Lower Fens A Sense of Self

[Alexius]

The man who wasn't there sat on a bench.

He sat and watched people as they walked by. He did this often.

Normally when he watched people he was passive and waiting. Waiting for the call, the scent, the thrill that told him someone was afraid of something. It was like blood in the water that naturally drew him toward his next victim. That was what he normally did. But the man who wasn't there wasn't doing that this time.

He watched the people walk by, their images blurry from this side of life like an oil painting in motion, and he wondered about them. Why did this man wear so much red? Why was this woman smiling so much? Why have two kids behind them. Why drink so early in the evening. Why hold hands with that other person. Why. Why. Why.

Why was he asking why?

The man who wasn't there furrowed his brow, a rare movement of his face for someone that normally kept an almost aggressively stoic expression. Why was he asking why? Why did he care? Did he care? He certainly cared more than he had before... he never wondered this much before. He just waited and then acted. One leading to the other and back again like an animal in a cage. Waiting for its feeding time over and over and over again. He held up his hand, the blood coating it dried and turning brown. He was wearing a black tank top, he was always wearing the black tank top.

When he looked over at a man drinking something with a woman he saw the coat the man wore. It looked warm. When was the last time the Man who wasn't there had felt warm? When he thought about it his own body seemed to blur as well until a similar coat draped over his form. He looked again and saw his hands were now cleaner, the blood looking to have been worn off and leaving only a slight stain on his fingers.

Why did that make him feel... something.

Why was he changing?

Why?

[Lin Nari]

outfit

Nari did not see the man who was not there. What she did see was the empty bench, a space where she, too, could watch the ebb and flow of the world around her. Her favorite kind of spot. She sat down next to the man who was not there, a cup of coffee in one hand, a shopping tote on the bench between them.

Settling in, the dragon crossed one leg over the other and sipped at the coffee, testing the temperature. It was hot but not too hot for a dragon. She breathed a little jet of steam through her nose as she took a long sip, relishing how the hot liquid felt on her tongue and filling her belly--a piece of pure, simple satisfaction.

[Alexius]

The Man who Wasn't There looked at the woman that sat on his bench.

Why did he think of it as his bench? He didn't own things he just did things. She had some bags beside her and was drinking something that must have been very hot because she seemed to blow steam from her nose as she took a sip from it. The drink looked warm too and the Man who Wasn't There realized he didn't feel particularly warm even with the coat he had somehow put on. He wasn't sure if he wanted to feel warm, it was more just something he had noticed.

He wondered what this woman looked like proper. Why did he care about that?

From this side of things everything blurred and seemed to never hold proper still. Annoyed that he couldn't see her very well the Man who Wasn't There decided he would be there after all. He manifested... he didn't do it often and wasn't entirely sure what it took to do it. Normally he only did it when he was in someone's sleep. No one was asleep right now and it left him feeling... vulnerable. That was a strange feeling too, since he normally hunted in dreams where he was almost invincible.

Alexius formed on the bench from nothing, his dark brown coat over his shoulders and his hands and mouth stained slightly pink from where there had once been wet blood.

He turned toward the woman on the bench and was silent. Not just that he said no words but literally produced no sound. The motion of fabric on fabric, the shifting on weight on the bench, the sound of breathing, or the hundreds of other small sounds someone made. He was like a silent movie, just a moving picture and nothing else.

He looked at the woman with her cup and tilted his head slightly trying to puzzle her out. To puzzle out why he wanted to puzzle... why he wasn't just sniffing out fear and searching for his next meal.

[Lin Nari]

She was alone on the bench, and then she wasn't. A blink, and suddenly, a man who hadn't been there was there. The dragon froze, the breath in her lungs stilling, while a little line of fragrant smoke curled from one nostril. It was not fear so much as a surprise--when one lived their life with one foot in the unknown, these things tended to happen.

Eyes trailing over the paving stones beneath their feet, she followed a little line of sprouting grass to the man's shoe. Then up the creases of his trousers, to one pale hand, cuffed at the wrist by a brown jacket. Finally, her eyes traveled up to his face, sharp gaze picking out the pink stains around his mouth.

He did not feel there. He only looked there. As if weightless light had spontaneously decided to weave itself into the shape of this man. A spirit, perhaps? Nari exhaled the rest of her breath and tilted her head as well as she regarded him. Then she offered a sphinx-like smile and returned to nursing her drink.

“Lost?” she asked, wondering if woven light was able to speak.

[Alexius]

Alexius watched the small trail of smoke rise out of the woman's nose. He wasn't sure if it was weird or not, but a faint memory of cold winter and people blowing out their visible breath made him think it probably was. He... couldn't remember where he remembered that though. He looked away from the woman at the place around him, the trees and the people and the short buildings. It didn't look like the buildings where he was remembering. So he must not have been there. But he remembered that people sometimes let out smoke so he decided that must have been fine.

When he looked back at the woman she seemed to have collected herself and sipped on her cup, that probably had liquid inside of it the ghost assumed, before looking back at him. She was not afraid. Alexius was perfectly sure of that fact. It was what he was, what he knew and always knew.

But could he make her afraid?

