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Entry tags:
- #event,
- arthur stuart (velvet goldmine),
- aymeric de borel (final fantasy xiv),
- jace herondale (shadowhunters),
- jughead jones (riverdale),
- kenzi malikov (lost girl),
- kurt wagner (xmcu),
- loki (mcu),
- marcus wright (tsfb),
- mikaela hyakuya (sote),
- nico di angelo (chb),
- private joker (full metal jacket),
- rafaello d’este (oc),
- will solace (chb),
- wyatt lawson (oc)
War with D.E.S.T.I.N.Y.
Characters: Ensemble cast, any/all characters of Xistentia!
Summary: D.E.S.T.I.N.Y. comes to Xistentia for the first time, bringing with it violence and havoc. Combat against enemy agents, healing, emergency sanctuary, and "Drift Compatibility" happen here. Refer to the OOC plotting post and the mod announcement!
Date(s): November 4-18
Warnings/Notes: Violence, death, psychological themes, trauma. Please warn for anything else in your subject headers!
Everything is, in short, super fucked. Era Ra's warning came at the right time, forewarning of some of the weapons and fighting styles that could be expected from D.E.S.T.I.N.Y.'s agents, but still, the people of Xistentia have not faced a force like this before. The ragtag combination of fighting styles and tactics promises both versatility and confusion.
For better or worse, D.E.S.T.I.N.Y. is in similar chaos.
The first to come are ships from the Western sea, bearing a mix of warriors in and monsters. Some wield old-fashioned steel swords and others bear laser blasters, and their armor is just as varied. Some creatures appear domesticated, while others are feral and snap at their own. However, one primary feature identifies the enemy: their war color is red, which adorns flags and uniforms. Interestingly, the sea and sky of Xistentia seem to be fighting back in their own way, massive waves and a storm, even animals pestering them as they attempt to land the beach. However, it's only a matter of time before the mainstay of their forces reach land, some two hundred fighters. It's then that sentient fires start to whirl into the forests, leaping from tree to tree. You have the home court advantage. Even the foliage itself seems to cooperate with you, aiding in efforts for stealth by keeping you downwind, twigs failing to crack when you misstep. Soon, you're joined by Xistentia's other forces-- a handful of battered ships taking air, an odd assortment of elves and talking dogs, demons and aliens from outer-space, coordinating counter-attacks.
You're locked in combat with a woman who seems oddly familiar, though you don't know her face and can't think of her name. You hit her in the head, and now a narrow slice of her face shows through her red-rimmed helm. She wields a rifle tipped with a heavy blade, though it crackles with electrical energy. She is a proficient swordswoman, deftly parrying and striking against you, her face eerily expressionless. Her blade has a switch that, when activated, will send out a net that numbs your limbs and drags you to the floor. Here's hoping you won't face this demon alone.
She's not your only problem. You may have noticed, that in every epic battle with evil wizards, there's always some kind of a problematically gigantic elephant. This is one of those days. At least, there's only one, its trunk as wide as a car, its feet moving slow, so that it might crush the trees rather than trip over them.
Fight one or both, or fight the hordes of nameless minions around them. Either way: there's plenty to do. Those of you who thought things were too quiet here? You'll be busy today.
Fighting isn't for you? Well, you'll want to get out of the way, then. The "wards" protecting the city are failing, and people are heading toward The Temple where the protections remain the strongest. Here, the injured need healing in the stone beds. The civilians do their best, comforting children, cooking food, trading intelligence, repairing weapons and armor where possible. Feel free to pitch in; they need all the help they can get.
And here, you've reached the Temple, you've laid yourself down on one of the many glass-and-stone beds within the safety of its stone walls. You know what the other Xistentia residents have told you about it— this is the next phase, after the memory share had raised shields against the psychotropic rain. This is the PsyLink. Through this bond, you are said to be able to activate special defenses. No one seems to know exactly what they are, but desperate times call for desperate measures. And beyond the Temple walls, times are desperate indeed.
Each drift requires at least two people. Your daemons will find and connect you, seemingly at random— and you may find yourself with the unlikeliest of partners.
