⇨ DANGEROUS ENCOUNTERS

[ringleaders]

Who: Anyone out in the library.
When: Day 59
Where: The Athenaeum
What: Towards the end of the visit, we are visited by a series of worrisome NPCs, who may or may not be illusions. There will be at least 5 NPC toplevels posted overall, all happening in a similar time period ICly (in rough chronological order), so not everyone needs to be in every thread.
Warnings: Possibility of very real danger to anyone who participates. Remember that Sans has told everyone to travel in groups, so if you aren't, you'll probably get a scolding later.

TURNING THE PAGE↴ As the carnival continues to explore the Athenaeum in the pursuit of more information about the legendary Miracles, the tension is thick with the knowledge that the Summer Court could be in pursuit any day now. On Day 59, a series of threatening encounters will begin manifesting - but are they real, or an illusion?

Comments

[mirrortide]

Lapis, about to open her mouth to reply to Herbert, instead opts to take a step back from the weird floating lady. Just in case. She frowns, naturally.

What Would Steven Do?

"Uh... Do you... need help? Or something?" Is it normal for people to float in water? Lapis feels like the answer might be yes?

[scientificist]

When the woman moves, Herbert is forced to re-evaluate what this particular story is intending. Possibly some kind of rusalka? Best to keep treating her like she's actually human, just in case. He doesn't want to reveal his hand too fast.

"I have not," he asserts, lifting up the bag to brandish it meaningfully. "We, have not--we're here to help. If that is, in fact, what you need."

[npcarnival]

"Could you really help me?" she asks, with a floaty kind of voice. She sweeps the back of her hand over her forehead, dramatically. "I've been so terrible lonely. Perhaps all I need is company..."

She glance at Lapis, and then to Herbert. She idly swims closer to the shore, in slow, leisurely movements.

"Do you like dead things, young doctor?" she asks.

[scientificist]

Ok...that's pointed but almost certainly confirms his assessment, in his mind. Herbert doesn't step back like Lapis but he's certainly not going to get closer to the water. He can't exactly reanimate himself, and he's yet to test his reagent on someone with water in their lungs anyway.

"I'd describe it as more of an...interest...?" he says, stopping short of correcting her to 'forensic pathology' or 'bioengineering'. It's a story, after all, not a textbook. "A fascination, perhaps."

[mirrortide]

"It's kind of weird if you like dead things, you know." What kind of a weirdo has a fascination with the dead? The carnival brings all sorts, doesn't it.

Lapis makes it a point to neither move closer or away from the pair. Mostly because if anything goes down, she's apparently the one who'll have to grab Herbert.

She should probably be closer, in that case.

Not that she's moving closer.

[npcarnival]

She glances at Lapis again as she speaks, watching her for a moment with dark eyes. Then, she dips into the water again, reappearing a few lily pads closer to shore.

"Do you ever think about being dead?" she asks.

[scientificist]

"Yeeees, I've heard that before," says Herbert, rolling his eyes at Lapis before looking back at the water woman, briefly concerned and narrow-eyed as she moves closer. He doesn't trust this but he's not sure how to manipulate the way this is progressing to his benefit. The bag is held in front of him almost like a shield at this point. Protectively, the base turned slightly out.

"Iiii think about Death," he says. "Not my own."

[mirrortide]

"Gem's can't die." Lapis responds, because she's just simply not as knowledgeable about the situation as Lambert might be, but her tone is exceptionally dry as she says it. "So I'll give a 'No' to that one." Trapped? Sure, shattered? Certainly. But being dead? Not even remotely.

[npcarnival]

"Everything dies eventually," she says, though her voice is unmoved. "You're dying right now."

This would make the most practical sense to be directed at Herbert, but with the way the woman keeps glancing between them, it's not entirely clear who is the intended target.

[scientificist]

This library is a lot more irritating and inconvenient than he initially thought. When he first arrived, it seemed like the best location they'd visited thus far. But at this point, forced to interact with someone it feels like is purposefully insulting him...

