Can you see the Darkness when the Sun shines?

by **Ryn** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 2:13 pm

Ryn wastes no time retreating from the subterranean complex that surrounds her like a cage of electricity trapped in logic-circuits. Ordered, artificial, human-wrought. She's seen much worse places, but none that made her feel more out of place. Like a forgotten shade that has no room in brightly lit metal halls.

by **Samantha McManus** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 3:44 pm

"Bit overwhelming down there, isn't it?" Sam asks after they've emerged.

by **Ryn** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 4:05 pm

"Only once have I seen a place as human-wrought as this." she says and from her tone it's obvious it's not exactly a happy memory. "I don't care for it."

by **Samantha McManus** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 5:17 pm

"My girlfriend used to be the same way. It's pretty rough, I know."

by **Ryn** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 5:28 pm

She nods and once again feels a strange relief about someone understanding her. Her time around humans must be getting to her, she never used to feel lonely or misunderstood. Or at the very least it never bothered her.

"Then your girlfriend is smart. Is she a Deva as well?"

by **Samantha McManus** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 5:30 pm

"Ish. Daughter of the Lady of the Lake."

by **Ryn** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 5:37 pm

"Tuatha de Danann, of course." It only makes sense that the Morrigan would choose a companion from among their kind. Then why does she feel weirdly disappointed?

"It's strange to see our kind walk so freely among humans. Did the old ways remain here? Do you brook worship?" she asks and her choice of words probably reveals how she feels about that sort of thing.

by **Samantha McManus** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 5:40 pm

"I don't... seek it out, per se. I've had some odd experiences, though and I think... sometimes people seek my favor. Even if they don't know it."

by **Ryn** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 5:57 pm

"Sounds annoying. Humans always want something. You should take off some of their heads for bothering you with trivialities." she nods. If this Godling is still learning then Ryn feels she ought to show her the old ways. When only the truly devoted dared ask the gods for favors and even the ones who bothered with humans were fickle and temperamental. Before their desert god rose to prominence and invited all their plights and ills onto themselves like the martyr they are. She liked their predecessor better. Plagues and brimstone-fires she could get behind.

by **Samantha McManus** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 6:01 pm

"Whether they're calling for me by name or not, usually they're... in a situation when I sense that."

by **Ryn** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 6:13 pm

"So? There's so many of them now. Don't seek their approval by performing tricks for them. They'll bind you without even knowing."

by **Samantha McManus** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 6:18 pm

"It's the ones that know what they're doing that are the real trouble. There's one that I've apparently had a pact with for quite a long time."

by **Ryn** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 6:29 pm

"See? Annoying." she says and shakes her head. "I guess it's nice that less has faded into myth though."

"What kind of pact?"

by **Samantha McManus** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 6:35 pm

"Every life I've had, she's offered me a boon..."

"...to not take her, in the end."

by **Ryn** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 6:55 pm

Ryn squints at Sam, though it's a bit hard to tell with the glasses.

"I could. If you wish to break it." Humans were always chasing immortality in some way or another. It's part of what makes her so terrifying to them. Endings. It's not inherently wrong, but unlike her, humans get bored and when humans get bored they get ideas. And immortal humans probably got even worse ones.

by **Samantha McManus** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 6:58 pm

"Well she came through on her part of the bargain. Hid Vivienne from the Grey Lords."

"She's... I don't know how I feel about her sometimes. We go back all the way before steel. Sometimes we've been lovers, sometimes it's just business."

by **Ryn** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 7:04 pm

"You've been with a human." she says and though she has many questions, there's not a one she can properly put into words. But she tries. "She did not mind the blood and darkness?"

by **Samantha McManus** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 7:07 pm

"I've... been with many humans."

"In her case, I was covered in blood when she called on me."

by **Ryn** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 7:16 pm

Well, that answers that, though Ryn's not sure how to feel about it. Humans who openly invite that kind of darkness are the kind who'd tend to end up dead at her hands. And Katarina's not like that. If anything she's afraid of becoming like it and once again Ryn fears she'd only hasten her down that path...

"What were they like? Did their souls succumb to the bloodshed?"

by **Samantha McManus** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 7:24 pm

"I mean, I know I'm... a lot, sometimes. A ball of war and death and things modern society says you're not supposed to like."

