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Val came over for a visit, and she brought some much-needed rum. We talked a bit about the situation with Slug and Briari and Blue. Val seemed a little disappointed in Slug for leaving Briari alone (even though he was coming to relieve her, who was watching three Spirals, and Slug said he'd have called someone but the garou of the sept were all battered and healing from the Spiral fight at Edgewood. Val shared a theory with me that Blue was not who he claimed to be, and that he was either a higher-up member (pack leader) for the Seattle Spirals or potentially a Spiral named Renegade, who is the alpha of the Seattle Spirals. I confirmed that I'd definitely detected some illusion magick happening around Blue and didn't think he was who he was pretending to be. (Damn, I ought to know, right?) Val said Briari claimed that the trio of Spirals she'd had eyes on bailed because Blue told them to leave (which seems to confirm my suspicion that Blue had links--or telepathic pack links--to those Spirals). Val didn't tell Briari where they'd gone off to because Val was afraid that Briari would just communicate that information to Blue. It seems like the bird has lost trust/faith in Briari. That, honestly, might be a good thing if she's openly sharing information with the Spirals at this point. More rum was consumed. It was good. It was needed. What the hell is Briari up to? More rum. More rum on top of that rum. And more rum on top of that. When I awoke the next day, the paradox--where I was turning all light blue--seemed to have disappeared.
The next morning, I made a trip out to the caern. Briari was there, and Rabbit turned up, too. (Rabbit's kind of cute. Makes me want to scruffle her head. Ugh. Parenting instinct. Must be missing seeing Emma's kid since she's been moved to safety.) Greetings were exchanged and, rather than address the whole thing with Blue directly, I opted to relay what I'd learned earlier about Briari's near future being very fuzzy by pretending I'd seen her future as being at a crossroads. I'd hoped it might prompt Briari to take a step back and consider how open she'd been with Blue, sharing information with him, letting him know where she lived, and being alone with him with no one to help her if something went wrong. Nope. Briari completely lost it. She thought she was going to die and said she was doing confidential work for Thane. (Thane has her interacting with Blue? Does he know the extent of what she's doing and that she's being left unattended with him? WTF?) I think I managed to do one productive thing: When Briari looked close to losing it, I encouraged Rabbit to move away from her and cautioned her about getting too close to garou when they were emotional, especially as the moon grew fuller. That might be a lesson that saves her life in the future. Briari ended up going off on a rant, talked about how I was an illusion (so much for her saying she'd keep that under wraps), kicked at stuff, and then stomped off--likely to find Thane and tell him she was not doing "this" (whatever "this" is) anymore. Plus side? I got the caern to myself for a while to meditate and re-center myself. The more I interact with the garou these days, the more I seem to need this.
Alicia turned up a few hours later. Majorly awkward. And it went downhill quickly after she brought up that there was a mage (though some thought it might be Jeb) helping the garou, calling Thane up on a phone from an unknown number, talking in circles, Thane losing his cool and storming off, Alicia telling him to call back later. She asked if I knew who it was. I said I did: it was the mage she'd suggested we go find and kill earlier for potentially having awakened the Nothing. She denied she'd said that (maybe she easily forgets when she makes death threats?), and then asked me to tell her his name. Uh. No. I know what the garou can do with a name, and I sure as hell wasn't going to give it to some hot-head with a history of using people. My refusal to share a name led to Alicia raising her voice, losing her cool, and slinging around accusations that I wasn't doing all I could t help the garou. (And then she mysteriously claimed I had no stake in this because it didn't affect me. But I don't think she was being rational at all by this point.) It was all I could do to bite back a comment about "Why don't you go mind-rape more answers out of your own brother again." Instead I asked her what she, who'd just accused me of not being open with the garou, intended to do with the mage's name if I'd give it to her. She then claimed that she just felt better being able to place a name to someone she was talking to. (Horseshit. I know all about Questing Stone. Manipulative, two-faced, untrustworthy bitch. Getting that name is not about your /comfort/.) At this point I realized if I said anything, it wouldn't be productive, so I shut up. So did Alicia, who left almost immediately thereafter.
Ghost had come in on the tail end of all this, asked what was going on, and Alicia claimed it was "that time of the month" before leaving. It took me a minute to calm down. (God damn, the garou have me really irate right now. Okay, that's not true. /SOME/ garou have me really irate right now.) Ghost and I then had a chat. A calm, sensible one. One that ranged from how she could best use her sniper rifle and area knowledge to defend the caern to how I, an outsider unused to heirarchical dominance social structures, might fit in with the garou, who instinctively default to roles of dominance, submission, and rank--and how I was aiding the garou of my own free will and had no obligation to help them at all if I did not want to. (The thought of saying "you're on your own" has crossed my mind a few times recently, but they were impulses I did not act upon nor vocalize.) It ended up turning back towards what had been happening with Ghost, how spirits seemed afraid of her, and how her umbral reflection was changing. I asked if it was changing to look more and more like the creature she'd encountered in the bunker. She got quiet, so I assume yes. I shared with her that I'd talked to Ghost 2, who doesn't have very good communication skills, and that I'd communicated with her telepathically and learned that her earliest memory was of being rescued by a pack of garou, as an infant, from a dark room. So Ghost 2 had Ghost's memories. Ghost was understandably upset by this and wanted to know how this could be. I said I'd seen something similar before with a mage, and that there could be a variety of ways magick might explain this, but I didn't think tossing out a bunch of theories would be productive as likely none are what's going on with Ghost. I offered to help Ghost if she wanted to delve further into the mystery as to what was going on with her. (I'll admit I'm curious myself and suspect it may hold some key to better understanding The Nothing, but I don't want to push her either--and I'm certainly not going to force her against her will or do it without her consent.) She didn't seem comfortable with pursuing the matter further (or it could be the moon's pull on her) and excused herself to run a patrol.
