abraxaslogs | EVENT #7: THE SIGHT

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EVENT #7: THE SIGHT

Event #7 - The Sight

go to the OOC event info and plotting post

The night before APRIL 18, your dreams are disrupted by a vivid image of the same eclipse that occurred last month. The black sun seems to be an endless void in the sky, growing ever darker - until it suddenly opens into an eye that stares straight at you.

When you wake up, much of your night seems a blur except for the vivid dream of that eye. Whether you find it unsettling or try to ignore it, the image is something you cannot get out of your mind. If you ask, you will discover that none of the locals of your faction saw another eclipse. Speak with your fellow Summoned, however, and you may learn that while there was no eclipse that formed over the world, you were not the only one who had this dream.

Of course, dreams don't need to mean anything. You can't feel or see any immediate effects, and nearly everyone around you is going about their day as usual. Maybe you should do the same.

The Awakening

It might happen that very morning or a day or two later. You could be discussing the dream with a fellow Summoned or perhaps you simply brush shoulders with them as you walk by. Whatever it is, as soon as you make brief physical contact, one of you is struck with a sharp pain in your temple that grows into a terrible headache. It's disorienting and painful as the world around you shifts to someplace you may or may not recognize. Like an old film reel, you watch the events of the past play out before you: the past of the other Summmoned. It might be something they would rather hide, a moment of failure or despair, or something they are immensely proud of and brings them great joy - or even a jumble of several images over the course of a person's life. But you see it as if it were real and right in front of you all the same. When you come to, you'll likely find yourself on the ground or bent over, possibly with one or more people around you to see if you're okay. It'll take you a bit to gather your bearings, and the subsequent pounding in your head could last from minutes to hours.

Or, maybe you aren't the one who receives the vision. Instead, as you watch, another Summoned might grasp their head and crumble in front of you. They may go silent or groan in pain. They'll be impossible to shake out of their stupor until it's over. If you ask what happened, they may be inclined to tell you the truth - that you, you were what happened to them.

Or, if your Arcana signs happen to line up in a specific way, you'll see each other in the shared memory itself. You may also find that for certain Summoned, you can help soothe the effects, calm their emotions, or help draw them out of the memory before it consumes them for too long. It's not entirely clear what determines which effect, but one thing is for certain - within each memory, every Summoned as they appear in the past seems to wear the mark of their Arcana somewhere on their person.

For some, they might experience this only once. For others, they might experience it multiple times: with the same person, with several other Summoned, or with a different memory each time. Over the next 7 days, you'll find the Summoned around you are all receiving a glimpse into each other's past, as if the Singularity has awoken an eye within each of you.

Flee for the safety of the Horizon if you want, but you'll find that in there, it's much the same. In fact, inside the Horizon, the other Summoned don't even need to be anywhere near you - just existing in the Horizon space itself together will be enough to possibly set off a headache-inducing vision.

The Factions

What has occurred between the Summoned will not go unnoticed within the factions. While it's difficult to say how faction officials have picked up what's happening, it'll be obvious they do know.

In THORNE, characters will be asked to remain in the castle walls until further notice. Characters will not be allowed to leave the castle grounds, not even to go into the surrounding city, and anyone who is already outside will be requested to not leave again as soon as they return. If asked, they will be told it's for their own safety, given the Singularity is behaving unpredictably and the Summoned have a unique connection to it. Soothing potions and healers are on hand to offer assistance, if anyone is particularly suffering from ill effects.

In the FREE CITIES, characters will find the army by the outposts show more activity than usual. A higher number of guards will patrol the streets throughout the event, particularly in areas frequented by the Summoned. Anyone who publicly and visibly experiences the effects of the memory share (pain, doubling over, etc.) will be offered assistance by the guards. They are generally there to help, but they are also there to maintain order and ensure anyone behaving erratically due to this incident is properly contained. This might include confinement for a day or two if anyone is especially posing a risk, but no one will be punished except in the most extreme cases, as the locals are aware this is not within the control of the Summoned.

