A Restless First Night

[aleifr]

WHO: Aleifr and anyone who feels like chatting with the viking at 2:30AM.
WHAT: Some first-night insomnia.
WHERE: The Dorms
WHEN: Late night on June 17th to early morning on the 18th.
WARNINGS: Nothing at first, will update if that changes.



[It’s clear fairly early on that Aleifr’s first night in Dualis wouldn’t be a restful one. He just couldn’t set himself at ease, and it wasn’t just the bombing, though knowing that something so damned small could do so much damage certainly didn’t help.

[He just didn’t like being here.

[He didn’t like the fact that he was a half-dozen floors off the ground, in a building that’d come tumbling down within minutes during one of Fenris’s summer quakes. Or that he was surrounded by similar ones on all sides.

[He didn’t like the unfamiliar city-noise and harsh neon that managed to worm its way in through the window recessed in the far wall. He was used to near silence at night; gently whistling winds carrying the soft crackle of a campfire or the murmurs of a distant conversation, not the thundering rumble of speeding light trains. If a night got that loud on Fenris, it was either feast day revelery, or you needed to be on your feet with an axe in your hand.

[He didn’t like that he was trapped in this bloody city. He didn’t like that he’d been dragged here against his will on someone’s whim. He didn’t like that he had no idea why either. He’d been given some vague answer about curing a plague when he was brought here, but he didn’t know if that was true, or what the hell part he was supposed to play in that design if it was. He fucking hated that there was nothing that he could do about it.

[He didn’t like sleeping alone, either. Wasn’t used to it anymore.

[He’d still made an effort to try, if only so he wouldn’t be sleep deprived while dealing with whatever tomorrow brings. He might have been able to find an hour or two if he was on his own furs, but even the bed worked against him. It was too damned soft, and no matter which way he lay he couldn’t shake the feeling that he was sinking into it.

[Needless to say, sleep didn’t come. All he did was toss and turn for a few hours until he grew sick of it.

[He decided he needed to do something. Walk. Memorize his surroundings, get something to eat, something to drink … Busy himself until sleep started to sound appealing again, really. Anything but lay around in that fucking bed.

[So he’d pulled on his loose-fitting undertunic, slid on his footwraps, and gone to do just that.

[Anyone who happens to be awake can find him. He’s not a hard man to spot. Maybe they catch him as they exit his room. Maybe they find him in the kitchen, digging through the contents of that strange little box that keeps everything cold. If they’re on the roof for some reason, they might even find him up there - staring out across the city, taking in the sight of it and trying to commit landmarks to memory so that he has some rough picture of the place in his head to navigate by.

[He’s awake for a good, long while that night. Plenty of opportunity.]

Comments

[aleifr]

[It is. But from the state of her, it doesn't seem to be the start or the end of her troubles ...

[He's curious, and if she looks at him hard enough, she'll see that. He won't ask though. He's a stranger to her. Probably not the person she wants to discuss whatever's troubling her with.]

Some of them have done it before. Gone to other worlds.

[Strange as it might be to him, and evidently her as well, you probably get used to it sooner or later. Of course, there's a difference between voyaging between worlds and being dragged to one against their will.]

Personally, I think you've got the right of it. [He snarls.] Don't like the smell of this -- any of it.

[merged]

[ She hadn't heard that others here have done this world traveling thing before all this but it doesn't surprise her too much, not given the pure oddity of the situation. Look at the kinds of people she's seen, from the magical to the technological; people with powers, people that don't exist where she comes from. It'd all be way cooler if she was prepared for this; if she'd had a choice.

He's as unsettled and bothered by all this as she is, though, and that knowledge, though it changes nothing, helps her feel more justified in her feelings. Her anger, her uncertainty, her fear, they're not misplaced. They have a reason to be bothered, right? ]

We're basically captives. [ She mutters, almost horrified at the realization, as if it hadn't really settled on her before. They've been stolen. From their families. From their lovers. From their duties. From their very lives. Her heart clenches. She shouldn't linger too long on those thoughts, she knows. ] How are we supposed to trust anything they've told us?

