[ The cage ]: You come across what can only be explained as a horrifically large cage, enough to contain hundreds of humans. You see it in the air, as you are no longer fully human, the lingering memories of those who had been trapped inside. They echo in the area as shapes and voices, and you feel only a great sadness that they were so incomplete.
1. You come across a man in grey. His echo resonates as he shakes his head. "I volunteered because I expected to succeed. I failed. I understand now, it is because I had not accepted it when it was there in the first place. This is only my fault."
2. You come across a woman in grey. Her echo resonates. "I rejected it because this was not our organization's true intentions. This was originally not the knowledge we sought and the power was not something we should have handled in the first place. We once had good causes. We wanted to save people. We wanted to show the world that anyone could have helped, that everyone had a purpose."
3. You come across a man in grey. His echo resonates. "-- Means the serpent that consumes itself. We are the wildfire that comes from centuries of inactivity. The -- knew long ago all this knowledge and they kept it to themselves. They could have shared all of this in the world, they could have given back to humans but instead, they thought they were better than us. This is our trump card against them."
4. You come across a child wearing a mask. He is dressed entirely in green foliage. "It is true, these are the children who did not make it to Neverland. Not all can join us in this final voyage. We were never meant to harm any, it is the rejection that hurts the most. When all understand us, then we can finally rest. This is our legacy.." After he speaks this, he immediately disappears.
Every single tendril that made up 'Caroline' was wrapped tightly together, interlocked in carefully calculated schematic that refused to let anything out. If a thing made of vines could seem tense within its own structure, she was managing it, but all that mattered was that this was safe. This was safe.
In this guarded effort to protect all that was left of her, she found enough bravery to face the cage with detachment and curious wonder. She stood before it, vines twisting in a way that gave the appearance of folded arms, and admired the sight of it as one might admire a work of art. This was not like any cage she'd ever seen before, and she pitied all it contained for all of their ignorance, for the naivety that trapped them on the other side of the bars.
She pitied them most of all for their own emptiness, so quickly forgetting the cage that had been her own.
The Semblance of Unity
Posted: Sun Oct 04, 2015 8:28 pm
When Harvard moved through the tower, he moved loosely, his vines twisting and moving. They stretched out to touch things as he passed them, to touch what might have been people. And, in that touching, he gained knowledge of who they could have been, before. There was a ticking clock hanging over his head. He knew, eventually, the creation would take them all and then Harvard would not be a him, but a they, an it. But he still had things to do, things to say before the end.
The idea of merging with everyone was honestly unappealing to Harvard. He was pickier about those he pursued, about those he continued to pursue. There were very few that continually lived up to his standards. She was one of them. Never boring. He was another, although much more tentative.
He has become used to the green feel of people so much that, by the time he came to the cages, he could not tell if it was his normal senses or something more that let him know it was her. He walked up behind her, slowly ,aware that she could be skittish at times, and twined his vines around hers.
"Caroline," he breathed into her mind. "-what do you see?" Harvard saw a cage of metal, primitive, a tangible reflection of life. It was ugly, unlike the cages people made for themselves.
nothing yet
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Posted: Tue Oct 06, 2015 2:58 am
In all of the places that they touched (and only where they touched), her tightly-woven structure relaxed to make space for him, leaving gaps and spaces for him to fill if he chose to. She had hoped that he would not be here, that he'd somehow escaped the inevitable, but knowing that he was made her unabashedly selfish.
'There truly isn't anywhere that you would not come to find me, is there?'
When she spoke, it sounded like nines. Not the word as it was spoken, or anything that could be conveyed with any fathomable explanation; it was the sound that equated with the feeling she'd once expressed to him, of all the nines working together correctly, all fitting in their proper places. Something managing to be in harmony and discordant all at once, existing in the knowledge that it both made sense and didn't.
It sounded like nines, and there was nothing to describe how it made her feel to finally share that understanding, with such an ease that made it possible to share in every syllable. He had so expertly comprehended her nonsense, had known what she needed in her moments of distress, and she was grateful to be given the chance to show him exactly how right he was. She openly, willingly shared this as well, all in an instant.
'I see failure.' She was uncharacteristically unsympathetic. 'Everywhere. All the wrong choices. All the wrong people. Trapped. Circles where nines should exist. A nine would have saved them. Now they will never be free.'
