| Logs |
2010 November 03
| Neverneverwhere |
| Realms |
Retired
| Reality Fault |
General Info
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| Realms: Taps Logs |
White Knight Talking Backward
Suraksha pauses, her glance at Roy a shifting shadow of firelight. She uses her liquid voice as a helping hand again, "Roy, keep soothing, please? That helps a great deal," then turns back to the little knot of non-human essences and sings to it of bliss within reach -- happy-puppy wagging tails, fresh-cracked corn and contented hens, fat juicy worms in the ground for the plucking... she tries to draw out the animals' spirits, to help them loosen themselves. Roy reaches out, liquid-cool hands touching each of the souls enmeshed in the lines, whisper-stroking them. As he does, Suraksha can see the way he blends into them a little and they into him, filaments of their being entwining. Suraksha watches in silent, not-quite-comprehending interest, then continues gently weaving and unweaving the spirits she's with. She'll try to wrap the animal spirits like yarn about her virtual fingers, plaiting them into graceful harmonies, and thus release the human spirits from their constraints so they can fly free with Roy's assistance.
Chanticleer raises his voice a little so the others can hear him, but not taking his eyes off the void. "We're not alone here."
Suraksha does not reply; not only did she mention that would most likely be the case as they walked in, but she's also focusing very hard on what she's doing -- she trusts Chanti to guard her back. The void-presence-guardian shifts and moves around toward the sphere of leylines and souls. The animal sounds start to pull free slowly, but it's obviously hard for them. They didn't have a lot of sentience to begin with and it has devolved as their essence was broken down into this metaphysical patching. Suraksha does not attempt appealing to their sentience at all; she's trying for emotional/instinctual reactions to motivate them.
Chanticleer keeps himself interposed between the void-thing, and Suraksha and Roy, his sword still out and at the ready. It doesn't even occur to him that it might not work against the thing. The weapon Chanticleer wields feels very much a part of him, just like his swordmaster taught him as a child -- only moreso. It feels like an extension of his hand, like it sings and sighs and moves with him. When he puts himself before the guardian he can't look at, he feels it shift away, avoiding the essence of his weapon. Chanticleer smiles tightly. [Good. It doesn't like this sword. I don't think it's my sword -- well, my sword in the physical world, at any rate. In that sense it's more 'mine' than any other sword -- but it certainly doesn't like it. If it moves closer I will feint at it a bit, but if it charges I can't afford to give it quarter -- let alone the chance to harm Lady Sulochana. Or Roy. Right.]
It's the essence of the puppy that wriggles free first, wrapping itself around Suraksha's arm like a friendly garter snake soaking up the warmth from a human. As it comes free, Roy is able to coax part of one of the humans -- the young man -- away from the grid of leylines... and the sphere unravels slightly in that spot. The king's thought-soothing-touch draws what seems to be the youngest of the spirits, which was linked with the pup. Suraksha laughs delightedly at the puppy, a sweet caress-breath against the wriggly darkness. She beams at Roy, her voice a soft violet scent, "Excellent! I'll try the bird and the rooster next." She turns her focus on them, singing of instinct: food, escape from capture/restraint! -even sex.
There is a not-sound of frustration from the guardian and a sudden shift of its presence toward the sphere as the first of the animal sacrifices is undone. Chanticleer takes a very solid step to block the guardian, raising his blade a bit. "Don't," he says firmly. Then he blinks as a flash of light from his sword, and the guardian's coming-up-short at his command, briefly reveal the creature to him. It's big, bipedal, with too-long arms and a too-small head. It's just plain wrong -- everything about it. When the moment passes, Chanti realizes he's emotionally quivering; the 'horizon,' of sorts, surrounding the thing is a blessing. But it does steel his resolve; this is not something he wants to allow near the tangle of ley lines. He knows something else, too: this is not something that will relinquish its prey easily. He braces himself for battle with the creature, strengthening his mind to once again face the horrid wrongness of this creature's existence.
