reading_rainstorm | Stephanie's Heart: The Archive

In your dreams you are in a thick and foggy forest. It could be mistaken for the woods around Tributary if you don’t know your plants. You are on a trail leading into a clearing, in the center of which is a simple, concrete structure with a single door. A chaos star has been spray painted on it with a stencil.

You approach the structure. Looking over your shoulder you see a large shape lurking in the fog, obscured by the foliage. Two shining Feline eyes peer at you from the brush. You feel your heart rate spike as you turn the knob and find an old fashioned elevator tucked neatly inside with an accordion grate standing between you and the ornate, gilded interior. It creaks open as the presence behind you steps into the clearing. It is a sphinx, an eight foot tall lioness with the face of a woman and the large brown wings of an eagle on her back . The feminine face and olive skin tone of a Greek woman from antiquity smiles as she readies herself to to pounce, the wings on her back stretching and give a few readying flaps.You back into the elevator and close the gate with shaking hands as the sphinx leaps at the elevator. Her claws twisting and shearing the metal of the grate slowly, but she is too late. The elevator springs to life and you descend.

Watch on YouTube

A small light above flickers on as it illuminates your view outside the exposed elevator as you sink into the concrete structure. You descend for a few moments before an opening in the concrete gives you the view of an observation deck on a hill, looking down on the sprawling suburbs and campus of a college town. The elevator continues downward. The concrete gives way to old, dusty marble as you continue sinking. You see a vast maze stretch far and away that gets nearer and nearer. This has to be it, right? Your destination? No. You plunge further down, past the walls of the maze and the marble is replaced again by well polished wood. Beautiful stained mahogany rises past you as your descent finally starts to slow. You are greeted by another grate that creaks open for you. Entreating you to enter.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

reading_rainstorm

You are in a hallway, complete carved from pristine marble. Looking at the angles and corners this hallway has you can tell intuitively that this is a labyrinth. Stephanie is standing in front of a large fire, reading a book and frowning. She still has her bright green eyes. She sighs and closes the book, tossing it into the fire. She turns and looks surprised to see you. You hear the roar of a lion from deep within the labyrinth. A feminine voice with a thick Greek accent bounces down the halls.

"You will regret that, my little book of spells."

Stephanie locks eyes with you.

"Run."

She bolts ahead of you and you find your legs carrying you just behind. She follows a path marked by spray painted sigils on the walls she periodically hops over and ducks under trip wires that connect to little paper figures taped to the walls and covered with sigils. Eventually you start hearing those traps go off behind you along with pained shouts and roars, then the flapping of wings.

"Shit shit shit shit."

A sphinx, one without Stephanies face swoops toward Stephanie tearing a gash in her shoulder with a claw. It curves around again in the air for another strike but Steph throws a glass object from her pocket onto the ground and the Sphinx is stopped in mid air. The Sphinx struggles to get her claw free of the solidified air and Stephanie rounds the next corner. Following her you see her target at the end of the corridor. Three ritual circles. Stephanie rushes to stand in one and tosses a set of tablets bound with bronze rings into another.

"C'mon...C'mon..."

From:

peccatore

[Everything is suddenly happening a lot faster than Marco anticipated.

He's along for the ride, but even knowing - or at least suspecting - that he's only witnessing something that already happened isn't enough to keep him cool and collected. The adrenaline coursing through him is his own, he's sure--

The solid hit that the sphinx gets on Stephanie makes him tense up, bracing himself for the need to put his own instincts into a chokehold - but the scent he's expecting never comes, nor does the hunger that comes with it. It would disorient him enough to stop him for a moment if his legs weren't doing their own thing right now.

... But does that mean there's nothing he can do to help Stephanie, either?]

From:

reading_rainstorm

Stephanie takes deep gasping breaths and clutches her shoulder to staunch the bleeding a little...that's why right? There's a little trickling in the back of your skull. You know the power contained in blood. She gives you a tired, apologetic look. "We don't have a lot of time to brainstorm. She set the pace of all our encounters."

The sphinx lands and rounds the corner, when she sees Stephanie standing still in the circle, she stalks forward but stands outside the circle clearly drawn for her.

"Did you really think you were going to lure me into a ritual with you."

"I already have."

You notice that the magic circle Stephanie is is actually painted on top of an older, carved one, with the sphinx currently standing at the center of another ancient carved circle as well. Stephanie throws another glass item from her cloak, this one you can see is a knife. It shatters at the sphinxes feet but the shards fly outward cutting into the sphinx. A drop of blood lands on the circle lighting it up with sickly green.

Stephanie takes some of her own blood from her gash and spatters it across her own circle. Hers lights with a cool lavender.

"Pact circles. I name my demand first, since you were the 'Initiator' my demand is you return to the the slabs that bound you. I even set it up for you in the de summoning circle."

"Tch. And if I don't accept this pact or make no demands of you?"

"You'll be stuck to this spot, I'll die before you and then you won't have a way to complete the pact. You'll be stuck in that circle."

