ph_logs | [OPEN] The world is spinning endlessly

[OPEN] The world is spinning endlessly

Who: Siebren and friends
What: October Shenanigans
When:...October? Possibly also November
Where: Siebren's home, the
Warning(s): Potential cannibalism mentions, unreality, mental unwellness, memory manipulation (self-inflicted), more in comment titles

1. This is the sound of energy [Gala Aftermath]
You can't believe how easy it is. You just have to go... a little crazy. And then, suddenly, it all makes sense, and everything you do turns to gold.
He calls into work the morning after the gala. And a couple more days beyond that. In that time, he is
~~metamorphosing~~
~~assimilating~~
~~unpacking~~
~~digesting~~ everything that occurred that night. He stays at home, alone, trying to avoid everyone and everything.

much. It's too
The fragments of past that he's avoided for their sharpness rotate in him mind, turning their points toward him, crystal shards of time that threaten him. And yet, some part of him reaches out with Pandoran curiosity, like Sleeping Beauty toward the spindle. What he pricks isn't a finger, but he feels the pain just as instantly. And yet, and yet...

too much. It's
There it is, the multiple choice past solidifying in fractals, like frost spidering across a windowpane. Siebren has no way of knowing whether this is a correct past, but it is now his, memories feeling more stable than they have in years. Some things are lost, others are fake, but the end result is more real than anything he's been able to grasp before.

For three days, anyone approaching Siebren's home for any reason may hear, even from outside the building, the sounds of someone having a Bad Time™, with pained screams or furniture being thrown against walls as his gravitational powers pulse and fluctuate. For three days, he struggles.

And then, there is silence.

Traveling through the galaxy [The Library; CW vertigo]
Siebren returns to work. Nothing is wrong. He is fine. Can't you see how fine he is?

Somewhere, a book falls off a table and he flinches. And then, to anyone within a certain distance of him, the floor seems to fall away, in a dizzying cloud of galactic light, just for a moment, before he regains control, glancing around to see if anyone noticed.

Into eternity [Stargazing Night]
A notice goes up on the bulletin board, and letters are issued to penpals with explicit invitations: Crane's Ridge, 9pm on a given night. Bring snacks, drinks, something to sit on. Siebren will have his telescope and star charts.

He's brought some cheese and crackers and apple butter himself, as well, and is floating beside his big brass telescope, dressed in a comfortable sweater. For the moment, he is completely at ease. For the moment, nothing could possibly bother him.

Right?

A One Note Symphony [Wildcard]
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"It hurts." The words come out in a whimper, eyes not opening. His awareness of her presence is flickering, like a candle guttering in the wind, but on some level there is comfort to be found.

Her claws run so very gently against his scalp.

"What can I do for you? What can I get for you?"

"I don't know." He sounds so helpless, so young for a moment. And then in the next instant his face twists in a mask of pain, and he lets out a sharp, primal scream. It is a strange piercing sound, given how low his voice usually is.

She clings tighter to him in shock, trying to ease his pain with a low hum, as much as she can manage. Siebren's scream is almost deafening, but she won't leave him.

Inside, everything is mirror shards, reflecting memories from a multiple choice past. In one, he glimpses the cold stare of a Galactic Emperor. In another, a pirate with ghostly green skin. There’s a humming of bees, but he can’t see them. He turns his head as if looking for them.

None of this is real, but it is true. None of this was, but it might will be. Everything is unstable, and he feels it only as falling.

The scream ends. His throat hurts, he realizes vaguely.

She’s clinging to him, a warm body to contrast against the cold vastness of everything. In this moment, she’s not sure if there’s anything she can do, but she wants to be here for when the moment that she can do something does arise.

Her presence is an anchor. Her existence in his memory is also an anchor. As the potential pasts assail him, he knows he wants no past without her--and no future without her as well. It is a starting point, as he painfully picks through shards and starts to try to reassemble himself from the wreckage internally.

