the price of immortality

[dustodust]

WHO: Guizhong and you! Open to all!
WHERE: Network, then around Brick Alley or Blue Fish Park
WHEN: Evening of January 17th...the full moon
WHAT: Guizhong's contract price needs to be paid.
WARNINGS: None anticipated.

post from: encheneer

[8:44 PM] My work has finished late. Would it be too much to ask for an escort back to my apartment near Blue Fish Park from Brick Alley?
[8:53 PM] Never mind!
[8:54 PM] I'm sure I'll be fine.

[9:06 PM] Have you ever seen such a beautiful full moon? I regret missing moonrise tonight.
[9:08 PM] I could chase after her forever.
[9:11 PM] I can reach her this time, I know I can.

fly me to the moon

[If you happen to be around Brick Alley or walking around Blue Fish Park, you might see Guizhong. She's not exactly the gentle, clever woman she usually is. Instead she seems almost ghost-like, wandering forward, stopping and staring off into the sky, spouting poetry and praise before continuing on. It'll be very evident that she's following the moon...completely disregarding anything that might stand in the way of her quest.

Try to stop her, or save her from whatever impending doom coming her way, whether it's bumping into people, wandering into traffic, or even walking off a cliff somewhere. She's not really in a great position to do any of that herself right now, and the only way to fix the situation is to block her view of the moon.]

Comments

[dustodust]

It's a reflection on age. The famous poet Du Fu is traveling by night, and the scenery he observes sinks him into a melancholic mood. Have my writings not made any mark? He is wondering about his legacy, implying that it may be best to leave things to others now that he is no longer young and healthy. He ends by comparing his transient self to a gull, flying halfway between the physical earth and the nebulous heavens.

[She turns to crane her neck in his direction, cocoa brown eyes curious.]

Did it strike a chord with you before I explained it?

[inutilis]

[ there's the soft clink as he sets the spoon in the tea cup, and before he replies... Abel strays from the warming kettle to lean against the kitchen doorway. blue eyes are warm-- if thoughtful-- where they rest upon his guest. ]

There's something about it... though I can't say if I can attribute it to your recital or the poem itself, truthfully. A sort of feeling, almost like deja vu?

[ an odd ache, but not the unpleasant sort. nostalgia? ]

Does that sound strange?

[dustodust]

Not at all. The mind works in strange ways, as you've seen with me. The oddest, most random of connections can trigger our memories.

[She straightens in her seat, all attention on him now.]

Sometimes it's best not to think too much on it, so that the recollection comes to you more easily. Shall I recite more poetry to help?

[inutilis]

[ maybe this distraction would be nice. if not for him (though to suggest he isn't enjoying would be a lie), than for Guizhong-- and to those ends, whatever brief moment of hesitation he had erodes, and Abel's nodding in agreement. ]

I think I'd like that, actually. Maybe it'll turn out your poetry is more therapeutic than tea, in the end?

[dustodust]

It may well be that they work better together than apart.

[She searches her mind for another poem, and this time her voice is low and wistful.]

Alone, in silence, up the west tower I go:
The moon is like a sickle;
That desolate phoenix tree, this clear, cool autumn,
Locked deep in the courtyard below.

O threads I can’t cut through,
In a tangle I can’t undo!
Such is my parting sorrow-
A taste that tastes so odd, so strange that my heart
Ne’er ever before did know.

[inutilis]

[ even if he might not be able to understand the words, it's uncanny how an image is painted into his mind's eye regardless as she speaks. something vaguely forlorn, giving the impression of yearning or a want he can't identify. the written-- and spoken-- word is powerful; even in a language he should not be able to speak, read, or understand... some part of the message gets through. ]

...This one is quite sad, isn't it?

[ and no small part of Abel might be quietly ruminating on her choice of verse to recite tonight. does it speak to something inside her, too? maybe it's more than Guizhong repeating well-loved poems. ]

[dustodust]

It is. Li You laments the loss of his friend, left lonely and forlorn at their absence, and yet the evidence of their relationship remains, a tangle of fated threads that can never be undone.

[Later, when she writes in her journal about the poetry she recited to him, as she sketches out a mountain to replace the tower and a field of flowers as the courtyard, she'll have her own flash of deja vu, deep and heart-wrenching. She'll wonder which friendship she was forced to leave, which person suffered greatly for her own absence. Guizhong can't think of a single person. So the feeling will stay locked away, and she will warily regard it as part and parcel of her awakened 'condition'.

For now, though, Guizhong easily follows the train of his thoughts, and offers him a reassuring smile, patting the seat on the sofa next to her.]

