Difference between revisions of "Fragmentary Passage: Zia"

Latest revision as of 20:11, 30 June 2013

Mysterious Bacon has posed:
Sleep can rarely be a safety although it can be a balm as well as a curse. As sleep draws down at last and the world of light fades to inky darkness, this time things are again different. There is a faint smell of the sea and the calling of ocean birds heard as if a far distance away.

The force of water around Zia is light but constant. Air bubbles up from the deep, shining spheres lit by some distant light underneath. It seems free and easy enough to breathe in this drifting dream of water. This cylinder bounded by darkness has a bottom which she touches after some time of gentle falling. The stained glass underneath her is partially obscured by sand.

The feeling of water fades away as the bottom is reached and there is a sharp CRACK of splintering glass as part of the cylinder breaks. A staircase of gently luminous blue crystal and silvery metal flows upwards from the floor of the cylinder to run alongside it and then upwards into a ceiling that is now roiling clouds.

There is a feeling, almost an insistant and urgent voice. A howling refrain but the words. The words are scattered and so very far away. "Such.. far away.. the road."

Zia has posed:
The still of sleep can be peaceful for some, but for Zia, it had become a strange place as of late. There were dreams that seemed like more than dreams, and nightmares that she couldn't escape with the hold of stone sleep. Yet, the feeling of this is familiar, too, as if treading the line between sleep and awake.

The smell of the sea is what draws her first, a deep breath drawing in scent of salt to her lips. It reminds her of Scotland, of the first rocky reaches that she'd called home. Then later, there was the smell of the ocean that came across Manhattan at times, blown in from the Atlantic. It's something that she's missed since moving to the dry, desert city of Fluorgis.

This isn't the first time that she's felt herself beneath the water, both in her dreams or while awake. The faint light seems familiar, too, as her talons touch down on the sandy floor of the platform. Expectation drawn from her last dream expects to see familiar faces in the glass, but the sand blocks them from view. The crack has her flinching, though. Though she'd fallen from one of these platforms before, it doesn't make the sound any less startling.

And then, there's the stairway. Blinking, the gargoyle glances around before approaching. There seems only one way to go, but the voice stops her just at the first step. Ears tucking back, she turns, unable to resist the urge to search for the source of that voice. "Hello?" She offers back. The clouds above may roil, but they don't frighten the storm mage, at least not for now. "Skoll?" It had sounded like him before in her dreams, but this time it seems even more strange.

There's no way to go, but to continue, step by step.

Mysterious Bacon has posed:
A silvery light shining down on the Scottish highlands, as seen through a crack in a dreamworld. The smell of the water and the feel of the air as a light breeze curls around the cliffs and the high places. A silvery fog curls across the rich earth and grasses, shrouding the rolling hills.

The turf littered with hundreds, thousands of ancient blades. They stick from the terrain like the remains of ancient caerns. The battered and rusted remnants of a battlefield long since turned to ash.

Some of these ancient and strange weapons of artifice are intricate while others are simple. Some of them are proud and others humble. But they are all dull and lifeless and broken.

Skoll's voice may have been heard before, just for a moment, for a flicker... but the new voice has nothing to do with them. It is a nameless and only vaguely male voice that announces frankly from her elbow. "Where do you think this path leads?"

There is a chime, a single lonely tolling as the fog reveals a grand and terrible clocktower that protrudes from the fog like a thorn of stone. The ancient clockface with it's tarnished face is as luminous as the moon overhead with violet flame underneath each of the archaic numbers. The wrought iron hands point to 'I'

The nameless voice continues. "Where these paths have always lead.." There is a faint chuckle and there, where there was nobody before there is a figure whose manner and bearing are very calm and controlled. Their coat is black and tied at the neck in the same draping manner as wings, though it is not quite certain if theya re gargoyle or human. A hood shrouds their face, what little can be seen of it at all.

"Good evening. Forgive the theatrics. They are somewhat inevitable in order to secure a moment of your time.. undisturbed. Would you walk with me, perhaps only for a minute or two? I shan't delay ye long."

