abraxaslogs | [ march / open ] you left me, you left me no choice but to stay here forever

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[ march / open ] you left me, you left me no choice but to stay here forever

Who: Julie + others + open
When: March
What: this month is A Lot (this post is a catchall)
Where: Cadens + the Horizon

[

bitchcraft or bitchcraft#2753 for a starter ]

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[He has not forgotten his invite to her domain, one with an implied promise to continue their Summit discussion there. The problem is, he doesn't know, exactly, who she is; no exchange of names, no direction given in the vast space of the Horizon to the home-away-from-home she's carved out for herself. Stephen doesn't know what to look for, other than he needs to look, and he may be looking for a while. His strategy (though it is no more strategy than basic logic): nose into domains he's never been to before, invite be damned. Good thing Stephen Strange has never had a problem with being nosy, and maybe he meets a new face or two before he draws even remotely close to Julie's domain.

But eventually, through the process of elimination alone, he does draw close, enticed by what sounds like the muffled sound of bass music playing at heightened tempo, a siren call for the curious and seeking. And eventually, greeted by the facade of what he can only assume is an active club, he walks through its entrance only to be hit with a storm of color, sound, and a surprising number of people. Dancing, milling about, sitting at the bar. His eyes widen in surprise, and his utterance is undoubtedly lost in the noise:]

Wonderful.

[He isn't sure if this is wholly promising or not, but Stephen presses forward, twisting his body through the crowd as though he may catch on fire if he accidentally brushes against any. Lights catch against his sorcerer's garb, the red of his cloak bright beneath the lurid colors, making him hilariously out of place, and he considers wearing a typical set of clothes, more fit for a man off the streets of New York than the Sanctum Sanctorum. Ultimately, Stephen decides that standing out may be the best way to catch this domain owner's attention, or at least about as well as standing in the middle of the dance floor, eyebrows raised and calling out over the music:]

Are you accepting visitors or am I interrupting something?

[Which is absolutely what he's doing.]

[ Meanwhile, Julie has absolutely forgotten her invite. In her defense, she's been dealing with a lot this month, and she had also been drinking pretty continuously throughout the summit, but the truth of the matter is that she talks so much, and to so many people, she often forgets what she said and to whom. The club, however, is nearly always open to anyone who finds their way in, even when Julie herself isn't on the club floor.

But she's not all that hard to find. The people who live in her domain tend to congregate around her, and she stands out anyway, all sparkles and glitter under the neon lights. In the middle of the crowd, she has a tendency to seem more vibrant than other people around her, as if they were somehow washed out, just a little.

He calls out and up on the VIP balcony, the bodies milling around pause, look toward the noise. Julie breaks through them to rest her hands on the railing, her head cocked slightly, like a curious animal. ]

If you were interruptin', I'da locked the doors.

[ Notably, her voice is at a normal level, as if she were standing next to him in a quiet room -- she doesn't need to yell or compete for any kind of attention in this building. A path seems to open through the people on the lower level, one that leads to the stairs, and Julie retreats from the railing. Her voice remains constant, though, even when she's out of sight. ]

Don't get shy now, c'mon up.

[ Upstairs, she can be found sitting on an oversized white leather couch, sipping champagne and bobbing her foot. ]

[His eyes are drawn to her presence when her voice echoes from above, as though magnetized in that direction. Fitting for a host of any domain, and all the easier for him to find just who he’s looking for, peering down at him from the balcony above. In comparison to rest, she’s shines; the life of the party, figuratively and literally.

Some people thrive in it. Others feel as though their energy is being sapped from their bones with every bass beat hammering through them, and Stephen squarely belongs in the latter. The promise of less shining lights and crowds to amble through—as well as continuing their conversation from before—is motivation enough to find her upstairs, looking right at home.]

I feel underdressed.

[He says as he approaches, which is more to say that he feels hilariously out of place. He isn’t in Thornean garb like when they first spoke, but his sorcerer’s outfit from home isn’t exactly the go-to clubbing ensemble most would pick for themselves.]

[ Up here, it is slightly quieter, if only by virtue of containing less people than the dance floor. There doesn't appear to be any particular rhyme or reason as to exactly who gets selected to be up here with her -- there's nothing special differentiating these fake people from the others downstairs. Well, except for bartender, who swoops in to offer a champagne flute and a cocktail. He doesn't have to ask what cocktail; it is always the guest's favorite, and it is always made perfectly (and Instagrammably).