Without really thinking about it, Herbert spreads his wings out slightly, curved in vague irritation, puffing himself up.

"Not if I can help it--do you need? Anything?"

[mirrortide]

"Unless you mean on the inside, I'm pretty sure I'm still safe." And to emphasize her point, she crosses her arms. That, and despite the glancing her way, Lapis is still fairly sure she's talking about Herbert, who is made of significantly squishier material.

[npcarnival]

Now her gaze focuses on Herbert, as she arrives at a space close to the apparently 'shore." She dips into the water, letting it cover her up to the bridge of her nose.

"Yes, actually," she says, her voice somehow heard despite the water covering her mouth. All at once, several strange of seaweed hair whip out of the water and wrap around... Lapis?

The lily pads lift as well, pushing downward as Lapis is rapidly pulled beneath the water.

[scientificist]

Uh....WOW?! Herbert brings the bag up even more protectively, flashbacks and comparisons to Dr Hill's mutated torso inevitable and startling--only for the seaweed to yank Lapis down into the water. He makes a strangled noise and bounces back and forth a moment between advancing toward and backing away from the water and ends up staying where he is. It wouldn't be wise, or fair, obviously, to leave Lapis to the mercies of that thing (whether or not it would progress the story) but then, he couldn't fight what Hill became either.

"Iiii didn't mean you could take that!" he yells, before quickly pulling his radio from his pocket, turning down the volume, and muttering a hurried message onto the public channel.

[mirrortide]

Yeah, well. Lapis isn't exactly expecting it either, to be suddenly yanked down into the water. She doesn't even manage to get a "Hey!" Out completely before the water overtakes her head. In the moment, she's helpless, but once she's sunk down a few feet...

Lapis tries to control the water, to drag down the person who dragged her down.

[npcarnival]

The woman disappears beneath the water too, even before Lapis has actively started using the water to grab her. Yet, the water doesn't yield completely to Lapis's will in the way she would be accustomed. It does move, but its as if she is physically wrestling with another entity - for every bit she makes the water shift, there is something pushing back against it with an equal or greater force.

The woman appears in front of her, her hair extended to all sides and wrapping around Lapis's limbs. She breathes a stream of bubbles in Lapis's direction, as if blowing a kiss.

It's then that Lapis will be overwhelmed by a feeling she's probably never experienced before: the feeling of drowning. Without lungs, without the ability to suffocate, she will suddenly and impossibly experience the desperate need for air, as if the wholeness of her gem depends on it.

[mirrortide]

It's a unique feeling. One that doesn't even register for her what it is in that moment. Gems don't need air. Gems don't even have lungs to breathe. But there's a burning in her gem, a desire for air that strange and unusual. It's desperation.

But Lapis knows how to fight against another entity for control. She knows how to wrestle down Gems thrice her size. The need for air is there, but the need for control of the situation is just as present. So she fights it in torrents, both to get up, to the surface, and to push down whatever is fighting against her, to exert her will on it the same way she exerted her will over Jasper. Over Malachite.

She's burning for oxygen, but she feels powerful, in this instance. It's a strange dichotomy.

[scientificist]

Herbert, meanwhile, is still up on the ground fielding questions and advice and honestly still not super sure how to proceed. Lapis can apparently control water, so possibly she's fighting the thing? Without any evidence of it aside from vague, occasional water blorping?

He......makes a sword. Pulls it out of his bag. It's orange-red, and has a sheen because making like, some kind of hot oil sword is his best idea for dealing with water. If he even has to. Everyone seems pretty certain that Lapis has it handled.

[npcarnival]

Fight, she does. Yet, no matter how she pushes, the opposition will seem inexhaustible - all the while, it feels as if Lapis's gem will begin to shatter from the strain of suffocation. The woman stares on, watching Lapis struggle - her hairs shows the way that Lapis violently shakes the water, several strands of seaweed hair torn off and left to dance in the undertow. Yet, she doesn't let go.

