EVENT #3: THE COST OF INNOCENCE

[aionmods]

The Cost of Innocence

INVESTIGATION

As the Aions arrive in Venera, they will find the natural beauty of the city in sharp contrast to its uncomfortable aura. Though the sun still shines and flowers still bloom in a place filled with physical vibrancy and life, the air itself is impossibly still, as if wind no longer blows. You can taste the stagnancy of it when you breathe, and the pleasant sights only make that feeling of absence more haunting. The streets are mostly empty, with most of the city's residents hiding away in their homes, fearing the touch of whatever illness has caused this. That is, all the citizens besides those most affected, who wander the streets in a lifeless and painless daze.

Normally, Venera would be occupied by both Hylician and Achamite soldiers, but it quickly becomes apparent that both have abandoned the city, only guarding its furthest outskirts. Their reasons vary: the Achamite soldiers seem to take religious objection to the feeling of the city, believing it to be some trickery of the Innocent, while the Hylicians simply see it as a plague they have no interest in catching or spreading. Because of this, it will be easy for Aions of both sects to explore with little pushback from any form of law enforcement. The Kenoma will be directed into the city with warnings about the potential physical and spiritual danger while Pleroma will be able to sneak in mostly unbothered. After all, no one is eager to follow you.

Most shops and businesses are currently closed, though some uninfected individuals still nervously keep watch over their workplaces, fearing potential looting. It's difficult, but not impossible, to find people to talk to, and while the most plentiful wanderers are the infected, the reactions from those with their minds still intact will vary. Some will be eager to speak to anyone who looks like they're trying to do something about their situation, desperate for any source of outside help. If revealed you are an Aion, this may either entice them even further or cause them to retreat, as if fearing that you are somehow to blame for their plight. For those that are enticed, it will become clear that they hold onto faith that Aions are in Horos to save them, and will tell these new arrivals whatever they can without discriminating between sects.

The base level information that can be found is thus: the infection began at the same levels it has been in the rest of Horos, only for the numbers of the afflicted to rapidly accelerate upon the coming of the Innocent's Moon. Some see it as a form of divine punishment for their cooperation with the Regent, while the less cooperative citizens see it as a malady brought about by the Aions themselves, their only hope being that they will be able to clean up the mess they made. Some citizen have managed to corral their inflicted loves ones into their rooms and will be willing to introduce you; most of these individuals are past the point of conversation, and seem fully lost to whatever fantasy world they are experiencing. They are disinterested in eating or drinking and it seems like, without help, they are destined for a slow death of starvation and atrophy. That is, if their apathetic state doesn't result in a severe accident, as it has in many cases already.

Any other clues will take more dogged investigation. It will be a day or so after the majority of Aions have arrived in the city that the first signs of their own infections become clear.

HEAVENLY BODIES

The first to feel its effects will be the Innocents, Lovers, and Celebrants; like a voice has fully awakening to them, whispering of how their touch can be the cure to the others' pain. It bids them to take their fellow Aions into their loving embrace, to share this gift, as only suffering lies ahead. It expresses without words that it will be a shield for their Aion kindred, and that those that accept will become their outstretched hands to a cosmos that craves peace. Any form of physical contact with those three Legacies will either introduce or rapidly accelerate the infections experienced by the others, this effect only becoming more intense if the wielder intentionally forces the power of this strange entity into their victims.

Even without that accelerating touch, however, other Aions are not necessarily safe; the infection will still seep in, albeit more slowly. All Aions may experience a growing feeling of connection to the infected Venerans, as if the energy within them is being drawn into their their own bodies. As the Aion's symptoms worsen, the the ones suffered by the Venerans will gradually lessen, though not go away entirely. It seems that the Aions soaking up this strange power is enough to take the edge off of what is happening to the citizens: but at what cost?

Various symptoms will manifest in afflicted Aions with outcomes far more diverse and devastating than what the Veneran civilians have experienced. Visionaries, Firebrands, and Artisans will suffer the most catastrophic symptoms, the clash between their spiritual natures and that of the Innocence being the most extreme. This malady is characterized by its innate desire to quell its victims of their resistance, smothering them in artificial peace, even if it has to deprive them of their bodies and minds to do so.

