Post by Mittens Mckittens on Nov 13, 2024 7:14:52 GMT
Written with the marvellous mind that is dee đ§ in the minutes following The Eldritch Mind of Calla Prim
Mittens sat across from Calla in the now empty academy room, the loud rumbling tones of the departing Ronk along with Mr Henry and Mr T-Taz..t-tâŚThe Nice Mr Bird-ManâŚNow faded away within the halls of the academy, leaving a deep oppressive silence apart from the regular flip of a page as Calla scrutinised the freshly scrawled record of her hired âhelpâsâ venture into her..mind.
âSoâŚâ Mittens began cautiously, the sad look in his eyes still present as he thought how to navigate the clearly heavy and possibly quite painful lore dump about Calla that had been revealed to him in the last..few..hours..Minutes? He hadnât bothered to check the time beforehand. He really should look into investing in a watch or something⌠âThat wasâŚThought-provoking.â He finished, immediately regretting the unintentional joke.
âMmmâ. Calla doesnât really look up from her work. âLots to do I suppose. Making sense of these ânotesâ to start withâ. She glances at Mittens for a scant moment. âIâm glad it all went by without any real harm thoughâ.
"Really?", Mittens said, cocking his head as he tried to meet Calla's eye, "Are you sure you're okay?"
"Well... I set out to do something, I always knew there was some potential for personal harm, and thanks to your collective efforts I escaped even that". Calla pauses, lost in self reflection for a handful of breaths. "I would have preferred to keep my private thoughts more... private, and it's... mildly embarrassing for some of them to be played out in front of you, but what's done is done". She takes off her glasses to clean them. And for the first time ever grips the frame slightly too hard. A crack spiders across one lens as a deep frown settles into her brow. Her tone stays steady throughout. Academic. Detached. Dispassionate. "As for the rest? Nothing material has changed from this morning to now. I'm in no greater danger. Nor are you. I have time to... consider my... response". Another crack joins the first.
"Calla..Y-you have a right to feel angry ya know? A-anybody would, being talked about like that by their family...L-like an asset..Like a tool."
"Mmm". Calla looks over at Mittens and her eyes are wall-to-wall black. Even in the comfortable glow of the map room they've shed their whites, their purple halo, to drown every trace of available light. "Feeling angry is one thing, and I won't deny it, but the question is what to do about it". She gestures at the bookshelves, the Academy, Daring Heights. "I could turn all this to ash, to winter, to both at once, but what good would it do? A day later five of my peers show up and that's the end of that. What a pitiful waste. What a dismal end". She casually crushes her glasses in one hand. Turns her palm over. Deposits shards and splinters of glass and metal on the desk to her side. "All it really does is hurt me and things I'm fond of". An uncomfortable silence stretches as she does her best to inspect the small ruin she's made. The gashes in her hand. "No. I can wait. I can build, and plan, and take my time". She mutters something in Sylvan, and her hand begins to heal. Places it on a book, says something else in Primordial, and watches her glasses reknit themselves as now unmarred digits weave a minor mending. "Ploughs can become swords. Swords can become ploughs. Even a chisel can bite the one that wields it".
Mittens watched Calla's actions with shock and a sudden prickle of fear. Calla's 'face' betrayed no hint of emotion from her actions: no pain, no strain. Her normally large round-framed friendly eyes were now strangely sharp, and..dark. Dark but for the occasional pulse of purple in place of her irises. The smallest hint of the powers and mysteries she held within her. Mitten had only seen Calla without her glasses once before, when they had been attacked in Sigil when escorting Princess Alathea. Calla had her nose deep in her journal for most of the trip until suddenly there she was, laid out and bleeding out on the cobbles of a back alley, her blue face pale and vulnerable, her glasses laying askew on the street beside her.
"A-and what is your plan?" He asked, his words unable to deny the shiver to his voice.
"That's a good question. Someone will need to burn, but let's not set a fire before we know how big it needs to be". Finished, and whole again, Calla's glasses are placed back on her nose. Her gaze now back to being rounded, her irises returned. She wrinkles her face, blinks hard, and there, once more, is the girl with her nose in a book. "I'll talk to Orianna about Kesserax, work out the best strategy and timing there. Then see if my new vessel has an open link to the Mountain. If it does, then I'll find out what he wants to admit to. Maybe check in with Asteros so I've got a contingency in place. And then... then I'm going home". "We'll see how much of it's worth saving".
"Well..fuck." Mittens finds himself murmuring. It seemed he really didn't know much about his friend at all. Calla. A bookish girl from the Underdark of the Feywilds whose her looks did not reflect her years and whose thirst for knowledge in fact far surpassed just simply gaining an education at the esteemed Daring Academy, but in fact was just one of the many seemingly planned steps on a library ladder of her masterplan: Phase 1 being to relinquish the control of an ancient feywildian 'mountain' deity that her family had sought to use her to control. Instead they could soon be finding themselves on the receiving end of whatever judgement their once 'prized' pawn deem suitable. Calla was no mere pawn of course, but the names of the other pieces from that old battered chess set back in the Happy Apple tavern at home seemed to elude him right now.