In SOLVUNN, the locals will be watching what's happening with a mixture of trepidation and curiosity. Host families and neighbors will be on hand to help with charms meant to offer protection, as well as general care and assistance (soup, blankets, and so on) if your character seems to be especially under the weather or afflicted by the event. Towards the end of the event, more elders and mages will be out and about to check up on the Summoned to make sure they're doing okay. If asked, the mages will say they aren't sure what's going on, but that they are currently divining with the gods and hope to have a definitive answer soon in the upcoming days.

None of the factions appear to be doing much more than keep a watchful eye on the situation - but as the week comes to a close, officials will start making a decision as to what they want to do and how to handle the Summoned who have demonstrated this unforeseen connection to the Singularity.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ After another second, he finally comes in and shuts the door. He does not yet realize that touching is a part of it; his contact with other two were so brief, the visions so sudden, that the only thing he's managed to piece together is a certain proximity. Maybe not even that. If they're all interlinked through the Singularity, should it even matter how near they are to each other? If the effect grows in strength over time, would it simply spread right across the continent itself?

Fuck. He hasn't had time to think about any of this. His gaze lingers on her. She does look fine. That's good, at least. ]

You had the dream, too. The eclipse. [ It's not a question. ] This morning, I had a vision. Not of my future, but of another's past. They saw mine in turn. [ His brows draw together further in thought. He shakes his head at the offered wine. ] I shouldn't stay. But you need to be careful leaving. Tell Nadine the same.

[ He straightens, starts to pull back from the counter. It feels like he's leaving her with more questions than answers, but he truthfully hasn't got more than this to tell her. ]

It was an eye... [ Her voice is faint, trails off, and she pales. Julie is now, understandably, afraid of shared dreams. It's become clear to her that they cannot possibly herald anything but horror.

His words swim in her head, don't immediately make sense. The dream, more visions. The dream didn't speak, didn't make them promises or beckon them. It just looked at them. How could that lead to anything? Wouldn't something have to send the dreams.

Geralt's making to leave without telling her anything else, and she feels like he just handed her a grenade with the pin pulled out. ] No, wait -- [ She reaches out to grab his wrist, pull him back. An unconscious movement, automatic. The pain is immediate, blinding, and she drops to the floor with the shock.

It's late summer in Kansas.

Julie isn't there anymore. Or, rather, the Julie he knows isn't.

Instead, there's a doppelganger, who seems to take no notice of him as she walks down the neighborhood street. It's Julie, but younger, just slightly. Only a few years, but they were clearly years that aged her. This Julie has a softer face, longer hair. It's still pink, but not the bright, hot pink it usually is. Her hair now is much lighter, barely pink at all. She wears cowboy boots and tiny denim shorts, plaid shirt tied at the waist. A shotgun swings at her side as she moves from one house to the next. She's sweaty and filthy, has dirt and blood smeared on her face. Her forearms are covered in scabbed cuts.

It's not a particularly nice neighborhood that they're in. The houses are rundown and shabby, the yards overgrown. The poverty and neglect are palpable, were present before whatever happened here exacerbated the feeling. It's nearly ninety degrees in the sun, and the heat makes the thick, putrid air stink even more with the smell of death. There are bodies everywhere; on porches and front lawns, hanging half out of cars. Dogs and cats lie dead as well. Most of the corpses seem swollen in the neck, like bullfrogs, and almost all of them are covered in foul-looking sickness, thick and spotted with blood. Many of them seem to have simply dropped dead where they stood.

Julie walks up onto one of the porches that doesn't have a dead body sitting in a chair. She bangs on the door with a closed fist, tries to look in the front window. Her voice is loud. ] Hello? Is anyone in there?

[ No reply comes, so she sighs, visibly bites back the desire to cry. She takes the butt of her gun and smashes in one of the glass panels on the front door, then reaches through to unlock it, nicks herself again. As she enters, the world around her, around him, shimmers and shifts, and they're inside. In the living room, there are four dead adults on sofas and the floor, a dead toddler in a playpen. Julie stomps her foot, whispers fuck in a strained voice.

There's no one alive here. ]

[ Her hand closes around his wrist. She collapses, suddenly, and Geralt moves in an instant around the counter. It's the same every time—that fucking piercing headache, like shards of ice, a nauseating lurch—and as he reaches to help her up, he's struck with a pain of his own.