When she looks at him, it is with a welcoming smile, as though she had been waiting here for him. She gestures toward the sofa, though she won't push if he really wants to stand. ]

Nah, you're just four months late for the Halloween party. Missed New Year's and Valentine's, too. I haven't figured out what the next one'll be yet. I was thinkin' about an egg hunt for Easter, 'cept I don't know when Easter would be this year. Gets hard to plan around the floatin' holidays.

[ She does seem genuinely thoughtful about how she might corrupt a celebration for the resurrection of Christ. Something seems to hit her, though, and she points at him. ]

Wait, y'all do come from a world with Jesus, right? I just don't wanna try to explain Easter if I don't gotta. Christmas was hard enough.

[The way the bartender swoops in with a glass in hand, ready to tend to guests as though they had been lurking in the background all along, is almost comically timed. Stephen takes the drink in an automatic way, surprised, his attention split in two, the straw drifting lazily around the rim while an orange slice bobs happily in the ice. Stephen assumes this is an iced tea of the Long Island variety — how generous.

He turns back to her with a brow raised, looking like… a sorcerer holding a drink, even more out of place than before. But having no inclination to stand and talk, he crosses over and sinks into one of the cushions of the couch. Ice clinks in his glass.]

I got into a fight over an Easter egg when I was kid, once. You don’t need to explain the big holidays to me.

[Much less Christmas; a New York Christmas sears itself into the mind when experienced every single year. Those festivities are no longer over the top, only normal.]

So where’s this supposed to be? [A sweep of his free hand.] On Earth.

Thank god. I never really knew how much stuff we all know until I was tryin' to explain dinosaurs. Not like, specific stuff. Just the concept of dinosaurs, and how they're different from dragons.

[ She is not a paleontologist, or even someone who did particularly well in high school to have this knowledge. It's just literally that she's had to explain things to people who have never so much as heard of these things. Explaining the basis of Christianity was a nightmare.

He asks where they are, and she looks around like she maybe doesn't entirely understand the question. It takes her a second before it processes correctly, that he thinks this is a real place for her, rather than simply a manifestation, an amalgamation of what makes her happy. ]

Oh, it's not anywhere real. I guess it's kinda like how Vegas was, but see, when I got to the Horizon, my actual home was already here. It was... someone else's domain, it used to be next door. This was waitin' for me instead. There was a door that connected us. [ She takes a sharp breath, glances away. This is a fresh wound, obviously. ] Anyway, the only thing I hadta make myself was the loft in the back.

[ Is she saying that she never even had to consciously manifest most of this? Yes. She'd simply followed her intuition through a door, and it was all ready for her, even the people. The Horizon already knew her that intimately.

She offers him her hand, which glitters with jewelry and rhinestones on her nails. ]

I'm Julie Lawry.

[He imagines it’s the same for everyone, dinosaurs or otherwise. Having the mundane become the fantastical in someone else’s eyes is utterly jarring, but Stephen’s been on the other side of that equation before, too. He can relate a little.

With no reason to turn down a handshake, he offers his own hand with the one not holding the stem of a glass. His grip only has the slightest tremor in his fingers, a trait that he could easily do away with in the flexibility of the Horizon, betraying the fact that he feels no need to bother.]

Stephen Strange.

[Perhaps their first conversation regarding the absurdity of names would have Stephen giving his with a tad more apprehension. But he’s both used to it and distracted by what Julie’s just told him. (Though her halting glance when speaking of someone else’s domain doesn’t go unnoticed, either.)]

So you’re saying that the Horizon just built this up for you?

[Maybe that’d explain the ease in which she cast her lightning-in-a-jar spell; a strong connection to this plane, for whatever reason that may be. Innate talent, maybe.]

[ The problem is, how do you explain things for which people have no context? When Julie says she had to explain the concept of a dinosaur, she means it very literally. The person she was trying to teach had no gauge of how big she was talking about, so she wound up just making a t-rex. At half-size, but still, she had to show instead of tell. She still has it, it lives on a shelf in her loft and is about the size of a chihuahua puppy. It is constantly at war with her tiny dragon.

