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Entry tags:
- !event,
- #innocence,
- archduke j: visionary,
- barnaby brooks jr: lover,
- estinien wyrmblood: firebrand,
- eustace: firebrand,
- father paul hill: martyr,
- kaeya alberich: lover,
- kim dokja: martyr,
- kim kitsuragi: martyr,
- liem talbott: champion,
- majorita: firebrand,
- makoto ("m"): firebrand,
- meteion: innocent,
- ryunosuke naruhodo: champion,
- tartaglia (childe): firebrand,
- yuya sakaki: lover
EVENT #5: SOVEREIGN CITIZENS (VENERA)
Sovereign Citizens
VENERA
In contrast the Aion's last visit, they now arrive in Venera on a completely average day... or so it seems. Unlike Godsblood, Venera has been given no warning as to what's about to befall it; the Kenoma are simply authorized to arrive and begin their bloody work without fanfare. Even their entourage of Achamite soldier don't stick out that much; in the time since the plague left, the city has refilled with occupying forces. Notably, the Hylician ones seem to be keeping out of the way, almost as if they've heard some things and would rather not be involved too closely in what's to come.As opposed to the ghost town it was during the plague, Venera is now reasonably active, with most attending to their usual business. Shops are open, and its people are withdrawn but superficially friendly when meeting strangers. Initially, the targets of the Kenoma hit list will have no way of knowing what's coming for them, but after the first couple attacks word will begin to spread. Those that have recently been engaging in seditious behavior will become harder to find, leaving their usual homes and workplaces to stay elsewhere, and making other attempts to escape the Regent's attention.
Once those alerts have been raised, the Kenoma will have to engage in more detective work to find their targets, questioning other Venerans and seeking out fugitives in the homes of their family and friends. In the meantime, some of those who believe they are in danger may become desperately enough to seek out the Pleroma directly, imploring them for aid. Unfortunately, seeking out one sect may just as easily draw the attention of the other. Most uninvolved Venerans will be too terrified to intervene one way or another, reluctant to aid in the persecution of their neighbors but fearful of consequences. If your Aion travels openly, it will take some effort to pin them down long enough to hold a conversation.
SEEDS OF DESPAIR
Several days into the culling of Venera, the Aions will have witnessed the city gradually withdraw into itself. The streets become vacant as more and more people decide it isn't worth the risk to be seen outside, abandoning work and play alike to hide out in their homes, refusing to answer their doors to all except the most desperate pleading. Those that can't avoid their daily obligations are quiet and morose, trying their best to remain unseen and unremarked upon.
If your character has been observed as a Kenoma, either now or in their previous visits to the city, the citizens will look upon them as if they are the messengers of death. If you are seen as a Pleroma, they will resist your gaze, as if fearing your presence alone might leave them marked. In rarer cases, you will see those with stronger spirits, with glares of hatred or determination. They are powerless now, but seeds have been sewn, and whether they are the seeds of despair or of action are yet unclear.
By the time the Kenoma's hit list has been fully addressed, several have been killed and several more have been rushed from their homes to flee the city entirely. There have been holes left in the tapestry of the community they were once part of. One way or another, their absence will be felt keenly by those they left behind.
If your character has been observed as a Kenoma, either now or in their previous visits to the city, the citizens will look upon them as if they are the messengers of death. If you are seen as a Pleroma, they will resist your gaze, as if fearing your presence alone might leave them marked. In rarer cases, you will see those with stronger spirits, with glares of hatred or determination. They are powerless now, but seeds have been sewn, and whether they are the seeds of despair or of action are yet unclear.
By the time the Kenoma's hit list has been fully addressed, several have been killed and several more have been rushed from their homes to flee the city entirely. There have been holes left in the tapestry of the community they were once part of. One way or another, their absence will be felt keenly by those they left behind.
QUESTIONS
What is the best way for Aions to travel to Venera?
Estinien has plans to get an early start for the Pleroma by teleporting to the Lover's shrine and flying somewhere closer to set up a portal from the ocean caves near the Godsblood Lodestone to a spot of farmland closer to Venera. Paul will be setting up a portal directly from Achamoth to one of the Achamite outposts in Venera.