"Look, I'm... I genuinely am proud of you. You've come so far. But I'm not going to hold back on this. And it isn't going to be pretty. I want to tell you to stay home and stay safe, but I... I do understand that that doesn't work. And I..." Calla takes a deep breath, and lets it out slowly. "I do trust you".
"Hm. Seems we do need to do a bit more talking then." Mittens says unable to stop the smile that tweaks the corners of his mouth. "If this is all the trouble you can get up to in just a few short months I've got a lot to get me head around so I'm not always playing catch up."
"I did mean what I said though Calla", he said, flicking his large golden eyes over at her, "I would..end someone..if it meant helping you...Long as they deserved it of course..."
"With only one exception, I've only ever hurt someone who tried to kill me or mine first. It's not enough to deserve it. If we worked like that half the world would be at the other half's throat. It's... it's not just that I don't want that for you, I don't want it for anyone. There's only one good reason to end a life, and it's when there's nothing else you can do to make things better. This whole... problem. If I could just walk away, I... I like to think I would". Another deep breath, this one more like a sigh. "But when you make someone into... when you don't even... I mean....then... I... I don't know what to say". A thin trace of distress brings back the frown, curls a lip downward. "It's like... loading a crossbow and pointing it at your own head. These people have dug their own graves. It can't be a surprise when they get swallowed whole".
Mittens gets up slowly and pads over to Calla, his soft paws making barely a whisper on the floor, his swift movements deftly avoiding the blobs of wax or arcane marking remnants of Callaâs spell casting until he is stood right before her like a little black shadow, his arms open and offering towards her.
Calla's face is inscrutable, but not because it's blank. A torrent of emotions swirl just beneath the surface, her amethyst eyes aflame with it. She holds Mittens' gaze for a long moment, and then, exhausted, returns the hug.
Mittens still and silent stands and holds Calla in his arms, waiting for her to be the one to end the hug. Unsure of how much she might actually need it, or if she would let herself realise how much she actually did.
After a few seconds of stand-offish and rigid body language, Calla pulls Mittens in further, his head tucked in under her chin. Whether out of warmth, or to conceal tears, he'll likely never know. It wouldn't be the first time she'd used prestidigitation or her glamour to hide a weakness.
âIâm here for you Calla.â Came the voice of the small Tabaxi as if in response to her unspoken thoughts. âIâm here for you.â
Mittens sat across from Calla in the now empty academy room, the loud rumbling tones of the departing Ronk along with Mr Henry and Mr T-Taz..t-tâŚThe Nice Mr Bird-ManâŚNow faded away within the halls of the academy, leaving a deep oppressive silence apart from the regular flip of a page as Calla scrutinised the freshly scrawled record of her hired âhelpâsâ venture into her..mind.
âSoâŚâ Mittens began cautiously, the sad look in his eyes still present as he thought how to navigate the clearly heavy and possibly quite painful lore dump about Calla that had been revealed to him in the last..few..hours..Minutes? He hadnât bothered to check the time beforehand. He really should look into investing in a watch or something⌠âThat wasâŚThought-provoking.â He finished, immediately regretting the unintentional joke.
âMmmâ. Calla doesnât really look up from her work. âLots to do I suppose. Making sense of these ânotesâ to start withâ. She glances at Mittens for a scant moment. âIâm glad it all went by without any real harm thoughâ.
"Really?", Mittens said, cocking his head as he tried to meet Calla's eye, "Are you sure you're okay?"
"Well... I set out to do something, I always knew there was some potential for personal harm, and thanks to your collective efforts I escaped even that". Calla pauses, lost in self reflection for a handful of breaths. "I would have preferred to keep my private thoughts more... private, and it's... mildly embarrassing for some of them to be played out in front of you, but what's done is done". She takes off her glasses to clean them. And for the first time ever grips the frame slightly too hard. A crack spiders across one lens as a deep frown settles into her brow. Her tone stays steady throughout. Academic. Detached. Dispassionate. "As for the rest? Nothing material has changed from this morning to now. I'm in no greater danger. Nor are you. I have time to... consider my... response". Another crack joins the first.
"Calla..Y-you have a right to feel angry ya know? A-anybody would, being talked about like that by their family...L-like an asset..Like a tool."
