RP: Fishing for Answers

This is a Mage's Guild RP.

Part of the The God of Undeath Arc

Kasyr enjoys his serene afterlife, ponderously fishing in the eternal sea of the heavens. What he fishes out of this sea is equal parts surprising and familiar.

Kasyr shouldn't feel guilty. He had done his part- laid the foundation for the others victory, over his own smouldering remains. Those vacant temple grounds had been filled with fresh faith- a glittering prize fit for a heavenly host. And his own reward in all of it had simply been a quietude - time to gather his thoughts, to stitch together the hollowed remnants of himself. Perhaps, he ought not to feel guilty- but as he cast the fishing line forward, and saw the lure bob atop the glistening sea of stars before him, he could not help but worry. Even with the answers provided, would they be able to navigate the lingering despair and unease that had so often threatened their conspiracy? Would they be able to patch together some fascimile of co-operation from Tessa, or would a destructive pettiness win out once more? Though, perhaps the worst realisation of all, was the ease in which those feelings were falling to the wayside. A drop in an experience that was more vast than it should have been- disjointed recollections of other places and times competing for dominance. Places he -shouldn't- have been, that did not mesh with his established awareness- but which felt far more real than they should have. Years of experiences compacted beneath a heavens-induced haze. "Calice." The lure tugged faintly, then stilled.

Odhranos sat cross legged in front of a doorway, as he had sat for time immemorial. Beyond the worn timber architrave, stars spun lazily in swirls, outward, downward and upward. Behind him, what was once an office lay in chaos. Pages torn free, scribbled on, walls, floor and ceiling strewn with the etchings of a madman. Theories and hypotheses, the weave of thought cast wide like a net to try and capture something, anything. And coming up empty. Picking some grit from the floor, Odhranos holds it to his eye, rubbing it between finger and thumb, before tossing it over his shoulder and stomping to his feet in one angry motion. "Alright, you wizen old crook. I've thought and looked and read and thought some more until my brains felt like they were fit to ooze out my ears, but I can't find the answers you said I needed." The terramancer growls into that yawning void. "I give up. Is that it? Is that the grand answer I've been seeking? The reality of my own shortcomings?" The door stays shtum. Odh hangs his head in defeat. He slouches closer to the doorway, pressing his shoulder against the timber as he leans out into the void. The stars swirl invitingly. Odhranos leans out further to see if perhaps there's something beyond the doorframe, something he missed. Perhaps something that might prove the key to everything. He finds nothing but more stars, twinkling serenely. A curse forms at the tip of his tongue, but quick as a flash, a dart of silver flicks through the air. A fish hook, that whips through the stars and snarls itself in Odhranos' robe.

Kasyr can feel the line tug again, and this time- there's a sense of solidity to the whole. Not just a fleeting jostle of a hook- but the bait taken, hook line and sinker. "Huh." What the hell could you even fish up here? To say he was unfamiliar with the waters would be an understatement, because even in his fractured recollections of the firnaments, this sea of faling stars hadn't existed before. Was this some small corner of space conjured up to be comforting to the once-islander, or was there some deeper meaning to the topography of the heavens? "...First things first." He drags one foot out from the twinkling 'waters', pressing down on it as he forces himself up to a stand- an ever increasing amount of force applied to the line. There didn't seem to be as much errant struggling as he would have expected- more of a tautness that seemed to threaten a broken cord if he was less than cautious. Or, well, fair. After all- calling upon your heavenly host to bless a line so it might hold fast is perhaps a bit simpler when you're basking in the hereafter- and as much as it might be frivolous- he imagines she might provide some degree of leeway if the end result was amusing. And was couldn't that be said of his explorations? It's with this reasoning in mind that he provides a far too sharp jerk to the now reinforced-thread, intent on plucking his prize from the shimmering depths.

