A force of creation

[Emily Littleton] January is coming to a close, ushering out the days of Happy New Years and resolutions. Sweeping clean the doorstep of Winter, making room for the hope of early Spring. Soon, but not too soon, there would be talk of Groundhogs and other superstitions. Soon, but not too soon, she would begin lusting for warmer weather, tee-shirts, shorts, and sunburnt shoulders. Soon, they Chicagoan collective would begin imagining leaf shoots and flower buds on still dormant trees.

As it is, she has returned to campus with an aura of expectation, hope, a clarity of purpose known only to those who have (had) a map of where they are, where they were, and where they are going. University was a singular experience in Emily's life; such clarity she has not known before this loose grouping of years. She wears the mantle of a student well. Her messenger bag hangs across her body, moves as if it has been assumed into part of her being. She navigates the campus and near-campus with a preternatural understanding of here and there. It is Home, as close as any place has been to Home for her.

So she happens upon the meeting place without flourish or hesitation. She is carrying two paper cups, each with thin wisps of steam rising from their take-away lids. One hand is also precariously carrying a small paper bags, its edges tied up in the fingers that hold fast to the paper cup. In the bag is creamers, sugars and a swizzle stick for mixing. The contents of this hand -- bag, cup -- are offered to Wharil whenever he may part the veil of her seeming inattention and step out of the anonymity that cloaks him like a shadow in the minds of many.

"Hi there," she says, with a lighter sort of smile. Emily is unburdened, and the British tinge to her voice has receded somewhat. She is quieter, and sounds more American than he has heard her to date.

[Wharil Choc] There was something nostalgic about being on or near a college campus, even when it wasn't your own. There was something attractive about the idea of student life, even for one who had left it behind. Wharil was himself distracted by this thought. By the warm comfort that surrounded a person as they soaked knowledge from the very brick and mortar. The practical side of him knew, of course, that it didn't work like that. No matter where you went.

"Hey Emily." He says with his usual jubilant smile, accepting the cup and bag gingerly, so as not to burn himself or drop either. "You're...in a good mood."

[Emily Littleton] "I had a good weekend," she replied, settling in beside him -- near enough to talk, but not near enough to do anything more than that -- and wrapping her fingers around the paper take-away cup and its corrugated paper sleeve (to prevent those burnt fingers [insulator]). "I saw my Ai-ee," the Chinese word rolled off her tongue like any other fond endearment, leaving no hint that she was void in functional understanding of that language.

"I had some paying work to do, too," she added, which was always a plus in student life. Jobs that paid were few and far between for most. "And I spent some time with a good friend of mine in a city I miss."

So, she was away. Though Emily showed no signs of jet lag, and that readiness was not aided by any magical effects, so it was Wharil's guess where she might have been.

"How was your weekend?" Artfully turning the question around, Emily fixed Wharil with a curious gaze. Her eyes were a deep blue, flecked through with bits of grey, stormy, and in their own way intense at times. Today they were intensely curious, warm and friendly. Perhaps his jubilant smile was just contagious, because it touched her mouth and eyes too.

She sipped at her coffee and waited on his reply.

[Wharil Choc] The smile became a thought in the back of his mind as he worked on opening a peeking hole in the coffee cup through which he could apply a bit of sugar. A bit of cream.

"Not as exciting as yours. Got my hands dirty. Cleaning mostly. Entirely the opposite of glamorous as a matter of fact. But I did get to see a couple of old friends that I haven't seen in a while. What's an...Ai-ee?"

[Emily Littleton] She nodded when he mentioned that his weekend had been more about chores than adventure and excitement. Sometimes that was how the cookie crumbled. Emily had gotten a respite from the magely weirdness of her winter, Wharil had returned to mundanity of cleaning up (or so she imagined) and then he was asking after... well... Family.

