04-24-2024, 11:10 PM
She stared upwards. The abyss of the towering creature’s gaze pinned her rigid, even as it swept past perplexed but ultimately uninterested in her presence. Afterwards she was left motionless not in fear but in confusion at the dissonant buzz of her own thoughts. She will forgive you, the Nemesyne assured, and its promise rang now as a frightening truth she could not place but neither questioned. Instead a powerless wave of anger washed her through as the soul cell’s gate began to rise, and in readiness the warden snapped taut the deimos chains coiled around its forearms. When she realised what it intended, desperate panic filled her. She struggled like a newborn fawn to find her legs enough to stand and hurry after. The 100-hands were not usually so imprecise with their initial probing, but it seemed as inexplicably disorientated as she felt herself right now. Her lungs were burning with just the effort to breathe, let alone summon the mageia to her bidding. To make it forget its intent, at least long enough to beg her Yiayia for clemency.
Instead she found herself flinching hard at the slam and death scream, hands tight over her ears as she scuttled backwards in fear. Tears tracked the streaks of sweat already striping her cheeks. She was not squeamish at the carnage, though her eyes were round in shock at what should not have been possible. Her hands trembled, heart racing. But it was to the shadows from which the creature had come that she looked in horror. For a moment she was utterly convinced they had just brought real catastrophe down upon their own heads; that something far worse would follow to punish the hand’s death. When she finally clawed herself up to standing, it was as a hopeless sentinel to protect against what ultimately never came.
The sound of a name beckoned her back into her own skin, a transition so soft she never even noticed it. When Thalia finally turned she saw the monstrous body anew, swathed in darkness and utterly still beneath the weight of the gate. Impossibly dead. She could barely discern anything else around her by the molten glow in the walls and floor, and where she could, the air shimmered and danced in the oppressive heat, distorting everything into a dark and dizzy haze. But she saw the lucent reflection of Tristan’s eyes like guiding stars, and a little relief settled her restless spirit as she stumbled closer. At least until her hands finally met the unyielding bars of the cage that separated them, and her heart sank with his declaration that the gate was stuck.
“I can barely see anything at all. The tunnel here was empty, just bits of broken floor, like this whole place is falling apart. Above us are ordinary caves,” she told him. “But I could go down and search where it came from. I’ll find something.” The offer was made in quiet but honest earnestness, conjuring hope from resolution alone, though even as she said it the possibility felt remote. She didn’t know why she whispered other than a sense of defiance and danger still lingered – her heart was hammering loudly, pounding in her head. The creature had not been hostile towards her, in fact it had barely acknowledged she was there, and if Neme was right she might at least explore freely. Only it wasn’t why she was afraid.
"Where ever we are, it is old." Tristan looked around, confirming, gaze coming to settle on the passageway Thalia described. As he looked over her head into that darkness she wondered what he might see that she could not, but she already knew she would take the risk and go anyway. Surely it was no more impossible a task than the monstrous creature dead at their feet in the first place, the sludge of its blood now beginning to seep hot under her bare toes. She’d already told Tristan she trusted the journey and wherever it led her, and she did; she’d cast herself wild to the wind countless times since leaving Moscow, come what may of it. But it had always been alone. For that, her hands remained curled around the bars, reluctant to let go. She was hesitant to leave him; more afraid of losing her way than of whatever else might be lurking in the shadows, but most of all afraid of not being able to find him again.
“Did it hurt you?”
"No," he mumbled, clearly lying, only to attempt to jostle the gate once more. When it showed itself as hopelessly stuck, he reached through the bars to cup her face gently, expression drawn. "You may walk out of here and never be able to find your way back. You should go, and keep going, until you find a way out. I won't suffer, I give you my word."
He looked worn. Despite his gentleness she could feel the calluses on his palms, sharp against her skin; solid, and very real in a world that had lost all its normal boundaries. The touch was bittersweet, a connection of reassurance she craved, and one which deepened the breathing in her chest: settling her of turbulence. But though she listened enthralled to the deep timbre of his voice, the words themselves rushed past unheeded. She didn’t want to think about the cold and inevitable grief threatening to unfurl at such a promise, or the way it alarmed her, even as she refused to acknowledge what he might mean by it.
