this is Salem, a land filled with magic and maladies. It is a place where witches and their elemental familiars gather, a home to legend and
lore that predates time itself. Yet of all the wicked and wonderful stories the past can tell us of, the most magical are the ones yet to happen.
This is Salem - this is the start of your very own journey. Welcome to starfall
Starfall is an animaga witch roleplay set in mostly modern times. Members play as witches in a world plagued by monsters, where the only safe spots are walled cities. Starfall strives to be a character-driven roleplay with expansive lore and a highly interactive plotline. We want to allow members to
create and look back on a magical journey, and mold the site and its plot as their characters grow.
the trio of witches split up to pursue the trio of paths (guys whY), and very quickly they lose sight of each other as the oppressive gloom swallows their trails (yay we're all gonna die). maddox rothscus ✨'s aquatic boots serve him well, as does his makeshift torch, however no matter how fast he goes the shadowy figure never seems to get closer. in fact, as they venture deeper and deeper into the sewers, the figure appears to be drawing further away despite the apparent disadvantage they have in wading through the sludge. will he continue on as he has, magicless, in hopes that eventually his persistence will pay off? will he use magic, as is rapidly appearing to be the only way to catch up? or will he give up and rejoin his friends, perhaps, or return to the surface to file a report?[break][break]
meanwhile, Zephyr Hart's path leads him up a gradual but noticeable slope, the illuminated section growing ever brighter as he approaches. his surroundings blur out into indistinct shadowy shapes as whatever night vision he has is destroyed by the light; whatever that might be approaching from the darkness is hidden - unless he manages to find a solution for it. whatever paranoia zephyr might have, though, turns out to be unfounded; nothing attacks. nothing moves. nothing. it seems... almost an almost unnatural stillness.[break][break]
and then, the light abruptly flares into supernova brilliance, bright and blinding and harsh and unyielding. in the split second before it erupts, zephyr might have caught a glimpse of something sharp-edged and all too familiar. a symbol, a sign. leviathan.[break][break]
and then the light is gone, leaving nothing but darkness behind.[break][break]
and kasimir burovski ✨, kasimir (is fucked) finds the tenebrous folds around him intensifying, getting deeper and darker till it seems abyssal; stare at it enough and it will stare back. his breathing, light as it is, fills his mind; a step forth, and another, and another, a n d a n o t h e r . . .[break][break]
back at the surface, if kirjava is paying attention, an uneasy feeling will have descended upon her. something isn't quite right, something subtle but distinctly and primally wrong. any attempt at contacting kasimir will reveal the alarming - there appears to be nothing at the end of their bond.[break][break]
silence. emptiness, as if he never existed at all.
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thread-specific rules
this thread is not death enabled, though the potential for serious to severe injury is now highly likely. unless zephyr prevents or addresses the aftermath of the light flare, it will be assumed that he will be temporarily blinded for a short duration of time, or at the very least has trouble seeing anything in the darkness. kasimir has suddenly and mysteriously found himself brainwashed, with the overwhelming inclination to eliminate zephyr and maddox. [break][break] due to the off-schedule return of this thread (and finals rip us), you have 10 days to reply in reaction to this post. two missing rounds will result in an elimination from the thread. [break][break] maddox rothscus ✨Zephyr Hartkasimir burovski ✨
Post by kasimir burovski ✨ on May 25, 2018 18:11:29 GMT
blue moon
you saw me standing alone
left alone to the dark that sweeps over his skin in winter-cold webs, his feet fall silent in the stillness as the light his companions wield fades into the abyss. it deepens, then, darkens and reaches out with too many dimensions and too many hands, reaches out and pulls him close, smothering the breath from his lungs and croons a lullaby of fear that shivers like a living thing beneath his framework of bones. kasimir stills the shudder that wants to run down his spine, squares his shoulders, breathes. walks on.
twilight might be his domain, but so to is stealth; every nerve ending sparking beneath his skin is on hair-trigger and his steps are careful, measured. ready.
he is ready. alert for any foreign movement, any hint of presence, of unfamiliarity, of possible attack. focus. the darkness presses in on all sides, thick and thicker and cloying till he is almost ready to drown in it, tendrils drifting down his throat and coiling around his chest and seeking into his blood like a spill of oil staining all in its path. choking on feathers, almost; the darkness is almost alive.
