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

[supersoldier]

[A part of him is stubborn and feels no need to dismiss his SOLDIER uniform (no matter how impractical it may be), but Sephiroth relents as soon as he crosses the threshold past the door. His proclivity for black clothing still exists, but he wears plainclothes as she requested — the simple cut of a black coat replaces the leather duster; his button-down shirt beneath is unbuttoned around the neck; his pants are unremarkable, but still possess the lines of a military garb. His gloves are gone, leaving on his bare hands.]

Better?

[Dryly.

Still, he looks around, the building unlike any he’s visited. No doubt there are similar structures on Gaia, maybe nestled in small towns like the one he had visited before arriving here, but that’s the extent of his knowledge when it comes to quaint and cozy places.]

I wouldn’t expect many places to be like Shinra. Is this one significant to you?

[It must be. He won’t just assume it’s her home, though that seems to be the theme with domains in general.]

[carmesi]

[when he crosses to the inside of the cabin, wanda is amused. sephiroth is as square as she had pinned him down to be, with his creativity limited to what he knows—fine lines and polished floors, but ultimately she cannot judge him too harshly. their lives may be dissimilar in so many regards, opposites of a coin as far as participation in their own wars and unrest is concerned, but there is something stark about how it all limits the growth of those involved.

she smiles wryly at him.]

There is room for improvement, but I'll allow it.

[grabbing at a cushion to keep her hands occupied, she looks about at his observation of the place.]

It's a place I created when I removed myself from society. I believe your kind [soldiers, military, governments—] would consider me a criminal; a fugitive.

[but that's a story for another time. wanda scrunches her nose, a playful look on her face as if to say, nope, that's as far as i will offer willingly.]

And since I don't have a home, I thought I would create it on what used to be my country before it was removed from the map. [she motions at a chair, her eyes looking over at the ceiling and then at him.] You can sit, Sephiroth. You know that, right?

[supersoldier]

[A fugitive? He looks at her with clear assessment, but he can read the signs, too: she will not share more than that, not right now. And that’s fine, Sephiroth doesn’t care to wrench it out of her just yet. Maybe with time, she will tell him more of her world, her role in it — why she seeks a place like this, peaceful and quiet, away from those who’d seek her out.

He doesn’t say much, then. Only nods at the expectation to sit, knowing it’s just that —expectation. To relax in her presence when the whole of him has always been trained to be presentable and alert, even when he’s not in the company of others.

He moves to the chair. Sits, with his hair pooling around his hips. And when he opens his mouth to speak, perhaps Wanda is not afforded the luxury of hearing them, because his memory suddenly folds into her like it were only waiting to do so, filling her mind with images from his past. They flash before her, clear and sharp and poignant.

As a young boy, he awakens in the same quarters day in and day out, empty, white, and sterile. Routine defines him; he wields a sword against monsters made of light in a virtual reality room, or he waits in a lab as scientists run their tests, slide needles into the prominent veins in his arms. One scientist in particular--a man with his black hair tied back, a hunch in his shoulders--oversees it all. Assesses his performance in every aspect of testing, or how quickly he improves while fighting against monsters that grow larger by the day in that room, or more numerous.

Time speeds forward. One day, the young boy waits for hours and hours, alone in another empty room, with an IV drip connected to one arm. The bag glows an eerie green, illuminating the side of his face. Another hour passes; he's lied down on his provided bed with bright white sheets, feeling strange. Feeling ill.

The next day comes, and he is expected to fight the same monsters made of light, even faster than before, more efficiently. His eyes glow now; they're a bright green. His sword feels clumsy in his hand, he feels dizzy, and when the monster snarls his way, he cuts it down two seconds slower than the previous day. Time passes again, and he's on his knees, nauseous, his stomach rolling. The man with the tied-back hair stands over him, sneering at the boy.

One step forward, two steps back. Unacceptable, absolutely unacceptable. You'll do it again until I see improvement, Sephiroth. Until you produce results worth recording.

The room buzzes, restarting. The monster materializes yet again, and again, and again-

The memory ends.]

