Networking

[Emily Littleton] Rabbit, rabbit, rabbit. It's the first of February.

Emily sits, nestled into a corner with her back toward the wall, surrounded by her laptop and an open textbook, typing something intently. Nearby, a half-full (half-empty) mug of tea lingers, tepid, still enough to scry for tea leaves in (though she has not yet taken to such oracles). It is a cold day, but a clear one, and a new beginning to the calendar cycles.

At nearly one, the tea shop is quieting down for the early afternoon. There are fewer partons, and what few do remain are largely engrossed in their own interests. She has chosen this time because it will be less crowded, and because it falls neatly between her courses on campus.

Half of the table is unburdened by Emily's belongings. The Orphan appears to be waiting on someone, but doesn't look up with great interest each time the door swings open (ushering in cold, clear air) and then shut again (blocking out the winter).

[Ashley McGowen] When someone loses something, counting down becomes a custom. A rite. One week since it happened. Two weeks. Three.

And now, a month. Only Ashley still isn't completely sure what it is she's lost.

The Hermetic comes to the tea shop, summoned by the phone call she got earlier, and shrugging a little deeper into tight black wool of her coat as she nears the place, turns sidelong and the wind strikes places on her scalp that had prior been shielded by her mop of dark hair. The door opens and shuts, blocking out the chill of winter once more.

Ash remains huddled until she's actually acquired a cup of tea and searched about for Emily, and when she does see the girl she slides rather unceremoniously into a chair across from her. "Afternoon, Em."

[Emily Littleton] Emily looks up as Ashley slides in to join her at the table. She smiles, somewhat warmly, and the hurries to tidy up her (not terribly unruly) school things a bit more. This is a point of commonality between them, study. Having a point of commonality made things easier for Emily, and perhaps that's why she was warmer here, today.

"Afternoon, Ashley," she says, not quite confident enough to return the familiarity of nicknames. "It's good to see you," she says, and there's a sincerity to it that comes across clearly.

"How are things?" she asks, and it's not meant to be a deep, probing question. Just a polite one, a how-do-you-do and a getting-to-know-you type question. Emily, for all her warm smiles and inviting personality, is unpracticed in some of the subtler arts of networking. She's good at making friends for the moment, but building relationships to last? Well. She has reason enough to start things off slow.

[Ashley McGowen] The Hermetic doesn't radiate warmth or friendliness or goodwill. She just inclines her head toward Emily and says, "Things are fine, how are you?" in that polite social manner before turning an interested eye to whatever Emily was attempting to study. Not one for smalltalk, Ash.

"...Sorry, I don't remember what it is you said you were majoring in," she says, dropping her chin into her palm and sipping at the tea. It is a point they have in common, and so it's the one Ashley seizes on, apparently intending to take Emily's desire to learn different perspectives to heart.

[Emily Littleton] Emily's textbook was a sea of pseudo-code and explanatory paragraphs. Some examples were hardly intelligible to the uninitiated at all, which might not seem so strange to a Hermetic (after some thought).

"Electrical engineering and computer science," she said, with a slight shrug. It's actually the most complete answer she's given anyone in the Awakened community. Most people get a curt engineering and never ask after more. Ashley seems more detail oriented than that.

"You said you were in Sociology?" Emily asked, trying to place the correct social science and hopefully not missing her mark. "As a grad student, right?"

Small talk. It wasn't easy for either of them. Emily pressed a few keys on her keyboard with her left hand, and then closed her laptop. Whatever she had been working on could wait.

"I suppose it'd be good to tell you that I have no great agenda. I just... wanted to say hi, and try to get to know you and a few others a bit better." There's a little pause, in which Emily reaches out to reclaim her mug of tea. Run her fingers around the rim. She starts to say something else, but thinks the better of it.

[Ashley McGowen] "My BA was a dual in sociology and Chinese," Ashley says, with a look up from the text at Emily. It's full of symbols, which of course are fascinating and always rife with significance. The significance of these symbols in particular escape her, though. Ashley doesn't know much about engineering or computers, beyond what it takes to turn hers on and use the Office programs. "My thesis deconstructs the evolution of society-generated ideals. Supermemes. So it's roughly sociology."

This is the first she's bothered to tell anyone in the city what her thesis is about - probably because it's the first time anyone in the city has shown some interest. Graduate degrees in any field are horribly technical things, full of language that would bewilder anyone outside the academic community.