The figure gestures to a pathway moving through the hills in a gentlemanly gesture.

Zia has posed:
One moment, it's part of a familiar dream and next she's back in the highlands. The transition takes her breath away, causing her heart to falter for a moment. She had last seen these cliffs as a child, back before everything changed. Yet, this is not some idyllic place, but something more ancient and dark. The cool sea air, rich green grasses, and silvery mist seem like home - the strewn battlefield does not.

Perhaps some great battle had been fought here, but just what had brought so their rest is lost to the hands of time. Her father had many stories of wars that he had told to his bright-eyed children, but seeing it first hand is another matter entirely. Crouching, Zia touches the edge of a ruined blade for a moment, her expression distant and sad.

Before she can come to terms with any of it, there is that voice. Turning towards it, she finds nothing at first, her pulse racing slightly in genuine surprise. Her tail tucks towards her, blinking into the fog, but at first, there is no one. The chime pulls her attention, though. The great clock appears like some monolith from long ago, but it doesn't feel like any ordinary clock.

The voice spins her gaze back again, but this time it is no phantom but some creature of flesh and blood. Watching for a moment, Zia lets out a breath, her head canted slightly. "Who are ye?" She asks in a soft voice, though he does go on to explain his presence here in this strange dreamscape. With a sidelong glance towards the battlefield of ancient blades, the gargoyle nods once.

Once, she might have been frightened by such things, but she's met her share of strange people since her world first fell. Now, she's driven more by curiosity. "If ye wish, though Ah admit tha Ah'm a wee bit puzzled as te wha yer doin here. Though Ah cannae say wha Ah'm doin here, either." Dreams were like that sometimes, but Zia moves along the indicated path none the less, her tucked tail showing that she's hardly at ease in this place.

Mysterious Bacon has posed:
"A seeker of many things, knowledge being one of them. Until we meet, perhaps it is best only to choose that for my name." The man(?) strolls through the mist of this ancient and shifted dreamland, hands loosely behind his back as he asks, in a voice that seems to shift and distort and become many people and none of them.

"There is nothing more important than the things we choose for ourselves, is there? Often. We have our choices made for us and our freedom stolen from us. Even by those who believe they have our best interests in mind." A faint chuckle. "I admit I drew you here for the sake of sating a curiosity. Tell me, have the sorcerers deigned to tell you anything of the path they have set you on by catching you in their nets? Did they aid the world you call home when the heartless came, or did they shroud their path in one of obscurity and feigned apathy and mistrust?" Another pause.

"Not even the Atlanteans know much of the things they have made sure the universe has forgotten. Even if it could have saved your world. ..And still.. very much could."

The Clock seems to follow them where they go, always omnipresent as if it were part of a background that always shifted so that the ancient clock was always in view.

Zia has posed:
Names have never been part of her culture, although many gargoyles now use them. The answer he gives is moer than enough to sate her, as titles fall more naturally to her tendencies than names ever have. "So be it." She inclines her head then, a polite sort of measure of introduction, because clearly he has some idea of who she is, otherwise he wouldn't have sought her in the first place.

It's his questions that take her time to mull over, because there are so many ways of answering them. "Ah suppose so, although Ah'm startin te wonder about the threads tha bind people together." Though she might have once scoffed at things like 'fate', she'd seen Avira saved by 'true love' and the power of those who seemed wise enough to know the paths for things to tread. "Ah've had m'freedom taken away b'fore. Ah dinnae plan te have anyone take it away again."

Then he goes on to ask about sorcerers and the heartless. This stops her slightly, causing the white gargoyle to look at him peculiarly. "Ah'm afraid Ah dinnae know wha sorcerers ye mean. The only ones Ah've met are the old man 'n the strange woman in the swamps." She's likely referring to Merlin and Mama Odie. "Ah dinnae know if they played any part in the fight for Manhattan, but they did help us find the way te bring it back." Yet, her words remain questioning, uncertain if these are the people he means, or if there is something else going on that she doesn't yet understand.