[carmesi]

[wanda had invited sephiroth with the express reason of getting to converse with him—get to know him more, because as far as people in this place are concerned, she considers him close to a friend. for his words to make it through, but only the smarting pain of a sharp headache to register? it feels contradictory to what this visit should be.

something comforting, something welcome.

she has not experienced the overwhelming feeling of memories of others being pushed into her consciousness, which is why she stares at what's happening with a rising amount of panic amidst her confusion. this kid in the vision, it is sephiroth, there is no doubting that.

what he's going through, though, it — it borders on the unforgivable thought of who would do this to a child? men and women in lab coats, one with a sneer to his words, demanding more and more, uncaring.

the memory ends without her realizing that, in the same breadth, as these visions populated her mind, the same is happening for sephiroth.

there is a world here to explore, of a cold winter night—cold war aesthetic, trying to make the most out of a small space. it's a loving family, oleg maximoff walking in through the door to greet his wife and son. there is talk among them, happy and excited.]

You said the only rule of TV night is we try to practice our English!

[the boy is loud, and wanda can hear him from the other room. she steps outside in time for her to hear him call.]

Wanda!

[and she gets to be hugged by her father, kissed on the cheek, a giggle escaping her. it is perhaps because of the war that wages outside, the dull sound of gunshots out in the streets, that her parents put affection in everything they do. there are a number of DVD tapes for her to choose, but she mentions her pick is not there. her father goes to look for it, stored inside a hole in the wall, and her mother pulls her back, kissing the top of her head.]

This is your pick, yes?

Season two, episode twenty-one.

[wanda smiles, as her father sets the DVD, and pietro follows after her sister to sit on the floor; a practiced routine, commonplace in their home.]

Always sitcom, sitcom, sitcom.

[though he complains, he doesn't really hate it; his smile is just as big as hers as the episode begins, exciting and thrilling, funny in its own right. wanda giggles, looking back at her parents who sits so lovingly together, an arm around each other. pietro knocks his elbow into her, and she knocks it back, her eyes back on the tv.

suddenly—the music and giggles get drowned out by an explosion. the power goes out, the rumbling of bombs, the whistles as they fly overhead. parts of the apartment burn, there is rubble and dust where her parents were. the girl looks shellshocked, looking around her, in disbelief.]

Wanda!

[it's her brother, grabbing her arm, pulling her away from the second bomb that falls directly into their apartment. the red dot on it comes and goes, stark industries, etching itself in her eyes as brother and sister hide under the bed.]

...by the end of the episode, you realize it was all a bad dream. None of it was real.

[she reaches her hand forward, and nothing happens. nothing, is the key; the bomb doesn't go off, but it remains constant. tick-tick-tick. waiting to go off; the wind rings in her ears, the building moans under the pressure of its broken infrastructure, falling apart. there is yelling, fighting, the shape of her parents under the rubble.

and the memory ends.

wanda opens her eyes, allowing for the light that filters into the cabin to rouse her from the visions of a younger sephiroth. she's fallen off her seat, trying to pull herself upright. she's visibly confused, the headache that pulses making it hard for her to focus any of her magic or the horizon's allowance for their imagination in any constructive way.]

—Sephiroth?

[supersoldier]

[He has been assailed by memories before now. This is the first that promises him a strange kind of warmth and belonging, the security of a family that he's never known for himself. To see it expressed in her childhood is both foreign and incites a dread wistfulness in Sephiroth; of knowing what he desires, and knowing that he often keeps it tamped down, only to feel it lance through him like a knife as he watches their smiles, their laughter.

Until it comes to a halt. Rubble crumbling and crushing; a bomb embedded nearby, threatening an explosion that never comes. Only silence remains, and the cold, unpalatable realization of loss—

When he returns to reality, he has both elbows on the table in front of him, a hand clenched at the side of his face.]

Even… here—

[In the Horizon, they still aren't safe from this influx of memory.]

[carmesi]

[even here throws a question into wanda's thoughts, as this is the first time she's experienced this kind of influx into her own mind. she leaves her questions for later, raising herself to her feet and reaching for sephiroth, a hand pressed on his back—

(a motion so familiar, so normal, an extension of herself, when she would check up on her older brother when he had exerted himself too much)

—and uses a small burst of magic to try and pulse out whatever pain sephiroth may be feeling, much like the migraine that contests her own head.]

I saw you... in a lab. [he knows what this is, doesn't he? what they just witnessed?] Are you alright?