Mutatis Mutandis

[Asterius]

((Open to any, but this takes place near the end of the Downtime period, for reference <3 ))

Asterius' aura is disturbed, as if a sleeping swarm of flies has been stirred with a stick, and now cannot find its state of rest. The silence around him has a different quality for him. It contains the sound of witheld confession, the quiet tick and rush of shocked blood. His heads throbs. He can feel each current air dinstinctly, as it passes over his palms.

Images and memories and thoughts come to him like a procession of bewildered refugees. The flash of the scene three hours ago (that he obliged himself devour now, image after image like toxic lozenges, hoping a review of the thing would force the guilt away) would not subside. His face feels, for once, too hot, his hands unbearably alive to the touch of everything, as if by employing them in that act he had increased their sensitivity.

It turned out that Asterius still kept his savings in the currency of shame and regret. After everything. Whatever time had furnished him with in richness of experience, somehow still, this: grief. Surprise at himself, and grief.

A muscle leapt in the elder's jaw. After an indeterminate amount of time wherein Asterius entertained himself by staring at the winking cobbled street, the rain having finally let up, he debated his direction. He could make both places in the night, with room to spare, for there was little hurry now.

But he did not feel up to either of them. He took idly to one street, walking until his feet found the road just beside the abbey, and Asterius wondered quite what his life had become.

Certain reflexes of the imagination still fire (the wind is God moving His hands) but ultimately they all come to nothing. The world's emphatically literal. Appositely literal, since he's no longer, at all, alive.

The wet road passes under him in less steps than he would've thought necessary, and then, there's the sandstone ceiling in front of him where the pillars meet overhead and as he passes beneath the overhang, he can see the abbey.

Asterius enters it, and finds a pew in a cool shadow, well away from the beam of moonlight that lit up the flagstone, turning the strip of the floor into a beautiful thing, glittering and white. Dust motes float across the beam like shy little spirits.

There was no denying the temptation to lie still, close his senses, go out, go quite out.

To any observer, Asterius was young for a modern Kindred: he looked anywhere between sixteen and eighteen years of age. But that was more common once upon a time.

The skin that was a light bronze in life is, in death, swallow and pale, its lack of color giving Asterius an unhealthy cast, marring what could be attractive features. It makes his eyes all the more hollow, his cheekbones sharp above the elfin chin, and the blind eyes are unseeing and cloudy. Adterius supposes he would look odd, but he cannot bring himself to care tonight. He would not at least, need to Obfuscate, even if he could anymore. Myca had taken to fixing his skin when it was needed. But the visage only ever lasted a few nights at best, before sloughing away. Asterius thought to make humour at first, because that was poor craftsmanship, but now the inability to maintain his own face left him tenderly empty.

The only feature he could retain was his hair, which they'd found did not shed away as with his flesh. The proud braid was extensive; it lay along Asterius' spine, against the travelling robe, and its thick mahogany coil was so long as to puddle onto itself along the bench, next to were the elder sat.

[alanwrotethis]

Will it be the kind thing to do... no matter. I'll be your Fury. Agreed.

All decisions are immediate, instantaneous, effortless. The part that feels difficult? That’s when you make a decision and you don’t like it, so you conjure up excuses for why you shouldn’t make it, but you will anyway. Hard decisions are just the last screams of the daimonion trying to stay your hand.

His right hand traces an outer wall, whispering in Latin as fingertips brush at the stone. His left hand, fingers twitching, flutters at his side out of habit, toying with a black rosary. He prefers to cast with his left hand, but an echo of superstition wouldn't let him wield left-handed magic on hallowed ground.

He is whispering to the archway, using the building as a confessional, unsure where else to speak on this. The way he hears the world... he needs to sequester his thoughts geographically, keep them out of his house, just to make his mind quieter when he sleeps.

An itch at the back of his eyes, inhuman sense flickering at... something. His beast is stirring. He sighs.

Someone is here.

He approaches the entrance, pupils dilating, iris greying in hue, auspex at work as he reviews the outline of the figure in the dark. Side profile, almost from behind, not a familiar silhouette, not a familiar aur- wait... something is strange here.

He clears his throat.

"Dukes. Elder. Sheriff of the City. I wasn't following you."

[Asterius]

"Then we are both holidaying in irony."

Asterius doesn't look away from where his cloudy eyes are fixed: ahead, on the distant altar of the abbey.