The Kissing Booth participants find it easiest. Everyone else-- it's a wild jumble, finding yourself caught up in a firehose of not only your own memories, but that of someone else. Everything they think, everything they feel, is intertwined with your mind.
You can't get caught up in it. You have to let the memories of the past, your predictions for the future, and the terror of war flow in and out of you, without neither resistance or pursuit, gently tuning them out. And in this serenity, this psychic silence, this acceptance of not only yourself but the other other, you find perfect connectivity— harmony with your PsyLink partner.
In this space, you find yourself having strange conversations. You and your partner will share ghostly images, some of which seem to be images from the past— while others seem to be present-day moments from the battle outside, fighting the enemy, as if you are somehow in two places at once. You must find traction and stay in the now and stay calm, but it's harder than you think.
The instant you latch onto that memory or emotion, it's a mistake... but you forget.
Your shadow is here. Whether out-of-context, or right here where it was meant to be, it's trying to kill you.
But you're not trapped here alone. Someone is calling your name, a familiar voice in the pandemonium. That voice comes from your drift partner. It's up to them to pull you back, remind you of who you are, and balance you. Hold on to them - they're your anchor, but you'll have to do the same for them. A successful drift means helping each other. Do it well, and you'll help to power the temple's defences. Fail, and there'll be trouble for everyone seeking sanctuary here.
Summary: D.E.S.T.I.N.Y. comes to Xistentia for the first time, bringing with it violence and havoc. Combat against enemy agents, healing, emergency sanctuary, and "Drift Compatibility" happen here. Refer to the OOC plotting post and the mod announcement!
Date(s): November 4-18
Warnings/Notes: Violence, death, psychological themes, trauma. Please warn for anything else in your subject headers!
WAR WITH DESTINY
By headsman's blade or battle-axe
Fight For Your Life
Everything is, in short, super fucked. Era Ra's warning came at the right time, forewarning of some of the weapons and fighting styles that could be expected from D.E.S.T.I.N.Y.'s agents, but still, the people of Xistentia have not faced a force like this before. The ragtag combination of fighting styles and tactics promises both versatility and confusion.
For better or worse, D.E.S.T.I.N.Y. is in similar chaos.
The first to come are ships from the Western sea, bearing a mix of warriors in and monsters. Some wield old-fashioned steel swords and others bear laser blasters, and their armor is just as varied. Some creatures appear domesticated, while others are feral and snap at their own. However, one primary feature identifies the enemy: their war color is red, which adorns flags and uniforms. Interestingly, the sea and sky of Xistentia seem to be fighting back in their own way, massive waves and a storm, even animals pestering them as they attempt to land the beach. However, it's only a matter of time before the mainstay of their forces reach land, some two hundred fighters. It's then that sentient fires start to whirl into the forests, leaping from tree to tree. You have the home court advantage. Even the foliage itself seems to cooperate with you, aiding in efforts for stealth by keeping you downwind, twigs failing to crack when you misstep. Soon, you're joined by Xistentia's other forces-- a handful of battered ships taking air, an odd assortment of elves and talking dogs, demons and aliens from outer-space, coordinating counter-attacks.
BATTLE MODE: ATTACK
You're locked in combat with a woman who seems oddly familiar, though you don't know her face and can't think of her name. You hit her in the head, and now a narrow slice of her face shows through her red-rimmed helm. She wields a rifle tipped with a heavy blade, though it crackles with electrical energy. She is a proficient swordswoman, deftly parrying and striking against you, her face eerily expressionless. Her blade has a switch that, when activated, will send out a net that numbs your limbs and drags you to the floor. Here's hoping you won't face this demon alone.
She's not your only problem. You may have noticed, that in every epic battle with evil wizards, there's always some kind of a problematically gigantic elephant. This is one of those days. At least, there's only one, its trunk as wide as a car, its feet moving slow, so that it might crush the trees rather than trip over them.
Fight one or both, or fight the hordes of nameless minions around them. Either way: there's plenty to do. Those of you who thought things were too quiet here? You'll be busy today.
