ꙮ Emberlight’s shelter at the apostate sietch. Not quite time for dinner yet, but people are starting to filter back in from whatever it is they were up to today, gather, and chatter. What are Salme and Aurelius up to?
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- Tan'neave Snake Salme
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#saint
#hunter
has been spending most of her time as a gold-and-alabaster statue every since she came back mid-morning with her her hair half out of one of its braids and looking slightly—something caught between ‘manic’, ‘triumphant’, and ‘deeply upset.’ Now she un-statues herself and, tomestone already in hand, finds Aurelius. “The note you found … Archie said the cipher needs a key.”
: “Probably, it didn’t seem like it was a simple substitution code at least.”
: “Hm.” She’d already wanted to go look, but. “Will you … I’d like to take a look. Would you come with me?”
rolls up onto his feet. “Not like I’ve got anything else to do.”
: “Be still my heart,” she says dryly, but some tension goes out of her shoulders and she reaches for his hand anyway. Her grip is a little tighter than usual. “Lead the way?”
takes it without complaint and gives a nod. “Certainly.”
ꙮ You’ve still got the instructions to get there written down, although between the Cartogrix and his sense of direction, I bet Aurelius doesn’t even need them. Some distance in the direction of the closest hydroponics system, and then a hared-off wild goose chase after a cat and salamander down some lit tunnels, and then you see the sword-mark gouged into the stone floor that’ll guide you the rest of the way.
clenches his hand tighter as it grows darker, but she forces her grip to relax. Not like she could actually hurt him this way, but. Still. When they get to the keypad and the open door, she asks, “What was the code?”
: “No idea.”
ꙮ The code was Aurelius being incredibly cool, Salme.
ꙮ He walked through the door like it wasn’t even there.
blinks, and looks at Aury, and grins. “Oh. Of course. Of course that’s what you’d do.”
: “Brute force cracking a 12 digit code would have taken forever.”
pushes it open.
ꙮ Although you can certainly take a moment to futz around with the keypad now that the lock’s been disabled. The door does slide open when you gently shove on it, though - inside, the dead man’s shelter. The broken, curved crystal screen, on one side of the main room, a bed in the corner. Smooth curves, cool metal, white surfaces made of some gnosis-sensitive substance. The table’s still glowing, and the lights are on - you can’t see the source of any of the lights, just this soft, everpresent diffuse glow.
: “Pretty standard room all told.”
: “Did you … hm. Why does the table glow? That’s not particularly normal, right?”
: “Aesthetic, mostly, but helps when you wanna keep the room dim with watching something on the TV.”
: “TV?”
points at the giant display on the wall, vaguely reminiscent of the view-mirror inside the library that looks outside of it.
ꙮ The mysterious dead man is still there, on the couch facing the screen; nothing about the scene has been disturbed, and Aurelius even gently slid the etched crystal tablet under his hand where he’d found it, after he copied down the message. His watch is on the table, where Aury left it. The only thing that’s really changed is that the boxes of supplies have been taken out of the room. There’s a thin divider, separating off part of the room from the rest; you can see the foot of a carefully-made bed behind it.
notes the dead guy, but the first thing she does is go over to the bed and run her hand over the covers. Nothing here is like anything she’s ever seen before. “What does a TV do? Does it show the outside of something?”
: “More or less. Project images onto and through it. Like playing a memory from a book, except without needing to invent a bizarre ass sealed space to do it.”
ꙮ Salme - on the wall next to the bed, obscured by the divider, there’s a watercolor painting of a man’s face. Darker skin, light blond hair drawn back in a ponytail, piercing green eyes and an aquiline nose, with the suggestion of a smirk on his lips. It’s impressionistic, the work of a dedicated amateur.
: “So it’s like … hm. A memory you watch instead of a memory you feel?” she asks, though she quirks an eyebrow at the watercolor painting. It’s … oddly comforting, that even in a time so strange and distant there’d be someone making ‘dedicated amateur’ watercolors of someone they—hm.
goes over to look at the body.
: “Kinda yeah.”
ꙮ Incredibly composed, a serene expression on his face. Reaching out towards the etched crystal tablet. The suit he’s wearing would be the envy of any tailor in Almachadta, and it’s not a cut or a style you recognise; it seems formal, almost– not military. Not monastic, either, exactly. It looks like he was crying, when he died.
: “Ah,” she says softly. She considers his expression, and tablet in his hand with the cipher carved into it. “Is this how you found him?”
: “Yup.”