"What basis are you looking to get to know me better on? As friends? Or as someone to try to answer your questions?" she asks Emily, glancing at her over the rim of the cup of tea. The question is not leading, not provocative: she seems to genuinely be trying to clarify what she was called here for. Or to help Emily understand what she wants from Ashley, even.

[Emily Littleton] When Ashley mentions her thesis topic, Emily's mouth quirks wryly. It is not mockery, but a sense of amused appreciation. "You and Jarod could have very interesting conversations on social constructs and ideals," she says, without asking of Ashley knows who the Verbena is. All the Awakened seem to know each other, or be a scant few degrees of separation in this city.

She thinks for a few moments, and lets the quiet between them stretch thin for a little too long. "I'm not entirely sure," she says, and its honest and unclouded by any willing deception. "I don't know you well enough to answer that," she adds, with a slight (self-conscious) chuckle. "But more and more I get the feeling that the lot of us are in something, together, and it might be good to know more about each other than that we have a mutual friend in Enid."

Ashley is the only one Emily has had this conversation with. It is a little odd. A little uncertain. "And, who knows, perhaps we may end up friends... or you may teach me something, or I might fix your computer?"

[Ashley McGowen] Ashley glances over at Emily and raises an eyebrow at the mention of Jarod. It's the second time she's heard his name in the past week, when she'd gone months without mention or sight of the man before that. "I didn't know Jarod was still in town, actually," she says. "I only met him the once. Maybe I'll try to see if I can hunt him down."

Emily continues on, then, about her intentions in inviting Ashley over here. The Hermetic listens, blue eyes fixed on Emily's face the entire time - in an attentive manner, one that maintains eye contact but is probably a little unnerving for all its intensity. "We are in something together. I mean...this is a society just as much as the one you've left, and if you haven't already you're going to find that we understand you much better than the people that used to be in your life. Networking's to your benefit for that reason."

[Emily Littleton] Something shifts in Emily, and the Orphan is a little less readable. Like a sheer drape drawn across an open window, it doesn't completely obscure Ashley's view of whatever is going on in the depths of her darkly blue eyes, but renders that awareness hazier. More subjective. Emily is pulling away, slightly, politely, without saying a word or shifting her body language.

This smile is smaller, more polite (cooler [by degrees]). "If you'd like, I can tell him you wish to speak with him." The foreignness in her tone is just a little plainer, clearer.

"I trust you'll find it is not something I have neglected," she says, about networking. Emily lifts her mug now, wraps long fingers around the porcelain, inhales the scent of flowers and green tea, sips. Then she curls her hand futher, bringing the mug to rest against her chest, nearby the lump in her sweater than belies the presence of that small silver oval that sings of Home. "I may not have been Awake very long, but I have met a surprising number of you."

She still says you and not us. Emily still holds herself apart, for whatever reason. Perhaps it is the growing understanding that she is so young in her magic, new, unfounded. Perhaps it is something more consciously driven.

[Ashley McGowen] Something shifts in Emily in a way that's hard to put her finger on: her language changes a little, becomes more formal, the tone is slightly distant. The Hermetic takes this in with a grimace that she hides behind the teacup, taking a long swallow. She's never claimed to be very good at talking to people - then again, it's a hurdle she's been trying to get over, as of late.

"Don't worry about it," she says, of Jarod. "I'm sure I'll run into him sooner or later. I just thought his help with everything that's been going on lately could be useful."

Emily says that she's been networking, and Ash is not sure what she wants to say for a few moments. Whether she should try to reassure Emily, what she should explain. There's another pause that stretches between them for too long. Then, "I know, you seem like you've been on top of getting to know others. I was...trying to express my approval of that."

She clears her throat. "So, anyway. Have you been getting much help in the way of outlook or explaining how this works? Wharil said he's been teaching you a little."

[Emily Littleton] "Oh," Emily says, when Ashley said she'd been expressing approval. There's a little hitch in the Orphan's expression, momentarily confused and then softening back to that warmer expression. Letting her guard down, again, by degrees. "I..." a pause, a little frown. "... sorry. I read that wrong."

And it passes, like water under a bridge. Whatever umbrage she's taken is gone, and the imposed formality begins to lift, evaporate, dissipate into the inviting atmosphere of the tea shoppe again.