The clocks ominous presence causes her tail to tick back and forth, as if it were counting out the seconds. "The Atlanteans seem te have lost a great deal aboot themeslves 'n their past, 'n the power they have is goin' te put them in danger. Manhattan is too busy tryin te protect itself from the evils of other-worlders te be preparin for the real threat of the Heartless." Neither were in a great position these days, but perhaps she and her friends had managed to hold off the Heartless for now.

"If there is a way te help, it's somethin' we need te seek out 'n find. Things cannae remain the way they are just now."

Mysterious Bacon has posed:
"Indeed. Many things bind hearts together, and not all of them pleasant or.. even safe. Things very much cannot remain how they are now, if your worlds are to survive." The apparition shakes their head slightly. "Although, if you wish to learn more of their folly. Of what has been possibly before and may be again. If you wish to learn of the deceptions of both those you mentioned as well as others then I am more than happy to point you in the direction of them."

The seeker makes an expansive gesture with a gloved hand, pointing towards doors that hang in nothingness somewhere approximate to where the 'base' of the clocktower would be if it didn't keep always moving away. "I am of the belief that learning answers for yourself is more honest than simply telling someone what they must believe, or how they should act.. even.. if it is what they dearly need to hear."

And then they are gone. Evaporated in a plume of smoke.

Zia has posed:
It's an odd thought - to wonder if someone else has been pulling her strings all this time. Yet, the first steps had been her own choosing. She'd met others who had brought her out of her shell and into a world that needed those strong enough to stand up and fight. It's hard to examine her own past and try to see where things could have been different. "Ah dinnae know much aboot these sorcerers ye speak of, lad, but there's a great deal in this world tha Ah dinnae understand yet. It'd be foolish te turn aside any insight."

The doors beyond remind her of the doors that once lead out of her dream, but these don't seem to be those kind of doors. "Ah'm willin te see wha it is tha ye have te show me." She moves towards the doors, although the twitch of her tail tells that her bravery may not go as deep as it seems. What if there is something she doesn't want to know beyond? Perhaps it's better to know now than to wait and find out later.

Mysterious Bacon has posed:
The inside of the clocktower is a place out of memory. Everything is where it is supposed to be. Every book, every item, every candle. There is only one thing missing in this study out of memory.

There is no Valen. No trace even though the candles are lit and the room looks only recently unoccupied. Eerily so for a dead man. As if he might walk in at any moment to resume his studies.

There are a number of small eccentricities that mar the perfection of this memory. There are small statues, chess pieces even scattered around the study. Pawns and knights and kings all carved as small gargoyles. Each of them is faintly luminous, with an aura of unreality like whatever they held in check would emerge if the faint surface tension of their binding was disturbed.

On each piece scattered around the study there is a name engraved and made obvious by the faint luminous glow of the letters when Zia approached any of them. That menacing clock, even though it should be around her, can be seen from the outside still frozen on 'I'

Near the wall, at eye level, is a tattered notice that reads only. "There is never time for everything."

And these are the words graven on the statues.

Endless -- a small praying gargoyle.
Zero Point -- A small gargoyle, sitting, head tilted upwards to look at some far distant obkect.
Utter Silence -- A gargoyle, hands over their eyes.
Wayfinder-- Two gargoyles with clasped hands
Tower of Voices -- A gargoyle sitting against an empty throne.
Dark Margin -- A gargoyle standing, half of their body ragged and worn away.

Zia has posed:
The sight of the room within is enough to take her breath away. It's been many years since she'd last stepped foot in Valen's study, not since the day she took back her own freedom. So many dark memories were built from this place, and yet it had also been her home for centuries. Some of the very books that line these walls, she now kept hidden back at the watchtower, but they remain in this memory none the less. It's eerie enough that she can't help but turn around, checking the stairs behind her for any sign of the dark sorcerer, but - of course- she is alone.