[ She knows he can't really give her an answer but she appreciates that he seems to be similarly unsettled and bothered; that helps. ]

[aleifr]

On faith.

[Said with sarcastic bitterness that suggests that he trusts none of they've said to him and all the rest. The fingers on one hand flex and curl into a fist for a moment before relaxing, but there's anger in his eyes.

[He's powerless here, for now. He has no idea how he was brought here, where 'here' is in relation to home, or how to find his way back, and he hates every facet of that.]

[merged]

[ His reply makes Sharon let out a short, bitter laugh, expression contorted between equal parts fear and anger. That. That was the cold, hard truth; the only truth they have in this moment and one she already knew deep down. ]

Faith isn't exactly one of my best qualities. [ She admits to him. She tightens her lips to control the weighted frown she can feel coming. Her nose and eyes sting like a warning. No, she has no faith and she can't survive on that alone.

She then turns her attention to the lights, suddenly desperate to quell the rise of sorrow and rage and fear. God, the lights would be really something if she were anywhere but here. Finally, she speaks up again, idly moving towards him and the edge of the building to get a better view. ] I'm Heather.

[ Her bright blue gaze rests again on him, voice tight, controlled. She doesn't want to think about this place anymore. ] I'm from this place called Earth. [ He didn't ask but she wants to change the conversation a little, maybe it'd be good for both of them. ] Some of our cities look like this, though I never really got to see them. Hell, one of our major cities is nicknamed 'The city that never sleeps' because it's always so bright.

[aleifr]

Been meeting a lot of people from 'Earth', today.

[Though the word itself is still unfamiliar to him. He knows it now, but he couldn't picture it. Couldn't tell you where it was, or what it looked like, or what kind of place it was to live.]

Nothing like this back on Fenris, though. We don't build this high. Don't think anyone knows how, but it'd be stupid to even if we did ...

[merged]

I guess Earth is pretty popular. [ It drips with sarcasm.

Looking at him, she could tell he'd probably never seen a city like this one—hell, he may not have ever even seen the smaller cities or the stretch of suburbs where every house looked exactly the same. He looked like a... a warrior or something. A fighter. Not a business man or cook or boxer. But definitely a fighter. ]

Why would it be stupid? [ Honest curiosity. She won't mention the possible horrors that come from living in a building so high. ]

[aleifr]

Quakes.

[He looks back at her and holds up one, massive hand in the air, wobbling it back and forth demonstratively.]

They come often in the summer. Some of them bad enough that they'll drag entire islands down into the sea. Never know if one of them will take yours, so there's no point in trying to build something to last.

[He looks back out at the winking lights of the city.]

Fenris always changes. The only constant is Asaheim.

I don't think that's true of this place.

[Otherwise building like this would be nothing but stupidity and hubris. This place was built with permanence in mind, which is ... strange for him, to say the very least.]

[merged]

That's reason enough, I guess. [ Islands, nomadic. This place must be hell of a culture shock for him and here she thought it was bad for her. ]

It's meant to survive as long as people are there to live in it. Nature takes the world back quickly. [ Not that there's much nature here in the city. Or animals, which unsettles her, though it's not an issue she's yet pinpointed. ]

Can I ask what... Asaheim is? [ She says the word slowly. She's got some tiny idea but assuming would just make her look like an ass. ]

[aleifr]

[It'd make her look like an ass if she was from Fenris, but she isn't, so he doesn't expect her to know.]

The home of the Gods. The largest island on Fenris, and the only one that stays.

[merged]

[ Gods, huh? She doesn't hold much stock in things like that and doesn't have the most positive view of those that do; to her, they seem gullible. ]

Have you ever been there?

[aleifr]

[Aleifr shakes his head.]

No. I saw it once, though, when my people were searching for a new home during the summer.

[He remembered that voyage vividly. It was his first summer. The first time he'd felt the quakes. the first time he'd heard the rumbling roar that came along with them as the ground shook, the first time he'd seen the mad scramble to evacuate once it became clear that their island might be claimed by the waves ... It was terrifying. He remembered clinging to his older sisters, with his eyes shut, waiting for it all to stop.

