Introducing, Doctor Atlas Mason

[Atlas Mason] The area could barely be called a highway, at least by todays modern sensibilities, no massive, flying concrete structures with three or four lanes a side. No great bright billboards lining the streets, or flashing navigational highway sighs to tell you where your going or how long it will take.

No this highway was only marked by the occasional country road sign, indicating that it was indeed a highway, despite the dusty two lane roads appearance. As so many fateful moments have taken place, it is at the crossroads where they find themselves this afternoon. With clouds gathering in the distance to threaten them with darkness and rain, this space could not be more ominous, or perhaps fortuitous.

In one corner, a small lake lay troubled only by the occasional gust of wind, sending ripples along its murky surface In another corner lay the edges of the wilderness, old tree's that were rotting and falling to decay a perceptible line between the growth of Chicago and the wilderness from which it sprung. As if divided by this old road, the other side was open barren land, the prep work laid for a new subdivision, or perhaps strip malls. So far though, there was still only silence, only wilderness.

[K. R. Jakes] [doodeedoo]

[K. R. Jakes] [doodoo?]

[K. R. Jakes] [doo?]

[K. R. Jakes] Then there was a truck: black as the devil's hide; splattered with rainwater, dirt - some kind of abattoir of filth that happened a few miles back. The driver has her music cranked on real high -- something about devils, something about country highways, something about rocking the fuck out, something about wayward sons and something that makes thought so unnecessary that, for this driver, anyway, it becomes easier, a zen exercise. There's a fzzt, fzzzt, kshksh and the music cuts out; picks up radio, picks up voices that aren't, then cuts off just as she approaches the crossroads. The truck jumps forward, over-eager, then the engine gutters, and it's a good thing she wasn't going too quickly -- when it stops working completely, she's able to coast, to keep control, and pull [screech: like an owl, baby, open up the Underworld, unleash the ghosts] just off the road.

Three heartbeats later, white-knuckled grip eases off the steering wheel, and the driver tries her key. The truck makes a noise: nope, I'm sleeping, try back later, GET OUT MOM GAGH. When she tries the key again, there isn't even that much response. The radio flares to life, far louder than it had been before, and she hastens to turn the volume down. This has no effect, but the radio cuts out [throat-cut] into a gurgle after just another second, and then

there's only silence, only wilderness.

[Atlas Mason] Atlas had been looking for the lake, tiny and insignificant as it was, there was rumor of some decent fish still left in it, of this tiny place being one of the last bastions of clean, healthy fish in the entire Chicago area. Having arrived at the spot after a long day of searching, the man found himself in a state of disappointment.

If the place had ever held fish, and had ever been a healthy, clean lake, its time had long since passed. The murky waters had given up nothing except sludge, muck, and stench having almost transitioned into a bog more then a lake. He had brought himself back up onto the roadside where his motorcycle sat waiting.

The machine was as odd and out of place as Atlas, it was a truly vintage piece, its body old and durable, designed for power, and not slick lines and shiny chrome ideals. It sat there a visage of another era, a relic, much like its owner, the old world war two motorcycle with side car attached was only missing the machine gun, and youd swear it had just come off the battle field.

Atlas deposited his gear in the sidecar, and wiped his heavy brow as he looked to the horizon, the great rolling clouds drawing ever closer. His clothing was the same as usual, as the man had only a few different sets to live in. An old pair of brown corduroy pants were held aloft by a pair of black suspenders, their lines drawn up along an ancient button up shirt that was at one time white, and now, had been stained to a light and dirty yellow. His hair was dark and slicked back against his head with a pomade, its length cut short and precise making the severe appearance of his aqualine features all the more prominent.

His silent gazing is disturbed when that black top truck out of hell roars to the crossroads, and then dies just as quickly, swerving and screeching to a halt so close that Atlas was forced to jump his motorcycle to avoid becoming part of the machine. When the machine dies completely. They are indeed left in silence, as Atlas watches the truck, this great foreign object in his universe, before moving towards it.

[K. R. Jakes] And she almost hit a person, too.

Atlas Mason. Some man riding a motorcycle that'd show at best advantage at one of those vintage automobile and motorcycle gatherings that take place outside of some diners, just a way for people interested in the maintenance of a classic to get together, to show off, to drive their precious things, their treasured those were better times. K. R. Jakes stares at him for a long, wary moment. He could be a specter. He could be Him, in some new guise. This is just the sort've place.