ꙮ He’s got shockingly loud blue hair that matches the colour of his suit to an astonishing degree, and a tight metal collar that looks like a single piece of rounded metal, conformed to the shape of his neck, tucked under the collar of his suit.
reaches out and touches his hair—it’s nothing like her bluejay’s is it? But she still thinks of him, despite herself. “Who were you?” she murmurs softly, and then moves her hand down to run her finger along the smoothness of the metal collar.
ꙮ There’s a box of figs on the table. It hasn’t been touched, for some reason, when the supplies were taken. One of the figs has been cut, neatly, in half, and packed in the box prominently. It’s still perfectly fresh.
ꙮ When you touch the collar, you feel a questing pulse of gnosis, a complicated, shimmering weave. If you had the counterweave to it, it would fit like a key in a lock.
blinks. And then laughs. She looks at Aury. “He must have loved the man who put this collar around his neck very much.” She takes a step back, considering the scene.
: “I don’t think…” Aurelius starts, then immediately shrugs.
: “What don’t you think?”
: “I’m fairly certain that’s a data storage device and not…” He gestures vaguely.
: “It’s a data storage device and not an expression of eternal devotion? In a room where the only signs of the occupant’s personality are a watercolor portrait of someone and this man’s crying over an encrypted tablet that’s likely intimate correspondence as his life ends?”
: “Not the only ones, but the only ones immediately visible, yes.”
- Aurelius has gained 1 Arete, and now has 4.
: “Oh? You mentioned something about … AR?”
: “Grab the wrist band and put it on.”
does so.
: “And now… uh… hm. Think about waking the box on the wrist band up, as you send it a bit of radiant gnosis. Even if that might not particularly make sense.”
ꙮ You feel it catch at your thoughts, as you put the wristband on. Like it’s waiting for– yeah, Aury’s got the explanation covered.
sends a spark of radiant gnosis out from herself.
ꙮ The face of it lights up, and a bloom of gnosis unfurls from it. For Salme’ eyes only, imagery flickers into the space in front of her. A desk, with locked drawers. A little model of a white tower that you feel like you could pick up with your hands and hold, you swear, it’s that detailed. An outline in the air, a suggestion, like a vivid sketch in three dimensions, looking down on the desk and its occupant with a faintly-amused smile on his face - the man from the watercolor, rendered even more stylistically perhaps, but still recognisable now that you’ve seen it.
does not change her expression, though she is certainly thinking very hard. She reaches out and trails her hands along one of the locked draws. “I’m guessing you tried to open them unsuccessfully?” Though she’s curious if they have keyholes.
ꙮ They do not have keyholes.
: “Yes, I only poked at it for a minute or two earlier and haven’t tried to circumvent the security on it yet.”
: “Also only you can see that right now.”
: “If anyone can figure it out, it’ll be you.” She picks up the model of the white tower. “You’ll want to show this to Wolf. This is the tower he dreams about.”
: “Had a feeling, yeah.”
ꙮ Somehow, inexplicably, despite that you know you’re touching thin air, it feels heavy in your hands, you can feel the surface of it, cold and polished.
feels the tower in her hands, the coldness of it, the smoothness of the stone. She sets the tower back on the desk, and closes the … AR. She looks at Aurelius. “Synomote. That’s what they were to each other. And I bet you anything that’s the key to the cipher.”
ꙮ An old, forgotten word, remembered once again.
ꙮ You could, if you wished to, translate it as ‘conspirator’.
ꙮ Do you know what that word means, in the depth of time, its most intimate and ancient meaning?
: “Seems like that would make it really obvious to anyone that knows them, but, I guess that’s not really any dumber than using a mother or child’s birthday as a password…”
ꙮ ”People who share breath.” Those who, together, hold one spirit. It’s right there in the middle of the word, clothed with connotations.
: “You thought the collar was a data storage device.”
: “I, uh, will take your word for it.”
: “I still do.”
: “Could be both though, like how your Mask is both a perfectly function mask, and also, a data storage device.”
nods at that. “That. Makes sense, yes, silmät. It really does.” She lifts a hand to … she’s wearing the Rose Gold Rose, but her hands seem to want to reach for pendants that aren’t there.
: “Anyway, didn’t Archie say the key would be 25 characters long? I don’t… think that quite unpacks?”
tilts her head at Aurelius. “I’m perhaps willing to concede that, but it absolutely is the other thing as well. A collar, a promise, a bond.”
shrugs. “There might be another part to it, but I’ll see what he can do with ‘synomote’ first.”
ꙮ I think it’s worth a shot.
: “Speaking of which …” she reaches for his hand again. “How is one of my beloved synomotes doing?”
: “Just fine.”
nods. “Thank you for coming with me. I. Appreciate not being alone. Here. I mean, always, but here specifically.”
nods slowly. “Didn’t feel like sending you into a room with a bunch of strange technology and a corpse alone would have done much for your mental state.”
