EVENT #7: THE SIGHT

[abraxasmods]

Event #7 - The Sight

go to the OOC event info and plotting post

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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.

Comments

[cointosser]

[Fuck.

He slides carefully to the floor, sitting upon it. His mouth still has the taste of the tea in it, but he feels as if that was a day ago. Honestly, he isn't sure how he's holding it together, either. He can't get those words out of his head.

I'm killing my son.

As if it were the final lines of a gothic novel, with the words ringing hollowly in the room they were spoken in. But he knows how this was spoken. Gentle. Defeated.

He holds his face in his hands. What did you see? he wants to cry. He doesn't.] All right.

[So they sit. While the tea grows cold, and the storm powers on around them. If anything, he imagine it grows stronger. Radu. Radu is out there. He's all right, isn't he?]

[cryptsleeper]

[The floor is good and comfortable. Moreover, it is warm, be it through how Alucard's enginered the house or through the dhampir's willpower within his Domain. Either way, it is a tiny step to try and make sitting in silence a fraction easier to contend with. Alucard can't know how long Jaskier will actually stay. The bard might decide that he needs time apart to process, and Alucard couldn't blame him.

It was always easier to talk about those moments as sad facts and nothing more. That Dracula's death was needed and he did the action as the universe required. The approach removed the emotion of it all, and that is what makes this different from telling others. He shared the basics. Geralt and Gideon did not live through them or see them as they happened, as Jaskier just did.

Alucard does not try and decode everything he saw in Jaskier's mind. It is cruel and invasive. The bard did not share what happened at home for a reason, and Alucard always refused to press for details. It was a matter of respect and it kept things easier to deal with. Trust was talking about those moments in one's own terms, when they were ready for them.

Somewhere, Radu has decided to be annoyed at the rain. Probably. And somewhere in Alucard's mind, he considers how badly they may need to break the silence.]

--Do you wish to know, or are you happier in ignorance?

[cointosser]

[It is quite out of the ordinary that, this time, it isn't to Jaskier to break the silence. It's awful, how he feels arrested by -- by what he feels, by what he thinks was an echo of Alucard's own feelings. You should do something, he tells himself, like make new tea, or find a surprise biscuit, or say something, anything. Yet he sits there, trying to wipe the visions out of his mind as much as he holds onto them.

He admires Alucard, a bit. To have been able to speak of such a thing, even to others, in a way that does completely break him down on the spot.

It would be easier with less context. But Alucard has mentioned his father, however briefly, and Hector has said so much more. The things he'd once believed about Dracula. The things he had been wrong about.

How he'd gone mad with grief. What was that, then? The moment he tried to stop?

Alucard's voice washes over him with the power of ice water. He lifts his head.] I only wish to hear what you'll tell me. [So he leaves the floor open. This is... this is too heavy a thing to treat even somewhat lightly. His everlasting curiousity wars with what he knows is far too personal a thing.

It doesn't feel like enough to offer.] Whatever you saw, you can ask. First, even, if you like. I don't know what it was, but I'd gladly speak.

[cryptsleeper]

I can't say I have questions exactly.

[Finger nails trade idle, stressed patterns onto the floor, although they don't dig into the wood itself. Alucard's breathing is steady, which has to count for something all things considered.]

You were helping others to safety in spite of mud and wet and conditions that result from things like the storm outside.

[There's no need for specifics, Alucard doesn't think. Jaskier knows his own memories well enough, and there's so precious little else to say. Again, the ghost of Dracula hangs too heavy in the air.

He never asks questions unless they come naturally. All because the other option is this awful moment of shared silence and trauma.]

[cointosser]

[If you ask him, it counts for quite a bit. Jaskier still cannot force his heart to calm. His fingers are shaking, but he's trying to ignore it. With little success so far.]

Ah.

[It hardly narrows it down, but he's not pushing Alucard to discuss it, or anything else, if he wishes not to. This situation feels as delicate as a spiderweb, and here he is floundering about with dangerous boots on.]