he keeps walking. keeps walking and walking and the darkness keeps growing and growing and swelling and expanding and it burrows hungrily and greedily into the marrow of his bones and he is sucked dry and brittle like a tissue-paper skeleton and he keeps walking and walking and the darkness wraps around him now, almost gentle but unyielding as steel and it muffles the flicker of flame that he is until he drifts to ash and all that remains is an illusion of self, writ in the shining black of wet ink, and he keeps walking and walking and-
kasimir is not walking. he has not travelled more than a few hundred steps. he stares ahead, eyes unblinking, wrapped in darkness; statue-still. and then, he moves. stands, turns around. quicksilver slips into his hands, beautiful and lethal-sharp. quiet, methodical, he takes the portal he holds. activates it. and disappears through it in a streak of crimson, nothing but the terrible clarity of lethal purpose in his mind.
at the surface, kirjava shifts where she stands, a subtle unease trailing fingers through her fur. something is... off. not quite right. almost as if the weight of the air has increased by a fraction, or gravity has shifted marginally left, or the universe has tilted ever so slightly off-kilter. there is nothing to pinpoint, but every instinct within her is screaming at her in jagged shades of red; something primal within her roars.
she shifts again, gold eyes narrowed. 'kasimir?' she asks finally, reaching out across their bond as her unease deepens. they have learnt the hard way not to ignore their instincts, even if they have naught for proof but the prickle across her spine. she reaches for her partner, easy, unthinkingly, more natural than breathing like every witch and familiar pair that has ever existed-
there is nothing there.
there is nothing, no one at the end of their bond, blank and terrifying emptiness, as if he had never existed, as if he never was. as if kasimir-and-kirjava were not two halves of the same soul but she, kirjava, is was and has been the only one to ever be real.
for a moment, her blood turns to ice.
and then, she whirls on moosely, eyes like solar flares setting the sky alight. "there's something wrong with kasimir," she snarls, the growl tearing from her chest all sharp-edged and raw with desperation and fear. without pause, she flings herself through the portal in front of her, muscles bunched beneath rippling fur-
-lands, claws skidding against the ground, the ghost of fire flickering along her spine. kasimir is a blur of crimson shooting out of a separate portal and there is no hesitation, no waverance in his movements as he immediately re-angles himself to attack zephyr. their bond is still silent, empty, like the kasimir in front of her eyes is nothing but a shell, an illusion, but she knows, she knows this is him. everything inside of her screams, and kirjava bolts towards her partner and leaps for him with every ounce of speed she has.
kasimir dodges her, but it is enough to drive him a step back from zephyr. immediately, there are three daggers streaking towards the crafter with the flick of a wrist and a sword forged of pure fire materialises in his hand, but kirjava is not concerned. not about the fireblade, no - their own fire will never, ever harm them, even now. no, she is far more concerned about her partner, her witch, and everything wild and primal inside of her is still screaming so she lets the sound tear from her throat and she spins and leaps for him again.
tl;dr: kasi gets brainwashed, takes portal to attack zeph, gets interrupted by kirjava (who tells moosely there's something wrong with kasi before taking the portal to zeph), throws three daggers at zephyr before facing kirjava again
[attr="class","gearcore"] Since he wasn't the one going after the shady guy who lured them down here, Zephyr wasn't too concerned about being seen and used his portal-lantern freely. Unfortunately, even with the light, there wasn't much to see. Tunnels... tunnels... and (surprise!) more tunnels. Despite the feeling that he wasn't going to find anything of interest in this direction, he resisted the urge to contact either of the other two in case they were getting themselves into stealthy situations. Hopefully they hadn't gotten in over their heads.
While Zephyr trudged onwards, Spock watched his back. The path he left behind was just as disinteresting as the path he had yet to tread, however.
"Bet Maddox gets hurts first," the monkey challenges across their mental link.
"He has those boots, though. I bet Sirius," the witch silently replies.
"Are we including their familiars?"
"What? They're the safest of all of us!"
The two playfully bicker about the finer details of the bet (What counts as being hurt? Was there a deadline? Locational restrictions?) before Zeph is suddenly an inexplicably blinded by a brilliant light, the symbol of Leviathan left burning in his retina.
