Magus Musings: Week 3

Conflux, Pt. 7

Anafenza tugged on the small jewel embedded in her horn.  She twisted it and tugged, feeling a small pop in her horn as the pearl came free, chipping away some of the horn as she did so.  She handed is to the Commander, who was pulling out her scanning device – the “tricorder.”

“Alright, that takes care of the two of us.”  The Commander looked up to the other blue woman.  “Your phone; it’s still getting a signal, yeah?  That should help locate and isolate your signal as well.”

“I can do you even better,” Stormy grinned, pulling the slender, black, rectangular device from her pocket. “It’s tied to the medicom system; when it detects my lifesigns are hitting critical levels, it activates the emergency transport beacon to send me to the nearest hospital.”

“It’s tied to a system on Earth in your time with a full reading of your vitals!”  The Commander smiled wide and nodded.  “That’s great!  Let me pair it to my tricorder.”  She began tapping buttons on the device, then paused and looked up.  “Um…do you have a ‘blue tooth?’”

Stormy snickered, tapping the device’s screen before handing it over.  “Bluetooth is enabled; you can pair it to your tricorder?”

The Commander shrugged. “It should be sending the correct signal?  Oh! There we go.  Yes.”  She took the phone and began tapping on the screen, then set the two aside with her badge.  “That takes care of those.  Now how do we fit the linkpearl in?”

“I could…”  Anafenza began, thinking aloud.  “What if I activated it, and then we meld it to your badge, like a materia?”

The other two women looked at her with an expression that told Ana they had no idea what she just said. The auri sighed.  “We attach it to the badge after I activate it.”

Stormy raised her hand, starting to ask “what is a materia-“ when the Commander elbowed her to shut up, then nodded.  “Alright, let’s try that.”

The women gathered around, as the Commander looked at the pearl in one hand, and her comm badge in the other.  The badge was gold and silver, with a thin wire bent around in the shape of an arrow, and two gold strips behind it.  She shrugged, then shoved the pearl between the two gold strips in the center of the badge.

Anafenza and Stormy chuckled a little, and the Commander just looked up and nodded, satisfied with her work.  Her tricorder beeped then, and she picked it up to read off the screen.  “It’s Rafale; they think they have a solution and said to contact when we’re ready to try it.”

The three women all looked at one another.  Stormy spoke first.  “Well…if it doesn’t work…”

The Commander shook her head.  “It has to work.”

“If it doesn’t, alright?” Stormy shook her head.  “I do feel a little bad we didn’t…really get to learn more about each other.  But this was neat.  A very…interesting experience.”

Anafenza nodded in agreement.  “I..am sorry Jessika could not be here to share this with you.  I think she would have enjoyed meeting you both.  I certainly have.”

The Commander sighed and nodded.  “Would love to be able to share this with the scientific community if we make it out of here. Not just proof of parallel universes but even parallels across time as well.  This was incredible.  I just wish the circumstances were better.”  She smiled. “Are we all ready?”

After they all nodded, the Commander took a deep breath.  “Jess, activate your medicom; Ana, your linkpearl.  Then, Jess, take the badge, and charge up.”

Stormy tapped her phone, while Ana took the badge and pressed the pearl in the center.  She felt the small tug of aether as she activated it, connecting it to the lifestream, before handing it to Stormy. The blue woman held it tight, powering up her electricity again, then pressed the badge.  It chirped.

“Rafale, St. Peter. We’re ready!  Go with the plan!”

“We have you Commander. M’Ral tied the navigational chronometric sensors to the transporter system; we were able to trace the link to the tricorder, now we’re switching to the comm channel…”  The woman on the other end gasped.  “Whatever you’re doing over there, I can pick out all three distinct signals for you.  Keep it up: M’Ral, prepare to initiate transport!”

Stormy screamed.  “Whatever it is, hurry up!”

Anafenza looked around; the creeping Nothing was closing in faster.  Even the tree in the center was starting to disappear.  She grit her teeth, her scar suddenly burning.

A gravelly voice came across now.  “Positive lock through the aether interference, initiating quantum transport in five…four…three…”

Anafenza shrieked, the burning was far greater.  She could see the dark aether begin to roll off of her body now, in the same way it was rolling off the tree before.  Her vision blurred, and she felt like she was reaching out in the lifestream, her aether chasing something unseen, searching…

“Two…one…energize!”