SEEK SANCTUARY
Fighting isn't for you? Well, you'll want to get out of the way, then. The "wards" protecting the city are failing, and people are heading toward The Temple where the protections remain the strongest. Here, the injured need healing in the stone beds. The civilians do their best, comforting children, cooking food, trading intelligence, repairing weapons and armor where possible. Feel free to pitch in; they need all the help they can get.
BATTLE MODE: SUPPORT (PSYLINK)
And here, you've reached the Temple, you've laid yourself down on one of the many glass-and-stone beds within the safety of its stone walls. You know what the other Xistentia residents have told you about it— this is the next phase, after the memory share had raised shields against the psychotropic rain. This is the PsyLink. Through this bond, you are said to be able to activate special defenses. No one seems to know exactly what they are, but desperate times call for desperate measures. And beyond the Temple walls, times are desperate indeed.
Each drift requires at least two people. Your daemons will find and connect you, seemingly at random— and you may find yourself with the unlikeliest of partners.
Drift Compatible
The Kissing Booth participants find it easiest. Everyone else-- it's a wild jumble, finding yourself caught up in a firehose of not only your own memories, but that of someone else. Everything they think, everything they feel, is intertwined with your mind.
You can't get caught up in it. You have to let the memories of the past, your predictions for the future, and the terror of war flow in and out of you, without neither resistance or pursuit, gently tuning them out. And in this serenity, this psychic silence, this acceptance of not only yourself but the other other, you find perfect connectivity— harmony with your PsyLink partner.
In this space, you find yourself having strange conversations. You and your partner will share ghostly images, some of which seem to be images from the past— while others seem to be present-day moments from the battle outside, fighting the enemy, as if you are somehow in two places at once. You must find traction and stay in the now and stay calm, but it's harder than you think.
The instant you latch onto that memory or emotion, it's a mistake... but you forget.
Your shadow is here. Whether out-of-context, or right here where it was meant to be, it's trying to kill you.
But you're not trapped here alone. Someone is calling your name, a familiar voice in the pandemonium. That voice comes from your drift partner. It's up to them to pull you back, remind you of who you are, and balance you. Hold on to them - they're your anchor, but you'll have to do the same for them. A successful drift means helping each other. Do it well, and you'll help to power the temple's defences. Fail, and there'll be trouble for everyone seeking sanctuary here.
Amanda
[If anyone had told Amanda a year ago that not only would she be living with the foul-mouthed young man beside her, but that she'd be linking her mind to his, she would have laughed.
But she really wasn't laughing now. Because this was insane, and not in a wondrous way, and she had to be useful, and even if she might threaten Graced with a variety of alterations that could make her much less fun, she couldn't argue with her daemon's choice of partner for this. Not really.
All right, she might argue with Graced about it after this is all over. Right now, she just takes a deep breath and tries to smile, the brief memory of the first time they met--when she thought he would be a little closer to her mind than he wound up being, given that she didn't understand his powers--coming to mind, more specifically 'tell me how you say try not to die in alien'. Considering everything that's passed between them, the fact this is one of the things her brain remembers is...not that bad]
'Comdo non mori' [she actually manages to give a weak thumbs up before she lays back. And she tries to focus just the objective, like when he was showing her how to be a dream thief, but that hadn't been life and death. The only thing at risk then was her apartment. This is so big, and she can fry a few machines and use that watch to gain a few precious seconds, but what is she without machines in the end, what…]
What are you doing out here, sweetheart?
[the voice is saccharine, and there's a woman crouching in front of her. Her uniform and everything else around her is white, except her blonde hair and very red lips. And her hand is so big, and Amanda's so small and she can't do anything but stare when a hand grabs her wrist. She can't even answer, because she doesn't remember, but she doesn't want to go-]
You know you're not ready to be out on your own yet. Let's get you back to your room where you'll be safe
[nothing about this woman or this bright, cold hallway is safe but she can't find the words for that. Or anything. All she can do it stare, as the woman's nails dig into her arm and Amanda has to believe what she sort of remembers someone telling her, that the people here just want her to be safe, because she can't move even when she thinks she sees blood on her skin, dripping onto the cold white tiles]
tw ableist language, slut-shaming/sexism, the usual i'm sorry
something about falling out of synchronization here or there, getting sucked into the deep pockets of your own shitty past. he met the same fiery doom, every time he slipped out of alignment with his other partners. and he's seen different dooms-- fiery or otherwise— every time he's seen the others fall, themselves.]