A fierce heat hits him, one that makes it hard to breathe and even more so with the stench of decay. Bloated, rotting bodies are hardly a new sight, but it is never an easy one and normally, he knows when he's about to ride through a village torn apart by plague or war. He'd hear it, smell it, miles away. Here, he's dropped into the midst of it without warning. For a split second, it overwhelms him. Drags forward buried memories of ripped open corpses that he walked through as a boy to reach the keep, stepping over them in the snow, and they sat there for weeks, preserved in the snow.

Then he sees her, a version of her: up the porch, a gun hitched over her shoulder. It feels, a little, like he's following her, a pull that will not release him. The scene's only vaguely familiar because it reminds him a little of Sam's patch in the Horizon, except these homes are not near as nice. Wooden steps are rotted in places, paint peeling, grass and shrubs overgrown. There are cracks in the stone roads and rusted steel junk that he now knows are cars. Glass shatters, the door opens. The crib flickers into view with the child inside, thick fluids staining the cushions.

Outside he's bent over, palm pressed against his eyes and his other hand gripping the counter. The light's too bright; the sound of her heartbeat reverberates right through his skull. ]

[ The room shimmers again, the colors swirl, and then they're in a different house. A different living room. A bloated hound lies dead in a dog bed in front of the television, black because the power went out a week ago. The bodies from before are gone -- now it's an old man in a recliner. Through the open door into the bedroom, his wife is visible in bed, lifeless. Julie huffs and peers around the corner into the kitchen, then begins to make her way back outside.

Another fade and they're at the end of a hallway in an apartment building. Every door is open from where she forced her way in to check. Her clothes are different, a darker shade of denim shorts, sneakers now instead of boots. A cropped white tee shirt bears a snarling leopard and the phrase "Def Leppard" above it. Her hair is pulled up, her face is cleaner this time.

She shoots the lock off the door and then kicks it in, takes only a few steps in before she screams "Fuck!". The scene changes again, faster, and she shoulders open the door to a small church. The pews inside are full of slumped corpses, leaning against each other and falling forward, to the sides. Faithful who gathered in a last ditch effort to get God's help, or at least forgiveness. Flies buzz in the light of the windows inside.

A hospital, where bodies line the halls. Julie pokes her head around corners and into rooms as she walks, calls out over and over. "Hello? Anyone?", her voice echoes in the quiet. Her shorts are olive green now, her tank top black with gold stars printed all over it. She has red lipstick on, maybe in an effort to give herself even a brief moment of lightness.

Outside of a convenience store now, fifty feet from another corpse, she sits on the curb and eats potato chips from a bag, drinks warm Coca-Cola. A car parked at a gas pump has a dead woman inside, leaned over the front steering wheel. An infant strapped in a carseat in the back is so swollen in the neck that it barely looks human. Julie stares into space as she eats calmly.

Another living room. A child's bedroom. Horses dead in a paddock. An elderly couple, arms wrapped around each other as they lie in bed. Broken windows, smashed in doors.

Finally, Julie stands alone, in a huge building not unlike the empty back part of her club. Daylight streams in through windows near the roof, open doorways. She sits down defeatedly on a couch surrounded by other couches and sets her shotgun at her feet. The only sounds are her breathing and the birds chirping outside.

The silence is deafening.

Everything closes out black. ]

[ Days (weeks?) flicker by in seconds, minutes. It blurs; it feels like the visions, dreams, he had that night not long ago, a years' worth crushed into his head. The corpses pile up, layered upon each other, indistinguishable, lining places that he nearly finds familiar and places that are completely foreign. The bodies grow more and more desiccated, rotted. Time passing.

Then the memories release as abruptly as they slammed into him. The candlelight in her kitchen flares, sears his eyes. He squints, cursing; tries to push back the way the ground wobbles, or maybe it's his feet or his vision or both. The fresh air rushes him. He reaches for Julie, thoughtless, to see if she's hurt, when their surroundings shift once more, and—

The fuck. He hasn't even got time to catch his breath.