It is not without treatment, however. It will gradually become apparent that feelings of intense suffering or upset are capable of purging the infection, that clash with painful reality seeming to wake them up from their trance and reduce or eliminate physical symptoms. The more intense the distress, the more effective it will be. Fortunately, this heightening of Aion spiritual energy has the added consequence of making empathic communion connections far more acute. Instead of just transmitting and receiving emotions and thoughts, Aions will find themselves more easily able to enter the delusions and memories of their kindred, drawing them out and manipulating them for this purpose. The catch is that they will only be able to access what is on the surface of the other Aion's mind.

When an infection is reduced or expelled this way, the energy causing it seems to be dispelled from the city, lowering the intensity of its ambient effects. While similar can be done to Veneran citizens to help treat them, the energy will not leave, and will either go into the Aion casting it out or return to the nebulous source of Innocence and eventually infect someone else. Something about going through the Aions specifically seems to act as a filter, as unpleasant of a way as it is to help.

IN THE SILENCE

For those unlucky enough to develop complete, or near complete, infections (IE. a full Innocence petrification) a presence will awaken within them regardless of their Legacy. It will urge them to join with it, to embrace the peace it offers, and to become the extensions of their will in this ravaged world. With an infection of this intensity, there will be little they can do but to hear its call. What exactly this would ultimately entail is unclear, but there is the sense that his entity is looking to join with you on a spiritual level. If your character becomes infected to this degree please let us know under the Committed Actions toplevel below along with the context of that transformation and whether or not they are being cured from it. You may receive some additional information in return!

QUESTIONS

What is the best way for Aions to travel to Venera?
The quickest travel paths are for Kenoma to take a boat from Achamoth, which will take about a day, and for Pleroma to teleport to the Celebrant's shrine and take either a carriage or river boat to the city (there are offshoot rivers not marked on the setting map). The riverboats would be the faster option option of the two, and would also take about a day. The carriages/delivery carts would be slower and take a couple days, but have relay access to horses and therefore could keep going overnight. Characters with flight are also able to use that, though flying right into the city might cause a bit of spectacle. Then again, none of the local law enforcement is eager to chase you at the moment.

Are Veneran civilians experiencing the same symptoms as the Aions?
Veneran civilians are only experiencing apathy/loss of self/daydreaming and maybe the loss of pigments/color for advanced cases. The more body horror orientated effects are Aion only and are being caused by their body's spiritual makeup.

Can 'cured' Aions be reinfected?
Yes! Even if cured or treated, symptoms can return or worsen again. This will keep happening until the build up of Innocence energy in Venera is entirely expunged, at which point the illness will fade away across the continent. Whether or not the Aions mere presence will be enough to trigger that is yet unknown, but it does seem to be helping lessen the effects suffered by the civilians, at least.

How long does the infection period last in Aions?
Chronologically, we are considering the infection period of the plot to last 2-3 days.

Comments

✦ closed to EUSTACE

[lifespanned]

[ Deep in the throes of the contagion, there comes a point where Misa begins talking to herself. It seems even an infection as serious as this can't quiet her down for too long, even though her usual energized cadence is slowed to a more honey-like and lethargic tempo.

In the real world, her skin and hair have turned a stark white, a bright halo gleaming down on her marble-esque appearance. Feathers have only just begun to sprout at her shoulders. Her eyes, nearly unblinking, glance between two separate spaces, her stiffening hand making a strange crackle as she balls it against her chest. ]

So, Mama, Papa, you'll be coming to my graduation next month, won't you?

[ Truthfully, she's not even cognizant of Eustace's presence, looking right through him, non-reactive and seemingly unaware of what she's even saying. Even a light prod into the innerworkings of her mind show glimmers of the scene before her; a dinner table, in a modest, and by all means normal household. Even the image Misa produces of herself from her memory has more of the vibe of an everyday schoolgirl rather than the alternative, stand out model she is in the present. Her hair jet black instead of blonde, her clothes a neatly pressed school uniform rather than gothic lace and fishnets. ]

You promised you'd come, so no take backs.

