Djalos seems like he's at a loss for words, but then pulls up another memory...
Djalos sat, his back rigid, in a simple wooden chair. Everything felt so... distant, since she arrived here. Rather than feeling the world, she saw it, calculated it, figured out the best way to approach a situation. Emotions, memories... they all faded away. The low crackling of a fire reached his highly trained ears, and he unconsciously cataloged the temperature at 500 elio. Other sounds reached his ears as well: a conversation.
"Dammit, Laen, is there any way you can get him fixed?" A deep, gravelly baritone-Djalos recognized it as Blacke-the man who led her to the Anonemuss.
"I am telling you for the last time, Blacke: no. I can block her memories, I can block her emotions, I can make her subservient to your every command, but I cannot alter her identity. It... it influences every part of somebody's mind. How they perceive the world, how they think. Just blocking it would undo all of the work I've already done on her." That was Laen, her psychic surgeon. A high falsetto, light and graceful.
The grinding of teeth. "Stop. Using. 'Her.'"
"I'm sorry, there's nothing I can do..."
"If this gets out once he gets out into the field, it will ruin the whole organization! The ninja clans will snap up all of our business."
"Well..."
"'Well' what, Laen!? I need a solution! I don't want to kill him-Djalos is going to be our best field agent in centuries! He's too valuable."
"I can block her gender. However, rather than siphoning off all of her-his, emotions and memories, it'll just put a dam on them. Bottling them up. It'll eventually kill Djalos-I'd give him a century and a half-but I'll probably be able to find a solution before then. However, he has lots of psychic talent. It'll prevent him from developing it at all, beyond rudimentary control over his mindscape. I hate to see talent like that go to waste..."
"We have to do it. Now."
"All right..."
Djalos felt a warm, calming tentacle enter his mind, first blocking her true self, then sending him into a black sleep...
"We're animals. All of us," Djalos whispers, her face pale.
** spoiler omitted **...
"Correct me if I'm wrong," she said crisply "but it appears as if you are basing your entire mental health and happiness on the unreasonable hang ups of one man. What he says is demonstrably, factually untrue. I can show you a memory of my own that will show why. You are not the first student from a ninja clan to attend Avalon and the family of one student visited a while ago. They were rather...disruptive. I will show you."
A picture swirled into view as Miss Jones concentrated. A group of people were walking down a hallway at Avalon. They were all dressed in kimonos, and the majority of them it was visibly obvious were tieflings due to horns, tails, etc. A pair of students were showing the group around. Presumably the red haired girl with the tiny horns was who this group was related to. The group clearly revolved around an old woman who was asking questions and bossing everyone else around. The red haired girl noticed Miss Jones and bowed. She turned to the old woman. "Obaa-sama, this is Miss Jones, the enchantment professor." The old woman looked her up and down, sizing her up. "Hmmph. She doesn't look like much. One would expect an enchantment professor to be more enchanting." "Obaa-sama!" The girl said in a horrified tone. "Sorry Miss Jones," she added hastily before hurrying the group on before the old woman could make more trouble. One of the younger members of the group, a boy with light hair and hooves for feet, stopped and bowed to Miss Jones. "Gomen-ne. Please forgive my obaa-sama. He is of the opinion that tact is for the young." "He?" She asked. "I thought that..." The young man didn't let her finish the sentence. "Obaa-sama is definitely a woman, yes. And no. Sometimes these things are complicated. Thank you for your understanding." And with that he hurried off to rejoin the group.
"You're incorrect. Laen blocked me out, shut all of the parts that could make me inefficient down-including... me... I suppose. If I had a choice, I would've left after that happened. But I didn't. They had complete control of me from that point onwards." Djalos' face is ashen, her long black hair blowing in the psychic breeze.
And then the scene changes. The storm rages far above them, yet they are sitting in a peaceful glade, with jade forests stretching all around them and tall golden grass gently swaying in the breeze.
She looks around, apparently confused, then realization dawns on her face, along with a gentle softness. "I haven't been here for more than a hundred years." But then, Miss Jones shows the memory, and all is forgotten.
Djalos appears entranced at the memory, her eyes wide. "There... there are others like me?"
** spoiler omitted **
"I think it is a good sign that you are willing to let yourself experience a positive memory such as this one," she said, indicating the glade.
