alexandraerin (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
alexandraerin) wrote2010-10-26 07:53 am
alexandraerin) wrote2010-10-26 07:53 am
Entry tags:
Magic Under Construction: TOMU #466
Started: 10/26/2010, 7:30 AM
Status: Paused for attempted sleep. (Updated: 10/28/2010 3:30 AM)
Word Count: ~1200.
The next morning I woke up feeling like my head had been rented out to a dwarven band auditioning new percussionists. I groaned, and my voice sounded horrible... all low and growly, and it echoed weirdly in my ear. Then I realized that I was hearing Ian, groaning right alongside me.
I felt very exposed... his bed was just a regular bed, exposed to the open air. He only had one bedspread for a blanket. While we'd had more privacy than we would've been able to get if we'd stayed in my room all night, the thought that there was another guy with a key to this room who technically could have walked in at any time and still could hit me like a blast of cold air, which was another thing that actually was hitting me as Ian shifted around and moved the blanket.
"How much did we drink last night?" he asked.
"Nothing," I said. "We weren't drinking."
He heaved himself up into a sitting position.
"You don't remember getting drunk?" he said.
"No."
"Huh... I guess I really don't, either," he said. "I remember feeling drunk... and I really have that 'morning after' feeling right now... but I don't remember getting beer, or drinking it."
"Maybe somebody slipped something into my room," I said, thinking about my alchemically-augmented bath products.
"Or spiked the pizza," he said.
"I think it started before the pizza."
"So you felt it, too."
"I felt something," I said. My mind went back to all the things that had flashed through it the night before... the uncharacteristic ones, the ones that were sort of characteristic, the ones that were probably really very characteristic but maybe usually a little more deeply buried... "I felt a lot of things, to be honest. I'm... not sure how I feel about them."
Ian nodded, then looked like he regretted the movement.
"It was... intense," he said.
I tried to focus on specifics a little... there was a lot of detail at first, and less later on. One thing seemed frighteningly clear to me, if only by omission.
"Were we... did we use a ring?" I asked.
Ian's suddenly bloodless complexion told me that he was not remembering the same thing I was not remembering.
"We'll just... watch for symptoms," he said. "Or signs. You know, and we can have you divined... not divine-divined, but you know what I mean. Divinated?"
"I'm less worried about that than I am diseases," I said, though a tendril of worry about that was working its way through my skull. "And I'm more worried about you than me. I'm pretty, you know, resistant to things."
"Yeah, but I can just have a cure disease thrown at me and be done," he said. "What do they even have for arcane remedies?"
"I... really don't know," I said. I hated to admit ignorance on a subject, but I wasn't really even clear on what a disease was, at a fundamental level. In my defense, it wasn't something I'd ever had to think about. Did they have a form in and of themselves, or were they more like a collection of meta-traits that could become attached to an individual? "I suppose... well, it could be complicated. I don't really know."
Ian was already nodding.
"You'll have to go into the healing center to find out," he said.
"Okay," I said.
He was right... I knew it... but agreeing with him somehow felt easier than it had before. I didn't feel the same sense of interconnectedness that had made the night before so strange even before the bizarre dreams started showing up, but I felt a different kind of openness all the same.
Ian was staring at me.
"What?" I said
"Um... are you okay?" he asked.
"Yeah."
"You just looked like you had something more to say," he said.
"No, I really didn't," I said.
He looked at me like he was trying to look through me... and he looked kind of genuinely confused about what he was seeing, or not seeing. I could sympathize. Maybe it was just the headache, but he felt really hard to read.
"Huh," he said.
"What?"
"You usually have more to say," he said.
"No, I agree with you."
"You still usually have more to say."
"Yeah, well... you're right. I don't have anything to add," I said.
Amaranth had always wanted me to be open-minded... given that the viewpoints I'd brought with me to school had been pretty parochial and also kind of intensely self-loathing, I couldn't say that this was a bad idea. But I'd never really seen the point of how being open-minded could be a good thing in and of itself... if you were right about something, you were right... right?
And even if you couldn't be sure that you were... well, you couldn't be sure that anyone else was. Not without stopping and thinking about it, examining things carefully... examining people carefully. I hadn't been like that as a child... in fact, I'd been really kind of credulous, all too ready to believe whatever I was told. My mother had never done anything to dissuade me from believing things... I could see looking back that she'd begun nudging me towards critical thinking, at least near the end of my time with her, but ultimately I'd learned the habit of distrust from my grandmother.
My grandmother had treated her mind like an intellectual fortress, a towering keep protected by her own iron will. She'd made sure no idea get within a three yard radius of her brain unless she trusted the source.
But being so skeptical... so closed off... took work. It required constant vigilance. It wasn't just enough to be on the defensive. Ideas had to be assailed, attacked, tested for weakness. This could look a lot like attacking the person who was bringing them. Letting my guard down felt good... letting Ian in felt good.
What was the point of making him constantly proving himself? That was what it boiled down to. In my grandmother's world, there were only a few narrowly interpreted sources worth trusting. I needed to find a wider place to stand.
"Well... if you're sure..." he said.
"Sure of what?" I asked, thinking I must have missed something.
"That you agree with me," he said.
"You know what else I'm sure of?" I asked him.
"What?"
"Confidence is sexy," I said. "I... like it when you take control."
"Oh?" he said.
"Yeah," I said, lowering my eyes.
"Well... you didn't seem to mind grabbing the reins last night," he said. "I mean, I liked that, too... but it surprised me. You aren't normally that... self-assured?"
I blushed. Self-assured? That was one way of looking at it, I supposed.
