Spring was an ephemeral season in places like Denver. It came and went with the flow of the weather's whim, bursting into vibrant bloom, only to be licked with winter's last bitter frost. It was not that long ago that these woods were blanketed in a dusting of snow, but by now the last traces of winter's breath were gone and the landscape was thriving with life. Up above, the sky was a cool wash of grey, but the air was a pleasant 57 degrees, and one could hardly blame the local mages (or anyone else, for that matter) for wanting to spend the end of a long week soaking up some of that life.
Maybe they'd all met at the chantry. Maybe somewhere along the line, someone had said: "Hey, let's go exploring." Because it was that kind of a day. The air outside felt charged with a kind of luminous anticipation. Like the beginning of a story.
(Anything could happen.)
(And perhaps anything would.)
Sera, in particular, would be feeling the prickle of it on the back of her neck. Not a proper vision this time, but a nagging instinct. Something was going to happen tonight in those woods. Something crawling along the edge of the periphery of he land - far out into the wilderness. Just beyond the reach of the chantry's effects.
So maybe they all came together. Or maybe they just happened to have the same idea at the same time. Either way, they were all there: Grace, Lena, Sid and Sera. Walking down a path that led through a grove of tall pines.
SidIt's Lena who gets the first message sent from Sid's personal cell phone in over a month. It doesn't really sound like Sid much, but then Sid hasn't felt much like herself (who is that, anyway? who is she anymore?), and besides. There were anti-axiety medications coursing through her system for the hours and hours it took for to get from one side of the world to the other.
"Trapped in planes for too much time. Need go outside. See grass? Sunshine? Et cetera?"
That was last night. In the morning as Sid attempted to recover from jet lag, she fired off another message.
"I want to see how what I did at the house is doing."
She will get her sunshine, her lush green grass, her flowers caught in perpetual bloom. Maybe she spent some time in the Node first, letting the warmth of the water soak into her muscles, letting the magic flow through her.
No. No, as soon as her old blue-and-cream-and-rusty truck pulled into the drive, Sid spilled out and set off across the grounds, with Lena in tow or waiting to met along the way. Maybe Grace was there, too, waiting to be swept off toward the edge. Soon as she saw that house, soon as she saw the thick carpet of verdant grass, the corners of Sid's mouth relaxed. She was here, she was home, she was in a place where she belonged.
They walk the grounds for a little while, Sid heading for one of the edges. She felt how far she'd stretched her magic and now she wants to see it. See if it's still holding. The edge of the magic is a sharp and abrupt thing. There is one step left of a thick carpet of green. Then the next is out onto ordinary Denver grasses. These are paler, a little more parched. The ground is patchy in places where the clay of the earth is visible.
Do they talk along the way? Maybe. About travel and flight and Sid's need to stretch her legs. At the edge of the green Sid pauses. Closes her eyes. Let's her senses be open again in this place that is familiar.
[percept+awareness]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 5, 5, 6, 9, 9, 9) ( success x 4 )
Lena ReillyThey didn't all come together, as it turned out. Lena was meeting up with Sid after she had landed in Denver, and the latter had suggested that they get out into the wilderness. The great wide forests of the world aren't Lena's bag but she completely understands Sid's want to get out into the fresh air and nature here in Denver, knowing how the Verbena appreciates it.
And so that's why they're out here. Lena is walking alongside Sid, dressed...not warmly, but not in summer clothes either. She's in a hunter green long-sleeved shirt and a pair of jeans with a bomber jacket for a little extra weather protection, sneakers on her feet and hair unbound. Out here she doesn't smoke out of respect for a side of the world she doesn't visit often. She is relatively at ease, despite being out of her element because she is with Sid and trusts her. Besides, pushing past your comfort zones is the lifeblood of a Cultist.
And so she's here, walking alongside Sid and Grace and letting the Verbena soak it in.
[[Per+Aware, Uncanny Instincts]]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 2, 4, 6, 7, 9) ( success x 3 )
GraceToday Grace dresses as she usually does, in jeans and sneakers and that gray turtleneck jacket that is pretty much her ubiquitous outer shell. Also similarly routine is her laptop bag slung over her shoulder. Even on a walk through the woods, yes, she has the laptop.
It had been a relatively peaceful day until Sid (Sid!) showed up at the Chantry with Lena, and Sid emphatically did not want to stay cooped up inside. It has been months since Grace saw Sid last. Months.
So, she agreed to be swept up in their rush to go explore outside, if only to catch up.
"Hey Sid, how was Russia? Did you do anything really cool? I quit school, did you know? Also, I went and had a Seeking while you were gone -- why did nobody tell me about that? Oh, but it was pretty cool though..."
And Grace, never quite one to go and chatter quite that much just goes on and on after seeing her friend for the first time in so long. If there is anything else out in these woods, they hear her -- unless she's told to shut it.
SerafíneSera follows the trail without thinking about; almost without noticing the change in the texture and color of the grass beneath her feet when she leaves the circle of the effect cast at the chantry. She is a slim figure against the landscape, but still somehow both dark and vivid. Wearing cut-off denim shorts over her thigh-high fishnets, with a black hoodie over that, zipped half-way up. Hands in her pockets, her shoulders forward, the hood drawn over the crown of her head, her blond curls all tangled around her face and neck as she climbs, following a feeling beneath her skin without ever quite knowing, precisely, where she is going or why she is going there, or what she might find when she gets there.
Somehow, she is only half-here. Somehow, she is then-and-now, where-and-when, each second staccato beneath her skin.
Breathing, just breathing, as she climbs.
Elsewise, neverwhen. No wonder she does not feel the other young women behind her as she climbs.
SidSid, despite her desire to get out into the world, is not really dressed for a hike. She is wearing a bland, nondescript hooded sweatshirt (which number is this now?), jeans, and black and white Vaans. Unlike Grace she left her belongings behind. Her bag is still in the front seat of her truck, along with her only weapon.
Her only physical weapon, at any rate.
