Log:Seek Ye the Lost

The Madness of David Flyte 2020/01/30 	 Sasha Grimm

12

This building is whats left of an abandoned church. The walls are falling in, with the eastern and southern walls punctured in multiple places by large holes as if a wrecking ball had been used on them. No glass remains in any of the windows. The steeple of the church looks as if it was torn off and cast down and now blocks the front doors of the church. The roof is shattered in several places and the top of the steeple is now exposed to the elements. The second floor of the church has collapsed down and the nave of the building is filled with a tangle of dangerous rubble. It stands forlorn and abandoned in the midst of a wide set of parking lots cratered and cracked with grass jutting up through where it can in clumps.

Grimm has given up the notion of not using her powers. She teleports to outside to between the old church and the school, down on the sidewalk.

Just a few moments after you appear, the door to the school opens and Sasha comes striding out, his look determined and his Mask held in one hand in preparation of putting it on belike. He pauses when he gets a good look at you.

"Ms Grimm? Is that you?" he inquires as you feel his gaze rest heavily on you in an assessing, but not threatening, manner.

Grimm's aura is different. There's a rift in the shape of spiderwebbing cracks, like broken glass with qliphothic energy seeping through. Invisible to the uninitiated. The seeping power is tainting her. "Yeah, it's me. I'm not quite myself lately, though."

Aleksandr gives a half smile at your words then nods. "Shall we retire to the church, Ms Grimm?" He gestures to the partially collapsed building. "It's, well, nicer inside and very calming for some. "A better place to speak than on the street."

Grimm looks tired. Dark circles line under her eyes. "Yeah, sounds good to me," she says, turning to walk that direction.

The apparent youth follows after you then comes up beside you as you walk. "You look done in, mam'selle Grimm," he murmurs in a thicker Russian accent than a moment earlier. "How long since you have rested well?"

Grimm rubs her eyes. "I got some rest. Radical was helping me, but Amelia made things worse after requesting I help her fortify her tower against psychic assaults."

Aleksandr nods slightly. "Well, Amelia can have that affect on people sometimes," he remarks dryly. "Like convincing JOrdan to break being grounded to come out and talk to her and some colleagues. Why do people always think scrying is only for spying on the present or the future? One can as easily re-watch old episodes of Dr Who with it." His tone is deliberately casual.

He then adds, "Well, perhaps not /easily/..."

Grimm rolls her eyes. "Connor thinks negative emotions make me worse. There's...rifts or cracks inside me, but I can't see them. But he drunk texted me, I went to his place, we got into a really big fight over things, and the cracks got worse. Bad enough that I felt pain from them."

Aleksandr nods as he walks by your side then lifts a conveniently placed board to reveal a winding way into the nave of the collpased church. "Yes, they are rather obvious if one no what to look for. You are leaking Qliphopthic energies. Like a Soviet reactor...well, not that bad, but yes, it's bad."

"It was worse the other night. Connor tried to calm down my anger. I don't even remember why I got so angry so fast. The cracks shrank, but the new ones remained," Grimm explains.

Grimm smirks wryly. "Would you believe happy thoughts are what helped restrain it?"

"From what little I, thank the gods, little and big, understand about the Sundering Dark, well, emotions, as we understand them, are generally alien to them and the 'gentler' emotions? Beyond their understanding. Even harmful to them, or so it is said."

The nave of the church has been cleaned somewhat, the pews reparied and straightened. The altar even has lit candles on it but no cross in the room. The closer one gets to the altar the calmer the ruined nave seems for some reason.

"I'd ask you not disturb the altar, mam'selle Grimm. Someone I knew is buried beneath it."

Grimm keeps clear of the altar, raising a brow. "Is that...recent?" she asks. She also adds dismally, "Great, I guess a disney marathon is in order." She shudders.

"In order: no, the burial is a few years old now. And, hmm, if you like Disney films, why not? I prefer silent film comedies or early talkies myself for humor," murmurs Sasha.

He brushes off a pew, sits, and silently gestures for you to sit as well. "How may I assist you, Ms Grimm?"

"I don't like princess flicks," Grimm states with a smirk. She takes a breath and sits down. "You're the most experienced mage I know. I thought maybe you could help me with a problem I've been having. I didn't want to bother you while you're in mourning, but it's turned into something serious, and the Travelers are just making it worse in same ways, except kind of for Radical." Though she does think back on the drunken texts from him and the mixed signals.

Dialydd blinks for a moment then nods. "Thank you for that, Ms Grimm. Although I do wonder who told you I'm in mourning?..." He then waves a hand. "Never mind, it's not important."

He looks over at the altar then back to Grimm. "Can you explain the problem and how I might help you? I am assuming part of it deals with the..." He waves a hand about you. "the cracks?"

"The frogs and blood raining from the sky," Grimm smirks at Sasha. "The night I caught you on the roof hammered as shit?" she adds. She nods as he gestures vaguely at her. "Yeah. The cracks. They're twisting me, feeding on negative emotion. They get worse when I start going into a spiral or argue and get angry. Bigger. I have to seal them up and I don't know how..."

"Ah, yes, that. Well, I'm working on the problem of my beloved's death...in a more steady frame of mind, mind you..." He grins slighlty at his poor attempt at humor.

"As for your 'cracks', you said they came about how? I've never noticed them about you before, Ms Grimm. And certainly not the Qlipophtic leakage. You are usually rather well, hmm, contained in that way. It's very hard to, hmm, sense, usually."

"I got lured into a trap by an insane author named David Flyte," Gabrielle starts, leaning back in the pew. "He trapped me and used me to open a gate to another realm. Something awful almost game through. I think that's when it happened. But I can't see the cracks."

