Alone in the crowd

shade

Oh, chat. In this one case I totally know.....

Alexander Brandt

[Per+Awareness]

Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 7, 10) ( success x 2 )

shade

It has been a long day.

The truth is, they are always long days. Even for the Enlightened, so much of the world falls under a cold kind of shadow. Invisible, but with that sudden loss of warmth and light as when clouds obscure the sun. Especially for the Enlightened.

They see the world for everything it could be.

They see the world for everything it is.

The street is full of people enjoying the spring. Warmth. Hope. Rebirth.

They jostle against each other on the crowded sidewalks, threaten to spill off the sidewalks and through parked cars into the streets at times like rivers swollen with melting snow overflowing dams.

But Alexander can sense something else. Something that isn't exactly at odds with the spring. Because everything that lay frozen and still over the winter starts to come alive in spring. So the rich, cloying scent of damp and decay isn't out of place. It isn't a physical smell, he's familiar enough with his newly expanded senses to know this is his mind trying to translate a psychic impression. Weave previously unknown sensory inputs into some kind of language that he can understand.

Alexander Brandt

The day may have been long, for those who have chipped away its hours through work or study and are now breaking free to enjoy themselves in the evening. For others, it is only just starting. Alexander, who has spent the day curled away in a darkened bedroom, is now out on the streets at the start of a night shift. A decent amount of shut-eye, followed by a decent amount of coffee, is easing the start of the transition into the city’s darker, mirror image.

And so here he is, slowly making his way through the crowds as people bustle and jostle and otherwise make their way through the early evening and onto their intended destinations. Alexander has no destination at present, simply pounding the beat. Perhaps people feel a little shiver as they pass, a little slide back into the Frozen depths of winter. But only for a moment, and the sensation is relatively mild at the moment.

The sensation of damp and decay does get his attention, though. Given a little more time in the city, and a few more encounters with its less mundane inhabitants, Alexander may become a little more cautious when such things appear unannounced. For now, however? He heads towards where the feeling seems to be coming from, pulled along by the force of curiosity.

Alexander Brandt

[Rollin' rollin' rollin'... Per+Alert]

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (3, 4, 4, 7, 8, 9) ( success x 3 )

Alexander Brandt

[Rawhide! Arete too.]

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (3) ( fail )

shade

It is like trying to pinpoint the center of a fog bank from within. Whatever is out there, whatever unseen unknown thing he can feel, it doesn't seem to have an easily defined center. Orienting toward it as it shifts around him seems impossible.

It is everywhere around him.

It is nowhere.

There is that sense of possibility and potential, that there is something just to the other side of some barrier he cannot see. Like the surface tension of water. Like stone.

Focused on extending all his senses, on searching out what is pulsing against his skin like a slow, failing heartbeat, he does see something. Someone.

A man in his mid-twenties. He has the athletic build that speaks more to endurance than strength, and one would expect him to have more coordination, but he staggers practically into an elderly couple, adjusts his course, and steps into a large window. He stops there, leaning on the glass without seeming to quite see the people around him or the mannequins on the opposite side of the glass.

Alexander Brandt

There is something there, that goes without question. Had one of the others been there – Sera, Kalen, maybe even Grace – then maybe they would have had better luck pinning down what and where its coming from. But they aren’t here, and Alexander is all alone in the crowd. Others may sniff unconsciously at a distant smell, but for him? It’s almost physical. Almost real. Or almost unreal?

So Alexander closes his eyes for a moment, trying to get some idea of where it could be. Pinches his nose, concentrates. But nothing, it’s simply... everywhere. Taking a step as he opens his eyes, he is bumped by a young woman rushing past and manages to stop dead in his tracks before he bumps into an old couple. Muttering apologies distractedly, he steps around them and out of the middle of the sidewalk. A mid-market women’s clothes shop has several mannequins wearing a selection of the shop’s offerings, trying to tempt window shoppers in. But Alexander isn’t looking at those. His attention is elsewhere – does this feel like that first day, with the open tear into the Umbra? Or the day he was dragged through the Gauntlet with the others? Neither of those were, intentionally, his own doing. So, he wonders, is this what the Gauntlet feels like when it’s intact. A barrier between the real world and... and its reflection?

He absent-mindedly notices the reflections in the glass, as people walk past behind him.