As they walk, Sid keeping the pace brisk but not going so fast that anyone must jog to keep up, she listens to Grace without interrupting. Does not tell her about Russia, or Shanghai, or Sydney, or the airports she's seen. Or the people she met. Or the things she's done. She merely listens quietly.
Until they get to the edge of her Working and she pauses and she stretches out her mind to feel the world, the universe that is in her, in the particles of her blood, the fabrics of her clothing, the wind in her hair. And then she feels-
Opening her eyes, she turns to look at Lena. That look is a wordless question as she lifts her hand to Grace for quiet. Does Lena sense that? Something moves and her eyes dart to the lone figure moving ahead of them. There is no question in her mind of who that willworker is. Sid frowns. And then she makes a quiet hmm, low enough for her ears only, a quiet but shifting single-note tune that seeks out and eventually finds a harmony that Sid can feel in her bones.
[Prime 1: Watch the Weaving, coincidental, practiced]
Dice: 3 d10 TN3 (3, 6, 7) ( success x 3 )
Lena ReillyShe picks up on several things, of course. There's the presence of her two fellows here: Sid's multiple Resonances, Grace's two. But there's something else out there; she feels Serafine and the sudden realization of these combined auras take her to a place that she had left behind recently...a place she'd rather forget. There would be a time later when she'll be more okay with it but this is the first time all of them have been on one spot and with that other, new feel permeating her senses, she freezes.
"There's something wrong here. And Sera, too." She's tense. Like any good Mage she believes in Fate, even if as a mutable quality. And there is something that doesn't seem right about this.
She begins to drum a beat against the side of her leg with her fingers. She concentrates until her eyes unfocus, letting that rhythm find her way. Sid's checking for Prime; Lena knows the Verbena's modus operandi by this point. Lena, for her part, starts scanning the area for Spiritual anomalies.
[[Spirit 1, Corr 1, WP]]
Dice: 2 d10 TN4 (2, 5) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
Grace[Awareness + Perception!]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (3, 4, 6, 8, 10) ( success x 3 )
GraceGrace is asking all those questions, and Sid is being silent until she lifts that hand to bring the quiet. Grace feels the tension in the air rise slightly, feels their surge of resonance as they begin to Work.
"Sera too?" she whispers, perhaps feeling a bit of the same unnerving that Lena does.
All of them, back again, with something wrong here.
SerafíneSo many things are lodged in Sera's throat. She lifts her face to the wind and finds herself in a grove of trees without quite understanding how or when she left the sunlight for the shadow.
Her head tips back, though, back and back and back and back, following the graceful lines of the evergreen all the way to its swaying top. The hood falls, unleashing the wind on her tangled blond hair, which whips across her face, filling her mouth as she opens it to take a breath. Stops, stills for a moment in the stippled shadows, rocking her left foot heel to toe, toe to heel, heel to toe, over the fulcrum of a rock that was here as before -
as now, as always.
Perception + awareness.
Dice: 7 d10 TN5 (2, 2, 3, 3, 6, 7, 8) ( success x 3 )
QuicksilverThere was something out there. They felt it already - those telltale notes of resonance drifting down on the breeze like an animal's scent. Sera was on her own, climbing a part of the trail that began to ascend a long sloping hill. As lost as she was in time (there and yet somewhere - somewhen - else) she may not have noticed the drawing presence of her friends behind her. But surely they noticed her.
And because Sera was in the lead, it was her who first saw the flash of brilliant red and the bob of a white-tipped tail as the fox bounded over a rocky outcropping and came to a stop just a few feet away, mouth agape as it panted for breath.
"Hello? Can you help me?"
The fox was... speaking?
Yes, it was. It was a talking fox.
(And this creature, see, this was the quicksilver flash of swift and clever resonance that Sid and Lena had felt approaching.)
The fox shifted its attention to the rest of the group, calling out with a loud, clear voice so they could all hear. "Hello! I need your help! It's quite urgent, I'm afraid!"
Sid and Lena began to open their senses, searching the nearby surroundings for signs of Willworking. As of yet, there was little for them to find, but still there was that draw of something... something... just beyond the edge of their awareness.
SerafíneOh, see. Sera can taste it on the tip of her tongue. Whatever it is. Whatever is uncertain or longing or strange inside her. Whatever has her caught between breaths and breaks and the stitched spaces the ordinary inhabit; whereever she holds herself, however she keeps herself in place.
Somehow, the presences behind her feel as much like hallucination as the fox in front of her, and Sera feels this brief ticking note of panic inside her - (not because the fox is speaking, no. because she does not quite remember something, some necessary doorway, some opening to the underworld) - even as she sinks to her haunches and opens her hand to the fox.
Of course it speaks.
She is on drugs, remember?
"What do you need?"
Even as she glances off beyond it, toward the horizon. This tangled awareness, almost-seeking.
GraceGrace blinks at the fox. It's not like she doesn't believe in the impossible. Not after Thakinyan and the scarecrow and the mummy. It's just odd what the universe will throw your way, isn't it?
She walks up, because where the fox is, Sera is. It's not quite like leaping ahead of the others. Sera gets a little quirk of a smile, but it's obvious Grace is distracted. Well, who wouldn't be?
"Uhh. Right. Talking fox. Hi?" she asks, and looks around for... whatever.
SidSera, too?
Sid does not turn her head to look at Grace, nor does she look to her other side to Lena. Her eyes are on Sera as she disappears beyond the line of the trees and begins her upward climb.
"I don't know," she says. Sera feels like Sera, but what is Sera doing out here all alone? There is something very, very strange going on here. She sensed that prickle of Paradox, but no working to cause it? Only the after-effect?
She would like to consider it, and if she had time she would. But Sera is moving on all alone and there is something quicksilver moving toward her, and there is something else out there as well.
"But we're not leaving her alone." Without another word, Sid carries forward. Either the others will follow her, or they won't. She is going after her...she's going after Sera. This time her steps are quicker, her long legs striding long. She does not break into a trot, but she does not slow herself for the others to keep pace - if they come with her.