One of many of its kin. [He hopes it was one of the better ones. The more hopeful ones. There were... fuck. There were so many.

He has to do something more, or he's liable to scream.] I'll make fresh tea. I think it's gone ice cold by now. Just... stay there.

[Unfortunately, he's a busybody in every fucking situation.]

[cryptsleeper]

[Alucard opens his mouth to protest. Or at least to point out that he's the one that should be moving about, Jaskier saw the infinitely more traumatizing and upsetting thing. Word after word dies on his mouth, and maybe there's a reason for that.

He falls silent, letting the bard putter around the kitchen as needed. For his own part, Alucard does nothing more than summon a few more of the furs from tiny bedroom that is his and wrap them over his shoulders, having just enough in him to get up off the floor and hunch over the kitchen table.

They both look like shit, don't they?]

If you need something to eat, there may be something in the pantry cabinet. Your immediate left, first shelf.

[It's mostly dried fruits in that cabinet, along with flours, nuts, and well, not much else. Cookies haven't been invented yet, and the Ottoman invasion is yet to bring phyllo dough and baklava proper.]

[cointosser]

[Oh, quite. They both look like shit. Even though he has dried, has been dried for quite a time, he feels all over as if the storm has brought him down, drenched him, and wrung him out. Distantly, though, he can feel the thread that is Radu -- grounding him, in a way, because he can feel something that must be a phantom of joy. An animal simplicity, delighting in rainfall. In the fury of a storm.

He putters. It doesn't feel... good, but it feels better. Automatic, he can clean his mind of everything else. (Even as he keeps hearing them. It was something about the tone. The smooth timbre. And the utter heartbreak.) Fill a kettle. Raise the fire. Boil. Pluck the leaves out of their tin.

Honestly, he cannot imagine eating, but the offering has been made and it is something to pick at with their fingers.] Wonderful. Let me look.

[Whether they were laying there before or have appeared from Jaskier's desperate searching for something, anything, comforting, he finds a stash of candied pistachios to place in a little dish, along with some dried apricots. Delicacies in many places on the Continent, laid out as simple as a loaf of bread here. The warm smell of the brewing tea, once poured, fills the room in a way nearly overpowering, like standing too close to a fire.

Smother those things down. The same way he's smothered the flame in the back of his mind, in the darkness of it, that sometimes snaps to life.

He places the plate in front of Alucard as he wastes more time with sugar cubes and a spot of milk. It isn't even how he drinks his tea, but it is something to do. Something to settle him.

And finally, he sits.] This is unprecedented on my part, I think, but I... I believe we could come to a mutual agreement. I think it may behoove us to agree not speak further on this experience.

[If it should bother them both so. He cannot stand the idea he should be any source of guilt nor lost sleep for the dhamphir, even though he gets rather much of it.]

[cryptsleeper]

[At some point in all of Jaskier's puttering, Alucard picks himself up off the ground and deposits himself in a chair. The worst of the nausea has since passed, but there's still no color on his face and he's staring mostly at the table rather than at the bard. The rain pounds on the roof, ensuring that no real silence fills the air. At some point though, it becomes static. Background noise. Something that just fades into the background, making it quiet for real this time.

His gaze does glance up every so often though, just to make sure Jaskier has command of the kitchen. He's found the tea leaves, the perishables, everything that's needed. When the tea starts to brew, at least there's something. It smells good. Grounds Alucard a little, just as Radu's joy at the storm does for Jaskier.

When Alucard slides the tea cup over to himself, it is only to place his hands around it and absorb the warmth.]

Yes. [A single, too quickly spoken word. Alucard stares into his tea cup, then flinches at his own reflection. He looks a mess. Again.

He closes his eyes, exhaling.] I am sorry you saw that, Julian. It is easier to state what happened than it is to get into the details. I might have shared it eventually as a point of fact. I would never have wanted this.