: “Oh it’s. I mean. The corpse doesn’t bother me. The technology is … baffling, and I wouldn’t have figured it out. But I mean the underground stuff. I’ve been trying to work through it but…” she laughs a little. “It’s a process.”
: “What underground stuff?”
: “The … ‘I wig out in caves and have anxiety attacks’ underground stuff?”
: “Hmm… I see. Honestly hasn’t come up before.”
: “It … hasn’t?”
: “No? You were perfectly normal-for-you on the Beast.”
: “Oh. The Deepforge was huge and filled with lava. It felt different enough that I didn’t … it was different. But when we were with Tasna and her crew? I was definitely … not having a great time with it.”
: “Could have fooled me.”
: “Did, in fact.”
: “Oh. I wasn’t. I mean. I didn’t want it to be a problem for everyone to deal with.”
swallows. “But yeah, that’s why I’ve been sleeping in the library here.”
: “Really can’t imagine how this feels that much different but. Hmm. Yeah I don’t really know what to do with that.” He offers an apologetic half frown.
: “I mean, you don’t have to do … anything with it? It’s not … rational. It’s.” She makes some aborted half-gesture. “It reminds me of the shrine on Almachadta, and I know it isn’t. I keep reminding myself it isn’t that, but.”
: “Much, much bigger yes.”
: “Yeah it’s stupid. It’s also. Again. I’m not going to be a Problem about it. I figured out a way to get through places if it gets bad.”
: “Hmm…”
: “…Well, if you’re sure.”
looks at him. “What are you thinking?”
: “Simply that you are very different from me.”
: “Well. Sure. Yeah. That’s … obvious. But in what way are you talking about here, specifically?”
just waves a hand around. “It’s very hard to imagine this causing anxiety.”
: “Yeah. I mean. That’s … I don’t want to be like this. I think—I wanted to be able to explore everything here. I think the caves are really interesting. I’m also just. You know. Kind of a fuckup.”
places a hand on Salme’s head and rubs it gently.
leans into it. “I went. There’s a place, where it gets really dark and narrow, and I wanted to try to … deal with this, so I went down there. The apostates told me it was a good place to … test yourself. To figure out what actually bothers you about small, dark places. And. That is where I found the … whatever the opposite of irrica is? The pillars of it, that reach up from the floor to the ceiling.”
: “Once I got through the crevice, I mean.”
: “I see…”
: “Do you?”
: “I don’t get it, but I see.”
: “I mean, I wouldn’t want you to get it. It kinda sucks.” She looks at him. “Is there anything you’re scared of? Even if you know it isn’t rational? Even if it … doesn’t make any sense?”
thinks.
: “No?”
: “Ah.”
: “Then I probably seem. Very. Strange.”
: “I’m scared a lot of the time. Sometimes for good reasons, sometimes for not very good reasons.” She shrugs and crosses her arms. “Anyway, it doesn’t. It doesn’t really matter. I’m dealing with it and I’m not going to be a problem. So. Yeah. Thanks for showing me the room?”
ꙮ Just always remember what the most important step to take is.
: “Thank you for not being strange about the corpse.”
: “What?”
: “You’ve been very strange about things dying or not, as they like, since we got here.”
: “I thought I … explained that in a way that made. Some sort of sense. Like I could have still been better about it, probably, but.”
: “Did it make sense or have you just been thinking I’m a complete freak this entire time?”
rocks his head from side to side.
: “That’s really less of an either or statement and more of an as well as one, if we’re being perfectly honest.”
: “Ah. Well. And here I thought you liked how I was.” She wraps her arms tighter around herself and starts heading back towards their rooms, slowly.
: “If I suddenly stopped liking you every single time you acted strange I probably would not have started to begin with.”
: “And, honestly, would not really be able to function within this group at all if that were the case.”
: “Someone’s always being weird. Myself included.”
: “Right. I get it. But the ‘acting strange’ stuff you’re talking about isn’t stuff that—you’re actively thanking me not being like that. You looked at me like I was a weird problem you couldn’t solve with the claustrophobia stuff. I—“ She laughs. “I actually like it when you’re strange in the ways you’re strange. It seems like I … at least lately, it has to be a thing you look past. Or get … lowkey irritated with?”
: “That was mostly a joke, as I did trust you to be respectful after I mentioned it.” Aurelius lets out a breath before folding his arms over his chest.
: “The cave thing is just. Particularly odd to me, because some of the oldest memories I have are of being in small, dark, enclosed spaces and they feel natural to me. And I wasn’t sure if you wanted me to do something or not, given how often you come to me for advise or direction on things you’re feeling uneasy about.”