How much force can the Kenoma use while interrogating Venerans?
While they are generally not permitted to kill Venerans who haven't tried to physically fight them, they will be permitted to apply both physical and mental pressure upon those that refuse to provide them with information regarding the whereabouts of their targets. This duress should be proportional to the resistance the Veneran is offering. The Regent is not inviting them to terrorize Venera on a level to a level they cannot reasonably blaim themselves for.
Estinien has plans to get an early start for the Pleroma by teleporting to the Lover's shrine and flying somewhere closer to set up a portal from the ocean caves near the Godsblood Lodestone to a spot of farmland closer to Venera. Paul will be setting up a portal directly from Achamoth to one of the Achamite outposts in Venera.
How much force can the Kenoma use while interrogating Venerans?
While they are generally not permitted to kill Venerans who haven't tried to physically fight them, they will be permitted to apply both physical and mental pressure upon those that refuse to provide them with information regarding the whereabouts of their targets. This duress should be proportional to the resistance the Veneran is offering. The Regent is not inviting them to terrorize Venera on a level to a level they cannot reasonably blaim themselves for.
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In the face of failure... will you abandon your cause?
In the meantime, it raises its lance once more, rushing at Eustace with great speed. It's form blurs, becoming nothing but a streak of light, only reforming several feet past where Eustace stands. He will notice at a delay that the lance has cut through him as well, a smoky steam of the Kenoma's power dissipating into the air behind him like blood.
It turns to face the Kenoma again, rising on its wings.
"Since time immemorial, the cycle has continued... Allowed choice, you choose destruction..."
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It's the only coherent thought Gen can muster past the euphoric haze and bloodlust that the Shimmer has cast through his mind. For one moment he's frozen where he stands, watching the tidal wave of earth he'd summoned be cast aside with absolute ease, like it barely merits any thought. Estinien -- no, not Estinien, that thing -- strikes down M and Silco with all the ease of a man swatting away insects.
Then it's on him.
He barely gets the chance to jerk back, reflexively trying to protect himself, before that spear rips through him from one shoulder to the opposite hip. The pain is staggering; the impact of being thrown aside by that blow and slamming into a wall only makes it worse. Even with the Shimmer's effects dulling the pain that pings through his nerves, Gen's left struggling on the ground for a long moment, chest heaving as he struggles to catch his breath in retching coughs. Vaguely, he notes that the spear doesn't seem to have left him any physical injuries, and it's only a strange sensation of something feeling wrong that lingers at the back of his mind. But it's hard to focus on that thought when, out of the periphery of his field of vision he can just barely register Eustace getting struck down as casually as the rest of them and --
fuck. That's not right. It's just not fair.
Even more than the Shimmer, it's genuine rage and indignity that drive him to stagger back to his feet, ignoring the way blood strings viscous from his lips, rendered a nauseating neon violet with Shimmer. And though his gaze briefly fixes on the entity, the Shimmer-induced glow of his eyes made all the brighter with genuine loathing, that's not where he lets his focus linger. Gen instead looks to the wall just behind whatever it is that's possessed Estinien's body, then grasps at the air with both hands. The furious growl that escapes his lips is quickly drowned out by the groan of bricks being unbalanced, that wall behind the entity slowly tipping forth as a result of the ground beneath it being wiped out by Gen's magic. Aiming to crush Estinien flat.
Every last nerve in Gen's body shrieks, punishing him for overusing his magic like this. But he doesn't care. Can't bring himself to care. Even as his consciousness starts to flicker at the edges, all Gen can think about is doing whatever he can to cause Estinien and that entity possessing him as much damage as possible.
