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.

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Jesper wouldn't profess to know Kaz better than anyone else, although he thinks that he and Inej probably know him better than most, and she more than him. But Jesper's observant and he pays attention to Kaz when no one else does, his eyes always drift there like they have a mind of their own. Or maybe it's soothing to him, to look to someone who always has a plan, and how unsettling it is when he's out of sorts. He is confident he is right about this.

"Well, to be fair, few things say I love you better than a pirate ship." He intentionally leaves out her parents even though that is the obvious extra part of that, because he doesn't want to remind her, although he knows she doesn't need to be reminded. She knows. Being here is keeping her from a reunion she deserves. "Except I suppose the actual words." That Kaz is unlikely to say, because he does the sweeping gestures thing. He has found the words, occasionally. Jesper still holds the knowledge about 'Jordie' close to his chest, it warms his heart when he needs it, small as it may have been.

"I'm Zemeni, we do say sorry." She takes his hand at least, and there is that. He holds it loose and light, so she doesn't feel any pressure with it. "I really am going to kill him when we get back. No one would have to know." He can make it look accidental.

She can't help the soft huff of a laugh that escapes her at that. "He does do gestures incredibly well, doesn't he?" Sometimes, she wonders if Kaz realizes that is, in fact, his love language. He doesn't go around making grand, sweeping gestures for just anyone. But the people that count? The ones that truly matter? No one could ever compete with Kaz Brekker in gift-giving.

"I'm not sure words will ever be something he gets much the hang of," she admits with a slight shake of her head. That boy is more stubborn than is good for him.

She breathes a slow, deep breath in and out and quietly mutters, "He wouldn't be the first kill you'd made for me." Before she'd eventually had no choice but to do it herself, Jesper had been the one to take those hits. Once she'd crossed the line it got... not easier, never easy, but... more manageable. She was better at compartmentalizing and separating necessity from morals, and she prayed every day that her Saints knew that in her heart, she was not evil. She did what she needed to survive.

"He really does. You know he refused to give me parem? I asked right before the last battle, but he wouldn't." Which for Kaz is a gesture too. Since it would make sense, logically, to give his other Grisha the drug so they had a guaranteed win, especially with Jesper's part as important as it was. And he nearly failed it. But though it was rational, and Dirtyhands should have done it, Kaz wouldn't take the risk. It's practically a love letter!

"He isn't likely to be the last." Listen, they might be going their own ways back home, but they're both young and make trouble, they're bound to come together again. And then they're here, when neither of them have had to kill anyone ... yet. Jesper's always ready though, for her or for anyone else. He's not a bloodthirsty man, but he knows when to put people down, and he never hesitates.

It took Inej a little time to put blood on her own hands, but he understood that, and it's one of those things Jesper's always willing to do. Step in to spare his friends. He'd do it for any of them. Van Eck will be a pleasure though. He'll have to come up with something to tell Wylan, but that's a then problem. "You're worth so much more than your skills, you know that, right?"

"Of course, he refused," the words are nearly bitten out, incredulous. "Jesper, why would you want to risk it?" Nina had barely survived it, and no one before her really did at all. He already had his own addictions to contend to, she can't imagine how much worse that would have been with someone so prone to them in the first place. All things Kaz had realized in that same moment, she's sure of it.

She closes her eyes at those words. She handles her own these days, but she knows she could count on him, any time, to take it in his hands instead. All she had to do is ask. She's made peace with the things she's done in Ketterdam, but it's still so important that he recognizes how much she hates it, even still.

When her eyes open again, they're bright with unshed tears. "Sometimes, I am not sure I do." Some days, it feels like that's all she is. All she can be.

"We needed every advantage, there was too much at stake. I still barely managed to fulfill my end of things, through luck." Well, luck and a lot of skill. Jesper had only speculated thanks to Inej at that point that his perfect aim was Grisha. But then he used only his ability to hit Kuwei unseen, from a distance, and it was all clear.

Jesper would have taken the easy route though. They all know that. Instead of taking a risk of failure, he would've used the drug and never gotten through it like Nina did. Kaz did the right thing, but if he was as cold as everyone thought, he would have given it to Jesper and used him. That's why he knows he's not. "I'm glad he didn't give it to me, believe me. I wouldn't be here now." They probably would've had to put him down, like they had to the other drugged Grisha.

His heart softens and aches for her and he gently takes her face into his hands, looking down at her. "You are worth everything, Inej Ghafa. Because of your heart, and your kindness, and your wisdom."

"We would have lost you to it," she's, unfortunately, incredibly certain of that, and it shines in her eyes.

Eyes that only shine impossibly brighter when he reaches for her. So soft. So gentle. So full of earnest belief in the words he's saying. Belief in her. Not just her skills. But her worth. She blinks and the tears spill like ink across her cheeks.

Sometimes, you can't know how much you need to hear something until someone finally just says it, and the way she crumbles against him is proof enough this is one of those things she needed to hear. She's so small against the height of him as she presses her face into the solid wall of his chest, fingers curling tight and desperate into the material of his shirt at his back as she clings to him.

"You didn't lose me. And you won't. No matter what." The Singularity might send one or both of them back, it's out of his hands, but Jesper believes no matter where they are, they will find each other. And he will carry her with him wherever he goes. It's all very poetic and spiritual the way she likes it, but fine, he can adapt to those things for the right reasons.