Suraksha can feel the crow is having a hard time letting go. It's a carrion bird, in a way, and this is a place of death, after all. The rooster, on the other hand, is struggling hard to disentangle itself; the idea-songs of freedom and sex and food are making it want to come free. The tiger-woman smiles and weaves another finger-thread in with the rooster to help it disentangle. As she does so, she whispers to both birds: cat! Behind them! She knows there's one woven in there as well, so there's the conviction of truth in her shimmering fractal song.
There is a shiver in the warp-weft-web of leylines as if they were crystals that had been struck by a silver hammer... except the note is very, very off. It's the screaming of the guardian creature as the rooster jerks free and the motes of its being skitter around Chanticleer's feet -- then fly straight at the void-being. Suraksha crows with delight as the rooster escapes, and sews her finger-threads through the crow to aid it as well. Catcatcatflyfleefree! Her voice is velvet-entrancing, "Roy! Pull another one loose?"
There is a rush of the ether around them as something swoops by Chanticleer, aiming for the disintegrating sphere, and misses -- running instead into the weapon-construct being wielded by the sidhe. Its scream-blow of pain is like an implosion, drawing light toward it and illuminating it. It flinches both from the sword and from the cockerel's little darting attacks at its feet. The crow pulls itself free just moments after, and Roy's gentle urging unwinds the soulstuff of the boy child. That spirit melts into the light of the leylines, as several of them slither free of the tightly-woven sphere and straighten into their original places -- some of them snapping back like cut bowstrings, which makes Roy duck and make a sound-gesture-scent of surprise. Immediately thereafter, though, he starts to try and untangle the stuff of the oldest male human in the increasingly lacy sphere-construct.
Chanticleer blinks, seeing the cock scamper between his legs and head right for the void thing! He ducks, trying to scoop it up while still keeping the sword pointed at the thing -- then is equally surprised that the creature misses swiping at him, and instead strikes the sword. Chanti grimaces. He doubts this thing is actually, really sentient, but the attacking rooster is, weirdly enough, strongly suggesting to him he no longer stay on the defensive. He lunges at the beast, driving it back so it can't try to make another swipe at the ley-cage.
Suraksha laughs aloud with glittering crystalline joy -- then blesses the crow and the puppy with a rose-scented kiss each before she sends them onwards to their just rewards. She thinks, then concentrates -- she's a cat-woman. She purrs... strokings, milk, warm sunshine... here, kitty kitty kitty! She figures the cat will be the easiest, since she's calling to her kind there. She expects the goat will be the hardest, so she's leaving him for last, and hoping Roy can get everyone disentangled before then -- to make it easier. Roy manages to coax the old man free more quickly. Perhaps it has to do with the man's age when he was sacrificed; it's as if he's more willing to let go. The cage-sphere-prison-spell is much weaker now and starting to deform in places as the ley energy that formed it is unwoven from the human souls who were mortaring it together.
The sense of the creature's presence lumbers backward and Chanticleer can see something very like a blood trail -- or would that be ichor? Or is it bleeding something completely else? There's a howl-hatred-fright that shakes the warehouse's structure as it stumbles back, swiping again at Chanticleer. The sidhe feels the thing touch his arm, and trails of black nothingness start to sink into the sense he has of the limb. Still, it is in retreat. Chanticleer grimaces, shaking his arm to try and shake off whatever it is the thing got on him... if it was some sort of attack. He feints, then slashes again, forcing it back and hoping to score a hit.
When he shakes his arm, the nothing-numbness-voidstuff splatters back at the creature and it flinches and moves, trying to avoid its own weapon... only to skewer itself on Chanticleer's weapon. Another of those silence-screams and the guardian flickers into view. It is a hideous mixture of fears and uncertainties wrapped up in a shell of wrongness and pain -- and it is furious it is being beaten by this bright-warrior-beings. The essence of the little cockerel is flickering around its head. It no longer looks like a rooster, but it gives the clear impression of beating its wings maniacally.