She does not react to either the tremor or his name, because god knows there are a million weirder ones around here. Her hesitation around the other domain immediately fades as well, because she has become excellent at compartmentalizing pain. It's necessary in a world like hers, or you lose your mind. Hers is intact.

For as evasive as she was out in the real world, Julie truly does seem delighted to talk to him, because she loves to talk to everyone until they prove themselves either shitty or beneath her. And it is very much the delight of a woman in her mid-twenties, enthusiastic and animated. ]

Oh, he's Steven too! [ She points her chin at the retreating bartender, who appears to be able to just sort of produce lavish cocktails on demand. He turns to cheerfully acknowledge hearing his name, then fades away into the crowd. ] With a v. I just knew when I named him, it was with a v.

[ There's a brief pause, during which she glances around as if to take a quick mental inventory, but then she nods to confirm that yes, this was mostly just made for her. ]

Uh-huh. There's some things I added later, when I had ideas for it, mostly stuff left over from parties that I thought was cool. But most of it was already here, and it felt right, so I didn't see much reason to change any of it. Oh! Actually, I changed the music a little, added more to the playlists. I had to kind of... create Spotify, I guess? But it only works for songs I already know. Some people, other Summoned, put their own music on the karaoke machine, though. It ain't all to my tastes, but if that's what they wanna sing, I don't mind.

[ There's another brief pause, where she takes a drink and is approached by one of the crowd for a selfie (she obliges, throws up a peace sign). The iPhones don't function as actual phones -- she has no clue how cellular networks work -- but they do have standard apps, a few games she liked to play, an incredibly rough facsimile of a few webpages. They're slightly more advanced than what might be found in a toy store. She uses hers mostly to waste time and teach people from medieval worlds how to sext with emojis, but every one of the partiers also seems to have one, and they take a lot of pictures. ]

But like I said, I just came through the door. I had a feelin', one of the strongest I ever had, and I just... followed it. It was my first time, when I didn't remember anythin', but I just knew I needed to walk that way.

[Well, points to her for being the five percent of human beings who do not remark on his last name after a fresh introduction. He’d be pleasantly surprised if it were the focus — even a rogue sorcerer who tried to give Earth over to an angry unfathomable entity from another dimension gave him crap for it, even unintentionally.]

Mine’s with a “p” and “h”. [This feels like an important distinction to make. No point in mixing him up with Horizon-made bartenders or Captain Americas of the Steven or Steve variety.

After that, though, he lets her speak. Her energy strikes him as far more open and enthused than when they spoke at the Summit, eager to share and with no sense of guardedness. It makes it easier to converse, but he also has to sit through explanations of Spotify playlists and shows of selfies before honing back in on the original point.

He sips his drink in the meanwhile. It’s practically perfect. (Thanks, Steven.) All the while his brow lifts incrementally higher.]

I put my own domain together. [He imagines that’s the case for many.] I wonder if how the Horizon reacted to you, almost naturally, is correlated to how quickly you learned magic. Based on what you told me, it didn’t take long before you were conjuring small thunderstorms, right?

[Slowly, he tilts the conversation in the direction he intended, but this is relevant on its own, too. Stephen is always curious about others’ magical aptitude, merely out of professional interest.]

[ Julie actually takes a very pointed mental note of the spelling of his name. Hostessing is one of her primary talents, and remembering people's names goes hand-in-hand with that. His last name simply doesn't strike her as particularly odd anymore -- once you've been resurrected into a magical world with a bunch of people from other worlds, you don't spend much time fretting over names. Not unless they're really weird.

Her face scrunches a little as she considers the question, but honestly, she doesn't have a great gauge either way; she only knows one other person who's learning magic, and there are a lot of differences between them in style and amount of time spent practicing. ]

Mm, it was a little over a month? But I was spendin' a lot of time on it, like hours and hours every day. And I started with fire, but it was harder to control 'cause I wasn't in a great place at that time, y'know, mentally. Just some bad shit was goin' on around me and I wasn't okay, so I kept accidentally settin' stuff on fire or makin' these huge bursts. You can't see it right now, but there's a mark on the ceilin' over there, from one of 'em. It's fine now, though.

