Event Log: Dust to Dust

[hadrielmods]

Who: All characters participating in the event
What: The event log for the Dust to Dust event
Where: All over the city!
When: January 14th-17th
Warnings: A big ol' mess.

It starts off small: the wind picks up, particles of sand and dirt and dust begin to fill the air. You might not even notice at first, not until you have to wipe the dust off your windows to see outside. After all, it's been a long time since Hadriel has experienced weather, and it's never experienced a weather event not caused by the gods before.

But the gods aren't in charge of the weather now, and even if they could prevent this dust storm, they have way too many other things to do. So it's up to you to deal with it, and as the wind rises and the dust storm moves into the city, there'll be plenty to deal with.

Once the storm is at its peak, it'll be almost impossible to see outside - and it won't be safe to go wandering, either. Entirely besides falling and hurting yourself, if you aren't wrapped up well enough the particles in the air will abrade your skin. Love that sandpaper feel! Oh, and breathing? Yeah, better make sure your nose and mouth are covered, or else they'll be full of sand, too. Hope you've got some goggles stashed away to protect your eyes. Luckily, it won't last too long - 'cause you'll have plenty of cleaning to do once the storm is over.

► This log covers January 14th-17th.
► Feel free to make your own logs, as well
► Please tag headers of threads with content warnings where they apply
► Please put your character's name and open/closed in the subject line of your starters!
► If you foolishly get scoured to the bone, please let us know here.

Comments

[dedikated]

( To not lose you.

Those words are rarer in Kate's life than she realises before they're said. It's a punch to the gut. So much between herself and Marc had been unspoken, and that spiralled out into everything else. She lost the ability to say those sorts of things to anyone, and in turn, they didn't say them to her. Faith did, but she said them to everyone. It took most of a decade for them to even say they were best friends - took Kate dying in a city they should never have been in in the first place.

Hearing it from Glacius is one thing. Hearing is from Carlisle, who for so long had prefaced all his arguments with how it would hurt Glacius' feelings, is another thing entirely. One that's enough to stun Kate into silence, into stillness. Something different from the usual stillness of a viper about to strike, or a cat stalking its prey; this is like a person frozen by powers and magic.

With nothing more than a few words.

The storm continues to bluster outside, battering the building and howling, ringing in her ears. It takes the crash of something against the door to finally snap her out of the speechlessness, and then only to say; )

I'm not letting you die, Carlisle.

( It's true, she has no idea how to fight this kind of death. It can't be fought by weapons and claws, and his world and the rules of it are nothing like her own, or Hadriel's. But she has to figure out some way of keeping him alive.

He's become too important to her to simply give up. )

[tongueamok]

You say that as though you have a choice in the matter, Kate.

[Her reassurance should be something that brings him comfort: it's what he wanted, isn't it? A sign that she's actually listening to him rather than deflecting his every -- and often nonverbal, unfortunately -- attempt to reach her? No, that wasn't it, not entirely. He wants her to see what she has, and perhaps her insistence is a way of showing that. How sad it is, he notes inwardly, that she wastes it on the unattainable.

The storm continues to rage outside, but what fury lingered in his voice drips away with the ink from his eye, from his nails, from his lips. Bit by bit, it is worn away, just as he is.]

You may choose to throw yourself into danger on behalf of others in the hopes that your sacrifice will change the outcome for the better... but there is little, if anything, you can do about this. That anyone can do.

[And just as he struggles to come to terms with her methods, so he has struggled to reconcile himself with his impending end. He's had years to deal with it, but has only found recently that he wants things to be different -- that he desperately wishes he could change his own fate with the same arguments that might change the minds of others, that might change how they see themselves and their own worth.]

[dedikated]

( She sees what she has. That's why it's worth protecting. Worth letting it continue to influence her world back home and the city here. And what she has here includes Carlisle. It very much includes Carlisle. He's been part of her life in Hadriel since her very first flat here, and the idea of letting him die. )

So we just give up on you, then?

( Seriously? That can't be the answer. The people here have fought so much. Carlisle has fought so much, even if not as directly as herself or Glacius. There's a reason he's the first person she had in mind, even over her own clinic staff, when she got whipped across the face by a Null's limb. She's fought so much. She's seen and heard about people coming back from the worst things.

