wrote:As your mind enters the world of the sensory stone, you notice that this memory starts in a fairly adverse setting. Your vision is black, but piercings of white light threaten at your tightly squinted periphery. Your head aches. Severely. Your tongue twangs with a bitter, burning sensation you just cannot quite identify. Something feels stuck in your throat, and before long an elongated, serpentine hiss emanates from your mouth as you start to come to.
"Hnnnssssssssss!" You immediately cough and gag at something in your throat.
"Eh... Again... Thank's for that blood Bethany. Know you could of made that an even worse situation if you wanted to..." you hear a male voice say.
"I always can, Rainrix dear. Do keep that in mind. Won't you," answers a very smooth feminine voice, although your physical state does not lend you much opportunity just yet to soak in the delectably luscious tones of that voice properly.
"Always do," the male replies to her rather determinedly.
The voices sound close by, to your left side and beyond your feet which you cannot yet see. The room hushes at your moaning and that same male speaks again.
"Eh... Careful... Careful."
You are opening and closing your mouth and curling your tongue, as if trying to clear something out of it.
"Bucket!" this 'Bethany' calls for.
"Err anyone got any water..?" remarks the masculine voice.
There is a scraping noise at your side as something is picked up near you. You try to open your eyes but it is still difficult to see what is happening. The shuffling of leathers and the dull 'tink' of metal indicates someone has taken something out. It sounds very close by, close enough for you to reach out and touch it.
"Water..." says a second feminine voice, this one touched with notes of concern. It feels very familiar to you.
"Ah you got some Sharon... Phew was going to go on a hunt..." says the male with a clear tone of relief. All you can do is moan as you feel your gag reflex coming to the fore from the depths of your oesophagus.
"Hnnnnnnhhhh!"
A supportive hand presses at your back, lifting you up. Just in time, too, as your stomach contents are given a good, old heave ho. A thoughtfully placed bucket catches everything, although that by no means prevents the automatic shuffling of feet you hear moving distinctively away from you.
"Well... That's no surprise," says the fellow.
".....Yick..." pipes up another male voice, this one with tones of something different to the other. You, however, are caught coughing and choking and more choking. One of your hands flails aimlessly as your search for something.
"Water..? Uh... Or..." says the first male voice.
"... Rain, is she clearing out what's in her throat?" Sharon's voice asks him. You wince and snort in deeply, trying to clear you throat of the revolting blockage, whatever it is.
"Give her the bucket?" says a third, more delicate feminine voice different from the other two. A hand starts to pat you on the back. You are not so sure it is particularly helpful, but it is rather effective.
"Well that would be my second guess... And... Eh..." says this male voice, now named as one Rain.
"Come on, get it all up," Sharon's voice says.
"...She's going to ruin that outfit. You really should have stripped her when you had the chance," remarks Bethany's voice, although it is hard to tell if it was spoken with sincerity or sarcasm.
"Woe be the outfit," Sharon bewails its impending fate.
"Eh... There's magic for that..." suggests Rain. Heh, don't you know that?
"Another one can be bought....or made, And ....yeah magic," quips the second male voice, agreeing with the others.
You do not really care at the moment, though, because you are concentrating on purging yourself of a disgusting half-vomit, half spittle glob which dribbles at the tip of your tongue as you start to haunch over, finally opening your eyes to look for something to spit into. Sharon has it. And she so kindly holds it out before you while everyone else starts to back away again.
"Ounce of prevention, darling," suggests Bethany's voice about your now-soiled outfit. You really liked that one, too. You spit, hoicking out as much as one great snort can carry. And again. And again.
"Nnnnhhhh!" you groan and slump your head down, the unpalatable taste of bile rich upon your taste buds.
"......You're alive..!" says the other male voice, apparently caught by surprise at your fate.
"There, now..," Sharon says encouragingly.
" 's th' brightness 'sgain?" you mumble, trying to piece together your surroundings. You feel like you've been here before. Comfortable bed. Bright lights. People speaking around you, discussing your near-death experience. Everything is still blurry, though. Your thoughts are disjointed, unclear, unfocused, as if you had just awoken from a thousand year sleep. Shapes are forming in front of you now, though. To your right is a rather quiet figure you realise you only just met in the Bazaar. Her angelic wings give her away at once. Namael. On your left side and by far the most supportive of your plight is the familiar, purple-clad Sharon. You start to think she really does care, actually. Flanking her on either side are two men. One familiar. Rainrix. He has some strange device on his arm, not that it is unusual for him, but it does give you a moment of pause. The other male is unfamiliar. An elf with long blonde hair. Your heart skips with mixed feelings. One is that insatiable sense of victory. The other is the undeniable pain of your severely weakened situation. At your feet is a rather amazingly shaped woman wearing delightfully black leathers. Her scent is utterly entrancing, the type that assails the olfactory glands before you even recognise where it is coming from. Bethany. She smiles at you, sloshing a quarter-full bottle of green liquid and says something rather cryptic.