"Fuck-- shit shit shit..." the crafter hisses as he squints and blinks with his one functioning eye, but to no avail. The world is dark, with only vague blobs of light drifting around his vision. Spock didn't get blinded by the full force of the light burst due to facing the opposite direction, and was now on high alert. Had that been an attack from a person? A trap? There didn't seem to be any follow-up hostilities, but the monkey's fur remained bristling. The crafter stops in his tracks and keeps his fingertips brushing against the walls to keep himself grounded.
"Sirius is here," Spock notes, calm in the first beat, but with her mood suddenly turning sour as she realizes what kind of stance the assassin is taking. She lets out a shriek of unbridled fury which echoes down the sewers before her next thoughts are even able to process in Zephyr's mind: "He's attacking us!"
Her fortress wall is erected too slowly to deflect the thrown knives, but at the very least it separates the two witch/familiar pairs for just a moment. Zephyr feels the impact of one of the daggers slicing through his chest, and hears the impact of a second as it imbeds itself in one of his prosthetics. Zephyr shuts his portal linking to Sirius immediately, at the same time twisting one of his legs just so, feeling the mellow sting of a half-dozen needles as the wires between the mana canisters stored in his inorganic thighs and the remaining organic portion of his legs are connected. As much as he hated to admit it, feeding his body extra mana like this was the only way he could keep up with his brother's magic, albeit for a short time. Spock feels the surge of mana and acts in synchrony, erecting a second, thicker wall and calling down an earth shower within Kasimir's side of the divider. Stone was plentiful here underground, so the familiar had more than enough source material to cause a catastrophe.
Zephyr, however, had no intention on staying and fighting with a trained assassin with control of fire. Spock's quick mental descriptions of the situation concerned him, however -- especially the fact that Sirius's familiar appeared to be fighting her witch. Was he not doing this of his own free will? Could the same thing have happened to Mads? Zephyr pulls the portal linking back to the surface over himself and Spock, immediately closing it and his portal linking to Mads as soon as he arrives. Maddox would have likely felt a sudden distance between himself and his familiar as the portals shut. "Tell me if Mads is alright," is Zephyr's first demand to Mooseley, unable to make eye contact since he could only barely make out the familiar's looming figure. He did not address the issue of Kasi's knife embedded in his chest and the blood-rose blooming from it across his shirt. It hurt, yes, but adrenaline drove him to consider it a secondary concern. Sprocket tore off a strip of Zeph's sleeve with her teeth to tie it around her identical wound; since the bleeding wasn't stemmed by a knife like it was with Zephyr's, she had to address it.
Post by maddox rothscus ✨ on May 28, 2018 1:37:54 GMT
he walks and he walks and he walks, each step as quiet as he can make it, treading light on the surface of the water. he walks and he walks and he walks, yet he does not get any closer. in fact, the stranger seems be drawing further and further away no matter how quickly he goes after them. a trick of the light? some odd magic at work? he breaks into a slow jog, impatience outweighing caution, but still to no avail. it seems that he is doomed to an eternal pursuit of an ever fleeing target, like some hapless petrarchan lover in an unfortunate play, and by gods does he hate it.
reprieve comes in the form of a warning across their mental link, moosely breaking the silence with an abruptness that almost startles him. 'there's something wrong with kasimir,' echoes the familiar, trading boredom for mild, begrudging concern. 'kirjava went to check on him, i have no idea what's going on.'
maddox wavers, eyes still trained on the slowly shrinking figure of the stranger in the distance. he's tempted to catch up, to get to what he assumes may very well be the root of this problem, but whatever moosely is relaying seems urgent. "i'll go take a look, then. can't seem to catch up anyway."
he opens the portal, takes one last mildly regretful look at the fleeing figure, and steps through. just as his eyes adjust to the new scene once more and he catches a glimpse of kirjava, teeth bared and claws outstretched; kasimir, with a blade of crimson flame in hand, moosely chimes in once more. 'i think he might have stabbed zephyr as well.'
"what- you couldn't tell me that earlier?"
( back on the surface, moosely turns back to zephyr with the equivalent of a shrug. "mads went to check on him." )
in the shifting shadows of the underground sewers, there's something amiss. maddox takes a wild guess, grasps at thin air for an exorcism spell, and lets it fly.
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[attr="class","itemstitle"]ITEMS USED.
