SS Pathstone Mingle

[heresyandlace]

Who: Crew and visitors of the SS Passive Aggressive Pathstone
Broadcast: Probably not
Action: Aboard the ship
When: All February!

[with how good everyone on this ship is at settling differences, getting along, acting rationally, and sharing their things, this month will go by without any ripples.

the audience will be so bored. there isn't ever any drama on this ship. at all. it's great.]

Comments

[killedwithlove]

Yes, I'm Cole. I met Sorey. You mean so much to each other, it's a song stronger than steel.

[He reaches a hand out, like he wants it to be taken, or maybe just reaching to Mikleo. He's not a human, a mortal, but he's not a spirit like Cole knows them.]

[nerdeology]

[Handshakes are unusual for him, but he at least knows of them, so with a small smile he accepts the offered hand. Sorey had mentioned how perceptive Cole was, but this is more than Mikleo expected. A spirit, Elize said, but... yes, definitely different than what he's used to.]

...I won't deny that, so yes. I've always known him. How do you know?

[killedwithlove]

[Cole clasps Mikleo's hand in both his, calloused from weapon use and with blank paint under the nails. He tries reaching, to see if Mikleo can do what spirits do what River did and communicate self to self, without words.

And it doesn't happen. He keeps holding on anyway, soaking in the warmth of Mikleo's emotions to Sorey.]

Because you both show it. Know it. It forms who you are and how you feel, always back to the other.

[nerdeology]

[It's so strange, to hear it spoken aloud by a stranger. Something he knows, something he's always known, but they don't really talk about it. The times when they've fought, or the times when one of them has pushed the other away- those times exist to be nothing but temporary. His entire life has had one focus, one fixed point, and that was Sorey.

And this man knows it just by meeting Sorey, meeting him. Always back to the other. It's both powerful and frightening, warm and unsettling. He's not sure what to say.

He's not talking about the pact.]

I... I see. This is- your power?

[killedwithlove]

[He has no idea about the pact. It's not the sort of thing he's made for.]

No. Yes. Not how you think.

Before I was Cole, I was Compassion. I know hurts, memories, loves, the things that weaken and strengthen.

[nerdeology]

Compassion...

[Well, that explains it. No wonder Sorey had liked him. He had no idea that spirits could literally be feelings, but the universe has proven itself to be a very strange and incredible place in the last several months of his life.]

That sounds as if it might be both gift and curse in one.

[Loves and good memories, connections like Sorey, yes, but also- pain and doubt, what frightens and causes turmoil. When we're always together becomes one day he'll leave me. Like sensing malevolence, but somehow knowing why it formed in the first place. That alone would be frightening.]

[killedwithlove]

I know how everyone hurts, but I know what will help usually, as well. So I feel it, live it, then I can help them stop hurting, stop suffering.

[He lets go of Mikleo's hand finally.]

He won't leave you. Not voluntarily. And it might hurt, but every moment you had together will be worth every ache you feel.

[nerdeology]

[Mikleo draws back once released, not repulsed, but... startled. That's too much. It's too much for someone - a stranger - anyone but Sorey - to know about him. He feels conflicted, unsure of how to deal or what to say.]

...I... thank you. Please--

[Stop, he wants to ask, but at the same time he doesn't, so he stops himself instead. It hurts to hear those words, almost as much as it hurts to think about losing Sorey one day, but is it what he needs to hear, too?

"You know that I love your company, right?"

Yes, but- does he?]

...It's too soon to be worrying about such things.

[killedwithlove]

Of course he does.

[Cole's voice is soft, not quite incredulous.]

No one can take what you have away. It'll grow and change, but it'll be there, because it's both of you.

[nerdeology]

[Still unsettling, and a bit too much for Mikleo to handle for the first time. He purses his lips tightly, then shakes his head.]

Can we... talk about something else? I appreciate what you're doing, but...

[Maybe not right now.]

[killedwithlove]

I'm sorry. Sometimes I try to help, but it hurts more. Not in a helpful way. I did that with Dorian a lot. Both Dorians.