Instead, as she walks she scratches at her arm, the fingernails of her right hand digging and digging at the flesh of her left wrist, just beneath the ink there. She scratches until the skin breaks and a bead of bright red blood oozes up, scarlet against the paper-whiteness of her skin. She is searching for something else now. As she nears she catches sight of the flash of red, low to the earth. Her brows furrow, but she does not slow, and she does not stop when the fox turns to look at her (at them) and speak.
She is reaching out, looking to see if maybe, just maybe, there are other signs of Life in this place. Something Other. Something unstable, but ardent and imaginative all the same. Something mad mad mad. Does it belong to a person, is it a resonance? Or is it something else?
[Life 1 scan, also practiced and such!: Looking for other life patterns]
Dice: 3 d10 TN3 (4, 5, 8) ( success x 3 )
Lena Reilly[[Int+Occult: Do I know about these things?]]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 4, 5) ( fail )
Lena Reilly"It's...a Bygone, maybe?" She hasn't encountered something like this before, but she does know about those. Most Mages with any level of experience are familiar with the concepts of Bygones, and certainly ones with Spirit.
She frowns and moves to head to the fox. She's not naively blundering ahead, but she's also not hesitant or wary either. This is a different Lena than the other three are likely used to. It's more like what Lena used to be.
QuicksilverThe fox's body shivered lightly as it stood there, muscles quaking with tension and energy. Its ears pricked forward when the others approached. Its eyes were a glow of brilliant amber as it took them all in - alive and intelligent. Something more than a simple fox, surely. (After all, it could speak.)
"Yes, a talking fox. Whatever will the universe throw at you next?" There was a hint of tired sarcasm in the creature's tone.
To Sera then, it said: "Henry, my friend. He was messing about with this book. And it summoned something. Ah... spiders, actually. It summoned spiders. Very big ones. Three of them. One of them bit him and wrapped him up for a snack and I'd really, really love it if we could do something about it before it decides to eat him."
And see, here. The fox? It was a clever creature. It gave them all such a wide-eyed, plaintive look... like a lost puppy begging for food. Surely a difficult thing to say no to. But for all that it may have been trying to play on their empathy, its desperate concern seemed quite genuine.
"Can you help us? Please?"
SerafíneSera reaches up to wrap her left hand around the length of her hair and pull it to one side, tugs up the hoodie again whilst she is crouched there, the diamonds of her fishnets digging in to the flesh of her thighs. Her weight is finely balanced on the balls of her Doc Marten's. From somewhere inside the pockets of her hoodie she fishes out a pack of kreteks and she's still playing with that idly, almost thoughtlessly, her body functioning on some level of automatic pilot.
A glance over her shoulder, at Grace and Sid and Lena. She may think they are as much hallucination as the talking fox.
"'That's what your friend gets for messing about with books. Course we can help. Let's go - " Not merely idly, with those cigarettes. Sera lights one. Inhales, see. " - how far is it?
Lena ReillyGreat. A snarky talking fox. That's all they need. She frowns, but not out of irritation. She couldn't give a shit less if the fox is sarcastic. It could talk in a British accent and wear a monacle for all she was concerned. What's important is that a friend was messing with a book and there are spiders.
"Which way?" she asks, without hesitation. If someone's in trouble, she's here to help. And when they get to the person they can assess the situation and see if help isn't quite an option.
GraceGrace's eyes widen a bit. "Okay, a talking fox who can also read minds."
Perhaps not for real. She didn't exactly sense the thing digging into her brain or anything. But whatever.
She looks over at the others, "I have no giant boot with which to de-arachnid the forest. I can take a look maybe?"
With that, she unloads the laptop from her bag and sits down on the damp needles of the forest floor, to try to follow a fox's trail through the place.
[Corr 2, Life 1, diff 5 = Trace the fox back... to spiders? Spending WP!]
Dice: 2 d10 TN5 (3, 5) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
SidBygone. Sid's brow shadows, she's heard that word. She's read it somewhere. After the thing in the alley, the peryton Leonhard said. She looks at the fox and she understands now. Paradox with no effect, of course.
The fox is sarcastic and then pleading. His friend is hurt and Sera tells him that's what his friend gets for messing with books. Sid can't help but agree, but her concern really is with large spiders and a person who has been caught up by them, bitten by them, could right now be feeling his insides melting away in preparation for a spider's dinner.
Sid senses around them for other living creatures, but all she feels is them and the other things in the woods around them. Sera says let's go, Lena asks which way, Grace opens up her laptop and looks.
Sid is quiet, letting the sleeve of her sweatshirt fall back over her wrist.
GraceShe boots up her laptop and (quickly enough) gets to work. It's a fast machine, made to silently, suddenly start. And her fingers do fly over the keyboard once it's come to.
Wherever one goes, one leaves behind the chemicals of life. Some are apt to be dragged along with the wind, but where the fox has stepped across the pine needles, there Grace follows. Sweat gripping its paws, a hair here and there, it's all enough to track.
On her screen, the others can watch it like a camera attached to a heli-drone as she progresses, quicker than even the fox through the forest, retracing its steps, until...
There is the fox's friend, unconscious on the forest floor, guarded by a single, extremely large spider.
"Found it. It's about a half-mile away from here. That way," she says, and points. "There's only one spider, though, Mr. Fox."
QuicksilverA wash of relief flooded the fox's expressive eyes. "Thank you, truly. If we get out of this I'll make Henry give you some of our stash."
It wasn't clear what, exactly, he meant by that. Who knew what sort of 'stash' a talking fox and his friend might have.
"It's this way." The fox turned and angled its head back in the direction it had come. The same direction that Grace's effect would inevitably lead her while she ran her calculations - finding that thread of connection that bound the fox to the unconscious mage it had left behind. The fox seemed about to elaborate further, but then Grace beat him to the punch, and he gave a quick little nod of his head to show that she was correct.
"Only one? Then the other two must have wandered off. Which is... both good and bad, I suspect. And my name is Red. Not 'Mr. Fox.'"
And then, because it was clearly in a hurry, the fox turned and began to trot back up the path, pausing only long enough to give the others time to catch up.
