kore_logs | ❝ and now it's time to build from the bottom of the pit right to the top. ❞

Who: The Doctor and Fortescue
When: Day 162
Where: Hola there is an outside world!
What: ADVENTURE. What are the odds of running into zombies?
Warnings: None that I can think of.

One of the goals the Doctor had since he had woken up in Cape Kore was to find a way out. Maybe not a way out of the planet (though that was a work in progress) but a way outside the building! Humans got testy if they didn't have sunlight for awhile, so god knew what it would be like if they never saw the outside world again.

You'd think the all knowing and powerful machine would of thought that one through!

Which led to the Doctor, after the fiasco of the hellhounds, to testing every door he could think of. He'd mark one with a small pen if he had tried it before. It was similar to marking their skin when a Silence was round, but not quite the same. Which was good because he very much did not want to think about all of that again.

He clapped his hands together and rubbed them as he walked down the hall.

"Eenie Meenie Miney...." the Doctor turned his head and grinned. His eyes fell on a green door he hadn't seen before. Jack pot. "Mo'."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Something shadowy, dark and uncomfortable flits across her face — a shiver from a bad memory, being restrained and told that this won't hurt. Except it had hurt, a lot. One bright flash later and she and Jazz had been bonded permanently.

"It wasn't my judgment," she murmurs, before her voice picks back up again. "I'm not sure if fez-wearing is a real fashion crime, anyway."

The Doctor raises his eyebrows. Oh, he's certainly rude. But he never really means offense--except for when he does. This wasn't one of those times.

"Then whose was it?" He asks. He is curious, but the tone of his voice says he is far more worried about it. "Things like this rarely turn out well in my experience. Trust me, I've had quite a lot of it as well."

He huffs then. "People don't think they're cool."

"I'm not sure if I'd go that far with them," Fortescue teases, to stall the question out a little bit. But it's just the two of them, and avoiding a topic is so much harder when it's this obvious you're doing it. "...The magic I use, it's harmful to souls, so... in order for a Magus to utilize it properly, we have to have our souls extracted through exanima."

She shrugs, trying to be casual. "I'd agreed to use it, so it was... done."

He stands where he is, hands in his pockets, quiet obviously not going to let her get away from answering the question. He is the Question Dodger. Not her! Though the answer does make him frown.

"So it is an anti-corruption prevention system." The Doctor glances between her and Jazz again. "Is there anyway to put it back?"

It figures, she thinks, that the first and the most current person to ask about the soul business, here, is the Doctor. Different faces, mostly the same man. More flailing, perhaps. And the bow tie. Fortescue heavily considers how to word her answer.

"The only way to put it back is to kill Jazz. And that's not an option. For obvious reasons, and for one other. It's a prevention system, yes, but it doesn't prevent all damage."

Her soul is still, after all these years of heavily using Blood magic, warped and damaged, but less than the alternative. How damaged? There's no way to tell. And Fortescue is absolutely certain she doesn't want to find out. What scraps of information she was able to dig up, more recently, indicate that the side effects of soul damage are... well, alarming.

And she doesn't know, really doesn't know, what she'd do without Jazz.

"I really don't want my soul back. The tether works just fine."

Good to know he doesn't change too much, eh?

"No just the bit where the magic would probably eat up your soul." The Doctor waves his hand to brush off the statement. "The funny thing is what the soul is considered. Most would say your mind, but most living creatures have an aura. One that shines around them. Energy that you project that makes up you. That is what you most likely share with Jazz here. It's a precious thing and once it starts to fade... well, there's nothing that can make it come back."

The Doctor sighs then. Of course her world explains souls differently, but he has learned to let people believe what they want. Even if they are wrong.

"Why wouldn't you want your soul back?"

"Because it doesn't fade, it cracks," Fortescue notes, quiet. "I spoke with my predecessor. He chose an inanimate holder, but the principle is the same. When he was able to get away from Imperium, he went to this place I want to visit. A safe place for Magi. They told him the void comes through the soul, when you use Blood magic. Shadow. You lose parts of yourself, gain other... aspects that slip through the void itself. Apparently some Magi who didn't have the process can't even remember their names anymore."

There are worse stories that she leaves out. Magi who scream at things no one else can see. Magi who can't see themselves in mirrors anymore. Magi who only see the Shadow, as if they live permanently in it.

"I'd rather keep it out as long as I can. As long as Jazz isn't fatally injured, I'll be fine." She chuckles, smiles wryly. "Relatively speaking."

"You trade one for another. By trading that aura--that matter that makes up you? You replace it with another. The Law of Equivalent Exchange. It isn't just something one makes up in the laws of alchemy. If you want to change what makes the unique being that is you, Bethmora, then you lose that exact thing."

The use of her name hopefully gets across how worried he is about this. Not that he can change it at all. It is done and she is from another dimension all together. Still, she is with him here and now in Cape Kore. That means he is going to worry. And, hopefully, he worried before too.

"Minus the state that you showed up in not too long ago."

"Certainly not in a hurry to be in that state again. But as long as we don't find any Panama thugs in these trees..."

She smiles slightly, always unsure of what to do with worry. Worry about her, more specifically. Ever since she was a young teenager, she's looked after herself. And her sister, before the Gate accident. These days, when worry crops up in Kore, she's used to gently brushing it away with some of her learned bravado. So, Fortescue reaches up and ruffles the Doctor's hair.

"I've been me for fourteen years, now. I'm not planning on changing anytime soon."

"That state again? No, no. You certainly will not. Not as long as I am here."

Which of course means that as soon as she is home? He can't stop her. She was a friend of his--one that he doesn't remember. That means he owes her a debt and he will make damn sure she is taken care of.

Normally he huffs when people do that. Instead he offers her a soft smile. An old one at that.

"You never know. I never plan on changing me, and I've got twelve new mes."

The difference, maybe, is that Fortescue also takes the time to gently smooth his hair back down again, even if that's only a few seconds. Fortescue likes carding her fingers through people's hair. It's oddly comforting. She returns his smile, hers younger but strained with too much life (and death) in too few years.

"That's sweet of you, love."

Here, in Kore, she has people to look out for her.

That's why she isn't looking too hard for the escape hatch, so to speak, even if it would be nice to find it for everyone else.

"...Twelve of you sounds terrifying," she chuckles quietly. "Shall we head back to the Center, Knight in Blue Armor?"

❝ and now it's time to build from the bottom of the pit right to the top. ❞

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject