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Post by Gavin Graves on Jul 27, 2021 18:44:26 GMT -8
Gavin's inquisitive mind was interested in the possibility of seeing and maybe interacting with another world. After all, delving into the Hedge was his thing. Gravewright was the kith he had the most interest in experiencing from the offered list. Although he figured that the gag orders and what Rowan had probably been through recently might be a bit much to ask of the man to recount even in abstract. He decided to let it go and hope for a second opportunity.
"Yeah, alright, let's not try to see the future or read the bones or whatever. That might be a bit of a reach," Gavin was genuinely put off by the concept of seeing possible futures. The thought of it made him look at the whimsical features flowing around the two Lost. The phantom faces and eyes in the darkness. The branches that looked to be threatening limbs of something sinister. He knew these things to be false and resolved to keep that understanding and not blur that line.
"Whisperwisp you say. That one like a Will O Wisp sort of thing from Celtic legendry--like a spooky light?" He was either not familiar with the kith or kidding around to prompt the correct understanding, it wasn't clear.
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Post by Rowan on Jul 28, 2021 16:06:08 GMT -8
"Fae informant, actually. Social chameleon with a knack for hearing things. And Oracles don't read the future, there's contracts for that. It's more like a magical common sense that won't shut up."
He cracked his fingers, each joint sounding like ice giving way when you walk on it. He flexed his icy talons before slowing down, realizing he might be looking like a maniac. "So, um, whenever you're ready."
He shuddered, not from the cold, but from how exposed Gavin made him feel. If there was something Rowan knew, is that the dark places didn't scare him - he was what made the dark places scary. But in an open, honest to god brawl, there was no way he could stand up to Gavin. It was a sobering thought.
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Post by Gavin Graves on Jul 28, 2021 19:55:47 GMT -8
"Perfect. Time to start hearing voices." Gavin chuckled in quiet reservation, "At least I'll win the arguments with them."
Gavin moved further away to give Rowan some distance. Instincts were sometimes overwhelming and a few extra steps for the man to invoke Light Shy might make the difference.
He took a few deep breaths to help remain steady, "Alright, hit me."
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Post by Rowan on Jul 30, 2021 15:21:36 GMT -8
He watched as the Beast put some distance between them. "Um. I actually need to touch you for this to work. Is that- is that something you're comfortable with?"
Lately, ever since the debacle in Twilight, physical contact had been pretty much case by case for Rowan. Sometimes, everything was great. but others times, it was as if the ghostly hordes were ripping him to shreds all over again. He had tried to review those moments in his mind, to find what the trigger had been, but he hadn't figured it out so far.
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Post by Gavin Graves on Jul 30, 2021 15:39:43 GMT -8
"Oh, uh, yeah." He held for an apprehensive moment at the increased distance before approaching again.
"I was trying to give you some extra room in case of a bad reaction. Hiding is better than running though, contrary to pop culture." Gavin then repeated his self-calming breaths. It was easy for him to write off whatever caution Rowan was feeling about the situation as being the Razorhand's own fault. He believed himself a monster waiting for a time to happen. The flashes from his nightmares had confirmed his concern over and over again so much as to be real. Real enough anyway.
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Post by Rowan on Jul 31, 2021 15:07:52 GMT -8
"Let's hope it won't come to that."
Slowly, keeping his hands in sight, Rowan approached Gavin as if he were a wild animal. Really, he had no idea what he was doing, but if putting your hands up can stop a bunch of dinosaurs from jumping you, it should work just fine. With slow, deliberate movement, he called Glamour to his fingertips and set to work.
Rowan sank his talons into the Beast's face as he scoured the possibilities for the desired effect.
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Post by Gavin Graves on Aug 1, 2021 0:22:27 GMT -8
Gavin was initially as relaxed as any manic cassowary could be. He was not resisting the magic that flowed upon contact, however Rowan had not warned Gavin he was going to apply claws, let alone dig them into his face. With adrenaline immediately surging his primordial amber eyes shot wide open. Gavin raced to snare any apparent intent from the Darkling's actions and eyes.
Any subtle nuance that might explain the action was lost on the Beast in the galvanizing pain of the moment. Reflexes saw to his hands rising to control the offending limb in a single swift motion where now-lengthened talons came to rest across the soft flesh of Rowan's wrist and the inside of the arm near the shoulder. The tension applied to Rowan's limb made his pulse pronounced and unignorably constricted within. A flinch in the wrong direction would easily lead to an open vein. Pressure from Gavin might open an artery.
