[no sooner have the girl's eyes closed than the unicorn that is Cecelia's familiar appears, slowly walking around her skirts and stopping to peer up at the bangle on its companion's wrist. both that and the unicorn's horn glow in tandem, and once Cecelia herself closes her eyes and accepts having to exhaust power of her own, the light grows, flaring up like a flame before it engulfs the both of them and spirits them away.
the transition is quick, and the both of them are suddenly no longer standing within the confines of concrete, but instead a vast expanse whose openness is palpable in the skin, gnawing at those core, animal feelings of fear of exposure. even though she's done this multiple times, Cecelia cannot untrain her instincts, and so she must take a moment to tense up and calm her nerves before exhaling, opening her eyes, and looking up.
there it is - that peculiar starburst in the canopy of endless stars. and in a quick glance around, all else seems to be in order, and no other loiterers can be seen.]
...You may open your eyes now. [while she says so, her grip on the girl's hands is less, but not entirely gone; she doesn't know if she'll need to grasp hold of her to keep her from reacting too intensely or not.]
[Even with her eyes closed, Klaudia can see the bright flare of light from behind her lids. She can feel the strange feeling of magic around her, and the brief (and slightly terrifying) sensation of weightless surging as the world twists in unnatural ways to accommodate their transportation. The urge to hold her breath is intense, but even in her excitement, she remembers to exhale and inhale once again.]
[Even more difficult to resist is opening her eyes before Cecelia instructs her to do so--and her reaction is so fast that it's hard to tell which one happens first, the permission or her blank white eyes popping open to take in her surroundings.]
[What she does see unsettles her in a way that she doesn't expect. She has no fear in her heart for open spaces--quite the opposite; but as much as this place reminds her of the vast expanse of the ocean that she loves so much, it lacks all of the same warmth and brightness. Rather than intense reaction, Klaudia looks almost transfixed by the scene as she slowly removes her hands from Cecelia's and heads to the cliff's edge.]
[If she isn't stopped, she'll walk right up to that vast blackness without much thought, crouching down and leaning over just enough to peer down the edge of the cliff. The lack of any ground attached to the "bottom" of the cliff is dizzying, and she has to grasp the edge of the rock to steady herself.]
This is what we're on? There's nothing there at all. It's... floating. It's a floating island. Like Netheril, but there's no land to float over...
[And if they crashed like Netheril did, where would they even go?]
[it takes a great deal of restraint to keep from grabbing and yanking the girl back. Cecelia clenches her jaw, tightly holding her hands together and watches with sharp, unblinking eyes.
gads, at least she lowers herself so she doesn't teeter over outright!]
...Indeed. A rather precarious situations. Please be careful not to lean too far.
[Klaudia glances back at that response, giving the other woman a curious tilt of her head.]
Are you afraid of heights? I'm not going to fall. [A pause.] I'm not even sure I can fall. How does that work, if there's no ground? Maybe it wraps around the bottom... or just keeps going past the island.
[And having said that, she starts to look around for a rock or something to toss off the edge. She hasn't yet taken account of the starburst overhead, captivated as she is with this present question.]
[That would definitely be some kind of adventure...]
[But regardless, Cecelia's comment seems to refocus Klaudia on the reason for them being there. She gives the intriguing abyss one last glance--almost a pout of disappointment--before crawling back from the edge and standing upright. She'll table that investigation of physics for later.]
[It's not difficult to find the thing in the sky, given how dramatic it looks compared to the other stars. She gives a brief look around the immediate area before her eyes glance upwards and stop.]
Is that it, then? That's the calamity thing? ...Not quite what I was expecting.
Have you encountered massive disasters previously? [it's a question asked in earnest, though the neutral nature of her voice might make it seem somewhat dry.]
No, but I've read about some. They're not infrequent. [That's sort of the same thing, right?] It's usually gods getting involved in things that they should really leave alone; but I don't know what kind of gods--if any--are here. Maybe they're all stuck in time, too.
