FIRSTFALL RIFTER ARRIVAL

[faderifting]

WHO: New rifters & their rescuers
WHAT: People fall out of a rift and get attacked by stuff, as usual.
WHEN: Firstfall/November 14
WHERE: Somewhere a ways off the Imperial Highway between Cumberland and Nevarra City
NOTES: This arrival log is open to all. Solas was able to alert the Inquisition to the general area where the new rifters would be arriving so people can pick them up. Rifters can then either continue on with the main Inquisition caravan to Nevarra City or be escorted back to Kirkwall.

You were asleep--deeply or fitfully, for the last time or just resting your eyes for a moment-- and then you were not. And wherever you were was not, anymore, replaced by nothing but the sensation of falling, tumbling into endless, bottomless nothing. If this were still a dream, you would wake before you hit the ground. You can't die in a dream, they say. In some worlds.

In this world, when the afterimage left by a flare of too-bright, greenish light fades, you will find yourself landing with a wet smack. There is no avoiding the mud: this rift has opened up in the center of some unfortunate farmer's field, and all his hard work plowing and manuring has now been ruined, first by the rain that has churned it into a thick and especially fragrant muck and then by the arrival the rift itself, splitting the air mid-field and making it impossible to safely plant. And now, of course, there's you as well, tumbling out of the Fade and into the shin-deep mud.

The cluster of demons emerging from the rift seem at odds with the setting, strange stark shapes in this empty space, standing out against the grey sky. Some are tall, spindly stick-things with too many eyes who seem like they should tumble down the hill in a tangle of limbs but instead sink into the snow to anchor themselves and use the long reach of their arms to attack. Some are hunched and hooded with no eyes at all, others mere wisps of greenish light that float over the icy ground. None look friendly or familiar. Also unfamiliar is the narrow splinter of light the same sickly green as whatever brought you here that now glows out of the palm of your left hand. It aches, a bone-deep pain that gnaws even through all the distractions.

All around is more fields, except for an abandoned farmhouse a ways off, beside a windbreak of spindly trees topping a low ridge before the next stretch of pasture. As you find your feet, you may catch sight of a handful of figures in the distance, exiting the farmhouse and hurrying away over the hill. If anyone ventures to the farmhouse, they will find the remains of a camp, and may be able to locate a dropped notebook or what looks like pieces of some unknown scientific instrument, apparently broken in the rush to leave.

Comments

[thunderproof]

If Adalia wasn't expecting the weeping, she definitely isn't expecting the voice in her head. Or — she is, but not like this. For all it sounds nothing like alacruun's voice — a woman's voice, calm and measured and regal — the sensation is still one that Adalia only associates with violation, and for a moment she is filled with dread. She'd thought — she hadn't heard from him since she stole the egg — but isn't it better to hear a voice than not, because it means their connection and their deal is still intact, and mat and akrasiel are still safe —

Cold settles in Adalia's stomach like a stone and she feels vaguely nauseous as she drops to her knees in front of the elf, staring forward unseeing, willing herself to be empty and unfeeling. He was going to talk to her sooner or later.

This is a new voice you've chosen, pal, she thinks, tone flat, but a niggle in the back of her head keeps her from continuing. She hadn't really paid attention to what was said at first, but now that her head is reengaging after coming to a crashing and disastrous halt —

Her eyes focus on the crying woman in front of her, wide.

Wait, is this you? You're in my head?

Oh goodness I hope this isn't too old now.

[laurenande]

Her tears are bitter but they slow in time and she is still too weak to maintain them as long as she would. Her head bows and her golden hair shields her tear-stained face from view, but it is little comfort.

Yes.

A moment passes and, gradually, she lowers her hand from her mouth. It quakes with the force of her sorrow, but there is a stability to the motion that she had lacked before. When she draws a deep breath it is audible, even over the rain and the distant sounds of the Inquisition Camp.