[Arete]

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (2) ( fail )

shade

Alexander can hear something. Soft and indistinct like conversations that have drifted on the wind. Like someone calling to him through water.

He is already leaning on the glass, it has already taken the soft impact and he has been pressed against it for a good twenty seconds when the glass shudders. A crack snakes its way across the surface. Slowly. Sluggishly. It stops inches from his nose.

Everything goes perfectly still for a second.

The glass shatters.

Shards rain onto the pavement like rain. Little drifts of them pile around the feet of the mannequins like the first, hesitant winter snow.

Alexander Brandt

The reflections in the glass pass by. Maybe there’s the reflection of another young man, dodging around another old couple, but he passes without notice too. Alexander’s eyes have closed again, forehead leaning on the glass. Straining to hear the words of the conversation.

Maybe if he tried hard enough..? Is it someone calling? Someone female? Her again?

His eyes flick open, in time to watch the crack slowly making its way up the glass. Seemingly in slow motion. There’s no new feeling in the air, no itch along his spine, as he got when Sera froze that coin in the air. So... that means there’s nothing new going on. Right? It’s all part of the same weirdness. Alexander takes a step back when the crack freezes, unconsciously holding a breath. Waiting for the moment to pass. And pass it does, in a swirling storm of glass.

Alexander Brandt

[Per+Alert]

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (4, 4, 4, 7, 7, 10) ( success x 3 )

Alexander Brandt

[And Arete]

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (8) ( success x 1 )

shade

He sees a woman in the shimmering reflections of falling glass. He can see that she is screaming before he can hear her.

The man who was reaching toward him reaches into the falling glass instead as Alexander steps back to regain his balance.

He can see a different man in the reflection. Covered in a thin film of greenish dust. Green veins winding beneath sickly pale skin.

His eyes are all pupil.

His lips are moving, but his throat is so dry all Alexander can hear is dry rasping sounds.

Until he hears the girl. Finally hears her.

Screaming.

"Run!"

He can still see her now. See through her. Like a reflection on glass. Translucent.

Alexander Brandt

There’s a face in the falling shards and, for a moment, Alexander wonders if that’s Her. The woman he heard in a dream, calling for help. Why won’t you help me? And there’s another face. Not cloaked and featureless, but green and sickly. Maybe inhuman? Do those iris-less eyes have life in them? Silence settles, as it so often does after something completely unexpected occurs. A quick glance around sees people trying to look without being obvious. Looking without really Seeing – oh, there’s the broken glass (what on earth was that officer doing to it?), but their eyes are closed to the others there.

The moment passes, thaws, unfreezes, and the screaming starts. Not her, Alexander will realise later, but still someone needing help. Maybe naivety, maybe stupidity, maybe gallantry – Alexander can’t stand by and watch someone in danger. So not for the first time, and probably not the last, he puts himself in harm’s way without understanding what's happening or with a thought to the consequences. She screams run!, but he’s not going to leave her behind. Whether she’s translucent or not, he tries to move forward to grab her hand. Only then will he run, with her.

shade

Alexander cannot reach across the distance that separates them. It is only a few feet. It is a whole different place.

There was a time she would have given anything for someone to reach out and take her hand. While she was dying. While she lay in the spirit world too lost in her own death to do anything but relive it again and again and again.

Tonight Alexander cannot even glimpse the echoes of the wounds that killed her.

She understands what he means to do. She's met Mages before. She understands how they do not succumb to the same constrictions as other mortal creatures.

And so she remembers the feel of a hand around hers and she runs as though he had caught hold of her. She does not breathe so there is no quickened breath. Her footfalls make no sound on the concrete. Alexander cannot feel her. But he can see her, running.

She looks back at the man, over her shoulder. His steps, as he starts to chase after them, crunch over the glass.

Alexander Brandt

A few feet, and a whole world away. Alexander’s hand passes through the woman’s when he tries to grab her, to pull her away to safety. He stumbles back, glass grinding into the pavement under his boots, as his mine goes blank for a moment. But it is only a moment, as she seems to understand what he intended and starts to run. And so he follows.

As breathless as she may be, it’s not the lack of fitness that slows Alexander. His breathing is barely faster the normal, his heart? That’s been pounding away since the weirdness began tonight. No, it’s the people. Those standing, or milling around on the pavement without paying attention to anyone else. The window shoppers, the mobile phone tappers, the loved-up couples: all getting in the damned way. So he sees her running ahead, passing through them without a thought.