[attr="class","itemsicon"]
[attr="class","itemssprite"] detection
[attr="class","itemssprite"] aquatic boots
[attr="class","itemssprite"] exorcism
[attr="class","itemssprite"] scroll name here
[attr="class","itemssprite"] scroll name here
tl;dr gives up following the stranger to go check on kasi, shrugs wildly and attempts to use exorcism
kasimir burovski ✨ does not even wince upon flinging his own familiar away with a knockerbacker; with single-minded purpose, he hurtles towards maddox rothscus ✨ with a blade of fire, ready to behead the purifier. the hastily executed exorcism slams into him just as he reaches the other witch, diverting his path enough so a killing blow does not land - unfortunately for maddox, it comes a little too late for injury to be fully averted. the sword shears through his arm, even as kasimir collapses to his knees, clutching his head.[break][break]
has the exorcism succeeded? enough so, it seems, that kasimir's mindless inclination to attack appears to be challenged.[break][break]
unfortunately, there is not so much time to wonder - the moment the first unauthorised use of magic was detected within the sewers, alarms have sounded with the nearest patrols. on the surface, a pair of helios knights rush to the site and immediately spot Zephyr Hart, spock, and moosely.[break][break]
"call for a medic!" the older knight orders, before striding forwards towards zephyr. "who are you and what's the situation? who injured you? who used unauthorised magic?" she rattles off the questions in quick succession while her partner rushes off to call for medical attention.
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thread-specific rules
this thread is not death enabled. maddox has lost an arm, with potential for further severe injury applicable to all participants. [break][break] you have 3 days to reply in reaction to this post. two missing rounds will result in an elimination from the thread. [break][break] maddox rothscus ✨Zephyr Hartkasimir burovski ✨
Post by maddox rothscus ✨ on Jul 13, 2018 6:17:58 GMT
he knows kasimir; he has fought beside him on multiple occasions, felled beasts of terrifying size, even traded blows in a friendly spar. he would like to think that he finds the flames familiar now, and truth be told he does, just not when they’re headed towards himself at breakneck speed and the intention to rend his head from his shoulders.
maddox throws up an arm reflexively, a wind wall called into action a split second too late. for a moment it is relief -- he sees the flicker in kasimir’s eyes and the trajectory of the blade diverted -- and then it is-
odd at first, as though simply unbalanced. then the pain hits, and his world explodes.
( on the surface, moosely says faintly, “oh.” there is a crack and a thud, and the familiar crashes gracelessly onto his knees, his left front leg neatly severed from knee downwards. the blood begins pooling immediately, dark crimson and rapidly spreading, uncauterized and open. for once, moosely does not say anything, only staring at zephyr with glassy, wide eyes. )
his mind is numb white and empty and his vision swims; he can’t breathe. he closes his eyes and tries to catch his breath. it doesn’t work, and he’s aware of how the darkness swims now like an oil-dark slick and how his breath is shivery-sharp, and how he can smell burnt flesh and hear someone making a noise like a wounded animal. he opens his eyes again and his vision is blotting out, and abruptly he is convinced this is how he dies: after a hundred and one encounters with death and flirting with danger, maddox rothscus is felled none other than by someone he calls friend.
he thinks for a moment that the pain might be fading but then it returns at full force with hellfire shrieking through his veins and barbed wire clawing the length up his arm and oh god it hurts oh god it hurts and now he is doubled over in the corner of the sewers dimly aware of faint fire-light and green eyes that he cannot see.
his breath leaves him in helpless choking gasps of pain, shuddering and struggling. the air is acrid and it drives daggers into his throat. the pain rips his thoughts into a million disjointed pieces and sends him on a treasure hunt for coherency yet somehow he is still searching for a word to label the way everything has locked into place; he cannot do anything but clutch his arm to his gut and try to breathe; he does not want to admit it he does not want to think about it but he is suddenly, truly, scared.
[attr="class","gearcore"] "What!? No-- tell 'im t' run!" Zephyr demands Moosely, panic laid bare in his tone.
But they are all too late.
Though he is still squinting and blinking against the dim afternoon light, he can still see well enough to witness the severing of the moose's leg. The crafter's eyes widen in alarm, despite how the light stings them and causes them to water. Zephyr knows what this means. If Moosely was hurt, that means that Mads was also-- his arm is also--
Sprocket shrieks.
