Laudna

[residentflorist]

code

Hyacinthus
Fabled to have sprung from the blood of Hyakinthos, a youth accidentally slain by Apollo
Playfulness, constancy, sincerity

Comments

weekend zero, sunday

[residentflorist]

[WELL. this has very much escalated quickly, and aerith has a copy of the rulebook that she's thumbing through and scrutinizing. what is this monster nonsense. why are we being sacrificed. what the absolute fuck. but despite this she glances up when she seems to notice someone else's presence, and her expression relaxes a little when she sees someone familiar.]

Oh, hey. Have you seen these yet?

[undread]

[wherever they are, in the void, she's been keeping to herself a little, talking to herself in a quiet voice to the dead rat with a bird skull sewn to his head that's fluttering by her side. but she'll look at aerith.]

Their rules... it doesn't make very much sense.

[residentflorist]

[i'm sorry she is very much looking at this dead rat. what is happening here. she does not look too perturbed because summons are real but it's equal parts confused and fascinated.

anyway, focus! she does look back to meet laudna's eyes again.]

Nope. But I think there's a few things that stick out a little more than others. [...] What do you think our affinities are for?

[like. why would they need these. just let them have their original abilities, damn.]

[undread]

I don't know. The prospect of having my life tethered to another person is not all that appealing, really... Nor do I think they'd wish to be tethered to mine.

[residentflorist]

[well. she can understand the first part because yeah, she's a little leery about being potentially tied to someone else and not knowing for a while either and the consequences that come with that knowledge. more important though is the reverse situation.]

Is there a particular reason you think so? [i.e. does she just think people don't want to be tied to people in general, or is it more she thinks people don't want to be tied to her specifically?]

[undread]

I'm a bit of a dead end, dear. You don't want to tie your life to someone who's already lost theirs more than once.

[residentflorist]

[her expression shifts into something a little more understanding, and also a little curious. she hadn't wanted to assume that perhaps this woman was currently dead, but you know. and something about how she says it kind of makes aerith go quiet for a second as she decides how she feels about that.]

I don't know about that. It sort of feels like we're all even now. [...] Do you feel alive right now?

[undread]

No. But I never do. I'm not.

[she's fine admitting that. it's just a fact about herself.]

But I'm still moving around. I'm here.

[residentflorist]

[the outright confirmation doesn't surprise her, but it is nice to have.]

...you're here. Think that makes you about the same as everyone else anyway. [even if laudna does not feel alive, she is present and here and that's most of what aerith thinks matters.] And it sort of seems like the people who brought us here didn't think it would matter that much if someone was dead or alive when they bound us to another person. I don't think it makes your chances any worse than anyone else's.

[unfortunately they are all free game here.]

[undread]

Perhaps you're right.

[she's a little uncomfortable about it, even still.]

I still have things I need to do, living or not. That's what's important.

[residentflorist]

[she will gently move on from that for now.]

Were you in the middle of something kinda time-sensitive, too?

[undread]

...Quite. Well. At the moment, our friend Seth was going to take us on a shopping trip. But overall, it was very time sensitive, yes. World ending very shortly, really.

[residentflorist]

Us too. [she may as well admit that because, haha, it is something she is a bit worried about and will continue to worry about in private while forcefully beliving they will figure things out on time before the planet blows up.] Our pilot was just finishing some repairs on his plane, but after that we were about to take off again. It's a little scary to think how far they might be by now.

[both her friends and the problems themselves.]

[undread]

Seth is probably getting so cranky. He was already being very openly impatient about teleporting us...

[what a rude bitch.]

Or maybe they left without me. Who can say.

[residentflorist]

Does teleporting take a lot of his energy? [or is this seth guy just rude?? but ah...]

If they noticed you were gone, why wouldn't they wait or try to find you?

[undread]

...I don't know. Maybe it was too important to wait.

[or maybe she's just making up problems to fuss about.]

[residentflorist]

[she is perhaps getting that sense. so:]

How long were you with the people you were traveling with? [she assumes it's traveling of some kind since she said teleportation, really.]

[undread]

...A few months. Imogen, a bit longer. A few years.

[residentflorist]

So still long enough to probably not abandon you just because. [thank you that was her point.] ...it's like that for us, too. Some of us have only been together for a short time, but there are some who knew each other for years.

[undread]

...Probably not.

[she hopes not. but she feels a little worried.]

[residentflorist]

I know they said we only have a little while that we can stall here, but...I think we can find a way to get out sooner. Then we don't have to keep anyone waiting and they won't have more reasons to worry about us being gone.

[undread]

[oh, she perks up, interested.]

I want to get out sooner. But we need the magic to work for that.

[residentflorist]

[magic! magic talk is easy, and likewise she looks a little more interested to talk to someone who might be more familiar.]

Do you have any ideas of what might work? Or what we should be aiming for?

[undread]

I don't know. If they've found a way to disrupt it, maybe we have to get to wherever the rest of the cultists are. The source of the disruption must be there.

[residentflorist]

And with the fog right now, our chances of getting there aren't very high. I wouldn't say they're impossible, but for now they've really boxed us in. [and she's not too happy about it. nevertheless...] Could be that whatever powers we get might be able to help us there though. Even if we're matched with someone else, that's twenty individual abilities we can try to work with.