tushanshu | [radio]

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[radio]

We did it! He's still alive! I felt--no, better than that, I heard him!

[She sounded tired, but only physically. Just barely out of breath. Still, even that couldn't contain the excitement to her tone as she barely waited until the radio had turned on before addressing the network.]

[Allowing a full second for that bombshell to properly sink in, she collected her thoughts and elaborated.]

The spell I was suggesting. The one to see if there was something magical interfering? It worked. We got through, and I heard Asti's voice calling to me, begging for help. It was faint...like it was coming from far away--no, lots of far aways. [Wait, no, that didn't make sense, either.] Like his voice was...I don't know...fractured?

Anyways, that wasn't all. I also had another Vision. It wasn't like the last one. I'm not even sure anybody else but me saw it. There were stones. Black and White ones. They were forming arches at this underwater crossroad...only some of them looked like they were brand new, while others looked close to falling apart.

I think Asti sent it to me. But I don't know what it could mean. Second, third, and any other opinions are welcome on this one.

((ooc: Because of the nature of the subject in particular, Threadjacking to allow for open discussions is not only cool with me, but I even encourage it! Spread the word~))

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[Raine sounds definitely apologetic.]

That's wonderful news.

I'm sorry I wasn't there. An emergency arose at the Guild at the last moment. [She promised, but life and limb had to come first.]

Black and white arches? Like the ones at Valishaera?

[Why do things always seem to come back to Valishaera?]

[A hand was waved dismissively.]

Don't worry about. I hope everything's alright at the Guilt, though.

[An emergency big enough to miss out on the spell; she'd figured something like that might've happened when Raine never showed up. It made sense. The spell wasn't pressing. Or it wouldn't have been, if there hadn't been a set time and location in order to organize all the people involved.]

...you know, I didn't think of that. Except, of course, these were all underwater.

Everyone will be fine, yes.

[It was just fortunate she hadn't left quite yet.]

The location matters less than the form and the balance-- were the black and white in equal measures?

...At any rate, I wouldn't be surprised if the Dreaming was involved.

I think so, but it's hard to say for certain. They were all underwater. The images were kind of blurred, and I only caught a second's glimpse.

To be honest, there's very little that would surprise me at this point.

[Hm. Interesting nevertheless, even if the thought of the Dreaming arches underwater does set Raine a little bit on edge.]

And you said it was at a crossroad?

[Underwater? Either metaphor, or a sunken city.]

[With there luck, it would turn out to somehow be both.]

That's right.

Crossroads and arches and water. [Oh, my] The first two definitely couldn't have ended up there all by themselves. Somebody built them.

[Both? Both. Both is ~~good~~ terrible.]

That's true. It suggests intent, regardless of whether it was built underwater or sunken later.

[Either's possible, provided it isn't a metaphor. ...Possibly even if it is. Raine is beginning to dislike visions.]

I wonder if it's tied to the rest of the visions experience by those who assisted.

Right now, it's hard to say.

I mean, everybody except for, like, two people saw different things. Aside from water, I'm not sure any of them could be directly connected. We wont' know until we do a little more research into local mythology and stories.

My-- Solomon described something to do with feathers, possibly a bird... Wasn't there a legend regarding something in that vein, told during the festival earlier this season?

[A brief pause, thinking.]

Ah-- I think he's already spoken to you.

[Which means that can be tidied off in her mind as 'taken care of' for now.]

Even with all of the troubling accompaniment, all this... it's a relief, to know.

[My Solomon.]

[Don't think she didn't hear that little slip-up. Another time, another place, she would have latched onto that little tidbit of gossip. She still might. Later, when there were less pressing matters to talk about. After all, all play and no work meant people getting pissed at her, and she really liked it when they weren't.]

If it's the same Solomon I'm thinking of, then yes. We compared notes. His vision had a less than happy ending, but I don't know what that means any more than we can guess why Tu Vishan's sinking.

[Because the coincidence was too strong to ignore. A dream about drowning. Their entire world slowly dipping further and further down into the water.]

I do enjoy having some answers for once, it's true. This is the closest to knowing what's going on around us since we all woke up.

[Look, it's just that she realized partway through that a specific reference like a name would be more useful than the relative one of 'my partner,' given Solomon showed up to the ritual. Raine's not getting subconsciously possessive. Probably.]

I'm reasonably sure there's only one of him. And yes, I... know about that. Perhaps it's something relating to the sinking, or perhaps it's meant to be taken in context with the others? If there were multiple visions, it stands to reason that they're meant to be fit together somehow.