Amanda!
[not gimp queen, not dweeby good tits mcgee, not my padawan. you know shit is getting serious when kavinsky is shouting her real name, even as he comes running through the weird white halls of her nightmare.] Yo, slut! [his attention cuts toward the white-uniformed woman, sudden as a slap. a slap he is for the moment, too far away to perform himself.] Let her go. This ain't your fucking reality, you get me? Amanda!
[he's out of place here. dressed, as in life, in his wife beater and jeans, his hair in spikes, a pair of white sunglasses bouncing against his collar. but they'd always been the odd pair, the two of them. unlikely roommates, even unlikelier friends.]
no subject
And the nurse keeps smiling, hand reaching out to touch her hair with nails that don't pet but yank.]
Oh, our little overachiever. You don't need to do any of this. You just need to go back to where you belong, where you'll be safe and won't be in the way for other people who can do everything you can without any help.
'Little overachiever'. It's not said with the warm smile Nick always had when he called her Little Miss Brilliant. It's condescending, the way so many other people said 'Doctor Perry' when they thought she couldn't hear. No, because they thought she couldn't hear, that being unable to turn to glare at them without the help of machinery meant she was deaf as well.
That, at least, makes an old anger rise and she manages to pull her hair away--and the pain helps, because these dreams never hurt which is what makes them so terrifying--turning to the voice that grounds her a little further]
Joseph.
[another sign this is really serious, even if her voice is a lot weaker than she'd like it to be, like her lungs are still insisting she can't breathe on her own]
cw sexual vulgarity
some part of him sees too stark, too frightening a similarity, between her figure laying prone in this nightmare, and the way he'd seen her last in the flesh. laying on the stone plinth, the glow starting up under her daemon's paws. maybe some part of him has worried, what if she holds her breath? what if she suffocates herself, buying into this reality. he knows better than most, how powerful the mind can be over the material world— how powerful amanda's mind is, moreover.
that's how they met. they might be nothing alike in every way, but he knows something of power and grief and wanting to kill around you.
he crashes into the nurse. skinny arms, barreling chest. fearless.]
Sit on a fucking poker, cunt, [he shouts. his knee hits the railing of amanda's bed, jolting her arm, and his shoes squeak wildly against the floor as he scrabbles to fling the enemy away. he doesn't know if the nurse is The one, the apex predator, the worst of amanda's demons fabricated by the virtual reality of this place. but he'll pit every wiry, tattooed ounce of him against her until something else shows up.] Medical fetish somewhere else.
cw suicidal ideation mention
But something about this adult being slammed away from her shocks her enough to break that horrible loop of thought, and not just because of the real pain that goes through her arm when it's hit instead of the phantom echoes she sometimes gets in her limbs.
'You can breathe', she tries to tell herself. 'You can breathe, you can move, you paid for that. Someone thought you deserved the chance to have that'.
Maybe the representatives of Eudio hadn't meant that when they came to her, exactly, but they'd still chosen to offer her that gift, when she knew there were so many others they hadn't for some reason.
It's difficult to tell her legs to move, but she does it, placing them on the cold tile and raking her hair from her face, reminding her legs and hands that they work. The fact that he's the person snapping her back is even more bizarre in some ways than the fact this happening; the fact it's someone who never saw her crippled, yet maybe understands better than the people who did just why her mind made this particular hell.
She grips the bed rail, though, not trusting her mind just yet not to make her collapse] Needing to prove myself...doesn't mean I didn't earn everything I did. It made me better, because it wasn't easy.
[the words are a bit choked, because she doesn't always believe them, but she has to right now, so she can actually do what needs doing instead of dealing with her own issues.