Then she opens the door on the driver's side and climbs out. Kage: she has red hair so bright, so vibrant, that foxes are jealous; it's in two braids today, coiled up, pinned behind her ears, which stick out a little. She has eyes so dark they could be gorgeous, but aren't: not right now. She's wearing fog-gray cargo pants, boots that are muck-rimmed, a (demure [how?]) blue teeshirt without a legend. It's warm, almost muggy today -- warmest it's been so far, Spring-warmth this.

"I'm sorry. Are you okay?"

[K. R. Jakes] [oh oh wait. percept+aware: Are You Strange, Stranger-man?]

[Atlas Mason] Atlas blinks once, twice, the person that had descended from the cab of that big black monstrosity was in direct contradiction to the idea of who should be driving that vehicle, but then...who was Atlas to judge an oddity. The woman had asked him, asked him for forgiveness and if he was hurt. The man patted himself down as he took in the stranger and then shook his head a few times, back and forth as his blue eyes looked from her, to her truck.

"Do not place your personage into a state of chemical imbalance resulting in anxiety, my biological structure is intact and functional." He pauses, and then speaks again. "Thank you for inquiring."

His words were strange, this stranger man, as was the feeling she took from him. He was filled with a [dynamic] luminous glow, like that from an open furnace door, warm and brilliant, but deep within that glow lay a twisting, a straining, a [entropic] deranged disturbance, not so much to be one of the truly dangerous, but one who had seen his share, and suffered for it.

[Per+awareness: And you rider of the black machine?]

[K. R. Jakes] Beat. "I wouldn't call anxiety an imbalance if the occasion warrants; the lack of anxiety, now there's imbalance. I'm glad you're well. What about your bike?"

This is a crossroads. Things happen, at crossroads. Atlas Mason sounds like a textbook or an academic tract or someone from out've this world. He sounds like a machine; like a feel-good 50s TV show astronaut character, and he looks a little like one too. This gives K. R. Jakes pause. What gives her more pause: the way he feels to her; what she senses in his bones, prickles behind her eyes. While she's getting his measure, he's getting hers.

The young woman in front of him who jumped out've the big black monstrosity feels, to preternatural senses, like the first blush of Spring, like a verbing of the word beloved, like a caress, fingers-sliding-up-a-thigh, amorous and shining; Dynamic. Pick a word. And she also feels like Spring's opposite: the withering away, the draining-off of vitality, the hungry, leeching dark that just won't be satisfied; Entropic. Pick a word. Whatever else: these two flavors are opposed, are completely opposite one another, are balanced.

There's something else in the air, too. They'll both pick up on it: something that tastes like alpine breezes; something that speaks of vast, inimitable heights and darkness.

[Atlas Mason] Atlas's gaze turns to his machine and he looks over the side of the vehicle that could have been damaged by the great pick up truck. It sat there without a scratch, its ancient side dented and bruised, but not from this most recent moment of possible calamity.

Atlas' eyes are pulled away from the woman, his gaze sweeping about the landscape at that other feeling. A chill settles across the man's frame, and yet there was no breeze at that moment, the lake smooth and calm. He returned his attention to the woman before him and he gives her his appraisal.

"My conveyance is intact and equally functional, however it would appear that your's is not. Do you require aid of a personal and mechanical manner?"

[K. R. Jakes] Kage's regard is thoughtful (pensive [opaque]). Maybe he's fallen out've his time. Her gaze is pulled away from Atlas, just as surely as his is pulled away from hers; it pauses on the barn, then cycles back to the crossroads itself, the center of the meeting up of roads and ways. Then it flicks back to Atlas, to his eyes. He's strange and Kage isn't pausing to decipher what it is he's saying. She's listening to him, careful and cautious and intent, and she's replying cool-headed and cool-voiced. Human, though: her mouth quirks, easy. "I believe I do. Are you able and willing?" A pause. "I'm a little spooked." She doesn't seem very spooked. "You aren't going to ask for my soul, are you? I'd just like to have that clear, on the table, out in the open -- the answer's no."

Wind kicks up, and it's getting colder. Fog's rising from the lake, slow but sure.

[Atlas Mason] The air was getting cooler, the fog was rolling in, and somehow, clouds that had been miles away had arrived and were already greedily swallowing up the sunlight, burying it behind their dark and ominous mass. Atlas looked slightly perplexed as he watched the woman, and she asked him a very peculiar question. He took a moment to pause, tapping his finger on his chin, and then as if getting an idea he looks at the crossroads, and the up to her, a smile stitching its way across his lips, before he laughs despite himself.