"...Hair of the dog...?"
"Eh well... I guess you can thank Bethany for being here twice..," snickers Rain. You barely want to crane your neck in his direction.
"Welcome back to the land of the living, Cherry," Sharon says softly to you. That voice turns towards the end of your bed. "...Please get that out of here, Bethany."
"Err... bad Bethany..." Rainrix concurs.
"As you wish," she replies and gulps down the remainder of the bottle. The blonde elf looks down at you, shaking his head.
Then it suddenly hits you. You did it again. You rolled the dice, took a chance and it utterly failed to pay off. Rainrix's voice soon brings everything into sparkling clear perspective.
"The good news, technically you won that drinking contest. The bad news, you did die."
"Wait, she really did die?" Sharon interjects in surprise.
"Yes," Bethany nods in agreement. "I felt it."
You just groan again, squinting your eyes shut and rolling your head to one side. Great. Now whose debt do you owe your life? You died? But yet you live? Still? By whose graces, you wonder, only to be disturbed in your thoughts by the elf's voice.
"
Please don't do anything stupid like that Miss Cherry, and yes...you ..won..?"
"What they call a Pyrrhic victory on this one little Prime I visited," Bethany remarks. You might not have understood the word 'Pyrrhic', but you sure knew what she meant even before Bethany went on to explain it. This striving to prove yourself has to come to an end, but you're just so conceited, so proud of yourself and your abilities. Hey, you're not immune to diabolical poisons! that voice of conscience screams in your mind, if you would dare to listen to it.
"'One more triumph of this sort will utterly undo us,' I believe was the phrase," Bethany clarifies for you, as if it was not clear enough already. You sigh. Maybe it is finally getting through.
"All right. I'm going to scoot for now. Please take care, Cherry," Sharon's voice says. Perhaps a tone of disappointment, perhaps not? She must be getting sick of cleaning up after your mess.
"And thanks for being my first test subject," Rainrix snickers at you with an accompanying wink. "But uh... Seriously... Yeah that was pretty bad. You're kind of lucky I was around..."
"Hnnnnhhhh. . ." you reply in a zombie-like manner.
Sharon pats your shoulder gently with a nod alongside. "Just get some rest."
"Literally the hangover from hell I guess..?" Rainrix adds. Oh the poisonous truth of those words!
". . . Last. . . one. . ." you start to mumble to no-one in particular. "Promise. . ."
Really? Are you really going to promise that. You better, because you probably won't get another chance, you bubbing sod! Oh your mind is so cruel!
"Rule of threes, darling," Bethany comments, kissing her fingertips against her lips and then pressing them lightly into your hair. "Rule of threes."
". . . . uh-huh. . . . . third time might
Kill you...." says the elf, the emphasis on the finality of the kill.
"Good enough for me," Sharon agrees rather heartedly. "We'll top off the Rule of Threes with a nice glass of lemonade. No abyssal shite.
"....Yeah...." the elf concurs again.
"Bye Sharon," Namael turns and farewells your friend.
"Take care," Sharon replies and heads out.
"..Well...I hope you have a speedy recovery........I'll send flowers and nice
non abyssal treats for you..." the elf comments to you. You can only murmur in reply.
" . . . Mnnnh . . ."
"Isn't that sweet. Your suicidal drinking habits have earned you a new friend," Bethany remarks. You still can't quite tell if those words are sarcastic or not.
"Eh... Well... I'll help however I can but I think most of this now is down to your own body recovering," Rain says. He has been ever so helpful. Your respect for the man has increased considerably, especially after today.
The elf adjusted his golden locks. "Well I feel partly at fault here..."
How noble. The piker probably did not even touch the drink you gave him, and he still feels guilty for your plight? One would have thought perhaps the elf would have just laughed at your misery and left it at that. There could be more to this elf than you think. His sudden utterance in Abyssal confirms your thought immediately, but you are not in a state of mind to concentrate on what the hissed abyssal grumble was. You mumble something to the elf, but you're not really thinking particularly straight either.
""Beaten by a girl. . ."
"Mhmhm," Bethany grins and whatever the elf said.
"...Dark past an all.." He shrugs. "In the past as they say.."
"Dark future. Also." Bethany seems to want to make sure this elf stands corrected. Rainrix pulls his regular work gloves back on. You smirk at your Pyrrhic victory over the plucky elf, but deep inside wonder if it was all really worth it. The rest of their conversation becomes a bit of a blur to you until something dawns upon you, and it is Rain's familiar voice which provides the impetus.
"I'm just happy I didn't need to test out those gloves in actual surgery..."
" . . . Rain. . ?" you turn to look for that voice of his.
"...Eh..?"
". . . s'that Rain?" you ask again.
"Are you Rain?" the elf tries to help, asking him as well.
"Yeah. I uh... Mended you," he answers. But that gives you pause. You felt that voice. In your mind. Soothing. Calming. Healing.