Gavin let out a low rumbling growl in a dire warning.
The magic Rowan invoked had continued to work its way into Gavin's being, slowly at first. The chilling touch from the Snowskin's claws reflavoured the pain in Gavin's face.
Gavin's expression turned at once from feral anger to bewilderment and then again to panic when the glamour he had set to sharpening his claws failed in manifesting as he expected. When drawing on the dread blessing of the Razorhand it usually meant claiming a limb from the victim.
Instead Gavin somehow heard the movements of a herd of wild horses that were grazing over the ridge a few hundred feet away. He was aware of the buzzing from hundreds of insects above the tree line dancing in the moonlight. He could hear the chittering noises from rodents in a burrow some fifty yards behind him. There were more animal noises and insect noises that began blurring together in an indiscernible mess. It became overwhelming. To Gavin, it was like a full season from a nature documentary had been cranked to its maximum volume and all episodes were playing simultaneously. It was too much for him.
He broke the hold with a shove backward forcing Rowan a few paces away. A cool breeze now flowed through the holes in the clothing where Gavin had been threatening a moment prior. Shaking his head he hoped to lose the unfiltered wall of sound from the wilderness. He pressed his hands to his ears in an attempt to block it out, to no avail. When he looked back at Rowan he wore fear and his eyes were now a glossy black like those of a corvid.
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Post by Rowan on Aug 2, 2021 12:29:32 GMT -8
Rowan fixed the gaze, his hand covering the holes in his clothes. He had taken a few steps back, both out of worry for his well-being and to give Gavin space to acclimate.
"Don't try to block it out, it won't help. Acknowledge the sounds and let them go. Don't try to follow them. Focus on my voice, focus on you other senses."
He had been there before, the first time he had changed. He had been alone with no one to guide him back. The newly born Whisperwisp had spent days locked away in his apartment, trying to overcome the sensory overload. Pillows, blankets, egg cardboard, he had lined the walls with every little thing that he thought could have helped. He had slept in the tub, practically submerged to make. it. stop. But the Wyrd didn't concern itself with trivial things like Reality and the laws of physics.
At least now, that shitty experience could be put to use to help someone else.
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Post by Gavin Graves on Aug 2, 2021 21:47:34 GMT -8
As much as the Beast was overwhelmed by the sudden influx of sensations and despite the odds stacked against him, he retained enough focus to follow Rowan's suggestions. He wanted desperately to run over to one or two of the sources to confirm their presences were real and not imaginings brought on by the wanton whims of the Wyrd or to simply withdraw until it stopped. That proved unnecessary with the Darkling's experienced assistance.
He looked in the direction of the ridge and picked out the sound from the wall of noise, "Horses." Then let it drop back into the background.
"A canine breathing and walking on hard scrabble," dropping that channel as well.
Glancing toward a mound in the distance, "Nearly dormant ants or termites?" He raised the question, but didn't linger.
Each signal pulled from the ether and given its name or callsign and put back diminished the pained expression until it no longer looked like he was trying to filter the pain in his ears by squinting his eyes.
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Post by Rowan on Aug 3, 2021 15:03:56 GMT -8
"There. There. How does the suit feel? Hmm. Too crass?"
Rowan understood that the continued use of the contract had left him little attachment to kiths. Why bother liking one when you could have all of them?
"Take some time to adjust, then let's try something. You will close your eyes and I'll hide. Then, you have to find me and tell me you found me without moving from this spot. The inherent understanding of the kith should allow you to do this much." He looked at Gavin expectantly, but found the Beast preoccupied.
"Something wrong?"
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Post by Gavin Graves on Aug 12, 2021 10:46:58 GMT -8
"It's a lot. There's just so much going on all at once. I feel like I'm hearing everything from every angle with no filters. Did you know there are so many insects? Sooo many," he dragged 'so' on for a bit and nearly drowned in a shell-shocked expression before being dragged back from the plane of infinite sound by something Rowan had said. He nodded absently before being swallowed again by the torrent.
He just stood there for a while turning in various directions out of simple animal habit of facing the thing being observed. "If I try and tune in and out like a radio it seems to be a little less crazy."
After acclimatizing for what must have been five minutes at least--if Rowan had interjected at points in that time, Gavin didn't notice--he took three long slow breaths before coming back to a semblance of awareness. "It's very different. There's no more driving urge to slaughter people that stick their claws in my face when they say they're going to touch me," he warned with a joking tone, the primal anger no longer vibrating through his nerves. "It's peaceful, relatively speaking. Well it might be, if everything would just shut up for a second."