"I'm not a bygone either. But I believe they are."
(They: as in the spiders.)
Lena ReillyShe looks to the others and then pauses to grab a decent-sized branch off the ground...some sort of weapon against giant spiders...before she moves to follow. Lena doesn't come combat-ready...in fact, she's just about the opposite of combat-ready as a rule. But that's not going to stop her.
"Fair enough, Red. Let's go."
She makes to follow, keeping herself alert for the other spiders. She's mostly pointing her attention up to the trees...she knows enough about spiders to know that if there's an attack, it could well come from above. Luckily her shows are well-suited for moving quickly and she's walking along with the fox (and Sera, Sid and Grace, of course) as she does. She's keeping closer to Grace since she's paying attention to her laptop, so that nothing drops down on the Virtual Adept.
"So if not a Bygone, then...what are you, if I can ask?"
SidA half mile away, eh? Well, Sid does not simply seek out other Patterns and then release the search. She keeps feeling out as she follows along, the rote passive enough that she almost doesn't have to think about it at all as she goes. And though she's spent the better part of the last twenty-four hours cooped up in an airplane, Sid is athletic. For her part, she keeps to the rear of the company, though. She'll watch their backs, in case anything should happen to surprise them, or slip through her search.
GraceOnce she's found the spot, Grace packs up again and stands to follow the rest. Lena's got a good idea with that big stick, and Grace follows suit with her own improvised weaponry -- another big stick.
Hey, you do what you can, right? She hasn't the ability to do much else than see things.
She gives a glance to Sera. "I usually like spiders, you know? They usually eat bugs, not people though."
SerafíneThe fox, the feeling in the back of her throat, the then-and-now, which is strange and lovely and terrible in its own way - all of it feels hallucinatory to Sera. Imperfect, unreconciled, as if the edges of the moment has started to become frayed.
Perforated,
and something else is seeping in.
It isn't the talking fox that gives her that feeling of both strangeness and impermanence and absurdity, though. It is Grace with her laptop in the midst of it all, sitting on the pine needles -
- and she thinks, not, perhaps, absurdly, of a boy named Jake instead of spiders and where they might come from and how and why and all that. And Grace says that she usually likes spiders, they eat bugs, and Sera gives her a spare glance and the edge of a smile that is inexplicably on the verge of tears or maybe that is the wind in her eyes, the sharp edge of it, as she shadows the fox, striding rather than jogging, this surefooted ease about her.
Weapons?
None but her Will.
Quicksilver"I'm a fox, clearly."
Red kept trotting up the path, leading them toward the source of the disturbance. Every now and then he'd have to slow his swift-footed steps in order to allow the others to keep pace with him, and this seemed to frustrate him a little, but he knew enough to be polite about it.
"I used to live on the other side of the Gauntlet, but then I met Henry, and he brought me back here. We have a sort of... partnership." He refused to use the word 'familiar.' Perhaps it offended him. "I'm a spirit given flesh, if you really want to look at it that way. But I prefer Red. Who I am is more important than what, wouldn't you say?"
He glanced back at Grace and Lena, eyeing their improvised weaponry. And then it gave this wearied little sigh. Like maybe it wished it had come upon a more well-armed group of mages. But then, beggers couldn't exactly be choosers, could they?
Besides, they had other weapons - the kind that did not require anything more than a waking mind.
(And cleverness, hopefully.)
They moved through the pine forest at a quick pace, drawing ever nearer their destination, and eventually the fox turned off of the trail and led them through the trees, its feet padding silently along the bed of needles. It wasn't long after this when Sid and Lena would begin to sense what was ahead.
SidSid is quiet, bringing up the rear, listening to Lena carry on a conversation with a fox. A fox. There was a time when she would have found that strange. Then her eyes were opened to the wonders of the world around her.
Or maybe the part of her that used to wonder and that used to be amazed is crushed inside of her. Maybe it's gone altogether. She is not the person she was a year ago. Sometimes she wonders if she was ever the person she was before that.
Grace and Lena gather what they can for weapons. Sid and Sera do not. This is the lot that Red found, or that Fate drew together for Red to find. These four are stronger than they seem. They have their minds, their wills. They have their ability to alter reality on a whim.
Suddenly Sid's head comes up, sharp and somehow animal. The way her chin lifts, the way her neck stretches, the way her body seems to lenghen into something larger, something barely contained within the cloak of her skin.
"We're close," she says, and she pauses. "I can feel your...I can feel Henry. He's alive. If this thing. If these things were summoned," she continues. "Can they be sent back? Or do we have to end them?" She is asking all of them because she does not know. All that power at her disposal and there are still all those years when she was on her own, on the run, refusing the closeness of others, the friendship, the help. There is still so much left for her to learn, and among that is anything to do with the summoning of spirits and the like.
Quicksilver[Edit: "And then he gave this wearied little sigh. Like maybe he wished he had come upon a more well-armed group of mages."]
Lena ReillyShe's not ever seen one before, so she wouldn't know what the deal is (and thus didn't), but she's heard stories at least and of course familiars are not some obscure part of wizard lore. So when Red makes it clear, she nods a little bit and accepts it. "Noted. Red you are."
The little familiar may have hoped for a martially-minded group of Awakened but that's just not this group. Not unless they have the ability to projectile vomit or bleed on people, anyway. Historically they've been better in that sense. Though whether any of them would be willing to do that again...yeah. That was a different, more desperate time. They do have magic of course, so that's something. They'll make do.
"Spiders eat whatever they're big enough to eat, I think." She's no naturist, she only knows what little she's read or seen. So she's probably wrong; just making conversation. "I'm less concerned about the eating than the poisoning. But yeah, either way."
And then she gets the sense thanks to her magic, and nods in response to Sid. "Something was summoned, yeah. The wall between us and the spirit side is very weak here. Someone ripped it open hard. And that's where the spiders came from. I don't have the ability to send them back, that's some pretty advanced magic. But if the spiders are indeed Bygones, and it seems like they are, they may have more than just your garden-variety spidery-things so be ready just in case."