"And for a few of them it was just a different age. What makes you a psychopath now made you someone they wrote sagas about back then."

"Still, there are humans now that can appreciate all of me, and... well, they're not all off their nut."

by **Ryn** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 7:38 pm

"That's... good." she nods. It doesn't help but it does make her feel a little better. "I try to be me in ways they can tolerate but they want me for what I can do for them. What I truly am is something they would hunt. Agent Kane would run if she knew how much I revel in hurting the wicked."

by **Samantha McManus** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 7:41 pm

"You care a lot what she thinks of you, don't you?"

by **Ryn** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 7:46 pm

"I've never cared what humans think of me!" she instinctively snaps back.

by **Samantha McManus** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 7:48 pm

"Humans, no. And I don't blame you. Humans are a real mixed bag."

"But her, aye?"

by **Ryn** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 7:54 pm

Ryn had almost forgotten that Sam is part mortal. And apparently that means she has their magic of gleaning truth from words and faces.

"Maybe." she mutters. "I like her better than most."

by **Samantha McManus** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 8:15 pm

"Your secret's safe with me. Can't be playing favorites, eh?"

by **Ryn** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 8:18 pm

"I can!" Ryn says, affronted by the implication that there's something she isn't capable of and completely missing what Sam actually means. "But when I try I always upset her somehow."

by **Samantha McManus** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 8:20 pm

"Not everyone understands the sentiment when a cat drags in a kill," she observes.

by **Ryn** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 8:25 pm

Ryn nods at the rare instance of a metaphor she actually understands. "It's all I know to do."

by **Samantha McManus** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 8:37 pm

"And you want to protect her. She might not want to be protected, but she also doesn't know what's out there."

"You do, and you know some of it's you."

by **Ryn** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 9:37 pm

Ryn nods. "When I... She glimpsed it and reached for her weapon. I don't wish to scare her but it's what I am."

by **Samantha McManus** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 11:13 pm

"And when you feel something even a little like shame about what you are it blindsides you, because of course when would you even have felt that before?"

by **Ryn** » Mon Oct 09, 2023 11:47 pm

"Not once! I know no such thing as regret or shame!" she snaps perhaps a bit too harshly. "But she's human, she doesn't understand absolute truths. They scare her. She thinks they're dangerous and maybe to her they are." she huffs.

by **Samantha McManus** » Tue Oct 10, 2023 11:22 am

"Look, I know this is... well, new for you. It seems like things used to be much more of a straight line for you."

by **Ryn** » Tue Oct 10, 2023 1:15 pm

"Straight, yes! That's what we are. Humans are different, they're always changing, always questioning. I am Erinyes, always. There's no doubt in what we are or do or we would not be." she says, though her mind flashes with that impossible moment of losing her footing. When for the briefest of moments the immutable inevitability failed and for the first time since the dawn of time the certainty in her actions had faltered.

by **Samantha McManus** » Tue Oct 10, 2023 1:36 pm

"And humans aren't supposed to want to be pursued by you, because if that's what happened, they really fucked up."

"She didn't do the usual things to warrant your attention, and that feels confusing, aye?"

by **Ryn** » Tue Oct 10, 2023 2:00 pm

She's not wrong, which somehow annoys Ryn.

"She's worked some kind of... mundane magic on me. I don't understand why she is in my mind, always."

by **Samantha McManus** » Tue Oct 10, 2023 2:10 pm

"Not a lot of stories about people who please the Kindly Ones, are there?"

by **Ryn** » Tue Oct 10, 2023 2:31 pm

"None." she says. She'd forgotten they once called her that. It had never been her name but long ago they'd understood her temperament and the comfort and justice she inadvertently brought the victims of those she hunted.

"Once they knew that to assuage me is impossible. Not one temple or shrine stood in my name." she says like it's a point of pride. Because in a way it is.

by **Samantha McManus** » Tue Oct 10, 2023 2:48 pm

"And that's where we're different. The Morrigan does play favorites. Getting my attention is rarely good in the long run, but I'm not always doing it to punish someone."

"I love humans. I love them enough that I couldn't leave them behind. I like to see what they're willing to fight for. I know where they all end, but I want to see how they get there."

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