"May I assist you, Sheriff of the City? I am given to understand that I have twenty and four hours within which to present myself to the Prince."

[alanwrotethis]

[Asterius]

"I am not you," Asterius says, devoid of tone.

It takes him a moment to even understand the pun, his language slow, modern idiosyncracies sitting less well than they had once. But humans had called the deposit in the ground iron for millennia, and after a moment, Asterius could connect the dots. The metal in the blood.

Puns as an opening gambit. A funny Sheriff. A few seconds passed, while this was internally disgested. Asterius could feel the first real inclinations of exhaustion.

Decency hasn't had the audacity to bed down with Asterius for a while, but for propriety's sake - and because he's found himself in a strange mood, taken to flights of fancy - he looks up at the stranger. It's clear auspex is at work, for he pinpoints him without too much issue.

"It is your career and livelihood, to chase introductions." A tilt of halt: be my guest. "Indeed. Elder." He agrees blandly, to save some of the hassle. But then came up short.

Asterius was not expecting company either. He did not mind terribly if he came up against any Kindred while passing through, but he hadn't expected it that much. He considers using the Romanian name, but discards it in case he'd need it again, unlikely though that was.

"Mn."

A few other names make themselves available; he turns them over in his head, until he remembers that there isn't reason anymore to dance about.

"Asterius," he said instead, reasoning that the scrappy Sheriff might not know him, and secondly, was alone.

[alanwrotethis]

When the stranger says his name, the Sheriff's blood chills far below freezing. He squints, blinks in recognition. He motions to speak, doesn't. In his mind he is swearing up a storm.

Don't say 'seven shades of Hades' you dumb wizard, you'll cause offence! Dark Mothers of Thesally tak-, shit, that might be worse, just.. oh for- don't peek into the sideways it will send you numb!

He pauses. Despite himself, he gulps.

"Thank you. Niketas Doukas... that's the name I favour, for those who can pronounce it."

He sits, across the aisle, a row back. His eyes are focussed forward.

"You know... no you don't know, poor phrasing, damned Angle-ish..."

He pauses again.

"I've heard of you, studied your work. For much of my existence, I've been in awe of you."

Another pause.

"You might have heard of me, or not."

[Asterius]

You never know with introductions, do you? You embark on another journey towards a bland greeting without the slightest expectation of marvels or booby-traps. Then this happens. You meet someone who still cares about your life, or your work - and suddenly the richness of your past throws the functional lines of the present into sharp relief. What am I doing here? What have I done? Where did all the time go?

Asterius flinches.

"Your family name, passingly. I did not care for Mikael's regime, so I came only rarely into business with Constantinople. My condolences."

His aura radiates discomfort. The tight lines of his energy - in Asterius' shoulders, his jaw - seem less brought about by Niketas though, and more because Asterius felt completely out of position.

It was the strangest feeling, as he looked upon the Sheriff and the man prattled on, as though Asterius were back in London a lifetime ago, the flash-memory of the apprentice's little teeth and his eager 'the ocean is much larger than I expected!' as he rattled off praise after praise and begged to stay a while, to learn at Asterius' side.

The bruised memory of former ideals, former patience - appeared like a ghostly presence beside him now, silently demanding to be dealt with. Asterius had departed from life as from an inn, not as from a home. But his research had given him that and more; his work became his friend, his kinder lover, his deeper anchor. The comfort of strangers is that there isn't time to sense your difference from them. There is no aloneness like the aloneness felt among those you know well. Alienation against Mithras became measurable against the closeness Asterius knew he ought to feel.

Love of the pedagogical, the academe, following the unknown - and demystifying it for others - had once been a pasison so bright as to render Asterius painfully silent now.

In dying, he'd seen his dreams dashed and divided like a million stars in the sky, that he'd wished on, over and over, shining and broken. Even his disciplines now filled his limbs with a reeling sensation of separation, from life, from other souls - as distant as if watching them all through a telescope.

His life's list of losses still flicker like a combined spirit that cannot quite depart the world, a white bird trapped under the rafters.

He swallows.

Well. Asterius had been wandering around looking for a distraction to his thoughts. He supposed he'd found one.

"Et nunc reges intelligite erudimini qui judicatis terram." And now, O ye kings, understand: receive instruction, you that judge the earth. "Even my work didn't keep me alive."