'There is never time for everything'. The note catches her eye, the writing looking as if it had been scrawled in the dead man's handwriting. Outside, she can just see the clock. "Alright." Turning back, her eyes sweep the room, over the various gargoyle forms that should not be here. Though she can't claim to understand what they mean, it's a matter of finding those things which speak to her.

The choice isn't easy, as she has no idea how many choices she will have in this strange place. Yet, her hand is drawn instinctively towards the small praying gargoyle. Endless. Even the people of Atlantis were not immortal. What about Skoll? Clearly, even the worlds were not without end. So what could this token mean?

Mysterious Bacon has posed:
There is a faint sound and a drawing forwards. It pulls Zia towards itself and the entire world seems to invert as the gargoyle is touched. There is a flash of light, quick and startling as sudden sunlight and the study is gone.

The last few wisps of that dream depart as the dream seems to have shifted to the deepest regions of space.

Stars and planets stand out statkly on the carpet of inky black. The darkness between the stars in which they are inbedded spiral with comets, nebulae and a howling solar wind.

They churn and ripple through the cosmos, through the unfathomable reaches between worlds. In this titanic set piece where all seems so small and so lost, how can anything be connected to anything else?

A single heartbeat shudders through this pocket universe. It is not a sound in itself but a single pulse that makes the walls and ceiling ripple. Revealing this place to be a room on which the universe is painted. The air ripples and there is a faint feeling of that sensation of water again. The floor moves slightly underfoot. The surface tension of a pond disturbed by that sound, that event.

And then again.

Sound.

Sound. Light. Emotions. .. something else. Not quite words or thoughts. The pure language of intentions. Unspoken wishes. Hope, both newly minted and greatly battered.

Hearts.

The universe lights up for a split second and every interconnected heart is shown. A delicate infinite tapestry of the interconnections life shares on a cosmic scale. A shining thread of song and sight and emotion that blazes from some far flung edge of the universe where all threads converge.

There is a core at the very center of this pocket universe. An empty place in the universe where all hearts begin and end. A flicker of luminous blue.

There is darkness here as well. It is a great blanket in which light is embedded with threads of chaos everywhere seeking to ensnare, to entrap.. but for all it's destruction, it is also part of the pattern as well.

And.. there is something else..

Empty places in the universe where it has all started to unravel. Places of no life. No light. No hope. A raw wound, an absence in the universe.

Another blaze of light. Brilliant like a cerulean star against the cosmos, traveling that shivering line of interconnection to touch Zia. The universe neatly and without fanfare inverts itself again. The light, the life is hers. Her heart briefly and painfully on display for all it's joy and sorrow. Her connections to others. How they have changed. How she has changed.. and it is all a microcosm of the bigger picture.

All hearts connected. Even separated by so much distance. So much pain and tragedy. So much darkness.

And still.. light.

The study returns with the force of being flung bakcwards, of rubber banding away from that universe-in-a-box before it begins to burn. A small searingly white piece of icy stone is in hand, which dulls down to a cool fire like smouldering coals set in blue flames.

Zia has posed:
It's a sickening lurch that has her feeling as if her stomach was left behind somewhere in the past. Thrown forward, it is almost as if she hovers somewhere, wings flexed against a wind that doesn't exist. The instinct to catch herself from a fall ebbs, but in the aftermath, she's left to let out a single breath, taking in the wonder around her.

On a night, a long time ago, Zia had sat up on the cliffs with her father and brother, learning about the stars. It was a stark contrast to the dim lights she could see from Manhattan in the years that followed. Yet, she'd found it again with Skoll, watching the stars fade and the sun rise over a foreign world. This is something even beyond that. The universe stretches on forever, and the expanse of it all takes her breath away.

Words fail her then, replaced only by the sound of that distant heartbeat. Not one heart, but so many that stretch out from so many places between. Light and darkness and chaos. Joy and sorrow. Song and sadness. Creation and destruction. It's a balance that seems to weave this greater tapestry, and yet some parts have come unraveled.