[lockedon]

[ He knows what to do, this time around.

It doesn't make it any easier, especially not after he allows himself to be enveloped by her delusion (daydream? memory? fantasy?) and the walls of a perfectly ordinary home spring up around him. Everything about this scene is so normal, so every day, from the dinner set on the table to the family seated around. Misa herself he barely recognizes, the shock of black hair a stark contrast to the bright blonde he's gotten so used to seeing.

Like all the times before, he feels like he's seeing something he shouldn't, a personal moment he has no right to witness.

Though she doesn't look at him, he keeps his eyes trained on her, unhappiness outlining his form as he places a hand on her (real, quickly bleaching) shoulder. ]

Misa. We have to go.

[ Can she even hear or feel him though? Or is the contagion so strong it's erased him into nothing more than a soft gust of wind? ]

[lifespanned]

Hmm?

[ There's a confused sort of mumble when he places his hand on her, her expression only dimming with confusion for the length of a breath. ]

Yeah, that's what I said... we should all go. Together.

[ Stubbornly, her mind reframes what he's said into her parents' agreement, her fantasy of her parents alive and well seeming to glow that much brighter. It's not something that she ever seemed to dwell on much in the real world, given the brazenness with which she brings up the death of both of her parents— but here, the intense love she'd felt for them both permeates the air, distorting the scenery around them to something much more picturesque and idealistic. ]

And we can go for dinner afterwards, and visit that bakery for a cake, and you can both get dressed up all nice, and...

[ She rambles on, listing all the things she wants to do to make the day perfect - the parents in her memory just look on with expressions of exasperated affection, clearly used to and fond of her energetic antics. ]

[lockedon]

[ The hand around his heart curls tighter, squeezing with no end in sight.

Pain lances through his heart, bleeding out slow but steady. It hurts to see her so carefree and relaxed, the warmth and love that fills the room practically suffocating in its fullness. It hurts because he knows exactly what it feels like to belong so completely in a place and the ache that's left behind when it's all ripped away unceremoniously and without warning.

Silently, he curses the contagion that spreads through their bodies and warps their minds—and forces his hand into doing the one thing he would never willingly do otherwise.

His fingers around her shoulder tighten, just enough to be uncomfortable. ]

No. We can't.

[ Maybe it's for the best that she's so wrapped up in her delusions. Despite his best efforts, he can't keep his misery from bleeding out into his words, voice catching on the very last syllable. ]

[lifespanned]

[ The physical discomfort from the squeeze aroudn her shoulder distracts her for just a moment, her head tilting in the direction of where the pressure must be coming from. We can't...? Her face goes wide with curiosity, wondering why the voice behind those words sounds so melancholic, so lonely. It's the feeling behind it more than the words that pulls her out of her vision momentarily, easily let down by being told she won't get her way. ]

What? What do you mean...? Why not? I have everything planned out.

[ As if completely leaving herself vulnerable, Misa asks this genuinely and openly, without the bells and whistles of her typical brand of indignant whining and demanding. In her distraction, the vision of her parents becomes blurrier, fading away as if she's struggling to remember it in the face of hearing that pensive timbre, as if it's making her remember something else - something she can't quite put her finger on. ]

[lockedon]

[ He wants to believe that this is all a daydream, a fantasy concocted by the contagion spreading through her body.

But daydreams are rooted in memory, the foundations usually true and real more often than not. "Oh, my parents did, sometimes. But they were killed almost two years ago." Had that been before her graduation? After? Had Misa ever gotten the chance to go to the bakery and buy the perfect cake of her dreams?

She might still be able to one day, albeit a different bakery and for a different occasion. But that relies on getting her out of here first. Letting out a soft sigh, he steels himself. He's walked countless battlefields before but none of them had ever felt quite so miserable as this one. ]

Your parents are dead. You told me yourself.