The kitten's soul slithers free almost effortlessly and winds itself around what would be Suraksha's feet... if she had any feet in this form... and then it darts off, chasing a slithering thread of ley-energy as it races back to its natural place. Roy is already working on helping to free the female soul, singing and soothing and coaxing. The older woman slips free with a sob-sigh-song and is gone. Suraksha laughs purringly to the little kitty, beaming a shimmer of harmony as another ley-line slides back into place. She turns and looks at the shell that's left: the goat's spirit, and the remaining ley-lines. Hmm... she starts weaving her self about the ley-lines, drawing on them to sing them smoothly back into the shapes they should be. Her song includes suggestions of healthy green grass and powerful young muscles... doesn't the goat want to go trotting free?
Chanticleer winces, but forces himself to not close his eyes or look away. "I... am getting tired!" he lunges again, "-of you throwing!" and again, "-yourself on my sword!" A third lunge. "If you want it so much, take the blade!" he growls, aiming a slash that should cleave it from hip to shoulder... if it has a hip, or a shoulder -- if it has any sort of normal anatomy at all, at that... which it doesn't seem to. The blow lands and Chanticleer can feel it slice through the guardian, moving through it with the satisfying-sickening feel of a blade sliding through flesh and simultaneously like a hand sliding through water. Coupled with Suraksha's efforts with the goat and Roy's assistance in untangling things, it is critical mass in reverse.
Darkness unravels and the hole Lisbet had been meant to seal begins to unravel, the natural order of things reasserting itself in a process that is impossible to truly describe or see. The goat's spirit bucks and butts its way out of the tangle of leylines and gallops off into the edges of sensing, then away, as the last vestiges of the sphere sing themselves out of being and back into their natural flow. The spirit of the little black rooster flaps and there's a definite sense of triumphant crowing as it swoops around Chanticleer's head. It doesn't seem to want to dissipate like the others. The void-creature is still screaming-imploding, its lack-of-being driven back by the energy of the restored leylines.
Suraksha laughs aloud with joy again -- the sheer pleasure of the ley-lines' power restored to their rightful place is like sweet honey on the tongue. She whirls gracefully, shedding sparkling crystal notes of happiness, and calls to Roy, "Done here! How are you?" Sweeping over to him, she curiously strokes fingers of light along his weirdly colorless-colorful form, "Why do you hold so tightly to human shape?"
Chanticleer doesn't pause to relish the trueness of the strike; he's known of too many knights who did so and were struck down for their hubris. He returns to an on-guard stance briefly, gauging the creature's status. He does, however, glance at the merrily flapping rooster, a smile lighting his lips. "Thank you," he says to it. "You were magnificent." Suraksha grins delightedly at the proud little rooster and his larger, equally proud companion. The little rooster spirit settles on Chanticleer's shoulder and preens. It's not visible that it's preening, but there is an unmistakable feel to it. Roy's strange translucent form shimmers under Suraksha's touch and she gets the impression, though he doesn't actually speak, that he thinks it's the form he should have. He is human, after all.
Suraksha tilts her head curiously at him, but politely pulls back. "Can't you speak?" She checks to be sure: the ley-lines are where they belong; the spirits have all moved on safely, but for the little rooster -- and the guardian thingie is dispersed, yes? The last bits of the guardian-creature have melted away and Roy's form radiates surprise. He is speaking, isn't he? Suraksha smiles golden light and shakes her head. "Not verbally -- at least that I can hear. Can you hear me in words?"
Chanticleer lets out a breath and sheathes his sword. He reaches up to rub the rooster's... what he thinks is the rooster's neck. "You did very well! I couldn't have done it without you."
