Beckett of the Mnemosyne (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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snowblindrpg2016-10-06 08:28 pm
bookofnope) wrote in snowblindrpg2016-10-06 08:28 pm
[network] @Mnemosyne; video; the light we cannot see [open] Night 165
I can't sleep.
[The tablet is on the floor, lighting its own patch of paleness on the ceiling above. Beckett is lying next to it, prone on his back - that's what the angle of his arm, raised half-heartedly into the frame, suggests. He pulls more clearly into view for a moment, rising to a sitting position, to squint at the camera. His glasses are off, and his eyes glow a faint red in an ashen face.]
For all I know, I imagined it - the girl, the eyes. I'm certain the red pen was real, though, and the choice that came with it.
[He falls back again. Too tired to sit up. The tablet records to show nothing but light and shadow as he speaks.]
It may have been just me. Doubtful, but possible... but it was not just me who saw things. Perhaps we all did. I'd like to know what. Piece of some whole, or just another attack on what's left of our collective sanity... either way. For the sake of the record, if not any kind of answer.
[His relationship with answers isn't getting any less complicated. His voice drops low, dreamlike as he speaks on.] I saw a girl wearing a cloak. She was drawing the eyes, all around me... around me... until I was surrounded. She climbed on my back and drew her eyes on mine, and I knew there was no leaving. There has never been, not for me. Perhaps we are all...
[Too much. He stops abruptly, and rises again, grabbing for the tablet.]
It's all in my notes.
[The recording ends. In its place he sends his notes file out again.]
[The tablet is on the floor, lighting its own patch of paleness on the ceiling above. Beckett is lying next to it, prone on his back - that's what the angle of his arm, raised half-heartedly into the frame, suggests. He pulls more clearly into view for a moment, rising to a sitting position, to squint at the camera. His glasses are off, and his eyes glow a faint red in an ashen face.]
For all I know, I imagined it - the girl, the eyes. I'm certain the red pen was real, though, and the choice that came with it.
[He falls back again. Too tired to sit up. The tablet records to show nothing but light and shadow as he speaks.]
It may have been just me. Doubtful, but possible... but it was not just me who saw things. Perhaps we all did. I'd like to know what. Piece of some whole, or just another attack on what's left of our collective sanity... either way. For the sake of the record, if not any kind of answer.
[His relationship with answers isn't getting any less complicated. His voice drops low, dreamlike as he speaks on.] I saw a girl wearing a cloak. She was drawing the eyes, all around me... around me... until I was surrounded. She climbed on my back and drew her eyes on mine, and I knew there was no leaving. There has never been, not for me. Perhaps we are all...
[Too much. He stops abruptly, and rises again, grabbing for the tablet.]
It's all in my notes.
[The recording ends. In its place he sends his notes file out again.]
@LELRIC; audio
It wasn't just you, and you're not-- there is going to be leaving, for all of us. I saw it too, not that exact thing, but... I saw someone drawing eyes on me. Asking me to draw them on myself.
[He saw Truth.]
audio;
threadjack - @ordo; audio
[It's almost a scoff in how he interrupts, though shaken in its own right. The utter lack of control and inability to fight an instinct not quite his own wasn't an easy idea to swallow.]
Hold your sanity, for god's sake.
no subject
[It'd be... almost alarming, if it weren't. At this point he expects nothing to make any sense. For things to start making obvious sense would feel like a trap.
More like a trap.]
And believe me, I've been trying to do little else ever since I woke here.
no subject
[Not that he blames anyone for being exhausted and struggling for their thoughts after that mess. But picking at another grounds him much faster than the efforts empathy took.]
I saw the eyes. I held the pen. But there wasn't anyone else.
no subject
It's a lost cause, but I know some people like those.
[He used to be one of those people. It's grating. It's despair that feeds itself.]
Was it the same choice? Draw the eyes, or cross them out?
no subject
[It's not so much a statement of comfort as it is mild exasperation. THAT SOUNDS LIKE QUITTER TALK, SIR.]
...Yeah. Seemed pretty obvious which one was right, even though it all sounds like nonsense now.
no subject
[It's an abrupt cut-off. He's said too much again. He breathes in.]
Does it seem obvious? I still can't tell.
no subject
[Truth never did anything other than ask, but it was the way he asked that made it impossible to refuse.]
It wasn't easy to say no-- actually, I didn't say no.
no subject
I assume they're gone now, though.
no subject
[He's less wary about sharing this, anything to potentially help with the gathering of useful information.]
I'm glad they're gone, it was... [He cuts off a moment, exhaling a shuddering breath.] ...I'm just glad they're gone.
no subject
What did it feel like, when they were there? Did it feel they were - ?
[He stops, afraid of prompting an answer that Al might not offer himself.]
no subject
Like they were what?
[No, he's going to make Beckett say it.]
no subject
Like they were tapping you. Anchoring you here in Norfinbury, with no escape.
no subject
[To him, it felt more like chains binding him to this body.]
But... but they weren't real, right?
no subject
[You made him say it, Al. Now he's going to say everything.]
I don't know if they were real as themselves. But I'm nearly certain they were representations of something that is real.
no subject
[Or was he the only one who saw something he recognised.]
no subject
I didn't see any of her features under the cloak. She didn't feel familiar, which I suspect is good enough an answer. But I take it you did see something you recognise.
no subject
Mm.
[He'd rather not talk about it.]
How many other people do you think saw things like this? All of us?
no subject
I have confirmation of seven so far. Myself, you, Enoch, Lord Francel, Haurchefant, Jade, and Kanan. But I'm not seeing any kind of pattern... if it were not for yourself and Kanan, I might consider some kind of faith to be a factor, but I lack the information on your two that would allow me to come to that conclusion.
no subject
[That's easily solved.]
I mean-- I have faith in people and in science and in alchemy, but I don't believe in any kind of God.
no subject
And what you saw - your personal manifestation has provided no clue as for why it chose you?
no subject
I think I know why what I saw would have come for me, but it wasn't real, so the reasons are probably false too. The eyes on me are gone now, that has to be a good thing.
no subject
Not... entirely gone. [He's still sleepy and distracted during daytime, and in that state has caught his share of glances at the echoes of the eyes, fading in, out of reality.] But what I meant to ask was whether the nature of the manifestation gave any clues as for why you experienced one when others didn't. Mine did not, but Francel's... seemed to. A prophetic talent.
no subject
[Wasn't it more unusual to be one of the people who didn't see it?]
I can tell you that the person I saw was significant to me, and-- and to eyes.