"No No, I am not a existential entity of negative intent and will bent on collecting your Etheric matter and essence. No.... " He seems to struggle for the words. "No devil at the crossroads here." He manages to squeeze out before bending over his motorcycle and pulling out a small tool set.

"I am able to within the limits of my knowledge and intrinsic capabilities." His voice is friendly, amiable, and he steps towards her the tool kit held easily at his side. But he pauses to look up as the light is blotted out entirely, leaving them in a dark, and desolate landscape, everything taking on a shadowy and indistinct caste. "Most....perturbatory."

[K. R. Jakes] He mentions Etheric matter and essence and part of K. R. Jakes eases: he isn't some Conventionalist goon; he's just a Traditionalist goon. They're both dangerous but some are easier to get along with than others. "Ah," she says, soft, just a little tangle of smoke-sound in the back of her throat. Ah. "You're a Gentleman Inventor, aren't you. A machine poet." That's far more forthright than Kage usually is -- but they're alone; there's noone else for miles; there's not even the sound of another car on the highway, and there's fog rolling in, there's cold growing sharper, brighter, until it kisses at their skin. Kage stands back to let him look her truck over, says, with a brief -- and luminous, wry-touched -- smile: "Well, Mister Not An Existential Entity of Negative Intent, thank you. My name is Kage, and the user manual is in the glove compartment." Most perturbatory, he says, and her expression grows grave as ballad-girls are dead in the river. "Gloomy," she says. "And sharp," she adds. "Feels funny. Eldritch-funny."

[Atlas Mason] "Yes, yes, those descriptives are all relativistically appropriate, Gentleman Inventor, how civilized." He seems to find the idea rather appealing, and he chuckles to himself at the idea.

Atlas waves off the idea of a user's manual, finding such things entirely tedious, and entirely unnecessary. He closes the gap between them and holds out his hand in a friendly gesture of hello. "Atlas...it is an acceptably memorable juncture in time to converge and interact with your personage Kage."

He says before stepping up to the truck's driver side and popping the hood, he then swung around and opened it to the sky, practically inviting the rain to come down. He lay the leather satchel of tools on the engine block and started to feel about, checking for broken parts, or missing hoses.

When she mentions the feeling in the air the man's amiable demeanor takes something of a hit, his voice taking on an edgy quality. "Yes...Perturbatory." He says as he looks up from the engine block, and his eyes widen. Not only had the fog rolled in...it had almost completely enveloped them, the cross roads was all that was left, and Atlas briefly took a step back from the engine to look about.

[K. R. Jakes] He holds out his hand; Kage takes it. Her grip is firm. Her hands are not a workman's hands; they're only callused the way a musicians would be callused, or a typist's would be callused, or a gunlady's would be callused. Kage's attitude is one of courtesy; she's being courteous, and cautiously friendly. Courteous and cautious and curious: that's Kage to a tee, or a cee as the case'd have it. "Likewise, Atlas. I just hope it stays 'acceptably' memorable and doesn't veer off into 'are you kidding me, I was just out for an innocent drive, what the heck is that' memorable."

She's not serious. It's just a little fog, which has completely surrounded them. It's just a little fog that feels like something Other is inside it. Maybe she's a little serious, after all. When Atlas wanders around to the hood, Kage crosses her arms over her chest and regards their surroundings, eyes narrowing in contemplation.

The truck could use some work: in fact, it seems like it's just picked up a flat. There are no hints as to why it just decided to stop working. There's no reason at all it should have guttured the way it did, no reason at all for it to flicker like a flame huffed out by some sort've wolf -- dead in the water.

[Atlas Mason] Atlas seems to feel the the trepidation in the air, and when he finished doing a once over the engine, his own concerns mix with Kage's he scrutinizes the air about them as he steps back to her, the hood still open, and the fog still very, very close. He doesn't frown or appear scared, he simply appears curious, and cautious, much like his counter part in this bizarre situation.

"Such a congregation of agitated water molecules in unheard of in these numbers and density without outside stimuli greater then the sum of our current atmostpheric conditions account for." He states the obvious maybe....but that doesn't stop him from moving back to his bike which sat woefully close to the edge of the mist, threatening to be swallowed up by it, and retrieved a bag of a different nature.

He then walked back to Kage, his eyes on their indistinct prison bag held infront of him. "My intellect can find nothing amiss with your vehicles internal combustion apparatus or its satellite components."