Ana screamed over the sound of chimes in the air, and a swirling vortex of lights wrapped itself around each of the three women.  Her vision was consumed with light.

Reblog if you RP NSFW

I’m curious, and remember that doesn’t just mean smut. It also means gore, violence, abuse and stuff around those lines

Conflux, Pt. 4

“So if we don’t find a way out of this…we go back to our homes, yeah?”

The Commander shook her head.  “No, I don’t think that’s how it works.”  She looked around the small cavern, then turned to look at the dark tree in the center. “This dimension will just continue to shrink until it completely collapses in itself.”

“And if we’re inside, we just…disappear.” Anafenza stated this as a matter of fact, to which the Commander nodded in confirmation.  She swallowed the lump in her throat.  “Ok…how do we get out then?”

The woman shook her head. “Maybe it’s as easy as just finding a portal of some sort…somewhere that connects directly to our dimensions. Otherwise?  I…really don’t know.”

Stormy was standing closer to the tree.  She reached out to it, fascinated by the clouds of dark fog roiling off of it.  “What is this?”  She turned to the other women, then looked at Ana.  “You said you recognized it?  It represented your soul?”

Anafenza nodded.  “I…have seen it before in dreams, yes.  I had taken to interpreting it as my life force, my soul.  The vines…are the curse I bear, choking out my life, taking control.”

They gathered around it, looking at the massive trunk that reached to the top of the cavern, branches spreading outward just before hitting the ceiling.  “How poetic,” the Commander commented, pulling her scanning device out again.  She waved it around the tree, frowning.  “I…am not picking up anything except…an energy that my tricorder can’t identify. I can successfully scan the rocks in the cavern and the two of you but this…it’s as if it’s not even there.” She snapped the device shut again before reaching a hand out to feel the tree.  Stormy did likewise, though Ana stayed away from it, as scared as she was of it.  “It’s cold,” the woman commented, feeling the solid surface of the tree beneath her hand.

Stormy pulled away and turned again to Anafenza, crossing her arms over her chest.  “Something still isn’t adding up.”

The other women looked at her curiously, waiting for her to continue.

She motioned to the Commander.  “Both of us are ‘Jessica St. Peter.’  We look nearly the same, we have nearly similar histories, abilities, quirks, personalities.  But why are we all here?  If this pocket dimension was formed because we all have something in common, then why, specifically, are you here, Anafenza?”

Anafenza winced, and shied away from the girl’s withering gaze.  “I…I don’t know.  I knew a woman who called herself Jessika at one point…Jessika Saphir.  Her real name was Jessielle though, I think.”

The other two Jessicas looked at one another and nodded.  “It’s a start.”  Stormy turned back and pressed more.  “Why did she use a false name, do you know?  Were you close to her?”

Anafenza bit her lip and shook her head.  “I…don’t know all the details.  I know her family had been accused of…heretical activities in her home city of Ishgard, and they fled to avoid being killed.  Her house – Vingesang – doesn’t even exist anymore because of it.”

“Vingesang?”  The Commander looked puzzled.  “That’s…an odd name.”

“Familiar sounding, yeah,” Stormy commented.  “French?”

“It sounds like it, yeah,” the other woman confirmed with a nod.

Anafenza just shrugged. “It is an Ishgardian Elezen name.”

“Another race on your world?”

Anafenza nodded.  “Tall, long-limbed, pointy ears.  Very regal.”

Stormy smirked, before looking at the Commander again.  “My French is not that great; my JD has been trying to teach me but, sadly, I haven’t picked up too much.  Do you know what it means?”

The Commander shook her head, but instead pulled out her tricorder, tapping a few buttons, and then repeated the word, “Vingesang.”  She held out the device’s screen for Stormy and Ana to see.  “Vine of Blood…Bloodvine?”

Stormy recoiled, her eyes wide, and stared at Anafenza.  “You have got to be kidding me…Bloodvine?!”

For as surprised as Stormy was, Ana was equally confused.  “You…know this word?”

