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 Posted: Fri Nov 05, 2004 1:13 pm
Conrad's Chronicles  Name: Conrad Age: Unknown. Appears to be in his early 20s, but his eyes seem much older. Height: Five feet, 10 inches. Species: Unknown. Gender: Apparently male. Other Notes: Conrad's clothes are at once elaborate and clearly expensive, but also rather dusty and shabby, as if they've been worn constantly for a very long time. Also, his left ear seems to have been torn in half. Personality: Conrad is a bit of an odd duck. He's very clever, enjoys spinning elaborate words and tall tales, but is also a tall tale himself. He knows nothing about where he came from or what he is, or what his purpose in life may be. However, he also seems cheerfully resigned to this lack of knowledge, as if he has long since come to terms with it. Conrad simply drifts through life, as it were - although he doesn't seem to actually BE physically alive. He's a self-proclaimed wanderer, and he doesn't know what he's looking for. However, he appears to have found it in Airi and the Fa'e... Conrad is also a bit of a flirt. He seems to coyly tease and court both genders, and tends to treat most things in life as a grand joke that only he knows the answer to. He seems to be amused by everything, and would gladly kill someone, if there was a need, with a big grin on his face. His jokes are always verbal, puns or clever twists of phrase, or played with his strange magic. He is not a cruel joker, though, and there seems to be a kind side underneath the constant facade of eloquent amusement. Image Songs: 'Eden' by Sarah Brightman, 'Two Small Pieces' from Xenogears Additional Information: - Please do not use IC unless learned IC, thank you! -Innate Physical Abilities: The most obvious innate 'power' Conrad has is that he cannot be seen by ANYONE except for Fa'e or their Guardians. He's not sure why this is, but it seems to amuse him along with everything else. Non-Fa'e or non-Guardians will only hear him speak. Furthermore, nobody save Airi can actually touch him. Magical Abilities: Conrad's magic is... unusual. Things seem to happen around him that can't quite be explained, little alterations from the normal way of things...
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Posted: Fri Nov 05, 2004 1:56 pm
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Posted: Fri Nov 05, 2004 1:56 pm
October 30th, 2004 - Conrad's ArrivalSosiqui So much light. So many tall structures. So much life, everywhere...
It was really refreshing, for some reason. Conrad wasn't sure why. He walked briskly down the streets of Barton Town towards the hotel, feeling an equally unexplainable pull to that place. Something about it, or in it, felt deeply familiar, like an old friend whose face you have somehow forgotten.
He dodged nimbly through the people passing by, who never so much as looked at him, despite his flamboyant costume complete with feathered top hat. He looked up at the hotel for one long moment. "It's quite nice, really," he chuckled, his voice lightly accented.
Then he slipped inside, following that familiar feeling into the Fa'e ballroom. Sosiqui Conrad turned in a slow circle, looking very carefully at each of the Fa'e - somehow, he homed in on them like a beacon, never accidentally stopping to study a Guardian or visitor. No, only the Fa'e. "Interesting," he murmured. "Very interesting." AnyaToo Airi had spent a while talking to Silver and Sati outside but now she has floated back into the room, pocking at the delicate frills of her dress with a certain measure of disdain. She loocked lovely, no doubt, and the expression on her face was all too fitting for the role, but the fa'e was not pleased. She was feeling rather mortified - like a doll. Sosiqui Conrad turned around as Airi entered the room, and his eyes lit up - that familiar feeling, though spread through many of the beings here, was centered in her. "Greetings," he called to her, though he didn't know her name. AnyaToo Airi, who was NOT feeling comfortable being a gothic cupcake, blushed ever so faintly from the unexpected greeting. She might be able to boss the Fa'e around, becasue, well, they listened to her. But this creature was new ... and yet ... Airi looked at the man again and nodded her head: "Hello." Sosiqui "Such strange things here, and you at the heart of it - no, I'd hazard that you ARE the heart of it," Conrad said, raising one eyebrow at Airi. "Your family, I take it? The bonds are very strong. Ah, forgive me." He took off his top hat and swept it down to the floor in an elaborate bow. "I am..."