Djalos looks out towards the glade, and says softly, "Whenever I was hurt badly-when I was still on the streets, before I could defend myself-I would limp just inside the grounds of a wealthy family. They always knew I was there, but they didn't mind me just lying here, on the grass. The sun warming me, away from the shadows and the alleys..."
"I... I should visit them sometime. Give them thanks, they saved my life."
The scene shifts again, this time to a grand dining hall. Beautiful birds of paradise flit about, free from cages, and delicious food laid out artfully sits in front of Djalos. He was pigging herself out, eating as much as she could-and so were the other dirty orphans around them. Rival gangs rubbing shoulders for just one day of the month, when all hostilities were forgotten for just a little while.
"I... I remember this place. It was the only place I ever saw true beauty. It was amazing."
Djalos seems content to sit, seeing her younger self experience true happiness for a little while.
Djalos quits crying, and instead a contented smile rests upon his face.
Archena takes a pen and starts doodling on her khaki uniform pants.
If she wasn't doing this for her friend, she'd probably be gone by now. At least he was cute. If only he wasn't so boring... And murdery...
At least now she was mildly interested in where this was going... Up until now, crying people were usually funny, because they were usually her parents' stupid friends and anything they were crying about was probably stupid too. Now it was interesting instead. Also uncomfortable. But at least interesting.
At the cultist city after everybody ran their own way, Vickory followed Rex for awhile, but then decided to actually look at a few scrolls and books to see what they said. She couldn't read the language so she took a few important looking ones and realized that Rex left her behind, that's when she realized she was still invisible.
So she wandered a bit, and eventually a strange drone-like device or creature, she couldn't tell which, offered to teleport her out. She accepted.
Then, somewhere near the odd pair standing between a forest fire and strange buildings, and whose day has brought many new things things, another new thing appears. Teleporting right between the two is an odd creature. It has the torso of an elven woman on the body of a snake with metallic iridescent scales, dark grey or black with lighter white and silver tones around the face and belly. She wears a circlet and cloak, has a small pack and carries a really nice double bladed sword.
She looks around, "So this is where it sent me. Hmm." Looking at the two creatures nearby, "Hello, I don't think we've met. I'm Vickory West of Dragon Clan, fourth clan Sorenson's children. Who are you?"
** spoiler omitted **
Djalos quits crying, and instead a contented smile rests upon his face.
She glanced up, gauging the strength of the storm raging overhead, and the urgency of the task of calming it....or at least containing it more efficiently.
Sits in the lunchroom, nervously waiting for his impromptu appointment with Mrs Del Sol...Pyra led her class to the lunchroom and handed them over to the supervision of the new gym teacher. She grabbed a charred cheese sandwich that she hastily ate on the way to Ephebe's office. She would need to find where Ephebe had hidden the new hire paperwork.
::Welp, now or never:: Kor thought to himself. He steels himself and gets up, heading to the elementary school offices. He gets to the headmaster's door, and knocks.
::Welp, now or never:: Kor thought to himself. He steels himself and gets up, heading to the elementary school offices. He gets to the headmaster's door, and knocks.Sits in the lunchroom, nervously waiting for his impromptu appointment with Mrs Del Sol...Pyra led her class to the lunchroom and handed them over to the supervision of the new gym teacher. She grabbed a charred cheese sandwich that she hastily ate on the way to Ephebe's office. She would need to find where Ephebe had hidden the new hire paperwork.
"Come in," she called, hastily moving the stacks of paperwork she'd been trying to sort through back to some semblance of their original order. She still had no idea where to find the new hire paperwork. She'd looked in all the logical places. And a fair few of the illogical places....Flames above, there actually was new hire paperwork, wasn't there?
The storm above seems to be a fusion of the intense negative emotions and memories that were unleashed earlier, and a mindscape representation of the massive energy that is currently contained inside Djalos. Looking at it, Miss Jones can ascertain a few things:
1. It requires a large amount of brainpower to keep the energy under control and to not erupt into physical space. It takes so much, in fact, that Djalos' brain donated the part that processes light into something the brain can understand to help keep it under control.
