2247/Boats on the Astral Sea

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Boats on the Astral Sea
Date of Scene: 27 June 2020
Location: Sanctum Santorum
Synopsis: Illyana and Strange survey the astral wounds left by Braniac's abduction of Bushwick.
Cast of Characters: Stephen Strange, Illyana Rasputina
Tinyplot: Genosha Burns


Stephen Strange has posed:
The real world is remarkably immutable when viewed through the eyes of those adept in the mystic arts. Things change, new buildings go up, old ones come down, and tastes in music and fashion shift but all of it seems almost geological in comparison to the astral. The 'soul' of the universe. It is always in motion, changing with the mindset and the emotions of untold quintillions of life forms. Sometimes it does not even stay the same from second to second.

This particular eddy of the great, psychic ocean is influenced by the thoughts and feelings of New York City. A hub of mystic activity, and most recently torn asunder by marauding forces from beyond Earth's celestial sphere. The misty 'tide' tosses and turns as though caught in a great storm, and a feeling of darkness and foreboding hangs over it all. Not far away, a great yawning void howls - the very stuff of emptiness and nothing.

Suspended above it hovers the blue, semi-transparent form of the Sorcerer Supreme. His legs are crossed beneath him and his chin rests in the palm of his hand, the elbow of which is cocked against his knee.

Illyana Rasputina has posed:
The universe having a soul might seem absurd to people practicing particular faiths, or absolutely understood as a constant. Hard to practice sorcery past a certain point, though, and not feel a sense of awe and wonder after opening the third eye to the transcendent experiences. Ideas sown of the seeds in mortal minds pepper the air with possibility, stars burning in the aether surrounding all that defines civilization. Existence. The astral may be more true than walking the streets of New York.

Somewhere in the city, a blonde Russian lies under the protective watch of her better halves. Nearer at hand is the reflection of such potential shattered into countless rainbow shards by the cruel cast of fate, her tortured soul reflected in the makeup of the vessel she takes. Silver scars trace her skin while she walks, as much as one walks in flicker-flashes of thought, sliding through the untold mirk unable to quite wrap around her ankles like a cat. Illyana wears the marks of Limbo -- and her mastery of it -- in the barbed black coronet, less anything else, but she walks alone outside herself.

Purposeful? Maybe. Sooner or later, the currents push her where she needs to be, an unseen hand dragging her nearer into the spin of wrathful notions tinged in despair, fear, doubt. Anathema to growth and life. But someone, sometimes, has to prowl the marches to bring down the small monsters before they become terrible ones. And such propels her into the night, into the shadows cast by Stephen Strange as much as any.

Stephen Strange has posed:
The Doctor's own aethereal raiment is less evocative of his role. Instead his projection is merely how he looks at this moment in the upper rooms of the Sanctum Sanctorum, seated and meditative beneath the Seal of the Vishanti. It's far from unusual to find others plying the astral tide, especially since the mutants came and ventured out with their telepathic powers, but another face is always interesting enough to draw attention.

"It's a wound," Strange calls down to the Sorceress of Limbo, the concept of space and distance in this place non-adherent to the laws of physics - he sounds close, even when so far away, "A missing part of the whole. It's dredging things up."

He pauses for a moment, focusing his attention on the expansive void and what sound like terrible and envious screams in the pitch-black depths.

" ... from somewhere else."

Illyana Rasputina has posed:
External projection, to a fault, though Illyana still walks around in a t-shirt and dark pants that might be leather, even in the astral. Never mind she could don a dress or almost anything, this suits as her preferred garment to cast forth into the world. Mutants and metahumans skimming the ethereal flow present their challenges, but seeing none of them is something of a blessing. Quieter. Freer.

Not that she would ask, but the emblem of the threefold deities of magic acts like a beacon. Her head lifts to mark the slashes contained within a circle, tracing infinite curves and promising lines. The Sorceress Supreme of one realm acknowledges the greater one here with an upnod; contained, controlled, in every aspect of a rise or a fall. "An absence more than an injury. Excised to the root," she agrees. Here, her Russian accent is barely a ghost, a proof of the mental modifications performed on a young child. Malleable potential cemented to adulthood.

The void would call to her, probably more than most. Here, the shards of her broken soul are tangible in a sense, the inner darkness an ultraviolet spike plundering her aura. "What comes through? The missing bleed their pain and attract spirits, worse things, that would feast on it."

Stephen Strange has posed:
"Difficult to tell," the Doctor answers, eyes still fixed upon the nearby void, "There shouldn't be anything. Like you said, it was torn out at the root. Whatever's there ... it's feeding on the misery this 'Brainiac' caused. There are creatures that thrive on the absence of hope - I'm sure you've met more than your fair share, Illyana - but they don't all come from Limbo."

In a surprisingly graceful motion for a man his age, Strange extends his legs out beneath him and is no longer floating but standing tall. The high-collared cape he wears moved about him of its own accord, and he lifts one arm to draw a semicircle in the air. His fingertips leave behind strange, arcane symbols that seem to brand the very fabric of creation like white-hot embers. There is a thrum like the distant slamming of a crypt door, and then the symbols fade.

"By the Shields of the Seraphim," he says in the tone of the invoker, "Ward this place."

The practiced eyes of the magus and maga would see what the uninitiated cannot. A series of arcane emblems in the air itself forming a powerful barrier, keeping others out and, more importantly, the denizens of darkness in.

Illyana Rasputina has posed:
Young as her face may be, those eyes hold a weight crystallized experience and antiquity, if not wisdom. Hard-won knowledge leaves its marks in kind, a certain proud flesh raised around the essence of being. Illyana tilts her head, examining the damage rendered to reality itself in some fashion, altogether aware of the creeping damage. "Too many come from our own making. Humanity spawns enough troubles on its own." The compulsion to pull at the buried shard of her soul currently merged in the spaces between curls her fingers, but she straightens her hand. "Descending to cut back whatever comes through would buy time. The only solutions I see are cauterization or transplant."

Odd medical terms, but she has them, a terrifying deep and rich lexicon of concepts and words, few used in any professional capacity. Yet there they are, hovering behind the mighty swirl of power forming into locked shapes and forms. Her pupils contract to pinpricks watching it all, worthy of flinching and looking away from Strange. She doesn't.

The cape, besides, gets a fond smirk out of her. Slender fingers spread out to feel the contour of power sizzling away. "How long do we have? He stole a piece of the city -- its people, the life of it. We all bleed slowly from that."

Stephen Strange has posed:
"Not long, but longer now," the Sorcerer Supreme of Earth offers, "Whatever is down there isn't strong enough yet to breach these wards. Especially if you add your own."

Those last words come complete with a knowing look at the young Sorceress Supreme of Limbo. It's no secret amongst the initiated that Strange prefers to keep himself to himself, only handing out information when needs must. But like knows like, and strength recognizes strength.

"It's a prophylactic measure, but temporary. The pain and anguish of the city is feeding it, and eventually it will grow too strong to be contained by wards alone. Something will need to be done. Cauterization? I don't know of any source of magic strong enough that either of us could wield without damaging the rest of the city. As for a transplant ... look."

There is a wave of the Doctor's hand, and the mists of the astral part to show silvery threads reaching up from the rest of the city into the high, saturnine vault of heaven. They fade away after several hundred feet, but there is a sense that they keep going forever.

"What was lost is still out there. Stolen but not destroyed. The soul of the city clings to the lost part of itself. If it returns, the wound will mend. But those tethers are not indestructible. If they're lost? You could bring back Bushwick just as it was, but it would be dead. Hollow. Lifeless."

A pause, then his grey eyes catch Illyana's own.

"We've got work to do."