“But I would suffer, knowing,” she said softly. Back in the strange study he’d shared too much of what he believed fate held in store for him, and by the openness of her expression it was clear she’d taken it all for truth and was thinking about it now. It wasn’t the pliability of a soft heart that made her stay; it was a binding made of her own choice, the same simple resolution that made her shrug away Neme’s sensible pleas to abandon a hopeless cause. It might as well have been an etching on her soul. Of course she would stay. Thalia didn’t understand the mystery of him, not even a little, but she was compelled nonetheless by the unseen weight he carried on his shoulders. She wished she could have slipped through the bars, so that it was not his prison alone.
Her hand swept over his against her cheek, and rested there. Quiet resolve did not mean she had given up on thinking furiously for a solution, no matter how defeated he seemed. Impossibility was an inconvenience, and she was good at makeshift hope. Good at being it, when there were no silver linings to be had. Her fingers interlaced through his, only to gently tug his hand loose, turning it palm up to trace the cut he’d made there. When Thalia had rushed towards the guardian at sight of her injury she had been bright with the desire to help, but the instinct left little imprint beyond intention, and she did not know how to recreate it without incentive. Tristan clearly was hurt, whatever he said; Thalia had seen it when he tried to shake the gate free. And while she couldn’t fathom in the shadows exactly what was wrong with him, she realised it was enough to compromise his brutish strength. A lever, if one could be found, was nothing without that. She’d been hoping for a reaction inside herself, but the wound was small and scabbing already; nothing happened to spark her into uncontrolled action, much to her frustration.
“Maybe you should have tied me to that tree,” she said after a moment. When her gaze cast back up to his, it was warm, not hopeless, and a smile curved her lips for whatever she beheld. There was no regret to her tone, despite the dire situation and where it had led them. Because she was glad he had followed her, even now amidst the damage of the consequences, and she found she could not be sorry for it. He might feel differently, being the one in the cage, but Thalia never made great effort to hide the captivation of her own emotions. Which meant it was also clear by the widening of her eyes that something new occurred to her, then. She was silent only a moment longer before it spilled out of her.
“I have a bad idea,” she breathed, curling his fingers closed under her palm, and gently pressing his hand back to him. She reluctantly remembered the blood trickling from the doctor’s nose (don’t think about it) and Tristan’s own blunt admission that she was clumsy as her touch skated the bars in front of her, wondering. It came in flurries of need, but less commonly to a conscious call, because she nearly always fell into it by instinct not purpose. In fact she’d never tried to actually do anything much with it – floating balls of light to see, bubbles of colour to entertain the lonely child on the grounds outside the church. Even now she heard Patricus’s admonishment, made out of care and more or less heeded since, because Thalia had no great desire for power. But like the entire world she’d seen it; the capability, when the Ascendancy announced his gifts to the world and melted Lenin’s tomb.
“Stand back, though. I don’t want to accidentally hurt you.” The words were whispered on anxious tides, but she was already falling back into the state which welcomed the power in. She didn’t want to hear him warn her away from the risk, nor would she listen if he did – she was already tumbling towards the attempt, come what may.
Now Thalia really looked, she became aware of a residue woven into the volcanic rock of the bars, else something that had been unravelling and fading since the death of the creature impaled under the gate. Caution squeezed her heart, but it felt like something distant, and she needed every ounce of her focus. The first thread she drew on was not a stable one, perhaps because the power always felt like it came from outside of her, and the chamber itself was hot and acrid as an oven. She felt it collect and weave around her before she pressed it in. After a moment something inside gave way. It felt like a tripwire, and she could not say if it faded with the rest or was simply released like a last dying breath. But she didn’t pause to worry what it meant.
She’d only ever seen the videofeed broadcasts of the Ascendancy creating his Arch. Thalia didn’t have anything like that kind of power of course, but this wasn’t art – it was desperation. When heat stung her hands, still touching the bars in curious hope of her having any effect, she made a sound of surprised pain and sprang back. A moment later she stumbled away from the red hot puddle beginning to spread from the melting bars. It wasn’t elegant, and she was hurrying as fast as she dared now that she realised it was working, like she still feared something might hurtle from the darkness to stop them. The exhilaration was wild in her chest.