2. The reason why it is "chained up" is that Djalos also activated latent psychic powers to boost the dam on the energy-unless the energy storm gets permanently removed, there's no way that Djalos will ever progress beyond basic mindscape manipulation.
3. There's also a powerful memory-full of pain and loss-fueling the dam, giving it the last little boost it needs to keep the energy under control.
"Come in," she called, hastily moving the stacks of paperwork she'd been trying to sort through back to some semblance of their original order. She still had no idea where to find the new hire paperwork. She'd looked in all the logical places. And a fair few of the illogical places....Flames above, there actually was new hire paperwork, wasn't there?
He opens the door and pokes his head in, then the rest of his frame follows him. He smiles.
"Hello, Mrs. Del Sol. How are you this afternoon?" He shuts the door behind him, and looks around a bit, still a tad nervous.
The coutal esque creature cocks it's head to one side
The nonhumanoid of the two seems to growl as it points it's head at the sky before it coughs again "he-lo yuan-it. Do you understand me ?"
This time Vickory cocks her head to the side, "Barely. I have no idea what Yuan Ti means. You don't speak this tongue very often do you? That would mean you aren't students of the school. Hmm. What languages does she speak? I can speak several other tongues if it makes communicating easier."
He frowns "you are not yuan-ti? Snake uh... Naga? She not speak prime-common she speak --<-*¥¡_--"
Lim-Môr exits the infirmary, grumbling to himself after Gian shot Nero in the foot for the second time today.
He passes a dark haired girl in the hallway, and one of his wings bumps her in the shoulder in his distraction.
"Oh. My bad."
"Shouldn't have been in the way..."
""Don't listen to him. I'm sorry. Are you alright?"
Serrin jumps, startled "Pretty sure you were in my way" She says, eying the bizarre, half and half being that just smacked her with its wing.
"Oh, really now?"
"No, it was our fault. I really am sorry. You're alright?"
He nervously bites his lower lip, showing a sharp canine tooth.
Serrin eyes this person suspiciously "I am fine, but you do not appear to be" She had heard of people who were apparently so crazy they talked to themselves, but she had never met such a person before.
"Come in," she called, hastily moving the stacks of paperwork she'd been trying to sort through back to some semblance of their original order. She still had no idea where to find the new hire paperwork. She'd looked in all the logical places. And a fair few of the illogical places....Flames above, there actually was new hire paperwork, wasn't there?He opens the door and pokes his head in, then the rest of his frame follows him. He smiles.
"Hello, Mrs. Del Sol. How are you this afternoon?" He shuts the door behind him, and looks around a bit, still a tad nervous.
"Honestly? Frazzled. I have no idea where Ephebe hid the paperwork, and we had a whole class worth of new students enroll over the last two days. Which is why I wanted to talk to you actually. Please sit down, have a cookie. They seem to replenish themselves as far as I can tell. Leave it to dragons to build a plate of endless cookies."
** spoiler omitted **
"I believe, Miss Tyon, that we need to reconvene to a different place in the physical world before we can address your problem. We need to drain off some of the energy safely or you will never learn to harness it and bring it under your control. This can be done in the SIM rooms without endangering anyone. It is time to wake up now."
"The school has always been full of little wonders such as this...' he says as he takes a cookie and sits down.
"How can I help you?"
"The school has always been full of little wonders such as this...' he says as he takes a cookie and sits down.
"How can I help you?"
She sat down at the desk and tried to look professional. "I understand that you spend a lot of time mentoring students, especially younger ones....I was hoping you might consider something a bit more official. How would you feel about accepting a post as a teacher?"
"She only speaks one language? How odd. As for me, I'm a reapling. I don't know anything about nagas or yuan'ti. I am a creature of the black blood." She studies the small woman for a moment.
"I'm as fine as I'm gonna get... right now... it's... complicated."
He puts one hand behind his head as she looks him over.
Like so.
She sat down at the desk and tried to look professional. "I understand that you spend a lot of time mentoring students, especially younger ones....I was hoping you might consider something a bit more official. How would you feel about accepting a post as a teacher?"
He looks taken aback, eyes wide with a bite of cookie in his mouth. He blinks, then hurriedly chews the bite.
"It's true, I've mentored a few students. I...it seemed the right thing to do. No one has all the answers or knows what to do at all times. Everyone needs help, at one time or another. I'm not sure that qualifies me to be a teacher, though..."