"How did you. . . my head. . ?" you protest.
"I uh... Your head..? Uhm... I've learnt a few tricks... Don't worry... No digging about I swear," he defends himself. You cannot object as you still feel a bit groggy.
"Hnnnh."
"Just enough to try and work out how things were going, or try and transfer any pain and the such," he continues. You do believe him, though. You
felt it.
He smirked. "Now you have my blood and a little drop of Bethany's in you too. Well... You might of thrown up all of Bethany's..."
"Ewwww..." the elf protests. You knew better, though. Bethany's abyssal blood must have been applied as some kind of emergency cure for your poisoning. No wonder you are alive. But his blood too? Magic, probably?
"Bethany. . ?" you call out, leaning up to look for your fellow Sensate.
"That's right," she answers you.
"Fashion Leatherball ..." the elf chimes in. Yes, you remember now. She was wearing the elfskin leathers. That was, afterall, how you started to get yourself into this pile of blek.
"I do need to learn that spell..." Bethany says, but you're not really sure what she is talking about now. One thing you are sure of, though, is that clinging sensation upon your palate, that lingering warmth on your tongue where the blood had been dripped. It was not your first time to taste it, and would likely not be the last. Of the Abysmal Absinthe, though, you think you have finally had your last drop.
"You. . . gave me your blood?" you ask Bethany, just to make sure. The elf's comment does not help.
"
Ghoulish..." he says.
Bethany sighs. "
Please don't go around telling everyone. They'll all want to try it. Lazarus is already looking at me out of the corner of his eye. Hindel's son was this close to licking my throat at the masquerade."
"I don't even remember. . . cannot record that. Just. . . the bitterness. . ." you answer her, thinking over this whole experience now.
"Eh her outfit aint too bad... Huh..." Rain comments about Bethany's attire, seemingly at random because you cannot make sense of the timing.
"Alas. Well, I'm certain it was more or less the same as last time. But in better company," Bethany replies, pressing her hand over her breast.
"You know..." Rainrix interrupts. You can only blink and try to sit up again. You hand quickly finds its place against your throbbing forehead. "I've never tried this... But huh... I wonder... Cherry you want my memories of this maybe..? So you can record them later..? Or would that be a little too weird?"
"Hmm?" What is that barmy sod talking about now?
"This telepathy stuff is still rather odd for me too... But... Eh..." he continues. Before you can think of answering the words pop right on out.
"You would?"
Meanwhile, Bethany quietly mouths something along the lines of 'I'll leave you two alone' and slips out the door with a little smile and wave at each of you.
"The stones don't work like that. . . they only record one experience. . . one perspective." You did not quite catch the full implication of what he said the first time. You thought he wanted to record this whole experience on a sensory stone, a prospect which could only help your advancement in the Society. Apparently that was not what he meant at all.
"Huh... Well still then... Still want to know..? I mean I wouldn't do anything to your mind really like that without your permission obviously. I find the abilities scary myself... Uh... Most of the time I try to cut myself off from the more powerful of my abilities involving the mind anyway."
You still did not get it. "Alright. . . I'll take you to the Sensorium when I'm feeling better about myself."
"You don't want the memories yourself right now..? Err..." he shrugged just the same as you were mentally. Finally you get it!
"Oh. . ? You. . . you'd
implant them?" This was the most curious prospect, and worthy of a sensory stone in and of itself you thought, not to mention filling in that great black between when you sipped your drink and the present moment.
"Well... I can show you all that happened... I mean I guess you could call it something like that... Uh... Not going to overwrite anything," he reassures you. You seem genuinely interested by the possibility.
"Um. . . alright. . . here's hoping I don't lash back. . ."
"I just figured as a Sensate you might find it interesting too then... As... You can't remember anything... And eh... Okay sure best be prepared just in case."
"What. . . what do I have to do?" you ask him. You have had voices in your mind before, sure. But a part of you feels like you did not have the choice then. You are going to have to
let him in. Your eyes glance up.
"You don't really have to do anything. I guess be calm or relaxed... That's about it..? Though it may be weird for you... Seeing yourself and all... Or feeling someone elses e-wait you know about that I guess. I've uh... Never tried those stones myself still so yeah... Uhm."
"They're not hard to use. . . but if you're not confident," you say, although you actually hope he will give you this experience of memory implantation, if only to fully perceive what a fool you made of yourself.
"Yeah... Anyway..."
You let out a deep breath and close your eyes. You begin to feel a presence, a marked concentration in your head. A mind probing into your own. Then slowly, gently, his memories flood into your own. You see what his eyes saw, you hear what his ears heard, from the point he saw you taking the drink up until this point now, trying to gently play the thoughts through in your mind in such a manner as to avoid distress. His presence in your head, however, was nothing at all like the voices you are used to. There is a gentleness, a compassion, a connection of empathy which calms you despite everything you see. And those visions, those memories, begin with a familiar, gruff voice...
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~~~ continued below!