[ As if to prove it, she opens her hand and a dragonfly made of flames soars out of it, hovers a few feet above them before it disintegrates. ]

[The dragonfly is an obvious point of interest, proof of her control over the ability to manipulate the energy of the Horizon, which in turn indicates her aptitude in the “waking” world — or so it’d seem. He doesn’t think drawing a correlation between the two is a long shot, though Julie admitting that she studied long and hard at it is a factor, too.

The magical display disintegrates. Stephen reaches out with a hand to catch a few falling embers, harmless as they land on his skin and fizzle out completely.]

It isn’t just one or the other — magical aptitude and intensive study.

[You can have both. Stephen only thrived because he threw himself into so much of the latter that the former had no choice but to be dredged up at some point.]

Anyway, it’s still impressive. Especially since didn’t exactly have your nose stuck in a book at all. From what you told me, Nott approaches magic a little differently than that, right?

[And there they are. The point of Stephen’s visit, however clumsily approached.]

[ Julie doesn't know that she'd call her education "study", exactly. More like determined and endless repetition until she was able to control it. Wild magic doesn't require any knowledge of magic, just the will to harness and mold it, bend it to one's wishes -- even the very first time she tried any magic, she'd managed to accomplish her goal, however briefly. But she doesn't bother to point out the difference. If he understood it, he'd already know, and if he doesn't already know, then he won't understand.

With a nod and a slight sigh, she takes another sip of her champagne. If she seems a tiny bit hesitant to speak about Nott specifically, it's because she truly cares about the town. Wants to keep it safe from any blowback from the castle. ]

Yep. What'd they teach y'all about the different kinds of magic, up there at the castle? Their style versus all the others?

[ She actually genuinely isn't sure what they tell people. She'd been confined to the dungeon for her entire stay in the capital, where no one ever spoke to them about any of this. The magic, the Singularity, the reason they were here. The most anyone ever said to her was the name of her arcana. But based on the impression Nadine gives, the mages in the castle aren't particularly forthcoming about the alternatives to Academic magic. ]

Edited 2022-03-19 05:11 (UTC)

[There’s a reticence, here, to speak about Nott — at least, Stephen thinks he senses as much. But she’s still more open and less guarded than she’d be at the so-called peace summit, and Stephen doesn’t care to beat around the bush now that they don’t have to worry about the wrong people listening in.]

What you saw at the summit was all for flash and show. Thorne focuses on one style above all, and that’s mostly academic magic.

[Books, study. Repetition and practice. It meshes well with Stephen’s preferred approach, too.]

They highly encourage its study. The rest is seen as outdated or frowned upon. But it is acknowledged if only to contrast against the efficacy of academic magic.

[Here, a sip of his tea.]

So. Not exactly perpetuating the wider-scope on the whole.

[ She rolls her eyes at the mention of efficacy, as if it's the only important thing about magic. From the very basic understanding she has of all the various types of magic, they each function to use the power as only a means to an end -- to commune with the gods or further technology. Academic magic, at least from her impression, seems to want the magic to remain a stable, unchanging material, warped only by the intention of the mage, like clay.

But, at least based on her experience, the magic isn't a material or an ingredient in a mix. It's a being, much more akin to a horse or a dog, it has a mind of its own. The academic mages only know the commands, not how to actually train the animal, teach it from scratch.

She nods, takes another drink from her glass. ]

Right. Frowned upon. Now, I don't know all that much about how they do it in Solvunn, and the magic they do have in Cadens is kinda [ She pauses, searches for the word, then settles on: ] stupid. It does the same shit as technology, they just... don't want to use magic? I don't know, honestly, when it comes to them. But they all have this idea that you need lots of rules and restrictions, that you have to follow a guide to it. They're afraid to go without the guide, 'cause then they might see somethin' new or maybe a little ugly, somethin' not quite perfect. But perfect ain't what magic's for, is it?

[ There's some slight stiltedness to her speech, as if she's trying to work out how to explain something that doesn't quite translate into words. And she is, she supposes, because her only experience with magic has not been something so easily described. It is something she has felt almost constantly since she left the dungeon, since she first came to the Horizon, and she only learned how to decipher it a few months ago. ]

Magic, the Singularity, they're alive. They can talk back. But you can't hear 'em or have a conversation if you're just yellin' instructions over 'em. That's what Academic magic is. Wild magic is about reachin' out to the magic instead, takin' it outta the air and askin' it to do what you want. It can fight back, it can get twisted, but if you keep your head right, keep yourself in check, it does more than just spit out cookie-cutter results.