[More reasons to literally never go swimming. Ever.]

It is, isn't it? Thank you for organizing all this, Zatanna. Hope is... a valuable thing.

[Uh-huh.]

[It's not like Zatanna had ever been through something similar in past relationships. Nope. Total ~~Freudian~~ slip of the tongue.]

Hey, if I hadn't done it, I'm sure somebody else would've sooner or later.

There's too many magic users here. And now I'm starting to think I know why.

[Because Magic was the answer all along.]

[It's so good they're on the same page, even metatextually.]

Perhaps. But the fact remains that you were the one who stepped up.

[What-ifs matter very little, in the grand scheme of things.]

Too many magic users?

[This earns a little bit of a blank look. Raine hasn't followed Zatanna's logic, perhaps owing to the disparity in their origins.]

Well, you know what they say about all the cooks in the kitchen. Something about broken eggs, I think.

[But she laughed. Either at her own (lame) joke, or because too many didn't actually mean as bad as it was normally interpreted as.]

Most other times, you get this many different styles of magic colliding, and that's what they do. They collide. I've seen maybe half a dozen work together in the past, but they were all mostly evil anyway, so that didn't really count.

We shouldn't work well together. But we do. And I think it has to do with where we are, and what kind of world this is.

[That doesn't sound quite right, but Raine can't place the original saying, either. Dubious:]

Broken eggs? I suppose I could see that.

[More relevant right now is the bit about different styles colliding.]

There are that many different types of magic in your world?

In my own, although elements and focuses vary, and the uses are certainly widespread, all magic at its base is shaped the same way. Working with another mage is simply a matter of learning their casting habits, not negotiating another style entirely. Perhaps that's why I sense the way others use magic here very similarly, despite how far-flung our origins are...

Or, perhaps, something about the spell that brought us here ensured that our magics would be compatible, tying them all to the same base. Is that what you're suggesting?

[Which, in some ways proved her point. Magic worked differently for them. For Raine. it sounded like it was meant to be shared. For Zatanna...casters could cast spells together, but there were certain times when they would either clash or cancel one another out.]

[Like, for example, if she ever went up against a goddess. No, really; there were rumours about Circe back home....]

Could be.

I mean. we know that all our powers are fueled by whatever source Asti provides us. Yours...mine...Jack's... Every person who has any sort of mystic or metahuman abilities. Last I checked, my powers still work the way I've always known they're supposed to, but I guess we don't know for certain.

That's true, we can't be sure. But it would make sense, at any rate, to design the spell that brought us so there was a minimum of disruption to our abilities, given that we were brought to fight.

[And it is impossible for Raine to be working with the source she usually does.]

I suppose we should simply accept the fortuitous circumstances that do enable us all to work together, but I still find myself curious.

[Also inclined to looking gift velocidragons in the mouth.]

Don't get me wrong. I'm not one to look a gift spell in the mouth. Especially not one that I know I can trust, after all these years.

Yes. It has been a while for you, hasn't it?

[A hesitation. She doesn't like what she's about to say, but it likely needs to be said.]

However, we trusted the visions of "Asti" we had, too.

[A frown. Yes, perhaps it did need to be said.]

They weren't wrong...exactly.

Weren't they?

I suppose in a way they were still communicating with the turtle, but... it makes all past interactions in that manner suspect.

[Wrong in the sense that the Source was a lie. But not necessarily the visions; not all evil shied away from what was true.]

It got us all to where we are now, though.

I mean, if you still want to doubt everything. I can't stop you. Trust me; I knew guys back home who could've written the book on paranoia. Still...that's not going to stop me from listening.

And subverted our will.

[She's not forgetting the consequences of that boon any time soon, but even so there's a pause while Raine considers.]

It's... simply something to keep in mind, that's all. All available information should be considered, of course, but so too should the sources.

[It probably meant something that Zatanna never had to deal with the boon ordeal personally. She'd known about the consequences. She'd even experienced mind control herself. On multiple levels, from multiple sources. She also knew that she'd been able to learn from the experiences. Every last one of them.]

Those are things I don't think I'd ever be able to forget.

[What will not come through the radio is the curl of Raine's fingers into the fabric of her jacket, over her heart, and the scar left over from that time.]

...Yes.

[And moving on.]

I don't think I have anything else to offer right now, but if I think of something, I'll let you know.

radio;

backwordscompatible - 2015-08-18 04:34 (UTC) - Expand

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