Her heart sinks. "Lost worlds..." She whispers to herself. She'd understood what it was like to lose her own world, but that was one sorrow, where as these are many. It's hard to see those places where the connections have been brutally severed.

Then, there is her own heart among so many others. It is a small thing, but even one light can sometimes be enough. Memories come like flashes back to her. Faces of her parents, her brother, her friends. Some are gone now, and yet some remain. One tiny part of the greater whole that remains.

A hand reaches out, but then she's seized again and flung backwards. The feeling of returning to the real world is enough to knock the gargoyle off-balance, causing her to have to catch herself against a nearby table. Her heartbeat pounds in her ears. "Ye didnae tell me there'd be a roller-coaster involved in this, Seeker." Though he's not there, she seems to be trying to divert her own uncertainty, rubbing a palm across one eye.

Where her hand has touched down on the table though, another of the tokens lies. The image of two gargoyles, hand in hand. It reminds her so much of her parents, or perhaps of Percival and the love he never had. And then... she thinks of Skoll. Steeling herself, Zia swallows and then touches this second icon. Her way has not always been certain, but just what do the words mean by 'Wayfinder'?

Mysterious Bacon has posed:
Again. The sound of the ocean.

The phantom sensation of water laps across the floor of the study. There is a pressure, then the smell of the ocean. The soft baking prickle of sun on skin. The warm and moist winds blowing through the study, ruffling the pages of open ooks.

A woman's voice, tinny and indistinct like hearing their voice through a seashell. "Somewhere out there." There is a smile that can almost be heard in the voice of the woman. The hope and at the same time.. doubt. Worry. All so carefully wrapped away.

"--there's this tree with star-shaped fruit. And the fruit represents an unbreakable connection. As long as you carry good luck charms shaped like it, nothing can ever drive you apart. You will always find your way back to eachother. An unbreakable connection."

Golden sand. A distant and dusky shore comes in for a moment, impossibly remote.. and then goes out like the tide. The study returns but the blazing comet star has become a five pointed star that blazes with that same constant cold light. It's pieced together carefully, like fragments bound together by wire, holding with it the connections made and lost. The paths that have lead to this day and this hour.. and the choices.. good or bad.. that make up those connections.

The small gargoyle is gone and all sensory information of that distant shore goes with it. There is another horrible clamor of notes. The Clock, which can be seen from the outside reads 'VIII'. So much time has already flown past. The hooded figure is examining one of the books. He says without looking up.

"It's true. What she said." he closes the book gently, carefully. "We all stand together in this. We all make choices and have to live with the consequences. What will you choose, I wonder?" --and again, they fade out of sight.

Zia has posed:
The ocean. It seems to come back to water a lot in these dreams. Where the rocky cliffs of her homeland had been familiar, though, this place is not. Though some part of her still feels connected to the study, her talons can just about feel the sand beneath her feet. Her tail shits, brushing past it, trying to find the edge of what is real and what is not.

Then, the voice twitches Zia's ear, drawing her attention. "An unbreakable connection?" She asks, but it doesn't seem to be to anyone in particular. The idea seems impossible, but so much of what she's seen lately is impossible. Some part of her wants to talk to this girl, to find out what it is that she knows about such things, and yet, this vision seems to fade even quicker than the first, leaving her once again back in Valen's home.

The bright sight of the Wayfinder burns into her mind, though. She looks at it, blinking against the brightness. Then, the clock chimes. "How in the..." She starts, but then cuts herself off, realizing that the note had been true enough about the passage of time. She wouldn't be able to see everything there is to see here, but perhaps she can find out enough.

The return of the Seeker to this dream is met with a startle from the gargoyle, who flicks her tail once and peers in his direction. Valen had so many volumes, and the one in his hands isn't familiar to her. "Aye. Ah wouldnae be here if it werenae for those who have stood by m'side. Ah wonder if..." And he's gone again. She narrows her eyes, "Bloody phantom." Muttering, she can almost feel the time ticking down.