The Semblance of Unity
The Semblance of Unity rolled 1 4-sided dice:
4Total: 4 (1-4)
Posted: Tue Oct 06, 2015 5:18 am
Quote:
4. You come across a child wearing a mask. He is dressed entirely in green foliage. "It is true, these are the children who did not make it to Neverland. Not all can join us in this final voyage. We were never meant to harm any, it is the rejection that hurts the most. When all understand us, then we can finally rest. This is our legacy.." After he speaks this, he immediately disappears.
His vines moved into hers, filling the spaces she let him, knowing he could take more if he wanted. Harvard sighed, a small breath existing only in her mind. It was comforting, somehow, that even here Caroline still sounded like Caroline, the perfect mix of knowns and unknowns. She was beautiful here, too, bright and shining underneath her tangle of vines. Harvard pushed his own greenery outward a little more, finding new spaces to creep into. And if, slowly, it was beginning to look like they were one intangible being wrapped in vines instead of two, that was alright with him.
"Did you ever doubt it? I would know you anywhere." She was his and he knew the combination of her, somehow, even though they had only had a month, less perhaps. It was enough. Harvard felt her like a moth feels a flame... or maybe the other way around. He anticipated her like the light that knows a moth will come, retreat, and come back, too fearful to dash itself against the heat, but wanting nevertheless. As if summoned by her thoughts, a boy appeared, surprisingly human for this place. Harvard tensed, waiting.
He opened his mouth and his teeth were like gnashing half-pearls. The memory of a campfire and a strange boy bubbled up out of Harvard. Even as the boy continued to speak of legacies, of rejection, Harvard simply wondered how much of himself Caroline saw now, how much she felt. This new way of being was strange and somehow, all he really wanted to do was press closer and closer to her. And then the boy was gone. A blip on his radar.
"They chose this cage when they knew it would not fit. They neither molded it nor molded themselves." Harvard fancied he could still smell the scent of her red, cloud-like hair. A memory, of course, but a nice one. "A cage is only a cage if you let it be." Harvard shifted, and a single vine reached out to wrap around Caroline's neck before sliding away. When he spoke again, a thread of amusement wove through his voice,
"Does this mean we made it to Neverland? I thought I was too old for that place."
nothing yet
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Posted: Wed Oct 07, 2015 7:40 pm
The feeling of their vines becoming an intertwined, sophisticated tangle was the absolute antithesis of being trapped, and she let herself get lost in it. She let herself feel like she had on those perfect sunny days a long, long time ago, basking in the warmth that seemed so endless then. She let herself feel like she hadn't in a very long time, and didn't hide any part of it.
'I had no doubts.' The sun still heated her skin, even if her eyes were closed; she shared the feeling of this as evidence, though her words had felt nothing like a lie anyway. 'I like when you find me in places we haven't ever existed before. And learning more ways there aren't boundaries or walls or bars to separate us.'
It was partially a joke, which she giggled at, but it was truthful even in spite of being so literal.
His tension was registered before she ever noticed the boy's presence, and she responded in the very same way. She saw and listened and thought about all of it, carefully inspecting every piece before she formed her reply.
'If this is Neverland--is it wrong, you think, to have stopped a child from coming here? If they don't belong?' There was no hiding this from him either - she had already grown attached to sharing her thoughts and understandings with him so easily, and her thoughts were on the grown-up daughter she'd handed to someone more human than her. 'I liked the cage you made for me. I'm not afraid any more to call it one. But she doesn't belong in it this time. I want my cage to be mine and yours alone.'
The Semblance of Unity
Posted: Wed Oct 07, 2015 8:21 pm
He heard that giggle and smiled, thinking that, right now, she felt very much like the sun. "Hmm, feels like there still might be some boundaries between us." One of his vines stretched out and wrapped around one of hers, tugging it gently. If they had still been in possession of real bodies, Harvard would have been tugging on a dress hem or the strap of her bra. He made do, picking up in the same spot as though the little boy had not interrupted them.
Her next words made him think for a moment, then Harvard shared his thoughts with her, showed Caroline the small person he'd pulled from the vines. She had not been human, not as they once were, but it hadn't mattered. "The one I pulled from the vines, the one I gave back, looked like a child. I think it's more important to give them back. They would have been like us if the vines fit them. But they were not." He paused for a moment, letting her feel how pleased her words made him. "We cage each other, Caroline, you and I. But it waits for us to become it. There are a thousand thousand voices in it, but I only want yours." He let her feel his reservations about merging with anyone. Harvard did not feel such hesitancy about her, specifically. He wanted to be with her in any way, to find her in every way.
Harvard tried to press a feeling on Caroline's neck. The impression of her collar, the feel of his fingers tugging it.