Suraksha grins and sings cheerfully to Chanti, "Brave little rooster, isn't he?" She flows relaxedly around Roy, checking the odd fluidity of the human form he's holding. "You look... odd... almost colorless? Shouldn't you have more color? Are you feeling well?"
Roy's voice, when it comes out, is a little hard to understand, as if he's speaking into a barrel. "I'm fine, but we should probably not linger." It seems to cost him effort to be audible. The rooster settles in on Chanticleer's shoulder and makes contented clucking noises before it seems to shimmer down along the sidhe's body and then away.
Suraksha smiles as she interestedly looks the king over, but doesn't get in the way -- she just nods and flows towards the door, "All right! Let's to our scattered bodies go." She giggles softly at that, leaving sparkling shimmers of gold and scarlet and jet behind her. Roy moves to follow the trailing line of his tether back toward the circle where their bodies sit. It is a shadow from this side of things, but the tethers are solid. Suraksha pauses before she re-enters her body, suddenly remembering she's the most experienced in this odd... form of meditation -- and she certainly cannot be referred to as well-experienced. She decides to wait for the others, to make sure they safely return. She'll return last.
Chanticleer grins to Suraksha, nodding. "That he is!" He sighs a little, shivering slightly as the rooster fades away. He is filled with a sadness, and is glad he did not witness the humans evaporating into the next world. Though a knight and trained to deal with death on every battlefield, and to not fear it... still there is the sense of loss, that life is somehow diminished by the passing of someone. Best, then, to celebrate their lives. Though the animals' bodies are shells, he resolves to bury them properly -- especially the rooster. That one deserves something special to honor what he did for Chanti here. He lets himself sink slowly back into his body.
Suraksha looks pleased as Chanti successfully returns to his body. She turns to Roy, smiling and gesturing, "Go; your house has triumphed. You can return safely." Roy, who had the hardest time letting go of his body, has the easiest time returning. He simply sits back down and joins with his physical self again. Suraksha looks relieved, then sighs happily and starts to move towards hers. She pauses, noticing out of the corner of her awareness that the little rooster spirit is still lingering around Chanticleer. She laughs a quiet inquiry: does it wish to stay? It has certainly earned its spurs, as well as the undeniable right to go on if it wishes. It has no intention of leaving. Suraksha laughs again, welcoming its courage and promising fierce protectiveness for the flock... then she smiles and slips easily into her own body, like a stretching cat easing into sunshine.
Suraksha rests for a moment, her eyes remaining closed and a small smile curling up her lips as she lets her senses expand into her physical form once more. For all of them, it is like waking from a dream and simultaneously slipping into a very snug suit of clothes. They fit and fit well, but they are still confining. The warm sense of the other two bodies leaning against them is there and the sounds of the three clergy chanting softly in their separate languages slowly becomes audible. Chanticleer blinks, giving a little yawn as he becomes conscious. His brow furrows a bit as he... sort of... tries to fit himself into his body again.
Suraksha sighs contentedly, stretching carefully from her fingers and toes first, letting the stretch travel with luxurious pleasure up the muscles of her body. She shivers herself back into her body once more... it may be snug, but it's her -- she likes this form! She rolls her shoulders a bit, enjoying the feel of the two men flanking her -- good men, both of them. She's glad to have them at her back. She grins, wondering how Roy's going to react to her request. Roy groans and stretches his hands over his head, fingers interlaced and knuckles cracking. The chanting of the three holy people slows and stops. After a moment Frere Alfonse says, "Welcome back."
Suraksha opens her eyes and smiles up at the priest... then beams at the big python and his horse. "Thank you, holy ones." The python's tongue flicks out and back and he curls himself around Froid Jacques' shoulders. Sulochana can't resist a discreet wink at the python when he flickers his tongue at her.
Chanticleer murmurs, "Thank you... I think we were successful."
Suraksha slides gracefully to her feet, adding to Chanticleer, "Your little cockerel friend likes you!" She giggles, then offers her hands to both men, to help them rise if they wish.
