Conversation Space III.

[powersthatbe]

A poured concrete floor and cinder block walls are lit by a single bare light bulb hanging overhead. Shackles dangle from brackets on every side, and the chair in the center of the room is clearly an electric chair. A tall glass sits on top of a stool made of what looks like pure gold - but the liquid inside it is almost definitely blood.

Comments

[mytearsaremine]

"Mortals, sure, that I can see-- we do stupid stuff, we do things that's bad for us, we get mad or sad or laugh at things we shouldn't laugh at. But you just said you're stuck as one thing, as this Justice thing, I don't see how there's anything contradictory about Justice," Jolie replies stubbornly. "So you're 'both' originally the formless concept of justice given personhood for this whole Jaunt thing, and something totally different from that. How does that even work?"

[adastraea]

"Can I not simultaneously be a disembodied theory of Justice and a person made of Justice?" she elaborates.

[mytearsaremine]

"That wasn't what I was saying, though. Now you're just talking in circles," she huffs, frustrated. "Because that doesn't answer the question of which one you were before, rather than now. But okay, say you're both now, too. What is the disembodied concept of 'the moon' or 'the tower'? I mean. Those are actual things, not concepts. Justice I can get, there's some spiritual force that wants things to be right and just and good, but how can there be some spiritual force that wants things to be 'the moon'?"

[adastraea]

"Ah. We are grander archetypes than you may conceive of us. The Moon is illusion and deception, self-doubt and romanticism. The Tower is sudden change, ruin, chaos, and revelation. I am justice, yes, but I am also intellect, analysis, and clear vision."

[mytearsaremine]

"Wow, I can think of so many images or pictures that would show those things better than the moon or a tower," Jolie says with a bit of a grin, but she's liking the sound of Justice more. "So clear vision, huh? Even though you can't see. Kind of like blind justice, the statue. With the scales and stuff. I always liked her."

[adastraea]

"I am glad that you are fond of me already," Justice says, wryly.

[mytearsaremine]

Jolie takes that opportunity to stick her tongue out at Justice. Of course she does. "So what now? What are we trying to do exactly?"

[adastraea]

"We are trying to achieve Synodiporia," Justice says, simply.

[mytearsaremine]

"Since I don't have any idea what that means, that doesn't help me at all," Jolie answers, making a face. "I need something more specific. Like. What do you need from me? And what happens if you get it?"

[adastraea]

"I need you to act in accordance to my archetype," Justice says. "Seek Justice. Be rational. Have a clear head. Use your mind. Be responsible. Be all the things that drew me to you. Synodiporia... one could say it is a battle of ideas. If you hold to my qualities, it will give me strength for my matches. If you hold to my qualities, if others follow you, then perhaps my ideas will win."

[mytearsaremine]

"I don't know if anyone will follow me, but the rest of that, I can do. Or try to do. I'm not always rational, I get pretty angry sometimes if people try to tell me what to do." Most of that didn't come across as ordering her around, or she might be angry here, too. "But I'll at least try. What happens if your ideas win?"

[adastraea]

"If they win one match, I will be pitted again against those who have won their first match. If I win that match, I will be again pitted against another who has won their match. And then if I win the final round, I will achieve the World. I will be reflected throughout a more Just universe. I will return the Travelers to the places they belong or where they wish to go, I will set the terms for a more Just Synodiporia for the next round, I will restore our fallen siblings, and I will use whatever power left to me to strike as resounding a blow against the Elder Gods as I may."

[mytearsaremine]

"The elder gods?" Jolie repeats, curling her tentacles in against her back self-consciously. "Who are they?" She isn't sure she likes the idea of another one of these rounds of kidnapping people, but the elder gods thing sounds kind of important, too.

[adastraea]

"Powerful beings," she says. "I think mortals have called them 'eldritch horrors.' More powerful, in truth, than we Arcana. Ask your fellows about a place called Harrogate. They will tell you."

[mytearsaremine]

"So. They're like me," Jolie says after a pause. "Only I guess worse, cuz I'm not all that powerful or anything. But people here have called me eldritch, too."

[adastraea]

"You are very little like them," Justice says, firmly. "I would not have Chosen you if there were more than surface similarities. Ask your fellows about Harrogate. Ask the woman Sabetha, in particular."

[mytearsaremine]

"Yeah, um, that's the one who called me eldritch and kind of tried to blast me or banish me or something, so I'm not sure she'd be super happy talking about it with me," Jolie points out. "But I can ask, I guess. At least I know she doesn't like those things any more than you do."

[adastraea]

"Ah," says Justice. "Hm. Your time on the peninsula has... tainted your physicality. But still. You are not like they. Your mind, it thinks still upon mortal pathways, yes? You have no desire to supplicate yourself to that which itself desires the annihilation of all?"

A pause. "If the man Leonardo da Vinci were still in ambit, I would ask you to ask him. But he is trapped in the prison of his own mind."

[mytearsaremine]

"Ew, no. I don't let anybody tell me what to do," Jolie says, wrinkling her nose. "I'm not going to supplicate myself to anybody, especially not soul-sucking monsters who want to destroy things."

She pauses, then adds, "Um. By the way. Is it you and the other Trumps who fixed that? So I can eat real food and not, you know, people's souls?"

[adastraea]

"Yes," Justice says simply. "We Arcana--" And there's just the slightest hint of emphasis on that word. "--did as soon as we noticed you being pulled in, for though you were not our only Traveler with special dietary needs, the others could satisfy them with liminal manipulation and the charity of their fellows. Mortals may replenish blood; they cannot replenish souls."

[mytearsaremine]

"Arcana, right, sorry." She can take a hint. "Thanks for that, though. I mean. I kind of hated it, like a lot. Does that mean it's gone forever? Or only until... all this over over with?" One tentacle unfurls to wave at the room, meaning the whole Traveling thing in general.

[adastraea]

"At least as long as you are connected to Liminal Space," Justice says firmly. "I will ask the others to make it permanent should they and not I achieve the World. It is likely that most will."

[mytearsaremine]

That's more than Jolie had expected, really, and after a moment, she surges over to throw her arms around her Arcana's waist in a hug. "Thank you. I don't... I didn't really think I could live with myself if I had to keep eating people like that." And now she might not have to.

[adastraea]

Justice grows stiff--but after a long, awkward moment a hand reaches out from her voluminous robes to pat Jolie's hair.

"It was monstrous and unjust what was done to you," she says. "I pledge I shall repair it should I gain the World."

[mytearsaremine]

At least Jolie doesn't hold on and make it weird. She just felt the need to express gratitude in a physical manner, that's all. So after the pat, she lets go, and grins up at the bandaged face. "And I'll do what I can to help. A more just world would be a good thing, anyway."