Please don't look so worried, Abel. My choices were random; I promise I'm not feeling particularly old or lonely right now. Come here and have tea with me.

[inutilis]

[ though he might be loathe to admit it, such a message resonates a little too close for comfort-- if not entirely in ways he understands. the city has been a strange place to live as of late... even stranger than normal, and given its propensity for being odd on a good day, that says a good lot, doesn't it? maybe that's where he can attribute some of this... ah, whatever this is, to.

there's more important fish to fry, however.

Abel accepts her invitation to the couch, sinking to sit with something of a tentative smile. the tray with two cups of chamomile tea are soon settled on the coffee table; he's already forgotten them. ]

Good. ...Good, because having you feel old or lonely definitely won't do, and I'd certainly have to see about fixing both if that were the case!

[ that's right. it simply wouldn't do at all. ]

...I'm sorry if I'm--

[ ugh. what is the right word--? he feels overbearing, but he can't seem to shake his disquiet. ] I don't know... fretting, I suppose. But are you sure you're feeling alright...? You seem much better now, but... at the lake-- it was almost like you were... lost, somehow.

[dustodust]

Abel, you needn't apologize for anything. I'm grateful you found me when you did.

[Perhaps Abel does a tendency to worry overly much. But she will be the first to admit that she occasionally needs a minder, if not for her tendency to work without stopping, then for nights like this, when she's susceptible to...lapses in sanity. So she's never bothered by him and the care he shows for her.

As for how she's feeling...]

Mm, I've no idea what to make of it, no matter how many times it happens. Could one even call that sleepwalking? [She smiles with a sliver of self-consciousness, then it drops along with her gaze, staring down at her lap.] I've never felt such a strong pull to it. Even now, with a roof above my head and knowing you'd stop me, there's a quiet part of me that thinks I should go back out there.

[inutilis]

[ to hear her put to words what she experienced is both a relief and makes the soft pang in his chest a touch harder to suppress. she certainly had seemed like she was dreaming, but for her to feel compelled even now to adhere to some sort of pull...

...he settles his teacup in his lap, cupping his hands around it for warmth for now. ]

Do you know... why? Why this is happening to you?

[ though he might have thought it the whims of a fever-addled brain at first, that clearly isn't the case. now that Guizhong is safely inside and out of the cold, he can see her eyes are tired-- but not glazed with illness, just fatigue. he doesn't understand...

but he wants to. ]

[dustodust]

I have a suspicion, yes. It's silly, but—

[She brings her feet up onto the couch, curling in on herself. Her voice comes out muted and slow behind the curtain of her hair. Factual. Clinical. Tomorrow it will be easier to do that in the sunny courtyard of their apartment complex, in the face of Jun's concern. But right now, in the gaping evening darkness, she has to work to keep every word from cracking.]

I was rushed to the hospital half a year ago. I'd been attacked and badly hurt, and I wasn't going to make it. I thought it was a hallucination. Something my mind made up to comfort myself in my last moments.

I was so scared, Abel. [Her voice wobbles.] So scared. I prayed for a miracle. For someone to come and save me. And then she appeared. The moon rising full in the window behind her, with a smile like an angel, and she said she could help me.

[She exhales, the sound a self-deprecating hah of those who know they made the wrong choice.]

I said "please" without thinking about it. I've been "sleepwalking" ever since.

[As soon as she finishes, she reaches out for her tea with shaking hands, gulping at it to wash down the lump in her throat.]

[inutilis]

[ is it the waver in her voice...? the hint of something that has been agonizing Guizhong in secrecy finally leaking through and out of her like a sieve? maybe it's the bitterness of hindsight, a tension the belies her quiet struggle.

or maybe it's the confession that leaves her like the words themselves might suffocate her that troubles him most. Abel can imagine the weight on her chest as she forces them out, and if the message itself wasn't so unnerving-- perhaps the only thing he might be able to do is resist the urge to reach out and offer some kind of comfort, like a compulsion of his own.

but, instead... he absorbs the connotations of that unnerving message in full with a tendril of fear and grief and stark concern unfurling in his gut-- because what she described cannot be mistaken. to be on the brink of death (--such a thing happened to her, and he had no idea...?) and to reach out for salvation... for an ethereal being to offer its hand in unspoken agreement that would seal their fates together...

...

in the end, it's the tremble of her hands, the miserable hunch of her body in on itself that stirs him from his dumbstruck stupor. Abel's placed is teacup clumsily on the table-- h-hasty, perhaps he's spilled just a bit, but he doesn't care-- and instead reaches a hand to lightly touch at her shoulder. ]

...Guizhong, I'm-- sorry. I'm sorry.

[ she's been holding this weight all alone for half a year...? ]