But where before, he's found himself drawn into visions belonging to another, this. This he recognizes immediately. Not only where he is, but when. The temple, darkened, lit only by a few flickering candles, but not dark how she might expect—shapes and figures that stand out in the absence of light. Several heartbeats pulse with clarity: men, gripping mismatched weapons. The distinct smell of burning fills the air. More startling than seeing himself—another him, unchanged here from his usual appearance but notably unarmed—is the flash of pink hair that does not belong to this scene. ]

Julie. [ Geralt grabs her on instinct—pulls her out of the way of a swinging sword. ]

[ Her head aches, and when she opens her eyes, she can't tell where she is or how she got here, and it's dark. Only it's not like how she's ever experienced the dark -- or anything, really -- in her life. It's disorienting in a way she's never felt, trying to suddenly figure out the sounds, the bizarre way that the people around her are so visible when they shouldn't be. Something is on fire.

Before she can even turn her head to see the sword, Geralt grabs her. But there are two Geralts, and she is so confused, so dazed by everything happening so quickly.

It's pure reflex that makes her step behind the Geralt who pulled her from the fray, still frazzled and trying to get her bearings. The last time she was suddenly dropped into a different world, they had the decency to not be in the middle of a fight. ]

What the fuck? [ Her hand wraps around his wrist and she tries instinctively to back away from the brawl. ] Where are we?

[ His brows are knitted, eyes half on her, half on what's in front of him. On some level, he's aware nothing here can hurt them (not physically)—he's done this once before, recalls it more of an illusion than not—but he shields her, anyhow. ]

The temple. [ The temple, not a temple; this place, it means something to him, something more than a building they stopped in. Where does he even start, as to what led him to this moment? Does it matter? ] I brought Ciri here to seek answers, but—some men found her.

[ So he'd given her to Yennefer. Take Ciri, he'd said, and she'd done exactly that, hadn't she? But in this moment, he doesn't yet know, doesn't yet realize; there's no spark of anger that tinges the air, no real anything that's tangible—an absence, almost, of feeling. Blood slicks the ground beneath their feet. The vision alternately blurs and slows with too-sharp clarity, bodies and himself moving in ways that seem to skip in places. He doesn't so much remember the fight as he remembers being in it. More audible than even the crunch of bone or twist of steel is the fade of each heartbeat, one by one, snuffed out like a candle, as though that's where his focus lies: on precisely who is and is not left alive. It's quick. Scant minutes.

A severed arm lands at their feet. The body follows a second later. Geralt glances over his shoulder. He looks...not uncertain, but aware, maybe, that though Julie has known him some time, though he's never made it a secret he's killed his share of men, he doesn't much speak of it, either. She's certainly never seen him do so. It's not a matter of if she will judge—he doesn't believe she will, nor is that where his thoughts turn to; they've shared a bit too much together for that, he thinks—it's more just. The truth is, he rarely looks back on the people he's cut down. Not ones of this kind. They were a threat, he removed them, and that's it. Facing it up close with someone who wasn't there at the time is strange, uncanny—like discovering an unexpected guest in your home.

The source of the fire comes into abrupt view: a mage, with fresh heavy scars on his face, flames crackling. ]

Edited 2022-04-24 05:23 (UTC)

What'd they want her for? 'Cause she's a princess? [ It's almost an absent thought as she watches, tries to keep up as the memory shifts in ways she isn't accustomed to.

A corpse hits the ground, and Julie's only real response is to take another step back, her bare feet not picking up the blood that's everywhere. This kind of violence is not new to her, does not trigger any of the instincts it probably should; she has cheered from the sidelines as people dismembered each other with chainsaws, with axes, desperately fought for things that didn't matter nearly as much as this. The only difference is that before, she had the advantage of being slightly further away from the mess. So her grip on him remains steadfast, her eyes following the other Geralt as best she's able to in this lighting.

When she does actually turn to face him, the Geralt she came with, she only looks wary in response to the mage. Her voice is slow. ] Didn't you say mages can't use fire in your world?

[ Julie's absent question goes unanswered; he's as distracted as she is. He doesn't know, either. There are pieces that don't quite fit—how Nilfgaard realized she was alive, how they knew she was with him. They were already targeting her long before she exhibited her power, when they sent the black knight after her, when they invaded Cintra and tried to capture her instead of killing her. His eyes are on the sorcerer. He knows what's coming, sees the mage vanish into smoke.

When Julie asks, his reply comes with a hint of dryness: ] Yes. By law.