She looks back, and so does Alexander. The green man is starting his chase, with the sound of crushed glass. Does that mean he’s physical, then? Something that can be hurt and stopped? He has ways of trying to stop something like that, but... Not here, not now. Not in a crowded street, with too many people who could get hurt. So, for now, he’ll follow her lead. Doing his best to keep up with her through the pedestrians, he calls out to her. “What is it?” He rests a hand on his radio – partly to stop it bouncing around uncomfortably on his shirt. Partly because having an armed man running past having a conversation with himself tends to raise eyebrows, but calling to someone who he’s rushing off to help? That would seem a little more normal.

shade

She does not leave him, this ghost girl. She does not pull away through the crowded streets.

"I don't know! They just started showing up!" She looks translucent at his side. Solid in their reflections in the window. The man chasing them looks solid however Alexander looks at him. Normal save for glimpses of green dust and veins in the reflections.

Alexander Brandt

The street is just too crowded to get anywhere fast. Even shouting for people to move aside simply freezes them in their tracks, like little injured owls trapped in the headlights of an 18-wheeler. There’s an alleyway coming up – wide enough for delivery vans to drive along to restock the stops along the parade, but with little else to appeal to the people looking to enjoy their evening. Alexander nods towards it as they approach, letting the ghostly woman know what he’s planning. Before they turn, he looks back to see where the strange man is. And, possibly more importantly, to see if it’s having the same trouble getting through the crowds that he has been.

A few metres along the alleyway, still running but starting to speed up a little, he speaks to the woman again. “How many of them are there? And what do they want?”

And when did having a conversation with a dead woman while running away from a weird green man turn into a normal day for Alexander?

shade

The man has to dodge people as well. Only the girl seems to be truly and entirely a creature of the other side of the Gauntlet.

"I don't know! I can see...whatever gets them, I can see it. But I don't know what it is. This is the third one I've seen." She speaks easily. Unwinded. Of course.

She follows Alexander into the alley. Looks back over her shoulder. She is dead and this thing isn't after her. She seems afraid anyway. But she doesn't leave him.

Alexander Brandt

“What do you mean ‘gets them’?” Alexander asks as they carry on running along the alley, speaking easily too – barely breaking a sweat so far, plenty of stamina left to keep this pace for hours. He looks over his shoulder again, checking for the green man following. Then thinks of his mobile phone, deciding if there’s anyone he could call for help. Alyssa, maybe? She’s the only one he’s really sure knows anything about the spirit side of things. But if the green guy is battling through people is it really a spirit thing going on? Ah, hell.

Plan A, run away from it. Plan B, if you can’t run away from it then kick the shit out of it and then run away from it.

Best hope there isn’t a need for Plan C. Alexander speeds up.

shade

"It gets them," she repeats. "I can just feel it. I know what death feels like. It gets them. I can feel them dying. That one can't see me yet."

No one appears in the alley. They are alone, Alexander and the spooked ghost girl.

Alexander Brandt

“So there’s something killing people? What happens to them after that?” Yeah, after. Death used to be the end for Alexander. No afterlife. No unavenged spirits, out for vengeance. Now? After seeing a dead guy’s spirit searching for hundreds of years for the people who will, eventually, find him? The headache of temporal paradoxes has yet to come to Alexander, but the knowledge – rather than belief – that spirits do exist? That’s there.

The green guy, however, isn’t. Another look back, and the alley is still otherwise empty. He could have missed them turning, could have dropped dead. Or some other form of weirdness could be about to tear reality a new one and land in front of them. He slows to a walk, though. Turning to face the direction they’ve come from, he walks backwards. Concentrates on that feeling from earlier – is the decay still there? While he concentrates, he asks the ghost, “How do they get around?” Because having something walk through a brick wall right now would probably be a bad thing.

Alexander Brandt

[Per+Aware]

Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (1, 5, 6, 9) ( success x 2 )

shade

Alexander can still sense that unsettling presence nearby. The scent of old damp leaves. Forgotten cellars.

"I don't know. I mean...Connor tries. But you guys are magic." She shrugs. Gives him a sad, apologetic smile. "I'm just dead. It was trying to touch you. I just thought...I don't know. That it would be bad. And you weren't paying attention and I didn't think you could hear and I panicked and the glass broke. I didn't hurt you, did I?"

