[[half interlude/half open post + entropy manipulation: a fatalistic warning]]

[forgethertoo]

FOR EVERYONE

Aornis is mildly irritated. For all everyone in this place talks about fresh starts and second chances, she doles out some measly nightmares and eradicates a few non-essential memories and all of a sudden, everyone is acting as though they've discovered a grand villainous conspiracy. It's irritating because she should feel flattered that she's caused this much trouble with so little action. After all, she can sense it. Every mention, every ping.

The problem is, the current situation doesn't feel evil enough. Would her brother Acheron be proud of her for what she's done so far? No. It's not quite as bad as her brother Styx's "evil deeds" but it all feels rather pathetic. She's well aware that she's the villain of this place, in terms of the narrative. That particular narrative intent is so strong, it's nearly hitting her over the head with it. Although she can't tell who the hero is supposed to be, it is perhaps time to fully step into that role. She is a Hades, after all.

At the moment, she's debating her options. She could just wipe everyone's memory and start fresh. That would be the easiest way to handle this situation. It's a distinct possibility. There's a slight issue with that plan... but she's taking care of it. Aornis is currently rolling over these issues with a Moscow mule somewhere public, if anybody would like to speak with her...


FOR SOMEONE IN PARTICULAR

It's a small coincidence. Very small in the grand scheme of things. In a hallway off to the side of the main area of the mansion, a sheet of paper sits on the floor, undiscovered and unnoticed up until now. Perhaps it was dropped by Susan and Lancelot when they were moving the boxes of papers inside. It's an application for a library card; very nondescript in nature. Name (William Jones), DOB (January 13th), Sex (M), City and State (Boston, MA). The rest is blank as if whoever started filling it out had been interrupted.

Comments

[timebethine]

Laertes goes to the library with an armful of books. The books in this batch are all about astrophysics--mostly written for lay readers, but a couple of them are slightly more technical volumes that he'd thought he might use to test his familiarity with the mathematical underpinnings of the discipline. He drops them off on the book return cart (from which they always seem to vanish mysteriously by the morning).

As he's looking up, he seems to notice Aornis for the first time. At once, his expression grows a little warier, before he seems to nerve himself up to approach. "Forgive me," he says. "I've seen you in passing, but never introduced myself--I'm called Laertes. And you are" he must remember the name Claudius used; it's not Avernus, it's the Greek "Aornis?"<sup>1

1</sup> Ping ...

[forgethertoo]

Aornis, of course, has been expecting this. This confrontation has been a long time coming, the planning of it involving multiple conversations and discussions. She's gleaned a decent amount of information from memories and dreams about what Laertes thinks of her and what he is trying to discover.

"That's me," she says with a small smile. "A pleasure to meet you, Laertes."

[timebethine]

"I hope it is," he says, oblivious to all that she knows. "I--I know not how else to say it, so I'll say it plain. I've heard that you're in the business of returning people like me to their stories. And my heart misgave me, for I cannot but think my story is a tragedy. I've been too craven to speak with you before, for fear that you would see that I was not where I belonged."

[forgethertoo]

Aornis gives him a sharp look. "And you think I can return you to your story?" Can is a purposefully word choice over want to.

[timebethine]

It is, and Laertes marks it. "I fear that you can," he says, "but I know not why you would not, if you could."

[forgethertoo]

"I can't," she says flatly. "Let's get that out there. If I could, don't you think I would've left by now? I have my own unfinished business at home."

[timebethine]

"... then I've spent long months in dread for nothing," says Laertes, with a sheepish little laugh. "My apologies. I fear I've made you into some grim, lurking specter, quite contrary to your desserts."

[forgethertoo]

"Aren't we all grim and lurking during whatever this Dark period is?" Aornis asks, dryly.

[timebethine]

"We are," says Laertes. "Even this poor little light is much diminished." With a whisper of lux, he conjures a werelight into his palm. The spindle of it is normally fat and even, a cool globe of light; today, though, it's thin as a candle flame, and weak little threads of radiance spark in a fraying corona around it.

[forgethertoo]

Aornis looks at it without much change in expression. "Did you learn how to do that here?"

[timebethine]

"I did," says Laertes. "In my world, such things cannot be done."

[forgethertoo]

"Hamlet isn't a fantasy, I suppose-- though there is a ghost," Aornis says, dryly. "We don't have magic in my world either."

[timebethine]

Laertes's expression shifts to surprise. "No? Then how do you do your work? I can work this small art, but I cannot step into stories--let alone enact my will upon them."

[forgethertoo]

"How can there be a spelling virus that has the capability to kill a person by changing their head to a mug of mead? How are characters able to abandon their novels and interact with the outside world? I suppose it's just a facet of my world." She shrugs lightly. "Besides, enacting my will -- as you put it -- in a novel is a matter of persuasion, paperwork, and sometimes brute force. It's just a job. No magic at all and very little skill involved."

[timebethine]

"That's horrifying," says Laertes. The spelling in his era is not particularly well-standardized; the idea that inevitable misspellings might change their referents is almost inconceivable. "What other facets hath your world? How does it ... work?"

[forgethertoo]

"I suppose the entire framework of the world is different. Everything orbits around literature. It's a secondary dimension of its own. Novels are more like living plays, where they can shift and change. It's certainly horrifying -- but doesn't it also make literature more exciting?"

[timebethine]

"It does," Laertes says, letting a tentative smile break across his face. "We had no such things as novels, in my time and place--they've been a new delight for me, here. But I confess, they would be more familiar if they were more like plays. Even the plays of later eras dictate so much of what the actors do and express. It's unlike anything I've seen before. So your work ... is more that of a--" he gropes for the term Nina had used when he was working through her survey; he remembers guiltily that he's still not done with it yet "--director?"

[forgethertoo]

"I suppose," Aornis muses. "A combination of director and stage manager. Keep the action moving and coherent to the eyes of the reader -- but also ensure that behind the scenes, the actors are still happy."

[timebethine]

"And you? Are you happy?"

[forgethertoo]

Aornis tilts her head and looks at him, expression unreadable. "Not particularly."

[timebethine]

"I can't imagine we've given you the warmest of welcomes," says Laertes, letting his voice go rueful. "So many of us are happy here, and fear to return to a place where we were not."

[forgethertoo]

"But not Tress," Aornis says, raising an eyebrow. "I believe Claudius tasked me with helping her, if I could."

[timebethine]

"Not Tress," Laertes agrees. "And there are others here who would return home if they could. I imagine they greeted th--greeted you with greater warmth than the rest of us. You were their greatest hope of returning."

[forgethertoo]

Aornis turns a sharp gaze on him. "That's awfully utilitarian. It doesn't always have to revolve around what I can do to hurt or harm people," she tells him, tone also slightly sharper than what it had been. "That's the way rumors spread and grow -- hypothetically speaking, of course. There are people here who have done neither and simply shared a friendly drink or two with me."

[timebethine]

"I'm sorry," says Laertes at once. "That was unkind of me. I learned the utility of other people at my father's knee, and such lessons are slow to fade, try though I might to erase them. But you aren't some unfeeling force, as inhuman as the spirits that govern us here; you're only another person. Dos--do you have a family waiting for you?"