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The radiant spear hits him straight in the chest, running him through, and he can’t help but recall how the dragoon had once done the same with a far more mundane lance, as well as the sickening vertigo of shock’s onset and the slow, steadily-crescendoing cascade of pain that had accompanied it. This time it’s all the same pain, but it’s more, because where the weapon doesn’t pierce his physical body, it does seem to directly target the Kenoma that has sunk in to suffuse his entire body — it reveals to him an entirely new way to feel pain, to feel the horrible shearing of something that had done everything it could to completely integrate into him attempt to tear itself away, regardless of the psychic damage it inflicted as it did so. Like the ebbing low tide, like a wave of vermin shrinking away from a pool of light, much of the Kenoma retreats from its foothold in Makoto’s body and hides away in his shard. His thoughts dilate and warp. It’s almost like it’s not enough that the spear had struck him right through the metaphysical essence of his being, but it feels like it’s pierced through his thoughts as well; the salient points of the events leading up to this altercation now burn so bright in his mind’s eye that it’s difficult to focus on them, everything connected to them through these last few days now growing confused and blurry. It’s like this exact moment of impact has punctured a hole in his memory with a white-hot blade, and everything around the epicenter of that damage warps and grows indistinct from proximity to the heat.
At first he can’t move, he can’t breathe, his lungs entirely arrested by the impaling blade of light. He lifts his hands, shaking, to claw at the weapon, but it’s all in vain as he can’t seem to find any purchase. His wings suddenly limp, his legs kick in a pathetically feeble attempt to get free. Then the spear slides free, and he falls to a collapsed heap on the floor.
The flame inside of him is beginning to gutter out. The enmity generated from the pain of his wounds and the lingering effects of Shimmer in his blood bolster him, but they cannot create something that doesn’t exist; Makoto’s rapidly running out of stamina, and what little he has remaining to him is slowly being stolen from the ghostly wings sprouting from his back, distributed to anyone close enough to receive it. He’s angry, he’s furious; a gutteral choking sound scrapes free from the back of his throat as he forces himself to his feet regardless, damaged in body and mind and spirit but still too galled by indignation and humiliation at his own perceived failure to make any sort of lasting mark on this thing. It blots out whatever self-preservation instincts that might have ruled in a more clear-minded moment.
Content to use the last of what little energy he has left to him, he launches himself into the air one last time: this time, far above the figures closer to the floor of the storehouse, dodging away from the section of brick wall that Gen had attempted to pull down over their opponent. This time, Makoto takes a page out of his book, scanning his surroundings long enough to locate his target: one of the metal beams protruding nakedly across the rafters. When he reaches it, he grabs hold of the steel with not only his arms but the talons of his wings, hacking and slashing and twisting and wrenching at it; the sound of groaning metal and splintering wood join the sound of crumbling mortar in the air. Imbued with Shimmer and his own pain and fury feeding back to reinforce his body, he’s able to damage both ends of a length of metal enough that the twisting of his torso can tear it free, turning for just a moment over the plane of one narrow shoulder so he can reorient and direct the length of torn metal, sharp end first, down from the rafters and tumbling in towards Estinien’s Innocence-possessed form right after the falling wall of bricks.
And it’s not alone — Makoto maintains his hold on the make-shift weapon, doing everything he can to keep its course true; vindictive until the end, he would like nothing more than to stab the creature with a lance of his own.
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Of course, that too does nothing. The form blurs as it approaches with startling speed—and then vanishes? At least, he no longer sees it before him, Eustace blinking in confusion for the space of a second before agonizing pain sears through his core and sends him collapsing forward again, gun tumbling out as his hands slam against the ground, debris and jagged rock cutting into the flesh of his palms.
Once again he's left gasping for breath, tears of pain blurring the edges of his vision as he tries to wrest back control of his various senses all going haywire. (Dimly, he can sense that there's something wrong, that there's an upset of the usual balance of the emotions and Kenoma presence inside him, but there's so little time to worry about that now.) He's been through worse before, or at least just as bad. If he can't pull himself together now, for both himself and his teammates, then what the fuck good is he?
The sound of an entire wall dislodging from its foundation drags him back to his feet, his head swinging around to try and frantically survey the chaos still spiraling around him. There's the brick wall tumbling down. Gen swaying on his feet, looking on the brink of collapse. Ryunosuke huddled on the ground, his body a mix of mismatched appendages. Thoma, still somehow all in one piece despite the destruction unfolding around him. Makoto, up in the air with a metal beam clutched between his hands. Eustace makes his choice. He sprints towards Gen, grabbing one wrist with his free hand to try and drag the boy towards the nearest exit, whether it be an actual door or an opening left behind by a destroyed wall.