[Atlas Mason] [Per+Awareness]

[K. R. Jakes] [Weeeeird shit?]

[K. R. Jakes] "The fog doesn't seem normal. Doesn't feel normal, either." They've covered that, but she adds it, off-hand and more specifically. Which one of them is the sidekick? His perceptions aren't at their most keen just now, and Kage's are just a little better: but they both feel that vast-y spaciousness, that old magick [old manifestation, whatever it is Atlas feels, however it is Atlas senses the Oddness in the world, the Offness] activated, calling up the fog, calling up something else. The truck's probably just a victim -- just the first victim? Dun, dun, dun. "I think I'm leaning toward leaving the truck here for now and coming back for it later. You can probably imagine why I hesitate. What've you got there?" There being the prison bag. Kage uncrosses her arms and, instead, slides her hands into her pocket, hooking a finger around a thread straying from her t-shirt as she does, tugging it in (unravel [just in case]).

[Atlas Mason] Atlas hauls up the bag and pulls open the canvas sack, pulling out a curious contraption that looks like it is meant to be mounted on the side of one's face. It is an exquisite piece of workmanship, high polished brass armatures and frame work support a great number of tiny and intricately carved and ground lenses of varying metals, the entirety of it operated by beautifully exposed cog work machinery, the apparatus is held in place by a leather band, which he slips over his hair. The entire contraption may seem bulky in his hands but it is remarkably compact once placed on his head.

"Its spatial dimensions and composition ensure that this Light Amplification and Dissection Instrument is adequately suited to large, urbane or sub-urbane enviro's." He looks about with it on, and looks back to her to speak an addendum. "For simplicity of conversation in future instances it is acceptable to call such a device a L.A.D.I." He says it like laddy, but it could easily be taken as lady.

The fog has intruded as far as it seemed willing, or as far as it needed to, and as it sits there, an impossibly unmoving barrier of fog, something swirls through the fog, something moves within it, but it is indistinct and unseen. Only a light rustling accompanies its movement before it disappears back into the fog, but it is not alone, as they stand there, several 'things' move in the fog, as if circling them like prey to sharks.

Atlas stands his ground, and an old service gun is pulled form the bag as well.

[K. R. Jakes] The strange Gentleman Inventor who feels like bright madness [like unhinged shining] explains what the bag is. He uses a lot more words than perhaps are entirely necessary, but he's trying for accuracy, and Kage is a patient creature, even while she's eying the fog, the Some Thing Is In The Fog, Circling, Circling, and by the time he's done explaining, Kage isn't by his side any longer. We'll come back to where Kage is.

He's standing his ground. He's drawn a revolver. The red-haired woman with the dark, dark eyes has climbed into the back of her truck and from the back of her truck she's climbed onto the top of the truck's car. "All right, Mister Atlas, Machine Poet. C'mere." C'mere appears to be the truck. Not the inside of the truck, but the back of the truck, and from the back of the truck, the car of the truck: atop it, high ground, spyglass ground, impromptu crow's nest.

" - or get in the back. It'll do for a temporary fotress," there's something amused, almost: there, in the very corner of what she's saying. It's not the dominant emotion at all, but she appreciates using her truck as a fortress, just in case mysterious shadowed creatures lunge out of the fog. "And it'll do for high ground. Don't freak out: I'm taking a look."

[K. R. Jakes] [Uh! And if you wanna roll this kind've thing: Corr/Mind/Prime/Spirit/Entropy Kage's Scan of Doom! Vulgar w/o Witnesses! Diff: 5. -1 v. v. practiced, baby. -1 taking time, duh. +WP, no crossroads horror movie slaughter for myself OR the Traditionalist.]
to Atlas Mason

[Atlas Mason] Atlas was watching the creatures in the fog, and he slowly, but surely backed towards the truck, the gun was kept low, kept at ease in a hand that had obviously trained with the weapon, and knew what to do. He jerked his head to the side roughly, and a few of the lenses slide down over his eye as he reached the truck.

He didn't turn his back from the metal machine, not until he knew exactly what he was doing, when he did, he hoped into the back of the truck quite quickly, and then moved towards the cab. He doesn't get up on it, leaving room for both of them to maneuver from their respective levels as the things in the mist continued to move about.

As her magic rolled out to feel them, to find them and know them, she finds four of the forms moving about at alarming speeds, they are humanoid in shape, and are infused with the power of prime, to keep them moving, but there was no thought, no intelligence behind these things, but spirits...oh yes, little malevolent pricks of spirit energy emit from whatever these things are, spirits bound into the forms.

