Inbox - Fade Rift

[nonvenomous]

Book/crystal/correspondence/action/whatever you desire.

Comments

[charmoffensive]

[ A scoff-- ] A little dramatic. Surely a floor or two down would suffice.

[ A beat, then; ]

I don't know what you think of me and her, exactly, but she is very probably one of the first people I've met willing to give a damn about either of us. And it never struck me as a bad thing, that.

[nonvenomous]

She is deeply unstable, and demands total devotion with a knife held to her own throat. She has work to do.

Until then she is dangerous.

[ Richard sets his glass back aside, empty. ]

Don't mistake coddling her bad behavior for chivalry.

[charmoffensive]

I'm not attempting to be chivalrous.

[ --that frustration rising again, on behalf of himself, a little bit on behalf of Athessa as well. ]

You were wrong, that time. I'm not some ridiculous-- whatever it was you said, being torn from a romance cover, all that. I don't believe she views me that way, at the very least.

[nonvenomous]

Athessa defines her sense of worth by the depth and purity of a partner’s affection, escalates the stakes by falling wildly in love with them, and comes unglued when they aren’t prepared to reciprocate.

I believe that you may love her, Loxley, but not in a way that is going to break this cycle.

[charmoffensive]

[ A pensive silence follows. If he had more to say, it's given up on for now. Maybe the opposite thing, which he doesn't put to words very often: that it is nice for the whole tiefling thing not to matter. The qunari thing, in this instance.

At least it sounds a little like Richard is being listened to. Loxley asks; ]

And it has nothing to do with us being Rifters.

[nonvenomous]

Being a Rifter is certainly a complication.

[charmoffensive]

And I doubt the solution to mitigating broken hearts [ a return of light sarcasm ] is to never touch any.

I'm not only talking of Athessa.

[nonvenomous]

Did you call to ask for my insight or to give me yours?

[charmoffensive]

Must it be one or the other?

[nonvenomous]

No, of course. You're right.

[ Richard reaches to wind down the wick of his lamp, damping light down to the low glow of the fire. ]

Tell me more.

[charmoffensive]

[ Easy to imagine Richard turning in for the night, while Loxley sits out here on the docks and watches the water and opines about hearts and such. There is a pause, the searching kind, suspecting a joke at his own expense.

No easy read, there. ]

Anyone can vanish at any time, is really all. Not just us.

[nonvenomous]

Are you referring to death?

[heirring]

[At some point while crossing a courtyard, a flouncing shape separates itself from the background surrounding it in the corner of his eye and diverts to close distance. It is the beeline progress of a predator.]

Mr. Dickerson, there you are.

[nonvenomous]

[ Oh, no.

There is a catch in Richard’s step at the movement, even before he’s heard his name — a casual changing of direction that is too little, too late. He has to stop and turn at the sound of his name, the breath he’d taken in to brace himself with let out in a passably polite, ] Hello, Miss Poppell.

[ He is drawn; there are circles around his
eyes, and his collar is flared, the tunic under his vest pulled on from yesterday’s laundry for the sole purpose of this one errand he’s gotten dressed to attend to. ]

What a coincidence.

[heirring]

[Oh yes.]

Not at all. You see, I thought this morning that we might soon sit together and have a brief conversation and had resolved to keep my eyes peeled for the next opportunity to do so. And so here we are.

[She glances past him in the vague direction of his original course as she speaks, studying this or that for a moment before her attention snaps fully back. Wysteria smiles.]

Are you well?

[nonvenomous]

[ ...

As she looks past him, Richard looks through her. Preemptively rearranging his plans with the grim fortitude of one who knows he doesn’t have a choice. ]

Of course, [he says. ] Why do you ask?

[ His zeroing back in upon the return of her full attention is that much more intent. ]

[heirring]

It is customary to inquire. Do you have a moment to discuss a matter for Project Felandaris? It is not strictly related to our work in Bierstagg, but there is some measure of overlap and I believe the subject in question would interest you.

[She searches his person as she chatters along, subtly looking for some trace of—]

I trust your messenger is faring well too.

[nonvenomous]

[ It is customary to inquire.

Calculated or no, it’s the right answer.

He pulls in a breath so deep it strains at the buttons of his vest, and holds it, watching her search him for signs of Ribbon (he nods absently to the question of her health) while he reflects on how this might not have happened if he’d decided to spend another hour in bed. Bierstagg was very interesting. ]

I suppose, if it’s brief -- [ There are other conditions he should apply. He pauses to think on them. ]

[heirring]

[It takes just that slight pause for Wysteria to create a hook with her elbow about Richard's arm, and to begin sweeping him away back toward the edge of the courtyard.]

Marvelous. We will be only a moment, I assure you.

[There is a brazier here, likely left smoldering from the evening when it had been some touchstone for the changing of the Gallows' guard. But in this hour, it is merely the heart of a warm pocket on an otherwise very crisp autumn morning. She launches into it as she goes, lest he ptherwise find some reason to escape during the relocation.]

I have been thinking on us—Rifters, I mean. Not you and I, but on certain similarities we share both with one another and with the natives of Thedas. You recall, of course, Mr. Fitz's and I's survey and its findings related to the common theory of—planar, I believe was your description, realms not dissimilar to either the Fade or the Crossroads and so on.

Is it possible [—and here they have finally drawn in close to the brazier—] that the strange things we saw in Bierstagg are the result of a certain...compression, I suppose? Of those spaces. Prompted by the longevity of the open rift. As if the longer the rift remained open, the closer it drew other places to this one which caused the sort of distortions on record there.

[nonvenomous]

Mmm.

[ Brief.

His skepticism is palpable in the unconscious drag he creates for her progress across the yard, resistance so slight he doesn’t realize he’s dragging his heels. But that only takes a few meters for it to work itself out -- he yields to her momentum, particularly once he’s returned to awareness enough to clock the brazier ahead.

It’s warm. He shivers, paradoxically, once they’re in the wash of it, and looks down and aside to her, intent. Also, still hitched to her elbow. She has his attention. ]

...Why a compression and not simply a contamination?

[ What was he even fussing about before? ]

[heirring]

Compression, contamination, however you would like to describe it.

[She makes a small gesture with her free hand.]

The point of my curiosity is whether prolonged thinning of the Veil makes it simpler to reach past the Fade into the places which exist beyond it. Or, if we are to be cynical and assume we are all of us are merely products of the Fade, to manifest the illusions of that place here in this world somehow. For if we arrived through Rifts, and if other things sometimes do as well, I am curious if the right circumstances would allow someone to... encourage the phenomena. Similar to how a necromancer might summon a wisp.

crystal.

[acreage]

[ not immediately after their return from murderhaus, but not too far later, either. ]

How's that hand doing?

[ a safer question than something like how are you doing ]

[nonvenomous]

It's still attached.

[ Can't complain. ]

You sound to be in less pain.

[acreage]

The healers here know what they're doing.

[ and he's not just saying that because one's walking past as he answers, though the rustling and hushed voices in the background probably indicate where he is, at present. ]

Not quite the way I wanted to find out, [ yk, how good the infirmary is, compared to space-age standards, ] but I'll take it.

[nonvenomous]

That sounds -- [ potentially deadly, like something Riftwatch would discourage, like a good way to get more giant tentacle eels with human eyeballs ] dangerous, [ he decides, diplomatically. Scientific theory dictates at least a dozen follow-up questions about variables, controls, safety protocols, etc etc etc.

Richard says more quietly, and with greater intent: ]

Do you have a Rift in mind?