Steph looks to Marco. "It's what I could manage under the circumstances"

From:

peccatore

... It's clever. [He smiles; it's meant to look congratulatory, but somehow, it ends up as more apologetic than anything.] I'm sure it was the best anybody could have done.

From:

reading_rainstorm

Stephanie winces as that phrasing as the memory continues, the sphinx speaks with a smile on her face.

"Very clever, little spellbook. I was right thinking you would be a fine apprentice. I'll agree to your demand. And for mine: Take the boon I offered when you summoned me."

Stephanie goes pale.

"Seriously? You mean..."

"With or without me, a sphinx will walk this earth."

The sphinx laughs.

"Fine."

Both the circles flare and then fade, releasing their prisoners. Stephanie steps nervously towards the sphinx. It bows to her and flaps its wings, filling the air with sickly green energy that flows into Stephanie. She closes her eyes like she is getting a terrible headache. When she opens them, she has the yellow feline eyes you know well.

"Farewell, Grimoire. Enjoy my gift."

Stephanie splatters the tablets in the ritual circle with her blood and recites a spell in Ancient Greek. The Sphinx simply watches. When she finishes the spell, the sphinx slowly melts into lavender energy and flows into the tablets. Stephanie goes to pick them up.

From:

peccatore

I realise this isn't a happy memory for you--

[But it continues to play out, regardless of his commentary, and...

...

Hm.]

... She tricked you?

From:

reading_rainstorm

Stephanie slowly goes over to the tablets and wipes her blood from them with her sleeve.

"We tricked eachother. We both got what we wanted, didn't we?"

It's hard to tell if she's talking to you or the tablets now containing the ancient monster.

She looks at you with those yellow eyes and you are back in the hall of fate.

From:

peccatore

[... Well.

Marco takes a deep breath and enters the third door.]

From:

reading_rainstorm

You are in a high-school hallway. Stephanie is taking things from her locker, you can see she's got a black eye that's on the mend. She flinches hearing you approach and whips around with a look of fear and anger, then she sighs.

"Ah, just you...This is your grand finale before the real deal I guess."

From:

peccatore

[... At this point, he has to ask.]

Are you talking to me?

From:

reading_rainstorm

"I am. I have just a little leverage to interact in- shit...here they come."

Looking over your shoulder, Stephanie shuts the locker and a troupe of large high-school boys round the corner. They all get horrible grins on their face as they see her.

"Well well, if it ain't the grimy Grimoire. Don't you know it's dangerous for you to stay late."

Stephanie looks at you sighing. "It's a memory, remember. You can't do anything to stop it." She turns her attention to the one that spoke to her. "Just going home, Zeb. Don't you have a girlfriend to cheat on?"

Zeb continues walking up to Stephanie. Getting right in her face. The are equal height. Stephanie doesn't seem to move in defense or care about his aggressive posture.

From:

peccatore

[Stephanie is getting very good at reading Marco, because the moment he sees the look on those boys' faces, he's putting up his guard. In fact, when Zeb approaches, he tries to hold him back with one hand despite Stephanie's reminder.]

From:

reading_rainstorm

Zeb passes right through your arms like a ghost. Suddenly a hardback book whips right by your face, hitting Zeb right in the head. You hear Ava's voice call from the books origin.

"Leave her alone you douchebags! Jesus christ, everyone knows who gave her that black eye. You think the principal is gonna look the other way when a valedictorian gets a broken arm?"

Stephanie turns to see Ava, seemingly totally surprised by this. It dawns you...this came before the last memory. Stephanie doesn't even know Ava's name here.

Stephanie takes Ava's distraction to stomp on Zeb's foot and runs to Ava. She takes her yet to be girlfriend by the arm and runs around the corner.

You are back in the Hall of Fate.

From:

peccatore

... Oh, Stephanie...

[He's... gonna check the High Priestess door again.]

From:

reading_rainstorm

The door opems and you find yourself in the main chamber of a temple. A black and white pillar suspend a floral patterned cloth behind a throne. On which is Stephanie adorned with fine red and gold robes, headdress with a Chaos star like a halo behind her head. There is no trace of her usual cat features about her but she wears a golden gorget around her neck that is chained to a headless winged lion that sits at the foot of her throne. She looks up from the book in her lap. Smiling.

"Hey Marco. Sorry, that all must have been...a lot."

From:

peccatore

[He exhales.]

You're apologixing to me? You're the one who had to live through all of it.

From:

reading_rainstorm

"Doesn't mean you should have to live through it too."

Stephanie gets up from her throne to approach Marco.

From:

peccatore

[Marco shakes his head.] That really isn't the point.

From:

reading_rainstorm

"...no, I don't suppose it is.

I am...a very open person Marco, but I don't want my past to hurt people, either."

From:

peccatore

Well, you don't have to worry about me. If you're worried.

From:

reading_rainstorm

"Very well Marco, I won't worry.

Thank you, for finding a few of those memories for me. I'm glad you were one of the people to help me get through them."