WHO: Thais + Open WHAT: Rift closure, quarantine WHEN: Enthusiastically handwaves this WHERE: Free Marches NOTES: Editing in starters as I go, HMU on plurk or Discord if you want something custom.
"Sort of, yes," Vanya confirms, watching for her roll. He does have one advantage over most of Riftwatch's new recruits; years with the Inquisition means that Rifters are, at least conceptually, not a novelty.
"I'm not an expert, I've been told that you somehow travel here through the Fade, which is a real place, but not the sort of place one can reach with a horse or a ship." He glances up at her, evaluating how she's taking the explanation. "Humans and elves, our minds go there when we dream. Thus the connection. But it's not a dream in the more colloquial sense of being unreal."
He looks rueful. "Yes and no. My mind has been, though I've not visited it physically. Few have. And I suspect frustratingly for you, I don't have any firm memory of it. It is largely as rifters have described dreaming elsewhere; a sense of reality while you're in it, fading once you wake. That said," because he doesn't intend to be unhelpful, "mages can enter the Fade consciously and remember their time there. Riftwatch, I understand, has plenty, so I suspect one of them will be willing to answer your questions more precisely."
He considers and discards the idea of discussing the experience of watching mages enter the Fade. It will raise more questions without answering any, and his own mixed feelings aside, he doesn't suspect it will help her.
"Not everyone in the Fade is a mage or dreaming, for what it's worth. We believe the souls of those of have died pass through. And there are spirits and demons native to the place. Earlier on, when rifters first appeared, the theory was that these spirits had just taken a new approach to influencing us." He sighs and takes a drink of his ale before adding, "As far as I can tell, this attitude has faded within the Inquisition and Riftwatch, though I can't answer for outsiders' opinions."
"Sensible," The green sheen of an empty hand. "Given the company we keep."
There had been an awful lot of spirits. Thais smiles, impatience smuggling in her teeth: He's right. She's frustrated. But she knows just a bit better than to beat him over the head with it,
At least, when he's supplied enough else to chew. She drinks, and takes in less of it than she'd like, and the tip of her tongue doesn't tear for Vanya.
"Perhaps we're all mages dreaming," Perhaps she cracked her skull on the limb of some ruin. "We might all be dead."
The look she gets for that is less shocked than nonplussed. (Yes, young templars also get drunk and wonder do they really see the same green, though, you know?)
"...possible. Hard to disprove. But I'm not sure I'm willing to gamble the world on an assumption that none of this is real, personally." A pause, and then he adds, "I would not blame you for feeling differently, of course. It is a great deal to ask, that you all care what happens to a world not your own as a matter of course." He'd like to think he would, in their place, but he can't know. He's not entirely sure yet what to make of her manner.
It takes him a moment to parse the question properly. "Ah. I am new to Riftwatch, but I joined the Inquisition five years ago, give or take. Much before that, there weren't Rifts, the way there are now. My experience with spirits or demons was ... more limited." He pauses, not embarrassed so much as unsure how much to explain. He decides against diving into either his experience in the Circles or Nevarran beliefs on the afterlife in more detail. Surely she doesn't want an entire encyclopedia entry.
"I can't claim to have known any rifters especially well, but I worked alongside them before. It is much of a piece with your question about us all being dead, I think. I can't prove rifters aren't demons, or spirits. But if you are and you want to spend years helping those of us fighting Corypheus, I'm not entirely sure it matters."
Five years is a long time (longer, when you've less of it to you) to leave anything. She's had the brief: Shuffle them all into one pocket. Call it something new.
"Do you want the official line or my observation?" Frank, though with just enough wryness to suggest he is not, in fact, an emotionless information dispenser at all times.
Reaching to take his turn with the dice, he adds, "I'm not in charge of anything, so if you pick the latter, do know that my only advantage over you is having had enough time here to form an opinion."
"Very well." He sits back in his chair, glass in hand. "I think that while the Inquisition has members with longer term plans, as an organization it will do whatever it takes to try to defeat Corypheus. There is no viable path toward that end in fully alienating Rifters. That's why they won't entirely cut Riftwatch loose, either, despite any divergence in politics. If and when there are enough Thedas natives with anchor shards to stay on top of the need to close rifts alone, that may change, but I suspect the war will be over one way or another well before that could happen unless there's a significant change to the Fade's instability."
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"I'm not an expert, I've been told that you somehow travel here through the Fade, which is a real place, but not the sort of place one can reach with a horse or a ship." He glances up at her, evaluating how she's taking the explanation. "Humans and elves, our minds go there when we dream. Thus the connection. But it's not a dream in the more colloquial sense of being unreal."
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"One horse," She points out, though it's no true quibble: Aethon must be invented, he's been dead ten years. "You've been, then."
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He considers and discards the idea of discussing the experience of watching mages enter the Fade. It will raise more questions without answering any, and his own mixed feelings aside, he doesn't suspect it will help her.
"Not everyone in the Fade is a mage or dreaming, for what it's worth. We believe the souls of those of have died pass through. And there are spirits and demons native to the place. Earlier on, when rifters first appeared, the theory was that these spirits had just taken a new approach to influencing us." He sighs and takes a drink of his ale before adding, "As far as I can tell, this attitude has faded within the Inquisition and Riftwatch, though I can't answer for outsiders' opinions."
no subject
There had been an awful lot of spirits. Thais smiles, impatience smuggling in her teeth: He's right. She's frustrated. But she knows just a bit better than to beat him over the head with it,
At least, when he's supplied enough else to chew. She drinks, and takes in less of it than she'd like, and the tip of her tongue doesn't tear for Vanya.
"Perhaps we're all mages dreaming," Perhaps she cracked her skull on the limb of some ruin. "We might all be dead."
no subject
"...possible. Hard to disprove. But I'm not sure I'm willing to gamble the world on an assumption that none of this is real, personally." A pause, and then he adds, "I would not blame you for feeling differently, of course. It is a great deal to ask, that you all care what happens to a world not your own as a matter of course." He'd like to think he would, in their place, but he can't know. He's not entirely sure yet what to make of her manner.
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The man looks shocked as a stone, and he's pivoted well.
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"I can't claim to have known any rifters especially well, but I worked alongside them before. It is much of a piece with your question about us all being dead, I think. I can't prove rifters aren't demons, or spirits. But if you are and you want to spend years helping those of us fighting Corypheus, I'm not entirely sure it matters."
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Five years is a long time (longer, when you've less of it to you) to leave anything. She's had the brief: Shuffle them all into one pocket. Call it something new.
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Reaching to take his turn with the dice, he adds, "I'm not in charge of anything, so if you pick the latter, do know that my only advantage over you is having had enough time here to form an opinion."
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Do you really need time to form an opinion?
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