Omg What Happened

[Caru]

"Who are we if not the next generation of Elders?" Caru threw back lightly, no heat to it. "Of course you're right. They probably weren't discussing lost magic, they were probabLy just discussing the threat of another Methuselah."

"You know it's funny you say that, Miss Audley. When I was a little girl my mother told me, before she died, that there was no dream too big to dream. But: some dreams become so big that they get angry about being just dreams. They ache to dance and laugh and cry and live. They want to exist beyond imagination. It was a superstition in my village that the big forests could contain dreams a bit better than other forests. Every dark moon we'd go down to the creek and leave offerings in eight wicker baskets. Sometimes we left wheat and maise, but more often than not we left sweet cakes and over-ripe fruits, honey, virgin blood."

"They were just children's tales, of course. But people really believed back then that there were things that collected those offerings, things that were the weaker descendents of a race of people that had dreamed so big that they'd become dreams themselves. Reality itself couldn't support their power, and so eventually, reality turned against them."

Caru cocked her head to one side, the lime green light of her eyes terribly luminous for a heartbeat. "As for whether big dreams could ever become... not dreams... again... well. Could anyone reverse engineer something insubstantial? How would one go abouts that, do you think?"

[Valentina Audley]

"The trouble with being the next generation is you are lacking in time to have had the experience of those gone before you. They always have the head start." Valentina grins and refrains from adding intelligence can make up for it, they both already know it so why state the obvious?

When Caru starts talking about dreams that ache to be alive, she shivers, disquieted by the notion. An image of a forge flashes into her mind, warm sun beating down on it and she closes her eyes, to try and dispel the image. Taking a firmer grip on herself she takes a deep breath then reopens her eyes, chosing to concentrate on her needle work for a moment.

"Why eight baskets?" It's funny isn't it, the little details you pick out? Virgin blood doesn't get a rise, but Valentina is curious about the significance of the eight.

She thinks for a moment, on the question of how a dream become reality and very quickly discovers her thoughts ar enot pleasant ones.

"What if the something that had become a dream realised what was happening to it? What if it gave itself a way back? And, well, some say dreams are a pathway into your mind. What if the big dream, came into your head and manipulated your thoughts, until you worked to bring it back? I think..." She pauses and swallows thickly. They have swiftly gone down the rabbit hole, as it were, and wonderland is turning out the be a darker place than this Alice had hoped.

"I think if a reality can become a dream, then there must be a, a, place of some kind where the dreams reside and the unconscious mind is the bridge betwixt the two."

Well. That was a rather nasty set of conclusions to have come to wasn't it? Valentina devoutly hopes she is wrong and resolves to ask Segarus the next time she lays eyes on him.

[Caru]

"Elders have the benefit of a head start indeed, and the staggering detriment of a mind that so perfectly understands... the era into which it was birthed. Once upon a time, that was good. It didn't matter that you couldn't readily process the next century, because each century sounded a lot like the last, just with different laws, fashions and ideas. Modern industry though... has taught even us Ancillae to keep with the times, because times are changing. Reality is changing. Doesn't matter if that's in seamstressing or cryptography..."

Caru too, has intuited what is left unsaid by her companion, for her eyes shine, a smile shared.

"Oh, eight and seven are just recurring numbers that crop up as power numbers through various cultures. As can be any digit or pattern of digits if you push a story hard enough mathematically. Everything can be made to look magical. But eight and seven are especially 'mystical' or so it goes."

"I later overlaid all sorts of nonsense reasoning to the number eight. Any amount of my theories could be correct," Caru smiles. "So I wouldn't take any seriously. Let's see... åtta was, to me, a number that could also be an infinity sign, the figure of eight representing two worlds forever overlapping but never joining with any true access, because the route between them has become pinched and closed. For one to exist as it is, that is, in equal dimension to the other, it needs to be entirely closed off. Otherwise, one consumes the other in the shifting of the boundaries, be in part or total. Moving the pinch will inevitably lessen the dimensions of one side of the mirror image. That's one wild theory."

"My best and over-analytical theory though, which is of course wrong because you can't analyse these things in the same way, but my best theory I developed later was: eight can be shattered exactly once, to split into two lots of four. When it comes to dealing with dreams, ensuring there's two of everything you need is pretty important."

Caru's gaze doesn't have any humour to it now, she's just watching Valentina quietly.

"In the year I grew up, we called the things that dwelt in the forest the Inanimae. And these spirits were bound by four laws. I guess that, in leaving two lots of four offerings, people hoped the spirits would be reminded that there are laws that exist between us. Laws the lost ones have to follow. If we respected their world, they would respect ours. Ultimately, people are scared of the eternal ones, no matter what they are. And we prayed and hoped that in giving blood and honey, children and song, that their kind would not interfere with the Land of Unfulfilled Dreams."

"But what nonsense, eh?"