Stormy nodded slowly. “It was…the name of the boarding school my…my girlfriends went to, in the Isles.  The Bloodvine Academy.”

The Commander laughed, smiling bright.  “There’s one connection, then.  Bloodvine, and this other Jessika.  But that doesn’t explain why you’re here, Anafenza.  Were you two lovers?”

Anafenza shook her head. “No…I hardly knew her.  I…I mean…”  She fidgeted, fretting over telling these women the real reason why a third Jessika wasn’t here with them.  “It wasn’t my fault!  My mind was taken over, I couldn’t stop myself!”

The Commander nodded slowly, her eyes showing she was putting the dots together.  Stormy, however was having a harder time.  “What did you do, Ana?”

“I killed her,” Anafenza admitted flatly, and she winced to see Stormy pull away from her, eyes wide, electricity dancing across her fists.  “I was trying to kill someone else and…Jessika was in my way.  And I killed her for it.  This was…years ago.”  Ana wiped her eyes, feeling more tears come out of shame.

Stormy looked to the Commander, then back to Anafenza.  “Are you here to kill us too, then?”

“Jessiy!” The Commander chastised her, moving towards Anafenza.  “She’s just as confused as we are about all this…And she was being brainwashed to do it.”  Still she looked to the auri girl with a slight hesitation.  “You’re free now, right?”

Ana nodded, and the older woman moved closer to embrace her.  “Alright…so another connection, albeit tenuous.  But even then, you shouldn’t be here with us.  But you have to be the key to this; what else are you not telling us, Ana?”

Stormy took a deep, calming breath.  “Why is she the key?”

The Commander motioned with a nod of her head to the tree in the center of the cavern.  “I don’t recognize that, do you?  She did; it’s tied to her.  There is something that binds all three of us together, and it’s obviously not just our names or histories.  This third Jessica had a connection to us through ‘Bloodvine,’ what else could there be I wonder?  Anafenza has to be the key to this.”  She ran her hands softly through the auri’s hair, comforting and soothing.  “And I think, if we can begin to understand how we all fit together, we can understand how to leave this place before we die here together.”

The Warrior of Light from Final Fantasy 14 is so funny. Like there's nothing inherently hilarious, it's pretty standard Fantasy Hero fare, but it's just the epitome of it, because it never ends.

Imagine being a normal person in this world and you see this catgirl living down the street going about her business. One day she's out getting groceries, another she's practicing archery, another she goes on a date with her wife. Then the next day she slays a dragon god summoned from beyond time or some shit. And the next day she's going fishing. And you're not even impressed anymore. Because this person has been single-handedly protecting the world for years. But there's nothing else special about her. She's normal. She's getting the same groceries you are. She raises racing birds in her spare time. She destroyed a giant robot by herself yesterday. She's wearing a new scarf.

OOC. Color tag, Anafenza.

Rules: Pick four colors you associate with your character. Then use the gif search-function and search for the color. Post one gif for each color. Tag 10 other roleplayers to do this. I can’t do this...but if you like it, then REPOST ! Do not reblog.

PINK (duh)

Grey

Deep Blue

Purple

sorry theres not a single person on this website id pay to follow idc if we’ve been mutuals for six years, if you put up a paywall we’re done

Jess had a great sword that she could summon (literally pull it from her aether, out of thin air) called Blood Thorn. This was tied to her family's bloodvine curse, and the blade was identical to other female members of her family (it was the same blade). Now that the curse has passed on to Ana...well...we'll see when she summons it what happens to it. Ze's daggers aren't named, though he has considered rather silly ideas like "Thunder" and "Lightning," to go with his Stormcrow persona.

Does your character have a named weapon?

I don’t mean just the in-game weapons, but does your character have a family weapon that has a name? Do they have a relic they found? Or did they name it themselves?

Conflux, Pt. 11

The women were gathered in the small room – the “transporter room,” the Commander had called it – and exchange final goodbyes.  All had been a giggling mess of nerves since they woke up that morning, though Stormy seemed a bit worse for wear; claimed she had an “accelerated metabolism” that allowed her to drink copious amounts of a drink they called “tequila,” she had woken with a splitting headache.  A quick visit to the sickbay had helped relieve the pain, and the blue girl had spent a tender moment with Doctor Dubois, sharing stories of a woman who they both knew a version of.  The Commander just watched the exchange silently, but Ana knew the expression was melancholic, as she and her Doctor remembered their fallen lover while talking about Stormy’s alive one.  Stormy and the Doctor parted with a soft kiss, and then the trio had gone on one last tour of the ship before arriving at the transporter room.

