I know I’ve been in and out for awhile, but I wanted to say Happy Thanksgiving to all of you. I’m thankful for the opportunity to be able to write and be friends with all of you!

By eleven-thirty, Kallisti was busy. Word was out on the quiet little Burlesque house, which on one hand made the exclusivity less impressive, but on the other, meant there were more people around to have a little fun. Jaxen's vehicle was one of three Lamborghini Centenarios in line for valet, but he didn't care when he tossed the key-code to the employee at the podium.

He guided Lawrence along the steps and into the front of the House. They recognized him by now, greeting him by name and offering to take his coat. He hesitated at the last moment before slipping it off, having almost forgotten about the need for a high collar obscuring the neck wound. In the dim light of the club it was likely to go unnoticed, but he didn't want to take any chances. Nor did he want to invite questions.

Music welcomed them into the club interior. Table service was full, already, which meant they were guided to a place in front of the stage. He could have bribed the host, but he wasn't exactly a bottomless bucket of money these days. Mom helped him out where dad cut him off, but even she would frown at the bill from a Burlesque House if he dropped enough to get noticed. Not that he was cheap, but he needed a few days to get his own house in order again. The supercomputer in his pocket was going to go a long way to doing just that.

"I promised you real vodka.
He grinned and ordered the premium spirit, on ice, with lime.

The last time he was on the campus grounds was the day the MSU museum of natural history was bombed. It had been a long time since he had designed one of his little special bombs, not since Mexico City. Mockingbird seemed farther and farther from who he once was. Perhaps Damien had had indeed erased the identity from him after all. Something else changed in Mexico City, too. A new thrill replaced the old. Aria had more to do with that than Damien, but regardless, Dane was fundamentally changed.

He shared tea with two young ladies recently and he'd come to an epiphany. Nobody was going to replace Aria. She was his elixir, his drug. Their hands entwined, working together, wet and warmth meeting the chill of lifelessness. He'd never felt more alive in his life than he had in Aria's arms. Maybe it was love, he couldn't be sure. Thus why he had open on a screen in front of him a book of classic sonnets. Love poems written by great authors. He studied the penmanship, the cadence of the words, and the flow of the style.

Dane attended boarding school across the English Channel in the south of France, amid warmth and ugly flatlands. There, he was forced to study the classics in literature, but he did not enjoy it. Poetry was worse. Oh he memorized the lines of Keats, Shelley and Poe, but only because it was expected. In the library here at MSU, he read their lines again, searching for meaning against what he knew of Aria. Nothing came close. It was all a giant disappointment.

He was about to close up the screen when someone joined him at the table. The badge of a student hung around her neck, granting her access to buildings and levels off-limits to Dane or any public visitor. Many of the individuals in the library were not students, but many were. Dane paid little attention to either group. Until this young woman of perhaps twenty-three joined him. She had brown hair that fell in curls to her shoulders, round eyebrows and a smile on her face. Dane straightened in his seat and greeted her with a quiet, "Hello,"
and let his accent clearly define his origin.

She was looking him in the eye, smiling in a polite, yet confident sort of way in which a woman accustomed to asking men out on a date would lead. Her response back was thickened by her own sort of accent, Eastern European, but not Russian. "Hello, I couldn't help but notice that you seem frustrated. I'm Annalise."


"A pleasure to meet you Annalise. My name is Dane Gregory."
She hadn't offered a surname, and he inwardly chastised himself for doing differently. He'd stopped introducing himself as a Lord for some time, refining his technique by bringing it up later in conversation. He could allow his posture, clothing and accent to speak for themselves, should someone recognize any of it. Annalise seemed to. "So what are you working on?"


Dane's eyes shifted toward the screen he was about to close. "I'm reading poetry. Suppose one could say I am searching for a definition."


Annalise tilted her head in a way that let her hair fall in front of her shoulder and graze her chin. Dane blinked, surprised to find her suddenly attractive. "Really? I'm doing my MFA on Poetic studies. Perhaps I could be of help. What are you seeking to define?"


