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Post by Bee on Dec 5, 2010 16:16:02 GMT -5
They went down paths that Ananta knew. That she had known by heart since she was a small child. And yet now something was off. The easy recognition that had allowed her to lead them forward turned murky. She was confident that she was still moving in the right direction, but she was no longer sure why. The landscape seemed faintly alien to her in a subtle way she could not pinpoint.
She gave no indication of feeling about this to Dev, of course. As long as she was sure she was stilling directing them correctly, the ebb and flow of her thoughts were of zero consequence to him, and might only lead to him questioning her.
She checked her surroundings more often, however, more alertly, hunting the odd crevices for signs of movement. She could just as easily be looking for signs of Rohit's band, but what she was really trying to detect was unknown to her.
She would know it when she saw it.
If she saw it.
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Dark
Five of Diamonds
Bladed Hare
You are not prepared.
Posts: 2,105
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Post by Dark on Dec 11, 2010 23:35:46 GMT -5
Sound had a strange quality in the twisting pathways of rock they traveled; noise equally amplified, echoing, and hushed by the heavy press of stone; distorted in such a manner to make directional identification nearly impossible. The wind whistled overhead, above the barrier of rock, but within the twisting labyrinth of stone it came in odd gusts; at times, the air was eerily still, like the plains before a storm, and at other times it was sent howling down the path.
Dev found the experience disconcerting, and the lack of a horizon even more so. He could only see rock, sparse vegetation, and a sliver of sky high above the steep ravine walls.
The pathways were sometimes wide, like a valley in miniature, with stunted vegetation and small catch-basins; at other times, the path was so narrow that the rock brushed against his shoulders at they walked. The dark maw of a cave cut into rock often.
Dev followed his companion silently as they wove deeper into the interior, observing, listening.
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Post by Bee on Dec 12, 2010 23:51:42 GMT -5
The air in the ravine ran cool. Not the sort of comfortable cool that came after a hot day and before a frigid night. It was a clammy sort of cool that caused her palms to dampen and her limbs to twitch. She had almost never felt such a thing, and never in the Wastes. She entertained the notion that it might be some type of spell.
She glanced over at Dev. He did not seem to be affected the way she was. It was not a spell to affect the ambient environment, then. A targeted spell, perhaps. From the things she thought she had seen, in the spaces she thought they skittered?
She turned a corner abruptly. She was fractionally less certain that she was leading them the right way. A small surge of frustration rippled through her. She tensed slightly. She narrowed her eyes. She overcame the minute slip of self-composure.
If the creatures in the rocks were trying to bedevil her, they were going to need to try much harder. She pushed onward, resolute. The force of her will would overcome whatever magic her hidden observers attempted to pitch at her.
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Dark
Five of Diamonds
Bladed Hare
You are not prepared.
Posts: 2,105
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Post by Dark on Mar 2, 2011 18:35:06 GMT -5
Dev had taken to watching Ananta. The landscape was interesting, but it all started to look the same after a certain point; he didn't have to concentrate on where he was going, because he had no idea where they were heading; and even scaling the more difficult sections of rock didn't demand his entire concentration.
He couldn't read her, not yet. She was fairly expressionless, but there were little things that gave her away. It might take a lifetime to entirely decode the subtle nuances of her expressions, but it was an entertaining enterprise. He couldn't watch her constantly, though, or she might notice his sudden scrutinizing; he alternated between Ananta-watching and observing the landscape. Which is the only reason he noticed that something was wrong.
They had been this way before; he recognized the rock.
He might have accused her of trying to delay him, if she hadn't been anything but accommodating up to this point. They had probably just gotten momentarily turned around... But this was Ananta.
Dev began to watch her a little more closely.
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Post by Bee on Mar 2, 2011 19:19:25 GMT -5
At some point, she began to wobble. She moved as though her feet had fallen asleep, even though she could still feel them perfectly, even though they did not tingle. She struggled over her own toes. She missed things when she attempted to grab them. Genuine concern settled itself in the pit of her stomach and burrowed in. She glanced at Dev. He still seemed entirely unaffected by what was happening to her. He did not appear to falter in his movements, though she caught him watching her.
She knew with complete intellectual certainty that he was merely curious about her behavior, perhaps a little concerned. He had every right to be. She was playing guide. If she was getting them lost it was in his acute interest to catch it. And yet. The little seed of paranoia growing inside her roused her suspicion, terribly, that she was the only one stricken down with this bizarre affliction. She thought about the shadowy shapes in the crevices. She looked at Dev again, eyes narrowed. The thought came unbidden. You've lived with traitors before. If one of her family could turn their coat, why not this relatively new companion?
She realized she was baring her teeth. She put a few more steps of stumbling space between them.
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Dark
Five of Diamonds
Bladed Hare
You are not prepared.
Posts: 2,105
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Post by Dark on Mar 2, 2011 20:56:42 GMT -5
Ananta was acting entirely not like herself. She was not generally in the habit of baring her teeth at people. She never openly expressed herself. She did not stumble, or drop things. And yet, she was doing these things now.
Dev was worried. Throughout their short acquaintance, Ananta had never displayed any such sort of behavior, and he had no idea what could be causing such a radical change. A psychological break, perhaps--it wasn't a completely uncommon illness in the Wastes, though no one liked to discuss it--but he couldn't fathom what might have triggered Ananta. And whatever was causing the shift--her symptoms were becoming worse.