She blinked when it was done, having stared for so long at the incendiary glow of the work that her eyes felt momentarily nightblind. Her breath came ragged, eyes stinging. The effort felt physical, legs left wobbly, but the surprised joy of the accomplishment surpassed the concern. She cooled the red-hot pool, tested its lingering heat with her bare foot without thinking (fortunately cool enough). Above it arched a hole in the gate, though Tristan would likely have to crouch. Even she would have to duck. She reached a hand in through the darkness to guide, forgetting he could see far better than she could.
“Is it enough? Can you fit through?”
[[Tristan's action/dialogue written by him]]
Instead she found herself flinching hard at the slam and death scream, hands tight over her ears as she scuttled backwards in fear. Tears tracked the streaks of sweat already striping her cheeks. She was not squeamish at the carnage, though her eyes were round in shock at what should not have been possible. Her hands trembled, heart racing. But it was to the shadows from which the creature had come that she looked in horror. For a moment she was utterly convinced they had just brought real catastrophe down upon their own heads; that something far worse would follow to punish the hand’s death. When she finally clawed herself up to standing, it was as a hopeless sentinel to protect against what ultimately never came.
The sound of a name beckoned her back into her own skin, a transition so soft she never even noticed it. When Thalia finally turned she saw the monstrous body anew, swathed in darkness and utterly still beneath the weight of the gate. Impossibly dead. She could barely discern anything else around her by the molten glow in the walls and floor, and where she could, the air shimmered and danced in the oppressive heat, distorting everything into a dark and dizzy haze. But she saw the lucent reflection of Tristan’s eyes like guiding stars, and a little relief settled her restless spirit as she stumbled closer. At least until her hands finally met the unyielding bars of the cage that separated them, and her heart sank with his declaration that the gate was stuck.
“I can barely see anything at all. The tunnel here was empty, just bits of broken floor, like this whole place is falling apart. Above us are ordinary caves,” she told him. “But I could go down and search where it came from. I’ll find something.” The offer was made in quiet but honest earnestness, conjuring hope from resolution alone, though even as she said it the possibility felt remote. She didn’t know why she whispered other than a sense of defiance and danger still lingered – her heart was hammering loudly, pounding in her head. The creature had not been hostile towards her, in fact it had barely acknowledged she was there, and if Neme was right she might at least explore freely. Only it wasn’t why she was afraid.
"Where ever we are, it is old." Tristan looked around, confirming, gaze coming to settle on the passageway Thalia described. As he looked over her head into that darkness she wondered what he might see that she could not, but she already knew she would take the risk and go anyway. Surely it was no more impossible a task than the monstrous creature dead at their feet in the first place, the sludge of its blood now beginning to seep hot under her bare toes. She’d already told Tristan she trusted the journey and wherever it led her, and she did; she’d cast herself wild to the wind countless times since leaving Moscow, come what may of it. But it had always been alone. For that, her hands remained curled around the bars, reluctant to let go. She was hesitant to leave him; more afraid of losing her way than of whatever else might be lurking in the shadows, but most of all afraid of not being able to find him again.
“Did it hurt you?”
"No," he mumbled, clearly lying, only to attempt to jostle the gate once more. When it showed itself as hopelessly stuck, he reached through the bars to cup her face gently, expression drawn. "You may walk out of here and never be able to find your way back. You should go, and keep going, until you find a way out. I won't suffer, I give you my word."
He looked worn. Despite his gentleness she could feel the calluses on his palms, sharp against her skin; solid, and very real in a world that had lost all its normal boundaries. The touch was bittersweet, a connection of reassurance she craved, and one which deepened the breathing in her chest: settling her of turbulence. But though she listened enthralled to the deep timbre of his voice, the words themselves rushed past unheeded. She didn’t want to think about the cold and inevitable grief threatening to unfurl at such a promise, or the way it alarmed her, even as she refused to acknowledge what he might mean by it.
“But I would suffer, knowing,” she said softly. Back in the strange study he’d shared too much of what he believed fate held in store for him, and by the openness of her expression it was clear she’d taken it all for truth and was thinking about it now. It wasn’t the pliability of a soft heart that made her stay; it was a binding made of her own choice, the same simple resolution that made her shrug away Neme’s sensible pleas to abandon a hopeless cause. It might as well have been an etching on her soul. Of course she would stay. Thalia didn’t understand the mystery of him, not even a little, but she was compelled nonetheless by the unseen weight he carried on his shoulders. She wished she could have slipped through the bars, so that it was not his prison alone.