"They're proportional distance is reducing in increments with every approachable rotation of this geographical location." He says a mouthful when he could have just said they were getting closer, and he was right. She could feel them closing in. His gun still isn't up, but soon they will pierce the foggy veil, and come for them.

[K. R. Jakes] The Orphan had murmured something: words, under her breath; incantations, to focus. Now, her breath plumes. It's just that cold. It's cold enough that it etches out've them just what they are: alive, for now; threats, for now. Go away, go away, go away is a drumbeat underneath this crossroads, is lingering to a nearby spot like a haunt, like one've those black dogs that comes out to give warning: go away, go away, go away. And, in the fog, there are four Prime-powered creatures, flecks of spirit, bound to do a task, to make certain that no, this place isn't going to be found, look elsewhere, Magelings, mine, mine, mine. Her perception is wide, now. There are flaws: she can see them, ink-blots in a star-map; something to tug, something to pull. There's no end to the fog; her preterhuman senses don't cover that, she just doesn't know.

"There are four," she tells Atlas Mason: "They're made of: what would you call it? The luminiferous aether? They're just remnants of power, some Other bound inside. There's something under the asphalt. And there's something else, buried off the road, in the fog, we're not supposed to see."

[Atlas Mason] "Under? Below the surface plane of the composite material of the traveling lanes?" He asks as he considers that information, his hand rubbing his jaw line as he looks about at the surrounding area, and the specter's that continue to dart about in the fog, their forms were almost there...almost visible as they moved, almost stepping beyond, their forms were definitely human, but something about the proportions, simply made no sense at all.

Atlas grabs a dial and twists it, and a light begins to glow from a spot on his headset. "Prepare yourself, I plan to sublimate and temporarily dissect the strata of the composite matter at the crossroads to ascertain precisely what is obscured by it."

He says as the light begins to play through the array of lenses and out towards the center of the crossroads. As he begins to...look? possibly?

It is at that moment that one of the things steps from the fog, and perhaps...appropriately for their location, a scarecrow strides forth, though no one had ever really seen a scarecrow stride, free of the fog the rustling turned to a sickening squish, as whatever was bound within the sack that made the body of the scarecrow sloshed about, it wasn't so menacing...not really, if it werent for the rusty and surely bloody sickle that gleamed in the low light.

[Matter/Prime/Corr scanning at the cross roads, diff 3 with focus and time taken to do so.]

[K. R. Jakes] He is an enlightened man, Atlas Mason. Named for a globe to compass, named for a Titan punished to carry the world on his shoulders (forever [or until he can no longer bear it]). Named for a book of maps, a book of places to go. He is a Son of Ether, and when he twists the dial and activates his headset, at first he doesn't get much in the way of feedback, even though the red-haired Magi who's crouched on the cab of her truck, one palm flat against the metal, the other in a fist, her elbow on the knee of her cargos, an altogether far too delicate-looking creature for this kind've mayhem, even though she said. But then:

There it is. He can see. Not just possibly. He doesn't get a lot, but he gets this: there's a knot of tass buried off to the side; it's locked behind metal [three-way metal: bronze, tin, iron] that's rusted shut, it's dwelling in bone, bone is matter, dead bone is: bone is ivory, bone is piano keys. That's all that bones are, teeth. And then, under the asphalt, there's a box. The box is made of wood. Inside the box, there are various implements: things he'll recognize, the potent mish-mosh of a sorcerer, activated. It's the key that's controlling the fog, that's calling it in; that's calling the scarecrows, that's calling the third thing (forgetfulness: it's not here yet).

" - No." While Atlas is scoping those things out, Kage inhales, slow and careful and steadying, and her fist tightens so that her knuckles are white, and she pulls on that one stray-thread of her teeshirt again, tugs it, ravels it around her finger, careful now careful. The no was for this whole situation: for the scarecrow, with its bloody sickle. Just: No. That thing is not coming closer, and it is not denting her truck, and it is not cleaving Atlas in twain, and it's not cleaving her either. It's getting itself freed, unravelled and un-locked.

[Prime, man. It's all about Prime. Diff 6 according to Master Daragan! +1 unpracticed. -1 quint. -1 taking time. +wp like a mofo man.]

[K. R. Jakes] [NO! +1.]

[Atlas Mason] "There is a metaphysical object controlling these animated avian terrify'ers. It is buried in the strata. We must dislodge and de construct its composite matter into basic elements."