"Ah, it means Auntie. For very loose definitions of Aunt." She said ahn't not ant, and for the first time the Britishisms slipped back in. Otherwise her accent was not tinged with that familiar note too much. "It's also used for non-familial relations, like friends of your mother or so. My Ai-ee is a friend's mother, who became a lot like my Chinese mum when we lived over-seas. She nags me about my marks, sends me red envelopes for New Year, makes me eat my vegetables and tells me to find a nice Chinese boy to settled down with."

Emily smirked a bit at this last, and playfully rolled her eyes. Then she sipped from her coffee and shrugged again. "If you move around enough, bits and pieces of other cultures stick to you, I guess. This is one of those many things that isn't American or British, but seems perfectly normal to me. Until someone asks after it."

[Wharil Choc] "Oh, I understand. I understand perfectly. Just wait until you meet your first Greek guru."

He gives a huff of laughter at that, taking the first sip of his coffee and shaking his head.

"Roman ships decked with Greek gods. There are certain truths that are simply universal. Like uh...Well, like the love of a mother, I guess. What about the journal? Any new entries?"

[Emily Littleton] Emily digs in her messenger bag for a moment, pulling out the red notebook with the Cubbies logo and handing it over to Wharil with very little fanfare. There are fewer notes this time, just two entries of note since she's seen him last, but at least one should pique the Euthanatos's interest. As before, they are dated. These are a little more verbose than before.

Malleability
Androgeny? Magic encompasses the ability not only to heal rends in flesh or breaks in bone, but also to change the fundamental nature of a thing: in this case gender. Though it creates a fundamental cognizant dilemma, it seems to be a rather complete transformation. Temporary and utterly reversible.

Visitation
Wind. I am trying to recall the other instances in which a precipitous feeling of moving air has presaged an unfamiliar or uncharacteristic choice or interaction. None so alarming as last night, though, when I heard voices and felt the presence of a ... something. ("Avatar", -JN) This other, a/my? Avatar, is displeased. Implied I should be learning more than words. Spoke in familiar voices, taken out of context -- Gregory, Cedric, Ling, Wharil, Jarod, me. Cold. Insistent. Restless.

She sips at her coffee, watching him out of the corner of her eye as he reads.

[Wharil Choc] Wharil reads casually at first, taking a second glance at a particular page while his other hand navigated the coffee cup toward his lips. He muttered a curious 'Hm' at a certain point, but eventually simply turned the page to the next entry.

The next entry, it seems, required both hands for him to read. And he read it twice. With the coffee cup hastily placed on the bench between them, Wharil fumbled about his pockets, finally finding a pen, uncapping, and adding his own notes to the page.

Where she had written Avatar he included what seemed like complicated scribbles (&+2310;&+2340;&+2381;&+2350;&+2344;&+2381;) and in more legible letters the word '&+256;tman' beside it. Wharil handed the book back to her.

"A little advanced, don't you think? The Malleability entry. You know why its reversible? Its cuz...no. No you're better off finding that one out yourself."

He inhales deeply, thoughtfully. The coffee has been completely forgotten now and his eyes seem to inspect Emily for a long time. And then he says:

"Excellent. Training your awareness like this, and your understanding of...everything, will pay off in the long run. For now though, Its time to move on."

[Emily Littleton] Emily twitched a little when Wharil lined out something in her notebook, scribbled something in the margins, didn't date or initial any of it. She would fix that, later, when he was not looking at her so intently. He would find his name restored on the page, with a notation. And a "W" and the date beside the odd letters he'd added. Emily was a bit fastidious about her documenation, especially in what she viewed as a laboratory notebook.

She tucked the notebook away again with a small nod. Looking at the messenger bag gave her a break from Wharil's intense dark eyes. And then she was looking back up at him with a curious expression.

"Move on, how?"

[Wharil Choc] "You've been contacted. By your Atman. Its...a part of yourself, a part of the universe, that is striving for...well, in a word: Ascendance. You're Atman obviously wants something. It will guide you to where you need to be and to what it needs you to become. So your next step is to find out what that is. And the best way to do that is to ask it."

[Emily Littleton] Emily's eyebrows inched up as Wharil spoke. Bit by bit they crept toward the top of her forehead. Incredulous. Displeased.