"We need to go!"
He can only pray Makoto distracts the being long enough for him to get Gen to safety.
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What? No-- No, of course I won't! he practically shouts in reply at the being. He doesn't even know which 'cause' it's referring to. Protecting Estinien? Fighting the Regent? Proving to this entity that peace CAN be achieved without it using its freaky powers trap everyone in an endless hollow delusion? Take your pick, the answer is the same for all of them.
He rises shakily to his feet, his heart pounding against his chest, still clutching his head in his one non-glowing hand. His mismatched wing and tail both flare out to help him balance, as he gets a good look at the chaos all around him.
I don't want to surrender! But I don't know what to DO! What CAN I do!? Against ANY of this!?!
He's almost telling the thing off as much as he is pleading with it to understand. He is literally trying his best here, with the extremely limited options available to him. He wants to be able to protect people from the Kenoma and the Regent so badly that his damn body changed in reaction to that newfound resolve, but how can he compete with the raw power on display here? He feels like a tiny mouse trapped in a room full of rampaging elephants--
Something else occurs to him just then: Thoma's still in here, completely unable to defend himself from any of the crossfire that's happening around him. Still fighting against the symptoms ravaging his body, he does an incredibly stupid and haphazard blind somersault across the storehouse, casting up another bubble mid-dive so that he can roll closer to where the other Pleroma is, scoot over, and huddle close enough that he can recast over both of them. It's sloppy, and he definitely makes himself feel even more nauseous from doing it, but he can't leave Thoma twisting in the wind like that. He probably doesn't have many more of these damn forcefields left in him though, especially with his concentration as rattled as it is...
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He wanted out. He'd done what he could, short of getting himself dissipated, trying to stab a knife in the thing, he would have to rely on Makoto and Gen's shimmered forms, to do the work. He wished he could slip away, invisible, but that wasn't possible right now. He wouldn't be able. He heaved, and turned slightly, to make that last couple meters to the door when --
He felt it. A raw, painful sensation between his shoulder blades, white hot and angry, like it would sear him from the inside out. He didn't imagine, the way his entire body, centered around his chest burned, and he stumbled, his feet skidded on the ground, skidded against the storehouse floor -- and he fell, face first, onto the ground.
He skidded, for just a moment, his body still, for a moment.
He felt it, something was wrong, and he felt anger seethe and writhe through his veins. If there was a way, an ability to do so, he would spin, and throw his knife at the thing, but it was too fast, too strong -- he turned, to look over his shoulder, to see in quick succession, a spear of light pierce one after another, after another of the rest of them.
And he couldn't see that familiar dark haze that he'd associated with his connection to the Kenoma, that familiar darkness, he couldn't touch it anymore. He couldn't feel it.
Silco very nearly out loud swore, but something sharp in his fingers stopped him -- Kaeya's shard -- the rest of them were strong, and juiced on shimmer. That spear, it hadn't killed him, and as he scrambled to his feet, he found no blood. He didn't look back, when he slipped through the door, to get out of there. He couldn't afford to do so, his feet scuffed and stumbled, as he tried to make his way out, and find a place to regroup.
But that white-hot flame, of that thing, whatever it was, associated with the Innocent. It made his head pound, and he seethed with anger, mad because it still existed, mad because it was had taken the man over, and mad that yet again he could feel the effects of its touch.
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The voice speaks in Ryunosuke's mind once more, as the screaming voices begin to fade. Eustace and Silco are allowed to retreat, though it is yet to be seen whether Gen will go along with them. For Silco's part, he may notice Kaeya's shard grow briefly hot, as if absorbing the aftermath of the strike to its holder's body.
The building falls around them, as Ryunosuke focuses his attention of protecting the remaining captive. The entity drifts upward, riding the shifts in the air, its wings outstretched. It breeze past the falling stone as if dancing. Its back is turned as Makoto approaching.