When the Knights approach, Zephyr has just grabbed his portal which was linked to Maddox's and opened it. He didn't answer the woman. She could wait, but Mads could not. With the mana from the canisters in his thighs still pulsing through his body, he causes stone hands of Gaia to burst through the walls of the tunnel. He does not care about the destruction of property -- he doesn't care that Knights witness him. A dozen of the hands grab Maddox (what is left of him) and push him through the portal and back to the surface, while dozens more grab at Sirius to prevent his movement as much as possible. There is no gentleness towards the latter. When Maddox is partway through, Zephyr begins pulling with his own physical hands as well. Although he could feel the excess mana from the canister dry up, the crafter does not let the strength of the spell waver. He'll accept the inevitability of mana exhaustion. It's the least he deserves for running away.
When his brother is back on the surface, the portal is shut. His vice grip hands do not release from Maddox. "Please help him. Please," Zephyr asks (begs) the Knights. It wasn't uncommon for the crafter to feign innocence and weakness around strangers to get what he wanted -- tactics learned from joining Leviathan when he was still just a child, he supposed -- but this time, the feelings of helplessness were very real. "Our friend's gone fuckin' mad." There. Three out of four questions answered. He didn't intend to answer any more unless these Knights were going to prove themselves useful.
Post by kasimir burovski ✨ on Sept 19, 2018 2:00:19 GMT
blue moon
you saw me standing alone
kirjava snarls as the spell flings her away without even an once of mercy, claws skidding against floor as she twists, lands, and flings herself at kasimir again. but she is too little, too far; she is fire woven and fire born, and her partner is immune to the flame that burns in their soul - there is nothing she can do. nothing, but to watch with horrified eyes as he bears down upon maddox with a searing beam of condensed light striking out with purpose. "KASIMIR!" she roars in a last, desperate attempt to shatter the fog clouding his mind ( their bond trails out into the void, the terrible void where she could scream and scream and scream and he would not hear; the void, where she is not, sees not, exists not; the void, where she is small and shivering and all too alone ); she roars, and the void swallows the echo.
but suddenly, a schism opens, pierces through the all-consuming nothingness; rends apart the abyss to reveal the crimson-bright beneath. whatever the spell is, whatever the void is, it tears itself asunder from her partner's mind, and she can feel him again, she can feel him-
and it is
confusion-realisation-horror-nonoNO- stopstopstop and desperation soul-deep and anguished, how-why-what but it does not matter, it is TOO LATE MADDOX
and even she shrinks back as his brain contorts in confusion-horror and desperation-despair and a wealth of self-loathing and pain. he crumples to his knees, fingers digging into his head while the last shreds of the spell rip themselves out of his neuronal network and dissipate into the air. kirjava cannot help it, cannot resist the bone-deep need to press against her witch, reassure herself that he is real, that he is back.
kasimir's fingers shake as they tangle in her fur, but his attention is elsewhere. "m-maddox?" he rasps, looking up with eyes shattered like bottleglass smashed into the ground, like the breaking of his mind is reflected in the fragmentation of his gaze; maddox looks back in true fear and that shatters him more than any physical blow ever could. but he deserves it, he deserves it; kasimir does not know how it has happened but he is responsible for maddox's injury, maddox's fear-
maimed, he thinks with horror like the thought digs fingers into his chest and pries apart his ribs and carves out his beating heart; maimed, permanence, not even guerra, not even xuan jin is this loathsome; and kasimir has done so to one of the few people he truly cares about-
he makes a wordless, distressed sound low in his throat and reaches out, reaches out for maddox with healing light flickering between his fingers, reaches out on instinct, running on the need to fix this, to offer recompense, to do anything to erase the expression on his friend's face; but then a portal splits space open, but then earthen hands erupt from the walls, and any words he might have had are gone with the moment. the hands grab maddox, grab him too with movements too rough for the stone that curls tight around his limbs; kasimir lets them, quiet and unresisting even when he sees the knights standing on the other side.
zephyr will fix maddox, will take care of his brother ( he has to, has to be okay ); whatever the knights will do to kasimir, whatever punishment they decide on, whatever recompense maddox or zephyr or aeris might demand - he deserves it.