"Wharil's been quite helpful," Emily agrees, making sure to nod her assention (to avoid any miscommunications) and smile a bit more warmly. She is making the effort to bridge the gap here, and hopefully it is not taken as an affront. "Kage, too. Kage is probably the most grounding of everyone I talk with regularly. Jarod is helping me, too. And I've started working with Charlie, a bit; he gave me a thought puzzle to sort through just last week."

So another Orphan, a Euthantos, a Verbena and an Akashic. Emily hadn't quite been kidding when she said she wanted to understudy as many roles as possible before choosing her Traditional home.

"Wharil and I quarreled the last time we spoke. I ... need to apologize," she said, without explanation or deception.

[Ashley McGowen] After clarifying her intentions, everything is smoothed over, and Emily is again regarding her warmly. Unfortunately Ashley is still confused. Her dark eyebrows furrow as she lowers the mug of tea and looks down into it, keeping it cupped between both hands.

Emily confesses to having a quarrel with Wharil, and Ash looks back up at her, the confusion melting away. "What about?" she asks, as she hadn't heard from Wharil about this.

[Emily Littleton] Emily did not know how close Wharil and Ashley were, or even if they were close at all. Only that they often, but not always, appeared at the same location or appeared to be working on similar projects. Even that was a stretch. They were, to Emily, no more necessarily connected than any two other members of the Awakened community. So she did not expect Ashley to know what Wharil was teaching her, or about their conversation not far from here last week.

"My Av--" Emily stopped and corrected herself almost immediately. "My Atman." They were talking about Wharil, and it seemed appropriate to use his language for the thing. Vocabulary seemed to be terribly important to some people. "He thinks we should contact it, and see what specifically it wants."

Emily, apparently, did not agree. She didn't say much of why, and she kept a fairly level tone, but there was some nascent tension there. The young Orphan was uncomfortable, at the very least.

[Ashley McGowen] "You can do that with the Ars Mentis," Ashley says. "I'm sometimes in contact with mine. Generally, though, you'll find that your Avatar contacts you on its own, and it's important to be open to contact and listen to what it says."

She considers this, watching Emily and trying to gauge her reaction. Wharil's advice was rather typical, what any mage would tell Emily, and she isn't really sure why it is difficult for the girl to accept that she should be in touch with it.

"Did something he said bother you?"

[Emily Littleton] She nodded, when Ashley said her Avatar would contact Emily on its own. She nodded, and looked down into her mug of tea for a long moment before exhaling carefully, slowly. Then she set the mug down, and carefully withdrew her hand. They were all thoughtful, heavy but graceful movements.

"I think it was more than my Avatar," this time she mirrors the word that Ashley uses, and it is a bit more comfortable,"Itself, bothered me. Or bothers me. I'm not sure. And having Wharil be so insistent so soon after the thing woke me up in the middle of the night and read me the riot act..." Emily sighed and pinched her eyes shut for a moment. "Sometimes I get overwhelmed, and I snap at people. The thought of going to that House, where those people died, and talking to my Avatar there just after it had shaken me away and yelled at me in my friends' voices... yes, that bothered me."

She pressed her fingertips against her left temple, then let them fall away, let her hand fall below the plane of the table and into her lap. Emily's features relaxed a little, and she looked up to Ashley again.

[Ashley McGowen] "I understand that," Ashley says, and here her voice is firm. Not unkind, but it is rather absent of sympathy, of the comforting tones most people would want or expect after confiding something of a deeply emotional nature. "But he was right to be insistent, Emily. Your Avatar is -you.-"

Emily's movements are heavy, and Ashley glances off to the side for a moment, biting her cheek before she looks back at the girl and continues. "It's hard. The rest of your Awakened life is going to be hard. You have to pull yourself together and confront it, and it sucks that you don't have more time to do that, but that's how it is."

[Emily Littleton] "See... that's what I'm not clear on," Emily says, when Ashley insists that her Avatar is part of her self. "Wharil made it sound like something else, something with a congnizance and drives and desires all its own, coupled or otherwise tethered to my soul," the way she says the last word leaves no doubt in Ashley's mind that Emily has a particular definition in mind for that word, and the thought of mystically superglueing anything to it is unwelcome.

"He likened it to a force of creation, and said that I was responsibile not only for myself but for its sanity and well-being as well. That if I lost my way it could get corrupted and broken. But you're saying its part of me... so is it both, somehow," a possibility she seemed to be able to take in stride, "Or is someone being overly poetic about this?"