"Ho, that's an interesting theory Miss Audley, on dreams. Certainly, the best way out of a jail cell is to just get the jailor to open the door. Some say this universe is built on duality. They say that nothing in the material world exists without its reverse signiture, energetically. The primal elements were the building blocks of our corporeal realm, but each of them too had its mirror image in spirit. Who knows. But if the whole ying and yang thing is true, and that everything is mutable and nothing is fixed, time being nonlinear, then you're right. Of course you could reverse engineer dreams. In fact, you could even argue, that just as there is a place in reality where dreams don't exist, then there's a place in dreams where reality doesn't exist. Somewhere between them, on the old infinity loop, exists a road that crosses itself, a crossroads where reality overlays dreams. A bit like... a hedge? Between two fields." The smile is fixed.

"I guess it would just be a matter of figuring out what this place was, and how to access it. Pretty dangerous though. I wouldn't want to be a step away from not existing anymore."

[Valentina Audley]

Patterns. The thing about dress making is you use a lot of patterns. And in doing so, you get good at spotting shapes that fit together. Valentina has a personal theory that all seamstresses would be excellent sleuths, just for this.

Right now though, her jigsaw is all bits of sky and no straight edges or corners so she simply can't see how to put them together, but possibly there's an edge here?

"What if... What if you were right about the theory of eight? Two worlds reality and dream, joining but with a pinched route between them? And what if the route is dreaming? That would explain why things don't cross from one to the other very often would it not?"

Then she blinks in confusion, digesting another little snippet. "Sorry, time is nonlinear? Whatever do you mean?" oh please, please don't be what I think this is... I don't want to be her, I want to be me! Valentina's expression is perhaps, a little more wde eyed and worried than it should be for someone discussing a hypothetical dream world.

[Caru]

"What if I was right? We-ell. Then hypothetically we should begin to mind what we dream."

Caru's pale lashes catch the gaslight, as she watches Valentina.

"If the route into this other world was dreaming (or at least the route to this crossroads was), that could explain why things don't cross over very often, sure. Dreams are one of the least understood aspects of vampiric existence. We die in the day, and yet, we dream. Some might even theorise that dreams are all that lock us to this world, as animated corpses. It's the only part of us that persists in Torpor, our dreaming consciousness."

The Gangrel grins. "Such drama. Don't worry too much. It's all just stories."

"Hm? Time? Oh, right. The exact nature of time is still a debatable topic. With new advancements in science, scientists are trying to study it but have no real way of doing so yet, so I guess it's just the domain of philosophy, religion and conjecture. Most conclude that time is relative and tends to be more on the non-linear side."

"Although most of us have come to believe that time is a physical reality that moves at a fixed speed, when we practice dreaming, time doesn’t have a direction. It doesn’t move along a straight line, as when we dream of a long-gone relative and then about our children. And there is no causality: When we dream the world into being, the future doesn’t have to build upon the past, and the past doesn’t have to predetermine our present."

"A lot of religions concern themselves with sacred 'non-linear' time, where the future as well as the past is accessible to some souls, because it's all happening at once. There's a Clan of vampires who once specialised in it."

"In fact, we can only dream the world into being from this place of timelessness, allegedly. As we raise our perception to that of eagle, we get closer to experiencing this sense of infinity."

"Infinity is a place both prior to and after time. That is, it is outside of time itself. In this place of infinity, you can influence events that occurred in the past and nudge destiny, so say the stories."

"An Earthkeeper understands that if you want to change a situation, you have to start by accepting it as it is. You recognize that this moment is perfect―and then you can change anything you want. It's a bit of a paradox for thinking."

"Once you step outside of time into infinity, the past and future disclose themselves to you ― you can see tomorrow and the day after tomorrow and even the day that you will die. At least, that's what this old Clan said, but they could only alter it on a minor scale, not extremes in time."

[Valentina Audley]

Valentina shudders at the thought of being a corpse animated by a dream. It's clear the topic of conversation is taking it's toll on her. She doesn't reply to the comment about being careful of what you dream of, becuase, how do you even go about guarding your subconscious?

Something in Caru's slew of information does catch her attention though. "A clan of vampires, who specialised in non linear time? Which clan?"

Then, "What is an Earthkeeper?" Valentina is starting to get lost. Is Vortigern in infinity? Is he floating around in the aether, nudging events to his satisfaction? But he cannot be, because he was in a physical body, wasn't he? Had he been in infinity, nudging things to get into that body? Did he put the Seers in their current minds that way? Was Lanny crossing to her from the dreaming? Did he already know the outcome to what he was doing?

Valentina is suddenly very tired and very lost. She smiles hopelessly at Caru. "All these new theories darling! I must confess myself behind the times, for I fear I'm getting in a frightful muddle with it all"

[Caru]

"The Brujah," Caru says lightly.

As for the rest, "Don't worry about it, honestly, it's just old Swedish nonsense. A lot of wives tales have gone into the working of my theories. Treat it for what it is, just supposition."