The wings of light he's been wearing, summoned by the pain of others, come to life. With a solid beat, they bring him to a halt, their feathers wrapping around him in a form of ethereal bondage. Turning to him slowly, the entity's pure white gaze meets his. It spins in the air, arriving behind his bound form, wrapping him in its arms as if in an intimate embrace. The metal beam dissolves into light.
"Still you hate," it whispers in his ear. "You, who soiled sacred ground. I will burn out your infection. I will make you anew."
The spear of light, which has been floating nearby, soars through the entity's own back and straight into Makoto, binding them together. The Kenoma within him screams again, and Makoto will feel its presence leave him entirely. Unmoored from his sect, he is helpless.
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-- then he feels fingers latched around his wrist. Yanking him forth.
Gen almost stumbles that first step. But somehow he manages to stagger forth, finding momentum even on wobbly legs as Eustace pulls him away from that fight. Even if he can't hear whatever it is that Eustace is saying, his words rendered into so much static past the constant buzz of tinnitus, he can tell Eustace is trying to get him away from this chaos and -- ...
maybe that's fine. Maybe that's permissible. Past the heavy curtain of exhaustion starting to shroud his thoughts -- both the Shimmer's effects and the adrenaline rush of combat starting to fade, leaving bloodloss to start weighing heavily down on him -- Gen can't fight the secret, shameful urge to live just a little longer.
Even as that entity's glow grows ever stronger behind him, casting a blinding light across their surroundings, he doesn't look back as he's pulled away from the carnage.
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Every time he believes he’s gained ground, every time he feels he’s attained something, every time he thinks he’s at his end, it’s always taken away from him. Finally when he had felt satisfied in their contract, J had refused to give him the peace he wanted; he tore away his mortal life and granted immortality instead. The love and care he had promised had fallen away into ash, replaced by confusion, pain, and humiliation. Every step he had made in Hell to overtake his master had been checked with often violent impunity. Even here, with each scrap of strength he’s able to graft onto himself, he only ever seems to find more faults, more weaknesses, more vulnerabilities, all so numerous he struggles to see himself ever covering for them all.
Again, the phantom angelic wings beat — as they’ve been doing all along, a double-image to the draconic wings sewn into his lower back — but this time they do more than leech away his vitality, arresting his downward motion so that he hangs in the air against his will. The feathers act with newfound agency to press forward and ensnare him to restrain his movement, the make-shift spear of twisted metal melting away into motes of light in his very hands. A fiercely-burning ember of anger burns at his core, dire, frustrated and humiliated at his own impotency, his own powerlessness, even with everything he’d done to try to assure otherwise. He might not be able to move, but he still tries as the pale arms, banded in their opalescent scales, slip around his wounded body; he can sense the creature behind him, can hear the soft words of its two-toned voice curl into the shell of his ear, scarcely centimeters away. That ember of anger flares up, fanned by hatred and disgust — he hates this facsimilie of intimacy that it forces upon him, he hates that fucking sanctimony that dribbles from its lips…! His jaw clenches, and his mouth twists into a feral snarl; two tiny white-hot pinpricks begin to burn in the corners of his eyes, but they’re tears of anger and helpless frustration. He knows it’s pointless and yet he struggles anyways, muscles straining in vain against the grasp of the myriad feathers until they fall entirely inert. Shimmer’s hold on his body ebbs and fades, the vivid indigo light pulsing visibly beneath his skin beginning to disappear altogether. Exhaustion hits him all at once, causing each of his limbs to fall limp and leaden, feeling so heavy they might tear free from him at any second.
I’ve always hated voices like yours. Words like yours. Those that told me no God would offer me salvation without burning out from me something I never even asked for in the first place.
He comes by his bitter indignation honestly; its roots sink deep into his essence, all the way back to when he was still human and remembered well the feelings of guilt and regret.
