wakey wakey [ @all ]

[kenosnpcs]

This is a post where you'll find a header in the comments for Aetós, Agapitos Voreen, and Florence Deshayes respectively.

As a reminder from our course correction, your OOC understanding of their places in their factions should not influence IC reactions, especially to Agapitos and Florence. Aggressive threats and demands are likely to be ignored, because this would be very out of the blue to them! ( You can be mean to Aetós, though. They're a dick, and they just won't respond. )

Timewise, Agapitos and Florence's posts are shortly after Shard-Bearers awake after the repose (roughly a day to give people a chance to get their bearings/go get a haircut/etc), and Aetós's portion is later in the month.


Please note, new tag-ins will not be responded to after April 23rd. However, tagging each other throughout this post is welcome. Threadjack to your heart's content!

Comments

[kenosnpcs]

All are accurate enough. I never fussed over the terminology. Grasping the forces of the universe is my work. And I do so with magic, yes.

[ A pause, as if they're considering something. But they seem to come to a conclusion easily enough. ]

Time was the first. But I mastered that during my Generation's war. Used it to forgo the conclusion.

[semicharmed]

[ Aetós may just sort of toss that off--or perhaps it's deeply meaningful to them, and Matt just can't tell over the absent feeling in their communion. The subtractive effect. Either way, the information hits him like a jolt of electricity in contrast. ]

The conclusion ... what, like when everybody got--what did Liem call it--purged? You used time travel to get around it? [ Hang on hang on-- ] Hang on, okay so time. I've been thinking about Oblivion as a form of destruction that doesn't leave anything behind, which normal entropy as I understand it would because it's just the process by which things progress from order to chaos, so it's not inherently any more sinister than like, pouring cream in your coffee. You can't unpour it.

Can you go backwards?

[kenosnpcs]

Your perception of Oblivion matches my own. It is why it cannot be stopped.

However, that is not what my magic does, no. Time in that sense, or rather, the Timestream, is fundamentally incompatible with organic matter. So, there is no travel. I have theorized that the soul alone could make the trip. But it is impossible to control which iteration of a reality it would land in. To say nothing of it being like sending a signal without a receiver waiting for it.

My control of it is more localized. A pause. Imperceptible to all.

[semicharmed]

[ Matt's mind is quiet for all this, though far from inactive. He soaks in what Aetós says like a sponge--or perhaps more accurately, like a prism. Taking the input, translating it through his own imperfect lens to see what he can make of it.

The Timestream, as alluded to, doesn't make immediate sense to Matt. Except perhaps in the sense that the realm of the spirit strikes him as operating independently of time as the living, the embodied, tend to know it. Linear, indefatigable, unstoppable. He puts a bookmark in the concept for a moment. ]

Would it be more accurate to say, then, that you're able to stop time in a designated area? So when the effect ends, time has ... either passed around people or things inside the area, and they haven't experienced time. Or time has only passed within the area?

[ A mental huff, irked. ]

Sorry if I'm not making sense. Words aren't always my medium.

[kenosnpcs]

It is the first. I move through the world as if it is on pause. Simple. Effective. It avoids even the end of a Generation, so long as it is configured correctly. It is why there are few survivors. Few are able to figure out their own method of avoiding the purge.

[semicharmed]

[ Matt frowns. ]

Something happened to my Shard. It felt like I was a circuit with too much energy passing through. I assumed it was the process of trying to channel Meridian or Zenith for the purposes they've told us ...

The way you're talking about conclusions, it sounds almost like ordered cycles. Not failed attempts.

[ Okay, it would be great to clarify that by "my Shard," he means the other him. The Savant. His thoughts are moving too fast for him to be totally clear what he's said and what he hasn't, however.

Speaking of: ]

Shame you can't have it go the other way--time passing differently in a localized area. [ Murmured, almost. ] I managed to catch one of these shadows, or I guess ... pin it down, with a friend. I'm curious what kind of relationship they have with time.

[kenosnpcs]

Both are correct. By their perception, it is a failed attempt. They did not know their fate. They never did. This is the only one I have told, for it is irrelevant to your motivation. Your generation has a chance to succeed in the goal of Meridian or Zenith. But it is not a guarantee. A luxury the previous did not have.

[ However, their interest sharpens as they continue. ]

You caught one? What did you find?

[semicharmed]

[ A piece of Matt thinks, Sure, I bet you tell all the Shard-Bearers that. Which is maybe unworthy of him, but the one thing everybody says about Aetós is they're not necessarily to be trusted.

The quality of their attention changes, making the Communion feel taut. Matt's slow to answer, but for reasons of accuracy rather than any desire to build suspense. ]

I burned it up, I think. My magic is--I conceive of it as light, but also maybe more crucially, as life? But while we had it, my friend took a look, and ...

[ Sensations pass through the connection. Matt's mind is an imperfect container for Tezcatlipoca's knowledge, but what fragments he was capable of retaining, he shares: intangible, oily darkness, fitting itself to the width of any crack it finds and seeping through. Swallowing souls like pomegranate seeds. Eating worlds. ]

We found hunger, primarily.

Which isn't much of a surprise. But I think I'd been ascribing more ... emotional intent, to this thing, than maybe it has. It's been reading our memories and looking like people we love, and I thought that was to hurt us. Maybe it is to hurt us, but it's not out of sadism. It's a predatory tactic.

It's the space in between stars. I wonder if maybe it's the space between thoughts, too. Everything that isn't.

[kenosnpcs]

[ There's silence in return, and it might seem like they've cut the connection if not for the barely-there feeling of thoughtfulness. It's very faint, so far as feelings go, but the acuity is much sharper. They're considering what Matt's saying, deeply.

And eventually... ]

That is valuable to know.

[ +5 approval for matt. is that good? who knows! ]

It is worth exploring. My current tools can be adjusted. Hm. [ A silence again, but this one is briefer. ] Were you volunteering, earlier?

[semicharmed]

Oh.

[ There's a moment of surprised pleasure. This despite Matt's misgivings about Aetós, his suspicion. He can't help it; all he's wanted since he got here was to be able to do something useful. A piece of him misses the part of academia where one could win approval by making a solid argument or raising a novel point.

The feeling doesn't last long. Aetós asks their followup, and Matt's emotions turn uncertain. Awkward. ]

Well, ah ...

[ But really, there's only one way this ends. ]

I was, [ he decides. ] Yeah.

I took some notes about what we saw when we scanned the shadows. Closer to when it actually happened. I could bring those, if you want.

[kenosnpcs]

Yes. I would like to read them.

So, I will contact you when preparations have been made.