She may not have a clue right now, but that doesn't mean she won't eventually.

Hadriel help her, she's beginning to sound like Faith.

There's a pause, long enough for it to seem like Kate's done talking, long enough for her to try and get a handle on her emotions again before they spiral out into something more. Think of what Glacius might do. Think of what Sweets said about keeping her urge to compete in check. This isn't about winning a fight. It's about stopping one.

For once. )

... Y'said it were part of your condition, aye? How's that... function?

( Call her curious. She's shaky on the details. If they were told to her, it was probably a long time ago. )

[tongueamok]

[He lets her talk, then he lets her think, wondering all the while if he should fill the silence with more words. They haven't seemed to make her understand so far, but then, he finds himself pleasantly surprised: she doesn't keep arguing, but asks for more information, tries to figure out just what it is he's saying rather than fighting against it. She makes a pass at understanding, and that's more than he could have hoped for.]

I have always known a young death was inevitable, but I only recently learned why through Glacius' assistance. I —[he rubs idly at his middle, feeling pangs from his old wounds at the mere thought of his worsening affliction]— I have an aural tear, a- a literal rupture within my very essence. Even if I use no magic at all, my energies spill from me, and will until there is nothing left.

[dedikated]

( The reaction - the sudden whited out, glowing eyes - comes all but automatically, as if those words triggered some vague memories from a time where all of this had to be done through her glasses. )

... That's what it were.

( She'd overlooked it at the time. It was unsettling, but she'd been focused on making those enchantments and he kept saying the coughing was nothing.

Well, at least that's proven bullshit. She should have called it out then. Fuck's sake. )

[tongueamok]

What? What what were?

[His eyes narrow as hers glow. Has she always been able to do that? His own apparently glow these days, but hers? That's new.]

What are you doing?

[dedikated]

( Give her a moment, one where she seems to stare directly into him, despite the lack of any colour to her eyes.

There's a blink, and it's over. And her eyes are back to brown. )

There's claw marks, in your power system. Or whatever you want to call it.

( That's an answer, right? )

[tongueamok]

[He doesn't like the way she looks straight through him, nor does he like the answer she gives.]

They are aural channels, and yes, something like that. That's what I tried to tell you. You didn't explain what it was you were doing just now, either.

[dedikated]

( Yes, and she listened. She just... needed to see them. And to think. )

Checking your powers.

( OH RIGHT. )

Same thing I did with those sunglasses.

[tongueamok]

Oh.

[So that is new, then. He assumes she must have learned it somewhere along the way, improved her skills enough that she can use them without the glasses. That's not uncommon for magicians.]

What, did you not believe me when I said there was a tear?

[dedikated]

( Basically.

She'd argue being called a magician, though. )

Not that.

( Her lips purse together before she speaks again, because she's pissed at herself for never bringing this up before. )

When we were making them trinkets... Saw something that looked weird. ( And yes, she's kicking herself for not asking, but he was coughing ink again. He was coughing ink and- ) Saw so much weird shit with people's powers that I didn't think it were anything but how yours manifested.

( Now she's thinking differently. )

[tongueamok]

Weird?

[His brow knits, his hand wrinkling his outfit as his fingers curl against his abdomen.]

You- could you see the tear? And the energy lost from it? Why did you not say anything?

[She just answered that. She couldn't have known -- he wouldn't have known, either, if not for Glacius' own inspection.]

You can see what will be the end of me, then.

[dedikated]

( She wonders. Wonders because this is her job. The thing she's actually supposed to do at clinics. Back home, however, a rupture in someone's power system would need actual healers. It'd need medications and work far beyond what her own abilities offer.

Her lips still pressed together, Kate brings a hand to them in thought, her eyes shifting from deep brown to something translucent. Nowhere near the flare of power seen moments ago. This is lingering, her gaze not moving from his abdomen. )

What's the difference between it and your other powers?

( It presents so incredibly differently that Kate can't help but think they must be separate entities in some way.