[ Because mages definitely obey all the rules stipulated to them. There's a portal, Yennefer—

—The dark shattered room flips into daylight. It's brighter, louder, hooves pounding the ground, but somehow the chaos is distinctly contained. The clamour in the background is faint, the blood soaking the grass barely a feature. Instead, the sharpest thing in focus is Ciri: younger by several years, unscarred, still easily recognized by her pale hair and green eyes. She's pinned down, struggling beneath two soldiers.

He need not watch. He remembers. It's one of the clearest memories he possesses. He remembers the coldness underneath that went beyond mere anger. It isn't a feeling that can be described, really, but maybe Julie can sense a shade of it in the air. A fierce, deeply primal impulse to protect what's his.

Blood stains his sword where it rests against Yennefer's throat. Exactly four people know he's got any type of relationship with Yennefer and two of them are Jaskier and Ciri. He makes no move to explain it now, who this woman is. It doesn't matter. (It does.) Not anymore. ]

After this, [ he steps around the image of the fallen Nilfgaardian soldiers, hears himself tell Jaskier to take Ciri home, ] the demon broke free of her prison. Followed Ciri back to Kaer Morhen.

[ There is so much happening, so quickly, and it's difficult to keep up as they're suddenly transported into full daylight. Instinct makes her take a step forward toward Ciri, before she can even truly gauge what's going on, before she even realizes that's not her Ciri, that the Ciri those soldiers are holding is younger, smaller. Doesn't need her help.

And then another Geralt comes from nowhere, and there's Jaskier, and... a whole group of murderous little people, which is an interesting direction Julie had not expected this to go in. Points for originality, really. The soldiers are taken down in an instant, almost faster than Julie can even see. And then everyone is just standing, and the air is heavy with fury, apprehension. Possession. It reminds her of the way wild dogs guard their food, with gnashing teeth and relentless viciousness.

She doesn't ask who the woman is. "How could you do this?" he asks her, and her response is pathetic. "I'm so sorry."

Months ago, in an empty club, he'd mentioned betrayal. Voleth Meir attacked, and a betrayal had lead to that. This woman has something to do with that, and Julie's immediate, visceral disgust is enough to make her not care. What does it matter who she is? It appears that she's getting what she deserves.

Nice coat, though.

Julie watches him move, the Geralt she came here with, watches young Ciri reluctantly walk away. ] How?

[ For a moment, Geralt is silent. In the distance, a deep ravine cracks open the land, stretching further than the eye can see. Easy to assume it was caused by a natural quake in the earth. He knows better. Ciri has never told him what happened before he arrived, not then and not in Abraxas, but he could always guess well enough. She's only ever used that power when she's felt especially threatened. ]

She fed. [ Barren answers are his habit at the best of times; at the moment, he's more than distracted. The icy sharpness in the air only grows, and beneath it something untamed and barely contained. Mine.

It's different, knowing all of the things he will feel later, the tangled knots they make when both trust and the heart break all at once in a way he never saw coming and maybe should've. He's considered it on occasion. If he found himself there again, understanding what he does now, with time and room to have sat with his thoughts and turned them over, if he would change anything he did. But here, faced with the same memory laid bare, he thinks: no. He would not.

The ground drops, abrupt. Grass gives way to the smooth floors of Julie's kitchen. His stomach lurches. He lifts his head on instinct, bumps it on the edge of the counter that he's somehow underneath. Ugh. ] Fuck. Julie?

Edited 2022-04-26 11:01 (UTC)

[ She doesn't ask any more questions. He's not really here with her anyway, she can tell, so what's the point? His feelings about this memory are clear without him saying anything, and no amount of clarified context is really going to help. What his feelings and expressions don't convey, younger Ciri's do.

It's not really about the woman or the demon or any of the rest of it. "Mine," he says, and the danger in his tone makes Julie shudder, because that's what it's really about. Something that's not specific to the world or the actual nature of the threat -- it's something that's hardwired into humans, all of them. That tone is how the human race survives no matter where they are. Because of that drive to protect what's theirs. Defend it.

When she opens her eyes, she sees the floors, the wood of the cabinets, and she dry heaves. Fuck, her head hurts. The clunk of Geralt's head hitting the counter makes her look, reach for him on instinct. ] Shit, you okay? Careful.