He rummaged through his pockets looking for something as he did so, even as the scarecrow continued its advancement, it stepped into the clearing by Atlas's bike and seemed prepared to drag its sickle down the side of the body in a menacing manner, the sickle was even descending until Kage uttered a very potent no. It was as if a wind blew out and touched the scarecrow, and then passed straight through it, taking what was held within with it as it went. The scarecrow took its final step, before it suddenly fell apart with a sickening squish, liquid, vile smelling foulness leaked from the body of the scarecrow as it became so much decaying matter and straw on the ground, the contents obviously not just straw.

One was dead, but others remained, and Atlas was still fiddling with what looked like a prism as two more stepped from the mist, the prism fitted Atlas began to work. The beam of light went from a light white, to a kaleidoscope of color, red however being the brightest and most dominate. The beam refines, and slices down into the ground, afterall, when it came down to it, all things were just light...just tightly packed.

[Liquidate that key! diff 6, threshold 2, WP to boot]

[K. R. Jakes] "I don't know how to do that."

That's what Kage tells Atlas, when he lays out the dilemma in his matter-of-fact, yet very verbose fashion. [And the fashion, kids. The fashion is old.] Fortunately for them both, Atlas Mason is the right tool for this kind of job. He starts to fiddle and Matter plays itself for him like its an instrument he's well-tuned to. He's dissolving the mishmosh of things that are locked in the box that activated this old story, and the different materials lose their coherence, and as they lose their coherence, they lose their potency. Then: splash. There's a moment of resistance, and then everything in that box is molten, liquidated, destroyed. And it's not controlling anything any longer.

The fog begins to dissipate.

And Kage, who not only doesn't know how to do that, but who is not paying much attention to what Atlas Mason is fiddling with, has decided, as far as she decides anything, to trust that he's doing whatever it is he just said he's going to do, is standing now, has turned to toward one of the other scarecrow monster-things, and has begun to try and do the same thing to it that she did to another, to un-tangle the (hum, she hums a little, under her breath) knotwork and tracery of someone else's Magick.

It won't be necessary.

[But since she doesn't know that! Same thing. -1 foci! -1 taking time. No quint this time.]

[Atlas Mason] The beam from the headset holds strong for another few seconds, before at long last he cuts it, certain that the materials in the box were destroyed, had hoped to get the objects for study, to understand what was inside. But given the horrible proximity of those great moving scarecrows, he chose the safer course, the course that saw neither of them, or their vehicles put in harms way.

"The Etherial effect is beginning to subside, I believe we have successfully terminated its function and capability thereof."

He says raising the lenses out of the way so that he could see clearly, the fog began to roll back, pulled apart by the laws of nature. The scarecrows themselves begin to unravel as well, their seams begin to part, and their bodies begin to rapidly decay and fall asunder. The one Kage chose for her own brand of wrath, fell apart even faster. Her magic giving the fleeing power a swift kick in the ass.

[Atlas Mason] [Willpower!!!]

[K. R. Jakes] [I'm ... cool?]

[K. R. Jakes] [...really? For a long time?]

[K. R. Jakes] There was the fog, first. The fog that's beginning to lift. Then there were the scarecrows, filled with some horrific substance. And there was a third guardian, a third foolproof failsafe, a third line of defense. They both feel it: something, working its way into their minds, wanting them, wanting to take. Atlas: he pushes it out. He pushes it away.

His companion is not so fortunate. Her body goes very still. Still, she is standing on top of her truck. Kage is a creature -- he doesn't know this, yet; maybe he's got an idea -- who's cool in the face of unusual things, who's always composed, always graceful with her brand of poise. She doesn't stand that way, though: as if her muscles were stone; as if her bones were ice. Her eyes go blank, blanker, blankest: a page to write on.

And she sways, sways, like a tower that's about to tumble down.

[Atlas Mason] The safety thrown on the gun and Atlas drops it into the bed of the truck, its projected location of impact noted and remembered...just incase they needed it. He watches her as she starts to sway uncontrollably, and he quickly grabbed her, and instead of allowing her to fall uncontrollably to the ground and hurting herself, he makes her fall into him. He falls with her, and brings her to a relatively gentle rest in the back of the pick up and checks her over.

"Ms. Kage? Respond verbally if you are still of synaptic capacity to formulate speech patterns. Ms. Kage?"

He knows it might not the be the most gentlemanly thing to do, and he certainly hopes that she will forgive him for it, but Atlas slaps her, not enough to do any damage, but hopefully enough to bring her out of whatever fugue she had fallen into.

