Painting with Luci

[Luci]

On a wall in a dream, Luci is painting.

The sparkling multicolored fumes of her spray-paint can drift down the street. They smell of vanilla and honeysuckle and lilac, and a warm fuzzy haze settles over your mind.  

Luci is breathing heavily as she works, using broad strokes to paint abstract shapes in psychedelic colors that swirl and glow on the wall. At the center, a beautiful pair of eyes with pupils of the most brilliant gold you've never seen is staring at you.

Luci turns around and smiles at you over her shoulder. The pair of eyes she painted blink unnervingly in time with her own. She slides her backpack full of spray-paint cans over to you.

"Hey," she says genially. "I'm Luci, grab a can."

Is your character currently asleep, unconscious, or purposefully traveling the Astral Plane? Come paint some stuff with Luci. This a strictly non-pvp zone, you signed up for it when you huffed my spray fumes.

[The Humble Sage]

The Sage glanced down in surprise at the pack of canisters laying on the ground at his feet. The world around him was… unimportant. There were surfaces: walls, floors, even gaps that were clearly empty space, but all of it seemed distant, an afterthought of the world’s creation. He vaguely got the impression of a street, for some reason he got overtures of Coasta del Sol, but that may just have been the unfamiliarity of the architecture. Or at least the vague impressions of the architecture that came through the oppressive plainness of the surroundings. It’s not Coasta del Sol, he decided after a moment, There’s too much want in these buildings. The drabness of the world seemed almost intentional, it drew the eye to the riot of color that covered one of the surfaces nearby. A short distance away, a peculiar being that reminded him more than anything of a sentient stained glass window was hard at work with another of the canisters spraying its colorful contents and illuminating an otherwise nondescript surface with an egregious amount of airborne dye.

For the briefest of instants, the Sage considered breaking off his meditation. This was not the mind-expanding calmness he had been trying to achieve, nor should his order’s technique of meditation even be able to produce these kind of results. From the description, this seemed far more like something the heretical prophets of the Third Tower would experience. But can I allow mere prejudice to interpose itself with knowledge? if this was in fact a vision of the future like the ones the seers claimed to possess, then he would be a fool to dismiss the opportunity this was affording to him.

The Sage reached down and picked up a canister, it was surprisingly non-descript, with only a colored oval to indicate anything of its contents. If this was a vision, then his best chance of understanding its meaning was to follow the scene. The stained-glass girl had offered he should paint with her, and the control she exhibited over her creation labeled her quite clearly as the centerpiece of this particular portion of the vision. He made his way over to another wall, letting go of his concerns. When one is not in control, it is better to be a bestilled river than a forceful one… The Sage cleared his mind, and let the painting come to him, perhaps it would give him insight into what was about to happen? His serenity was undermined however, when he realized that the fine spray the girl’s can emitted was coming out far more liquid and uneven for him. Ink? He thought in confusion, looking down at the sea blue oval that adorned the leaking canister he held.

The Sage turned back to the stained-glass girl with a quizzical look, only half expecting her to have any sort of answers. He held up the can, its black ink trickling down the polished metal and onto his hand. “It seems I only have one color…” he said with an almost bemused laugh.

[Luci]

Luci does not laugh, but smiles warmly at the newcomer. She watches the ink drip steadily from his painting. Sometimes it would drip down, sometimes it would drip up. The raven's eye's seem to follow her movement.

"I think it's a very good color," Luci says, her bright gold eyes boring into the crow's black ones. "I think it's wise, I think it's honest, I think it can tell stories no other color can. But I think you are wrong. I think you can paint with more colors than me," Luci says frankly.

She pulls a white feather from behind her ear and press the tip lightly into the ink painting. Immediately the feather turns jet black, and starts to drip, forming a small pool at Luci's feet.

Luci begins to write on the wall, her neat letters morphing into an alphabet familiar to The Sage. He sees a kind of superposition occur; Luci is writing a description of a man, and as she writes each line, a physical image of the man grows and takes form on the wall above the words.

Translated from ҨՅӴՅԖҴՒՅѼ Speech

There is a man in a room lit only by a bright, white light.

The light shows streaks of charcoal in his otherwise black hair, his neatly trimmed beard failing to conceal a smile

His face does not show the wild exuberance of youth, but the warm nostalgia of the well-traveled. Joy is not a new emotion to this man, but he appreciates the feeling even more for this fact, and savors it.

Where the light shines on his sea-weathered cheeks is a deep bronze.