[ Her brow furrows, and she's not entirely happy with her own explanation. This is not something she's ever spent much time talking about, because her world did not have magic, and because most of the people she knows do not seem to feel it like she does. ]

It's the difference between followin' a recipe and writin' your own, if that makes more sense. Basically everyone can follow instructions from a book, get somethin' pretty close to the picture. But you gotta understand how the ingredients actually work if you wanna make your own shit. Magic works from your emotions, your thoughts. If you're angry, frustrated, sad, the magic uses that. It'll lash out if you ain't careful, don't know how to keep it calm. So they took all the thinkin' outta the equation. Like paint-by-numbers, 'stead of just paint and a canvas.

Edited 2022-03-23 21:11 (UTC)

[Again, he listens, even if there are moments where it seems like Julie is grasping for the right words, the exact way to put thoughts into explanation. He isn’t surprised about Caden’s perspective on magic — he had gotten that impression quickly enough from his time spent at the summit.

The recipe analogy is one he can inherently understand, though, and once more his thoughts trickle back to Wanda — magic that runs on emotion, dangerous if running purely on impulsivity and a lack of control. But without restrictions, without even so much as a spell book, an incantation, or a few wayward hand gestures to cast. Powerful and malleable; likely more than anything he could conjure up himself with all of Kamar-Taj’s resources.

Stephen’s lips purse, nodding. He wonders…]

There’s someone from my world whose magic functions in a similar way — driven by emotion, willing what she wants into existence not through study and adhering to proven theory, but by instinct.

[How to word this without making Wanda seem— ah. Volatile? It isn’t his intention, this thought that’s occurred to him in the breadth of this conversation; but Stephen will offer that little nudge when it comes to aiding those from his world, whether or not they asked for it.]

You’d have to run into each other on this plane, but she’d probably appreciate someone to practice with. If you’re willing, someday.

Edited 2022-03-28 18:48 (UTC)

[ It's not what she was expecting to hear. Julie's only ever met one other person who seemed to actually understand what she was talking about, how it felt. She already lacked the vocabulary, the context, to explain so much of what she experiences. It's too new, too foreign still. It's isolating enough to not be able to describe it, let alone know that, even when she could put it in words, the other person almost certainly won't have a clue what she means.

Her eyes light up, big and bright, shining in the flashy lighting. She's never considered that there might be someone that could help her. ]

For real, no foolin'? Does she come to the Horizon?

[ Julie is here daily, even if she only stays for a hour, but over the past few months, she's gone out less and less. The new domains rise and fall like tides, built up only to disappear not so much later. Some are created and then stand empty as their owners decide to not visit this plane. It's hard to know who she doesn't know. ]

[The interest is immediate, bright in her eyes. Stephen thinks this is a good sign on her side, at least; now one needs to only hope he isn’t being presumptuous where Wanda is concerned, though he’s going to make the executive decision that it would be good for her to connect with someone who wields magic in a similar way.

After all, though he’s entrenched in magic, too—and from the same world to boot—there’s a distance lodged between them, not something easily discarded, either. He’s still not entirely sure Wanda doesn’t seem him as some kind of Magic Police, here to descend upon her the moment she looks at someone wrong.

This disconnect is evident in his reply, which is not all that helpful.]

I’ve never visited her domain, and I don’t know her schedule, but she’s bound to visit the Horizon on and off. Just to get away.

[It seems like a very Wanda thing to do.]

Her name’s Wanda Maximoff.

Wanda Maximoff. [ She repeats the name to commit to memory, nodding to herself. It's usually not particularly difficult to find any one person's domain, if not through process of elimination, then by just concentrating and following her instinct. It is, again, not something she has ever considered whether others can do, but in the Horizon, she usually doesn't have to try very hard to find anything she's looking for. Normally, she can just walk in the direction that feels right and she'll get to whatever it is she wants.