GraceSera is still acting weird, still not speaking to her, but giving these tiny smiles that are as confusing as they are welcome. She sighs, but continues on, gripping that stick when Sid says that she can feel Henry.
"So they're spirity spiders? Demon spiders? Fuck my life," she says, and whacks the palm of her hand with her pine stick.
"Kalen's going to just love it. I face down demon spiders now. Brilliant," she says, but the sarcasm, it drips off of every word.
Serafíne"I can't send it anywhere," Sera, quiet, hands in the pockets of her hoodie again, her breathing sliding into a deliberate sort of rhythm, matched to the beating of her heart, away of the beat of the universe all around them. She is looking out, away, beyond. Holding herself the smallest measure apart, isn't she. Somehow on the trot over here the surreality of the hallucination has given way to something else and she follows that changing sense of the moment with a perfect quickening in her heart.
"But I can stop time around it. Long enough for someone to get him out."
Serafíne[Mind 2 Scan: General disposition of spider. Dif 5 -1 practiced.]
Dice: 3 d10 TN4 (2, 6, 9) ( success x 2 )
QuicksilverRed hopped up onto a dead log and looked out into the distance. They were close enough now to see movement between the trunks of the pines ahead, and the breeze carried echoes of some kind of... horrible shifting, liquid sound. Like something being drained. Whatever it was, it wasn't Henry (Sid would have sensed that.) Maybe the spider had caught itself some other prey.
"That's a tricky effect." Red spoke softly as he turned back to look at Sera. "But if you can manage it..."
He paused thoughtfully.
"The book. We need the book to send it back. If you deal with the spider, I'll find the book."
Lena ReillyYou deal with the spider, I'll find the book. Lena's come along to help without reservation, but there is a brief moment when her eyes narrow. That sounds almost a little fishy to her. But they really don't have a huge amount of options and so she hefts her stick, sighs.
"All right then, let's do this. I knew I should have brought some Deep Woods Off." Hey, she's got to keep her sense of humor up, right?
"I'll lure it out this way with a little mental gymnastics, get it out into the open and then we'll keep it busy?" She looks to the others to make sure they're in on the plan.
SidA book. It would be easy for Sid to locate the book if she had her knife, but it's back in her truck. She does not lament this. The fox will surely have his own senses that he can use to locate it, anyway.
Knowing that there will be a way to send these creatures away, back to where they came, it gives Sid the smallest sense of relief. Perhaps there won't be any death here today.
Sera will stop time, Lena will lure the spider out. Sid looks at Grace and the corners of her mouth, they flicker, just a touch. Grace can almost see the shadow formed as old, old laugh lines just barely begin to show. It does not resolve into a smile, or even a glimmer of a smile. This is a smile's ghost, a translucent, non-corporeal thing.
"That leaves us to grab Henry. Are you ready?"
Serafíne"I can."
Spare and graceful, and this to the fox only, Sera unearths her hands from her pockets and reaches back to twist her hair back out of her face. Shakes her hands free then and gives Lena a glance that is quite nearly sharp.
"No. We don't need to lure it here if I do what I said I will do. And I will need time to make it work.
"Give them a hand with Henry, in case what I do goes wrong. You have to time this just right."
Grace"Yeah, I can grab his feet if you grab his hands? Drag him out of here maybe?" Grace says, and she doesn't smile back. In concentration, she either looks extremely distracted or angry -- one of the two. Now, she just looks pissed off.
She drops the stick, because apparently it won't be needed. And besides, it might stand out to an angry spider. Attack the one waving around a weapon, right?
Instead, she slips behind the trees, trying to slip behind enemy lines, so to speak.
[Dex+Stealth = Sneaky sneak!]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 7, 8, 9, 10) ( success x 4 )
Sid"Something like that," replies Sid. Her eyes are on the movement. If the spider has found itself another meal its life has already fled, she would have sensed it just like she would have sensed the other two spiders mentioned.
Grace drops her stick and Sid pulls up the sleeves of her sweatshirt, one after the other, revealing the ink on her left wrist as well as the scratch she already started. Digging her nail into the wound again, she draws up her blood again, just a droplet, and she smears it down her forearm until it fades.
[Life 3 coincidental, increase Dexterity for a boost o' speed, -2 Quint to lower the diff, +Wp because no time to extend]
Dice: 3 d10 TN4 (2, 6, 10) ( success x 3 ) [WP]
SerafíneDistort Time. Time 3: Vulgar Without Witnesses. Difficulty: 7 -1 (focus). -1 (quint)3
Dice: 3 d10 TN5 (3, 4, 10) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
Lena ReillyLena is a musician, but people haven't ever really seen her perform. A few have seen her spin, but that's different. She sings, but only very rarely and those tracks are for her and her alone thus far.
It's not because she can't sing, though. Only because she's a perfectionist about her Passions, and if it's not the best it's not for her. Today though, she's making due as she relies on her own heartbeat to provide her internal rhythm, raising her voice in a melody that lacks words, but tries to beckon to the spiders:
Come
[[Mind 2, Impulse: Come This Way. -1 For specialty focus, -1 practiced. WP and Quint to lower diff to 3 and gief suxxessors]]
Dice: 2 d10 TN3 (3, 9) ( success x 3 ) [WP]
Lena Reilly[[And while I'm not asking for Abilities Enhancing Magic, this is just for flavor and because I wanna see how good she does, Performancing!]]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (1, 6, 7, 7, 9, 10) ( success x 6 ) [WP]
QuicksilverGrace had the right idea, and seconds after she slipped silently into the trees, Red followed her, the fluff of his white-tipped tail disappearing into the undergrowth as he crept away.
As Grace drew nearer to the clearing, she'd be able to make out a clearer picture of what lay before her. A giant grey-furred spider, as tall as a small horse (and much more dangerous,) feeding on a doe that it had caught in its webs. The deer looked as though its neck was broken, its head hanging at an odd angle with the whites of its eyes showing. The spider's fangs were sunken into the deer's shoulder, draining it of blood as it fed. The forest here looked like something out of a dream: darker somehow, and coated with thick, silken strands of webbing.