She'd make her choice, and live with the consequences of not knowing the rest. "Ah'll choose wha'ever it is tha m'heart tells me te choose." He may not be talking about the little gargoyle tokens, but for now, that is the choice she has to make. There is not enough time.

It's the gargoyle, sitting, looking upward towards some unknown horizon that she chooses. Once, a long time ago, she had sat like that upon the ruins of her family's castle. Her father joked about her head being up in the clouds, and perhaps that wasn't far from the truth for a storm-witch. It reminds her of herself, and that is why her hand reaches for it: Zero Point.

Mysterious Bacon has posed:
Darkness.

It surges up and around and blots out the study in seconds. There is a sensation of falling, of drifting out into that darkness and then again, returning as recurrent as the tides, the sound of the ocean.

Now an otherworldly illumination. A silvery sphere lay like a sun in the distance, casting it's pale light on the beach and the waters and the strange arching protrusions that form a partial cage over the sky.

The air has a thrumming silence to it. A silence so complete save for the movement of the dark water that thought seems sluggish and difficult. Willpower and memory seems to fade like a sand castle being worn away.

There are footprints along this dark shore. In the near distance, a blue ahired woman sits upon a dark rock looking out at the ocean. She looks in Zia's direction and smiles. It is the smile heard from an unknown shore, full of hope and that squirreled away doubt. She looks a little closer as if trying to remember something that slips away from her and, with a look of faint resignation she lets whatever it is go.

She gestures for Zia to join her and sits with her hands in her lap. "I.. " she chuckles but it is a sad sound. "I do not know where I came from.. or who I am, but I am glad for the company."

Zia has posed:
Darkness first, and then the sea. This time, the sand beneath her feet feels real enough. Taloned digits leave strange impressions next to the footprints that line the sand. Once again, the sounds of the ocean fill her ears. Crouching, Zia takes a brief moment to feel the sand between her fingers, wondering if this could be a real place, or if it is just another illusion or memory.

It's too quiet here, without the sounds of life that normally accompany a place like this. The silvery light casts an eerie reflection of the water, making it look as if it were depthless. Yet, she isn't alone like the other visions, and the moment her eyes come across the blue-haired woman. Rising quickly, Zia dusts the sand from her hands and steps forward. Though she can feel the pull of the waves on her mind, for now she manages to resist losing herself to this place.

"Ah didnae realize there would be anyone here." Her wings cape, trying not to look quite so monsterous. Wherever this woman came from, it's probably not a world that had creatures of her kind. The sad tone of the woman's voice pulls on her heartstrings, causing her own ears to tip down slightly as she approaches closer, tail curling faintly against her ankles. At first, there seems little she can say to offer comfort, but she has to try.

"Ah'm sorry for wha'ever brought ye here, lass." Though it may be another vision, it feels real enough, leaving the question to linger: Will she be trapped here as well? Pushing that thought from her mind, the gargoyle comes to stand behind the blue-haired woman, "Is there anythin Ah can do te help ye? Anything at all? Ah'll do wha Ah can, even if it's jus' te stay here for a wee while."

Mysterious Bacon has posed:
The woman looks out at the ocean again. She looks over and the absolute faith in her eyes shines out as she shakes her head. "I don't know if I am dreaming or not.. this has seemed like such a long one. So.. I'm not sure I can answer that question." The smile again, ticking at just one little corner. "I've been waiting for so long. Company /does/ seem like.. it would be nice."

In her hands are the broken pieces of a stained glass charm much like the wayfinder that Zia found in her hand after the other dreams had past. "..All of us who come here are waiting for something. Wishing for something." she shakes her head. "Moving around in circles. Saying the same things.. hoping.. that one day I would be saying them to someone who remembered me." A single tear slides down her face, a moment of broken control in an otherwise straight and calm and confident bearing. She reaches up to her shoulder, to a place where armor should be but is not. "..We promised to stay together but they got.. lost somewhere."

A painful breath. "But I have hope. And visitors.. and time. Sometimes. That's good enough."