It does strike her that, for a friend, he seems to not know all that much about how to reach her, but then again, he could just feel protective over her. It wouldn't surprise Julie if he's uncomfortable disclosing that information to someone he doesn't know. They may all be in the same boat here in Abraxas, but there's still plenty of reason to be cautious.

Her head cocked to one side, she looks thoughtful for a moment. ]

Do you know Kylo? He's the only other person I met who seems to understand it like me. I'm not sure that his version of it is exactly the same, but he knows how it feels.

[ Kylo is also overwhelmingly intense and makes her nervous, so she's not exactly chomping at the bit to hang out with him, but he gets it. ]

[Friend is definitely using the term liberally. But Julie's not wrong about the protective streak, either. His priorities (or personality) may not always mesh with those hailing from his Earth, but in the end, he only wants what's best for them. They're his allies, even if he isn't close with all of them. (Or most of them.)

Well. Anyway.]

Kylo's one of the first Summoned I met when I first arrived in Thorne. [He doesn't know him know him, so much as he is aware of his reputation. It's hard not to, with the clout he holds in the castle.] He guided me to the Horizon for the first time.

[He seemed like a... dour young man, but Stephen cannot deny that he was helpful. He owes him for that, if nothing else.] We didn't really talk magic, though. I guess that's an oversight I should fix next time I run into him.

Not that he ever looks ready to chat anyone up, but. You know.

Yeah, I know, he's got shades of "Have the lambs stopped screaming, Clarice?" to him, but I'm pretty sure he's mostly just a Hot Topic teen on the inside. And it's totally not a phase, Mom.

[ Is he weird and does he come off a little Dylan Klebold-y? Yeah. But Julie has met true darkness in human form, and it's much, much more pleasant on the surface than Kylo is. It smiles and invites you in, holds its hands out for you. It doesn't behave like an edgy preteen with anger issues. She isn't afraid of him. ]

Anyway, he said it's like bein' born with a sense of touch when everyone else is numb. And that was the first time anyone ever seemed to know what it's like. He calls it the Force, but I know other people who call it Chaos. It seems like mostly the same thing all around, to me. But most people don't seem to feel it all the time, they just use it.

[Oh look, he isn't the one making references for a change, and they aren't flying over his head, either. Julie may not be from his version of Earth (a brash assumption, maybe, but most would recognize his name upon introduction) but Stephen can appreciate familiarity that apparently strings them together, all the same. The sameness that some realities share.

His smile quirks a little more pointedly. That sure is a way to describe Kylo, and maybe accurately enough. He can't claim to know the young man all that well, but he does have a very... Hot Topic-y air about him.]

That's interesting. [Should he consider directing Wanda to Kylo, too? ...Hm, maybe, but he'd like to know how she and Julie get on, first.] I didn't know he was another who intuited magic [the Force? Chaos?] naturally. Because that's what it sounds like it comes down to: innate versus learned talent.

[Though...] Not that the two can't intersect. I've gotten the impression that you're not all that interested in learning out of a book, but you could still find it helpful someday. Stop by my domain if you ever feel like it; it's hard to miss, a tall townhouse. You can see the Himalayas in the distance. I'm already teaching a few people, and I've got time [usually] for another.

[ Julie has learned that it's easiest to just make the references and assume that other people will get them. Especially if it's funny. Other people can ask questions if they want, but it gets difficult to constantly weed out every instance of modern culture from one's thought process.

She nods a little and takes a sip of her drink. For someone like her, who came from a world where this inborn gift was meaningless, she can only guess. What she does now know is why she always felt lost, adrift. Empty. The thing that was supposed to carry her, fill the hole in her soul, was something she had no access to. ]

It's not that I have a problem with book learnin'. I read all the books they had in Nott about Wild magic, but there are only a couple, and they're meant for kids. For them, it's the same as learnin' letters and shapes and colors. Things adults ain't supposed to need explanation for. But I'm no good at academic stuff anyway. I don't want to waste your time.

[ It is said with the casual acceptance of someone who was told many, many times, at a very young age, that her dreams were too big. That she wasn't smart enough for the things she wanted, that she should stop trying because it was a waste of energy. The kind of thing that becomes deeply ingrained in children, until it is a part of their understanding of themselves. ]

But thanks for the offer. Really.

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[ march / open ] you left me, you left me no choice but to stay here forever

horizon, late march.

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