"You are beyond your ken," the woman's voice says, though her lips don't move. "Tell me, elemental..." Her voice is soft. "Do you want to breathe?"

[mirrortide]

It's awful. The pressure is unbearable, tight. Suffocating, and Lapis shakes her head back and forth like some kind of wild animal, before lunging forward towards the woman. To grab her, to squeeze, to exert every ounce of pressure she can in return.

She'll crush her, like she crushed Jasper under her might.

[scientificist]

Despite having a sword now, Herbert is honestly really hesitant to just. Cut up the water and jump in after a drowning water spirit who Lapis might already be fighting with water right now. Would cutting the water disrupt the fight? Maybe! He has no clue how that works. At this moment, Lambert's idea sounds a lot more feasible.

So he actually does advance somewhat on the pond, sword in both hands, not right up to the edge but close enough to search, and try to find the specific object that stands out that Lambert mentioned.

[npcarnival]

All Herbert will see is the rapid descent into water, and the way it is blocked by the lily pads. There are no magical object, no hidden dead bodies of killers. Just water.

That's all there is for Lapis, too. Yet, somehow she manages to get her hands around the woman's throat, viciously squeezing, furious and desperate to win. Yet, the woman barely moves. She keeps staring back at Lapis. a few tiny bubbles rising from her lips.

"Do you want to breathe?" she will ask again. By now, Lapis will begin to feel her senses dull, as the lack of oxygen ostensibly and inexorably slows and shuts down her systems. For a gem unaccustomed to it, this is what dying feels like.

[scientificist]

This is very aggravating. Herbert hates being forced to handle things like this, but he supposes there is no other choice.

He is going to have to Cut The Water.

Reira told him to announce his intent but Herbert thinks the attack should be enough to do that. Bracing himself and leaning down, sword clenched in both hands, he slices down with intent. This is a magical sword. He...crafted it himself with magic and the intent to...end the scourge! Of the Rusalka! It will work, and he sees no reason it should not.

[mirrortide]

While herbert Cuts The Water, Lapis is experiencing a bunch of unique sensations. She can't quite get her grip to work right after only a few seconds. She feels like she's holding tight, but, everything's getting hazy.

She's not winning.

She shouldn't have tried.

What use is a Lapis Lazuli that can't command water to even save herself?

Slowly, she lets go, lets her arms drop, ferocity drained from her body. And she nods, slow. She wants to breathe.

[npcarnival]

The sword slices through the water, and causes a wall of it to rise away from Herbert like a wave. The wall of water left by the move allows him to almost see the shapes of the two women underwater, as if through a glass panel, but it isn't enough to intervene.

Instead, the woman is happy to see Lapis finally submit. It took a surprisingly long time, for someone experiencing drowning for the first time. She's seen mightier foes bend much more quickly to the agony than this.

Meanwhile, a party of three crows land on a bookshelf nearby, watching curiously and from a distance.

Finally given permission, the woman slips an arm around Lapis's neck and waist, pulling her in close... then, they lock lips. A torrent of air bubbles flows from the woman's mouth into Lapis's, and it feels like breathing - finally, some of the pressure begins to ease away. Yet, this relief isn't given freely. Something slips from her mind just as easily - memories. The woman is somehow in her mind.

As the water swirls around them, the pale woman holding Lapis close, something will be just barely visible to Lapis's eyes. A pointed ear, beneath the crown of seaweed hair.

Only then will Lapis's physical form finally give way. Instead of death, it feels like release.

[scientificist]

Herbert sighs, and is ready to walk forward into the water when....Lapis fully just disappears. Only the shape of the water creature remains. He's apparently too late, in some way that honestly makes zero sense to him but he's done. It's very clear to him that he's not the person who should be handling this. He's a doctor and a scientist and there is no corpse left to reanimate and the people on the radio were wrong.

His best move now is to back away from the pond and out of the scenario, his sword dissolving as he does so. If he finds someone already searching he can guide them back, and they can do something.