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 Posted: Wed Jan 27, 2016 9:49 am
The upgrades received to the signet ring seemed invaluable, and yet Scholomance rarely used them - partially due to the pace of life demanding that he spare none of his moments for experimentation. The present night was clear, both in cloud cover and in auric variances in the area, which Scholomance considered a great rarity in his life of late. Carefully he set up for the eve - a flat white to his left, the ring's editing screen before him, the river to his back, and the promenade to his fore.
Like Mistral said, the editing screen was designed very similarly to Wikipedia, safe for the fact that the moon's luminescence shone through the projection, and he could see through the tables onscreen where great outcroppings of rock formed ancient sculptures.The light wind offered no disruption to the screen, however, which left his editing process neat and easily managed. Within the database, Scholomance created a self-titled page, wherein he started the slow documentation process of the contents of his wonder. Its purpose remained one of the primary headers, and beneath it came a delineation of the campus and each building therein. Added was what information he had on his ancestor, Blaine, and the history uncovered since his becoming a knight. He paused, then, and took a sip of his coffee, before he looked over the information given.
And he realized, in his rereading, that his explanation of Scholomance read too similarly to a parched textbook. Frowning, he deleted all but the title and purpose of the wonder.
"This is a lot harder than I expected." Staring at the nearly blank page once more, Scholomance started approaching it as a request page. Instead he elaborated on the purpose of Scholomance and its past achievements (which, unfortunately, was left blank), which was followed by a short form to indicate how to submit a request for research. No pictures were included, as the drawings he rendered were not available in an accessible manner to this intranet system, so the squire stopped with a barebones outline with how he intended his research solicitations.
It was then that he realized two key facts - one being that this platform only reached one half of his intended audience, and two being that he still suffered much trepidation in visiting his wonder, and therefore couldn't hazard the beginnings of experimentation. As much as he wanted to pick up where Blaine left off and unlock the fruits of his wonder, the place still stood as a foreboding, unforgiving crypt.
Sighing, Scholomance canceled out of the editing screen entirely. Then, he realized that the auric lull of the evening gave rise to a highly familiar signature - one that matched his own.
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Posted: Mon Feb 01, 2016 3:25 am
Andronicus flipped the crystal over in her palm.
It had long since been filled with energy, though she definitely used it as Caedus suggested. In the days since that encounter, the squire had slept little. New Years, it seemed, had that effect on her. Last year, it was because of a flood of memories and nightmares. This year...
traitor
The world sat on the precipice of change. She felt in her bones, she felt it in the crystal in her hand. The events that would follow gaining access to the Castle and Academy would have rippling repercussions through the universe and cosmos. Either they would succeed, turning the tide in a thousand year war and saving themselves from utter annihilation.
Or the light as they knew it would be snuffed out.
She knew what a future controlled by the Negaverse looked like. She'd experienced it and been a part of it's rise. The Negaverse would turn the world against the senshi and knights, execute them and their families, and convert anyone who wanted to save their skin. In the eyes of Order, it was the worst possible scenario. It was World War Z, and extinction for their kind.
Andronicus found she cared very little for the outcome.
None of it matter, not balance, not winning, if she got stuck behind, tethered to people who blindly charged through. Ochre's offer of helping her corrupt lingered in her mind, a larger possibility and option than before. It still tethered her to something.
She didn't know how to not be tethered, so she hesitated. Hesitation bred inaction, which in turn weakness, and then finally a suffering all its own. Fear led her to corruption in her memories. Inaction would lead her to death in this life.
Maybe death wasn't such a bad choice.
Andronicus sat down next to Scholomance without realizing he was there. She fingered the crystal, distracted by her melancholy and thoughts, for almost a good minute before she recognized the feel of an energy signature. The squire jumped slightly, caught entirely off guard and flailed, falling over in a heap with a yelp. It was the best introduction Scholo probably would get from the Uranus squire.
"s**t. Uh... sorry I... uh honestly didn't even sense you here." She scratched at her scalp, wincing. She was doing so great with the whole 'meeting new people'. Sigh.
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Posted: Thu Feb 18, 2016 1:47 am
Scholomance blinked at the squire that nearly tripped over herself upon discovering him. Inwardly he didn't blame her; between the garish mask and bone accessories, Scholomance did not cut a welcoming figure. And given his past predicament in being mistaken for a Negaverse officer, he wondered if she didn't half-expect the same of him. The squire recovered well, at least, and reacted to him nonviolently. It was a promising start, even if it proved a startling one for her.
"You must've been deep in thought." Scholoance pulled his half-mask down to reveal a far less ominous smile. He extended a gloved hand then, and with it, his name. "Scholomance. Saturn. You are...?"
Secondly, he wondered if she knew of Caedus - he did not recognize her from the meeting, but so many had gathered there that he couldn't place many names or faces with that event. Besides, the mysterious creature commanded far more of their attention than their fellow knights and senshi. This squire may well have been standing next to him, and he would not have remembered.
