[PRP] told to get talkin' (lily & jeremiah)

[AMItotic]

"So we don't really know what will happen if we mess with this thing? Sounds like business as usual." She glanced down at the hand on her forearm, but made no attempt to move herself away from it. "What are the odds that we go poking around and making things worse? Like, I like being a moonwalker and whatever, but if I get downgraded to spooky mall cop then I'm gonna be pissed.

"Or, I mean, dying or being permanently disfigured is bad, too," she shrugged nonchalantly. "I'm just...not even sure how you get the manual for this sort of thing. We went in blind when we remade the sigil, is there like a spookypedia or something? Maybe some cliffnotes?"

azuredreams

 

[azuredreams]

"If we mess this up, it could result in magic becoming unbound or acting in ways that it hasn't for quite some time. It's tied to all of our abilities- likely even those who have not deviated from simply having magic." Which was one way to say that even spooky mall cop may not be an option.

"The only avenues we have are those that are still alive and were around for it's creation. Noeh is one of them, of whom we are speaking of, as well as some of the fetches who are part of the Court. How it was created we know and it was completely unacceptable." Jeremiah's eyes, for a moment, seemed to glow brighter and the air a touch colder before it dropped back down. It was, apparently, that bad.

AMItotic

 

[AMItotic]

"Yeah, well, I mean, something that has an upkeep of 'stab someone or else' probably wasn't made with flowers and harmony in mind," Lily scoffed, rubbing her arms to dissipate the sudden chill in the air. She glanced somewhere in the distance, trying to do some mental heavy lifting to process all the possibilities, but it was for nothing. So far it all still felt like a puzzle missing half its pieces.

"So the only people that know about how the charter works are Noeh and the zombie things that steal people's lives." She glanced back to Jeremiah, wariness creeping into her voice. "There's not, like, a debate on who we talk to about that, is there?"

azuredreams

 

[azuredreams]

"It was made with control in mind, with one for many in mind." Jeremiah paused, his hand lifting from Lily's arm before it pressed lightly back (as he had noticed the rubbing of her arms). Her clothing would feel warm almost immediately. Not uncomfortably so but enough to deal with his presence. "My apologies, the subject matter at hand is not one easily discussed and it tends to make me ... subconsciously chill the area around me. More so when we are within other ashdown.

"There's little room for debate about who we discuss things with. It is a select few and Noeh is whom I will be seeking out shortly to speak with. The fetches only know because they were the ones who looked after what became of the girl who was sacrificed." There was a pause, his head tilting towards her. "You have met her, of course, the Spinel Lady. She was not always the way she was but the magic twisted her when they carved a Sigil into her very bones."

AMItotic

 

[AMItotic]

"Oh." Lily had almost assumed the Spinel Lady to be as much othercreature as many of the other things she had seen at the ball that evening, and the realization that she had once been just a girl sat strangely unwell with Lily. It had some startling implications for the paths certain people were choosing to go down, possibly herself included. It had even more startling implications about othercreatures in general.

"It's cool," she shrugged absently, which was her way to acknowledge that it was, in fact, warm, but she was not particularly bothered by the sudden chill. Everyone had their weird abilities, especially here, she wasn't about to pitch a fit over the mildest inconvenience, especially not when she was trying to do the mental gymnastics to determine if Gloom had ever been a person.

"Lady Melany," Lily nodded slowly, trying to shift her worldview back into focus with a shiver, despite the warmth. "Noeh was looking for Melany. Said she had something that belonged to her. Would that be sigil-related?"

azuredreams

 

[azuredreams]

Jeremiah looked to her sharply. "I don't know- Noeh has no magic, so for her-" He shook his head. "It is possible and I am planning on speaking with her again soon.

"She, along with others, helped create the document that made the Court. You saw within the void, of course, how blood was used in the process? The same applied to the document. It was blooded by many individuals." Jeremiah looked away again, his eyes distant and glowing brightly. "They may not have known what happened, what was done to create the thing they put their bloody thumbprint on, but they are just as responsible in a way as those who ... did what they did to the girl Melany was."

AMItotic

 

[AMItotic]

Lily nodded along, following Jeremiah's glance on the off chance that he'd seen something out past the fog of the otherworld. "Yeah, I mean, I barely knew what we were doing for the sigil, so it makes sense that other people have ******** it up before...but, like, signing a paper's different than straight-up carving someone up. That's pretty messed up."

She put her hands in her pockets and stared down at the ground, still frowning about the whole affair. "I know you don't know the exact timeline, but if spooky s**t starts to hit the fan, just text me and I can be wherever." In theory, Lily had duties and responsibilities outside of the ones given to her by Other Ashdown, but none of them felt quite as important as making sure the world didn't fall apart.

azuredreams

 

[azuredreams]

His fingers stretched once, out and in, before he let out a cool breath. "If I have any leads about needing to gather people, absolutely. The same goes to you, I'll help if you need it."

There was nothing but then again that was not always the case when his eyes scanned the way in front of them. "It wasn't signing, Lily. That would have-" He stopped and looked at her, eyes bright and eerie. "There are twenty-four bloody thumbprints on it. Twenty-four people who, while they probably were not aware of what was done to create it, were for what it was."

AMItotic

 

[AMItotic]

"Okay, so those people are assholes, there's a lot of those in Ashdown, it's whatever," Lily shrugged, not really sure what the distinction between a signature and a bloody fingerprint meant if it all led to the same result. "But we can remake or unmake it or whatever, like we did with the sigil, and then their assholery doesn't have to hurt anyone else, and we're gucci."