Zia has posed:
In that moment, Zia looks out across the sea, herself, trying to imagine what it must be like to only have this sea for solace. "Ah know the feeling... sometimes, yer just nae sure if yer awake or still dreamin'. This feels real. Ye feel real. Ah'm just nae sure if Ah'm really here or not." It's a daunting question. If this woman exists somewhere, then surely her fate has been a sad one. "Maybe ye'll wake up someday, too." So long as people believe, then some hope has to exist.

When her eyes look back to the woman, it takes Zia a moment to recognise the charm in her hand. If it weren't for the glimpse she'd had into Wayfinders, the gargoyle might have never been able to guess what it might have been. "Even things tha are broken can be fixed. Nothing is lost so long as people fight for it." Reaching beneath her scarf, she plucks out her own crystal. Though it still shows the scar from where it had been cracked, it has regained the power it had once lost.

"Keep faith, lass. Maybe they're out there somewhere, still tryin te find ye." Though, she doesn't know this woman, it seems wrong to leave her here without some reassurance. Maybe, if she remembers, then whomever this girl was won't be lost cmopletely. She wants to tell her that wishes can still come true, but it sounds false on her own lips. Without knowing the circumstances, there's not much she can do but be here, and try to remember every moment.

Reaching out, Zia tries to place a hand onto that same shoulder, trying to offer some support where she can offer no solution. This is another mystery, but what does it have to do with everything else? Pieces of a greater puzzle. "Well, Ah'm glad te offer some small comfort. No' one deserves te be alone. No' like this." After living so long by herself, she'd learned just what it is to need and care for other people. Being separated from them seems like an unfair curse to be placed on this woman's shoulders.

Mysterious Bacon has posed:
"We'll find eachother again." The woman smiles at Zia, looking curiously at the crystal and then back down at the wayfinder. The wattage goes down for a split second and then returns. Her voice becomes tinny and indistinct. "I just have to believe."

The darkness recedes and the study returns. The hooded figure is sitting in a chair with a book as if waiting for Zia to return. The Clock reads XI and is preceded by eleven massive tolling chimes. "An image." The voice says in an echoing voice. "..Preserved in memory. A knight trapped in amber, forever hoping for a rescue that may never come. Her friends came and went and made their choices. They chose freedom for countless others.. and left none for themselves."

The seeker tsks softly. "A casualty of sorcerers and their machinations, as many are still trapped and lingering between the worlds. Waiting for saviors." He gestures that Zia follow him and walks out to the streets of Manhattan, with all of it's life, and noise and hum of life. Only all of the people are only echoes. Silohuettes without form. "But it's a tenuous thing, all that you have struggled for so far. Without knowledge.. without a way to secure this fragile peace. It could be lost.. without a sound."

The soap bubbles of the silohuettes pop and the city of manhattan is suddenly cold, and silent and empty.

Zia has posed:
It's with a heavier heart that Zia returns to the study this time, tucking her crystal back beneath her scarf as she emerges from the vision. Though the Seeker offers up some explination, it doesn't do much to lift her spirits. "Ah dinnae know her or her friends, but maybe they made the right choices. Maybe if they cannae come for her, someone else can." Sure enough, the gargoyle would try to hold on to this part of the dream if she can. No one should be lost forever.

It comes as little surprise that there may be others, lost and waiting for rescue. The dangers that have recently shown themselves to her world, must have existed before. In the end, she may be stuck making the same choices. Could she really live on that distant shore, forever, even if it iwas the right thing to do?

It is a question to think about, and the chimes tell her that there is little time for it. When he becons, the white gargoyle follows, leaving behind the choices left unmade. As Valen's study fades, giving way to Manhattan, it doesn't lift her spirits as she might have expected it to. So many questions left unanswered, and so much to do.

"Ah willnae let m'world fall te darkness again." She'd been there at the end, and felt the weight of that failure. The sight of the world going dark and cold sends a shiver through her. Like many of those who had fought to ressurect Manhattan, she'd seen the way the world looked in that state. The Heartless, the press of darkness, the emptiness of everything that made it real and living. "We're stronger now. we'll find a way te keep it safe."