Alexander Brandt

The strange resonance lingers without an obvious source. Assuming that it’s related to whatever affected the green man, it’s still nearby. So back to Plan A – turning away from the entrance to the alley and heading further away from where it probably is. Although... if it’s killed the man, would he still be chasing them? Or would he be a gently cooling corpse on the sidewalk? He looks back again, then over to the ghostly woman, having half-heard what she’d said.

“Sorry, what? Oh, no, I’m fine.” She gets more of Alexander’s attention, as the rest of what she says registers. “And... thank you. For helping me. It’s not that I wasn’t paying attention, I just don’t know how to yet. Y’know. I’m still new to all this.” He shrugs, unsure how much of it makes sense to her. Hopefully more than is making sense to him at the moment.

shade

"Um." She frowns. Now that they aren't running she doesn't look into his eyes though she does keep glancing to either end of the alley. Nervous. Skittish. "Have you met anyone else?"

Alexander Brandt

Surely if someone had just dropped dead in the street, it would have been called in and he would have heard it on the radio by now..? So, probably not then. Yep, Plan A. Alexander starts walking towards the other end of the alley, keeping up the conversation with the woman.

“A few. Not many. Kalen and Grace, but I don’t think they’d have been able to see you. Alyssa? Sera? Sid? Oh, and a guy called Leonhard.” Pan comes to mind, briefly, and Alexander snorts. “There was a new guy called Ryne, too. Have you met any of them? I don’t know that Connor guy. Is he still in the city?”

As they’re talking names, a thought comes to mind. “I’m Alexander, by the way. What’s your name?” He hopes she can remember it.

shade

[Well, Mellie?]

Dice: 6 d10 TN8 (5, 7, 9, 9, 10, 10) ( success x 4 )

shade

For most of those names, there is no flicker of recognition. She smiles when he mentions Alyssa. She looks up and her smile widens and transforms her face into something radiant when he mentions Connor. "He's still here. I met him and Alyssa at the club on Halloween. I haven't seem Alyssa since, but I see Connor."

She stops. Blushes a little, because even if she has no blood she remembers how to feel embarrassed. She looks down and then looks up again. Her smile is hesitant, shy.

She takes a deep breath into lungs she can only remember and holds out her hand very deliberately out to Alexander. And this time, if he takes it, he can feel it. "Mellie."

Alexander Brandt

Alexander smiles back, “It’s ok, we had other things to run away from. It’s not like getting to know each other was top of the list of things to do at the time.” He stops walking to turn to Mellie, takes the offered hand and grips it firmly. It seems these days that his hands are colder than they used to be but, hey – cold hands, warm heart. Right?

He resumes walking when she chooses to let go – or keeps hold as they both walk, if she wants. “I’ve only met Alyssa once, but she seemed like a decent person. I’ll keep an eye out for Connor, though.”

shade

She nods and resumes looking anywhere but his eyes, though she does squeeze his hand back. "Alyssa is good people. Connor...well...he's all over. So...he is the easiest or the hardest person to find, depending. Alyssa has his number, if you want. I should go, though. If I stay gone too long I think he worries I decided to try running into the light or something. Be careful, okay?"

Alexander Brandt

“I need to spend some time with Alyssa anyway, so I’ll ask after him. Oh, one thing before you go? Have you bumped into The Message at all? I don’t know if you would have, but...” He looks ahead, towards the end of the alley. “I wonder how he’s getting on.” He thinks about asking about the voice, but there’s no real way to describe who he’s looking for there.

shade

She frowns and shakes her head. "I haven't met anyone going by Message. But if I hear anything, I'll tell Connor and he can tell you or Alyssa. Or if I see you again. It's a big city, but it could happen."

Alexander Brandt

Alexander shrugs, not really having expected her to know anything. Maybe they will bump into each other again some time. Until then, he’ll keep asking after the spirit of Anastasius when he can. Maybe even try to find him himself at some point. Who knows.

“Thank you,” and he is grateful for the offer. “I’ll keep an eye out for Connor. And for you.” He turns to look at her face, even if she avoids eye contact again. “And I’ll try. To be careful.” Like the way he tried to save her before running away from the green guy? Yeah, real careful.

shade

She smiles, nods a little without looking up, and then starts out of the alley.