She stared back at him, her lips pulling into a thin frown. "Off-topic, but have you considered shades? Might help your good cop vibes."

azuredreams

 

[azuredreams]

Jeremiah let out a small huff, a near laugh. "Shades would actually probably make that worse. What do I have to hide? Why am I wearing them all the time?" He shook his head before looking away.

"I am trying to find a polite way to tell you that I am aware of the people who have thumbprints on the Charter," he said after a moment. "That you're saying those people are assholes but ... you know some of them." It was more than that, in fact. "Most are not even aware they were part of it in the first place considering that it happened cycles back."

AMItotic

 

[AMItotic]

"But what if they were bomb-a** aviators," Lily persisted, miming the action of putting glasses on her face. She glanced over and seemed to suddenly remembered who she was speaking to, sliding her hands into her pockets as she stared down at the ground.

"If it happened a bunch of cycles back, then it's not really them, is it?" she frowned, trying to put faces to the silhouettes Jeremiah conjured. Did she even know that many people? If she counted the internet, then probably. "It's like an alternate version of them, like that time in the 80s when Shun kept making eyes at 80s you, or Temperance V2: 'the Temperance that saw some s**t'."

She coughed, trying to bring her thoughts back around. "My point is, it's the same body maybe, but not really the same consciousness or 'soul' or whatever. 80s Shun wasn't my parkour friend, so even if it was the same guy, I couldn't really say we were friends because he didn't know who I was. So people in a different world were assholes, it happens. Some of them are probably still assholes, but they're not assholes for that."

"If that, um, even makes sense. I guess." She scuffed her boots against the ground, puffing her cheeks to make an expression that was meant to be sheepish. "Why does it even matter? Do we need all those people? We didn't have whoever made the original sigil when we made the new one."

At least...she thought they didn't. She wasn't sure.

azuredreams

 

[azuredreams]

Jeremiah snorted. "Remind me to show you a picture of me when I was your age. I went through an aviators phase." Not that he ever really talked about those dark teenage years. (They were not dark so much as the things he did were Very, Very Not Talked About.)

Then he was blinking a bit at the mention of Shun making eyes and the comment about V2 Temperance (which made a flicker of annoyance appear). "No, those that have come before are not you - not in my opinion - but they are considered to be you by some people and, more often than not, we find ourselves having to fix things done by our past counterparts.

"I would actually say that it's the exact opposite. That our souls remain the same, the consciousness changes because of circumstance - our lives - along with our bodies too. It's the spark that makes us, us that keeps coming back." A breath was let out. "Otherwise, yes, what you say makes sense. However we are still locked in by the things the people that were us did." His expression shifted, something flickering across it.

"Lily," he said in a somber tone, "what if I told you that you have a thumbprint on the Charter? That some other you at least were alright with what the Charter stood for?"

AM1totic

 

[AMItotic]

Lily took a moment of pensive silence to consider the gravity of Jeremiah's thought experiment, then shrugged. "I guess in some other universe, I was an a*****e," she plainly decreed. "I don't know how you want me to feel about it. Like, I think it's a s**t thing to do, and it's not something I would want to do, but I dunno, s**t happens I guess, maybe it was like Blackfriar's where we really thought we were doing the right thing, but oops, wrong choice, now there's a body on the beach, and somehow that's our fault."

She didn't like the idea of her name on the document that made the court, but it wasn't any less plausible than any of the other bullshit things that made up the otherworld. It was just one more thing to add to the laundry list of things that she pretended not to be bothered by.

"What are we supposed to do about it?" she asked lowly, hugging her arms. "Write a strongly worded letter, say we're sorry? Like that's gonna work."

azuredreams

 

[azuredreams]

"You're not the only one who is on it, I am as well, though I would appreciate that it not be discussed." Jeremiah let out a sigh, looking ahead once more. "It doesn't mean anything- you were not necessarily an a*****e at all. Simply put: you gave your consent for your magic to be changed but also that you were in agreement with the creation.

"The odds are that you, myself, and others that have prints on it? Most of us had no idea what was done to create it. Yet it may explain why you have found yourself as a moonwalker this time around." Bright eyes looked back to Lily, quiet for a moment. "We want to change it - or make changes to it - so think about what you want to be as a moonwalker. Those of us who are new Nobles, that came into our powers after the ball, are not happy with the way the Court has existed. Yet if we are changing that, you - moonwalkers - and wargs need to be approached too.

"This will affect each of us who have differentiated."

AMItotic

 

[AMItotic]

"...I guess that makes sense," Lily said lowly, looking down at her hands. Given enough cycles, she had to have been something other than a moonwalker at least once, and she supposed there was some comfort in knowing that there might have been a method to the madness. Still, she couldn't help but feel unnerved by the idea that the life she lived in now was predestined by choices she'd made some number of realities prior, or worse, that the choices she made now would end up changing the Lily that existed in the life after this one.

"The Court sucks," she said defensively, and then she let out a slow sigh. "But that's not your fault, or anyone on this side's fault. It's cool that you wanna mix it up. I want to help." After a pause, she nodded. "That's all I really want to do. It's just...hard, you know?" She looked away, fidgeting under the gaze of those bright eyes.

azuredreams

I'm so sorry for the delay. We can probably work towards ending the scene?