[cointosser]

[He releases his breath. He did not think Alucard would necessarily disagree, but... he can't take this. Right now. Possibly ever.

If he even lets himself consider, for a moment, that this is what Alucard carries with him --

Jaskier's lips twitch into something that may have been a smile, before this, at the sound of his name. He so rarely hears it now. Barely even thinks of introducing himself as it; not necessarily from any disconnect, but simply because that's who he's known as. What the Free Cities know him as.

Who he's become, maybe.]

Adrian, please. I do not blame you in the least. [To be fair, he doesn't blame himself, either; he never would have come if he thought there was a chance this could occur in the Horizon. He can only assume the Singularity is to blame, as most everything else. It just can't help fucking about with everyone, can it?] I never would have wanted to -- to take this from you, either. No one should need share memories they don't wish to.

[It was enough that Alucard had shared... that other memory... some months ago. Jaskier takes the seat across from him, takes his tea in front of him. Even shoves some nuts into his mouth despite having no sense of hunger.] Sentiments I'm sure you already know. It's only -- [Fuck.

It's only he's not sure what else to say.]

[cryptsleeper]

The only consolation I have is that nothing else remains.

[It's a shitty consolation, Alucard knows. There's the risk that Jaskier might see the memory of the other thing, which would be infinitely worse than his father's death so far as Alucard is concerned, but Jaskier now knows the worst of everything. Anything else Alucard might be forced to share pales in comparison. That's the simple truth of it.

Alucard doesn't go for the food. Or even try to take some of the tea. There's only a hollow attempt at a noise.]

I think any other warnings need to be delivered via physical notes at this point. I'm not sure if the rest of your household is aware of the effects here.

[cointosser]

[It's no consolation at all, but neither of them needs to make such a statement. Jaskier sips his tea quietly, trying ever so hard to push the glimpse of Dracula's face out of his mind. The longer he lingers on it (and how he curses his memory now), the more he can see the ways in which they appear the same.

The urge to weep does not feel so overwhelming anymore, but it is waiting by the door, waiting for an opportunity.

He sips more tea.]

Yes. I think that's a smart idea. Geralt already had the worst of it from others, then to come home to this...

[He swallows and it feels like a rock in his throat.] I can't have it happen to Ciri or Rinwell. And, honestly... I don't think I could take it again.

[Sorry, Alucard. What little walls Jaskier's ever attempted to put up have crumbled now.] I'll try to spare them. And send something to Hector. I think... gods, I never thought I would ponder sequestering myself before. Until this ends, it appears the safest bet. And not here, in the Horizon.

[Unfortunately. Though, to be fair, if he had not braved Alucard's storm, would he not still be safe?]

[cryptsleeper]

[Alucard knows he is terrible at offering comfort in poor situations. He's accepted it as a part of himself, but it doesn't make it any easier in the moment. There is the distinct feeling that he has somehow managed to do an impossible thing and break the bard, and oh. That guilt is going to linger.

The look of fuck flashes across his face at the mention of Ciri and Rinwell.] I'll keep my distance.

[It feels like a return to earlier days, when he first arrived and wanted nothing to do but run feral in the desert. Except the safety was for himself, not for others.]

Find a rented room that will deliver food to you and compose. That should be sufficient isolation from others like us for however long this takes.

[cointosser]

[For once, Jaskier does not dissuade him. Rinwell, especially, he thinks -- she's quite strong, of course; possibly stronger than himself, but he still does not think she should see this. Or anything similar. If he had seen another memory of Alucard's, the one he mentioned --

No. He won't think of it.

He sighs quietly, then gives a nod.] You're right. It's a good idea.

[And torturous for him, who cannot bear the idea of sleeping alone again. Not only with his own memories, but now burdened with more.

He doesn't touch Alucard, but he does rise slowly, after they've drained tea, and barely spoken more. He should go, in case it happens again.] I'll send a letter, perhaps. When I'm sure it's passed. [His smile is quiet as his tone.] Be well, all right? As much as you can.