[ Gone is his sadness, replaced by a grim determination bordering on harshness. ]

[lifespanned]

[ Misa flinches more from the harshness than from the words— honestly, at first, she barely processes them. She's quick to shake her head, shrinking more into herself— quite opposite of her typical boisterous and proud behavior. ]

W... What are you talking about? We just...

[ Around them, a memory flicks by, like a camera reel clicking to an individual, still frame. It's an image that must have taken place just after her graduation - it's of a photograph that was taken. Misa with a huge bouquet in her arms, her parents' arms around her as she smiled loudly for the camera. In the present, she reaches up, holding her temple, pressing her nails in hard to the skin there.

It's something important. She's forgetting something important. When she tries to recall it, it's simply out of a stubborn, forceful desire to remember, a product of her hard-headed personality. She doesn't expect the memory she runs head first into—

That very same house, that very same kitchen, but all the lights are out. Compared to the blurry nature of her memory before, this one seems preserved in mint condition, the room around the two of them forming without even a minute detail missing. There, near the entryway to the kitchen, is a strange man - holding a bloody knife. Not too far from the pair's feet is the body of Misa's mother, who only moments ago, from the perspective of Misa's memory, had been alive and smiling with an unquestionable fondness for her energetic child. Blood stains the tile floor of their family home, and still runs hot from the fresh wound at the woman's neck, dark and thick. Huddled up in the corner furthest from the corpse is the past Misa, cowering behind her father, so frightened that both of her hands are clasped tight around her mouth, not even a breath escaping for a hint of a sound. The pool of blood just keeps growing, and she doesn't tear her eyes away from it once.

Perhaps in a show of irony of the construction of the disease, some color seems to return to the present Misa's face, her wide eyes taking in the scene shakily. Her reaction is... surprisingly muted. Denial, at it's finest. She shakes her head again once, laughing nervously. ]

Ahaha... what? I don't want to be here. [ Rather forcefully, she claws at Eustace's hand, trying to tear him away - to her infected mind, she assumes he must be the cause of this turn of events. ] Get away from me.

[lockedon]

[ It's a dream, but it feels real to him, the image so crisp it truly feels like reality. He can almost smell the coppery tang of blood as it stinks up the air and stains the floor, fingers curling further into Misa's shoulder—though whether to pull her back from this horrific scene or to stop himself from reaching out to punch the image of the killer he doesn't know. Surely, if he reaches out now, knocks that knife from the man's hand, then….

But that's not how it works. He knows that. Clinging to the past doesn't change the future, and feeling sorry for Misa now won't save her from the grips of disease spreading through her. His gaze drops back down to her, in time to catch the spots of color that bloom in her cheeks and the dig of her nails against the back of his hand. The pain is welcome, a reminder of what's real and what isn't.

Sorry Misa, but he's not leaving just yet. ]

Is that what you were thinking when he [ with a nod to the silent killer ] killed your mother? Were you there the moment he dragged the knife across her neck?

[ The words are unnecessarily cruel now, meant to staple this memory and all the pain associated with it in place. If he has to fight both her and the innocence ravaging through her, as well as risk whatever tenuous understanding between them, in order to drag her out of this, then so be it. ]

[lifespanned]

[ Rather than answer in full, his words only drag a wounded, frustrated sound from her, raw and pained. His efforts are rewarded, because even if she wanted to, she can't stop the onslaught of memories his goading brings to the surface, the fact that she saw everything. ]

Stop it. Stop it...

[ Trailing off, she hangs her head, a mess of feathers flittering off of her with the movement. Her frenzied and violent attempts to get away strangely seem to come to a screeching halt when the memory plays on before them, her father standing to his full height. If Eustace expects her to look away - she does just the opposite, contrary to her words, staring as if trying to burn every detail into her mind in an endless cycle. It's strange— the more she comes back into herself, the more... controlled she becomes, as if remembering once more how she'd buried this all, convinced herself that there was justice for this all.