I lingered a while longer, watching the fire and observing how the forces from the flame echoed into the spiritual resonance of the caern itself like ripples in a pool, before ceasing my trip to the caern, dropping the illusion, and going outside to mow the patches of the yard that have grass. Maybe I should try my hand at gardening again this year?
The next morning, I made a trip out to the caern. Briari was there, and Rabbit turned up, too. (Rabbit's kind of cute. Makes me want to scruffle her head. Ugh. Parenting instinct. Must be missing seeing Emma's kid since she's been moved to safety.) Greetings were exchanged and, rather than address the whole thing with Blue directly, I opted to relay what I'd learned earlier about Briari's near future being very fuzzy by pretending I'd seen her future as being at a crossroads. I'd hoped it might prompt Briari to take a step back and consider how open she'd been with Blue, sharing information with him, letting him know where she lived, and being alone with him with no one to help her if something went wrong. Nope. Briari completely lost it. She thought she was going to die and said she was doing confidential work for Thane. (Thane has her interacting with Blue? Does he know the extent of what she's doing and that she's being left unattended with him? WTF?) I think I managed to do one productive thing: When Briari looked close to losing it, I encouraged Rabbit to move away from her and cautioned her about getting too close to garou when they were emotional, especially as the moon grew fuller. That might be a lesson that saves her life in the future. Briari ended up going off on a rant, talked about how I was an illusion (so much for her saying she'd keep that under wraps), kicked at stuff, and then stomped off--likely to find Thane and tell him she was not doing "this" (whatever "this" is) anymore. Plus side? I got the caern to myself for a while to meditate and re-center myself. The more I interact with the garou these days, the more I seem to need this.
Alicia turned up a few hours later. Majorly awkward. And it went downhill quickly after she brought up that there was a mage (though some thought it might be Jeb) helping the garou, calling Thane up on a phone from an unknown number, talking in circles, Thane losing his cool and storming off, Alicia telling him to call back later. She asked if I knew who it was. I said I did: it was the mage she'd suggested we go find and kill earlier for potentially having awakened the Nothing. She denied she'd said that (maybe she easily forgets when she makes death threats?), and then asked me to tell her his name. Uh. No. I know what the garou can do with a name, and I sure as hell wasn't going to give it to some hot-head with a history of using people. My refusal to share a name led to Alicia raising her voice, losing her cool, and slinging around accusations that I wasn't doing all I could t help the garou. (And then she mysteriously claimed I had no stake in this because it didn't affect me. But I don't think she was being rational at all by this point.) It was all I could do to bite back a comment about "Why don't you go mind-rape more answers out of your own brother again." Instead I asked her what she, who'd just accused me of not being open with the garou, intended to do with the mage's name if I'd give it to her. She then claimed that she just felt better being able to place a name to someone she was talking to. (Horseshit. I know all about Questing Stone. Manipulative, two-faced, untrustworthy bitch. Getting that name is not about your /comfort/.) At this point I realized if I said anything, it wouldn't be productive, so I shut up. So did Alicia, who left almost immediately thereafter.
Ghost had come in on the tail end of all this, asked what was going on, and Alicia claimed it was "that time of the month" before leaving. It took me a minute to calm down. (God damn, the garou have me really irate right now. Okay, that's not true. /SOME/ garou have me really irate right now.) Ghost and I then had a chat. A calm, sensible one. One that ranged from how she could best use her sniper rifle and area knowledge to defend the caern to how I, an outsider unused to heirarchical dominance social structures, might fit in with the garou, who instinctively default to roles of dominance, submission, and rank--and how I was aiding the garou of my own free will and had no obligation to help them at all if I did not want to. (The thought of saying "you're on your own" has crossed my mind a few times recently, but they were impulses I did not act upon nor vocalize.) It ended up turning back towards what had been happening with Ghost, how spirits seemed afraid of her, and how her umbral reflection was changing. I asked if it was changing to look more and more like the creature she'd encountered in the bunker. She got quiet, so I assume yes. I shared with her that I'd talked to Ghost 2, who doesn't have very good communication skills, and that I'd communicated with her telepathically and learned that her earliest memory was of being rescued by a pack of garou, as an infant, from a dark room. So Ghost 2 had Ghost's memories. Ghost was understandably upset by this and wanted to know how this could be. I said I'd seen something similar before with a mage, and that there could be a variety of ways magick might explain this, but I didn't think tossing out a bunch of theories would be productive as likely none are what's going on with Ghost. I offered to help Ghost if she wanted to delve further into the mystery as to what was going on with her. (I'll admit I'm curious myself and suspect it may hold some key to better understanding The Nothing, but I don't want to push her either--and I'm certainly not going to force her against her will or do it without her consent.) She didn't seem comfortable with pursuing the matter further (or it could be the moon's pull on her) and excused herself to run a patrol.
I lingered a while longer, watching the fire and observing how the forces from the flame echoed into the spiritual resonance of the caern itself like ripples in a pool, before ceasing my trip to the caern, dropping the illusion, and going outside to mow the patches of the yard that have grass. Maybe I should try my hand at gardening again this year?