And of course it's not so easy as that, it can't be, and of course a figment of her imagination isn't destroyed by a young man's violence or her legs holding her up, and even if through a bloody mouth she smiles and speaks in a voice that would be sweet if it weren't for the words it was saying]
You could still lose it, you know. You could be helpless again. And you'd want to die again, wouldn't you? This would just be faster. You wouldn't have to ask someone to end it for you.
[well. This isn't the way she wanted her roommate--or anyone--to find out about that. This is exactly the reason she doesn't go to therapy, and probably the reason she should]
no subject
Fucking bullshit cunting liar.
[later, he'll know that she wasn't. but right now, disgust hits him like a crowbar in the middle of his spirit, smashing his heart against his ribs. he feels his face contort into a sneer before he even thinks to make a threat. they'd fallen on the hospital floor, him and the spectral nurse, and suddenly he's as mad as a toddler. it's without technique, without strategy, that he lashes out at the evil creature then, kicking out his feet, knocking her a couple of feet.
kavinsky doesn't have his vampire strength here, in amanda's world. maybe at some point, he'll wonder why that is; why it is that amanda perry brings out the human in him.
whamp. that's the sound of his naked hand slapping shut on the railing of amanda's bed. his tattooed knuckles sharpen, and he pulls himself up off the ground, tottering slightly. (he doesn't have his cocaine strength here, either.)] Amanda! [he says, abruptly and absurdly brightening.] About time you got your skinny ass up. Listen to the shit coming out of this fuck's face.
no subject
She tries to hold the hysterical giggle back, but the jarring sight of him smiling in this place breaks the dam a little so she has to put a hand to her mouth to muffle the sound that is something between laughter and sobbing]
Yeah. It's crap. [it's not, and maybe when this is done she'll give in and have a drink or three and tell him the story behind that, which isn't much of a story besides 'high school is awful especially when you're a crip'.
She shakes her head a bit, stepping around to him with legs that are getting a little steadier with each small step] She makes you sound like a gentleman. [it tempers it a little, takes the sting out of the condensed version of things so many people said, things her own mind said. And probably will keep saying, she knows that.
There's an urge to wipe at the blood on her face, but she knows it's not really there, so she just lets out a long breath as she glances at the body of every bit of self-hatred and doubt she's held in herself for too long] It might have had a point or two a long time ago. But she's forgetting I grew up. [and that is as close as she can get to really admitting she's thought these things, that this really is how she saw herself, that it's both the scared child and the adults that child had taken all the wrong things from spitting out this poison] Good thing I've got someone around to call me all kinds of things that are definitely not child appropriate to prove her wrong.
[she never thought she'd be thanking Kavnisky for his foul language, especially not like that, but then again she's never thought she'd be doing just about anything she's done around him]
no subject
'Child appropriate?' That's ageist, bitch!
[or stupid. but he's trying to help and keep her upright, holding her arm, then letting it go so that she knows he has total confidence in her (not true) (but more than he would most people who have been disabled), his hand hovering at the small of her back. he takes a step forward, putting himself beside her instead of in front of her. sometimes, it's hard to tell whether kavinsky is being supportive or just shoving a buddy out of a nest and down a sheer cliffside.]
Listen. I know you're having some kind of deep psychic shame, [he moves his hands further from her waist, and angles a look down the hallway. then at the nurse laying prone where he'd punted her. she looks disoriented, but not dead.] But I think if we want to get our asses out of here, you may have to smite a fellow woman. I know the misogyny don't come easy to you, but like.
You could think of it as symbolic. I dunno. A lot of my other 'Drift' type thangs has come down to people beating the shit out of they worst fears. [he wipes his nose with the heel of his hand, attractively, and jerks his head at the fake medical professional on the floor.] Maybe if you hang her, that'll be some extra poetic justice. Hahaha.
Just kidding.
[(sort of.)
(why did she pick him again?)
but he's also looking around genuinely wary, lest the nurse not be the 'final boss' in amanda's nightmare at all.]
no subject
Or she'll just suggest they go out for a drive and maybe make some ridiculous and useless tech for the hell of it. That might be better]
Look at it this way, it's one of the few things I can get out of being a woman in her thirties.