Of course, he considered the alternate possibility that she never even heard the name.
"May I ask what's on your mind?" If nothing else, the wince on her face spelled 'troubled' effortlessly. Tidings came grimly with the appearance of Caedus, who presented the senshi and knights with a dangerous offer. Undoubtedly he would find a great many distracted senshi and knights on the street because of that, which meant that the Negaverse found all the more reason to acknowledge Scholomance's story. The stakes rose with every passing day, and Scholomance was viscerally aware; he could not misstep in his careful game, even with this new squire who nearly sat on his lap (a shame she didn't, for she was easy on the eyes).a-disgruntled-dragon sorry about the wait, am trying to get back into rp
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Posted: Thu Feb 18, 2016 4:11 am
"Andronicus, of Uranus. And yeh... New Years tends to do that to me it seems," she said with a chuckle, shaking the hand. She hadn't even noticed what he was wearing, or the mask; Saturn knights tended to be the really odd ones, and she'd learned to just accept that the universe liked to dress people in the weirdest s**t.
"As for what's on my mind... that's a loaded question." Andronicus chuckled again with a shake of her head and lifted the crystal between her fingers. "I find myself at an impasse. I don't want to be tied to 'Order', yet I don't want to be tied to 'Chaos' either. I desire to be my own entity, without relinquishing the status of 'powered individual'. While I get that everything is a spectrum of gray, in reality, we are defined by what powers us and that makes us biased.
"And then, some guy escapes the Rift of all places, wants us to destroy Metallia - can you even destroy a being of energy? - all at the same time that the Knight's Code wants us to try to recover the Academy and I..." She paused, sighing and glancing at Scholomance. She wondered where she got side tracked, where protecting the city took a back seat to power, when defining herself became more important than life. Yet if she could not define herself as an entity of magical power... how could she protect anyone?
How could she protect her Sentinels, let alone the civilians?
"Find myself utterly lost what to do. The entire universe is on the precipice of change with this. We take out Metallia, we end a thousands year old war. We fail, we all die. Is it wrong to want to be something more than I am now, in the face of all that?" Power was a delicate balance. It corrupted as easy as it helped. Yet there had to be something else out there, something akin to what they defined as Order and Chaos but different.
Didn't there?
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Posted: Tue Mar 22, 2016 2:35 am
Scholomance listened with practiced patience. He offered no interim questions, or responses other than a nod of the head where pertinent. His gaze remained focused on her, even when peripheral movement urged him to stray. And with her dilemma came both a highly interesting concept and a potential case of snow blindness: Andronicus preferred to define herself as an interim between Order and Chaos rather than either one of the two entities. This, naturally, proved interesting to the Saturn squire. Upon reaching the end of her exasperations, Scholomance crossed his legs and laced both hands over one knee, for he assumed this may be a long conversation.
Clearing his throat, he elected to preface his statements. "Before I continue, I'm going to say that I make no assumptions about what you do or don't know. If something I say comes across as painfully obvious, it's not a reflection of your intelligence. That being said... Andronicus, have you ever heard of 'The Ugly Duckling'? I think you might find a good handful of parallels between the story and your position here. On one hand, you have a duck that doesn't fit in among other ducks, and often gets made fun of frequently. On the other, you have a squire who's not terribly interested in the White Moon or the Negaverse. But, as you might know from the story, the duckling eventually discovers it's a swam, and comes into its own blah blah cue happy ending. This is where, I think, things got skewed.
"Knights don't feel like White Moon senshi. I can't say that they necessarily feel 'good' or 'wholesome' but I can say that they feel absent Chaos. And rather than looking at it in a black and white perspective like Order and Chaos, think of it more like Chaos and No-Chaos. It's..." He cocked his head to the side momentarily as he searched for an example. "It's a lot like blood types. You can have type A rhesus positive and you can have type A rhesus negative, but you can't have a mix of both. You're either positive or you're not. 'Order' and Chaos are the same way. You either have Chaos or you don't.
"As for the source of our power coloring our views... That's quite a bit trickier. Yes, the Code lends us power through the pieces in our wonders, but the Code hasn't presented any ultimatums or hostaged that power against us. Of the time I've spent as a knight, I haven't ever attacked the Negaverse or tried to undermine them, and I would think that if this was the Code's goal, and it intended to use that power against me, it would've revoked my rights to be a knight of Scholomance a long time ago. Now, whether that's due to the Code's benevolence or otherwise is beyond me, but... Recent experiences have taught me that our little scrap of paper isn't exactly brimming with kindness. In fact, it's more a persnickety little s**t. I think that, if it could hostage our power against us and coerce us into moving against our ideals, it would. So, I'm starting to think that the Code cannot revoke the distribution of power that flows through our wonders. Even that is out of its control.
"So what does this say for you? It says that your power source is your wonder, and as a piece of rock isn't going to give you any commands this way or that, you're free to do as you please. The only difference between you and that tie to 'Order' that you're interpreting is the collective absence of Chaos on this side. No one's telling you that you have to go along with White Moon ideals. I certainly think they're garbage. What do I care if this town goes to hell in a handbasket or not?"
