come_sailaway | it's a war in there [March OTA, including memshare]

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it's a war in there [March OTA, including memshare]

Who: Cassandra de Rolo & those visiting her memories / OTA
When: March
Where: Around the Serena Eterna; also Whitestone, at various points in the past
What: Things are beginning to crack
Warnings: Game-typical angst; in memshares, murder, torture, vampirism, mindfuckery both magical and mundane, and potentially noncon/dubcon; other warnings to be added in reply headers as needed

A. you're just like them, you're unprepared

Cassandra's noticed the cracks, of course. Before she brushes against one, they seem alarming and inexplicable; are they a trick, a trap, a sign that this whole little artificial plane is starting to come apart?

(The thought she barely lets herself contemplate: a way out?)

After her first few encounters with them, the nature of them seems more apparent -- although there's no guarantee they aren't also any of her previous thoughts. The first time her own memories double on her, with faces she knows from here appearing in them, she locks herself in her cabin's bathroom and curls up on the floor of the shower, arms wrapped around her knees, struggling not to begin screaming for fear that she might never stop.

[This prompt is for interacting with Cassandra in the present setting! Feel free to run into her anywhere on board, either before or after memshares begin, or PM/ping me on discord to discuss a more specific prompt.]

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B. cause you don't know the terrain

Several cracks about the ship, as it turns out, lead to a world called Exandria and a little city-state called Whitestone. Those who tumble into them will encounter a younger Cassandra at some point in her past.

[Specific pre-discussed prompts are below! If you would like a different one, see the plotting post here or PM/ping me to discuss.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

The approaching guards exchange glances with the closer one.

"Can't make no promises," says the first guard, frowning, "and you're in no position to demand any. Now we can do this --"

"Lieutenant Holbrook," says the high clear voice of the little girl, in a tone almost as peremptory as the guard's own first words. She's come closer, and is now standing about five feet from the group, still holding the stick.

(Holding the stick, a good eye might notice, in a tolerably good fencing grip. With the end down, as carefully as though it were an actual point.)

The guard (Holbrook, presumably) develops a look of mild consternation. "Lady Cassandra," he says, "please keep away, this man is a stranger here and could be dangerous."

(Oh, of course he spots it; what a shame it’d be if he didn’t, training with an upcoming Olympic fencer the way he is.)

She’s nobility, he realizes. She’s Lady of this place. Phil immediately defers, bowing slightly and folding his hands in front of him where they’re visible, and keeping his damn mouth shut in front of a Lady and her guard until he’s called upon. Better they think he’s stupid rather than prove it. (For the love of God, don’t throw him in ye medieval castle jail.)

"How did he come here?" she asks.

Holbrook's look of consternation deepens, turning a touch sour. "He won't tell us. That's why we're bringing him to the captain."

"Hmm." She tilts her head, and then turns a very determined look on the stranger. "You," she says, "what's your name?"

"Phil Connors," he offers with a nod of his head. "I will tell you, but again, the explanation isn't a very good one. I'd be more amenable to trying to tell it if I were at less risk of being immediately put on trial."

"You might be at less risk," growls Holbrook, "if you'd try and tell it without any more stalling."

Cassandra has been studying Phil's wings, and now asks: "Are you an aasimar?"

Phil flicks an annoyed look at Holbrook, before returning his attention to the Lady. "No. I'm--a Moonblessed."

It's a term that he has to blow the dust off of. He hasn't used it... god, since he was on Prismatica, yeah. How many years ago was it? One and a half? Two?

"How much do you know about other worlds? ... Dimensions? Planes?"

The other guards exchange glances at the word Moonblessed, and Holbrook begins to look uncertain.

Cassandra frowns, and then starts to rattle off in a cadence like a jump-rope rhyme: "Prime Material, Astral and Ethereal, Shadowfell, Feywild ... something, Elementals ..." Her frown deepens for a moment with the strain of trying to remember, and then she sighs. "I can't remember the rest. Vesper knows them."

"Right," he nods, going along with it. Good. So it's not just medieval, it is fantasy, and they've got multiple layers of dimensions. By the sound of it, there's magic too. "And how much do you know about travel between them?"

She shrugs. "People can do it with magic? If they know how."

"Right."

Sigh. Okay. Here we go.

"So a couple of things." He raises a finger as he counts. "One: there's a powerful being--not a god, but close to one--who exists between worlds and has made one of his own. Not a real one. It's small and fake. The logic is constructed. Two: he steals people from all across the universe there and toys with their lives, and that's where I'm coming from.

"Three: I'm not really sure, but I think it's starting to lose its integrity. Cracks and tears have been appearing inside of it, and falling through one is how I ended up here. I've been here for about five minutes. Does this make sense?"

Edited 2023-03-07 05:20 (UTC)

The little girl's expression has looked rather older than its years for some time now, but a growing uncertainty makes her look her age again. So does the way she glances up at Holbrook, as though for guidance.

Unfortunately, Holbrook doesn't look any more certain, and the look on his face is rapidly trending toward outright disbelief.

"That's your story," he says, with a tinge of scorn.

“I said it was bad,” Phil says with a growing impatience of his own, “but it’s what’s true. I didn’t walk here, I fell. I’m not from here. Nothing you do will corroborate otherwise.”