Makoto has nothing else to say to it; really, he is very nearly about to succumb to the pain of his wounds and the exhaustion of his body when the spear moves with the dreadful surety of a guillotine. Its blade plunges through Estinien’s Innocent-possessed body behind him, and then again through his own chest, causing a fresh, new bloom of spiritual agony. The last of the Kenoma retreats as far as it could, screaming, and as it does so does he, though really all he can manage at this point is a strangled cry that cuts itself off with an ignoble choke. The Kenoma having been entirely banished, whatever abilities imbuing his body fade along with it. The Shimmer, gone; the power of his enmity, faded; his wings hang from him, as heavy and lifeless as windless sails. Darkness begins to encroach on all sides as both his body and his mind reach their limit, truly and fully spent. But he does not go gentle into that good night; despite the feathers’ restraint and the spear impaling him and adjoining him to the creature, he manages a few half-hearted jolts of pointless struggle. And then, finally, he goes fully limp.
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Gradually, though, Makoto's vestiges of consciousness will feel something building. The Kenoma, screaming in pain and forced to retreat only moment before, is making a resurgence. A weight of heavy darkness forms around the heart of his being, like a clawed hand rising from the depths and endeavoring to drag him back down to the protective shadows. There is a familiarity to it. A kinship.
The entity makes a sound if discomfort, as if burned by its attempt to remove his shard. The lance, still running through his body, flickers... and then shatters. Darkness overwhelming floods through him, every orifice seeping with it. The entity is forced to retreat, even its halo of light unable to pierce what emerges.
"Destroyer! Defiler!" the entity cries.
A fissure has opened around Makoto, sending cracks of unreality through their surroundings. From within it, one clawed hand of darkness emerges after enough, slowly pulling Makoto into the void.
It's then that Makoto will know this touch, as it's one he's felt before.
In trouble again, are we?
The Regent's voice whispers to him as the abyssal gate closes, taking Makoto with it.
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Well. Four? It's unclear how to account for the entity mathematically, in this scenario. And let's just say that Ryunosuke doesn't even have the slightest idea where to start with processing any of what just happened after he'd scrambled his way back over to Thoma. The voices have stopped screaming at him at least, which is a marked improvement on things. With the Kenoma dealt with, he can let his forcefield up and focus on finally getting Thoma free.
He sends Thoma off to go get help, just in case. Because that... Being still seems to be inside Estinien, and it seems rather upset about losing M to boot. Ryunosuke isn't sure what to expect from it now.
At least he knows not to run at it. If he's not aggressive, it shouldn't bother him... Right?
He cautiously pokes his head out before stepping out into view again, eyeing innostinien warily.
"Umm... Hh. Hello there...?" he says cautiously, ears held back nervously. What else does he say to it? 'Thanks for the assist, now could you kindly remove yourself from our dragoon'?
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It doesn't look at Ryunosuke as he speaks. Instead, it seems to be murmuring to itself.
"The boundary grows thin... Left unchecked... What can be done... As I am...?"
It seems lost as it speaks, as if also disorientated by its lack of clear focus in the aftermath of the battle. Its attention drifts.
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It's not paying attention to him, nor is it releasing its hold on Estinien. Which is making him increasingly worried. But how to get its attention?
Hadn't it said a name, earlier...?
He steps a little more into what appears should be its field of vision, waving a hand up and down to see if it will acknowledge him or react at all.
"Um... Mr... Or Miss. Monad...?"
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Its voice is dull as it corrects him, as if gradually losing vitality along with its focus. The fiery halo is growing dim, its form becoming less solid, as if witnessing a ghost.
"Speak."
Perhaps it is offering Ryunosuke one last opportunity to say his piece.
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Ryunosuke notices that it seems to be fading, and he starts to panic. Terrifying as the entity is, and as much as he'd like to see Estinien back to normal, he's conscious of the fact that he may never get a better chance to ask this thing questions... And he has so many.
They tumble out of him in a frantic rush, in his desperation for answers. Too many for it to answer with what limited time it has left, most likely. But he can't help himself.
"Who... Who or what are you then, really? What is this barrier you mentioned? Why does the Regent claim that you've destroyed this realm before? And what... What is going to become of Ser Estinien after all of this!?"
The Regent claimed this thing was swallowing his spirit up, but what does that really mean? And can the their word on the matter actually be trusted, given that there seems to be no love lost between the two of them?
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"I am the solution."
