[ Staring into her eyes, which now loom large before him, he can only focus on the deep, deep of their green for so long before he notices the reflection in them, of the room warping. Silhouettes of objects grow long wisps all around the edges. Like fire. Like cilia, all moving ceaselessly.
Picture frames take root in the walls. Chairs twist into the table they're arranged around. The doorway distorts so strangely it no longer looks like a way to escape from this.
Ivan has to wonder if he's merging too, but Lortel's forehead leaned firmly against his stops him from looking down.
[ keeping the murmur clear of her ever-mounting panic while still projecting the calm she thinks he needs to feel is, honestly, one of the hardest things she's ever done. the cognitive dissonance of it threatens to make her physically ill.
nevertheless. she keeps her spine straight, and she holds him close. ]
Keep talking. I'm right here. You're safe. We're safe, right now.
[ A little overstimulated, Ivan gladly rests against the cushion Lortel offers both physically and mentally. Things only get harder to comprehend as the whole world wriggles like worms of color. It's just his eyes that are wrong, she reassures him.
Good, a good thing that it it was him, and not someone with a smaller body. It would be a bigger shock to their system... ]
Mm, I hope none of this is making it over to your mind. It's a bit much...!
[ Hahaha... ]
Why don't you have Till sketch what's left of that one so we have a record of it...?
It would be fine if it did, [ she tells him, serious as anything, ] if it would help.
[ she nods against him. the only reason she hasn't already set aside the mushroom that triggered all this is that it means she'd have to take her hands off him, and she's not willing to risk it. ]
I will. I'll pass the information on to those who'd make good use of it.
[ those who would protect theirs with the knowledge, rather than seek to harm. Megumi, she thinks. Arthur. well, she's got time to think about it. ]
[ Do her hands still have five fingers each? It's starting to feel like more, scratching against him in unknown sequences. Flies buzz behind her voice—the black kind, not the ones that drink from flowers—a thousand misshapen and miniscule throats trying to copy her words and getting them just slightly wrong.
He has to search the distortion to understand her, but he still does.
He still does.
And there's just one more thing he has to ask of her, very important. ]
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no subject
manipulating her own feelings to flood the murmur on purpose... is a skill she's rapidly been honing, these last two months.
she is Lortel Kehelland. she would smile at the end of the world.
surely, she can do at least this. ]
Maybe, [ she hedges. her hands pull him down until their foreheads bump. her thumbs continue to brush, mindless and comforting, across his skin. ]
I won't let anything happen to you, Ivan. I'll make sure you're safe. You belong to me, after all.
[ it's a promise she means and a complete lie. there is no help for them.
still, she thinks. whatever it might take. ]
Just focus on me. Tell me what you see.
no subject
Picture frames take root in the walls. Chairs twist into the table they're arranged around. The doorway distorts so strangely it no longer looks like a way to escape from this.
Ivan has to wonder if he's merging too, but Lortel's forehead leaned firmly against his stops him from looking down.
So senseless. ]
...we are just tendrils, we were always tendrils.
no subject
nevertheless. she keeps her spine straight, and she holds him close. ]
Keep talking. I'm right here. You're safe. We're safe, right now.
no subject
Good, a good thing that it it was him, and not someone with a smaller body. It would be a bigger shock to their system... ]
Mm, I hope none of this is making it over to your mind. It's a bit much...!
[ Hahaha... ]
Why don't you have Till sketch what's left of that one so we have a record of it...?
no subject
[ she nods against him. the only reason she hasn't already set aside the mushroom that triggered all this is that it means she'd have to take her hands off him, and she's not willing to risk it. ]
I will. I'll pass the information on to those who'd make good use of it.
[ those who would protect theirs with the knowledge, rather than seek to harm. Megumi, she thinks. Arthur. well, she's got time to think about it. ]
no subject
He has to search the distortion to understand her, but he still does.
He still does.
And there's just one more thing he has to ask of her, very important. ]
Don't tell him I've been doing this.
no subject
she doesn't ask what he means. she nods against him again, so he feels her do it, and cards her fingers slowly through his hair.
shh, shh, goes the murmur. ]
I won't, Ivan. You have my word.