[She pauses, briefly giving Cecelia another curious look. There's clearly a question on her mind, and it seems unlikely that it has anything to do with the Calamity.]
Speculation runs the gamut in that regard, and there's only sparse evidence for much of it. [because some argue that the ceremonies done in the name of gods proves their wakefulness, while others have strained in vain to hear their lords' calls.
Cecelia has yet to hear the whispers of the nephilim, but they aren't gods, so it's neither here nor there.
in any case:] For now, we can only work with what we have. In this instance... [she'll gesture.] There's an instrument over there you can use to observe it in more detail, if you like.
[The telescope is a good distraction--certainly better than whatever personal questions Klaudia was considering. It gives her the momentary restraint to table those for a later time, and she heads towards the telescope.]
Nice of them to set up equipment here. I don't have one of these yet.
[But she's certainly thinking about getting one. Either way, she'll lean down to check the view through the lens, making some minor (slightly clumsy) adjustments to the knobs to bring the view into better focus for her. When she finally gets a good look at the thing... She pauses, her brow furrowing. Her back straightens so she can look skyward with her normal vision, then she takes a bit of her skirt to clean her glasses and looks through the telescope again.]
...What am I seeing here? It's just blackness, and there's... Things? Flickering in and out on the edges? Is that magic? Are they visions, or... [They can't be actual places, right? She's never seen anything like this before, but it has to be some kind of illusion...?]
[Cecelia moves over to the bench behind the telescope, bending and picking up the journal she leaves there and sitting down with it in her lap.
while thumbing over to the latest empty page:] Without any other divination instruments, I can't say a hundred percent, but they appear to me as edges of other places. Like pieces of a picture book that fell in water, pages rumpled and bleeding.
Given the impact this has upon several different worlds, it's not wrong to assume it could be other places reflected in the rippling impact of the explosion.
[That gives Klaudia pause for a brief moment, as she looks through the telescope for a third time. This time she scans the flickering images, straining to recognize any familiar places from among them. Some of the sights are distinctly foreign to her, but some are vague enough that they might be places she traveled through once. It's hard to say, given how small the list of places she could reliably recognize is.]
[She sets her pack down by the telescope, opening it up to retrieve her own journal and pen. Holding those out to the side, she juggles between looking through the lens and writing things down.]
...If these are the worlds that have been affected then, it's possible to see our own worlds here, right? So... have you ever seen yours?
[while procuring her quill:] Signs of how to undo what's been done, for one thing. Warnings of the spells keeping things in stasis failing, for another.
No, I haven't. [she taps the quill to paper a couple times to wake the ink up before starting to write.] Which is what this little book is for. I've been logging status with each subsequent visit, trying to note any changes not only to the barrier or calamity itself, but the surrounding area as well.
Have you tried touching the barrier? Is it permeable?
[Not that it would be a good idea to try and go past the barrier, but Klaudia's pretty sure it would be good to know just how protective this barrier is.]
I bet if you asked a Kinetic mage to come out here, they could test how solid it is. Or a familiar that can fly. I'd ask mine, but I'm pretty sure she'd tell me no.
That's not something I'm keen to test without getting more detail on the spell from either its caster or someone adjacent to the caster. [she sighs.] Which means getting a word in with that court wizard of the King's, should he ever spare a moment from taking photos of himself...
... Merlin was the one that cast this spell? [A pause.] I never would have guessed. He seems like an idiot. I'd more readily believe that he stumbled across it.
I can't confirm if he did at all, but seeing as he is one of the highest points of contact for information of this sort, he will be who answers my questions first and foremost.
[and whether or not he's an idiot? she can't rightly say. she sure doesn't enjoy his outward persona...but she knows more than a thing or two about that sort of theater.]
Hmm. [She still looks skeptical. Enough so that she's stopped her own note-taking in order to watch Cecelia properly. There's definitely a small amount of judgment in her tone when she responds:]
You think that because he's closest to the King, he'll know more about this? Or his information will be more trustworthy? Isn't that putting too much faith in status?