Dev was at a lost on how to proceed. He claimed no particular skill at dealing with people, let alone crazy people. And with the way Ananta was starting to glance at him, he wasn't entirely sure there would be a peaceful solution.
"Ananta," he intoned, a question in his voice.
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Post by Bee on Mar 2, 2011 21:18:15 GMT -5
She glanced over her shoulder at him, unexpectedly angry at hearing the sound of his voice. The little bead of a word was merely the first on a string of them, a putrid little necklace, and she could tug them out of his head effortlessly without him even speaking them. She didn't need to wait for him to finish. She did not wish him to. It was not his place.
"Quiet," she snapped. Her hands shook. She willed them to be still. Her entire body felt riotous. A couple hours ago this would have been a matter of major concern. Now her reason had been tamed to a caged, muted onlooker. She didn't even notice it. "I know where I'm going. Be silent."
But she didn't anymore, not really. At some point this place she knew so well began looking entirely undifferentiated, each rock melding seamlessly with the next, changing into the same red-brown mass. It was broken only by the slither of shadows. She pitched a rock at one. It missed its mark by a distressing amount.
"You. You too," she snarled. "I think you've turned him. I know what's going on. I know where I'm going."
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Dark
Five of Diamonds
Bladed Hare
You are not prepared.
Posts: 2,105
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Post by Dark on Mar 2, 2011 22:09:31 GMT -5
Dev took a deep breath, releasing it shakily. And another. He was careful to keep his eyes on Ananta, expression shuttered; made himself remain still, when his trained response would have been action, pose as nonthreatening as he could manage under the circumstances.
Even when she started to throw rocks at nothing more than shadows, he remained still, watching, quiet. Apparently they were lost, as well, but he had suspected that already. She was shaking, and something in his heart clenched.
"Ananta..." he spoke softly, "No one has 'turned' me." He met her gaze, willing her to believe him-- there was no one there, and it was hard to be indoctrinated by invisible forces--but logic did not have any particular place in the current situation.
"Why don't you lie down? I'll take first watch," he offered. If he could get her to calm down, and sleep, maybe the problem would correct itself. However unlikely that sounded.
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Post by Bee on Mar 2, 2011 22:49:15 GMT -5
She turned, with whiplike speed, and pelted Dev with one of the rocks, then another and another. It was like he had turned over some kind of switch in her brain. She had been angry at him before, suspicious. Now she was just enraged. Lie down. As though that would amount to anything. People lie down in the hopes of going to sleep. She didn't do that anymore. She hadn't done that in years. She never would again. She could lie down forever and nothing would come of it. Now he was just taunting her.
Her mouth set in a hard line. No one taunted her. And that was the proof she needed, wasn't it? If Dev were truly still her companion he wouldn't be doing that. The shades obviously had a grip on his mind. She considered what she might do to break it, their control over him. She could shake it from him with her pain ability. She could cut out the infection with her sword. She could mind control him into telling him everything he knew about the creatures.
At the moment, however, nothing sounded better than a solid, real beating, and nothing sounded more incongruous, either. Something told her that it wasn't the way she handled things, normally. But this was not a normal circumstance.
She pushed her unwieldy limbs into motion, prepared to launch herself at him.
She made it halfway through a step.
She collapsed to the ground in a swell of dust and, for the first time in five years, she slept.
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Dark
Five of Diamonds
Bladed Hare
You are not prepared.
Posts: 2,105
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Post by Dark on Mar 2, 2011 23:25:44 GMT -5
Dev was at her side by the time she hit the ground. "Ananta," he spoke hoarsely, desperately. He turned her over carefully, felt for a pulse beneath the delicate skin of a wrist. It was there--she wasn't dead.
"Ananta," he called again, shaking her slightly out of fear. She didn't wake up; he hadn't been expecting it. He didn't know what to expect. "Ananta. Fuck."
He pawed at his face in frustration, glancing around for an explanation, a cure, a goddamn exit. None were forthcoming. Dev growled, hating how utterly useless he suddenly felt. He didn't know what to do.
He huffed, willing himself to calm down. He had to calm down, to think. He stood when he felt he'd regained some sort of equilibrium.
They couldn't stay out in the open. Dev hefted her onto his shoulders--had she always been so tiny? she weighed practically nothing--and began to search for suitable shelter.
--
They ended up in a small valley, tucked away under a deep overhang; the sky was a tiny washed out sliver high above. The determining factor, however, had been the tiny well that burbled up from beneath the rocks, creating a basin of fresh drinking water. There were several kinds of edible plants that held tenaciously onto life around its edge, as well. It was almost picturesque.
Dev hated it.
He spent the first day between restless worry and restless rage. And the second day. And the third. Every minute was a reminder of how much more ground he had lost to Rohit. Every minute was another where Ananta slept, quiet like the dead. But he didn't leave.
By the end of the first week, he had taken to explore his surroundings. A little farther each day, familiarizing himself the the twisting rock corridors that he would eventually follow to open ground. He hunted the small creatures that lived there to keep himself fed.
Two weeks. Rohit's business in the Capitol had come and passed, and he had lost his chance. Dev wanted to be angry, but he was tired. Ananta hadn't so much as twitched.
Three weeks. She was still alive; she hadn't withered away. How could she still be alive? Magic, of course. But would she ever wake from it? And how much longer could he wait, before he was forced to admit defeat, and left her to her eternal slumber?
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