Odhranos watches mesmerized as this gleaming trail of fishing line whisks about him, his jaw falling open. Certainly many things could be expected in the realm hereafter; angels and apparitions. Fishing hooks were not the first thing Odh would have expected. It is this bewildered awe that takes him off guard to the degree that, when the shimmery fishing line suddenly yanks taut, the terramancer cannot keep his balance on the precipice of the doorway. Pinwheeling arms flailing like the finest Larketian jester, Odhranos teeters forward, nearly rights himself, before a second, more forceful pull hauls him out into the abyss. A wordless shriek echoes around eternity as Odhranos is cast adrift into the sea of stars. He grasps for anything, hands reaching like the claws of a drowning man, desperate for any salvation. And salvation came in the form of a fish hook. Hauled bodily upwards, Odhranos breaches the surface of… what exactly he cannot say. One moment he is falling into the yawning maw of the heavens, next thing he is treading stars as if they were water. Tiny stars stream like rivulets from his long shaggy hair, now steel grey through and through as the terramancer awkwardly pirouettes about in the not-water and comes face to face with the last person he expected to find. Like the fish that he feels like he is, Odhranos gapes wordlessly, mouth trying to form too many questions at once and thoroughly mangling all of them. "Wha-why-you-how-where…" He clamps his mouth shut with a grumpy looking frown and squints at the familiar fisherman accusingly. "Sven above and below, Kas, you were only dead yesterday!"

Kasyr is expecting a mighty haul. Perhaps some stygian sea serpent that had long since succumbed to extinction, and now cavorted in the hereafter- it's struggles immortalized in the stars. What he is -not- expecting, is a terramancer bobbing to the surface like a drowned rat, and spluttering ignorant questions in his direction. Which is probably why his immediate response to the man's questions and ensuing grumpiness- is to parrot the bewildered expression he'd held a few moments prior, complete with a more tired sounding, "Why-how-where~" The rod is abandoned at this point, cast off to one side of the dreamily non-descript pier the Kensai had apparently been sitting on- the only thing that seemed to have any real focus or solidity- beyond the sea, beyond it's prizes. "Is -that- why you'd been dragging your heels for so long? Karasu went on a little pilgrimage to revive you. Didn't pan out so well. Now I'm wondering if it's because your head was in a book up here for like a year."

Odhranos wipes stars from his vision and splutters indignantly; "Dragging my heels!? DRAGGING MY- ooohhhh I swear… if I weren't dead…" Odhranos grumbles as he plunges forwards through the glittering waters. Four incensed seconds later and he has his hands on the edge of the pier, straining to haul himself out. A few swear words and some elbow grease later, Odhranos collapses on his back beside the kensai, teeth gritted in exertion as starlight leaks into puddles from his robes. "And I haven't a clue what you mean by a year; the old codger upstairs set me an impossible question to answer and I've been wracking my brain over it, but it's only been a few days…since…" Odhranos' chest heaves with exertion as he kneads his eyes with the palms of his hands. "Yes, definitely only a few days since Haladavar, that whole ordeal. Right, Kas?" Silence passes and Odhranos pulls back his hands to reveal a face scrunched up in concern, his grey eyes filled with apprehension. "Right…. Kas?"

Kasyr is curious if Odhranos can feel pain in this particular plain of existence. It's one of those thoughts that had never really crossed his mind until this moment, given the sense of contentment that being in this place so often provided- but well, "You witless jackass." It's not the hardest smack the Kensai could provide, but as some semblance of comprehension crosses the Terramancers face, the Kensais fist is crossing over to tap his kidney uncomfortably, "Non. I said what I said. You widowed your wife, Lanlan took over the archmages guild and evicted me in a corrupt act of pettiness, an undead god rampaged across the continent- your dragon familiar quoi-ce-soit died." Okay, the Kensai might be somewhat peeved given, "During all that, you were here navel gazing about a question. Really?"

Odhranos is dumbfounded. A year? Whatever obstinance remained in the terramancer faded away and he lies still against the hard cold pier. "A year." It hits like a punch in the guts. He'd been dead for a year. The world had a year to move on. The Mage's Guild that he'd given his life for, moved on. Friends, loved ones, on to better things. Inks… Odhranos bit his lip as he tried to hold his emotions in check. That poor woman. After everything they'd been through, he left her alone just like he said he'd never do. He squeezes his eyes shut tightly and grits his teeth before letting everything fall slack with a sigh. "He told me I could just move on, you know." Odhranos' voice is flat, emotionless. "Well. No. He didn't say it as plainly as that. But he didn't rule it out." Odhranos sits up and hugs his knees, gazing out at that sparkling sea with eyes glazed over in thought. "I figured, if I thought hard enough about it, I'd get an answer. Everything I've learned suggests that if you look far enough, there's an answer for everything, but I've looked and looked, and I can't find an answer. Just… questions." Odhranos turns to face Kasyr and there's a deep tiredness in his eyes, that reflects a small fragment of the tiredness in the kensai's own. "How do you keep going back, knowing what's there waiting for you?"