Edited 2022-04-26 23:54 (UTC)

[ His ears ring. It feels like hours have passed, but it must've been seconds, minutes. He reaches for her in return, brows drawn together. Everything tumbles—not only their little trip through his head, but hers. The piles of corpses.

She doesn't know it's what he saw. He doesn't yet bring it up. Part of him is still processing it—trying to separate it from the memories of his own childhood. ]

Yeah. What about you? [ They've both been better, he supposes, but he knows this is. New. For her. And he hadn't meant to send her delving into his memories, but as disorienting as it is, he's simply relieved she didn't see anything far worse. There are darker images living in his head than...that. Men after Ciri. He regrets a number of things in his life. Keeping Ciri safe no matter what has never been one of them.

He rises to his feet, offers Julie a hand to help her to hers. Some hesitation lingers—like it might spark another vision once again—but he's fairly certain it's over. For now, at least. He hasn't any idea how long this is meant to go on, if it can even stop. It's been one day and he's already fucking tired. ]

[ Likewise, there's a wary sort of reluctance to the way she takes his hand, but nothing happens this time. She feels like someone is banging the inside of her skull with a hammer. It's making her feel kind of sick.

As this is her first experience, it has not occurred to her that it can work in reverse, without her also being there, so she doesn't know that he's seen anything from her at all. If she did, she would apologize; as he can probably tell, much of what occupies her memory is truly horrifying, and no one should have to experience it. And honestly, she doesn't believe there's all that much she could have seen from him that would have made her ever view him differently. This woman has literally seen a man disemboweled with bare hands and teeth, watched people chop each other up with chainsaws, was present for the incredibly violent death of her now best friend. What could Geralt possibly have that's any worse? ]

I'm okay. [ A bit pale and discombobulated, perhaps, but fine. Her fingers tighten around his. ] How did you kill it? The demon?

[ His gaze is on her, a remaining hint of concern. He doesn't let go of her hand until he's sure she's steady on her feet. ] I didn't.

[ He sighs. It isn't directed at her. He stumbled out of a trip to hell with Dean not a scant few hours ago, knows Dean saw his own version of it when he was a child under the Trials; he's had a lifetime of practice pushing it all down and yet right now, even that doesn't feel enough. But at least this is something else to focus on, something that isn't rotting bodies and anguished screams, so that's what he does. ]

She went home. Rejoined her world. [ He uncorks the wine Julie offered when he first arrived. Fuck knows they could use it. ] I still don't understand all of it. [ He grows quiet. ] And Ciri will not tell me some things.

[ His memories go no further than that night. Whatever happened in the years afterwards, Ciri refuses to say. He suspects it is to do with him, that something happened to him because he can recall the look on her face when she laid eyes on him out in the dungeon yard. How she ran to him. As though they were parted for longer than days or even weeks. He just doesn't think it's worth forcing her to speak of it before she's ready. He's here with her, now. That's all that matters. ]

[ She reaches up, opens up a cabinet and pulls out glasses. Though she's moving slowly, it's not because of the headache or what she saw. She's just listening intently, thinking. Putting pieces together.

Demons come through monoliths and apparently sometimes get stuck. If the demon wanted to go home, then it figures that she couldn't get back through the monolith on her own. But why chase Ciri back to Kaer Morhen? Julie feels out of her depth trying to solve a puzzle like this, which has so many elements that are so incredibly unfamiliar to her. And she does distinctly get the feeling that, every time she learns something new about their world, that they wish she hadn't, let alone think more about it.

That gets pushed out of her mind easily, though, when Geralt's tone shifts, when he says that Ciri won't tell him things. Granted, her experience with telling people their future is... limited, but it didn't go particularly well. Placing the glasses down on the counter, she sighs and absently touches his shoulder. ]

It's not that simple, tellin' people what's gonna happen when you already know for sure. You probably don't wanna hear it. Anyway, you're here now. Who knows what that means for the future?