He paused for a moment, a look of confusion flickering across his face. "... who...? I have a name, everything must have a name. Yes." He glanced up towards the ceiling. "Conrad, for now, then." AnyaToo Airi floated back a tad, putting a hand on her chest. The corkscrew ringlets of her hair bobbed as she moved away. He said heart ... if only he knew. And, indeed, how would he know" Who was this man in a top hat? Was he a man, at all? "You are perceptive ... Conrad." Somehow, this new person dind't seem dangerous, nor violent, nor evil. And yet he was painfully familiar - the air about him, his voice and manner had a certain something Airi couldn't place. "I am called Airi. What ... are you?" Sosiqui "A wanderer, if I remember correctly. I think I do." His brow furrowed. "Back and forth I go, and in all my wanderings I've never found any who could truly see until I walked through this door. Perhaps it's the strength I feel that makes you and yours so perceptive." Conrad chuckles. AnyaToo Airi nodded to that: "A wanderer ... looking for insight? Or looking for power?" Because if it was power, and he felt the power of the fa'e, then he had wandered long indeed ... and could be dangerous, if he craved the power he found. And why ... why was he ... so familiar? Airi looked again at the dark hair, the extravagant, yet shabby clothes, the jewelry ... and the eyes of the stranger. It was the eyes, or rather, what was behind them that made Airi so entranced with the man. Sosiqui Conrad grinned easily at Airi. "Power I have." He held up his free hand; a bit of light flared in his palm and grew outward into the shape of a long-stemmed flower. "Substance, alas, I have not-" and he quickly swished the hand holding the top hat through the flower "- but that is my own failing, and no problem but my own. As to what I seek..."
He looked up, again, then around the room, slowly. "I am not sure," he admitted. "I confess, it was merely a feeling that brought me this way. An instinct, if you will." The illusory flower faded away. AnyaToo Airi was starring at the flower. It was an illusion, a mirage ... a possibility. And then it faded away. And Airi began to realize what it WAS that lay behind the crimson eyes of the stranger. But was that not an impossibility? She put her hand on the edge of the table for support. That coudln't be ... "How long have you wondered for ... Conrad?" - she asked Sosiqui Conrad looked abashed again, then laughed aloud, and for a long time. "My lady, you do ask the most penetrating questions! Ah-" He shook his head. "To be perfectly honest, as I'm sure you would know if I were otherwise, I am not sure. That seems to be the one constant in my strange and wonderous life." His tone was cheerful, but guarded now. "I am such the man of mystery that even I myself am not sure what I am up to." AnyaToo "It is a blessed existance, to just wander, not knowing where you came from, nor where you are going, nor how long your journey has been. But it is also a curse." She then added quietly, tugging on the frills of her costume absentmindedly. White clad, and even more pale then before from the makeup she looked small and frail. "I feel like I know you. But I am sure I have never met you before. Isn't that ... strange?" Sosiqui Conrad raised one eyebrow, again. "Stranger still, perhaps, is that you make me feel the same way. If I believed in Fate, I might be inclined to think it was her doing. But I'm told these nights in this season are strange ones. Spirits, ghosts, and otherworldly beings abound. Perhaps that is what I am. Or you. Or all of us. Who can say otherwise?" His eyes wer bright; clearly, he found that idea amusing. "I revel in uncertainty." AnyaToo "Part of me whispers that I know who you are. But the rest of me will not believe it. Because that ... would be impossible." She stretched out her gloved hand and put it on Conrad's jacket, a bit lower then his left shoulder. "Do you ... have a heart?" - she asked then. Sosiqui Conrad's look of confusion deepened. "I am afraid you've lost me now, dear lady," he told her, though he did put his hand atop hers in a quick, flamboyant gesture. "I am not, truly, like the rest of you. Not everything in the words has need of such things."