Inside, a low din of activity greeted them as many of the Commander’s officers worked to finalize the calculations that would send them home.  “It’s funny,” the Commander remarked, watching them before turning to Anafenza.  “How strange this must seem to you.  All this technology, science, generations ahead of your world.”

Anafenza nodded.  “We have technology – the Garleans make full use of it – but this…is almost…”

“Indistinguishable from magic?” Stormy smirked, winking at the Commander.

Anafenza shrugged and nodded.  “That would…be a good way to describe it, yes.  But I’ve seen magic,” she continued with a wink.  “If you can call down a meteor from the heavens, then I’ll believe it.”

Stormy chuckled, but the Commander winced for a moment, her eyes going distant to some memory she didn’t want to think of.  She shook her head to clear it, before smiling again.

The “Trill” woman, Sano, cleared her throat behind the Commander, and all three turned to look at her. She nodded, almost sadly, clearly not wanting to break up their group.  “Ma’am, it’s time.  If we want a shot at getting them home before the window closes…” She trailed off, leaving the implications hanging in the air.

The three woman took in a deep breath, turning back to one another.  They smiled, before moving in to embrace one another together.

“This was…quite an experience,” the Commander remarked.

“It will certainly be a story to tell,” Anafenza continued on with a small nod.

“No one will believe us,” Stormy countered with a small laugh, and all three laughed together.  They hugged again, Stormy turning her head to plant a kiss on first the Commander’s cheek, then turning to Anafenza to do the same. Then, Stormy and Anafenza stepped up onto the illuminated pad.  Ana gave the blue woman’s hand a quick squeeze, before they parted, standing on opposite sides of the device.

Commander St. Peter smiled at them both.  “Good luck, and whatever gods you believe in protect you.  I am so blessed to know you both.”  She winked at Stormy playfully, but gave Anafenza a genuine smile.  “You’re going to do great things, Anafenza of the Ejinn.”

There was a long pause, as the three just stared at one another for another moment.  Then, the Commander turned her head to her crew.  “Energize!”

The light on the pad began to brighten, and a chiming filled the air as swirling motes of light enveloped the two women.  Anafenza giggled a little, feeling ticklish.

There was an alert on the panel, and Sano began shouting to her team.  “Engage the chronometric navigational sensors!”

“They can’t get a positive lock!  Something is throwing the entire equation out of sorts, and the transport can’t engage.”

“It’s not that ‘aether,’ is it?”

“No, we have a positive fix on that.  But there is a quantum imbalance in her signal and the other St. Peter’s.  The buffer is having a hard time maintaining their patterns, like another variable is missing…”

The lights died down, and the chiming subsided.  Stormy and Ana looked at each other, then at the crew working.

The Commander frowned, shaking her head.  “Something is missing…but the numbers all check?  We have good locks in both time and space?”  Her crew was nodding and agreeing as she rattled off things Anafenza could not comprehend.

Stormy snapped her fingers, looking at Anafenza.  “Something isn’t missing.  Someone is…”

The Commander paused, blinking, then smacked her forehead.  “Of course…the computer can’t make a firm lock on either of you…”

“Unless you can serve as an anchor,” Anafenza finished.  “And a beacon.”

“Just like in the pocket dimension.”

The Commander hopped onto the pad and took the center spot.  “Alright Nizeri, try now.”  She nodded. “Energize!”

Sano turned to the controls as the officer there worked the panel, and the lights and chimes began anew. She smiled, continuing to direct the officers.  “Positive lock engaged, they can make it to the pattern buffer!  Engage the scanners!”

The light overtook Ana’s vision, and the chiming deafened her.

“I’ll always…remember you…both!  May you walk…in the light…of the Crystal!”

🙋‍♀️

“We never believe we’re beautiful, no matter how many times we hear it. We never believe it until someone says it in the right way.”

— Francine Prose (via goodreadss)

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