Finally Scholomance removed the half-mask that covered his face, revealing a much more personable appearance. "Personally I've always thought of 'Order' as the White Moon and the Knights who decide that Chaos has to be stopped. Then there's the other knights, which probably consist of... Well, you and me, and then there's Chaos as the Dark Mirror and the Negaverse. Though I'm starting to wonder if the Dark Mirror isn't their own special brand of neutral, too."
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Posted: Tue Mar 22, 2016 2:56 am
Andronicus listened quietly, waiting for him to finish before replying. He certainly had a very unique perspective, and unintentionally echoed some of what the Code had told her in the archives. It's not one or the other, or black or white, and they weren't... quite White Moon. Not really. It made sense, especially for a selection of knights who had no 'living' princess or prince. They were only beholden to their wonder, not necessarily the planet it existed on or the princess or prince who ruled it long ago.
She tapped the crystal to her chin, collecting her thoughts.
"Hmm... yer right that the Code is a little s**t. You'd think a disembodied floating incorporeal piece of paper would be a little more appreciative we haven't set fire to the damn thing yet. I agree that I don't trust most of the senshi; many of them are just as destructive as the Negaverse. Let's not forget how.... argumentative they all are. Or I guess it's special snowflake syndrome. Never sure with them.
"That aside... I don't want to abandon the city. I grew up here, ya know? I'd rather it didn't go to hell in a handbasket. I just don't think stopping Chaos is the answer. The basic laws of entropy, right? Without Chaos, the White Moon wouldn't have any reason to be, and without 'the good guys' let's call them, Chaos would get to a point of complacency. The cosmos needs both to function.
"Chaos needs to be kept in check, yes, but trying to destroy it all is stupid. Something bigger and worse will take it's place, and then we'd be right back where we'd started in the first place." The squire shrugged at him, leaning back for a moment to crack her back.
"I guess 'neutrality' is more based on your actions and not your 'power source'. I don't think it's inaction, either. I guess... it's not neutrality I want? But to be a third entity, to shake up the status quo. Even if it makes me the target of both factions, the civilians are worth it.
"Keep the city free of Negaverse or White Moon control, is worth it," she said, emphasizing her words with a tilt of her head. Maybe that was it. It was about protecting the civilians, yes, but it was also about protecting free will. So that the city could choose it's path itself, not be controlled by either group. Not that she knew how to do that, course.
Or maybe that was idealistic and short sighted and completely bogus. Andronicus had no idea; as far as she knew, no one had tried to shake it up before. Talking it out definately helped her sort through the thoughts though, and she appreciated the chance.
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Posted: Sat Mar 26, 2016 10:21 am
"Yes, it's difficult to deal with the White Moon and they aren't always allies. I've been attacked by one once before, and she wasn't apologetic about it even after she figured out I wasn't a Negaverse agent. Ever since, I've been a little wary of them. For a guerrilla force, they don't have enough tactical organization to hold their own. It's a wonder the Negaverse hadn't steamrolled them yet. Though..." He paused as scanty traces of memories not yet made reached him. "Nevermind." He dismissed the notion at once.
"I don't know that Chaos and the White Moon quite go hand-in-hand like Batman and the Joker. The laws of entropy state that everything inevitably proceeds from order toward chaos, and that refers to both juxtaposition of materials and atomic structure. Entropy talks of breakdown processes and decay, rather than the opposing power balance of 'good and evil'. Then again, I suppose it could apply to that, if Chaos just naturally gets stronger without an active presence against it. That's an interesting prospect." Babylon would've disagreed, he felt, but Scholomance found it worth investigating. Did the climb of Chaos to power occur naturally, then? Evaluating this demanded significantly more digging into the initial start to the war, as Metallia found Beryl.
"What does being of a different power altogether have to do with helping the civilians here? I would think you're in a better position as you are now than you would be as something else. For one, you'd be completely alone power-wise, and currently you have knights that would gladly serve as allies simply because you yourself are a knight. For two, even if you managed to become something different, you can't assume you'd be just as powerful as you are now. For three, there's potential drawbacks of that kind of conversion to consider. I've been told that corruption demands memories, and your entire civilian identity. Would you, knowing this, make that sacrifice to protect the people? Would you therefore be able to comfortably say that you would still follow the idea of protecting the people if you had no memories to attach to this place anymore? You say you grew up in Destiny City - would you still want to protect it if you became a stranger to it?
"Now I'm not trying to say that wanting to be something else entirely is a bad thing. Being outside the loop might put the whole war into an entirely different perspective. What I'm saying is I don't think you should consider your current knightly stature as a hindrance to the goal of protecting the civilians here. But remember, you are a Knight, not Negaverse or White Moon. You have complete control over your own actions to fight for that freedom of Negaverse or White Moon control for those reasons. And if the Code doesn't like it, what can it do?" Scholomance shrugged dismissively.
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