Indeed, looking closely, one would notice that Conrad wasn't really breathing more than is needed to speak, nor was he blinking except to express emotion - and Airi did not feel any heartbeat or warmth from his hand. "Another uncertainty," Conrad added. "But I thank you for the touch. It has been a long time." AnyaToo The visitor didn't have a heart. Nor was he alive ... but he somehow was a memory of hers. A memory from a very long time ago. So ... was THAT what he was? Airi panicked when he put his hand on hers. She was not the touchy feely kind. But it was her who touched him first ... was it not? And if her heart's whisper was true, then she didn't mind him touching her hand. Not one bit. She smiled at him for the first time: "It is indeed been a while ..." Sosiqui "Perhaps I am truly a spook, a ghoul of the night," Conrad laughed, sweeping his top hat back onto his head. "No breath or beat, and no touch but yours, no sight..." He quickly waved his hand in front of someone's face. No reaction. None. "But that's another old story. We are hardly ever what we seem, only ever what we... dream?"
And with that, Conrad faded away, chuckling. "I am sufficiently intrigued. I will be back to visit you and your family, I think, my Lady."
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Posted: Wed Dec 01, 2004 12:00 am
Airi was watching the first snow fall. It was floating gently to the ground and, when it fell on her frozen hands, she could see the dainty beauty of the tiny snowflakes. So perfect, so fragile, so easily gone. She was still wearing her simple white dress, still barefoot, still floating a foot of the ground. Her lips were blue from the cold but she didn't seem to care all that much. This was her second winter. And the snowflakes would melt were her skin was any warmer.
Conrad had been around the HQ often as of late, simply looking around, watching the Fa'e at work and play. Although he knew by now where most of them lived, he felt no reason to intrude on their personal lives. Here, though, they were fair game for his watching.
However, today it was empty. Except... "Well, well. Good evening, ice princess," he chuckled, seeing Airi as he emerged from the HQ.
Airi turned towards the sound. Here he was. The stranger she met on the night of the dead. A phantom. A memory ... but a good memory. She smiled ever so slightly, partially because her face was pretty frozen and bowed her head in a greeting. But she was to shy to really say something. This man was so familiar, and yet so different and strange and new and ... hard to explain even for Airi. So she kept quiet.
Conrad slowly advanced on Airi, the snowflakes drifting right through him, leaving no prints in the snow already fallen. "So cold," he said, pressing one hand to his heart as if wounded. "I have been watching your children, my lady. They are... quite astonishing. Unsurprising, considering their source."
Airi smiled a bit more and spoke: "They are, aren't they? They are all amazing. They live and love and hate and argue and fight and aspire and ... become more then they were before. They are destined for greatness. It's in their blood."
"Indeed," Conrad said, simply. "They are beautiful, too... they take after you in that respect." He swept his hat off of his head and bowed low. "And if they are intriguing, you are more so..." He looked up, a strange emotion in his eyes. "I don't understand it."
Airi's cheeks would have flushed if the blood hasn't let her skin a good while earlier for warmer areas of the body. Instinctively she folded her hand on her chest and floated back a little. The snowflakes were slowly floating thru the familiar stranger and somehow, despite herself, Airi didn't flee.
"What intrigues you so?" - she asked quietly.
Conrad bowed his head again. "Perhaps it is how you are... so vividly alive, my lady... even when the snowflakes do not melt on your skin, I feel that you are more alive than a city filled with people..."
Airi looked at him, not fully understanding, and also maybe not wishing to discuss what she did understand. She opened her mouth once, but kept quiet. Alive? What was alive ... she was alive now, but life and death ... those were such vague concepts ...a border so easily crossed.
"Why do you say that? I am no more alive then any other of the Fa'e."