Her hand swept over his against her cheek, and rested there. Quiet resolve did not mean she had given up on thinking furiously for a solution, no matter how defeated he seemed. Impossibility was an inconvenience, and she was good at makeshift hope. Good at being it, when there were no silver linings to be had. Her fingers interlaced through his, only to gently tug his hand loose, turning it palm up to trace the cut he’d made there. When Thalia had rushed towards the guardian at sight of her injury she had been bright with the desire to help, but the instinct left little imprint beyond intention, and she did not know how to recreate it without incentive. Tristan clearly was hurt, whatever he said; Thalia had seen it when he tried to shake the gate free. And while she couldn’t fathom in the shadows exactly what was wrong with him, she realised it was enough to compromise his brutish strength. A lever, if one could be found, was nothing without that. She’d been hoping for a reaction inside herself, but the wound was small and scabbing already; nothing happened to spark her into uncontrolled action, much to her frustration.
“Maybe you should have tied me to that tree,” she said after a moment. When her gaze cast back up to his, it was warm, not hopeless, and a smile curved her lips for whatever she beheld. There was no regret to her tone, despite the dire situation and where it had led them. Because she was glad he had followed her, even now amidst the damage of the consequences, and she found she could not be sorry for it. He might feel differently, being the one in the cage, but Thalia never made great effort to hide the captivation of her own emotions. Which meant it was also clear by the widening of her eyes that something new occurred to her, then. She was silent only a moment longer before it spilled out of her.
“I have a bad idea,” she breathed, curling his fingers closed under her palm, and gently pressing his hand back to him. She reluctantly remembered the blood trickling from the doctor’s nose (don’t think about it) and Tristan’s own blunt admission that she was clumsy as her touch skated the bars in front of her, wondering. It came in flurries of need, but less commonly to a conscious call, because she nearly always fell into it by instinct not purpose. In fact she’d never tried to actually do anything much with it – floating balls of light to see, bubbles of colour to entertain the lonely child on the grounds outside the church. Even now she heard Patricus’s admonishment, made out of care and more or less heeded since, because Thalia had no great desire for power. But like the entire world she’d seen it; the capability, when the Ascendancy announced his gifts to the world and melted Lenin’s tomb.
“Stand back, though. I don’t want to accidentally hurt you.” The words were whispered on anxious tides, but she was already falling back into the state which welcomed the power in. She didn’t want to hear him warn her away from the risk, nor would she listen if he did – she was already tumbling towards the attempt, come what may.
Now Thalia really looked, she became aware of a residue woven into the volcanic rock of the bars, else something that had been unravelling and fading since the death of the creature impaled under the gate. Caution squeezed her heart, but it felt like something distant, and she needed every ounce of her focus. The first thread she drew on was not a stable one, perhaps because the power always felt like it came from outside of her, and the chamber itself was hot and acrid as an oven. She felt it collect and weave around her before she pressed it in. After a moment something inside gave way. It felt like a tripwire, and she could not say if it faded with the rest or was simply released like a last dying breath. But she didn’t pause to worry what it meant.
She’d only ever seen the videofeed broadcasts of the Ascendancy creating his Arch. Thalia didn’t have anything like that kind of power of course, but this wasn’t art – it was desperation. When heat stung her hands, still touching the bars in curious hope of her having any effect, she made a sound of surprised pain and sprang back. A moment later she stumbled away from the red hot puddle beginning to spread from the melting bars. It wasn’t elegant, and she was hurrying as fast as she dared now that she realised it was working, like she still feared something might hurtle from the darkness to stop them. The exhilaration was wild in her chest.
She blinked when it was done, having stared for so long at the incendiary glow of the work that her eyes felt momentarily nightblind. Her breath came ragged, eyes stinging. The effort felt physical, legs left wobbly, but the surprised joy of the accomplishment surpassed the concern. She cooled the red-hot pool, tested its lingering heat with her bare foot without thinking (fortunately cool enough). Above it arched a hole in the gate, though Tristan would likely have to crouch. Even she would have to duck. She reached a hand in through the darkness to guide, forgetting he could see far better than she could.
“Is it enough? Can you fit through?”
[[Tristan's action/dialogue written by him]]
![[Image: thal-banner-scaled.jpg]](http://thefirstage.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/thal-banner-scaled.jpg)