She sat down at the desk and tried to look professional. "I understand that you spend a lot of time mentoring students, especially younger ones....I was hoping you might consider something a bit more official. How would you feel about accepting a post as a teacher?"He looks taken aback, eyes wide with a bite of cookie in his mouth. He blinks, then hurriedly chews the bite.
"It's true, I've mentored a few students. I...it seemed the right thing to do. No one has all the answers or knows what to do at all times. Everyone needs help, at one time or another. I'm not sure that qualifies me to be a teacher, though..."
"I'm pretty sure that it does. I'll be frank. This is not an easy job. These children would test the patience of an angel. And they have a lot of the same issues as the older kids, without the maturity to deal with them. And none of us actually have any formal training at this. Well...unless raising my own children counts," she added with a shrug and a slightly self-conscious smile. "But the important thing is a willingness to work with these children, to try to help them. Yes, we will definitely make mistakes, but it's still worlds better than what they would face outside this school. And the elementary division of Avalon is growing faster than we can hire staff. Ephebe has had making an appointment to interview you for this job since school started, but things keep coming up. Since I'm subbing as school administrator for the day, and since I've been trying to teach a class of sixty.....well, I decided that this was an emergency. Really. We need more teachers. And I think that you would be perfect for the job. You would be teaching a class of 8-12 year olds. For now. Eventually we are hoping to hire even more teachers so we can separate children into smaller age ranges and let our headmistress worry about running things instead of running things and teaching a class. But right now that looks like a far away pipe dream. Right now we are just trying to keep up. "
He looks thoughtful as she speaks.
"You know...this is most fortunate. I've been looking for a reason to stay here. I am expected to return home upon leaving here. Unfortunately this means also that I would be expected to fight the current chief for leadership. I would most certainly win, but I would win a life I do not want, at the cost of my uncle's life."
He grows quiet for a moment.
"The spirits do not want that life for me, either. I will remain here where I can be of use. I accept your offer, Mrs. del Sol."
He looks thoughtful as she speaks.
"You know...this is most fortunate. I've been looking for a reason to stay here. I am expected to return home upon leaving here. Unfortunately this means also that I would be expected to fight the current chief for leadership. I would most certainly win, but I would win a life I do not want, at the cost of my uncle's life."
He grows quiet for a moment.
"The spirits do not want that life for me, either. I will remain here where I can be of use. I accept your offer, Mrs. del Sol."
She breathed a sigh of relief. "Oh, thank goodness. I hope you can start right away....would this afternoon be too soon?" she asked hopefully.
"I can't find new hire paperwork, so you'll have to take care of that with Ephebe when she gets back, but don't worry. The school will recognize your new position even without the proper paperwork. And don't mind the firebird children. They're all bluster, and mostly just feeling lost due to the recent turmoil and not having a home anymore. But do watch out for Cedric. He teleports. Keeping him in class can prove...problematic. "
"I trust Ephebe to take care of it. I've noticed a change in her over the last year. A good fit for this school, I think. I will begin my service whenever it suits the needs of the school. This afternoon would be fine. I will vacate my room in the student wing, and acquire more appropriate lodging. I will be watchful of the children. If necessary I can anchor Cedric. But, I know what it's like to be a child that does not understand what is going on around him, and needing to 'take a break' from things.
I hope this proves a good move for both of us. Thank you for the opportunity."
"She only speaks one language? How odd. As for me, I'm a reapling. I don't know anything about nagas or yuan'ti. I am a creature of the black blood."[/b] She studies the small woman for a moment.
"where she was, only one needed, in any case, bring me to someone with authority, I have things to say to them, and wing needs fixing" he says showing her the branch lodge into it
"I can fix your wing, and we should catch that fire before it gets big. What kind of life energy do you have? The same as elves?" she says as she takes a closer look at the injured wing.
"I guess so, never been an elf before, bone is also broken so will need strong magics"
He turns to the smaller one and speaks in what to all observers seems gibberish, some of the sounds seem like they shouldn't be comming from someone's mouth, but are
"Since you aren't sure, and I don't know much about other species, I'll try just a small bit of one type of energy, then you tell me if it hurts. Once we figure that out, fusing the bone should be simple enough." after examining the wound for a moment, "Well, the bone looks like calcium, the same stuff as an elf, so I'll try an inflict first." she casts a cure light (positive energy, or what she considers a harming spell) at CL 1, just enough to see how you respond to it.