"I don't much like its tone," she said, just on this side of seriousness. Emily left out the part where she'd been left scared and sleepless by its late night version of a tete-a-tete. "And it talks to me, not the other way around. Or pushes when it wants me to do something and I'm not naturally inclined. I don't think we can just sit down and have a chat, one on one, if that's what you mean."

[Wharil Choc] There's that smile on his face again, but this time it seems a bit less jubilant, and a bit more amused. Condescendingly so, in fact.

"It takes a bit of effort for the Atman to contact you, especially if you haven't developed a proper connection with it just yet. And yes, it will push and insist, and sometimes even threaten if it goes too long without getting its way. Like I said, its a part of the universe. When you die it'll go off and find another soul in another time. You're awakening isn't just an awakening to magic. Its an awakening to the Atman's needs.

"And you're wrong. You can communicate with it. You must. Just as there'll come a time when you'll feel like you must work against it. But that...that's something I can't teach you. I can, however, teach you how to cast off the external and listen to where it's guiding you. It was hard for me at first to imagine it too, but it is possible."

[Emily Littleton] The look doesn't phase Emily anymore. She's grown used to the condescending laughter of a particular Verbena disciple, which grates along her nerve endings like sandpaper on some occasions. So a smirk? Well, yes, that's far more tolerable.

But something else does unsettle her. This talk of souls, of having something interfacing with her inviolate sense of self. The seat of her connection to some sort of divinity. That this rush of wind, this harsh voice, might preempt that. Emily sets her coffee aside, now, folds her arms across her middle, now, and bows her head thoughtfully.

"So the Atman is... like a leech, or a remora, or some other thing attached to another body for sustenance or purpose or survival? Does it choose indiscriminantly? What if my wants or needs are not in line with its? Who takes precedence now... you speak of its needs. Is Awakening entering into a life of servitude to this other?"

Such heavy questions, yet the fall like rain from her lips. Emily, who has never evidenced to Wharil any great proclivity for Faith, is ... concerned. Contemplative.

[Wharil Choc] "That's a really dark way of looking at it. Let me put it to you this way, and I warn you this is pretty much the dogma of my tradition so when this J.N. guy you write about tells you something completely different try not to get too confused."

He takes a breath, eyes finally moving away from her as he tries to gather his thoughts.

"You don't read Sanscrit, do you? This would be so much easier if I could just have you read it for yourself.

"Anyway, Its the basis of every creationist story. In the beginning there was nothing. Then there was something. Well, that first something was singular, unified, and stagnant. There was no room for life or creation or beauty. Then, at some point, unity became chaos and the universe that we know started taking shape. Little pieces of everything broke off and went out and did their own thing.

"They created sentience and will. They created matter and life and the space between the planets and the time it took for them to spin, and the energy they held and even the cycles in which they were created, destroyed, and created again. They formed reality as we know it, basically. And even some forms of reality that we still don't know.

"Now, your Atman is one of those pieces. Only now it seeks to shape a bit of the universe through you. It's as nefarious and unpleasant as the universe is nefarious and unpleasant. Its as generous and benevolent as the universe is generous and benevolent. And, most importantly, its as powerful as all reality. But it needs you. It chose you, either because you, in this instance, are special or because you were special in a past life."

"Now the thing to remember is...you hold power as well. You, Emily Littleton, hapless human, hold the power to shape your Atman simply by will of it being with you. You're decisions and choices affect it as much as it affects you."

And here he pauses, tensing his lips and knitting his eyebrows together.

"You remember when you asked me about...Marauders?"

[Emily Littleton] She listened. Emily listened to him in the way that only scholars of Faith and students of the Universe could listen to a tale of Creation (Genesis). She listens while he wraps a familiar hymn around an unfamiliar tongue, ties it up in trappings that call to hear, and makes the whole thing easier to unfurl again in her mind. She does not watch him while he talks, instead focusing on a spot a little behind him, a little above his shoulder. Emily listens with the full weight of her attention: mind, body and soul.

