kenoscomm | locked to zenith

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[ Link's mental space feels like being outside, so depending on where you are, you might not realize that someone has started Communion with you. Since joining the Zenith, the landscape of Link's mind has gone from idyllic, sunny forests to icy, overcast mountains. A frigid wind blows against your face, carrying the scent of firewood and meat roasting over an open flame. The diminutive Hylian is not sitting by the fire, but standing at the edge of a rocky ledge, his back turned. ]

There's going to be another Oracle soon. I can feel it. The rest of you can feel it too, right? That... pulling feeling.

[ He sighs. ]

If we lose this one, it's over. The Meridian isn't going to go easy on us. I know them... I know how badly they want to win. To them, the stakes couldn't be higher.

So let's talk. About what we're going to be up against, and... well, planning ahead isn't really something we can do, but at least we can warn each other of the dangers that individual Meri pose.

And I... I want to say something, too.

[ He sits down where he stands, his feet hanging off the cliff. There's a sense that he knows this isn't going to go over well, but it's important enough to him to say it anyway. ]

Killing the other guy before they kill you is what war is. That's normal. But Kenos is different. Death doesn't work the way it should here. We don't die permanently. You can neutralize someone threatening you by just dissipating them. There's nothing to gain by destroying their soul after you're no longer in danger.

So, I don't think any of us should shatter anyone ever again.

If you claim someone's Shard, you should protect it. If you feel that you can't do that, give it to someone else.

...I'm not stupid. I know a lot of you aren't gonna agree to this. And the Meris probably won't either. I'm sure they want revenge for what happened to Quetzalcoatl, and those of you who lost the Shards Yima gave you probably aren't feeling very merciful right now either...

But if we don't come to some kinda agreement now, that's going to become normal. Things are gonna get really bad. I don't want that. So... can we talk about it, at least?

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A little slow-going, but yeah. I know how they work, how to take them apart and put them back together, all that jazz. Problem's getting the materials. And the manufacturing once you do got 'em — magic helps out, but it's still kinda taxing. Not to mention the ammunition problem, so every bullet here really does count.

[ Still, there's a pleased little air to him as he answers Yuber, because it's good that this is so well-received. Nevermind that the guy had been ready to burn down the entire Beyond at the drop of a hat — these are guns! He likes guns, so he's happy to talk about them just about always. ]

Would be more valuable if I could make more, or knew how to build the ones I'm used to from my original universe. But it's been a long as fuck dry spell before I could get to this point, so I ain't complaining.

Did they now?

[It's obvious this is new to him, and not in a good way. Cid's opinion of Aetos is... incredibly low.]

They were apparently an advisor to Meridian a long time ago. How long ago, precisely, I couldn't say.

You know... the first Oracle. Aetos showed us a dead future for Kenos, what would happen with inaction. Something like that. It's been some time, and I wasn't thinking too clearly at the time.

I am of two minds.

One, the Oracles can truly do what we are told they can do. This, I find unlikely. I only have that fragment of a memory of someone else... but for the memories of the past to still be present here... I don't think they ever left Kenos.

The other is that this is all an elaborate performance. Something is out there, like a predator in tall grass. These Oracles, these trials? It's all for show. A proverbial carrot on a stick. We're the entertainment for that thing, to distract it is to delay the end of the universe.

[The intensity in which he believes the second is very obvious.]

I believe Zenith's ideals, I do. That our worlds are gone, that the only way is forward. That a new world is the only option.

...but the Oracles can't do that. Only we can. People, building the new world with our hands. One day at a time.

[...]

I must sound mad.

[ Considering he's just happy to talk about guns, his bubble isn't burst too badly, at least. There's a flicker of disappointment, but it's quickly gone as the conversation continues. ]

Ah, nice, nice, M97's at least good still! I've got a special P38 myself, so I know about goin' old school. Kinda had to myself, but don't worry about that. [ it's dumb bullshit from his canon and even he knows it ] I got to try out a SCAR-L when a dealer swung by my place, and it was real nice! Ended up going with AK-47s and M134 Miniguns for my guys, but of course the latter was only really practical for the big, big guys.