"Can you...sing for me?"

Drelasa nods, and sings from the very depths of her soul. Her song is the motion of the stars in the heavens, and the feeling of dancing weightless in the early evening air. Her song is a plea, and a promise, and a reassurance. Everything she wants for him, she wraps in a mantle of tonal splendor, and pours her heart into giving it shape.

It helps.

He clings to every note, like a mountain climber using the narrowest of handholds. It is enough for him, for this moment. He goes still and silent, and to outward appearances he might seem to be asleep.

He's not, but it seems peaceful enough.

She continues to sing, even as she feels herself growing exhausted beside him. She continues to hold him close, stroking his scalp, brushing her fingers through his hair, even as she feels her body growing heavy. Her song is taking a portion of his exhaustion into herself, and with that comes the gravity of fatigue.

She wouldn't choose to be anywhere else in this moment.

Well. If they're both in a heap on the floor, at least they're together. That's what matters, right? He continues to hold on, even as she slips into the heaviness he knows so well.

"That melody..." the words escape her lips (yes, she does have them) as for a moment, she could almost swear she can see, her senses pitching headlong into a cascade of something, somewhere. A part of her wonders if she should try to do something to get the both of them off the floor, but she knows that gravity could easily turn into a suggestion at any moment, and trying to get him onto the couch could just as easily lead to the couch being lodged in the opposite wall.

She could try to get a cool cloth and wipe his brow, at least? Oh, but that would require her letting go of him, and him of her...

He is pointedly against the idea of letting go of her. She is the door in that last scene of Titanic. She is the altos in the choir holding a steady note for the sopranos to soar over. She is the taproot of a dandelion.

So she remains, and as much as she is frightened, for her kena and for herself, she finds a strange, warm solace amidst the chaos. She presses herself a little closer against him, filling in the space between them, feeling his heartbeat, angling herself so that he can feel hers a little, through oddly-placed arteries.

Some quiet part of her wishes she could melt into him entirely, a steady drum-beat to his core, steadying him and making him strong.

Hours pass in physical silence and psychic self-violence, bodies still but cleaved together. Strange, how similar that wording is to cleaving apart. Time passes, but eventually, Siebren lets out a wholly unmusical sound, something of a cough-gasp-sputter.

She’s jolted out of her dream-like stupor by the sudden racket.

“K-kena? Siebren, my love?” She adjusts her position, moving to give him the space to sit up and maneuver as he needs to.

"You were here, my song. I wondered if you were a dream, at times."

He slowly sits up, rubbing his eyes.

“Are you feeling any better? What happened? Shall I make some tea for you? Something to eat?”

"Pick one question to start with, my head is still ringing." But there's fondness and warmth there. She's fussing, and he can't actually find it in himself to get mad at that.

“Shall I get you something to eat and drink?”

That seems like a good first question, the answer potentially facilitating more answers.

"Water, please. Maybe some bread." He can't stomach any strong flavors. He's not sure yet if bread will be a good idea.

She fetches the water first, bringing it in as wide-bottomed a mug as she can locate. She doesn't waste a lot of time feeling through the cabinets, of course. Then, after pressing it into his hands gently, she goes to locate the basket of bread she'd brought in the first place. It's no longer fresh-out-of-the-oven, but it's still soft and mild and ever so slightly sweet.

To Siebren, it tastes like fairy bread, the sweetness lingering on his tongue still from devouring Blanche. But he eats it all the same. It might be the first solid food he's had since the gala. It might not. He's uncertain and unstable.

"Do you want me to get you a change of clothes? The fabric of your shirt feels sweaty, and it might help you feel a little better to be dressed in something clean."

"Ah. You're not wrong." It might not be just sweat, but he is embarrassed to admit how much control of his body slipped while he was afflicted.

(He is still afflicted. He can't get himself to stand or float, yet.)

"With any luck, the bedroom is in better order than out here. The wardrobe is against the far wall."

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