"So you came here by mistake?" says Cassandra. "What are you going to do now? Can you go back? Or -- if it's a bad place you came from, do you need somewhere else to go?"

"I don't... know."

His demeanor quiets. "I don't know. I hope I can go back? I left people behind, but I don't know."

Almost every time, it's been without warning or choice. Into the loop and out of it; into Prismatica and out, and leaving was the only time he could choose, and then not a few months later he was pulled again onto that fucking ship. And now here he is. Again.

He was pulled into Lyon and left again within the night, and he just... hopes that this is the same. It seems to be, right? Snapshots of people's heads. Is that crack to leave still there? He doesn't think so. If it was, he'd have run by now.

"If I'm lucky, I'll disappear again, and you won't have to deal with me anymore. If I'm really stuck, then I won't... bother you. I'll find something." (He says this, hoping he won't have to be for long enough to come to that.) "

Holbrook shakes his head, looking grim. "Whether you're lying or not," he says, "this is bigger than me. You're for the Lord de Rolo, and that means putting you under guard until he's got time to see you. And it definitely means you handing over that blade. You'll have it back if his Lordship says so, not before."

He sets his jaw, as though expecting resistance and not relishing the thought.

Phil sees that expectation. He's too sharp to miss it. He has half a mind to fulfill it, but...

But the guard is right, and this kind of protocol can only be expected. They heard him out. He's doing his job. And, god, Phil is really, really, really tired of this.

He hesitates, then sighs with his eyes shut and his brow knit. "Fine," he mutters, "fine." Phil unbuckles the blade from his hip and holds it out to Holbrook. "Here."

Cassandra fixes the guard with a fierce glower. "And you will keep it safe and give it back to him later, won't you?"

"Yes, Lady Cassandra," Holbrook sighs. "Please go back to your game now, and let us do our job."

She puts her hands on her hips and studies them all, considering, and then gives a decided nod. "Carry on, Lieutenant," she says. "And thank you."

And as she steps back, Holbrook takes the sword and gestures for his two underlings to fall in behind Phil. "Come on, then. This way."

(She does not, in fact, go back to resume her game.)

There's sort of soft surprise on his face at the clemency that Cassandra demands on his behalf. Well, perhaps he shouldn't be so shocked, but any kind of mercy in a situation like this is something he can only be thankful for, and she's got a strong head on her shoulders, he can tell. Fostered by her noble upbringing at the very least, but still. Something like that could as easily make a brat. She is not.

He isn't sure whether he should speak to thank her. He hesitates a moment too long and the decision is made for him when the guard behind jostles him forward, and Phil turns away, falling in line behind Holbrook.

They lead him from the little orchard to a paved courtyard, and from there into the castle proper -- a very businesslike and unornamented part of the castle, down a broad stone corridor (clean and well-lit, at least) and into a room furnished only with a couple of plain wooden chairs and a table. Another guard is inside, rising to his feet as they come in.

"Found this one out on the castle grounds," says Holbrook, "wouldn't give an account of himself at first, then gave one I don't know what to make of. You hold him here, I'm off to tell his Lordship and find out when he can --"

It's at this point, turning toward the door, that he sees that Cassandra has evidently followed them.

"Yes, go ahead," she says blithely. "I'll help keep an eye on him. He's interesting."

Phil, at least, does not look surprised to have been tailed.

He keeps quiet and his hands to himself until Holbrook leaves. Nevermind the other guard in the room; he turns to Cassandra quickly and says, "Thank you for--for your help back there, Lady Cassandra. Really. And I'm sorry to be the cause of all this disturbance."

Holbrook, before he leaves, looks almost unbearably frustrated at the bind Cassandra's put him in. He gives the other guard a meaningful look and Phil a darkly warning one, before turning to go.

The guard in here carries a heavy short staff in addition to the shortsword at his belt, and when Phil speaks he extends it horizontally in front of him like a toll-gate. "You keep your distance from the young Lady," he says, not harshly -- even a little good-humoredly -- but very definitely. "Double your arm's length, and we won't have any trouble."

Cassandra sighs, but doesn't try to countermand it. "What's a Moonblessed?" she asks Phil. "Is that anything to do with the Moonweaver?"

Phil does as he's told, standing a short way off. No reason not to.

Moonweaver... yeah, he doesn't know nearly enough to start fibbing now. "No." He shakes his head. "I don't think so? Who is the Moonweaver?"

She stares at him, in her unguarded surprise suddenly looking more her age. The guard stares a little too.

"The Moonweaver," she repeats, as though he might not have heard her. "She's a god?"

He pauses awkwardly and shakes his head.

“I don’t… know that name.” Uhh. “So, no, I don’t think it has anything to do with her? But it is related to a moon god…? Do you have a sun god too?”

This time the guard suppresses a disbelieving snort, while little Cassandra stares openmouthed and then rolls her eyes in the classic exasperation of any intelligent child faced with an (apparently) idiotic grownup.

"Um, yes?" She points to the crest on a shield hanging on the wall: a tree with five stars at its roots, surmounted by a sunburst. It's the sun at the top of the crest she's pointing at. "Pelor, the Dawnfather. God of the sun, the summer, and the planted fields. He planted the Sun Tree?"

At his blank look, she sighs. "You really haven't been here very long, have you."

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