[ He also sighs wistfully... just two guys, missing their guns, ]

But, yeah, if you don't mind, I'd love to see what you're cookin' up. Miss Tattoo Artist also told me that I'd be swingin' by your place too for some new ink, so! Sounds like your spot's the place to be.

[ Tezcatlipoca whistles, impressed. ]

That's pretty damn good! I'd like to see it. Any army'd be lucky to have you with sharpshooting like that.

[ Since if it's talk of bows and arrows, his mind goes back to the times of the Empire more than the Ocelomeh. ]

So, what's this about not being a hero anymore, huh? With a bow arm like that, I dunno, sounds pretty badass to me.

No.

[ The answer, though soft, is immediate. Matt's presence is suffused with something like enlightenment; the photo-negative version of a blessed insight. And there are insights here, things Matt has never heard before. Puzzle pieces he can use to give his musings new and more detailed shapes.

The biggest piece is why. What purpose all the spectacle could serve. Cid's hypothesis seems dreadfully possible. Maybe someone on Kenos--Yima? Aetos?--made a deal with the darkness to keep it fed. ]

You don't sound mad at all, [ Matt assures him, with feeling. He's more certain now that they won't be overheard, a sense that comes from Cid rather than himself. Matt is a little loose over Communion, to put it nicely, but he's adept at following another's lead. ] I've been thinking a lot of the same things. I wish I could make a better world, one that didn't have--God, unnecessary pain and cruelty, where everything could just be loved for what it is, all of that.

But something's hunting us. All of us. And ever since I got here, it's felt like everything is conspiring to keep us from noticing and hunting it back.

...Sure.

[ He agrees with a smirk in his voice. "Do as I say, not as I do," c'mon. But he doesn't hate that this is the angle Matt is taking. ]

But you only got so much to give. And not to put too fine of a point of it, but I've got some experience with world-eaters. [ He and Daybit had been trying to wake it up, in fact. ] Well, anyways. When you're certain that's the path you wanna walk—and no turnin' back from it if you do—then I might be able to help out. That's why I'm curious.

You're right. There is something hunting us. I awoke from a nightmare not too long ago, a nightmare that wrenched my shard from my chest. I don't know what could cause something like that— I'm no stranger to bad dreams.

In that dream, I was being hunted. Perhaps even by that which lurks in the shadows.

[There's a sensation like him shaking his head.]

Zenith desperately needs a morale boost. Even if gathering these Oracles is for naught... we still need to win. If we win this, it will be two each.

[ A soft scoff. ]

I do not make enemies of forces of nature, normally, no.

[ He'd seen it, after all. That darkness. (Was it really the same? Who knows! But he remembers that pitch black he had seen in the Regent's throne room even now. It was not sentient, it was not evil. It simply... was. It had been grand and great, and all-encompassing.) ]

It is something to guard against, and prepare for, but fight? Or stop? Can you stop a storm? Or the undertow, boy?

[ Matt's feeling of faux pas is, he realizes, most closely aligned with how you shouldn't talk about a party in front of someone who isn't invited to it. It's a bit gauche. But he's pleased by the reassurance anyway, a feeling that comes through in a mental hmm. ]

Let me know if I can braid your hair again sometime, by the by. [ Listen, he started with "god of beauty" and this is where his associations led him. ] I wonder if I could put a spell in there ... in ribbons or clips or something.

[ Matt's curiosity is piqued by both particulars: experience with world-eaters, the possibility of aid. He's not surprised, exactly; from what he recalls of Tezcatlipoca's history, he has been both eater and eaten. ]

Help out how?

[As if she had not just shared something peeled from her memories, (and neglecting to mention that the exorcist survived-)]

It becomes extensive when needed.

So the original can be smaller... but it still must contain enough ink to be deployed when needed.

I did too, [ Matt replies immediately. ] And yeah, I have nightmares too, but it was the same thing--being hunted, my Shard ripped out.

[ This instantly bumps the dream from suspicious nightmare to vision in his mind. Great!

Matt rolls the issue of morale around in his mind for a moment. Then, tentative, ] Do you think it might be easier to reason with some of the less reasonable people around here if we won the next one? Like ... they'd be less afraid, or upset?