[Ashley McGowen] "Your Avatar is the Awakened part of your soul. The divinity that you hold inside you, if you want to get poetic," Ashley says. "It will be at the core of your Ascended self, when you become something more than human. It has desires and drives, but it's -you- pushing yourself, really. The Avatar is just a way for your Mind to interpret and try to understand what it's telling you. It's a symbol."

She furrows her brows again, contemplating the bottom of her teacup as she mulls through Wharil's explanation of his Atman. "Both his explanation and mine are correct. One is more correct than another. You'll have to decide which one."

[Emily Littleton] Ashley looks down into her teacup, and perhaps it is a good thing that she misses the look of quiet grace on Emily's features -- fleeting, subverted almost as quickly as it surfaces. There is a quiet around the Orphan for a moment, now. A purposeful quiet. When Ashley looks up again, Emily's eyes are downcast and her head is bowed a little as well. This is not a tense quiet, but a peaceful one instead.

When their eyes meet again, there is something more soulfoul at the bottom of Emily's. (Peace [Home] Reverence).

"Thank you for explaining," she says, and there is less consternation and frustration in her voice. "I think... it makes a little more sense to me now." Or, from the shift in her carriage, perhaps it makes quite a lot more sense.

"And if that's the case," she adds, with a lighter tone (laced with laughter), "Then it is no wonder that my Avatar is an unabashed over-acheiver." The warmth spreads from her tone to her mouth, which quirks wryly at one corner, to her eyes.

[Ashley McGowen] Their eyes meet, and there is nothing soulful in Ashley's. If one were being generous they might call them attentive, alert, and rapt. More accurately, they are intense, they peer at the world around her and dissect every bit of information and devour it, with that same air of rapacious hunger that she herself usually exudes.

"Most of the time, in order to be Awake in the first place your Avatar has to have a pretty strong push," Ashley says, her mouth quirking for a moment with a little humor. "So keep overachieving."

Another sip of her tea. The cup seems to be mostly empty at this point but she holds it between her hands anyway, for something to occupy them. Because it's there and the warmth between her palms is comforting. "Why were you afraid of it? What did it show you?"

[Emily Littleton] "It didn't show me anything," Emily said, shrugging a bit. Perhaps her Avatar was not particularly visual. "I felt ... wind, in a still room. And heard voices of people I trust say familiar things, but all taken out of context. Including my godfather, who's been dead more than five years, and my own voice."

Emily let that sit a little, and then shifted in her chair a bit. "I didn't know about Avatars at the time. I thought I was losing my mind, or being called again... like that night, at the Chantry."

[Ashley McGowen] "A lot of magi think they're going crazy the first time they hear or see it," Ashley says, with a nod. "Have you heard it since then?"

They're rather invasive questions, really, and they are questions she would not ask a more experienced mage. Emily seems happy to answer them, though, or at least willing, so she'll continue probing until she's asked to stop. "Or..." She pauses, frowning as she analyzes Emily's last statement. "Did you -not- hear it, when you woke up?"

[Emily Littleton] "That was the first time it has spoken to me directly. Well, not directly but in words, more or less." Emily's expression twisted slightly, as if she was a little exasperated with this nameless, faceless force within her. But only somewhat. "I've felt it, I think, as little nudges here and there but no, I did not hear or see it when I woke up."

A pause, thoughtful, and Emily exhales only to draw a small careful breath back in.

"I hear Enid speak about how she Woke Up, about the violence and the power in it. I didn't have any such thing. I could have explained mine away, if I had truly wanted to." Emily is not sure what this means. She is not sure whether she wants to know what it means. Perhaps she is weak, ineffectual, and it is intended for her to remain that way.

"... There was a time, several years ago, when I wouldn't have minded Waking Up the way Enid did," she adds, but it is not entirely true. Emily would have suffered more to enter this world through someone else's demis. She would have regretted it, and perhaps that is why it did not happen, why her Avatar did not push her to use her Will in that way. Even if it would have, on the surface, solved some immediate problems.

[Ashley McGowen] The Awakening: something they all have in common, and yet it's been a vastly different experience for most of them. Enid killed two of her best friends. Emily's was quiet, she would have barely noticed. Wharil and Rene and Ashton probably died in some manner...or perhaps that was later. Bran woke in a burst of fire and smoke and rage. Ashley, well...

"I find," she says, her voice quiet and reflective, "that usually the manner of your Awakening dictates the path that your Awakened life takes. So maybe you're lucky that way. Or, at least, maybe you have an opportunity to sort of determine after the fact where you want to go."

