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[ostro_goth]

Things are odd and worrisome.

Teja feels that some sort of doom is looming gloomily over the place, and fate may be waiting patiently to strike, in a dire manner.

Teja is sitting by the fireplace, brooding, staring into the flames, while his hands rake through the soft fur of his little black cat.

Maybe he should go to see his people, in case that after fate strikes, he can no longer reach them.

Or no longer exists in a way they may recognise.

Comments

[mogget_cat]

To those who don't know him that well, Yrael's demeanor would seem nowhere near worried.

Teja knows him well.

"Teja," he greets. "How goes the day?"

[ostro_goth]

"Greetings, my friend," Teja says; and little Myrrh stands and stretches, to offer her head to Yrael to be skritched.

"It goes darkly -- there were explosions, and that green thing over the bar appeared, uninvited, and beyond the touch of any weapon."

[mogget_cat]

"Yes," Yrael replies, obligingly scritching behind Myrrh's ears and rubbing along her jaw.

"Things are strange, lately, and not the usual strangeness that is more to my liking. A few days ago, there were some here who were entertaining the idea of breaking the Observation Window. While under normal circumstances, I am a supporter of intellectual curiosity, I will admit to nearly breaking the first rule upon hearing it."

Yrael trusts Teja will understand. Things are different - there is something in the air that makes his fur stand on end.

[ostro_goth]

"Who were these two?" Teja asks.

[mogget_cat]

"The Fool, predominantly," Yrael says, with something of a hiss in his voice, "though one got the feeling that the idea was not something he had stumbled upon on his own. He said there were already cracks in the window; all that would be needed would be to make them bigger."

Yrael had liked the Fool, too. But some things, like the potential destruction of one's home, take precedence.

[ostro_goth]

"I have seen him, and he is a fool indeed," Teja says. "I have seen him consorting with Urquhart."

The word 'consorting' takes a dark tinge.

[mogget_cat]

"The Fool has crowned himself King of Milliways," Yrael offers. "He chose me as his grand vizier, tasked with aiding, advising, and ultimately usurping him."

"But I will not aid him in whatever plans he may have for the Window. I have already advised him - whatever good it might do - and am willing, if necessary, to... usurp."

[ostro_goth]

Teja gives a little smile at that. "I will aid you in that usurpation, whatever help I may give, as a small mortal between powerful beings," he says.

[mogget_cat]

"I would appreciate your aid," Yrael smiles slightly. "You have a greater patience than I, and may exert reason when I would prefer to abandon it."

"Do we yet know what caused the earthquake earlier? I do doubt it was the Fool's doing, at least."

[landlesslord]

"Penny for your thoughts?"

Teja looks somewhat close to how Guy feels.

[ostro_goth]

"Greetings," Teja says to the stranger. "I do not sell my thoughts that cheaply, or at all. But I shall give my mind freely -- there is doom afoot!"

[landlesslord]

"Doom?" Guy raises an eyebrow at that. "I take it that you mean more so than usual?"

That last year has not gone quite so well for Guy.

[ostro_goth]

"Doom has not been quite final here, yet," Teja says, "even though dark things have loomed often; but this feels more so than usual, with the signs and portents we have been having. And I am well versed in darkness and destruction -- this feels bad."

Teja has ever trusted his most pessimistic intuition, and rightly so.

[landlesslord]

"Perhaps I should have paid more attention to omens when I still lived then." Guy has never had much time for signs.

"Very bad?"

[ostro_goth]

"Do you see the glowing green portent over the bar?" Teja says. "None has caused it to appear; none can make it go away. There have been explosions, and rumours of cracks in the Window."

[landlesslord]

Guy had assumed the green object to be a mere quirk of this place and given it no further thought. Now though, he eyes it with a small amount of suspicion.

"Then these explosions might be the cause of the cracks?" It makes sense to him. "If the rumours prove true?"

[ostro_goth]

"If so, then we and all of this place, are indeed doomed," Teja says. "That beyond the window is the truth of this place; all else in here is only cunning and willpower holding out against utter annihilation."

[forgottenmotley]

The Fool looks pleased with the world and cackles a little as he drops into a seat by the fireplace. Underneath his hat his eyes glow amber and his shadow flickers oddly - even for being by the fireplace.

"You look somberer than usual," he says. He's smiling, but it's hard to tell, his face is cast in shadow.

[ostro_goth]

Teja strokes his cat.

"It is our world," he says, "that is more sombre than usual. Fate looms."

[forgottenmotley]

"Fate always looms. That is the point of fate. To loom. To spur people to action to avoid it, to accept it, to do something with their lives besides sit and brood in front of fireplaces with cats in their laps."

[ostro_goth]

"Do not dare or presume to judge me, my actions or inactions!" Teja says, grimly. "You are a fool, consorting with Urquhart and spreading your own rumours of doom, I have heard. I have done with my life what needed doing, and in my afterlife, what I wished for and had no time for while I was alive, and if my afterlife will end as the Window breaks, then so be it: - I have no regrets!"

[forgottenmotley]

"Your afterlife will not end when the window breaks, if it breaks. The fates That would be too easy away out," he says with a shrug and a laugh. "As for rumors of doom, surely you've seen the signs already. They're not rumors, they're truths."

He then pauses for a moment. "You're awfully obsessed with Urquhart, did you know that? A bit jealous of the attentions he gives to others?"

[ostro_goth]

"What do you mean to imply?" Teja growls. "That I cannot let go of my wish for revenge? True -- I am a Goth! We have principles."

[forgottenmotley]

"You are dead. You've said as much. You've said you've done what you needed to do in your life and after life. So if that is so, why do you harp upon Urquhart all the time?" the Fool shoots back. "Why is talking with a man a damnation in your book?"

He laughs. "Would you like to see what fate has in store for you? Would you be willing?"

From a pocket in his coat he pulls out a deck of cards and starts to shuffle them idly. His face is still hidden, but it's easy to tell the Fool is daring Teja to say yes.

[ostro_goth]

"Yes, I would see what your cards have to tell me; some of your brethren are truly wise," Teja says.

Pause.

"And you were far more than merely talking with Urquhart. And I am not harping upon him; indeed, I would not wish to touch him as I touch my harp, at all!"