Dane's answer was dispassionate. "Love."


And with that, she was hooked.

They spent the next thirty minutes discussing the merits of sonnets, love poems and pieces. She opened his eyes to words that once seemed cloyingly sweet and made them palatable. Perhaps most surprising was the revelation by Andrew Marvell, whose perspective on love was seduction in verse-form. When Dane read a passage to Annalise in his own dulcet, tenor voice, her mesmerization was complete.

"....then worms shall try
That long preserved virginity.
And your quaint honour turn to dust,
And into ashes all my lust;
The grave's a fine and private place,
But none, I think, do there embrace."


Before he parted, he asked if he could take her to dinner that night. Perhaps she could enlighten him more on the topic of love.

They agreed to meet at ten o'clock.

Who here would support that we give Kallisti it's own board?

I'm considering renaming Manifesto board to Kallisti and leaving the threads in it as-is.

But we could also just make a whole new Kallisti board. I can transfer all old kallisti-located posts into the new board so they are collected in the same space for continuity.

What do you guys suggest?

Congratulations everyone! We finally crossed the 10k mark! It's been a long time coming, but still a massive achievement. The stories you create and characters you craft have filled all our imaginations with entertainment, creativity, and fun. I appreciate each and every one of you! Those who are still with us and those who have come and gone for various reasons. You have been the best group ever!

-A

In his daily summary of events, there was only the briefest statement that something out of the ordinary happened within his capital. That something was the confiscation of a small cafe into the hands of a young man whom transformed meager tables and university students into a war command room. Odd indeed. Certainly, further investigation revealed the identity of said commander. A name that pricked Nikolai's memory strong.

Jacques Danjou.

The commander of Legion Premiere was a hard negotiator. Of course, when spending half a billion dollars to save an entire Dominance, he had listened to the finalization of the deal. Danjou was young for such responsibilities, but his manner and cunning were forthright.

The reason the Frenchman was in Moscow and operating war rooms out of Nikolai's cafes was something the Ascendancy was curious to learn. Intelligence would certainly provide the answer, and Nikolai intended to read what they reported as the truth, but more importantly, he wanted to hear it from Danjou himself. For few people intrigued him as the young commander had.

"Extend an invitation."
He ordered, "Today."
And even as he spoke, staff departed to carry out the task. For certainly this was no simple invitation.

Danjou was being summoned to the Kremlin.

Let's talk reincarnations for a bit.

So I think everyone knows that Jay is a reborn version of my character Jai from an old forums RP board set in the 3rd Age before the last battle. For one thing, Jai was hell of fun to write, and while Arikan was interesting, he was pretty dark while Jai was just plain old fun. I didn't want to lose that character so decided to rebirth him here as Jay.

With all this posting of Jay's past life as Jai (3rd Age Asha'man) i've been doing lately, it's made me re-read all that he was in his past life. While I have worked hard (about as hard as I work anyway) to make Jay fit as a reincarnated Jai, there is a lot I am struggling to figure out.

For one thing I don't want to repeat the same story that took Jai to where he ended up and force that upon Jay, because while they're the same soul, they're two different people.

That led me to ask what factors go into making a character. To me I figured 3 things: genetics, childhood, and the soul. The soul remains the same between reincarnations while the other two vary drastically.

Jai had OCD and was a math genius (genetics). He had a good family that came from wealth and prestige, but not exactly affectionate. He loved his family, but their relationships were twisted and bizarre. But those were the factors that went into who Jai was in that life specifically.

Soulfully, he is loyal, tunnel-visioned, able to sacrifice one thing to gain an ends he truly felt were justified, is a good soldier in battle, and loves the thrill and power of saidin perhaps too much, enough that he'll kill with it and feel little remorse, especially if he deemed it "necessary" or "for the cause." He's self-sacrificing for those to whom he is loyal. He enjoys flirting with women and gets a thrill out of charming them and making them smile. He's also bisexual, but is only particularly romantic with women. Specifically, his soul is also tethered to Natalie (Past life: Nythadri) and he loves her fiercely, passionately, and probably dangerously.