The status was there before us, and there for reasons before us. Until a more substantial truth presents itself, I must work with what is in front of me. And so far- [she'll glimpse at the bangle idle at her wrist.] -it is yielding some result.
[She should probably refrain from being too judgmental, but the longer they talk, the more comfortable she feels speaking her mind. And giving a small eye-roll as well.]
Status isn't always deserved, and reasons can be stupid--even more-so if they're old reasons. Those are probably the most stupid ones.
[The oldest families are often the ones that are furthest removed from the reason for their power, after all. And she's overheard far too much idle gossip and political drama in her lifetime to feel any sort of reverence for status.]
What about that... Morganna? I bet she would know something about all of this.
I imagine so, though entreating her for an audience is something more of a challenge I've yet to surmount. [and she's not sure if the return on investment will be much at all, especially with the way most high-powered, high-ranking sorts are.]
For now...it seems as though most are confident that the stasis you see before you will hold for the time being, as there's not been any real rush to act upon it yet.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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Date: 2021-07-12 08:41 pm (UTC)From:the transition is quick, and the both of them are suddenly no longer standing within the confines of concrete, but instead a vast expanse whose openness is palpable in the skin, gnawing at those core, animal feelings of fear of exposure. even though she's done this multiple times, Cecelia cannot untrain her instincts, and so she must take a moment to tense up and calm her nerves before exhaling, opening her eyes, and looking up.
there it is - that peculiar starburst in the canopy of endless stars. and in a quick glance around, all else seems to be in order, and no other loiterers can be seen.]
...You may open your eyes now. [while she says so, her grip on the girl's hands is less, but not entirely gone; she doesn't know if she'll need to grasp hold of her to keep her from reacting too intensely or not.]
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Date: 2021-08-02 08:34 am (UTC)From:[Even more difficult to resist is opening her eyes before Cecelia instructs her to do so--and her reaction is so fast that it's hard to tell which one happens first, the permission or her blank white eyes popping open to take in her surroundings.]
[What she does see unsettles her in a way that she doesn't expect. She has no fear in her heart for open spaces--quite the opposite; but as much as this place reminds her of the vast expanse of the ocean that she loves so much, it lacks all of the same warmth and brightness. Rather than intense reaction, Klaudia looks almost transfixed by the scene as she slowly removes her hands from Cecelia's and heads to the cliff's edge.]
[If she isn't stopped, she'll walk right up to that vast blackness without much thought, crouching down and leaning over just enough to peer down the edge of the cliff. The lack of any ground attached to the "bottom" of the cliff is dizzying, and she has to grasp the edge of the rock to steady herself.]
This is what we're on? There's nothing there at all. It's... floating. It's a floating island. Like Netheril, but there's no land to float over...
[And if they crashed like Netheril did, where would they even go?]
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Date: 2021-08-02 02:56 pm (UTC)From:gads, at least she lowers herself so she doesn't teeter over outright!]
...Indeed. A rather precarious situations. Please be careful not to lean too far.
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Date: 2021-08-02 03:41 pm (UTC)From:Are you afraid of heights? I'm not going to fall. [A pause.] I'm not even sure I can fall. How does that work, if there's no ground? Maybe it wraps around the bottom... or just keeps going past the island.
[And having said that, she starts to look around for a rock or something to toss off the edge. She hasn't yet taken account of the starburst overhead, captivated as she is with this present question.]
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Date: 2021-08-02 04:44 pm (UTC)From:[yet if the girl throws herself off and drifts away, what is she to do about it?]
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Date: 2021-08-02 05:38 pm (UTC)From:[But regardless, Cecelia's comment seems to refocus Klaudia on the reason for them being there. She gives the intriguing abyss one last glance--almost a pout of disappointment--before crawling back from the edge and standing upright. She'll table that investigation of physics for later.]
[It's not difficult to find the thing in the sky, given how dramatic it looks compared to the other stars. She gives a brief look around the immediate area before her eyes glance upwards and stop.]
Is that it, then? That's the calamity thing? ...Not quite what I was expecting.
