(2018-03-21) Do Not Deny Me
Cutscene: Do Not Deny Me
Summary: Callisto's mother is still Not Happy about her daughter's intervention in what was a decidedly 'juicy' nightmare.
Date: 2018-03-21
Related: Repercussions of this log.
NPCs: Malachite Aine
Scene Runner: Callisto
Players:
callisto..

The Dreamplain
Wed Mar 21, 2018
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CUTSCENE: And so, Callisto weaves a dream…

(OOC: Mood music - "Pax Deorum" © Enya, 'Semblage Remix')

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It goes without saying that Callisto is a lucid dreamer. Immensely so, if you wish to look at it that way. That which she weaves for others extends ten-fold upon herself. Could it be considered a blessing, then, to be 'present' enough to pluck forth any and all thread from her mind to revisit that to which it connects? To alter it as she sees fit, for a time; to pause, to observe, to experience something all over again? The fae girl does not allow herself to tread the waters of her mind and memories very often, but when she does….

Callisto has to calm down. It's been a hard week and if she could only build a wall of 'goodness' in her sleeping mind, perhaps she can keep that damnable monster that she calls a mother out.

And so, Callisto dreams.

She has willed this dream forth before, as it is one of few that make her feel happy.

It was when the Summer of Love — most notably the reverberations of such — were still cascading across the country, the ripples carrying far and wide. Even three years following those events in 1967, when Callisto was just tasting her true freedom come 1970… there were those who carried those philosophies. Go figure the first man she would meet and get to know.. that he was a free-spirited hippie. A beautiful, outgoing, ebullient creature of 32 who met the uncertain, willowy girl with the moonpale hair and fair skin and had drawn her into the fold.

Callisto's first 'love', forged during the most naïve, 'pure' time of her life.

She dreams of him often, though they have long since parted ways. He would be 80 now. Might he be alive, still? Surrounded by a family and loved; grizzled and wrinkled while Callisto remains beautiful and youthful? She has no way of knowing where her one-time lover went away to, since the summer of their flirtation. But Callisto has her dreams, and she can see him as he was anytime she wishes. This is not a thing that happens often, for she wishes never to get sick of the visions. It is brought out only when she needs it; like a sip of old, valuable liquor.

Callisto dreams of this flower child, watches his open-necked, gauzy cotton shirt as it avails to her a sighting of tanned skin, sweat glistening in a sun that blossomed nearly 50 years ago. She wishes she could touch him, but it's only a dream.

But she feels something; the sense of unease precedes her actual knowing, and the dream seems to ripple. The nostalgic, wistful bubble of her memory quivers at the edges…

… oh no. No, no…!

Her beautiful flower child fractures, quivers; some terrible magic is rendering the vision putrid before Callisto's dreaming eyes. He rots, falls into ruin, fades into dust. The golden grass upon which he sits, trying to feed her shade daisy petals, darkens and sizzles and then… darkness unfolds. A stronger force has intruded to take over Callisto's sleeping mind, and hold fast to it… whether she wants to or not. She knew this was coming… how much more punishment can she inflict before she considers Callisto suitably 'punished'?

A woman stands where the flower child sat, surrounded by her vortex of darkness. Like a photograph overexposing itself, the walls and halls of a ghastly, dark room in an ancient mansion surround both fae women. Callisto kneels, the skirts of her gown rippling around her knees. Maybe if she just lets it happen, takes her whippings, then.. maybe THEN it will stop. Malachite will feel justified and let her be.

«I need to make you see.» The elder fae says to her daughter in Unseelie, adopting a boggart's guttural, harsh sound. Callisto understands all of the varying 'branches' of her dark language. She turns brilliant cerulean eyes upon her matriarch, lips pressed together. Malachite stares the girl down, standing tall and foreboding over her form.

«Don't you ever deny me that right again. You are a means to an end, a worker bee… I birthed you, all of you, to gather.» Malachite continues, her white hair swaying in a maddening nimbus behind her sleek head. She is fair, intoxicatingly so… one could call the fae woman angelic in appearance until they see her eyes. Awful, stark, uncaring chips of onyx in a finely-etched face. Callisto shares many of her mother's qualities and hates herself for it, sometimes. She, thank Gods, has her father's eyes.

Callisto must look even the slightest bit flippant, for now the floor disappears beneath her. Abruptly she is falling, the sensation of which felt in her sleeping body, resulting in twitches and shakes as the feeling of a swift, endless fall activates a deep, instinctive urge to flinch. The dark walls move in a blur as Callisto falls, but all she can see is her mother, flying above her like a ghoul.

«If you do so again, I shall kill you. I shall bear the sting of iron in my hands and garrote you myself with a chain, spawn. You are to serve me, sustain me, gather for me. That is why I birthed you.» The sorceress, this terrible emotional siphon, barks at the girl as they continue to fall.

«T'is why Lymsleia and Aumrauth departed, is it not? They preferred to fade into aether than to carry you! You are terrible! Repulsive to me! I will not do this! I will not allow you to invade their minds!» Callisto cries out in Unseelie, matching her mother's chosen dialect.

«Foolish Daedhelwen! Foolish stupid girl! You assume the loss of your brother and sister had been of their own choosing? NO, FOOLISH CHILD. PIG PETULANT CHILD.» Malachite booms as the ground does not yet meet them. Endless, terrible falling through darkness. «I killed them, for they refused to serve me, just as you've designs on doing. Think on that! Surely you will not be so stupid as to deny me what is my right.» The fae woman infuses her words with pain.

The two stare at one another, Daedhelwen — Callisto's true name — holding the eyes of the creature that birthed her, whose fae name even she does not know. Callisto is terrified but she will not, cannot let on. Malachite hisses, her own 'fall' slowing… while her daughter is left to tumble until the ground finally meets her.

Awakeness.

Callisto sits in bed now, hands pressed to her mouth to prevent herself from screaming.

She can't, she can't-

… can't what…?

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