So that's my analysis of Jai.

My struggle is to take all the attributes of Jai's soul and strip them away from his past life, and implant them into the current life. In the current life he was raised by good old fashioned close family in rural Iowa. He was a sports star and not particularly intellectual. He joined the marines and eventually the Legion. So there's not much genetically or from childhood that has some huge impact on his current life. In fact, the current Jay is probably what past Jai should have been if 1) his family weren't crazy, 2) he didn't have to murder damane for a job, and 3) there was no such thing as the taint screwing with his sanity.

To all of who that have characters who were reborn versions of someone else (either a mythological figure or an old RP char or whatever), how do you meld those two people? What in their souls do you connect life to life and how do you strip away the genetics and childhood impacts?

I'm thinking reading all of your thoughts could help me organize my own.

After escaping the wreck that was Sierra Leone, Lawrence regrouped back in Morocco to figure out what her next steps were. Everything that happened she documented as dramatically as possible. Truthfully, absolutely, but the great thing about running her own online news site was the human element she was able to inject. Nobody else presented stories about what the people went through. They reported facts and updates and movements; but nothing about the refinery worker whose brother died, leaving him alone the sole male in the family. Nor did they show the images of toys left behind to never be played again. They didn't discuss the scent of refinery-fires, or talk about what it was like to run through the jungle equally afraid of being shot in the back as finding a predator. Laurie represented the people. She told their story. She would fight for their voices to be heard.

After the story broke on the Monday Margin, thousands of followers demanded explanations from Legion Premiere. The company had a habit of showing up in bloody battles for their own profit. Sure, they saved the Custody's ass, and they were paid well for it. They saved some of Sierra Leone, but what did they get out of it? What did Jacques get?

Quote:<dl>
<dt>MondayMargin.net</dt>
<dd> </dd>
</dl>


Danjou has a loyal army, billions of dollars, and an invitation to the heart of the Custody. Is he and Brandon plotting to conquer Africa together? Who will rule it? Brandon likes to say he is not a tyrant; he is not a conquerer; he is a hero. He is unlikely to rule Africa in such a way. But Danjou is a wild card, the genius maverick that we can't anticipate. Will he rule Africa on Brandon's behalf? Or will he outright call himself a king? I will find out.

A delivery?

Curious. Nythadri kept no ties to her world before the Tower, and knew of no one who might have seen fit to send her a gift. Her family, perhaps … at a push. Every letter they’d ever sent had fed the flames in her hearth, unread, and they had consequently stopped arriving a long time ago - before she had even earned the serpent ring. But if not them, that didn't leave a lot of potentials to speculate. Farune? Hardly likely. A mistake, perhaps. A misunderstanding. Or something mundane that would make sense once she'd received it. She pushed the door to the small office without hesitation, strangely bereft of the sorts of excited inquisitiveness one would usually expect at so uncommon an event.

An Aes Sedai sat behind the desk; Brown, Nythadri would imagine by the stacks of paper scribbled with ink. Ledgers and piles of letters arranged into some obscure order decorated the desk and shelved walls; checked, presumably, before being collected by their intended recipients. Or held until such as time as delivery was deemed appropriate. The ageless face did look up, but only to nod towards the waiting courier. A man as non-descript as the precise and smooth lines of his uniform.

“Nythadri Vanditera?”


She nodded, and held out her hand impatiently, eager to be away. She had been called directly for this, hailed down by a breathless and excited novice because the courier had been instructed to relinquish his goods personally – had in fact calmly refused to leave it in the hands of the Tower, which insofar as the Aes Sedai (and even Nythadri herself) were concerned, was as good as the hands of Nythadri Vanditera. It fit in the open palm of her hand, with a weight that suggested something significant within. Curious now, despite herself, she curled her fingers around the hard edges of the box. There was nothing outwardly to identify it; it was just plain, neat, unexceptional. She prolonged the mystery of it, looking askance at the sister. It would be preferable to retreat to the privacy of her own rooms to open it, though doubtful she would be offered the luxury.