He gives Niketas a self-depcreciative smile. "That same thirst isolated me as much as it enriched. A cautionary tale, perhaps."

"But, if a Cainite is to fear any one thing, let it be fear of stagnation, and aspirational degradation."

His tone softened slightly. "Ad perpetuam memoriam, mn? I did not believe it enough to only crack the yolk of our potential; above all one need feed regularly on a deeper cairn of growth, flex the muscles which nourish a soul's expansion, and its journey. The common man forgets that it is not enough to be enough. To be great, one needs to be more. More than they ever are, in any fleeting breath."

[alanwrotethis]

He relaxes as Asterius speaks. No, he tries to relax, the calming in his aura more through will rather than a calming state. Still, the final statement helps, a little at least.

"Never met Mikael, but thank you for the sentiment. I enjoyed Constantinople, it was a big place, lots of places to read and talk, even an odd creature like myself could vanish into the crowd there."

The hand in his pocket unclenches, he rests it on his lap.

"The 'eternal memory', I like that. I value learning, and teaching... teaching more so. You never know how far you've come with a craft until you share it, see that wonder of knowledge in another person's eyes. Scribing your life and knowledge into existence, into books, into a promising student, into the memory of the land itself, it's a form of,"

He pauses.

"Immortality."

A twinge of recent memory, a moment of painful learning, the suspicion that knowledge he shared may have sundered a thread of experience... permanently.

"Most of the time, at least. You can't always control how your knowledge is used, or if it is used. When I heard that you had... departed these lands... it made me unhappy, like losing a library."

He pauses, not sure how to proceed with the conversation.

"Full disclosure, I am of Clan Tremere, if you would like me to leave I can."

[Asterius]

'Most of the time, at least. You can't always control how your knowledge is used, or if it is used.'

Asterius raises his eyes in the give-me-strength manner. However, the Sheriff's next comment gives him pause.

'When I heard that you had... departed these lands... it made me unhappy, like losing a library.'

It's strange how being inhuman still doesn't prepare you for being reduced down to something inhuman, objectively, in your death. Asterius composes himself after a small white noise starts up in his head - which he roughly puts aside. What else did the blood witch have to say.

"Conversely, I find the Tremere an ingenius people. That they replaced my Clan for our role as viziers - and ritualists - to this sect is no means a shortcoming on their part."

There had never been a question of Asterius disliking the Tremere; the reasoning behind his view was structural, but it remained a point of contention between he and Mithras; one of many.

And once upon a time, Asterius would have dismissed - laughingly dismissed - the idea that his proud and ancient Clan would become nothing but a footnote in vampiric history.

He looked away. "Bygones be bygones, as they say."

[alanwrotethis]

For a split second he almost smirks habitually - Niketas triggered his fair share of eye rolls over the years and can spot them a mile away. Except, and knowing this causes his face to tighten, he didn't mean it this time. He was trying, genuinely trying, to make headway here. Of all the kindred to dismiss with the bumbling pedagogue persona, this was not one of them.

I used to be good at this. I think. Maybe I was just young and handsome, maybe I was always this droll.

"Bygones be bygones, as they say."

His words halt as Asterius turns to look away.

"You are... too kind. Thanks you."

He blinks, taking in the room. His eyelids slow and dip. He hears whispers.

The benches, stoic and brusque, old proud wood varnished and tended for generations, supporting weary pilgrims in prayer. The spirit of lectern, the proud herald standing before the champion of the local spirits, unaware that the faith it embodies would call its existence heresy. An old bible, discarded in a corner of the room, pages missing, spine open... words fading. It knows it is dying.... has just discovered what dying is. It is scared, it has never been scared before.

"I will leave you to your thoughts soon. I came here to... empty my mind. Memories have a way of attaching to a place. I can speak to places, meditating in my own quarters leaves the four walls echoing with my own thoughts. Too much thinking, too many voices. I make contact with so many spirits, I sometimes test myself to know which thoughts are mine to begin with."

He stands, crossing to a corner of the room, arcing his walk to limit his time in Asterius's field of vision. Under one of the pews, he picks up a beaten, decaying bible. He opens it, a page slips loose. With a gentle shhh, he tidies the separated pages and closes the book, tracing a finger over the worn corners of the cover.

"I respect your desire for quiet. I need it too, sometimes," he says, possibly to the room, or the book, or to Asterius.