Mysterious Bacon has posed:
"Will you?"

No air of judgement follows that statement. no disbelief. It is only a flat and unassuming question. He reaches out a hand and there is a quick flash. A snap of energy that reforms into a blade of black and blue. A keyblade if one has been seen before and similiar to the rain of broken blades in the scottish highlands of dream that they began with.

"It comes always down to choices. I would like to offer my experience.. offer what answers I have to give you in helping you find and restore those lost worlds and make your own safe. Perhaps.. even restore all of it, instead of a single small island amidst an ocean of darkness." The keyblade is lightly pressed into the earth and the man(?) extends a hand towards Zia. A streetlamp shines down a circle of light on which the hooded figure stood just barely outside the reach of.

"Walk with me a while longer. Let us see if we cannot save those who deserve so much better than they have been given."

Zia has posed:
The question doesn't so much catch her off-guard, but causes Zia to pause briefly, considering herself. Since the day that Manhattan had been lost, she'd gone out of her way to do whatever she could to bring it back. She'd sought shards, went into hell for Avira, and faced the darkness of the lost city. Step by step, she'd grown stronger as a person, but also as a fighter. Her own will to do more has changed her from a scared girl into someone who isn't afraid of standing up and taking initiative.

When he reveals the keyblade, some measure of understanding hits her. She'd seen Sora unlock the shard for the Pride Lands. "You're like the spikey haired boy." Her head tilts, "Though Ah cannae say Ah've heard of any others like 'im." It's yet another question about this man's identity, but for now, she decides to leave him with his title alone.

Everything is a choice, and for now, she chooses to follow this thread wherever it might lead. "Ah'm listenin. There's a great deal tha Ah dinnae understand, but Ah need te." She looks towards his hand, then reaches out for it, nodding her head once. "But te answer yer question, lad... Ah will find a way. Someone has te. Things cannae stay like this." She shakes her head, ears drawn back against her hair.

Mysterious Bacon has posed:
Fog rolls across the city of manhattan, beginning to shroud it and fold it away as the hooded figure pulls her out of the circle of lamplight. The Clock overhead (still here, even in manhattan) strikes XII. The last violet fire goes out and the clock goes silent, fading into the spreading fog that folls across buildings and streets.

There is a flash of light, the field of vision contracting further until all is returned to that cylinder of darkness from which this all started.

The hooded figure says with calm certainty. "Then seek me.. here." There is a picture, an image, a flash of rolling green hills and a white expanse of castle in the middle of that green. Castle Oblivion to those who know it's name. A forgotten place of memory to those who do not. "And we shall begin.."

The last light fades.

Let the pieces fall where they lay.

Destiny or Distortion.

Dream or prophecy or nightmare.

All things in thier places and at their own times.

And with the last rays of light failing, the dream ends and Zia begins to awaken.

In hand is the wayfinder, the smooth glowing stone of the star as if from a passing comet.

Zia has posed:
A white castle on a field of green. A clock chiming in the distance. Though she had never seen Castle Oblivion, herself, there were others she could depend on to show her the way. All it would take, is asking. Soon. "Soon." She repeats the thought out loud, nodding once as the world around her falls again into darkness.

Like so many times before, there is that uneasy feeling of falling. For a gargoyle, it is even more disconcerting. Her wings twitch. Then, with a gasp, she returns to the waking world. Sitting up, Zia runs a hand through her hair and groans slightly, her mind replaying the images of the dream. It takes a moment before she realizes that the wayfinder remains in on her palm. "How..." There are no answers, but at least she has somewhere to start.

In the kitchen, there is the sound of whistling and the rattle of pans followed by the smell of bacon cooking. "Might as well get up. Otherwise Ah'll be dreamin of bacon next." So, she drags herself out of bed, already steeling a new set of goals in mind. She'd find her way to the Seeker. Soon.