“You’ll need to open it here, dear.”
Spoken disinterestedly, amidst the scratching of a quill; the Aes Sedai did not look up.

She shrugged, disinclined to argue, opened the box, pulled the object out. And folded back the wrappings.

A falcon in flight, with a flash of aqua caught in its outstretched claws. Darkness rushed the edges of Nythadri’s vision, and it felt like falling. Falling ever so hard and fast. The sigil of her brother. Lying stark in her pale palm. So unexpected it tugged her sharply off kilter, wrenched her somewhere dark and distant. Seconds trickled past unnoticed, her expression deathly still. Then, as numbness receded to sensation, ice stung her palm and prickled up the length of her arm. If the Aes Sedai had not been there, she would have snatched her hand free of its burden. But composure demanded more of her than rash impulse, no matter how sickening the twist in her stomach. A blood-soaked memory battled for consciousness among the dim-lit halls of things better left forgotten. “Who sent you?”
Her eyes flicked from the pendant to the courier, lethal as black ice. A detached control robbed any warmth from her gaze, and she spoke again before he even had a chance to answer. “Who is it from?”


She was very still, her voice steely and measured, expression deceptively blank. But the world was vibrating around the edges. Punctuated by a cascading rampage of buried memory. Tash’s face was predominant among the recollection, like his ghost shared the room, fingering the cold gold that had once lain against his warm and beating heart. Who would send such a thing? And perhaps more importantly, why. Fury mixed with disbelief, the pain tight in her chest. Light send her hand was not shaking; it felt like it might, and her grip on the hard edges of the pendant intensified. Squeezed her fingers white.

“It was sent anonymously, Accepted.”


“Anonymously,”
she repeated, and the word tasted bitter. Who. Had. Sent. It?

“I don’t want it.”
Quick steps brought her forward. She pressed it against his chest, crinkling the smooth front of his uniform. “Take it back.”
But he did not move. Calm grey eyes accepted her hostility placidly, even as he was pierced by the uncompromising demand made eerie in her pale gaze. His hands were clasped behind his back. With the Aes Sedai perched behind, she would not be able to sway him; though he might have noticed, in that moment, how the demand in her expression faded to a desperate plea. If he did, it did not cause him to falter.

“Then do as you will with it, Accepted. I am only charged with its safe delivery.”
His gaze broke to check the Aes Sedai, and he bowed his head. Retreated. Left her staring at a wall, with a weight of guilt hanging heavy in her hand.

“Accepted?”


Steeling her breath, blinking back the gaping black hole of the last few moments, she turned. The sister waved her forward, arm outstretched. A flick of Nythadri’s hand, a flash of gold, and the pendant fell from her palm, swinging like a pendulum suspended from her finger. The Aes Sedai cupped it in her grasp, and she snatched her hand back gladly. The chain clinked against the desk. For a moment saidar brightened her periphery, followed by a buzz of foreign weaves. Then the sister shrugged, and held it aloft. If she knew anything of Nythadri’s past, of what this trinket meant, she did not show it. “There is nothing to prevent you keeping it, child.”


In the corridor beyond, Nythadri’s heart was pounding, and bile stung her throat. A message? Anger. Her jaw locked. A warning? Fury so white she could feel herself ripping apart at the seams, for the person who had been so cruel as to send this to her. When she closed her eyes she saw Tash's face, and when she opened them she saw his pendant. A memory and a guilt she had fought so hard to bury, to forget, to accept in icy stillness. She placed it back in the box, and forced the lid shut.

Normal Test example
#FF00FF - Danika

lightgreen - Aria/Sierra

#0072bb - Nox

red - Marcus

khaki - Thalia

#FE0 - Dane

Gold - Ivan

lightblue - Alex



Edited by Nox, Oct 27 2017, 01:35 PM.