And off to the side, wrapped in a cocoon of gauze-like silk, lay a human body. Alive, but unconscious. Henry.
Behind Grace and Red (wherever he was,) the rest of the group began to work their effects. Sera began to manipulate the strands of Time, focusing on the spider, trying to slow it down to lessen the threat of its attack. Meanwhile, Sid felt her body surge with a new-found agility, and Lena...
That voice.
She could beckon the fucking stars with a song like that.
And oh, it worked. The spider stopped feeding and looked up, its eyes glistening black in the evening light. And then it moved, and oh... it was fast. Sera and Lena would barely have time to comprehend the danger they were in before it was on top of them.
[Ok, Init time folks!]
Lena Reilly[[Init +5]]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (9) ( success x 1 )
Quicksilver[Spider Init +6]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (8) ( success x 1 )
Grace[Init + 6]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (9) ( success x 1 )
Quicksilver[Red Init +8]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (2) ( fail )
Sid[+8]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (3) ( fail )
Serafíne+6
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (4) ( fail )
QuicksilverAnd the order is:
Grace 15
Spider 14 (base +6)
Lena 14 (base +5)
Sid 11
Red 10 (base +8)
Sera 10 (base +6)
SerafíneSera [Extending Distort Time]
Quicksilver[Red is off doing sneaky things and hopefully finding the book]
Sid[1a: Bolt to Henry, 1b: Heft him. Reflexive (think she notices Grace by Life alone at this point): "That way," with a nod of her head in some direction that is away so that she and Grace don't accidentally try to pull Henry in half]
Lena Reilly[[No guts no glory! But Lena's not interested in glory so she's trying to dodge.]]
Quicksilver[Spider Declare: Split action
1st split: Close distance to Lena
2nd split: Tackle Lena]
Grace[Sneaky-bolt to Henry]
Grace[Dex3 + Ath1 = No get caught in web!]
Dice: 4 d10 TN8 (1, 3, 4, 7) ( success x 1 ) [WP]
Quicksilver[Spider closes distance to Lena, second split Dex+Brawl -3, diff 7 for tackle]
Dice: 5 d10 TN7 (1, 2, 5, 5, 7) ( success x 1 )
Lena Reilly[[Dodge!]]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (1, 4, 5) ( fail )
Quicksilver[Str+1 bashing damage from the tackle]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 5, 5, 7) ( success x 1 )
Lena Reilly[[Soak]]
Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (3, 6) ( success x 1 )
Sid[dex+2+ath, -2 for split, diff 8, c'mon Sid you're a stag, be nimble!]
Dice: 6 d10 TN8 (3, 4, 4, 5, 7, 8) ( success x 1 )
Quicksilver[Red does things]
GraceAs she swiftly slides her way to Henry, somehow always keeping a tree or log or what have you in between herself and the spider, Grace notes the webbing getting thicker and thicker until strong silk weaves its way in front of her.
And she almost gets wrapped up in it herself. It clings to her arms, and she wants to panic, but no, we must focus here. She powers through it instead, ripping at the sticky ropes of silk with her fingers until it releases. She has an unconscious person as her goal, and she's not going to let him go because of a spider's trap.
SerafíneExtending. Vulgar Without Witness: 7 +1 (extending) (-1 resonance) (-1 focus). (-1 quint).
Dice: 3 d10 TN5 (1, 6, 7) ( success x 3 ) [WP]
Quicksilver[Spider is now operating at 1/3 speed and can only take his turn every 3rd round]
QuicksilverSid and Grace barely managed to avoid getting stuck in the spider's webbing, but they made it safely to Henry's side. From what they could make out, the man was old, and weighed comparatively little for his height. When they grabbed him, the spider-silk stuck uncomfortably to their hands and arms, but they were able to lift his unconscious body enough to move him.
Meanwhile, at the edge of the clearing, Lena found herself confronted with the sight of the spider's massive fangs, already dripping with venom in anticipation of its strike. It tackled her to the ground so fast the breath was knocked from her lungs, but the weight of its legs on her body weren't enough to cause any real damage (yet.) No, this was not the beast's intention. What it meant to do was immobilize her, and this it did rather effectively, but just before it could sink its fangs into her flesh, Sera's effect hit.
They'd all feel the surge as time warped around the creature. And it's movements slowed to a slow-motion crawl.
But it was still coming closer. Now Lena just had more time to watch the inevitability of her fate drawing near.
Quicksilver[Also, Sera takes 3 Paradox]
Serafíne[Extending. Spending one last quint.]
Dice: 3 d10 TN5 (5, 8, 10) ( success x 4 ) [WP]
Quicksilver[Red continues to do things that no one can see]
Serafíne[Declare: sera is extending her time effect one last time. But damn I wanna keep that roll.]
Sid[Shuffle shuffle shuffle with Grace and Henry away from the dangerzone]
Lena Reilly[[Try to get out from under Spider-Not-Man.]]
Quicksilver[Spider cannot declare until two turns from now]
Grace[Grab Henry's feet and moooove!]
Sid[dex+ath, ALL THE DICE and a WP because that last time was scary]
Dice: 8 d10 TN8 (1, 2, 3, 6, 6, 7, 8, 10) ( success x 3 ) [WP]
Grace[Dex3 + Ath1 = No get caught in web! And a WP!]
Dice: 4 d10 TN8 (1, 2, 7, 10) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
Quicksilver[Grace and Sid be like, "pff, what web?"]
Lena Reilly[[Dex+Ath, I'll put WP in here]]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 8) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
Quicksilver[Lena wiggles free like a boss. Spider be like "waaaaaiiiit, come baaaaack...."]
QuicksilverWhile Grace and Sid worked on moving Henry's body from the clearing, they'd be able to hear a sound coming from somewhere a few yards behind them. That sound? Was Red's voice.
He was... chanting something. The words sounded foreign. Nothing remotely like any mundane language they'd heard before. Something ancient and occult.