"Spirits guide me," the older knight mumbles under her breath, shocked at maddox rothscus ✨'s current state. Immediately, she turns and calls to her companion, who'd already run quite a ways away in search of a medic: "QUICKLY!" [break][break] She kneels down next to the two crumpled brothers and works on tying her crimson sash around what was left of the purifier's arm. The speed of the descending sword did not leave enough time for the cut to fully cauterize, and the last thing she wanted to happen was for this stranger to bleed out before help arrived. "We are going to do everything we can to heal you both. Please understand, we are trying to stop this before more people get hurt." Once the fabric is tied tightly around the stub, she reaches for Zephyr Hart's gate, which he had let go of in his efforts to pull Maddox from the sewers. "If you want to explain why you were wandering around a restricted zone, now would be the time to do it." [break][break] As the gate is re-opened, revealing the heavily damaged tunnel covered in petrified hands, the Knight's partner returns with a familiar woman. Once her partner returns, the older Knight begins restraining kasimir burovski ✨ and untangling him from the stone-handed prison.
[attr="class","stafftemptextarea"]
[attr="class","stafftemptitle"] lunacea joyheart
Of course it just had to be that reckless Rothscus boy -- the same one who'd caused a commotion in Ezra's tent during one of her visions. He just didn't learn, did he... [break][break] "I won't be able to do much outside of my lab -- I have just a few potions and salves on me," the Helios Knights' second in command says as she takes one look at Maddox's arm. She certainly wouldn't be able to fix that without a highly specialized (and very expensive) potion. It was not something to be given away so freely to a troublesome commoner. [break][break] "Drink this," she instructs, voice soft but firm, as she hands a cherry red potion to Zephyr. Then, turning to Maddox, she warns: "I apologize, but this is going to sting." An understatement. Before he has a chance to protest, she smears a healing salve across Maddox's wound, painting her fingers in blood, but sealing the injury and mending the flesh. [break][break] "You will live today, foreigner. But I must ask... how, pray tell, did any of you come to be wandering about our city's sewer system?"
[attr="class","stafftempsubtext"]
thread-specific rules
this thread is not death enabled. maddox has lost an arm, with potential for further severe injury applicable to all participants. [break][break] you have 3 days to reply in reaction to this post. two missing rounds will result in an elimination from the thread. [break][break] maddox rothscus ✨Zephyr Hartkasimir burovski ✨
[attr="class","gearcore"] He can already feel the mana drain eating away at his awareness. Or maybe it was the blood loss? His body sways slightly when he lets go of Maddox to allow the Knight to bind his arm, and he realizes he needs to plant his hands on the ground for the support. Sprocket clings to his neck -- he knows it would be easier if she wasn't materialized, but he doesn't want her to leave. They're not quite out of the woods yet.
Although the woman knight speaks in a kind and reassuring tone, she keeps asking questions, and Zephyr has to really force his mind to come up with a reasonable excuse. "I told you, th' guy back there went mad--" he starts, but thankfully the other Knights returned before he needed to say more.
What an alien concept -- feeling relief, of all things, when the Knights' second in command showed up. Everything was going so terribly wrong, and he had reached the dregs of desperation where he thought a Knight couldn't possibly make it worse. "What... does it do?" he asks as he gingerly takes the vial. He wants to believe that it's a health potion for the knife in his shoulder, but hasn't quite lost so much sense that he'd down it without question.
And then Lunacea also asks about how this all occurred, and his heart sinks as he realizes she remembers Maddox from casting a purification spell in Ezra Virgo's tent, the same day the seer had burst out screaming in a wild fit and the mana in the area felt like it'd been drained away. "We were walkin' past here... n' our friend in there..." oh, one of the Knights had opened the gate, he realizes long after she'd already begun retraining the limp Sirius. He pauses. Fuck, his focus was a mess. "Our friend started actin' possessed. He went down there, n' we followed him, n' then he started attackin' us..." Had he forgotten anything important? Oh, right, the mystery guy that they'd followed down there. But in his current state, the crafter couldn't quite figure out how to fit that into the story.
In truth, he couldn't be too concerned about if the lie was any good at the moment. "You're... sure he'll be ok..?" the crafter asks in a hoarse whisper, staring hard at the master alchemist.