He growls at her when she proposes her plan "I said yes, life energy, back home we take life direct from source, soul gem, lives of weaker enemies, planar holes, if arm working right I just teleport to, I would just teleport t positive plane and be fine, now hurry and fix bones or point me in direction of someone more competent" it seems that either his anger or his continued useage of the language is somehow increasing his fluency, though it is still rather broken
"Umm. Pardon me, but is that smoke?" he says pointing to the grey cloud above the trees...
Djalos nods. "Yes..." then prepares herself for the departure, taking one last look at one of her only happy memories.
"I trust... you remember my conditions?" she says tentatively.
"Then you should know already that there are two opposite kinds of life energy. I have not had much experience with other peoples, just elves, and the occasional human or dwarf. Learning all the various people's life energy type wasn't exactly high priority for battlefield medicine. Now stop wiggling or you'll tear things up worse. Two year old students are better disciplined than you are acting right now, how shameful." she continues with her plan.
[ooc]She doesn't seem to be exaggerating, but she does have a very good commanding tone.
"I told you I-yeagh" as the magic enters his body it seems to switch itself into negative energy and back again as far as you can tell, before exploding in a burst of negative energy seemingly centered on his good wing
He pants and the bandages rot off as the branches are pushed out, though the wing still appears broken
He then blearially says "don't remember it burn so much before... Seemed to be work though"
She shrugs "Whatever you say Halfy"
"Not the first time I've heard that one..."
He continues walking, as they're both apparently going in the same direction away from the infirmary.
"You're new? Haven't seen you before."
"Hmm, odd. It seems you mostly healed, except for the bone. Clearly magic is funny when worked on you, but for the moment you aren't bleeding so let us take care of that fire before it gets too big, then we can take the time needed to see about your broken bone without other worries, okay. I'm going to bring some rain to get everything wet, why don't you two try making a fire break or throwing dirt on the flames if you can."
She waits a moment for input from the other two, if they decide to go forward with her plan, she says "This will take a few minutes to cast." and she will cast Control Weather.
She chuckles "Good, then you won't mind my using it. And yes, I am new. Sorta. I'm from the Sun"
"the reason the bone still broken is you need strong magics fix it like I said before he says giving a huff, and sending small embers out of his nose
"why can't we fix wing first, it just fire, bad form you leave a job half finished
"It is called Prioritizing. Your wing at this point would be fine for a few days without attention, the fire however will not. Therefore, fix the fire, then I can take as much time as needed to fix your wing, which will take lots of time since I don't know about that awkward magical response. It didn't hurt you this time, but we don't know if it is predictable, or if it might hurt you worse on the next attempt, and I'd rather work on it without the threat of a firestorm enveloping us from behind. The seeking of instant gratification will sow the seeds of future misery." she gives a glare at the creature as she lectures him on priorities, though the last sentance seems to be some religious quote by the way she says it. :)
Bubble 1 was when she was four and was the first time she internalized the message that no one would ever want her. Bubble 2 was when she was six and was her first time running away from the orphanage and living on the streets. Bubble 3 was when she was 13, and was right after she joined the circus and thought that she'd finally found someplace to belong. The next few bubbles will be along the same lines.
Once the first three bubbles are anchored, a different set of bubbles lit up, as if trying to draw attention to themselves. Meanwhile, smaller bubbles were starting to stick to the first three. It wasn't going to be fast, but once he got enough of the larger bubbles anchored it looked like the rest of her would form around them.
Leaving the three fragments of her memories to gather the pieces that fit to them, Phaezeriel draws in the two new fragments. He winces at the pain in so many of her early memories. He debates the wisdom of trying to help her heal from those wounds as he is fitting them back into place. On one hand she may never have as good a chance to heal from them, but on the other hand it may change who she is as surely as if the memories themselves were changed. Still debating, he fits the two new fragments into the growing section of memories fixed to the anchor that she will not reject, slipping them in between the second and third of the other fragments.