[More than any of that, though, he remembers Asaheim.]

Just saw the coast from the distance. A few leagues of icy beaches and snow-covered trees before it rose up into mountains. All you can behind them is gray, and at first you think that it's a wall of storm-clouds, ready to drag themselves over the mountains and spill out over the water ... but then you look a little further up and you see the clouds hanging above the gray, and you realize that it's stone-gray because it's actually more stone. More mountains. Greater mountains, taller than anything you've ever fucking seen. So tall it damn near breaks your spirit to look at them. So tall that when the sky clears at night, it looks like you could stand on the top and pluck a star out of the night sky to keep it for yourself.

[merged]

[ Island sinking quakes and a giant mountain? A volcano, maybe. In any case, she can only imagine how something like that would stop her heart; how small she'd feel in the face of something seemingly indomitable. She shivers involuntarily, hairs prickling up on her neck. ]

People where I'm from, they'd pay to climb that mountain. They do that where I'm from: pay to reach the top of a mountain that's so high up, it's hard to breathe. [ She shakes her head. ] So, why haven't you visited it? Is it impossible?

[ Is it just one giant mountain? Or is there something to fear? ]

[aleifr]

No. [Aleifr shakes his head.] Not impossible, just not our place.

[He turns to face her properly this time.]

The gods made Fenris the way that they did for a reason, and they placed us in the midst of it for a reason. Living and dying there is our wyrd unless they have something else planned for us.

[It's where they're meant to be, you see.]

Some live there, though, on the coasts of Asaheim, but ...

[He shakes his head, lip curling contemptuously.]

Nothing on Fenris is permanent, save Asaheim, and so they cling to it. But relying on it makes them soft. Weak.

[merged]

[ His views are foreign to her and she unwittingly judges him for them. He call those people soft, weak and she thinks they're smart. They chose to live without certain fears and she can't fault them for that. ]

Maybe living there is what the gods want of them? [ But she shrugs her shoulders as she says it. It's not like she knows and she doubts he knows, either. Gods aren't real to her. ]

[aleifr]

They wouldn't be there if it wasn't.

[He agrees with a nod, as though that's obvious. Doesn't change what he's said otherwise.]

[merged]

[ . . . What.

She squints at him in confusion. ]

Then why are they soft? [ That seems so backwards to her. ]

[aleifr]

[His eyes narrow slightly in irritation.]

Iron sharpens iron. They don't deal with the same hardships, and so they don't develop the same edge.

[merged]

Do you think that's a bad thing? A life with fewer hardships is something most people strive for. [ where she comes from. It's gonna take her a little while to adjust to the fact that people come from places so wildly different than her own. ]

[aleifr]

It's all well and good on its own.

[He sighs, a hint of irritation creeping into his voice at having to answer so many questions]

But it leads to complacency, and that is a bad thing.

[merged]

[ She tilts her head in a show thoughtful agreement. The ever curious part of her wants to ask more, like an annoying child who's just learned how to ask why, but she picks up on the irritation. To be fair, she'd end up feeling something similar if someone kept digging (not that it stops her from doing it). ]

Can't argue that, I guess. [ Oh, she could. She's argumentative by nature, often just for the simple sake of it. Her dad would say it's one of her more annoying traits—with love, of course.

She sighs, though it turns into a bit of a more restrained yawn. Maybe the pharmacies here sell cheap sleeping aid. She turns back to the access door. ]

I'm gonna go and try to crash again. Enjoy the view. [ It's a nice one, after all. ]

[aleifr]

[The only verbal response is a grunt. The constellation pattern of city lights is pleasing to the eye, he'll give her that. Doesn't find much 'nice' about it, though. Everything the light washes over is another reminder that he's a long, long way away from his home, his family, and a world that made any kind of sense to him.

[He seems content to let her leave and return to the slow process of acclimating to all of this, but before she can, he perks up as though something's just occurred to him.]

Aleifr.

[He says over his shoulder.]

[merged]

[ Oh, yeah. ]

See ya, Aleifr. [ She sing-songs as she heads back in. Hopefully, they'll both be able to get some sleep at some later point. ]