Post by maddox rothscus ✨ on Sept 24, 2018 8:49:50 GMT
the world is white and black and fading at the edges, vision oscillating between fog-blurred shapes and terror-sharpened clarity -- he is aware, then, of green eyes like vicious dragon-scale and his name called out treacherously soft, a hand offered ( he flinches, presses back further against the unrelenting rough brick walls, a sound half whimper half snarl caught somewhere in his throat ).
then the walls fold around him, an earthen grasp solid and familiar; then there is daylight, bright and blinding and oh so very welcome. his vision swims again -- goes black for a second as the open wound brushes gracelessly against something and pain explodes -- and then he is still here, still awake, but now wishing desperately for the relief of unconsciousness. anything to make it stop hurting.
the familiar fades now, not with fanfare as he is wont to do, but with no more than a whisper. he stayed materialised only to see his witch alive with his own two eyes, and with that requirement ( barely ) met, he leaves a pool of dark blood where he lay.
maddox thinks he can hear distant voices shouting, and somewhere far away is the sound of approaching footsteps. someone grabs his arm -- again, he struggles involuntarily, agony and confusion alike sending him kicking out in a blind panic; he chances a glance downwards/upwards/sideways and he sees the uniform, he sees the crimson sash, he sees blonde hair and blue eyes and these are knights knightsknights-
no no no-
but he has neither energy nor ability to do anything but lie there, helpless, panicked, his mind tangled in blood-stained barbed wire. for a second once more, the pain lances through him as the healing salve takes hold, effective but no less painful. lunacea asks him something. he doesn’t quite register it. he should probably answer it, but losing an arm does rather remarkable things to your ability to formulate a coherent answer.
the best he can do is to rasp out, distantly, “what he said.” it takes most, if not all, of his energy to simply keep from fading out right now; earlier, he might have been perfectly fine with it, but the presence of the knights changes many things.
"It's just a health potion... Oh, I'm so sorry, I should have introduced myself. I'm Lunacea Joyheart, second in command of the Helios Knights. You're in good hands, I assure you," she answers Zephyr with a warm smile, despite the wounded Rothscus lying at her feet. [break][break] For a few pensive moments, it seems like Luna might not believe the brothers' story as she glances at Zephyr and then back to Maddox. Or, perhaps she didn't fully trust their vagueness. However, she admits: "That matches up with what many others have been experiencing around the city." None had been quite this effective in their maliciousness, however. "Imogen, Maria, please escort these two to a hospital so their injuries can be properly examined. I'll take the third back to Hall for questioning and to test for residual signs of whatever spell was affecting him." [break][break] The stump which was once Maddox's arm is now in a stable condition, at least. Having done what she could, Luna wipes her hands across a Helios-red cloth before tucking it away and standing up. "Like I said, he will survive this," she says to Zephyr gently, "With good support and time, I'm sure he'll be ok." [break][break] She puts a hand on the crafter's shoulder as an act of encouragement before walking over to Kasimir, whose arms had since been bound by tight constraints which did not even allow the fingers movement. "I understand that someone else is likely to blame for all this--" she says as she reaches towards the Silvertongue's shoulder. Instead of a pat, however, Kasimir would feel the light sting of a needle in his neck, "-- but, considering the circumstances, this is for both of our safety." The awareness of the assassin would begin to slip, and he would fall into unconciousness over the course of the next minute.
[break][break]The other two knights complied with Luna's instructions, ready to tend to the two injured males. "Can you stand? Ah, I can bring my familiar to carry you, i-if you've lost too much blood?" the younger one asks. She's clearly more unnerved by the lost limb than the others, but trying to hide her worry and sympathy beneath her helpfulness. "I'm... also pretty sure you'll heal faster if your familiar goes back to its native strata," she notes to Zephyr.
[attr="class","stafftempsubtext"]
thread-specific rules
this thread is not death enabled. maddox has lost an arm, with potential for further severe injury applicable to all participants. [break][break] you have 3 days to reply in reaction to this post. two missing rounds will result in an elimination from the thread. this is the final round before the last NPC post [break][break] maddox rothscus ✨Zephyr Hart [break]kasimir burovski ✨ (1 missed round)
Post by maddox rothscus ✨ on Sept 26, 2018 1:52:11 GMT
silence meets his words for a while, and maddox wonders if lunacea does not believe him. he is lying at her feet, only barely saved from bleeding out entirely, too drained to do anything more than simply keep awake; does she think he possesses the capacity to lie right now? ( frankly, he does not know. training with leviathan has put him through countless hellish scenarios in the name of ‘preparation’, but never have they cut off an arm before. )
the world continues to fade in and out, light and shadow alike leaking through the corners of his vision. it wavers like an underwater vision, voices distorted; it would be so easy to just close his eyes and rest; it wasn’t as if his life was in any danger anyway. he lets the chatter wash over him, head tilting ever so slightly to follow the conversations as they go, listening but not quite comprehending. he watches as lunacea moves over to kasimir, and the scarlet-haired summoner slumps over ( and he is certain he should feel something like vindication or relief, but he feels nothing but a bone-deep exhaustion ).