[any levity in her expressions fades as she follows his gaze, swallowing hard and nodding. She expected this, once she got herself grounded again. It might have been easier to face if it had been the driver of the car that had changed her life, but somehow he'd never been her personal bogeyman]
Yeah. Well. I know she's not a real woman, and she doesn't even look like anyone I actually knew. She is the reason I don't watch horror movies that take place in hospitals. [because too often there's a woman like her in them made into one of the monsters. Because the places of her nightmares have to be made that little bit worse with the added dose of sexism]
I do sort of wish she'd been a man though. There were a lot of them I would have liked to...[scream at, kick in some very sensitive places, shove face-first into a computer monitor. There's a lot of ways she could take that sentence, so she just lets out a long breath, tentatively stepping away from Kavinsky.
Her steps aren't exactly confidant as she moves towards the thing she wishes looked like someone who had really looked down on her, instead of this twisted amalgamation of all the roles those people had played. But it makes sense, that she's something both violent and caring. Someone using the mask of wanting what was 'best' for Amanda to cover up the fact they didn't see her as a person.
She crouches down, only trembling a little, so she's crouching by the woman-shaped monster. And of course it smiles at her, voice still sickly sweet and surprisingly clear for something with a face that's been rearranged]
You can't do it, can you. You can't let yourself be angry at me, at anyone. You're their pet genius who does anything they ask so they'll tell you you're a good girl. Especially him, his Little Miss-
[It's not surprising that even mildly referencing how Amanda knows she acted around Nick, especially after Gloria died--tattooing 'see how perfect I am, see how nice I am even when you've just yelled at a roomful of people, see how good I can be for you even though I'm broken'--that makes Amanda give in to urges she's suppressed for years and not just because she couldn't actually act on them, reaching to grab the thing by the throat]
I'm not. I was never his pet, or anyone else's. I earned my own goddamn place. [she's not even concoius of swearing, or the fact her grip is tightening, or that she's crying] I wasn't kind to make them like me or give me anything. I'm kind because all of you weren't. You pretended you were, but even a kid's not that naive. You pitied me. [she tries not to be affected by the too-familiar sight of the thing gasping for air, tightening her grip so she doesn't reach for her own throat to grasp at the phantom sensation of her vent being yanked]
He. didn't. [it guts her, to use the past tense for Nick in anyway, but biting off those two words gives her strength. She hadn't always believed them, but she believes he really thought he didn't, unlike all the teachers and doctors and strangers who hadn't even bothered to hide it.
There are sharp fingers clawing at her hands now, gouging deep cuts in an attempt to keep its toxic presence alive, but she ignores the pain until its grip on her spasms and then slacks, and even then she holds like that for a few more moments before pulling away, sitting back on her heels and staring at her bloodied hands]
no subject
but it's real extra super fucking weird to kavinsky, whose monsters are shaped like dragons and birthed into real life by his own strategic superpowers. strange too, for he who loves her-- you might as well call it love, right?— but cares little for the people like her, who've suffered in countless worlds in countless experiences of disability, insults and injuries from people made anxious, angry, greedy or cruel by that perception of difference. kavinsky's never been good at giving a fuck about justice by itself or the principle of anything.
yet even he can glimpse the current of something deeper, moving through her words as amanda says what she says. as she grabs that human monster by the neck and squeezes. mostly, she's amanda-- his amanda. amanda perry, his roommate who hates his yelling gay drama and loud shitty bulgarian music and tendency to leave socks or sneak up on her with vampire powers. but a little bit too, she's a woman who was wronged by a common and ordinary system, and is angry for it, righteously. and for a moment, he gets that it's-- a problem. a big one. something meaningful that needs to change.
and of course, the next--]
Yeah, bitch is turning blue! [he howls behind her, proud. he gives the dying nurse monster two bony middle fingers, and even as he does, the world around them is beginning to glow and soften. the psychic prison losing its grip on them.] Ding dong, witch is fucking dead. Fuck yeah! Sit on the gimp girl's fist!
[he's kind of supportive? in his own way?]