Either way, she wasn't kidding when she said she wasn't about to let him die. Especially not if this may just be the kind of thing she spent years training to help stop. )

[tongueamok]

[Even without him actively using his abilities, the putrid energies still spill from his middle, visible only to someone with the ability to see such things. The feel of that drain is too subtle for even Carlisle's awareness most of the time, but it is ever-present... as is something more, a soft, but steady light housed within his chest. That would be the Mote, what gives his eyes their newfound glow.

Carlisle shakes his head, seemingly confused by the question.]

It's not a 'power' at all. It is a wound, one possibly tied to another plane of existence.

[dedikated]

... Great.

( That's definitely out of her line of experience, as evidenced by the expression that flickers over her face. The new light is certainly drawing her attention, but it isn't the main thing she wants to focus on right now. What needs to be focused on is this wound and wounds can be patched up.

At least, that's usually the case. )

What stops it being patched up?

[tongueamok]

[His brow furrows.]

It is an aural wound. One cannot simply apply a bandage to one's energies, Kate. My scars have long healed over, but they flow from me regardless, drawn into an abyssal maw.

[dedikated]

S--

( She bites her tongue before a word comes out. Sure, they can back home. Back home, powers are biology. She's not working with back home though.

Maybe it's time to start at the beginning. )

Explain. All of it.

( She's not convinced that there's not an answer somewhere. That they're not able to save him.

She is not going to lose a friend because of something relating to the one damn thing her power does. )

[tongueamok]

[A noise rumbles from the back of his throat, something disgruntled enough to express that he's not sure she's listening to him. She's certainly not said why she's demanding an explanation to begin with.]

I don't know what it is you want me to tell you. I've already said it's an aural tear, you know what I can do because of it. And I'm now well aware just what it is this wound is doing to me, why exhaustion clings to me at all times and why no amount of energy from Glacius can sustain me.

[dedikated]

( Because of it is news to her, at least. As is the energy from Glacius, which - she assumes - is the new glow she can see. But still, it's like the obvious isn't obvious enough to Carlisle.

She breathes deep, so she doesn't snarl the words at him. )

I want you to tell me how your powers work so we can fix this.

( Slow words. Deliberate words. )

This is my job.

[tongueamok]

You probably know more about how I channel than anyone, Kate. [Save for Glacius.] You saw me do it dozens o— wait, your job? Since when?

[Because last he heard, she was a power magnifier and enchanter of some sort, but didn't do that anymore. He never did get the gist of what it is she does do now, though.

Also, way to continue to not answer her demands, Carlisle.]

[dedikated]

( Wait what. )

...Since we met.

( Well. Sort of. She'd only been at it a month, then. The enchantments were just a part of that. Now she has much more direct access to actually doing something about things. )

[tongueamok]

It's your job to fix aural tears.

[He says that flatly with a hint of disbelief. To be fair, she never did fully explain her work, nor did he ask. The things they thought they knew about one another go mostly ignored, as usual, as though getting too personal might make them actually care about each other.

Which Carlisle clearly does, hence all his bellyaching regarding her safety. The part where he's been arguing about how she ought not take her life for granted, however, mostly stems from his affliction he keeps not talking about, and the demise coming because of it.]

[dedikated]

( Whatever attempts were subconsciously or consciously made clearly worked perfectly, between Carlisle's constant worry over her safety and Kate's refusal to let him die. Kate's eyes narrow in response, mild confusion passing over her face at that conclusion. )

Don't have them back home. ( Obviously, or she wouldn't need to know more about it all. ) ... I fix people's powers. Ruptures in their system can be part of that. Works different, though. ( Since they're definitely not linked to any other plane of existence back home. )

[tongueamok]

How does one even attempt such a mending? And do you not fear it too close to necromancy?

[Because if Carlisle's tone says anything, he absolutely considers it too close to necromancy for comfort.]

[dedikated]

( ...Necromancy. Carlisle, please. )

'Bout as close to it as your healing is.

( A shrug. Kate purses her lips together in a brief moment of thought before continuing. )

Back home, powers are as physical as anything else. Most ruptures're corrected by minor surgery and medicine. ( But that's back home.

Still. There has to be something that this allows for. Right? )

Don't imagine it works the same but-

( She can't just let him die. Not without trying something. There has to be some way of figuring this out. )