always get the better of him, and that's what pushes him to move, snapped-out like a whipcrack, his body serpentine in motion, streaking through the air. He takes every scalding burn of grace and fire along his flank, not bothering to shield so that he can reach out and latch onto some aspect of Michael and just holding. Wrapping limbs around close--no more vines, just him--partially out of thinking that Michael may be the safest location left to the domain, but that's going to get dicey real soon too.

He doubts Michael cares about the backlash ricocheting to himself.

He doesn't say stop. Knows that's far too hypocritical of him to try. Probably make matters worse, right?

He wouldn't stop (he couldn't stop).

He doesn't want this.

He never wanted this.

But how can he apologize? There's nothing he can apologize for, he doesn't--he's not sorry for what he did, he's not going to be someone that gives empty apologies. It's not what he is. It's not who he is. That is something he's decided from the Beginning. And of all things to stick with him he's not going to give Michael that. Because it's nothing. It means nothing. Some line even the King of Lies hasn't crossed (he won't take that aspect from their Father).

Lord. His thoughts were so much quieter when he couldn't remember his Father. What it must have been like for Michael who didn't remember any of them.

He shouldn't have come here. Let Michael play alone with the sand castles of memories, make moats out of dreams.

This is why Lucifer so long ago didn't poke and prod the elephant in the room in the Feywilds. He knew better. He knew it would make a scene if he managed to unwind Michael's blocked memories, just not as destructive as this.

But just all the same so much pain. That Lucifer can't fix--Lucifer's never been good about fixing anyone's pain. Because he just wants to bury it down and make it nothing. Just put it away for later.

There is no more later. They've surpassed later, there and gone.

And Lucifer can't leave his brother here. He doesn't know what will happen if Michael stays in the Horizon when reality is breaking down and Michael has no coherency left to him. He's just beast. He's just apocalyptic. Lucifer really had the gall to look at that world--that sunken, drained-out color world, with an insane archangel as ruler, eyes lit with not power but sheer desolation twinkled with broken desire and ruptured memories--and think this isn't my brother.

But it was, wasn't it?

Lucifer knows that version of himself died--torn apart in the skies above. What did he say? What did that Lucifer say to make that happen? Oh, he wants to believe that it was some part Michael's fault. He always wants Michael to believe and understand how he was at fault, to some degree. That it can't all just be Lucifer that destroyed everything. Why is it always just his fault?

And maybe that's why he can never apologize. Because he just doesn't want to be the only one taking the blame. How is that fair that he's the only one that takes the blame? Can't anyone else ever have a lick of self-awareness? Any other useless feathered abominations of angels have a lick of self-awareness? Any of them. He'd like someone else to be able to have any understanding of him that isn't goddamn Castiel, the trainwreck of a being that can't handle any form of relation. Can't even handle a fake reality of relation. Lucifer's gotta have something else other than that broken creature.

He wishes Gabriel was here. He wishes Raphael was here.

Lucifer doesn't so much fight as much as he continues to cling. He's trying to work out some mechanics at how to drag his brother out of the Horizon and into--well. The fake reality. As though maybe that's the wakeup call he needs to calm down and come back into himself.

He should have known better. He should have known better. He should have known better.

Why did he bring up their Father in this tense of a situation? It just came out--he wasn't choosing his words carefully enough, he just wanted Michael to understand and he knows there wasn't a point to it. Because they never listen to each other, do they? They don't know how. They just hear what they want.

He wonders if he could afflict Michael. Just smooth away the edges. Make him forget, if only temporarily, but he doubts it would stick. There's nothing to adhere to, only rage.

"If what you want doesn't matter than you'll be less incensed if I prevent you from staying here in your misery!"

If Michael shatters the new stunning glass architecture of his domain, Lucifer intends to direct them through a hole of oblivion.

Maybe they can just... fall out of the metaphysical realm if he puts enough willpower into it. Like he knows!! He's never had to be concerned with this before!!

He can strive for the optimistic approach when he's got nothing left in the tank!

cw: gore lol

[familysucks]

If Lucifer doesn't want to fight him, why is he attacking?

He might think it odd, later, that for all the things he's said here Lucifer still looks at him and sees safety. Maybe he looks like the eye of the storm in this moment, but there's no calm to be found in him. In the moment, Michael isn't thinking much at all. There are arms around him, stronger and more threatening than the vines had been. This is an offensive.

There is no warning roar, no growl. Michael turns on the closest arm and sinks his teeth in. The part of him that is leviathan says chew and this time he doesn't fight it. His teeth cut cleanly through flesh, skin and muscle and tendons, blood and ichor welling up against his tongue. The wound he opens up sings with the shrill ringing of exposed grace. Eight hundred years hasn't given him a sense of taste to either delight in or recoil from the familiar flavour, but there's something alive in his mouth and he swallows back everything his teeth cut loose.

There's bone beneath, too thick and too sturdy to break through in a single bite. Michael grinds his teeth against it, cutting furrows into the bone—a weak spot for a break when he twists his head sharply to the side. The sound of bone snapping is deafening, like an icy meteorite exploding upon atmospheric reentry.

(Was it like this when that other him tore his Lucifer apart? Was it only blind rage, something he reframed as good and righteous in the aftermath? Is there a version of him that would do this and enjoy it?)

Michael lurches to the side. Severed arm still clutched between his teeth, he slams them into the crystallized dune with enough force to send a network of cracks spiderwebbing out from the point of impact. It cracks but doesn't split.

If Lucifer doesn't let go, he'll take another arm.

[thedevilwhorose]

The scream that tears from his maw shatters through the forming glass, sunders this new, evolving landscape. He bleeds grace and blood and maybe magic, who knows. That maybe some of the Singularity connection peels away with the lost limb.

"MICHAEL!"

It's a roar, a condemnation, a plea.

That anyone ever thought Lucifer was the epitome of rage of their family when the white-hot burn of wrath that Michael can wear is impenetrable. That Lucifer thought he had any chance to break through that was nothing more than a dream.

It's tempting to just hold until it all breaks.

Until there's nothing of him left.

Terrible.

He lets go, slipping free, staggering, loping away. Two claws reach up to press over the openly flowing wound, burning power into it to cauterize while the rest of his essence tries to knit itself back together but he's spinning out. He feels a press of Time that he doesn't remember having to bother with in centuries and he's already lost control of this situation, as though he ever had any of it, as though it hadn't slipped free like sand grains.

Well.

He wanted Michael to be the same as him, to understand him. Lucifer created this monstrous beast but there's no understanding there.

His brother's awake but it does them no good. Lucifer should've let him keep sleeping.

Another slip and slither back. He's grasping outside of the Horizon. Finding the physical plane sidled with the mental. Their home. Their reality. Gods.

What a nightmare.

"Michael," repeated, but quieter. Because Lucifer still won't speak an apology though this one he's feeling for the disaster crumpling around them. Part of him wonders if he leaves the Horizon if Michael will follow him to get another bite, or if he'll let this realm swallow him up.

He has to believe that if it does, the Horizon will spit him back out, like a bad meal, or that maybe the stain of Lucifer away from Michael's scope will allow him to remember what empty calm can feel like.

He fights for more too say that isn't just his brother's name, and manages, "I can't do anything for you," if only because it lets him waive away some fraction of guilt as he leaves the Horizon and abandons his brother to whatever does or doesn't happen next--abandonment the very thing that Lucifer most holds against Michael.



If he's lucky, maybe Michael won't remember.