"It would be pretty excellent to have unicorns back, though."

"Miss Audley, can I ask you a hypothetical question? In this, you are you, and... your Prince remains your Prince. I'm aware you've a good friendship with them. What would you do if you were suddenly confronted with the knowledge that they would sacrifice you for something they considered more important? Just say. I know Elders do this all the time, but what would you do, in this circumstance. Whether you feel it an emotionak betrayal or full of grief or any number of things, your service and loyalty is still to them."

"Do you... escape? Back away while you still can? Or do you just hope everything won't go as you fear it will, because you are set on this loyalty and not breaking from it? How far does loyalty to something you love go? And this is literally a hypothetical, I'm actually trying to work out a situation of my own. I'm not in love with this person, they're not my friend either. But I owe them loyalty and an oath I made. Oaths matter a lot to me. I just don't know what to do in a situation where two things I value are mutually exclusive. I'd like perspective from someone who has an even closer bond with the person in question, in this kind of scenario."

[Valentina Audley]

At what point did they stray from lighthearted gossip into this pit of uncomfortable and unsettling theories and hypothetical queries Valentina wondered to herself. At least she knows the answer to this hypothetical, having debated it interally a lot in recent months.

"I gave my life into my Prince's hands a long time ago darling. And I place my trust in the knowledge she will do what's neccessary for both of us, even if I cannot see the purpose in her actions." Like giving my secrets away and telling all the world I'm a Seer, she thinks to herself.

"She has never failed the trust I have in her." She pauses to smile "and usually I get an explanation sooner or later. So I find it all works out."

She glances over at Caru. "But unlike you I am loved and I love. Which I suspect changes the nature of the situation somewhat. Without love? I suspect I would put my continued existence ahead of my oaths. Mind you, I try hard not to make oaths, lest I end up in your situation so I'm not sure I can say for certain."

She pauses, thinking.

"Could you... just not be around for a while? Be unavoidably detained elsewhere? Or does that fall under breaking your oath?"

[Caru]

“I am - loved,” Caru blinks, her words halting and getting stuck. The tone was a little too strained to hide how upset that statement made her. “Just not by my Prince. This is meant to be a hypothetical on your part. So yes, presume for whatever reason Lady Dyonisia did this, and would do this. It’s not meant to be a terribly deep question. Just... when is it acceptable to not be loyal? When your life is forfeit? Or beyond that too, should we all offer our lives just for being in someone’s domain? What kind of service do you have to have promised in order to give up your life? I’m not a chivalrous type, but neither am I the type to ignore duty.”

The Ancilla nods as she listens, otherwise working through her own mental reaction.

“I’ve never made an oath of this kind before, or almost any kind, as I find them too easy to have externally manipulated and twisted, and people like to do that. Let’s just say this wasn’t an oath I was able to refuse giving. So it’s what it is now.”

She rests her chin on her knuckles, elbow on knee. The Gangrel’s expression is pensive, if a little despondent. “I considered the not being around thing. One though, I want to be around in this century. A lot is happening that matters immensely to me and my Clan. Two, and I’ve been living on the edge of the world before, like some ghost. I don’t want to do it again. If there’s any good alternative I’ll take it.”

She sighed. “There just might not be an alternative sure. I guess I’ll have a think, maybe visit someone. Thanks for entertaining the query.”

[Valentina Audley]

Wince. Way to go and put your foot in it Valentina.

"Darling, I'm sorry, that was terribly rude of me. I didn't mean at all to imply you weren't loved, only that your prince does not care for you the way mine cares for me. But I did so unkindly and I am heartily sorry for it." Mentally she upgrades the outfit to better fabrics and resolves to have it finished in the next fortnight.

She pauses to give the next questions some thought and hopeful avoid causing more offence. "I think, perhaps, that if my prince needed my life I might give it." She admits, slowly. "Though it would depend on the circumstances of why she needed it."

"As for when is it acceptable not to be loyal?" She winces, Reggie coming once again to the forefront of her mind. "It's hard to say darling. I'm sure there is a point, in every situation when self preservation must come before loyalty, but it is perhaps to hard to define a set of general rules for such a thing. "Situations vary from person to person, what's bearable for one might be crushing to another and so on and so forth. I hate to think that anyone's life should ever be forfeit. But I suppose, hypothetically, it's forfeit the moment it's given?" She shrugs, her own aura tight with discomfort at the thoughts.

"I'm not convinced our princes should be able to take our lives just for granting us a place to reside, but I can see why they might ask it, in the same way that a soldier's life is not neccesarily forfeit, but a general might ask it, for the good of the country?"

She avoids answering the next few as beyond her abilities and for fear of causing more offence. Valentina sighs, annoyed with herself for not being able to provide a clear answer.

"It may be that I just do not have the answers you seek darling. I'm sorry. I hope that, if you do visit someone, they have the answers you need."