It all happens so fast, anyway. A hurried attempt to disarm the attacker, pathetically short-lived, ends in in a flurry of quick stab wounds, a sick groan of pain, and a loud thud, her father's body landing half on top of the corpse already desecrating their family home. Just like that, two lives ended. And her life - changed forever. ]

I saw them both...

[ Misa forces it out through gritted teeth, flinching once when the body spasms, the last traces of life leaving him forever. But peculiarly, the imaginary world around them begins to plunge itself into a hazy darkness, infinite and absolute. It's pure and utter emptiness, swallowing them both whole. Had she blacked out everything that happened following it? Or simply fallen unconscious, following witnessing such a traumatic event alone, brushing so closely with death? It's unclear. But what is clear is that even in the face of a lack of a physical memory, feathers continue to slough off of her, the feeling generated reopening a magnificent and wide wound all on its own. There's something dark and vengeful and sorrowed beneath the surface, when she speaks again - so far away from the energetic and carefree persona she shows on a day to day basis. ]

I saw it all. But it did nothing.

[lockedon]

[ He doesn't stop, fingers digging deeper into her shoulder the more she thrashes, letting go only when her movements suddenly cease. The sudden cessation of motion is startling and his eyes flick back to the scene before them, expecting a second murderer to spring out from nowhere or a fire to start licking at the bottoms of their feet.

But the scene plays on leisurely—if a second heartless murder could be considered leisurely in any sense of the word. Nothing climactic, nothing out of the ordinary, and that's what makes it all the more horrifying, the knowledge that this sort of thing happens every day, unchecked despite the best intentions of local law enforcement. It's truly unthinkable, how many lives can be changed so drastically in the span of just fifteen minutes.

A part of him registers the sight of the feathers that begin to fall off her, a return to normalcy, but he feels no joy over it. There's only her deep sorrow wrapped tight around like a film, and an even deeper anger whose source he can't quite pinpoint.

Is it his, or hers? ]

Did they ever catch him? The man who did this?

[ A part of them hopes they did, because Misa deserves justice. But a bigger part of him hopes that the man met an unfortunate end somewhere else, gutted unceremoniously and mercilessly in the same way he gutted his victims. consumed by the same fear and desperation he inflicted upon those he murdered. There's a reason he's a Firebrand, vengeance for the wrongs committed against his own family burning bright in the face of all else. Some of it bleeds out now, responding unconsciously to Misa's own emotions, morphing the endless black around them.

Instead of a homey interior though, there's a snow-covered ground, the pure white stained by too much blood from too many bodies mangled beyond repair. The scent of bitter smoke fills the air as the last flames of a dying fire lick at a broken down barn. And in the midst of all is a child, his small frame weighted down by grief, youthful voice crying out in search of the mother, the sister, the brother that had been taken from him. ]

[lifespanned]

No...

[ She answers, even if it's not completely the truth. Did it matter if the man had been caught immediately? Nothing had ever been done. He might as well have just not been caught, given that the man spent a chunk of his time following the crime simply living his life in public awaiting trial. A trial that kept getting delayed, and delayed, and delayed. Misa presses her eyes shut, bringing curled fingers underneath her closed eyes to keep any tears from falling. ]

But he got what he deserved, in the end.

[ And — she reminds herself to be content with that, honing in on the vindictive elation she had felt when she'd learned the man had been killed, that his smiting had been swift and just. Misa doesn't even see the vision actually unfold in front of them, as when she opens her eyes, the bloody snow and the dying embers eating away at Eustace's home town are already fully formed.

Perhaps it's the shock of seeing her own parents killed again, the reminder of that life-altering moment that had changed her forever from the normal teenage girl she'd like to be, that keeps her from reacting as volatilely as she usually might have - jumping back in fear, a scream, anything that would be predictable from her reactive, and altogether very normal seeming personality. All that comes out is a quiet, dejected oh god, muttered under her breath, to herself. And afterwards, the only thing she manages to do is look on to the scene with a pale face and a hardened expression, now carrying a small piece of his anger with her, heavy and searing. ]

And... what about the person who did this...?