"Mmm". Calla looks over at Mittens and her eyes are wall-to-wall black. Even in the comfortable glow of the map room they've shed their whites, their purple halo, to drown every trace of available light. "Feeling angry is one thing, and I won't deny it, but the question is what to do about it". She gestures at the bookshelves, the Academy, Daring Heights. "I could turn all this to ash, to winter, to both at once, but what good would it do? A day later five of my peers show up and that's the end of that. What a pitiful waste. What a dismal end". She casually crushes her glasses in one hand. Turns her palm over. Deposits shards and splinters of glass and metal on the desk to her side. "All it really does is hurt me and things I'm fond of". An uncomfortable silence stretches as she does her best to inspect the small ruin she's made. The gashes in her hand. "No. I can wait. I can build, and plan, and take my time". She mutters something in Sylvan, and her hand begins to heal. Places it on a book, says something else in Primordial, and watches her glasses reknit themselves as now unmarred digits weave a minor mending. "Ploughs can become swords. Swords can become ploughs. Even a chisel can bite the one that wields it".
Mittens watched Calla's actions with shock and a sudden prickle of fear. Calla's 'face' betrayed no hint of emotion from her actions: no pain, no strain. Her normally large round-framed friendly eyes were now strangely sharp, and..dark. Dark but for the occasional pulse of purple in place of her irises. The smallest hint of the powers and mysteries she held within her. Mitten had only seen Calla without her glasses once before, when they had been attacked in Sigil when escorting Princess Alathea. Calla had her nose deep in her journal for most of the trip until suddenly there she was, laid out and bleeding out on the cobbles of a back alley, her blue face pale and vulnerable, her glasses laying askew on the street beside her.
"A-and what is your plan?" He asked, his words unable to deny the shiver to his voice.
"That's a good question. Someone will need to burn, but let's not set a fire before we know how big it needs to be". Finished, and whole again, Calla's glasses are placed back on her nose. Her gaze now back to being rounded, her irises returned. She wrinkles her face, blinks hard, and there, once more, is the girl with her nose in a book. "I'll talk to Orianna about Kesserax, work out the best strategy and timing there. Then see if my new vessel has an open link to the Mountain. If it does, then I'll find out what he wants to admit to. Maybe check in with Asteros so I've got a contingency in place. And then... then I'm going home". "We'll see how much of it's worth saving".
"Well..fuck." Mittens finds himself murmuring. It seemed he really didn't know much about his friend at all. Calla. A bookish girl from the Underdark of the Feywilds whose her looks did not reflect her years and whose thirst for knowledge in fact far surpassed just simply gaining an education at the esteemed Daring Academy, but in fact was just one of the many seemingly planned steps on a library ladder of her masterplan: Phase 1 being to relinquish the control of an ancient feywildian 'mountain' deity that her family had sought to use her to control. Instead they could soon be finding themselves on the receiving end of whatever judgement their once 'prized' pawn deem suitable. Calla was no mere pawn of course, but the names of the other pieces from that old battered chess set back in the Happy Apple tavern at home seemed to elude him right now.
"Look, I'm... I genuinely am proud of you. You've come so far. But I'm not going to hold back on this. And it isn't going to be pretty. I want to tell you to stay home and stay safe, but I... I do understand that that doesn't work. And I..." Calla takes a deep breath, and lets it out slowly. "I do trust you".
"Hm. Seems we do need to do a bit more talking then." Mittens says unable to stop the smile that tweaks the corners of his mouth. "If this is all the trouble you can get up to in just a few short months I've got a lot to get me head around so I'm not always playing catch up."
"I did mean what I said though Calla", he said, flicking his large golden eyes over at her, "I would..end someone..if it meant helping you...Long as they deserved it of course..."
"With only one exception, I've only ever hurt someone who tried to kill me or mine first. It's not enough to deserve it. If we worked like that half the world would be at the other half's throat. It's... it's not just that I don't want that for you, I don't want it for anyone. There's only one good reason to end a life, and it's when there's nothing else you can do to make things better. This whole... problem. If I could just walk away, I... I like to think I would". Another deep breath, this one more like a sigh. "But when you make someone into... when you don't even... I mean....then... I... I don't know what to say". A thin trace of distress brings back the frown, curls a lip downward. "It's like... loading a crossbow and pointing it at your own head. These people have dug their own graves. It can't be a surprise when they get swallowed whole".
Mittens gets up slowly and pads over to Calla, his soft paws making barely a whisper on the floor, his swift movements deftly avoiding the blobs of wax or arcane marking remnants of Callaâs spell casting until he is stood right before her like a little black shadow, his arms open and offering towards her.
Calla's face is inscrutable, but not because it's blank. A torrent of emotions swirl just beneath the surface, her amethyst eyes aflame with it. She holds Mittens' gaze for a long moment, and then, exhausted, returns the hug.
Mittens still and silent stands and holds Calla in his arms, waiting for her to be the one to end the hug. Unsure of how much she might actually need it, or if she would let herself realise how much she actually did.
After a few seconds of stand-offish and rigid body language, Calla pulls Mittens in further, his head tucked in under her chin. Whether out of warmth, or to conceal tears, he'll likely never know. It wouldn't be the first time she'd used prestidigitation or her glamour to hide a weakness.
âIâm here for you Calla.â Came the voice of the small Tabaxi as if in response to her unspoken thoughts. âIâm here for you.â