Where the light touches the palest areas of his body it appears grey, but shining with inner life, like sun peeking through a cloud on an overcast winter morning.

Where his body hides the light is a soft shadow, not dark enough to obscure the lines of his capable frame.


On his arms and chest he flushes with life, and streaks of tea-rose criss-cross his body.


Luci signs her name and the letters start to drip forever, and the painting blinks above the description.

She hands the feather idly to The Sage.

"It is a very good color."

[The Humble Sage]

“And a very good portrait…” The Sage answered absently, squinting at the script with suspicion. “But there’s no need for flattery here, my dear.” There was no mistaking the symbols, they were the same as the ones in the journal he had found. Yet while that text remained elusive, its meanings impervious to his best attempts at deciphering them, these letters formed themselves happily and contentedly into neatly packaged parcels of information. Exactly what I want to see… in more ways than one…  

Coming back to the present situation, the Sage noticed that the stained-glass girl had moved to begin another piece. “Not to seem forward, but I have a few questions.” He called, moving over to speak with her again.

“Sure you do.” She answered, still painting, “you’re not dead yet, so you’ve gotta have questions.”  The Girl paused, and looked at her can, then began painting again.

The Sage barely registered that she had a new color as he spoke “This is no vision is it? You are both aware of my presence and fully tangible. What is this place?” His tone was even, not accusatory, but lacking the relaxed whimsy of his prior speech. His hand tapped against the side of one leg in agitation, as the nonsubstansive nature of his surroundings began to set in.

The visions he had read of were much more structured. The Seers spoke of the experience almost like it was a play, where the events occurred with or without the consent of the beholder, and if anything was to be gleamed it was on the Seer to bring the knowledge back to the real world. No, this is not a vision of heretics, more probable our good friend Omni has decided to meddle once again… Do my antics grow stale so quickly? He thought with chagrin

“Do I look like a vision?” She asked simply, looking at him with a playfully askance glance. The Sage thought for a moment before answering, his arms crossed as he pondered the implications of the question.

“You aren’t a vision.” He answered at length, “You’re a prism.”  There was no response from the girl, so the Sage explained further “You take in your surroundings with an unrefined experience, then display them, pouring out from a bottomless decanter. Your kaleidoscopic shell appears opaque, but your core is a mirror. You reflect the world you take in, become what it is, become what it needs. The light goes in, and you send it back in scattered hues. Yet the light is still there, you keep but scant rays for yourself…” The Sage trailed off, he was practically muttering to himself at this point. “What is your calling, Girl of the Chapel’s Eves. Why do you pursue this path?”

There was silence, then the click of metal on metal as the Luci shook the can she held. The rainbow-hued artist did not look at the Sage as she replied, focusing entirely on her artwork, “You’re right. It’s not a vision… but I suppose it could be visionary. You could say this is a staging ground, a station of sorts. We’re waiting, but that doesn’t have to mean we have to be stationary.” The girl smiled and looked up at her newest creation. the iridescent lizard blinked as its extruded eye roved, taking in the meaning of its newfound existence. Luci peered at the piece with an intent focus, tapping her cheek with one finger as she pondered the artwork. “he needs a branch.” she decided after a time, then moved over to the backpack for another can.

Squatting down she rummaged through the sack, “There are people, there are things they need, there are things I can do. If there’s a mission for me somewhere in between the three, I suppose that isn’t for me to say...” She stood back up, a fresh can of paint in her hand and looked back at the Sage with a wry grin “but I certainly wouldn’t call myself a missionary”

[Kuzuru]

The demon opened his eyes. Before him stretched a street, devoid of any color. Structures made with metal and sharp angles stretched high into the melancholic sky. Everything carried a drab and disheartened wash of dull colors. Kuzuru stepped forward. Invisible weights were hung from his joints and every action took considerable effort. His throat was dry, very dry. There was no noise. There was nothing except that street and those monoliths of steel and the invisible weights. Another step forward. The scent of vanilla licked at his nostrils. The demon breathed deep, filling his lungs with sweet scents. As he exhaled a cloud of rainbow haze escaped his lips. Glitter filled his skull and lightning sparks through his veins. The weights were gone, the buildings were not.

Before him the world opened up, a Pollock painting on LSD. The demon squeezed his eyes shut and found a new sense of clarity. This was not his world, he was but a guest within this multicolored wonderland. When he opened his eyes he saw a trail of fumes leading further down the road. The demon walked forth, taking his time to absorb the new and wondrous world presented to him. Like a siren’s call he followed the sweet scent, inhaling more and more of the haze. The city twisted in upon itself and pulled him deeper and deeper into the maze. Voices. Distant at first, but every step brought him closer to their source.