[ It's all very obvious to her, now that her head is clear— that child is him, isn't it? The grief in his voice is so haunting, so familiar. But she doesn't dare look at the present Eustace, instead watching the vision of the younger him, with an expression that looks eerily close to pity. He was so young... ]

[lockedon]

[ His answer is similar to her own, the single word exactly the same but said in a different tone of voice. Angry, bitter. A splinter wedged deep under his skin that no one's ever been able to pull out no matter how hard they tried. (And Ronan had tried, so very very hard.)

He doesn't even seem to notice her own muted reaction, too wrapped up in his own anger. ]

No.

[ How many years had he spent searching for the culprits of his entire village's extermination? Over half his life now, devoted to this single cause. Others would call it a fruitless quest, a waste of his energy, but to him this is the only thing that's kept him going for as long as he has. It's not as though he has much of a life anyway, without the only people that have ever mattered to him.

It should bother him (and it does) that she's bearing witness to one of the worst days of his life, usually tucked away so deep that others can't catch even the merest glimpse of it. But between the injust murder of her parents played back so casually in front of him, his own cyclical battle with the Innocence that worsens and then subsides, it's near impossible to keep a leash on all the feelings he usually keeps buried deep down. It's not her fault that any of this happened, or his. They both have a right to be angry at the injustice the world has bestowed upon them, both in terms of their original loss and the repeat of these memories they've been forced to endure.

There's no reason for him to be mad at Misa, not when she'd had no hand in causing any of this. And out of everyone, she should understand his feelings the most, right? ]

But if I ever find who did it, if they ever show their face here...I'll kill them.

[ Of everything in his life, he's the surest of this one fact. ]

[lifespanned]

[ Her head feels clearer now, as if Eustace's own Innocence conjured vision ebbed away the last traces of her contagion. It's a strange sort of empathy that she feels for him, one she's never felt for anyone else. When her parents were killed, she never sought out people who had been through the same thing, too consumed by restless hatred and an exponential apathy. It's like feeling the initial gash of it all over again, the wound fresh and bleeding again instead of scarred. Misa fidgets, struggling to control her expression, uncomfortable being faced so blatantly with something she honestly thought she was done feeling torn up over.

Timidly, she reaches out a hand to him, brushing his arm with a light touch — not out of comfort, or pity. Just acknowledgment of his resolve. ]

I... really hope you do.

[ And her words are open, honest, lacking the typical fanfare and veneer that coats her words on a day to day basis. She really does hope Eustace can kill them one day, like they deserve. Because she knows what it's like— never being able to move on while a killer like that walks free. She knows how frustrated he must feel, how singularly focused his life must have been leading up to this point. Her heart bleeds, wishing that she could at least grant him the satisfaction of taking the people responsible for this out of existence, in some tangible way that he could recognize. Pass judgment on them...

But she can't. All she can do is tug on his sleeve a little, wanting to pull him out of this vision— to pull them both out of it. ]

But we won't find them here. Eustace...

[ She looks at him pleadingly, blinking away tears. There's nothing good that will come out of staying here. ]

wraps this up with a bow

[lockedon]

[ She's right.

The thought slowly filters into his mind, pushing past the anger and muting his frustation until it cools back to a more manageable level. Slowly the bodies fade out of existence, the bitter scent of smoke fading from the air as the streets of Venera blur back into view around them. They have a job to do here, both as people and as Aions. IF he doesn't want this to turn into another tragedy like his hometown, he needs to pull himself together.

Breathing out slowly, he shakes his head, as if the physical rejection might somehow rid him of the ugly feelings that have stirred back to life inside him. It doesn't, but he feels a little more composed afterwards all the same. ]

You're right.

[ Maybe one day, he'll finally be able to finish the job he's spent fifteen years of his life preparing for, but that day isn't today. He doesn't offer Misa a smile as he turns towards her, but there's a small flicker of tired gratitude on his face for her intervention. ]

Let's go.