That was an odd thought... he always hunted fear and then helped it grow. He never tried to make new fear. It was something to think more on but he wasn't really sure why he should think on it. For new food maybe? That made some sense to him even when he was more feral. While he pondered the woman asked him if he was lost and he thought on the word, rolling it around his head. To not know where you were or at times even where you were going. That was... very true of him right now.

He looked into the woman's eyes and then nodded once.

He would say he was lost, yes.

[Lin Nari]

Woven light could not speak, it seemed. But he heard her, and she smiled placidly, pleased. This was progress. Towards what, the dragon couldn't say, but the mystery intrigued her.

So he was a lost spirit. It was not the first time she'd seen such a thing, and it would not be the last. She was quiet, mulling it over, but it was a comfortable quiet, even though she was sitting next to the dead.

“Are you trying to go somewhere? Or are you trying to go back to where you came from?” A slight distinction, but an important one. The former was better than the latter. If one was lost trying to find their way somewhere, they might know their way back. If they did not know their way back, then, well... That was someone truly set adrift.

[Alexius]

Alexius looked at the woman as she smiled at him. It was a... strange expression and not one that Alexius saw very often. He tried to twitch his face to mimic the expression. The edges of his mouth seemed to twitch a few times before slowly rising. The rest of his face remained perfectly still though and the end result looked more than a little hallow. In the end it felt off and Alexius let his smile fade into his natural stoic stare.

The woman then asked if he was trying to go somewhere, or back where he came from.

Alexius looked away and down. He didn't know where he came from, all he knew was what he did. Is that where he was going? He supposed it was. He looked back at the woman and his eyes shifted in shades of orange and sickly yellow. As he did his body seemed to smear as if a hand had been drawn through the paint of him, he would reform into something the woman feared. Alexius didn't know what it would be but he knew he had this ability.

It would only last a second before he resmeared back into the unremarkable young man sitting near her... except the stains on him were a bit fresher. A touch more red... and his eyes did not completely return to their previous natural color.

Used his Face of Fear cantrip

[Lin Nari]

Nari caught the abortive attempt at a smile and tilted her head, curious. It looked like a copy-pasted feature, the curve of the shade's lips not matching the look in his eyes. Whether it was unfamiliarity with the expression or insincerity, Nari couldn't say, but she didn't care. The more interesting reaction was his answer.

He did not know where he was from, which meant he was truly lost. As for where he was going?

The dragon blinked as the shade's eyes shifted in color from something human to something more like pale fire. Then when she blinked again, her throat closed in fear. The woman did not move, but she couldn't help the sudden animal shot of adrenaline.

It wasn't anything extravagant when the shade shifted. One moment, a Caucasian man with a bloodied mouth and a brown jacket sat next to her on the bench. The next, the man sitting next to her was a tall, handsome Asian man, his suit sleeves rolled up to his elbows and a cigarette in between two fingers. His knuckles were thick and rough with callouses. Tattoos peeked from beneath his pristine sleeves. When he smiled at Nari, he displayed too-sharp canines. Her face of fear was a cousin who'd been near a brother but was now unquestionably a mortal enemy. The thought of him being here...

In the next heartbeat, he was gone, and the shade sat in his place, but Nari was shaken by the glimpse into her past. Wordless, she returned to her drink and took a long, scalding sip. The pain grounded her, though the heat wasn't too bad for a dragon. Another trickle of steam curled from her nostril as she stared ahead and contemplated the shade next to her.

What did he get from scaring her?

[Alexius]

Alexius Cinder Roll (Empathy): 7d6
1 pass = Failure

Alexius felt his form shift and where he was a new image sat. One he saw in the girl's eye. One he became aware of on a superficial level. This was the woman's fear. It was more... nuanced than he was used to. You would be surprised after all how many people just saw some mangled corpse or horror movie monster. Instinct started to swell inside Alexius and he began to breath in the woman's fear.

But a second later she centered herself and Alexius lost the thread of it that he'd started to draw upon. The yellow of his eyes seemed to dull greatly and his image became less distinct. The blood on his lips and hands went pale again as if days old.

Looking away from Nari the spirit seemed... listless. Why would he want a fear he hadn't even initially set himself upon. He didn't understand. He didn't even know what it was he didn't understand. It was frustrating... not knowing but unable to know why he cared that he didn't know.

All of this was new. Or had it just been so long since he felt that he had forgotten the sensation. This all started after he fought with that little twerp dream spirit.

Alexius scowled at the memory of the girl.

Of Priya.

Then he looked back at the woman on the bench. She seemed less at ease but certainly not afraid. At least not that Alexius could sense.

How was it that others did it again? A dull fuzzy memory rose in his mind...

Alexius slowly reached out a hand and held it toward the woman. A handshake gesture.

His lips moved as he tried to introduce himself, yet again no sound came out. If the woman was able to read lips she might catch I am Alexius

[Lin Nari]

Nari glanced back in time to see the blood fading from the shade's face, knowing now for certain that the stains were blood. She realized that she was not dealing with any run-of-the-mill ghost. This was a hungry ghost, and she felt her smile pique with interest.