Jesper knows he got through to her because of her reaction and he immediately closes his arms around her, hugging her tightly, holding her the way she deserves. He meant every word and it's clearly something she needed to hear. If he knew she did, he would've said it sooner, but he said it now.

"You are good, and brilliant, and loving, and stronger than anyone I have ever met." He will keep telling her nice things because he has a whole lot of them to list. "You deserve the world, Inej."

The quiet murmur of his words feel so genuine, and like such a farce all at once. She doesn't feel strong or good sometimes. Weakness she can handle. She's not Kaz, she isn't afraid of being perceived as weak, her reputation or character would not be ruined for it. But the other bit? That gets under her skin more than she'd ever like to admit.

Inej has stains on her hands she can never truly scrub clean anymore, and in the darkest of nights, on the worst of her days, she thinks maybe her Saints will reject her. That she won't reach the afterlife the rest of her family will find themselves in. She'll be boxed off, separated from them in death as much as she has the last few years in life.

She doesn't talk about it. People get strange in conversations about death and the afterlife; religion and spirituality are not easy topics for people to hear. But the fear is there, it's made a little home in a small corner of her heart, and it likes to remind her it's still there from time to time.

At least his voice is soft and his arms around her feel like safety instead of a cage she cannot flee from.

Jesper doesn't judge good the way others do, he would be the first to admit his sense of morality is deeply gray and questionable. It has to be in order to go through life the way he does, and to be a gunslinger, Kaz's right hand man. Jesper also wonders sometimes if he's good, and he also isn't always sure he cares if he is. But then he remembers that he wants Colm to think so, that he doesn't tell Sam the darkest things he's done, some part of him does want to seem good.

But it also doesn't torture him the same way it does her. He is who he is. All the good and bad that entails. Jesper's been ashamed of his addictions and what it's led him toward, and coming to grips with that really meant he had to forgive himself, or he'd just drive himself crazy. Do better. That's what Inej's own advice was to him once, and he has. That's the power she has, that's who she is. Someone who inspires others to be better. In their little crew, she's the only one who tries.

He'd be no real help when it comes to her Saints. He doesn't believe in them. Jesper believes in her. She is the realest person he knows. He's seen how much the darkness can turn people wicked, and she didn't let it. If she needs him to say what he believes, she has. The Wraith is a title she took on. "The Wraith is a part of you, Inej, but it's not all of you."

"...s'all there is-" the words are choked out between her still flowing tears and she pauses to take a breath, slow in, slow out. It steadies her some, but not completely, her words still come out in a bit of a warble. "Some- sometimes it feels like- like that's all there is."

It's not an easy admission, not one she thinks she would have come to owning for a long time if not for this strange occurrence happening around the city at the moment.

She swipes her hands under her eyes, but it's futile, the tears just keep coming. "I can't stop it now," she mutters and lets a gasp of a laugh escape her. "Look what you started." she wipes at her eyes again.

"The Wraith wouldn't have waffle parties with her friends. The Wraith wouldn't even have friends. And she definitely wouldn't be crying and wondering about whether she's a good person." He means the symbolic version of her, the assassin and spy, Dirtyhands' favorite tool. Inej is lethal the way he is, in a different way, although she's still kinder in his opinion than either of her beloved Crow boys. If she was nothing but the killer, they wouldn't be here like this.

Jesper has multiple layers on, as per usual, so he runs fingers over his shirt and separates some of the fabric from it, pulling it up and it looks like a nice handkerchief by the time he offers it over to her. He doesn't have any on him, but luckily she knows a Durast who can make that sort of thing on a whim. For her tears.

"You are made of love, Inej. And love can never truly be evil."

He's not wrong. The girl that is made of shadows and as many knives as most people have teeth, who had made herself important and irreplaceable to the boy that had saved her is not the same as the girl standing in front of him questioning her self-worth.

Of course, one well-placed and well-time comment doesn't resolve all the underlying parts of this. But it helps. It's something she needed to hear.

"Stop it," she mumbles, swatting at him lightly, taking the proffered makeshift handkerchief to dab at her eyes. "You have to stop making things that are going to make me cry more."

It's fine, Jesper will follow her around and remind her whenever necessary. Inej, in his opinion, is the best of them. Wylan too, they're probably about the same, but he's innocent in a way none of them are, yet he has his pessimistic times. Inej still believes and hopes, that's something the rest of them rarely dare to do.

He just smiles at her softly and reaches out to snag her other hand, threading their fingers together. "I only speak the truth to you, you know that." Jesper may be a rampant liar in other areas, but not to his Crows. That's not the kind of group they are, outside of Kaz, who has a very bad relationship with telling the truth.

"This is happening to everyone, be careful who you touch, it seems to be set off by that."

She squeezes his fingers in her own where he’s threaded them together. It’s a balm on her nerves, the affection from him so genuine and pure. “And I appreciate it. More than words can say,” and she means it.

“Okay,” she nods a little at the warning. “Thank you… for coming to tell me.” she releases his hand, but stays close to him as they walk through the hallway. “Breakfast?” she tips her head up at him. It seemed the best cap off to the morning, at least.

"Always in the mood for breakfast," Jesper says with a laugh.

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EVENT #7: THE SIGHT

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We can lead to wrapping this!

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and fini!