"I felt like a passenger," I said. "Like there wasn't much for me to do but go along for the ride."
"It felt like you were doing plenty."
Status: Paused for attempted sleep. (Updated: 10/28/2010 3:30 AM)
Word Count: ~1200.
The next morning I woke up feeling like my head had been rented out to a dwarven band auditioning new percussionists. I groaned, and my voice sounded horrible... all low and growly, and it echoed weirdly in my ear. Then I realized that I was hearing Ian, groaning right alongside me.
I felt very exposed... his bed was just a regular bed, exposed to the open air. He only had one bedspread for a blanket. While we'd had more privacy than we would've been able to get if we'd stayed in my room all night, the thought that there was another guy with a key to this room who technically could have walked in at any time and still could hit me like a blast of cold air, which was another thing that actually was hitting me as Ian shifted around and moved the blanket.
"How much did we drink last night?" he asked.
"Nothing," I said. "We weren't drinking."
He heaved himself up into a sitting position.
"You don't remember getting drunk?" he said.
"No."
"Huh... I guess I really don't, either," he said. "I remember feeling drunk... and I really have that 'morning after' feeling right now... but I don't remember getting beer, or drinking it."
"Maybe somebody slipped something into my room," I said, thinking about my alchemically-augmented bath products.
"Or spiked the pizza," he said.
"I think it started before the pizza."
"So you felt it, too."
"I felt something," I said. My mind went back to all the things that had flashed through it the night before... the uncharacteristic ones, the ones that were sort of characteristic, the ones that were probably really very characteristic but maybe usually a little more deeply buried... "I felt a lot of things, to be honest. I'm... not sure how I feel about them."
Ian nodded, then looked like he regretted the movement.
"It was... intense," he said.
I tried to focus on specifics a little... there was a lot of detail at first, and less later on. One thing seemed frighteningly clear to me, if only by omission.
"Were we... did we use a ring?" I asked.
Ian's suddenly bloodless complexion told me that he was not remembering the same thing I was not remembering.
"We'll just... watch for symptoms," he said. "Or signs. You know, and we can have you divined... not divine-divined, but you know what I mean. Divinated?"
"I'm less worried about that than I am diseases," I said, though a tendril of worry about that was working its way through my skull. "And I'm more worried about you than me. I'm pretty, you know, resistant to things."
"Yeah, but I can just have a cure disease thrown at me and be done," he said. "What do they even have for arcane remedies?"
"I... really don't know," I said. I hated to admit ignorance on a subject, but I wasn't really even clear on what a disease was, at a fundamental level. In my defense, it wasn't something I'd ever had to think about. Did they have a form in and of themselves, or were they more like a collection of meta-traits that could become attached to an individual? "I suppose... well, it could be complicated. I don't really know."
Ian was already nodding.
"You'll have to go into the healing center to find out," he said.
"Okay," I said.
He was right... I knew it... but agreeing with him somehow felt easier than it had before. I didn't feel the same sense of interconnectedness that had made the night before so strange even before the bizarre dreams started showing up, but I felt a different kind of openness all the same.
Ian was staring at me.
"What?" I said
"Um... are you okay?" he asked.
"Yeah."
"You just looked like you had something more to say," he said.
"No, I really didn't," I said.
He looked at me like he was trying to look through me... and he looked kind of genuinely confused about what he was seeing, or not seeing. I could sympathize. Maybe it was just the headache, but he felt really hard to read.
"Huh," he said.
"What?"
"You usually have more to say," he said.
"No, I agree with you."
"You still usually have more to say."
"Yeah, well... you're right. I don't have anything to add," I said.
Amaranth had always wanted me to be open-minded... given that the viewpoints I'd brought with me to school had been pretty parochial and also kind of intensely self-loathing, I couldn't say that this was a bad idea. But I'd never really seen the point of how being open-minded could be a good thing in and of itself... if you were right about something, you were right... right?
And even if you couldn't be sure that you were... well, you couldn't be sure that anyone else was. Not without stopping and thinking about it, examining things carefully... examining people carefully. I hadn't been like that as a child... in fact, I'd been really kind of credulous, all too ready to believe whatever I was told. My mother had never done anything to dissuade me from believing things... I could see looking back that she'd begun nudging me towards critical thinking, at least near the end of my time with her, but ultimately I'd learned the habit of distrust from my grandmother.
My grandmother had treated her mind like an intellectual fortress, a towering keep protected by her own iron will. She'd made sure no idea get within a three yard radius of her brain unless she trusted the source.
But being so skeptical... so closed off... took work. It required constant vigilance. It wasn't just enough to be on the defensive. Ideas had to be assailed, attacked, tested for weakness. This could look a lot like attacking the person who was bringing them. Letting my guard down felt good... letting Ian in felt good.
What was the point of making him constantly proving himself? That was what it boiled down to. In my grandmother's world, there were only a few narrowly interpreted sources worth trusting. I needed to find a wider place to stand.
"Well... if you're sure..." he said.
"Sure of what?" I asked, thinking I must have missed something.
"That you agree with me," he said.
"You know what else I'm sure of?" I asked him.
"What?"
"Confidence is sexy," I said. "I... like it when you take control."
"Oh?" he said.
"Yeah," I said, lowering my eyes.
"Well... you didn't seem to mind grabbing the reins last night," he said. "I mean, I liked that, too... but it surprised me. You aren't normally that... self-assured?"
I blushed. Self-assured? That was one way of looking at it, I supposed.
"I felt like a passenger," I said. "Like there wasn't much for me to do but go along for the ride."
"It felt like you were doing plenty."