june catch-all

[mehanizovati]

Who: viktor and others, open to all with some closed prompts in comments
What: june catch-all, some tdm prompts
When: june
Where: various

content warning; terminal illness, arcane season 1 spoilers



misc lab stuff and various fruits.

[viktor's lab in the willful machine is usually left unlocked when he's working inside. friends or acquaintances have likely been told they're welcome to stop by if they like, either to say hello or to get help with whatever a vaguely sketchy lab could handle. of course someone he doesn't know can just walk in too or knock. maybe there's a sudden downpour and that ajar door is tempting? go for it.

the lab has been slowly filling with all sorts of nonsense on the various tables- lasers! tasers! some weird machine hooked up to a blood gem? it is not unlikely to be walking by and hear some minor booming noise and either a curse in czech or a satisfied 'a-ha!' feel free to investigate.

this month there's something else too, a bowl full of fruit. all the fruits mentioned in the tdm in fact, there to be tested on though it looks more like they're just for guests if people are unaware there's some weird shit going on.]

Just a moment, make yourself at home. [he might say to guest. that would include eating some fruit, right? enjoy. probably not the raw lemon though, that's weird.]

[ooc; if you want to memshare i am game, my only hard limit on memories is no suicide stuff please. self sacrifice is fine! feel free to ask to make sure one is okay. if you'd like a viktor memory let me know any hard limits and what sort of memory you might prefer!]


gaze and time loops.

[having lungs mostly working for the moment is pretty great, in viktor's humble opinion. it means walking around the trench doesn't come with the risk of coughing up blood and attracting beasts and generally having a bad time, along with added perks like not getting so easily winded and going for longer. it also means he finds himself out longer than he usually would, which maybe isn't the best, as it turns out.

for example, making his way home through gaze and hearing the chilling cry of a beast, sighing and trying to make his way around what turns out to be the wrong corner. maybe that's where he sees your character before the snarling of a too close beast starts in earnest.

and then snap! they're both back about an hour, where they passed on the street. the look viktor gives is somewhere between resigned and 'fuck this, actually.'] There is a term for this. 'One of those days,' I think.



[ooc; if you'd like to wildcard or do something else you can pm me here or find me at dichotomy]

Comments

[mehanizovati]

Was she the first child born after it all? [what a nightmare that must have been, for each. he frowns, idly watching rio's tail happily sway.

what an oddity, two kinds of loneliness- one where the children turned their backs to him and the other where there were no children to turn away. he wonders if the trench is pointed here, cherry picking these memories like a theme, before he lets out a soft sigh.]

I suppose it is. For what little it is worth I am glad you are here now, to speak of it.

[noniad]

And the last.

[If Ortus were privy to Viktor's thoughts, he would share in the sense of deliberate contrast of it all. He had been lonely in some of the way that Viktor was, but perhaps the closed, small world of the Ninth created more unity between its children than the open gash of Zaun.]

The whole of a House's future given to one child at her birth. [Another sigh, softer.] To be overlooked, or to be looked to overmuch. I cannot begin to judge which is the greater burden.

I am glad that you are, as well. [He manages a lightening of expression, if not a smile.] I am glad to be able to speak of it.

[mehanizovati]

... the Ninth stopped having children after Harrow?

[odd. alarming, really. how could they possibly survive otherwise?]

They both offer their pressures and their scars. Worse still when one envies the other, needless bitterness against the wrong source. [viktor sighs, thinking a little of jayce despite himself. at least they never fought over such things. haha.

he offers the ghost of a smile back.] I wonder if this was thematic, in a sense. About the same age, about certain lonelinesses and singular, old friends.

[noniad]

Yes.

[An oddity indeed, one that Ortus never found adequate answer for, when it finally occurred to him to contemplate it.]

The Ninth was never a fecund House. We lack the resources of other Houses, as well as their flesh magicians. Another type of envy, that disparity in the material conditions.

[Something he could understand in Viktor's memory of that strange, bright world. For all of the wealth of sunlight, he could recognize the signs of other deprivations all too well.]

I have been told that this place seeks to foster connections between Sleepers. Perhaps this is one of the mechanisms that encourages such things? [To lighter topics, by comparison; all things considered, the concept of magic that shares memories for some higher end is almost explicable to Ortus.] Well-chosen memories, if that is so.

[mehanizovati]

Ah, that does explain many matters. Admittedly I only know what Palamedes has told me, but the ah... inequality of resources is a familiar one.

[one that makes his lips thin a bit. if only it weren't such a familiar matter between worlds, but alas.

the bit about connection makes him tilt his head, considering.] Many of the issues we face are only resolved with the help of another. Some pointedly punish isolation.

Well, in this matter it was well chosen, though pointless. I already respect you a great deal, Ortus, even without such Trench tricks. [said with the easy confidence of something that is simply true. what can he say? ortus is a good guy.]

[noniad]

[Ortus ponders if the alikeness in the patchworks of their youth is another contributor to this fellow feeling, but he knows that is only a part of it. There are many who, through little fault of their own, turn less generous under the grinding weight of need.

In some ways, he was one of them.]

I respect you as well, Viktor.

[The gravitas of the words announce their significance. Respect has not been a thing accorded Ortus often, if ever. It touches a part of himself he thought withered into nothing long ago.]

I suppose the lesson is more aimed at myself. [He looks to Rio, contented and peaceable.] It is good to have a friend, in the dark.