"A realm somwhere in the Sundering Dark, I'd wager given the leakage, Ms Grimm. Which means it deals with Qlipopthic entities. Which are outside this Reality. And by 'this Reality' I mean this universe and all multiverses and realms not Qlipophtic, to be clear," Sasha states as he looks not directly at you but around the edges of you.

"Wait...how...how can something be outside all realities?" Grimm asks, sitting up and looking disturbed. "THAT'S what I'm tied to??"

Alexsandr nods slowly. "Yes, that is what you tied to, Ms Grimm. It's one of the reasons it so, pardon the joke, blessedly hard to sense. It's like, hmm, trying to sense the absence of light rather than just seeing darkness...if that makes any sense. I'm not an expert on the Qlipothic. No one is whose sane and human."

"I knew my powers were connected, but...I guess I really don't know enough about it," Grimm sighs. "I mean, some of it. Not the ...outside of all reality part."

"That is, I fear, about all I know about the Qlipothic other than others bits and pieces. Such as some entities being weakened or driven off by positic emotions. I read somewhere about something called, hmm, Sqrmm, I think that take famage from touching flat planes of ground or rock?"

"So happy thoughts save the day?" Gabrielle groans. "Will that seal up these cracks?"

"I, I am not certain, Ms Grimm," says Sasha with a sad smile. "I hope it at least slows what is happening. As I'm very fond of Earth and have no desire to flee it along with my loved ones."

He starts to say more than gets an odd unfocussed look. The youth raises a hand and crooks his fingers bringing into existence a glittering coppery 'weave' in midair.

"Seek ye the weaver, the mystic, the lost; Seek ye the dreamer, the sailor, the skald; Seek ye the warder, the keeper, the prince." Sasha voice is completely different, an echoing descant of female voices who sound vaguely familiar to you. HIs eyes glow a glittering silvery-blue as he speaks. And his skin glows with sweat as you see all his muscles are clenced as he speaks.

Grimm watches, mystified by the spell and Sasha's unfofocused look. She tries to commit those to memory. It seems important. "Sasha, are you okay...?" she asks carefully.

Sasha repeats the verses again and then once again. Each time the voices repeat the same words in the same order. And with each repetition, Sasha shakes and sweats a bit more. Until, upon the conclusion of the third repeat, it's as if someone cuts his strings and he slumps boneless on the pew. After a moment, he curses, in Russian you think.

You sense that something just told you someone. Something not of this dimension that reached down into Sasha to deliver a message.

Grimm gets out her phone and quickly rights this down. "Okay, okay, got it! But who the heck do those refer to?"

"Shick! Are you okay? What was that?" Grimm asks and tries to help him. "Gods Above and Below, why can;t any of them just send a dove? Wasn;t it good enough for others? A nice omen in a meat pie? No, they have to..." He leans over and spits. "And why does my mouth tasts like peaches and dust?"

The youth is soaked to the skin with sweat, hair now sticking to his head. Sasha looks at you. "Do you have any water? Or whiskey? I'd even take Demon Piss right now..."

Grimm blinks at Sasha, at least glad that that doesn't happen to her. "Any of who?" She winces at the question. "How about just water?" she asks as she holds up her hand in a grip. A waterbottle manifests in it and she offers it to Sasha. Sasha all but snatches the water but does hastily say, "Thank you!!" before drinking it all down in one long pull. He closes his now non-glowing eyes as he says, "To be all that I am, Ms Grimm, I have Agreements with various Powers That Be. Said Powers sometimes have me repay tehm by spouting prophecy. Or gibberish. Or taking moonlit strolls theough Gates to make certain a specific stone is in a specific place at a specific time for Prophecy's sake."

"I /am/ incredibly Gifted at magick, mam'selle Grimm. And magick has a Price, always."

Grimm smirks. "Some people apparently don't pay it," she grumbles. The cracks widen, ever so slightly. "I wrote down what you said, but I don't know what the heck it means. I don't know anyone that fits these..."

"I am just the messenger, mam'selle. It fits someone, or maybe three people, you need to find." He holds up a hand. "As to why? I've no clue. But the message is for you and I've delivered it. I ask that you not shoot me." He grins slightly, if still a bit pale.

"And, hmm, a bit less snark, perhaps? The cracks ever so slightly widened at your irritation with someone over not paying a price," Sasha adds after a moment.

Grimm sighs at the warning. "I can't even snark? Okay...great." She tries to focus on the clues. "One person, three, or nine? And what's a skald?"

Sasha says, "Something that happens when you pour boiling water on yourself, isn't it? But, hmm, that makes no sense..."

"No, hahah, it's ...something archaic. I recognize the word, but I just don't know it's meaning." Grimm turns to the almighty Google.

Google states: Skald: a composer and/or reciter citer of poems honoring heroes and their deeds.

The Google states: Origin from Old Norse skld, of unknown origin. A composer and reciter of poems honoring heroes and their deeds

"Well, that cleared things up, didn't it?" says Sasha in a droll tone.

"A...poet? Or bard?" Grimm asks, puzzled. "I don't know any..."

"The key to prophecy is that the words have meaning but not necessarily the, hmm, heads on meaning. For instance, amonster 'Cannot die by the hand of Man.' could mean only a Woman can kill the monster...or a non-human for that matter." He shakes his head. "I think the reason they send prophecies is so the Powers can hedge their bets while not revealing too much at the same time."

Grimm sighs in doubt. "Well, thanks, Sasha. I'm going to try and interpret this. Take care of yourself."

"If you need help, mamselle Grimm, do contact me. I'm just not an expert on what ails you, but I'll ask those I trust about the problem." He starts to rise then says, "I think I'll ist here a moment. Please, be well."

Grimm nods and gives him a wave before vanishing in darkness.

Next: Log:Research Injury