Either he was doing what he'd claimed, or he was doing something else entirely. Surely they'd find out soon enough, because as he chanted, a rush of coalescing energy began to wash over their skin.
Something was about to happen.
SerafíneExtending Time 3 - Distort time effect. Dropping her last quint / WP.
Dice: 3 d10 TN5 (4, 4, 6) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
GraceGrace grabs Henry's feet, as she promised earlier, and starts hauling him away with Sid's help. Between the sticky webbing and the dead weight of a man between them, they make slow progress, but it is progress at least.
The fox begins to chant in his strange tongue, and Grace raises her brows at Sid. "Hope he's telling the truth," she whispers, trying still to remain unseen and unheard.
QuicksilverWhen Sera's effect went off, strengthening the power of her hold on the creature, it's movements almost seemed to freeze. It gave Lena enough time to wrench herself free from its grip and slide back along the ground. The plan had been a risky one, but they'd pulled it off in the end.
Beside them, the spider gave this slow, drawn-out hiss. The time distortion deepened it somehow - made it seem as though it came from some cavernous space.
Meanwhile, Grace and Sid managed to drag Henry's cocooned body free from the webbed clearing and onto the dry, clean pine needles of the forest floor. He lay slumped in their arms, unconscious but breathing steadily. Alive and reasonably well, all things considered. Sid would be able to feel the damage from the puncture wounds in his side and the paralytic venom that coursed through his body. It wasn't as bad as they might have suspected. She could heal him, if she tried.
And then - the air snapped. Everything warped for a moment. The very lines of reality blurred and dripped like the world around them was suddenly made of watercolors. Wind gusted around them, blowing pine needles and leaves and bits of rock and dirt and wood everywhere. The gauntlet opened up. And the spider? Vanished into it.
Then everything fell back into place. And the earth grew still and quiet.
SidTogether, Sid and Grace manage to get the man out of the grip of the webbing. For some reason getting out of that place was easier than getting into it and getting to him. Something about desperation, the greater need to get the three of them to safety, perhaps.
Sid is trying very, very hard not to pay attention to what's going on behind her. It's not that she's any more afraid of a giant spider than a sane person should be, it's that something is attacking her friends. If she turns around she will act, just as she told Eleanor once that she would act. But in doing so she would break several promises that she made to herself.
One of which is helping others. That means getting Henry to the safety of the clean woodsy floor. When they're free of the webbing, bits of it stuck to their clothes, clinging to their hands where they hold onto Henry, some of it pinning a lock Sid's long hair down against her sweatshirt, Sid says, "Here."
Here is where she stops, and Here is where she crouches, lowering Henry and shifting her legs as she does so. Her body is still unnaturally agile, superhumanly nimble. It's not hard to shift so that the man is resting his head back against the cushion of her ample chest.
"Try to get the webbing off him," she says to Grace. She wraps her left arm around the man's shoulders, connecting herself to him by strength, and by that swath of blood that's dried to rust on her skin. Quietly she hums a melody to him, a lullaby from her youth. Something to soothe his Pattern and ease his injuries out of existence. Slowly, she starts building up the energy she needs to heal him of his injuries.
[Life 3+Prime 2: Vulgar as fuck, diff 7, will extend twice. WP all the way, baby.]
Dice: 3 d10 TN7 (2, 5, 5) ( success x 1 ) [WP]
GraceGrace just stares around once the air snaps and reality shifts and melts like Dali painted the world. Sid says 'here' and she lets the burden of Henry's legs down slowly.
"Yeah, okay," she says in response to the request to get the webbing off, and she starts pulling away at the sticky mess. It ends up sticking to her, and she rolls it into a web ball in order to discard it. He'll be sticky for a while, anyway. She can't get it all. It's a horrible mess.
The earth shudders back to normality, and Grace looks around. No spider. Just forest. Forest, and a man, and a fox who is still hiding.
"Hey, looks like Red pulled through after all," she says, and manages for the first time since being shushed to smile for real. "I think he's going to make it."
He, and the rest of them too. But she doesn't dwell on the danger they all could have been in.
Lena ReillyShe was pretty sure she was--well, probably not die. She had less of a concern of that than she did of getting skewered, which would put her friends at risk because she'd be bleeding all over the place and THAT would not have been good. But luckily just as her magic had done its job, Sera's did its job and the book or someone made the spiders get sucked away as she skittered away (not un-spider-like herself in the way she back-crawled). Now they're all there without arachnid threats bearing down on them.
And then she gets up and brushes her off. She doesn't wait for the adrenaline to wear off; she revels in the feeling. She is an Ecstatic, and this is exactly the kind of thing that pushes her to her limit. She's not grinning like a madman or saying AGAIN! like an animatronic baby dinosaur, but that moment where endorphins are racing through her body is one that she doesn't dread or wait to wear off. She uses it to get into action, picking up her branch and keeping guard. We think the other spiders left, sure. But it pays to be sure.
"Everyone okay?"
SerafíneStrange to come back to now when she is caught in the interstitial places between seconds; when she is multi-part and many-skinned and gleaming, when she is peeling the layers of the seconds apart to freeze them in place and -
- a breath, see, which is deep and sharp in the moment,
after.
--
The spider disappears before her eyes.
Sera makes a noise like a sob -
oh, yes, a sob, something short and wrench as she sags forward, the feeling the weight of what she did yawning behind her eyes. Hands on her thighs, shoulders hunched, she just - gathers herself for several long, spare seconds, remembering again how body and mind fit themselves together.
Then she glances up; this spare glance at Lena, finds the other woman fine, just fine, but her own her heart is pounding in her chest. Just pounding, see -
- and then Sera turns, rather blindly you see, and climbs away.
SidJust like that it's over. They helped like they said they would. Red helped as he said he would. But there is one more offering made without an exchange. Sid is not going to let this man be poisoned. She is not going to let him bleed out. She is focused on this task when reality trembles back into its proper place. Eyes closed, head dipped forward to press her cheek against the strange man's hair. An oddly intimate gesture from a woman who does not make contact with strangers. But Sid is going to stitch this man back together. She is Working around him and over him and through him. It doesn't get much more intimate than that.