I apologize, she begins and sounds greatly diminished as she continues, aloud, her voice far rougher and less clear, "I...was overcome. I am overcome."

She lacks the presence of mind to lift the woman up, to bid her stand and not rest so forlornly on her knees, and settles for wrapping her arms around her stomach, crossing them above the wound this woman had just healed. To explain would be a boon but she cannot find words that encompass what she desires to say and omits what she cannot. Instead, she shares the sense of her dread with this woman, the feel of sorrow for her people, and a vague memory of Lothlorien as reflected in the waters of the Silverlode. A memory she was certain would be engulfed in flame quite shortly.

now it is my turn to hope

[thunderproof]

It isn't what she thought it was, but that knowledge does nothing to quell the roiling of Adalia's stomach — in fact, it makes it worse. The question of what exactly this woman can hear in Adalia's head is the first to cross Adalia's mind, and then — what kind of person is she, that she can speak like this? By the time she speaks out loud, Adalia's worked herself into a tizzy of fear and anxiety, the widening of her eyes the only outward evidence of it.

"It's... alright," she says eventually, "just please don't —"

There's no chance to finish the sentence. Before she can get out her request that her mind be off-limits, sensations fill her, rather than thoughts, and the utter despair that fills her is at once familiar and entirely foreign. She has felt this, she knows this fear — the fear that her people are doomed and the best she can do is delay the hour of their passing, the dread of knowing evil is on the horizon which cannot be averted. The most unfamiliar thing, truly, is the city in the water, but even that carries a familiar feeling — certainty of its destruction, in time. It's enough to drown in, to mire Adalia in thoughts of her own fears and failures...

And drown she does. Her fear mounts with each familiar image and sensation, but even as Adalia is overcome with terror she tries to numb herself. If she feels anything she can't do anything, better to be empty than to be frozen in fear —

She doesn't move from where she kneels, dress muddied by the ground beneath her.

I am sure there is some quote about hope I could dig up for this but I can't think of it.

[laurenande]

They are too similar in their dispositions, it seems, and Galadriel has behaved hastily. The interaction of their hearts is recursive and folds atop itself, like ripples from opposing corners of a pond. The grief that drags Galadriel below the water has snagged this woman and her own grief is an anchor looped round Galadriel's neck. There is a moment, an eternal moment of synchronicity as they are perfectly aligned in their tragedy before Galadriel gasps again and closes herself off to the sense of this woman's heart.

It is like breaking the surface and she sucks in air as she falls to her knees alongside Adalia...and Adalia is her name, is it not? There is silence then, just the fall of the rain and the sounds of distant riders. Galadriel unwinds her arms and, with quaking limbs and no reservation, engulfs this woman in an embrace. To suffer as they do is so terribly, dreadfully lonely and she cannot abide it for a moment longer.

[thunderproof]

For a long moment Adalia doesn't seem to realize she's free, that her mind and her feelings are her own again. She stays on her knees, staring down into the mud unseeing, wrestling with her emotions —

and then Galadriel's arms are around her, and that is enough to shock Adalia from her melancholy. There were monks in Candlekeep who would reward her with a pat on the back when she did well in her studies, as well as those who still saw her as a child and touched her accordingly — momentary contact, somewhat condescending now she's grown, and never, ever lingering. The Avowed are not a cruel order, but neither are they overly concerned with the physical, and it has been a long, long time since Adalia has been hugged.

It takes a second for Adalia to react, so shocked is she by the contact, but when she finds she can move again she shudders forward, leaning into Galadriel and wrapping her own arms tightly around her. She hadn't realized how badly she needed a hug until this very second.

"So this hasn't gone very well," Adalia says, hoping the joke of the understatement can be heard even though the words are muffled by Galadriel's shoulder.

[laurenande]

"It has not," Galadriel agrees, her voice rough and her own eyes closed against the top of Adalia's head. She holds her for some time before the moment is passed and the edge of the emotion has ebbed; it is not a feeling she will forget with any speed.