Stephanie's Heart: The Archive

[reading_rainstorm]

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.

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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.

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[turntoash]

"Don't worry, I gotcha. Just for a little bit of light reading, then you'll have it back." As Metis rambles, she tries to open the door and get inside.

[reading_rainstorm]

"Sure thing. Just...return it to Harmony when you're done."

The door swings open and you are in a modern hospital room. Tile floor, the smell of antiseptic, eerily quiet. Someone moves behind the hospital curtain. You can see Ava's crutches leaning against the wall beside the bed. A knot forms in your stomach. This is wrong. You don't want to be here. You turn around and the door is gone.

[turntoash]

Shit, Metis thought. Looks like I'm here for the duration. She grit her teeth and tried her best to swallow her unease.

"Hey," she said, her voice cracking ever so slightly. "You okay?"

It was, perhaps, a dumb question to ask someone in a hospital room.

[reading_rainstorm]

"You know I'm not fucking okay Stephanie!"

Suddenly Stephanie is there beside you, or...a ghost of her, she is younger, no sphinx eyes and for once she isn't dressed in her cloak. She wears a black blouse with an olive skirt. She passes you and pulls away the curtain to reveal Ava, fuming.

"Finally got the courage to face me hm?"

"The courage!? I didn't even know you were here! I haven't heard from you in a week, I was worried Ava."

"You made your worries quite clear before I left, Grim." Stephanie cringes as Ava uses that name for her. Ava's frown burrows into Stephanie. "Your little superstition spooked you away from a trip we had planned for weeks!"

"Supperstition? You know- You've seen my magic! You know the things I can do."

"You let cards keep ruin a trip with my family."

"I told you I thought it would be dangerous, and-"

"AND YOU WERE RIGHT? Is that what you were about to say Stephanie? Oh great, your predictions came true and the doctors tell me I'm going to walk with a limp forever. So what, I should have listened to you and just stayed home with you? Holed up like a pair of hikikomori?"

"That's not what I-" The knot in your gut turns. You didn't deserve this. All this spite Ava was throwing at you, no. At Stephanie. That fear turns into anger. "You're going to call all this superstition after all you've seen. After all the luck charms that got you straight A's."

"Doubling down on the creepy girl act. Very nice Steph."

"You think I want people to call me creepy!? You think I want their attention? I sure know you do. That's why you started dating me, right? To look like the nice girl deigning to date the Freak" Tears prick at the corner of your eyes. You're crying. Ava points to the door and tosses a card at Stephanie. It slides to your feet.

"GET OUT. Take your stupid luck charm with you. We're done Steph."

[turntoash]

Metis wiped her eyes. Her normal coping skills weren't working. She pushed and pushed and pushed and the anger, the fright, the sadness, the torrent of emotions just wouldn't go away--

She wheeled around and kicked the wall as hard as she could.

Predictably, this was a bad idea.

Metis fell to the ground, hissing in pain, tears pooling in her eyes. Her hand landed on the card, and she grabbed it unconsciously before looking up, to see if Stephanie was still there.

[reading_rainstorm]

Stephanie is still there. Frozen in anger and fear. She blinks at Ava and looks to the spot where the card had landed. She makes eye contact with you as she turns to leave, not reaching for it at all. The door re-materializes for her.

The card is Strength

[turntoash]

Metis hobbled to her feet and slid the card into her pocket as the violent emotions ebbed. Three of them, now. She wondered how many there were.

At least the door was back. She limped out of it and closed it tightly behind her.

[reading_rainstorm]

Having the three...feels right. You somehow know it's enough to tell the past present and future in a typical tarot reading. Having more will only show more of what fate has had in store for Stephanie.

Where will Metis go?

[turntoash]

Metis fanned the cards in her hands, examining them. She decided on a course of action: though exploring more was tempting, it was also a violation of privacy.

Admittedly, something inside her suggested that this wasn't something she usually cared about, but this time it was a friend. She wasn't looking forward to explaining to Stephanie that she'd ended up in her soul and had seen some of her most emotional memories.

She also considered that this meant that she now knew more about Stephanie's past than her own.

Letting out a breath, Metis left the hall (after reshelving the book; she wasn't a monster) and went back to Ava. "Found 3 of them, now."

[reading_rainstorm]

Ava looks up from her book.

"Cool. That means the Hall of Fate is open, if you want to get to Steph. Just like...do her weird tarot thing or whatever."