[He flickers back a step, in a whirl of smoke and shadow, to stand a bit further away.]

[nerdeology]

[Both?

And whoa, how did he move like that?]

It doesn't hurt. Not exactly. But I've never known anyone who could do anything like this before, and... it's hard to hear it.

[Like getting your heart pried open and all your fears laid bare in front of your own eyes. He knows he can be irrational or especially worrisome, particularly when it comes to Sorey, but knowing and hearing it spoken aloud are two very different things.]

[killedwithlove]

I don't want you to worry about your friendship, about the love, because it's so real that I can feel it hum under my ribs. Nails. Both?

[He sways on the spot, looking down at his long fingers hands.]

Bodies are strange. And they take a lot of work for mortals. Do you have to eat?

[nerdeology]

[That... is easier, so after a moment's hesitation, Mikleo smiles faintly.]

I don't have to, but I do sometimes, anyway. When the food is good.

[killedwithlove]

I don't like eating. Or drink. I find it strange. Overpowering. I ate a couple of times when I was with Rhys and thought I was a mortal, but it felt heavy, knotted and weighted like sodden rope.

[nerdeology]

Does your body not know what to do with it, maybe? Some creatures are ill-suited for sustenance that isn't natural to their kind.

[killedwithlove]

Maybe. I don't need to eat, or drink, so I don't. I don't sleep, either. Sleeping scares me. What if I go to the Fade?

What if I don't?

[nerdeology]

What is the Fade?

[killedwithlove]

It's where dreamers and magic are. Magic come from the Fade, the Fade is shaped by dreams and memories. Spirits live in the Fade, but I don't. I wasn't meant to come to the real world without a host, but I did. And a host would've made me an abomination and I don't want to be that.

[nerdeology]

[His world certainly sounds different. A lot of this goes right over Mikleo's head, but hey, that's what learning is for.]

So... spirits can enter the real world by using a host? By host, do you mean a human?

[killedwithlove]

Possession.

Not necessarily. Some use dead bodies. Some use any mortal they can. On rare, rare moments, they possess items or animals, but they don't like it.

Usually, it takes a blood sacrifice to summon a spirit without a host. Solas didn't say it, but he thought that the fact that Cole was dying might have given me the strength to reach through to help him. Comfort him.

[nerdeology]

[This... is a lot darker stuff than he's used to. Hosts, abominations, blood sacrifice? Like something out of a horror novel, or those creepy undead hellions in the crypts. And yet, there doesn't seem to be any malevolence.

The world is a very strange place, indeed.]

So... that's why you were Compassion, and are Cole, now.

[killedwithlove]

[Thedas is a bit of a horror novel, frankly.

But there's no malevolence. Not from Cole. Cole has suffered, but he bears no ill will over it. He simply wants to make people feel better.]

Yes? Sort of. No one really knows why.

[nerdeology]

[It's amazing, really. Scary, too, but Cole is such a gentle presence that Mikleo can't resent or fear him for it. It's just odd- as a seraph, he's used to being the one viewed as strange or frightening.]

Why is a host and spirit an "abomination"?

[killedwithlove]

It's the word mortals use. Abomination. It often doesn't go well. For the mortal or the spirit.

[Cole comes closer again, holding out both hands, palms up and open.]

A spirit is what is. I was Compassion. Solas had a lot of Wisdom friends. I met Faith twice, different Faiths.

What it is is shaped by mortals. Benevolent spirits don't interact with mortals much because it changes them. We... help. From the Fade. But we don't interact.

I heard a story once.

He met her in the Fade and she was Love. They spent the day together, simply enjoying one another's company. He summoned her again, and they talked of the Fade and the World and he fell more in love and he wanted her, to feel her against him, to keep her with him.

He summoned her a third time and Desire came and said "You wanted too much".

[It's a simplification of the story, but it gets across the point. By wanting, rather than merely loving, the mortal changed the spirit.]

Mortals change spirits. And when we enter them, we change them with the overwhelming nature of what we are.