She looked at it for a moment as he reached over to shake her hand, contemplative. Then she shifted her drink and curled her fingers around his, squeezing gently into the handshake. Eyes flicking up to his face, she caught his lips moving, even if there was no sound.

“Hello. Alexius.” Nari said his name with the gravitas it was due, and an odd chill went up her spine. For all she stood with one foot in the supernatural, this was still not an everyday occurrence. “Call me Lin.”

[Alexius]

Alexius took the woman's hand.

No warmth. That felt odd to him but he wasn't sure why. His own hand was never warm either.

The gossamer substance that made up his body was both very solid yet somehow seemed fragile at the same time under the squeeze of her hand. He could slip back to being A Man who Wasn't There so easily. He could feel it, all that kept him present was his desire to be so. Yet still he couldn't understand why he desired to be so.

The woman said his name- Alexius - and when she did his eyes moved a shade closer to their sickly yellow norm while the stains on his hands and mouth grew ever so slightly darker. Alexius... it was what he was. Right... right. When she gave him her name he looked at her with contemplation for a moment. It was normal to lock a name to a face, but her face wasn't impressionable to him. No one's face was. They were all moving oil paintings blending in and out of the background called life. Instead he set the name to what he did know of her. The fear. The fear of the face he had when he looked at her. That stern face.

“...” Alexius moved his mouth to the word Lin, and as he did for the barest of seconds his features looked like a cousin well known- not that the spirit understood any of their relationship. All he knew was her fear and the name he now called that fear.

The change was less pronounced than before and gone even faster. That was Lin's fear. Lin was the person afraid of that. This is Lin.

He nodded to her again then looked away at all the people still walking away. “...” His lips moved again as he spoke. 'something is wrong with me' were the words though as always no sound followed.

Used face of fear briefly again.

[Lin Nari]

His hand felt like touching cobwebs. There was no heft, but there was resistance. Feeling, something tactile, even if it did not exist. Fascinating.

Nari's mouth tightened when he once again flickered to the visage of her cousin, but when she blinked, he was gone once more. Withdrawing her hand, she curled it back around her cup, quiet and contemplative as he mouthed her name. Then, the silence, the impenetrable silence drew on. She watched Alexius' face, eyes dipping to his lips when he 'spoke' again.

“In what way?” the dragon asked with muted curiosity. Something more than being lost? Than flickering to a visage of fear?

[Alexius]

In what way... how do you describe something you don't understand...

How did he describe what he was when he barely understood it, how to describe what he was becoming without knowing what it would be? How did he explain a process he was only just now aware was in progress? How could he explain that even contemplating this much was part of the problem? If he put his mind to it he could possibly find a way to articulate what was bothering him, but in doing so would he be giving in to these changes? Exacerbating them? At the end of the day he just did not know.

He shrugged once before moving his lips again. “...” I don't know. I am... different than I was. it was the closest he could come to it. He was Alexius. That was who he was but before this... he could not imagine describing himself as a who. He just... was. He wasn't sure if he even liked or hated this change in perspective...

[Lin Nari]

That did not offer Nari much to work with but it was to be expected. A spirit was often only a fragment of whatever it used to be. That Alexius was becoming self-aware of this fact was likely troubling for him, but it did speak of change. If he didn’t know, Nari couldn’t know either. Still, she smiled faintly into her next drink.

“Often, all you can do is sit with a problem,” she mused, treating the moment as if she was speaking to a human man who physically sat on the park bench with her. “It is okay not to know right away.”

[Alexius]

Alexius sat there looking at people as they walked by. Every now and then his appearance would flicker slightly, traces of the people's fear reflected off of him. Fur and teeth, cold pale dead skin, long stringy hair and all black eyes, the different fears only on him for a fraction of a second. All the more base fears... none of the more abstract ones that he still felt but couldn't reflect as easily. The fear of dying alone, of being hated, of the dark. He knew those were out there too and they were much stronger fears that some fear of a scary face... he could be those fears too but it took more of him to do it. In a dream he could be any fear and every fear.

He wasn't in a dream now and he didn't know if he had enough of him to be those things right now. Maybe he had more of him than ever... if he was growing... but did becoming more of what he was becoming make him less of what he had been? He didn't like these complicated questions or the feelings alongside them.

The woman- Lin who was scared of the stern faced man- mused next to him. All you can do is sit with a problem, its okay not to know right away. Alexius considered this for a moment then slowly nodded his head. “...” I see... thank you. his mouthed.

Then his body seemed to fade away... the world became a wash of greys and smoke for him as he was once more just a Man who Wasn't There... sitting with a problem and waiting to see what became of it. What became of him.

[Lin Nari]

Nari was relieved when the spirit began to fade, on edge in a way that only became apparent after she relaxed. She'd touched him, and he'd felt like spun light. That alone was unnerving, but along with the various strange apparitions he became, she thought she was dealing with only a piece of something worse. Something only momentarily lucid.

She caught his last words, though. “Goodbye. Perhaps we will meet again,” she said softly.

Despite everything, she hoped so. He was a fascinating creature, something with stories of a sort, she was sure. The dragon did like stories.