Perhaps he can see a little why an Atman would choose her. There are many things hidden behind her plain exterior, many things that may influence the choice to Awaken or might, in time, move mountains.

"Now that I can understand," she says, and while it is meant to be light and somewhat reverent the words come out as breathy and a bit distracted. It is there, though, the nascent Reverence building in her pattern and strengthening with each Awakened day. There is a remote fondness to her features, an abstraction as she turns away from something higher to the question of those who have Fallen.

"... Yes. I do." And it is gone, the reverence, the Faith. She is just a girl standing beside him too near to campus, talking about the stuffs of faerie tales and magic.

[Wharil Choc] "A Marauder is what happens when one of us goes mad. Not just mad, but completely batshit crazy. They're literally trapped in their own insane reality, cut off from everything else. What's worse is, after a while, their Atman begins to warp to match that world. It goes crazy as well. And when the Marauder dies, if it ever does, the next incarnation is just as messed up because that madness goes along with it.

"The same is true for a Nephandus. That's when one of us serves...well, to avoid another overly long explanation lets just call them 'The forces of darkness' if you don't mind. Their Atman's can become blood thirsty, vicious, and completely depraved, and drive the mage to follow suit."

"So, You can see why its equally important for you to put your foot down when the time is right. Trust in your Atman. Follow where it guides. But keep your wits about you."

[Emily Littleton] "So... I'm responsible now, not only for my own well-being, but also for the relative sanity of the force of creation coupled to my soul. And should I venture into paths unknown, I might corrupt a painfully powerful entity for all time's sake?"

Emily looked to him for confirmation of this much. He could, perhaps, understand why it was a bit much to swallow in one sitting. At least all the loose threads and impromptu lessons of the past months were coming together into a cohesive plan. Unfortunately it sounded a lot like the cliche: With great power comes great responsibility.

[Wharil Choc] "Yup!" He says cheerily. "Don't worry, its not as bad as it might seem. I've been doing it for twelve years now, and I'm perfectly fine. You will be too, I promise.

"Okay, now here's the good news. The cleaning that I've been doing this weekend? Its so we can get back into that safe spot that i spoke to you and Enid about. It should be safe to go to, except for the smell, so we can meet there next time and work on you actually interacting with your Atman."

[Emily Littleton] Her expression pinched a little, and Emily's arms unwrapped from her middle finally. She looked at her hands, as if she was seeing something in or on them that was not there any more. Discomfitted, she tried to push the feeling back and away, tried to find something else to focus on as she picked up her coffee cup again and took a long sip.

Strangely, Emily makes no effort to hide the transgression of these dark emotions across her features. Perhaps she is less mindful of that deception around him now, or after a pleasant weekend.

"That would be the Chantry, right?" she asked, with an unusual burr to her tone. Emily had put a few things together, by talking to several people, by asking a lot of pointed questions. Just like this one.

[Wharil Choc] He'd said it all as a positive. They had a place now. Somewhere they could meet and teach and learn. Somewhere safe. Emily's reaction was the opposite of what he'd expressed, and his cheer falls away with it.

"Yes. The Chantry. Why, what's wrong with it?"

[Emily Littleton] "..." The quiet was her first response. Emily knew something, something that he hadn't expected her to know or recall. The levity was gone. The Reverence was gone. Something solemn, pained, and quietly scared remained in its stead.

"You got all of that cleaned up? Over the weekend?" She looked down at her hands again, made a small nauseated face at her coffee and set it aside.

[Wharil Choc] He sighs at that, leaning back onto the bench and re-discovering his coffee.

"Yeah well." He says in between sips. "Somebody had to. I'd forgotten. You kinda...saw all that, didn't you?"

[Emily Littleton] "I saw enough," she said with a little shrug. Emily rolled her shoulders, hunching forward a little. It made her seem smaller, somehow. Diminished. And she was slight to begin with.

She let the silence stretch out between them like taffy, pulling back into herself for a while. Unfocused. And then, when she couldn't bear to stand like that in the cold and the quiet, Emily spoke up abruptly. "So, I ... suppose I should be going."