Conrad shrugged, smiling. "They have that same wild life to them as well... And it intrigues me, though I'm not sure why. If the world knew about what I've seen here, I doubt not you'd have hundreds of dreamers. Artists painting, composers writing songs... "
Airi looked up at Conrad and at this moment there was fierce determination in her eyes: "I am not looking for poets. I am looking for power. And with that power ..." she broke off and looked away. His presence reminded her all too vividly of her memories and of the reasons she existed now.
"It is none of your concern, visitor."
Conrad raised one eyebrow. "Power, is it? And not the type that can be stirred in a song. Oh, songs and words can hold great sway over the masses, my lady.... you could woo them to your battles with a few notes..." There was something odd in his eyes as well, matching the look in her own - along with the constant undercurrent of bemusement.
"The power that I need doesn't exist yet. And ... I am not much for public speaking ... or wooing heart. I am particularly clumsy at that" - she shrugged and went back to her quiet self. Stretching out her hand to catch another snowflake she smiled to herself: "Aren't snowflakes amazing? So perfectly symmetric ... yet so different in their forms. There is never one that's alike to another ..."
She should have left by now. This conversation ... she didn't like where it was headed
Conrad rubbed at his torn ear. "They are lovely, indeed," he said politely, making no effort to regain his passionate words from a few minutes before. "So lovely, and so temporary..."
Oddly, the snowflakes were no longer falling through him, or even onto him... they sluiced around him, as if an invisible barrier was guiding them to either side.
Airi looked up and watched Conrad for a while quietly. Then, capitulating, she asked: "Why are you asking me all these questions? Why do you flatter me? Why is it that I continue talking to you even though I know it might be foolish? Why is it that you can control the snowflakes even though you not truly here? Why ... why do I stay?"
Conrad looked up as if surprised; the snowflakes immediately changed their patterns and fell normally, but still they didn't fall through him - now they melted an inch above his skin. So close to normalcy, yet so far... "My only answer to all of those is... I don't know," he said quietly. "Only that I feel drawn to this place, to you and your children, like iron to a magnet, like the birds to the south in winter. Why this is so?" He shrugged. "I do not know. There is much in me, about me, that I do not know. It has become... a way of life to me. I am sorry if it bothers you."
He took a few steps back away from her, still leaving no footprints.
Strange thing was, Airi was drawn to this man as well ... like a magnet. "You say you do not know. Maybe. But this place, me, all the Fa'e - all this is so fragile, so easily destroyed. How ... how can I trust you not to hurt all this? You might seem nothing but a memory, but ... you are the memory of a great power. Somebody I am not ... ready for yet. Somebody I can't protect myself or the Fa'e from."
Conrad looked surprised; his eyes clouded over. "I do not understand..." He put one hand over his chest again, and seemed to be pressing harder than usual, his fingers clenching around his coat. "I am nothing but a wanderer and a collection of empty spaces, my lady. I mean neither you nor your children any harm... I give you my word..." He stepped back another few paces.
She was hurting him. She didn't mean to hurt him. Stretching out her hand towards the stranger, Airi said: "I'm ... sorry."
"It is not your fault," Conrad murmured, but he was withdrawing, pulling away. The snow around him whipped faster, as if to form a veil to hide him from her. "Your apology is accepted... though not needed the least..."
He reached out one hand to touch hers - fingers touched for just a moment - and then he was gone, almost as if he'd been pulled... or pushed... away against his will.
Airi was still looking into the now full blown snow storm, trying to see the purple coat and the dark hair blowing in the wind. But the stranger was gone. Forever? That thought for some reason made Airi's heart hurt. She ... somehow she didn't want him to be gone. But she also didn't want to give away her secrets. Not yet. Not for a good long time. Her children ... they were all so fragile still. Her goal ... so distant.
She felt very alone at this moment. Far more alone then she usually felt. Pressing her hand against her face she tried not to cry. She finally understood why she didn't leave the bothersome stranger. Around Conrad ... she didn't feel lonely.
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