[turntoash]

"Right, thanks. It's been a trip."

Metis knew for a fact that before this dream she had no idea what tarot was, let alone what Steph's 'weird tarot thing' was - and yet, in a corner of her head, the knowledge was there. She sat crosslegged on the floor and shuffled the cards facedown in her hands before revealing them one by one in front of her - one for the Past, one for the Present, and one for the Future.

[reading_rainstorm]

"You're doing it on the floor? We have a table for that in the main hall, you know?"

The cards as they reveal themselves to you are Emperor, Lovers, Strength.

[turntoash]

"Well, excuse me for trying to be efficient. This is supposed to open the Hall of Fate, is it? Because as far as I can tell I just dealt a hand and nothing happened."

Metis might have had a little less patience for Ava after seeing the scene in the hospital room.

[reading_rainstorm]

"Tch. No need to get snippy. It's probably unlocked after that little display, the big doors in the main hall. Can't miss 'em."

[turntoash]

"Great. Thanks." It was up to Ava whether that sounded genuine or not.

Either way, Metis left Ava behind (symbolism!) and marched back down to the main hall. She hadn't spent much time there yet, and she figured she'd at least see the sights after the Hall of Fate.

[reading_rainstorm]

The main hall remains as you left it. Books and papers stacked on tables. Shelves brimming with texts of all sorts. The Hall of Fate stands at its end. Now you see there are three sconces lit with lavender flame above it. On the table just beside it, three of six candles are lit with a similarly lavender flame around around a velvet cloth.

[turntoash]

Six cards, then. Lucky she was able to find half of them so quickly.

Metis steeled herself, placed the cards on the table beside the doors, and entered the Hall of Fate.

[reading_rainstorm]

The Hall of Fate looks to be be floored and papered entirely with pages upon pages upon pages of Stephanie's journals. Every inch of the place is covered with her hand writing. There are three stone doors along the walls of the corridor. Each bearing the image of the tarot cards Metis found. The Emperor, The Lovers and Strength. At the end of the hall is a final stone door. Emblazoned with the image of The High Priestess

[turntoash]

This was... well, not alarming, not after everything else that Metis had seen, but she didn't think of it as a good sign, certainly.

She'd never get anywhere trying to read all of the pages, Metis knew. And even odds the first three doors had more to do with the scenes she'd already seen. Plus, Ava had called Stephanie the High Priestess anyway...

Her mind made up, Metis made to open the final door.

[reading_rainstorm]

The High Priestess door is locked, and the door leaving the Hall of Fates has disappeared behind you. It seems you have sealed yours, for now.

[turntoash]

Of course. Nothing could be simple. She was getting tired of doors disappearing behind her. Metis looked to the ceiling and rolled her eyes. "Fine, I'll do it the long way!"

With that said, she made for the Emperor door instead.

[reading_rainstorm]

You are in a grey, cement room of decent size with nothing in it except for a beat up futon mattress. There is a large, heavy metal door that you know is locked. Sitting in front of a wall with “I WISH ENOCH’S PROMISE WAS DESTROYED” written in what is clearly drying blood is the child Stpehanie. They have shaggy brown hair and are dressed in dirty, threadbare clothing. They look to be eleven years old. They look up at you with a cold, empty look in their eyes.

"Hello, Metis. Thank you for returning my journal."

[turntoash]

"Oh... yeah, don't worry about it." There was a lot going on in this room for Metis to take in at once, but just as with last time, her attention is drawn first to the child. "Are you... okay, clearly you're not okay. But how can I help you? Even if it's just..."

She took her coat off and draped it across Stephanie's shoulders. No kid ever deserved to be cold.

[reading_rainstorm]

They wrap themselves in the cloak and smile weakly at you, nodding in thanks.

"All there is to do here...is wait."

Stephanie turns her gaze to the writing on the wall and you feel the time passing. Minutes, hours, days. Suddenly you can hear shouting coming from behind the door, not the door you entered but one that looks heavy and made of thick metal. A bell starts ringing, a raised alarm. Gunshots coming down the hallway.

[turntoash]

"What in the hell--?!" Metis knelt down on one leg, positioning herself between the child and the door. Her hands swept forward in a practiced motion and--

Nothing happened. When her mind caught up with her, Metis wondered why she'd done that.

At least she wouldn't have to wait long for everything to come to a head.