Chanticleer laughs softly, pulling himself to stand as he accepts Sulochana's hand up gratefully. "He was a great help," Chanti says quietly, letting his glamour shift over him again. "I hope he's found peace. I hope they all have."
Suraksha cheerfully helps the sidhe rise, "I think somehow he is still a warrior at heart, Chanti!" She grins mischievously up at him and pats his hand where she's holding it, before she releases and turns to the king, "So... better? You are satisfied?" She yawns suddenly as she asks, then blinks amusedly at herself. She's going to need sleep and food soon.
Roy blinks and takes the offered hand, but he doesn't actually put any of his weight on it as he rises and looks around at the warehouse. Even from here it can be seen the light is acting correctly now. The king does, however, kiss her hand when he stands, "Ya'll were both magnificent..."
Suraksha laughs delightedly, "Why thank you!" Her grin gets mischievous as she adds, "May I make a request, then? It is just a request, not a demand. You owe me nothing."
Roy arches a brow and drawls, "Always willin' to listen."
Suraksha beams, not quite bouncing on her toes, and says, "I would like to ask you to release Chanticleer from your service, if he agrees to it!" She grins at Chanti happily -- this way it's her who'll take the brunt of any anger from Roy, rather than the sidhe!
The king blinks at the woman and then over at Chanticleer. His brows draw together and it's clear he's wondering just whose idea this is, "Well, I gotta say, yer wrong 'bout one bit. I do owe ya somethin'. Him too, I reckon."
Suraksha smiles peacefully at the king, "If you wish to, that is your right. I do not claim such." She has to stifle another sudden yawn.
Chanticleer blinks in surprise, his jaw dropping. He looks like you could drop him with, well, a feather. Sulochana grins at Chanti's surprise; he's both surprised and more than a little in awe of Sulochana for taking on that burden. Roy wouldn't just be so willing to let him go! He blinks again at Roy's comment about owing him. "Just doing my duty to the people, Sir," he says automatically, still sounding more than a little flabbergasted.
Roy smirks and snorts through his nose, "Ain't a choice, really. You wanna go with 'er, you go. Won't hold ya to yer contract. But I am going to need replacements before you go." He tips his head toward the ambulance, "I just bet Alg ain't stayin', either."
Suraksha looks suddenly worried, "He's not? Oh, no-" she whirls for the ambulance, "did he get worse?" She darts over to the ambulance, slipping in as quietly as possible. Her thoughts are fierce: [if that darned bigoted nurse has left him when he needs her...!]
Roy watches her go with another smirk, "Damn, that was one huge leap she jes' made." He motions Chanticleer over to follow him, "Think he's got a crush on 'er, actually. Gonna be damned difficult replacing you two."
Chanticleer blinks as he follows along with Roy. "You attract good people, Sir," he says, still a little poleaxed. "It won't be long before you get folks who are much better. Of that I'm certain."
Roy shakes his head, "It'll be a while before I get someone worth you in a fight, Chanticleer."
Chanticleer says, "I have a feeling that things will be quiet for a time here, Sir. Especially after today."
In the ambulance, Alg is sleeping as peacefully as can be expected from a wounded goblin. "Gramma Marcie" is sitting on one of the ambulance's bunks, glowering at her godsdaughter. Sulochana gently touches the sleeping Alg, making sure he's breathing regularly, then sighs in relief. She sits down tiredly next to Gramma Marcie, murmuring, "Roy seems to think Alg and Chanti are both coming with us, Gramma. Hope you don't mind." She gives the glamoured sidhe woman a tentative smile, then adds softly, "Don't be angry with me, please, Gramma? It needed doing, truly!"
The sidhe woman murmurs sotto voce as the two men arrive, "We'll talk later, girl."
Sulochana sighs and smiles ruefully, nodding once as she curls her feet up under her on the bunk and stretches tiredly out, "Yes'm."
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