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Date: 2021-08-02 05:43 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2021-08-02 10:05 pm (UTC)From:[She pauses, briefly giving Cecelia another curious look. There's clearly a question on her mind, and it seems unlikely that it has anything to do with the Calamity.]
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Date: 2021-08-02 11:39 pm (UTC)From:Cecelia has yet to hear the whispers of the nephilim, but they aren't gods, so it's neither here nor there.
in any case:] For now, we can only work with what we have. In this instance... [she'll gesture.] There's an instrument over there you can use to observe it in more detail, if you like.
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Date: 2021-08-03 07:02 am (UTC)From:Nice of them to set up equipment here. I don't have one of these yet.
[But she's certainly thinking about getting one. Either way, she'll lean down to check the view through the lens, making some minor (slightly clumsy) adjustments to the knobs to bring the view into better focus for her. When she finally gets a good look at the thing... She pauses, her brow furrowing. Her back straightens so she can look skyward with her normal vision, then she takes a bit of her skirt to clean her glasses and looks through the telescope again.]
...What am I seeing here? It's just blackness, and there's... Things? Flickering in and out on the edges? Is that magic? Are they visions, or... [They can't be actual places, right? She's never seen anything like this before, but it has to be some kind of illusion...?]
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Date: 2021-08-03 06:16 pm (UTC)From:while thumbing over to the latest empty page:] Without any other divination instruments, I can't say a hundred percent, but they appear to me as edges of other places. Like pieces of a picture book that fell in water, pages rumpled and bleeding.
Given the impact this has upon several different worlds, it's not wrong to assume it could be other places reflected in the rippling impact of the explosion.
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Date: 2021-08-03 08:07 pm (UTC)From:[She sets her pack down by the telescope, opening it up to retrieve her own journal and pen. Holding those out to the side, she juggles between looking through the lens and writing things down.]
...If these are the worlds that have been affected then, it's possible to see our own worlds here, right? So... have you ever seen yours?
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Date: 2021-08-03 08:47 pm (UTC)From:That the entire thing is frozen still helps, at least, to give us time to examine it for that and other things.
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Date: 2021-08-03 08:58 pm (UTC)From:What other things?
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Date: 2021-08-03 10:53 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2021-08-03 11:13 pm (UTC)From:Have you noted any changes in this place since you first came out here? For better or worse?
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Date: 2021-08-04 01:24 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2021-08-04 06:24 pm (UTC)From:[Not that it would be a good idea to try and go past the barrier, but Klaudia's pretty sure it would be good to know just how protective this barrier is.]
I bet if you asked a Kinetic mage to come out here, they could test how solid it is. Or a familiar that can fly. I'd ask mine, but I'm pretty sure she'd tell me no.
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Date: 2021-08-04 07:46 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2021-08-04 08:42 pm (UTC)From:... Merlin was the one that cast this spell? [A pause.] I never would have guessed. He seems like an idiot. I'd more readily believe that he stumbled across it.
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Date: 2021-08-04 10:15 pm (UTC)From:[and whether or not he's an idiot? she can't rightly say. she sure doesn't enjoy his outward persona...but she knows more than a thing or two about that sort of theater.]
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Date: 2021-08-04 11:56 pm (UTC)From:You think that because he's closest to the King, he'll know more about this? Or his information will be more trustworthy? Isn't that putting too much faith in status?
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Date: 2021-08-05 12:12 am (UTC)From:[the pace is just...glacial.]
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Date: 2021-08-05 12:24 am (UTC)From:Status isn't always deserved, and reasons can be stupid--even more-so if they're old reasons. Those are probably the most stupid ones.
[The oldest families are often the ones that are furthest removed from the reason for their power, after all. And she's overheard far too much idle gossip and political drama in her lifetime to feel any sort of reverence for status.]
What about that... Morganna? I bet she would know something about all of this.
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Date: 2021-08-06 03:51 am (UTC)From:For now...it seems as though most are confident that the stasis you see before you will hold for the time being, as there's not been any real rush to act upon it yet.
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