It seemed like the appropriate thing to say, now that she'd run aground something she didn't really want to discuss again. And Wharil had grown quiet. There was too much quiet here for just two people.

[Wharil Choc] Another pronounced, almost frustrated sigh.

"Emily." He starts, but doesn't seem to know where to go from there. Wharil shakes his head, and nods toward her, but otherwise looks away.

"Thanks for the coffee. And I was serious about the contact thing. I'd say take your time and think about it, but...I think you might be on somebody else's schedules right now."

[Emily Littleton] "Kage and I always have something, tea or cocoa or cider, when we talk. I thought it might be nice," she said, about the coffee. Hinting again that she was feeling her way through the community with more than just him. Her voice was warmer now, and a little compassionate.

"... What do you mean by someone else's schedule? My Av--Atman's?" She corrected her vocabulary halfway through the more familiar word to be the one that Wharil had chosen instead.

[Wharil Choc] He nods, still not getting up to leave. She would probably leave him here, and in some romantic fairytale notion he would stay there forever until he was forgotten. In less romantic terms he'd probably just finish his coffee before walking to the nearest trashcan.

"It wants something from you, obviously. And it's not afraid to drive you. Unless you find out what it wants li ke I said, it'll only get worse."

[Emily Littleton] "It was pretty straightforward about that, to be utterly frank," she said, with an edge of irritation to her voice that he may or may not pick up. The Britishness was worming its way back to the forefront of her tone, becoming more noticeable now that they had strayed back to upsetting topics.

"It does not like that all I've learned in two months' time is vocabulary." She said it flatly, like she was reporting something to him. It was stripped of her own emotions as much as possible, and perhaps that was telling enough for him. "But it bothers me, the way it pushes. And the Chantry bothers me, because I carried bodies to someone's trunk there. And the thought of combining the two is a little too much for me right this moment."

Irritated gave way to blatant frustration. Emily's fingers tightened around the paper cup, threatened to deform it in her frustration.

"Excuse me for not wanting to hurry right into all of that, alone, again, just yet."

There came a pause, a heavy sigh, and Emily reached up to press the fingertips of one hand into the little indentation of her temple. Her hand shook, slightly. She willed back the fear masquerading as anger, trying to shove it down some place where it wouldn't seethe out at Wharil again.

"Unless, of course, there's a way to have a civilized chat with these Atman... Atmen? And then, in another setting, perhaps I'll try."

[Wharil Choc] It occurs to him, as well, to lash out. To tell her to suck it up and go off on a tirade about the amount of dead bodies he's had to stuff into someone's trunk, or furnace, or acid bath, or deteriorate with nothing more than his will.

He sips his coffee instead.

"Atman. You pick the setting, I'll show you how."

[Emily Littleton] "Fine," she says, and the word is imbued with all of its usual feminine connotations. It does not mean fine in that tone of voice, not when voiced with that look in her eyes, or that set to her jaw or any of the myriad of conflicting cues. It is an acknowledgement of some sort, and a promise in some way, but unless Wharil is particularly well versed in the subtleties of angry women he is unlikely to unravel what Emily's particular inflection of Fine might mean.

"I'll call you," she adds, leaving it at that. Perhaps there was more to that thought, but she will not give it voice. There's a moment, for parting remarks if he might make them, and then the Apprentice turns -- not quite on her heel, not quite proudly or haughtily -- to make her exit. Somewhere nearby a trash bin is the unwitting recipient of an angrily discarded take away cup. Further away yet a door or three on campus is unceremoniously slammed shut behind her.

Fine, she has said, but Emily is anything but.

[Wharil Choc] Wharil only sighs as she storms off. If he thought ill of it, or if he was expecting more from it, he didn't let on. Or he tried not to, anyway. His silence, and his letting her go without question, might have been illustration enough.

At least, he thought, the coffee was a nice touch. He finished it there, staring out beyond the throngs of people. And stayed there. Forever. Until he was forgotten.