It sounds more like something it is repeating, a piece of lore remembered from a book, than anything with raw conviction behind it.
"Before... our ends are sealed..."
That last statement loses its sense of tonal duality, largely coming through in Estinien's voice as the indistinct impression of wings leave his body. He is left to sink down and crumple against the earth, hollowed out by the absence of what took him.
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His strength is gone, after all. He doesn't have anything left to keep his defenses raised. Even his mind feels exposed, filled with holes and cracks. In those initial moments, he can barely remember why he is in the state he is, or why he seemed to be an entirely different creature for the several moments preceding this. Who is he, really?
His slitted pupils have returned as least, his eyes wide and staring into nothing as he wretches, shaking like a man on the verge of completely losing his mind. He makes a woeful sound, trying to hold together the fragmented parts of his identity.
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His frustrations have to be set aside for the time being; Estinien is coming back into himself, and he looks an absolute mess. Sounds an absolute mess.
"Ser Estinien--!"
Face writ large with concern, Ryunosuke hurries in to try to steady him, and help him to at least sit up so he's not in a complete heap, a clawed hand firmly at his shoulder.
"You're alright, everything's alright, it... The entity is gone; the Kenoma are gone as well," he says, trying to talk him through his return. The man seems so distraught, Ryunosuke isn't sure if he's even picking up on anything he's saying... But he has to at least try, right?
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He yells, suddenly, at no particular target. Thankfully, it doesn't amplify into the roar that Ryunosuke has heard more than once at that point. Instead, he curls forward again, his wings still doing their best to shelter him, as if from some unseen threat.
"What has it done... ?" There hasn't been enough time to feel around the edges of the gaps in his memory, to take full stock of what he's lost. Right now, it feels like throwing white paint across a tapestry. "I can't... Who... Who was I...?"
What came before this? Before he awoke here, trembling? He remembers fighting against the Kenoma, again and again, and suffering for it... but he'd had a home, hadn't he?
Where had it gone?
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The shouting spooks him particularly badly; he flinches back, the feathers on his new wing flattening down in his fear, and for a moment he's quite tempted to just bolt to a safe distance. If he encountered a stranger behaving like this back home... He'd try to find help, from someone who is better equipped and better trained to deal with this sort of thing.
But he's not back home; Estinien isn't a stranger, and there's no way he can just leave and run off to find a doctor or something like that. He'd already sent Thoma off for help, anyway... Which he now rather regrets doing, as the man would probably be a better help here than he himself is. Ryunosuke can only boggle at the dragoon at first, in his usual way, trying frantically to think of what to do or say; indecision throttles his mind, a half a dozen arguments and counter arguments clashing and cancelling each other out until his mind is nothing but a snarl of white noise. In the end, he just blurts out the first, most obvious thing that rises to the top of his mind:
"ESTINIEN!"
He shouts it, the exclamation preceded by the loud automatic thwack of Ryunosuke's tail against the ground. He hopes it's enough to get the man's attention, but even if it isn't, he'll continue on anyway, trying to pull Estinien's focus away from whatever is distressing him and towards anchoring himself here, in the present, by providing an answer to his question:
"You ARE Ser Estinien Wyrmblood! You are an Aion of the Pleroma, and a man of exemplary courage and strength! I don't know what's happened either, but, just-- for the moment, please, set it aside! Focus on my voice, focus on what's right in front of you, right here!"
He's not the right person for this job. If ANYONE should be here trying to calm Estinien down, fighting to rescue him from whatever this catastrophic spiral he's trapped in is... It should be Himeka. Hell, it should be anyone who knows more about this man, about his past, the world he comes from, his accomplishments and triumphs, his highest and lowest points... All the little things that make him who he is beyond just his martial ability, and a vague knowledge of his life as it is in Horos.
It should be Himeka. But Himeka is not here. And so, once again, Ryunosuke finds himself the locum player, a mediocre replacement acting a role that he's barely qualified for, because he's the only one around who can.