[ Though Meridian would get worse. Maybe they can "afford" to lose this round, but he can't imagine any of them feel that way. And of course they wouldn't--even after attacking Highstorm. Revenge has yet to bring back a single slain civilian, as far as he's aware. ]

[ A polite, disbelieving pause. ]

I can stop a storm. [ Emphasis on "I." ] Or call one. And I can usually reason with an undertow.

I don't think this thing that's hunting us is a force of nature at all. Un-nature, maybe. But whatever it is exactly, is it that weird to think we might be fighting a war on multiple fronts?

It's possible, aye.

[He hopes.]

Being able to find out something about the thing stalking us would help, too. We need concrete proof, something that's impossible to ignore.

[ There's a general feeling of acceptance, and "whenever you feel like it" is pretty clearly on the tip of his tongue, but the further offer is the surprise. ]

...Oh, yeah, I guess a mage could do that, huh. [ why did no one ever offer him this before wtf!! (because they knew he did not actually need it) ] I mean, sure, that sounds handy. Ribbon's gonna be more convenient, since I dunno if clips would stick around if I needed to put my armor on.

[ Too modern, essentially. ]

I mean, you wanted to see a miracle, right? Taking a good lil peek at something creeping in on my domain is a good opportunity for one.

[ He says it casually, but it's also very vague on purpose. ]

But you gotta show me that you're committed to that path. Maybe pass one of my Trials. Then I'll consider it.

I've been working on that.

[ Matt sounds firmer on this point. ]

I found something small with light scars on it--a teacup from the baubles market. Took it back home and tried to get a feel for it, though so far all I have is that the light seems ... kind of alien. Like it came from somewhere far away? And like it's capable of shining brighter than the normal light here is.

Um. And I was talking to another magic user, from Meridian, about how we might get some of these phenomena to stand still long enough to get a better look at them.

That's good, that's good.

[Cid isn't lying.]

It will be difficult. There are people beyond reasoning on both sides. Ones who will refuse to listen when it comes to the peril just outside of Kenos, too consumed with war.

So any ally you can make in Meridian, embrace it.

[It makes it sound like Cid has his own, though he isn't naming names.]

The more this war heats up, the more difficult it will be to travel to the opposite city, after all.

I may be interested in learning how to use a gun.

[There is a cool pause as he considers this, then...]

Actually, if you can make a gun, could you make me a weapon that can slay a god?

I'm aware this is a joke, but our numbers are already so low...

Hoh? I've only ever been dissipated once, by a surprise attack. I'll have you know I'm much more durable than your average mage.

[Wouldn't that just mean he'd be dying to come to her aid so he could be smug about it? Hmmmm]

Depends on how much of a liability we think they are, I guess.

Ha.

[Yuber's oily presence rolls in amusement.]

But that's easy for you to say. You want to destroy everything and build a new world from the ashes. What would a soul or twenty crushed into oblivion matter, right?

…Considerin’ the ones I’ve met or even heard about, I don’t know if I even know what that metric even means anymore.

[ Daybit is his first example, of course, and he’d go tangle with Deinos with nothing more than a gun… Certified freak. Peperoncino he only met for five minutes and was a freak. The Chaldean mage is DEFINITELY a freak (if only for their absurd luck).

Anyways. Not really the point here. ]

If you’ve got yourself handled, I ain’t gonna complain. Not exactly a hero type, if that wasn’t obvious.

I'm not sure how to answer that. An overwhelming majority of people here are adults, so we can't be expected to effectively control each other. Especially when those people hold a higher rank in the faction.

[Thinking about this... the sensation of a frown deepens. There is another issue that might be more pressing. The concern of fake shards, and the information D shared with her — Rin has a small worry. An inkling that they'll be so entrenched in the faction divide that they won't be able to defend against what may be coming.

Yet that doesn't stop her from rallying her comrades. Because even if there might be a bigger threat, if a side has to win... Rin wants it to be Zenith. It has to be Zenith.]

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locked to zenith

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private forever;

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minor lb7 spoilers ahoy

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