: “If I wanted advice or direction I would have asked? I wouldn’t have expected you to just … intuit that? I mean. I guess a hug or some concern wouldn’t have gone amiss, but.” She shrugs. “And I guess. I didn’t get the joke because. You know. I had just told you something I’ve been struggling with pretty bad and … I don’t know.”
: “And I am sorry if I’ve been relying on you too much and you felt … like you had to have some sort of answer.”
: “I apologize if I’ve hurt or offended you with my awkwardness.”
shakes her head. “You haven’t offended me. I just … hm. I’m self-conscious about it? About being scared of something I shouldn’t be scared of. And … I guess I was caught off-guard because I thought you knew, for some reason? Even though I apparently didn’t tell you?”
: “You’ve never mentioned it once, or let it show. You are, if you’ve forgotten, actually a fairly accomplished actor.”
: “I don’t think there’s anything particularly worth being self-conscious about over your fears? As you said, it’s not something people generally have much of any control over.”
: “Easy for the man with no fears to say.”
: “No, it would be much easier to say anyone with one is a fool and a coward both. But that wouldn’t be true.”
stares at him for a long moment, and then she laughs.
: “Yeah I guess that would be easier, wouldn’t it?”
watches her face for a moment, before nodding slowly.
watches him watch her face. “Are you trying to read what I’m thinking?”
: “It’s not always immediately clear if a laugh is good or bad.”
: “You can always ask, you know? Though I understand. I laugh a lot, and it’s not always because I’m amused.” She uncrosses her arms. “I think. I think, you being who you are, it’d be real easy to be a fucking asshole, right? And it’s not that you aren’t capable of being an asshole—I think we all are capable of that. But with your particular skills and talents? You could be a real dick about it. But you aren’t. Instead … I’ve never met someone take so much care to. Hm. Treat people he doesn’t understand with dignity and fairness and consideration, according to how he understands the world.”
: “An understanding which is largely correct. Except when you miss the obvious emotional valence of a piece of jewelry.”
makes a face. “Collars are for animals, not clan.” then lets out a breath. “If it humanizes me a bit, it’s not all kindness and empathy. Some of it is knowing that if we make a huge mess and piss off one of the only known hubs of civilization, it’s going to be really hard to do recon and information gathering. And that desecrating the loved dead is generally a sure fire way to piss off any spiritual people.”
scratches at the side of his face. “I do try, though.”
: “You’ll notice I said ‘dignity, fairness, and consideration.’ You do kindness exceptionally well when you decide to, sure, but I’m not saying you’re some idealized, inhuman paragon of … goodness. You’re brilliant and you use that brilliance strategically. Thinking you weren’t capable of being calculating or clever because you make an active effort to be good would be underestimating you just as badly as assuming you’re always trying to be a high-handed asshole. And if I’ve given the impression that I think you’re all kindness and empathy than I owe you an agonizingly formal apology.”
: “Also, let’s be honest, no one is ever going to call you particularly empathetic.”
: “Not around you fucking weirdos, no.”
: “Considering you’re a weirdo yourself, you should be more empathetic, not less.” She pokes him in the side, gently.
: “No, not a damned one of you makes any sense. Except Awa. When he talks like a person.”
returns the gesture.
: “He talks like a person all of the time. A person who has huffed copious metaphors and crashed them together in his head in a way that only makes sense to him.” She takes his hand.
nods while taking the hand. “Right, like an actor, not a person.”
: “Oh, I see,” she nods sagely, “actors aren’t people.”
: “Correct, they’re exaggerated caricatures of people, on stage.”
: “This may shock you, but sometimes people talk in complex metaphors, Aurelius.”
: “Ah, yes, woe onto me for having forgotten the verisimilitude with which the more educated of folk choose to engage in casual with.”
nods with even more solemn consideration than before. “Fear not, my vulpine beloved. Though you art but an incomplex creature from quaint lands which smoulder and cannot propagate records through cycles, there still is room within our clan for your humble wit.”
: “You forgot to pronounce the silent e in arte.”
: “Fuck, I did. I’m never going to make it on the stage.”
: “Alas and alak. You’ll have to settle for being our ace investigator instead.”
snorts. “I guess being nosy does have a couple benefits. I’ll have to see if Archie can use that key, or if there’s more to it than that.”
breathes out. “Also.” She squeezes his hand. “Also. I don’t need you to do anything to help me with the cave stuff, not really. But being near you or Awa does help. It doesn’t fix it, but it helps? So. If that’s okay … I might. Do that. More.”
: “That’s perfectly fine.”
nods. “Anyway. Thanks again. I really appreciated getting a chance to see a corpse on Mu without having to make my own.”
shakes his head exasperatedly.
laughs.