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It genuinely answers a question for him. In the wake of having been taken, body and soul, by such a creature, he had been dropped back into this realm mid-freefall. Even though he has a sense that he has faced a feeling like this before, to lose himself in the soul of another, this had been a window into overwhelming psychosis. Had he even been anything besides a vessel for that force? If so, did anything of him remain?
It seems that it does, at least, because hearing his own name does something to ground him. It's one thing that feels right, that feels like it belongs to him, and gradually it rallies other memories beneath its banner. His breathing begins to slow, and he no longer attacks his own body in a terrified frenzy.
He lifts his eyes and looks around him. He remembers this. He was just here.
He makes a sound as if he's trying to speak but the words keep cluttering together and tumbling out of his mouth formlessly. After a few attempts, he manages to communicate again.
"Am... Am I..." He trails off, as if answering his own question within his head. He brings down his hands, looking at his disconcertingly unblemished skin. "You are..."
With such vulnerability, the passing of the entity really has left him in a state of dire innocence.
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The questions he's asking, though... Deeply concerning. Ryunosuke tries to play along, tries not to let on to his own anxiety knowing that losing his own cool certainly won't help the situation any... But alarm bells are going off. Just how much has he forgotten!?
"I-I'm... Ryunosuke Naruhodo, remember?" He keeps trying to hold that eye contact as he speaks. "I'm... Well, I'm one of the Pleroma as well, actually, if you can believe it..."
He says it with a bit of a scoff and a rueful smile, unable to keep himself from turning to self-deprecation. Joking helps pad things out while he tries to think of other things he can add on in any case; details that might help jog Estinien's memory further. And it helps Ryunosuke keep his own delivery steady, so he's not just blurting out a frantic list of things in his desperation to find something that provokes recognition. He goes on...
"You saved my life, just now... But we met several months before this, at the lodestone beneath the waves-- Do, do you remember that?"
Well. He can't quite keep the desperation out of his voice towards the end there. But he's doing his best.
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His fingers instinctively grasp at his shard.
"...The Venerans... have they been..."
He remembers coming here to defend them from culling, he remembers fighting in the streets. Had they succeeded? He remembers coming here to help them once before, when the city was still with illness, when he had been...
He flinches, choking on his breath. He had been so sick, so powerless. The Innocence had held him tight, eroding him with its presence. Is this the final result? Is he being hollowed out so that it might live through him?
Slowly, he lays down on his side, as if the energy to do anything else has left him.
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He looks alarmed at first when Estinien lays down like that, but... You know what? That's fine, actually. The man deserves to rest. Ryunosuke isn't about to insist that he sit up instead.
"Let's... Get somewhere safer first, shall we? Then we can discuss the Venerans. Just wait there a minute..."
Ryunosuke struggles to his feet and hurries off to locate his belongings that had been taken from him on capture. Lucky for him that they hadn't simply been disposed off... It's a bit awkward, slinging on his pack and his bow with the addition of his new wing, but he makes do. He does a quick detour to pick up Estinien's discarded spear as well, and then returns to the man in short order.
He'll take the burden, then, of contributing his energy to recharge both of their returning stones; he's fairly spent from the constant bubbling and stupid stunts he'd pulled during that whole debacle, but he wouldn't dream of trying to get Estinien to do it himself. He reaches out to do the elezen's first, then his own. In a flash they'll both be back in the safe, Kenoma-free embrace of the Godsblood lodestone.
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With Ryunosuke deferring conversation until they are safe, Estinien spends those five minutes in silence. He flinches as the stone finally activates, the whorl of light and colour making his stomach turn, too familiar to the luminous world he'd been trapped within only minutes ago. When he opens his eyes again, they are resting on shimmering sand, the sound of moving water echoing in the caverns nearby.
"I remember..." he murmurs to himself, gazing at the rippling water suspended above. He'd arrived here with a knife in his back, as help rushed to his side. He remembers the waves of her red hair, the familiar warmth of her healing touch... Himeka...
He remembers meeting Ryunosuke here, too, sitting at the edge of the water explaining what he could. He remembers approaching Hayame as she rested despondent in the corner of the cavern, and how startled she'd been at the sight of his wings. Is it possible that he was a fully formed person before this, with a history and memories?
Friends...?
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