[Emily Littleton] She nods, but Emily is not quite sure what it is she is agreeing to, or recognizing. Nodding seems appropriate, feels like the correct thing to do or say in the moment. These things, Waking Up, Avatars, have all the feeling of private and personal truths but none of the resonant anchorings for Emily. Yet. Not yet.

"Perhaps that's a good thing," she echoes. "Or will be, once I find footing on one path or another." Emily chews on her lower lip a little, then continues. "I've been thinking about what you said, at the very beginning, about joining a Tradition. I still haven't decided, but I think I understand a bit more why you and Wharil find it so important."

There is another pause, and it is not so pleasantly thoughtful. "Though... I have the sense that the Traditions are not always polite with one another. Is there a... reason... why Jarod might speak ill of Wharil's?"

She doesn't say all of what's on her mind, but Emily says enough to cast aspersions.

[Ashley McGowen] Ashley thinks on this, realizing that she doesn't even -know- Jarod's Tradition. The only group that has -historical- reasons to dislike the Euthanatoi is the Akashic Brotherhood, but...well, she can't see Jarod as an Akashic Brother. Ever. "I don't know which Tradition Jarod is, he never told me," Ash says, with a shrug. "But we all have our own personal opinions about other Traditions and how they look at things. I've never met a Cultist I had any respect for, for example."

She sets the empty teacup on top of the table, supporting her chin on the ball of her thumb, resting her elbow on the edge of the plastic top. "You'll want a Tradition, though. Someone to guide you and help you learn so that you aren't just forming your own - likely wrong - conclusions."

[Emily Littleton] "I don't mean to be difficult," Emily says, prefacing her question to make sure there are no further missteps today. "But what is the functional difference, then, between having a Mentor and a Tradition, this early on?"

"And if one has a Mentor, are they necessarily assumed into or expected to join that Mentor's Tradition?"

[Ashley McGowen] "Generally, yes, and sometimes you'll have to agree to join the Tradition before the mentor can officially accept you. Enid had to agree to join the Order of Hermes before I would accept her as my student, because there's so much I -couldn't- teach her if she weren't a Tradition member," Ashley says, settling her shoulders against the back of the seat.

She doesn't seem troubled by the questions, merely giving Emily a shrug as she adds, "Beyond that, when your mentor teaches you to do magic, they're teaching you their Tradition's methods. So you effectively become a member of that Tradition anyway."

[Emily Littleton] "Ah," she said, and nodded a little. "So I suppose I really ought to stop dragging my feet and just enlist?" A little smile, not entirely facetious. Emily nodded again, and seemed to be thinking things through a little more.

"Feels a bit like a Catch-22, though. Can't learn more until you join, but joining determines what kinds of things you learn. And it is as much about who finds you, as what you believe, when it comes to joining up. Or have I missed something here?"

[Ashley McGowen] "No, you haven't." Ashley shrugs. "It's not the most optimal situation, but it's just how it works. Most of us weren't really given that much of a choice either. You do what you can with what information you have available."

Again, largely without sympathy; Ashley gives Emily a flat look across the table. "Learn as much about each Tradition as you can and what you're likely to learn, and make your choice then."

[Emily Littleton] "It is one of my main orders of business," she agreed. Emily sat back a little and looked at her open textbook and closed laptop. They'd been largely forgotten in the space of this conversation. The Orphan felt the press of mundane life pushing back against all of this Awakened talk.

"Along with learning something more than vocabulary, to keep the restless one happy," she meant her Avatar, here. "And working on all the puzzles and questions that come up in conversations or more directed teaching. I suppose I should figure out who among all of these helpful people, is actually my mentor. I'm assuming it's impolite to choose more than one."

Emily rolled her shoulders a bit, and looked toward the clock on the wall to catch the time. "I should go, soon. I have an evening class this term," she said, but not with any hurry or rush. She had to tie things up soon, but not immediately.

[Ashley McGowen] "Keep in mind," Ashley says, getting to her feet, stretching and taking up her coat, "that they have to choose you too. Think you're a suitable fit for their Tradition." The Hermetic shrugs her small frame into the coat, taking a moment to button it.

"Feel free to head off to class, then. My recommendation in the meantime is to give some serious thought to how you think reality works, and where you think your magic comes from. Let your beliefs dictate where you end up, not the other way around."

And then a short nod and a sidelong glance at the girl through a dark fringe of hair. "Hope that helps. Call me if you need anything."