[K. R. Jakes] There is no resistance when Atlas grabs her, guides her fall, falls with her into the bed (why, sir!) of the truck. The Orphan has gone boneless, and her gaze is still blank. More than blank: her pupils expand, swallow up the iris of her eyes, show Atlas just how black her eyes weren't before, now that that's all they are: swallow light.

He wants her to speak. Kage doesn't. He slaps her (so much for Gentleman Inventor, sir!) and her head turns to the side with the force of the blow, stays turned; he can see her eyelashes lower, kiss her cheekbones, rise again. Then she tries to sit up. Worry: she tries to sit up, and it still isn't her. Worry: she reaches out to use him as leverage, to grip his shirt and haul herself aright.

"This is no - " she says, quietly, but it's not her voice. " - place for you."

[Atlas Mason] Not her, its not her, its something else, its something else that was guarding the box, something NOT controlled by the box. All these thoughts fly through his head at the speed of light and he does his best to keep himself upright, but her on the bed of the truck. He grabs for his gun, not to use it on her, but to keep it from whatever was in her certainly not wanting this new entity to have control of something as destructive as a firearm.

"You are correct in your hypothesis, this was an inappropriate convergence, defying all acceptable laws of decency and intent!" He says loudly, with gun in hand he pushes himself off the woman, looking to get some distance between himself, and this newly changed Kage.

[Dex+Brawl]

[K. R. Jakes] [possessed!Kage. Mind 2! -1 Quint. -1 Being Controlled By Possess-y Thing. Induce: horrified adoration!]

[K. R. Jakes] [again? same +1]

[K. R. Jakes] "Stay still -- " is what not-Kage says, in not-Kage's voice. Atlas Mason doesn't know the Orphan well enough to know that she'd be horrified by this. Atlas Mason doesn't know the Orphan well enough to know how stubborn, how intractable, the other Traditionalists have found her. He doesn't know that she's been stronger than this a hundred times before, in Chicago alone: he doesn't know. He does know that This Thing almost got him, too. Maybe he'll be forgiving; maybe he won't mock her, later on. If there's a later on. " -- You can't see this. You need to leave this. But you'll come back, won't you?"

He hauls himself away, and he's limber enough, dextrous enough, that this isn't even remotely a problem. K. R. Jakes is not a fighter, and whatever set of preprogrammed conditions is puppeting her limbs can't use what she isn't -- not well. "It's not --" a pause. Borrow the word: " -- appropriate."

Then: he'll feel it. Another mind, alien, touching his; stirring up his emotions, seeking to re-define and re-arrange them, stroke higher what's already there, Adore me, Adore me, be Terrified, Horrified, and Adore me, something that wants him awe-inspired and stricken, still-standing, standing still, motionless. Something that wants him overwhelmed.

[Atlas Mason] He staggers to his feet as he listens to the thing inhabiting the woman, and he managed to back himself against the cab of the truck, he had prepared to go over it, over it to relative safety until he could find a way to reverse this, or stop it. He even had a working theory in his mind of just how he could. But with those eyes, and those words trickling from Kage's mouth his only concern was to get some distance.

Until the effect took hold, in those moments of confusion and terror Atlas truly felt what it wanted him to. Curiosity of what this being was, what it could do was stoked into admiration and desire to know more about it. His scientific mind bringing him to a stand still as he tries to work out this situation.

But deeper, in the older parts of his mind where the reflexes to run from a creature that meant you harm still resided, Atlas' mind was screaming, begging him to flee, to live, to remain unharmed. In the end, he was stuck, his free hand gripped the top of the truck cab, demanding he follow through and move away. But he stood there none the less.

"What are the particulars of your existence?" He says almost meekly as he watched it.

[K. R. Jakes] Atlas Mason'd pulled himself out of the creatures physical grasp, but the creature had stood (don't call it Kage; it isn't), and the creature had looked at him with its dark, colorless eyes and it had known him and it had called out've him something that's foam and blood. He's a Scientist and responds as such: Scientist to God, see? He's pressed against the cab of Kage's truck and the creature wearing her skin is staring at him without blinking, its eyes as blank as a journal, and it's saying, "If you want to know, all you have to do is,"

And that's the moment Kage's Will manages to reassert itself, to shuck the alien from her thoughts, from her limbs, shake it out've her bones, draw it out've her hair, push it away. The change is almost instantaneous: she holds herself differently; her eyes can see. See too much, for a moment: her pupils shrink to pinpricks, as if the gloaming light's too much for her, then swell to normal proportion.