[ He leans forward on the counter, palms flat after he sets the bottle down. She has questions, he can tell, but even after all this time going over it in his head, he doesn't know what it means. What do the Wild Hunt want with Ciri? It was more than Voleth Meir wishing to return to her place with the Hunt. Daughter of Chaos. And where the fuck does Nilfgaard come into it? He was barely on the verge of answers back home; here, whatever path he'd started towards, it's gone. Or maybe it's simply grown much larger than any of them can comprehend. In the grand scheme of things, are the Wild Hunt little more than pawns alongside the Singularity?

Ciri is withholding pieces of the future from him, she is. He knows that. But where her powers are concerned, what the world may want from her, he isn't certain she understands, either. More than that, he gets the sense that some part of Ciri does not wish to understand. Not any longer. That she has already learned too much. He wants to help her. He can't decide if that means leaving things well enough alone or trying to unearth what none of them know is lurking. It isn't like him not to dig, but this is about Ciri, not him.

Julie's hand lands on his shoulder and some of the tension eases from him. She's never pried. He can appreciate that. Out of everyone he might've shared those images with, at least it was her and not a stranger. ]

Grand things, I'm sure. [ Yeah. They've a new future to make, as far as he can tell. He fills both glasses before he looks up at her. What he glimpsed feels more private, more intimate, than what she witnessed from him in return, if only because she was entirely alone for all of it. He has no intention of making her speak of it—but she should know. That he did see it. ] I received a vision from you, too. The towns of the dead.

[ Nadine has, thus far, been unable to accept what Julie already knows happens to her. Has seen with her own eyes. Instead, Nadine insists it happened (happens?) to a different person, someone who isn't her, and in some ways, maybe that's true. The Nadine Julie knows here is nothing like the one she met in Vegas, already pregnant and somewhat disconnected from reality. They'd all been disconnected, Julie realizes now. But if Ciri is hiding things, they must be at least as bad as what Julie now wishes she had hidden from Nadine.

He mentions the dead, the aftermath of Captain Trips, and she freezes, her breath catching. It's not something she ever thinks about -- even when she has told others about what she went through, she brushes over what it was really like. There is no way to make people understand what that world is, where you're the only living being for hundreds of miles. Where the bodies just fester openly and there's nothing you can do about the sight or the smell or the germs, because they outnumber you by thousands. ]

I'm sorry. [ It's the only thing she can think to say, her voice small. How can you apologize for making someone else suffer through that? No one else should have to see it. ] I -- I'm sorry.

[ Her reaction makes him pause. Geralt places his hand on her arm. ] It isn't your fault.

[ He's sorry, too. For what happened back then, or maybe for seeing it uninvited. He knows, of course. She's told him. It isn't the same. Geralt has told her things he's not told many others, but it'd still be...different, if she actually saw it. Experienced it. The things he went through. No one needs to see that, either. One or two have, and he isn't sure how he feels about it.

His expression flickers. Funny, that it's the rotting heat which make it a little easier to pull apart the memories from his own. The corpses never rotted in the snow. Even summers never grew particularly hot in the mountains. ]

I'm glad you aren't there anymore. [ It isn't something he'd say to many, but it rings true. Some worlds are not meant to be lived in, and hers is one of them. Maybe it isn't fair, as she said. That so much suffering had to befall her and the world to end up here. Maybe it isn't fair that she is here and others were never afforded the chance. He doesn't know. He only knows that on the smallest of scales, where Nadine and Julie are concerned (where the people he cares about are concerned)—it's...they don't deserve to be trapped on a dead sphere, haunted by corpses and demons. ]

[ She looks at his hand. She knows it's not her fault, because she would never willingly subject anyone to her world, not after that final spring. There are other things in her head that would have worse for him to see, she knows that, but there are things that would have been better, too, and she doesn't understand why it couldn't have been one of those. She has happy memories, she knows she does. Why is that what it had to be, more bodies for someone who already has more than his fair share of them?

And on top of that, it hurts because now she is forced to open that box for herself, remember the things that she has spent so long ignoring, letting their sharpness fade until it's bearable. Those jagged edges come roaring back in an instant -- her initial determination to find other survivors, how it diminished room by room. The way the dread settled in the pit of her stomach and grew, fed on every failure, every new body, until that's all there was all there was room for. Fear and desperation. Loneliness that dragged her so deep, she began to swim down because it was easier.

His palm is warm, like it always is, and she shifts slightly, moves so that she can curl her fingers around his. When she speaks, it's soft. ]

I'm glad I met you.