Kasyr watches Odhranos collapse harder than a dying soldier- and can't help but feel his indignation ebb away into a weird sort of sympathy. And yet, when he lapses into his thoughts- the guilty admission as to how he'd spent his time in the hereafter, the Kensai can't help but snort. The answer comes easy, after all, "Duty." But, that isn't the whole of it, is it? While his arrangement with Daedria had certainly provided a simple 'noblesse oblige' line of thinking- had he truly been required to uphold it as vigorously as he had? When he next speaks, the words are more thoughtfully spoken, "To uphold the promises I'd made to people. I -could- come back to protect the people I cared for, and so I intended to do so- until I either outlived them, or burned out." There's a queer sort of smile that accompanies the last comments, "The latter seems to be the case, but given I've been doing this song et dance for far longer than I'd initially estimated- I think I've fared rather well, all given." There's a shrug there, before the Kensai adds, "Sounds like you've been overthinking things- since, the real question is- do you regret leaving things the way they are, and if you can change it- would you?"

Odhranos listens quietly, nodding as Kasyr answers his soul searching question. Duty elicits a wry smile from the mage, but his second comment cuts deep and cuts hard. Odh recalls the promises he made, promises he had taken far too lightly in the face of his impending death. To Inks, Karasu, to far too many people, he'd made promises and hadn't upheld them. They deserved better than that. Odhranos can't help but wince at Kasyr's morose outlook on his longevity, but it goes a way to easing some of the tension that had wound itself up in the mage. And then, the kensai poses that simple question. And before he even has time to think, Odhranos has an answer. "In a heartbeat." His eyes flash with a steely resolve, that softens in the next moment as he comprehends what he has said. A peal of warm bright laughter rings out over the starry sea, as Odhranos throws his head back. "After all that! No thinking, no theories!" The mage's mirth is cheerful, as an ungodly weight seems to lift off his shoulders. "Yes. I want to go back." The words seem foreign in his mouth, but they have a ring of truth to them. "There's too much left undone. Too many things I have yet to settle." Odh looks at his friend with a sudden calm resolve that he hasn't felt in a very long long time. "Trust a Kensai to cut to the bone of the problem. Kas, I've missed you."

Kasyr has been on his own for so long, staring out over the evening touched ocean- that the sheer depth of Odhranos' feelings are daunting. There's an intensity there, in the attachment to promises that had been left to the wayside- that is jarring- a reminder to the empath that despite the surrealness of the situation, it's not just his own mind filling the blanks. And more than that, there's reminders. Of those left behind, not just by the former archmage, but by his own actions. Overlaps between the two. "Well- at least you're resolved. Now you just need to wait until -one- of them gets off their ass et finishes that whole job of reviving you. ...Or me. J'suppose." The Kensai actually looks a bit thoughtful there. "I'd probably be able to drag you with me- really, given all the changes I'd made." And yet, as curious a theory as it is, it's not long before he's shaking his head, "Which es to say, you still have a bit of time on your hands. So, care to take that fishing trip? I never did get to bounce those research papers off you- and let moi say, Lanlan is terrible insofar as the spirit of academic collaboration. Did I tell you he tried to steal what I'd been working on?" Yeah- okay, Kas is definitely well adjusted to being dead constantly.

Odhranos lingering glee from his epiphany is abated somewhat when the reality of the situation returns to him. "Ah. That is a bit of a problem, isn't it. How -does- one actually go about getting back there?" Odhranos can feel the researcher's mania bubbling at the fringes of his mind, but he shudders and pushes it away. Too many calculations have been done in recent memory. Too many. "Yknow, I think a fishing trip is exactly what I need right now." Just like that, as if manifested from thought alone, a cerulean blue fishing rod clatters gently on the pier beside the mage. He picks it up and snorts derisively, before electing not to question it and simply to begin threading the hook. "Yourself and Lanlan really never got on, I swear. Chalk and cheese." Odh chuckles as he raises his arms and with a whistling flick, casts his hook far out over the sea. "Go on, indulge me with those theses. We've got nothing but time."