"Ugh. That has not happened to me before. I don't like it," she says, and there's Atlas, against the cab, with his gun: still under the Effect. The Effect that has her signature all over it. "What'd you ask?"

[Atlas Mason] [Willpower?]

[Atlas Mason] "What...what are the particulars of your existence?" The words almost come out as a cry, as if he desperately needs to know, but is so terrified he cannot bring himself to come any closer, to ask anything more of her then what he manages. "Inform me please?!"

He almost begs...almost, the gun is kept down, but its creeping upwards slowly, his mind is freaking out, fight, or flight...flight was not working. The only other option was fight.

At that moment though something seems to shift, his eyes open up and his pupils dialate. When he speaks, his voice seems older, and all the more desperate. "Alexa...dont! Don't make me!"

[K. R. Jakes] "I'm not Alexa." Her tone is bare; is stripped of ornament. Simplicity. "And I don't know any Alexa. Just scarecrows and fog and sigils. Atlas, listen to my voice. Try to think clearly. You're luminous, you know. You shine: let that be clarity for you." There. That's what the quiet-voiced Orphan says, intent (passionate creature), while Atlas shifts, while he stares at her, first rapt with horror and admiration, and then with desperation: "We can talk about the particulars of existence all you want." He's against the cab and Kage is getting the hell out of the truck bed. If he shoots, maybe she can duck behind in time. If he shoots, maybe -

Or maybe what she did she can undo. [Unravel the effect: she reaches out and does so, slowy un-knots the bindings, sees them in her Mind, the way she did it.] If that fails.

[Atlas Mason] "Alexa this is insane! It wants you to do this! It wants you to kill it, to send you all to its masters! Don't make me!" The gun rises, but only so far, at best to stomach level, his eyes are down, as if looking at something on the floor of the bed of the truck, but nothing is there.

Kage backs away, quickly moving towards the end of it with every intent of getting out of the line of fire, a smart move at that. But quick as a whip, Kage peels back and pulls apart the effect she had woven into his mind, releasing the pressure, ending the strain, and slowly Atlas' eyes return to him, that friendly, amiable man who had offered to help fix her truck regained his senses.

The gun is dropped, for a moment she might have thought it would still go off, but the safety was still firmly in place and it simply clatters to the bottom of the bed. Atlas breaths deep, and for a moment seems ashamed, and horrified at what he had done. he rubs his face, hands moving up and down as he sighs.

"My most distinct and abject social reform Ms. Kage...I...I had not meant for that to happen."

[K. R. Jakes] The red-as-blood-haired Orphan is no longer in the bed of her truck. Now, she is outside of it, her elbows on the truck's edge, her gaze [tarnished (smoke)] still intent, but somewhat inscrutable. This is another thing Atlas Mason doesn't know: that she's frustrated a number of people who just wanted to know what her motivation was. For now, her motivation seems to be: listen to the Son of Ether, make certain that that's an end to it. Her gaze lifts from the shamed slope of his shoulders and she pushes away from her truck, burying her fingers into her hair, half-unravelling the tucked-up braids, losing a hair-pin, two hair-pins, so there's a long tendril, Medusa-loose.

"I'm sorry," she says, claiming the apology for her own. "I didn't want to touch you like that." Make him feel what he felt. Make him stricken so. "But uhm. We can still talk about the particulars of existence, if you want." Note: she's not asking about Alexa, not asking him about how salt-etched and desperate his voice was. Not.

[Atlas Mason] Atlas seems to come about at her questions, and at her apology. He rights himself his hands falling away from his face as he does so. Looking over at Kage as he takes a long deep breath and looks about. No more scarecrows, no more fog, no more terrifying black eyed possessor claiming others bodies, the danger had passed, and they were both still intact.

In his gaze about he found his gun laying on the bed of the truck, he leaned down slowly, suddenly seeming far older then his relatively young age would seem to indicate and carefully picked up the old service piece and slide it into the bag he had pulled it from. He then gently removed the apparatus from his head, and put it in the bag as well, safetly away. Only then did he turn his gaze back to Kage.

"Perhaps at another juncture in our time and space? I had initially sent forth that inquiry to the extra physical entity which had overtaken your cognitive processes. I could not theorize upon its predetermined nature or the fundamentals of its physical or extra physical existence. So I inquired."

He shrugged, and moved to climb out of back of her truck as well.