So am I. [ Some of that aching loneliness he felt inside her memories lingers with him. How deeply it burrowed, wrapped up in even deeper layers of fear. For a moment, he's silent. What else is there to say? Julie doesn't need to linger any more on the images of her past than she already has. And Geralt has never quite made it a secret how far he would go for Ciri. Perhaps the only difference is in this world, Julie has not seen him have a need to. Not yet. Not like that.

He picks up the glass of wine. With their memories crossed between them, he no longer feels the urgent need to leave. Maybe it's for the best. Can it even be avoided? If there's anything he's learned about the Singularity, it's that it comes for you whether you want it or not. Between the strange magic bestowed upon them, the Horizon, that tether that links them, the words scrawled across surfaces—it's present in a way that can't be ignored. ]

Come on. [ He tips his head towards her couch. ] Not sure I want to see anyone else today.

[ Three sets of shit memories is more than plenty. His head hasn't stopped hurting all day. The pieces of his past are one thing, but it reminds him of his time in Thorne, too, memories being plucked against his will and dragged to the forefront. All around, not fun. ]

[ He doesn't need to say anything else. If anyone had to see it, she's as satisfied as she can be that it was the one she trusts most. Someone who has seen enough pain of their own that it wouldn't change their mind about her. With the exception of Nadine, Geralt is the only person in Abraxas that Julie truly believes won't throw her away over her baggage.

And, though she knows he never judged her for it, maybe now he understands just how little choice she had to follow Flagg's call. What else could she have done?

She takes the other glass and follows him to the sofa, sits facing him with her legs curled up and her head resting on the back of the couch. ]

Nadine won't be home until the afternoon. [ Sipping from her glass, her brow knits. This whole thing is so bizarre, and terrifying because it doesn't seem like something that's sustainable for more than a day. But nor does it seem like something they can force an ending to. ] You think this happened because of the dream?

[ He sinks into her couch. Frankly, he's tired of this world fucking with their memories. Between losing them in the Horizon, the queen, the flood of memories that one night, now this—he likes what's in his head to stay in one place.

And yeah. That dream. He shakes his head. ] No. A sign, I'd say. Of what disturbed the Singularity.

[ The eclipse that day—what does it mean? He looks over at her. She's the only one he knows who spends much of her time with her magic and inside her domain. Sam had mentioned in passing feeling off not long ago, but Geralt had thought little of it. Magic is never completely stable, in his experience. Especially for someone who's never used it before until now. Besides, that was some weeks ago. ]

Did you feel anything unusual? Last night maybe? With your magic or the Horizon.

[ Julie is usually pretty neutral on the memory thing -- the first visit to the Horizon is a trade-off, and she can live with that. The queen's exercise was an independent act. But this, to affect all of them, seemingly by something greater than the Singularity itself? Or else... the Singularity wants this to happen. But Julie has never really believed it's capable of that kind of thought.

She knits her brow thoughtfully, then slowly shakes her head. While she'll have more to say about this later, as of this moment, she hasn't been to the Horizon to feel the change there. And nothing had seemed different last night or in recent memory. ] Nothin' I can think of. Everythin' seemed pretty normal.

[ Or at least as normal as things ever are. She hasn't had a truly normal night in over two years.

Frowning, she takes a sip from her glass. ] Who else have you been through this with?

[ He doesn't believe the Singularity can want things, either. It's living, he thinks, as a tree can be considered living, but not much more than that. But its connection to all of them has seemingly caused something to unsettle it. They're the only ones this has happened to. No one else in this damn sphere wakes up with unasked magic or memories of a future they didn't yet live through and yet did.

Though he still thinks the latter is more to do with Ciri than the Singularity. At the end of the day, it's only a powerful source of magic, not an entity. (Isn't it?)

His last visit into the Horizon was two weeks ago. More. And he makes little use of magic outside his Signs. If something changed recently, he wouldn't be able to say for himself. ]

Two others. [ One of them, he isn't sure Julie is familiar, but the other— ] Before I came to find you, I was with Dean. They both saw...pieces. Of the Trials.

[ If he'd not been right next to Julie, he'd be afraid she saw the same. At least she was spared that. ]

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