It had taken some time for Rowan's words to catch up in Gavin's mind. It was like a full computer buffer where the words' appearance had significantly lagged behind the author. "Sure, we can play hide and seek." The concept of hide and seek alone in the dark in the woods that Gavin knew well and Rowan did not was amusing to him now that he no longer felt the peculiar dark impulses to which he had become accustomed. While Rowan maneuvered around the area, Gavin had an absent wonder what drives this new form would instill in him if given the time. He was still a Beast, driven by instinct, reforged into a kind of Arcadian spy. Perhaps he would be driven to hunt people's secrets: gossiping and prying into all the details of everyone's lives. He shuddered at the thought. "Whenever you're ready."
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Post by Rowan on Aug 18, 2021 18:33:12 GMT -8
Rowan did, in fact, interject. Several times. With emphasis. But after several minutes, it was obvious that Gavin was not gonna react. It was all taking too long. Sure, it had taken the Darkling just as long to adjust the first time, but it had been in private. Rowan hadn't inflicted in on-
Rowan winced from his own thought process. This is why you don't have any friends, he berated himself. Shoving his hands back into his pockets, he simmered in his self-loathing, waiting for the Beast to snap out of it. There was some progress, at least, because he was able to recognize the pattern before it spiralled. How long had he considered others as nuisances? He couldn't remember. It was a general sense of mistrust with a healthy dose of arrogance. He clicked tongue.
Finally, Gavin came to with... sarcasm? It was probably meant as a joke, but Rowan couldn't find the punch line. "I... don't get it. Anyway."
"It helps to have a goal. So listen to the way I breathe. Five seconds. Four. Three..."
"Ok. Close your eyes."
Rowan moved. He was going full tryhard mode, but he at least made sure to not make any sound as he stepped softly out of the lightly. He didn't need to go very far. It was dark enough that the average person would have to strain to spot him. But sight wasn't what they were focusing on. He made no moves to conceal his breathing and waited for the telltale whispers.
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Post by Gavin Graves on Aug 18, 2021 22:30:02 GMT -8
Gavin closed his eyes a few moments behind the Darkling's request. He wasn't looking in Rowan's direction at the time as the flutter of a nighttime bird had taken his immediate attention in another direction. The Beast still lagged behind the world in processing the inputs, but it had become better than impossible to sort it out.
B r e a t h i n g
He steadied his own breathing when he realized he had zoned in on it instead of his target. Focusing on it, internally naming it, allowing it to linger a moment in the mind, he had taken control of that channel. Then he set it aside. With his eyes closed the noise in his chest had taken on a special presence when he pushed it into the background.
R o w a n ' s b r e a t h i n g
Casting his hearing out into the wild he began to hunt for similar breathing in the discordant symphony in the night.
He filtered through the various nearby presences. Mice and rats scurrying about, a chipmunk sleeping in a tree. He was still losing his focus on the various wildlife.
A signature was what he needed. Something to filter out the bulk.
While he pondered the problem he continued locking onto each nearby thing and moving on to the next when satisfied it was not his target.
Then it occurred to him. His own breath. It would be similar. Coming back to it he studied the pattern and strength of it. Pushing his senses like they were outside of himself a few feet away he listened again. Then farther and from a different angle. Then farther still. And again.
This time he did not send his own breathing into the background. He cast it out with his senses and sought its echo.
"There you are," he announced loudly over the din of sound only he could hear and somehow from both his mouth and where Rowan was standing in the dark. "Echo. Okay, that's ... strange." Echo indeed.
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Post by Rowan on Aug 24, 2021 0:46:47 GMT -8
"Good. Nice job," he answered back, trusting the Beast would hear it. He came out of hiding, relinquishing the darkness with a wistful look. "Do you think you can keep going? I'd like to ask you a few questions about the differences you feel."
This had all been, after all, for research purposes. Both parties were supposed to take away something from this experience. Rowan looked at Gavin expectantly while the Beast marvelled at his new-found capabilities. "You'll find whispering works just as well, if not better. More subtle, too."
"If it's too much, we can rain cheque. I need you to be able to reflect on the before and after, and you can't do that if you're tired." They were both grownups, capable of gauging the own limits. Undoubtedly, the strain on Gavin had been far greater, which was why the Darkling gave the option of stopping there for the night. Shaking off one's skin could be very taxing.
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Post by Krakenbox on Sept 12, 2021 10:36:41 GMT -8
Given new perspective and Autumn ties, the pair eventually part ways...
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