‘can you stand?' is all that he really comprehends of the younger knight’s question, one to which he gives a blank look. does he look like he is in any state to stand? nonetheless, he tries. maddox staggers to his feet, unbalanced and unsteady; almost trips and falls back down, braces himself brusquely against the knights’ shoulder with a half-hearted muttered apology.
“i’ll walk,” he says, as though he isn’t swaying as he stands and the world is spinning wildly around him. he doesn’t want more help from the knights, though logically he ought to accept what he can get. being even more indebted to the knights for their help, however, is the last thing he wants.
Post by kasimir burovski ✨ on Sept 28, 2018 2:28:36 GMT
blue moon
you saw me standing alone
there is still a fracturance of mind, still feels like a thousand tiny fissures have torn open his brain and poured molten lava through the channels, but his mind is his own ( is it, though? how would he know? how would he know? ) and that is more important, far more important than any potential damage he might feel. kasimir grounds himself in the pain, chains himself to materiality and the present with his ringing ears and stinging eyes and the knowledge that he can do no more harm wrapped up in the earthen hands as he is ( liar, liar, he could set the world on fire, he could- he could- stop it )
there are no words; his eyes dart towards maddox without conscious thought but drop as soon as the man comes into view. easier to look at the ground, look away, pretend for a single moment more that this is not the end of the burgeoning something they were, pretend that this might not be the last time he sees the purifier. the hands that pry him out of the stone and bind his arms tight almost seem too gentle in the light of that realisation. he sways in their grasp, desperately clinging onto coherence from the mess he has made - should he say something? attempt to apologise? offer repentance, penance, a promise never to darken maddox's door again? last words that never come, that cling to his throat with emotion unsuited for the assailant and not the victim; there is nothing he can say that can ever encompass the chaotic flood of everything he wishes he could express, nothing that could ever ( or deserves to ) make this right.
and even now, even through everything that has happened this day, all the consequences looming overhead the horizon, he cannot help but worry what this would mean for his sister, their coven. what this means for their already damaged reputation, for the fledgling witches in silvertongue at no fault but for a connection to them, for the civilians who rely on them. what this means for sundial, to have someone able to mind control so subtly and skilfully running amok.
it is almost a relief when the needle pricks at his neck and he slides away into oblivion.
[attr="class","gearcore"] Zephyr supposed that he could walk around with a knife sticking out of his chest, and could probably make it to a hospital or healer before passing out... but then that would be an expression of distrust towards the Knights. Open distrust bred more of the same, and he was pretty sure he couldn't manage any more suspicion against them right now. And so -- a bit disgruntled over the situation, he drinks it.
Moments later, he sees the glint of a needle flash into Sirius's neck. The gravity of the action doesn't hit him immediately -- that with sleight of hand like that, the unassuming contact from the Knight just moments ago could have easily been lethal if she'd desired. He would later recall it while in recovery, and he would not forget it.
"I... gimme a second..." Zephyr asks the younger Knight as he shifts his body experimentally. He honestly wasn't sure if he could walk after draining his mana stores dry like that. His prosthetics felt disconnected, like dead weight. But, they had separate, smaller mana canisters to power them in just such an occasion (not that he'd actually had many chances to test it, though), so, at least theoretically, they should work. So then, were his legs or his flickering awareness to blame for the his struggled attempts to stand?
If something was broken, he knew using more magic would be an impossibility for him at this point. Spock, drained, and of little help beyond moral support, weakly pats her witch on the cheek before fading out of the material plane. He felt like he wasn't whole with her gone -- but that was merely one of many discomforting sensations swirling through him at the moment.
Hands pressing the ground, swaying as he tries to find his balance, he eventually pushes his legs to stand properly. Good. This was progress. Mads had already went on ahead, and he had to struggle with his instinct to catch up to him. (He'd fall if he walked too quickly -- he'd definitely fall...). " 'm good," he finally says to the younger Knight girl, following his brother and praying neither of them passed out.