Eyes closed, focused on this dangerous task, she does not see that Sera abruptly leaves. She wouldn't stop her even if she did. If Sera wants to go, Sera is free to go be elsewhere. Grace says something, Lena says something, but Sid isn't listening to them. She keeps pushing her Will onto the universe.
[extending: -1 Quint to reduce diff]
Dice: 3 d10 TN7 (2, 9, 10) ( success x 3 ) [WP]
QuicksilverAnd then, there came Red, dragging this huge, weathered old tome along the forest floor with his teeth (and surely somewhere some old, stuffy Hermetic was cringing at that image.) His fur was fluffed and prickled with tension, and as he drew near, the source of all that Unstable resonance would become clear.
This wasn't just a book. It was an artifact. (And likely not one that anyone would be advised to actually use.)
Red dropped it nearby and trotted toward his friend. Henry, who now lay in a sticky mess against Sid's chest, looking oddly innocent and peaceful in his slumber. And it was clear in that moment that, whatever the fox's outward disposition, he clearly loved the man he'd bonded himself to. There was a soft expression on his face - one of worry and relief and gentleness - as he touched his nose to Henry's prone hand and wuffled a delicate, warm breath against his skin.
On the other side of the clearing, Sera was already taking her leave. Perhaps later the two would get a chance to thank her for what she had done. But for now, Red's focus was on Henry.
GraceGrace watches as Sera sobs, picks herself up and leaves. She wants to go with, to provide comfort or even a hug if necessary. But she also remembers the last time she tried that. It wipes away the smile from her face to see.
"I think so, Lena," she says, and her gaze shifts to Henry lying there with his body in Sid's embrace.
"Hey, Red. I think he'll be okay," she adds, to the... fox. Which is still a little strange, even after watching the world melt at his command.
Lena ReillyLena sees Sera sob, sees her have to pull herself together. The DJ doesn't despair at the sight, because she knows what it's like. She knows that for them, Sadness is as important, as necessary as Happiness or Wrath or Envy. They all serve different purposes and they are neither good nor bad. They just...
They just are. And they all have their own uses, none more important than the other. It is falling too far into one that you ignore the others. That is the trap.
So she lets Serafine go and she looks back to Red, to Henry, to Sid and to Grace. And, tired but not traumatized (not even with a giant spider on top of her moments ago), she finally drops her piece of wood.
"C'mon. Let's see if we can get him out of here." A pause, and she looks to Red. "Or wherever you want him to go."
Sid[final extension! go sid go go go! uh, dropping her final quint for diff purposessess]
Dice: 3 d10 TN7 (3, 4, 5) ( success x 1 ) [WP]
SidThe magic builds all around Sid, and it's powerful stuff. It's nothing that these two haven't felt before, though. They've felt it at the Chantry, radiating slightly from the grass and the flowers the surround the house. A little piece of Sid even though she was away. They've felt it other places, too.
That desperation, that euphoria. The sense of fresh, vibrant, verdant growing things. The strength that holds the whole of her up, empowered. It twists around Sid until finally it releases, all at once, across the old man.
Who will feel the poison swept from his blood, and who will feel his injuries seal themselves up.
Sitting back, Sid sighs, relaxing her grip so that one hand drops to her side, hand falling into the drink. A blade of grass or two swell at the contact with her fingers, become a much brighter, newer shade of green. The other arm still supports Henry. Opening her eyes she looks up at those around her. She notices the absence of the other Disciple and a shadow forms between her brows but she doesn't ask after Sera.
Vaguely, she realizes what Lena said, like an echo of a memory from another lifetime. "He should be able to move himself," she says quietly. Shifting behind him, if he's mobile and awake at least, Sid will try to help him up.
That is, if reality doesn't crack her one and lay her low first.
Sid[PARADOX GO]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 6) ( success x 1 )
Sid[YOU CAN SOAK IT SID C'MON]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (2, 5, 6) ( success x 1 )
QuicksilverSid's effect did its work well. She held the old man in her arms and pushed her will into the threads of his pattern, knitting his body back together until it was whole. Red kept his nose in the man's hand throughout - silently offering this comfort as though Henry would be able to sense him even in his paralyzed state. And perhaps he did, because moments after Sid finished her healing, the man's eyes fluttered open and he said, to the sky, "Red, your nose is wet."
And the fox sneezed with grateful amusement.
"Welcome back, Henry."
The old man gradually pulled himself to a sitting position, and it was then that he finally seemed to comprehend the other faces around him. He looked first at Grace, then Lena, blinking, and finally turned his head to regard Sid.
"Why hello. I seem to have gotten myself in a bit of trouble." He glanced at Red, who looked about as deadpan in that moment as fox was capable.
"Yes, Henry, you could say that."
But Henry? With all that Ardent and Imaginative resonance. He just smiled. Like he'd known all along that someone would come by and save him.
"Why, what marvelous creatures you all are. Thank you for saving me."
He got to his feet then, and attempted to brush some of the dirt and detritus from his clothes and skin, but it was a hopeless task and he soon abandoned it. The man was a proper mess, but nonetheless he affected a dignified pose and cleared his throat. "My name is Henry Alexander Calliergi, of House Jerbiton in the Order of Hermes. I owe you all a debt of gratitude. Are the spiders...?"
"I sent this one back where it came from," Red answered. "We need to go find the other two. I should think, probably, right this moment? You know, before they wreak havoc on the unsuspecting citizens of Morrison Colorado."
Henry's expression deepened into a grave look, and he nodded. "Very well then. Where is the book?"
"It's on the gods-damned ground where it fucking belongs," Red muttered.
And then goodbyes were made, and names were exchanged if those gathered wished to share them, and a promise was made to return soon with a reward - though who knew if it was a promise they intended to keep.
Then Henry and his talking fox named Red made their way into the woods with the sunset at their back, leaving the others to marvel at the fact that they were all still alive and relatively unscathed.
It was, as they say, a long, strange evening.
11:57 AM 5/18/2014
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