Rounding the corner he spotted two figures. An older man and a girl seemingly painted from the same stuff that constructed this world. They hadn’t noticed him yet, or if they had they paid him no mind. He blinked a few times and glanced down at his own body. It was untouched by the tie-dye wetwash. A black suit with red pinstripes, the blood red undershirt undone one button too far. He smiled and slicked back his black hair. The world around him quivered and seemed to breath in time with him. Kuzuru started walking towards the duo. His foot kicked a can of spray paint and the two turned to face him. He smiled and crouched to pick up the can of paint. With a nod towards the other two he shook the can and pointed it towards the ground. As he walked toward them he sprayed a trail of red, so dark it was almost black. He stopped a few feet from them, shrugged, and turned towards an unoccupied wall. On it he painted a rudimentary smiley face, bright yellow. Paint bled from its edges, but it kept its form.

“Huh, guess I can’t paint very well either,” he shrugged and offered a smile towards them, “sorry to interrupt your little shindig, not that I did it by choice, anyways name’s Kuzuru, nice to meet you two.”

[Luci]

Luci grins as she teases the over-serious soul-searcher. She paints a long brown branch underneath the chameleon, and steps back, kind of framing the picture with her fingers.

"What do you see?" Luci asks.

"A Dreamer," remarks the Sage.

Luci looks up quickly at the sound of a foot connecting with an aerosol can. She tenses as she takes in the newcomer, his slick suit and warm smile failing to conceal the sharp, angular features of Kuzuru of the Ashen Blades.

Her big gold eyes find the Sage's deep green, and a mutual emotion is shared; caution.

Kuzuru picks up a can, and Luci lets her eyes return to her painting, turning the chameleons branch into the top of a bay window.

Luci takes note of the thick yellow smiley face the bounty hunter leaves on the wall, but continues her painting.

She hears Kuzuru introduce himself, and hears the Sage respond politely.

"Well met, fellow Astralnaut," says the Sage.

"Are you sure he's not a vision?" teases Luci, turning her attention away from her window and onto Kuzuru smiley face.

"No," answers the Sage seriously.

If Kuzuru was confused, he was very polite about it.

"I'm not sure I caught your name," Kazura says, smiling at the Sage.

"Well, I'm quite sure I didn't give it," says the Sage pleasantly.

The two men smile at each other for a moment.

"I think it is a very nice portrait," says Luci as she crouches down to make a similar yellow smiley face.

Kuzuru stares idly at the Sage, his head cocked to the side. "I should like to kill you some day," he muses.

Luci swirls the yellow eyes with her fingers until they shine brightly.

"Oh, perhaps you will," the Sage responds. "I'm sure if we were ever to enter combat, death would be the only possible outcome."

Luci paints a thin line of blue at the borders of the face, then smears it into the yellow, creating a light green that she uses to fill in the face.

Kuzuru sneers politely. "You think you would kill me?" he asks with genuine interest.

Luci paints a pair of thick eyebrows and a large, square nose.

The Sage sighs and says, "I hope never to find out."

Luci paints a bright scarf around the portrait's mouth.

Kasura shrugs. "Hiro Protagonist considers you the toughest bounty of all time," he comments.

Luci paints a dark green hat going over the forehead.

The Sage chuckles. "Well, I don't think it's a contest," he says humbly.

"Done," says Luci, taking a step back. After a tense moment, the two men stop staring at each other and turn their attention to the portrait.




"Does he look familiar?" she asks the bounty-hunter.

"Hmm," says Kuzuru sarcastically. "Doesn't ring any bells. Oh wait, could it be?"

Kuzuru lashes out at the portrait with a series of lightning fast sword slashes, leaving deep cuts in the stone wall. After a moment, the gashes in Ballad's face begin to bleed, and the light fades form his eyes.

"Yep, I remember now!" he says happily as he sheathes his sword.

The bounty-hunter grins at the gangster. The gangster stares calmly back.

"I'm asleep at 76 West Hover Avenue on Teir-5," she tells him unflinchingly. "I have a very busy today tomorrow, but you can come kill me around 3:30 if you like, I will be home and the Deathblades will be at soccer practice. Although if you want to stop by at three, Princess Hellstab is hosting a tea-party, and I'm sure all the Deathblades would be be thrilled to meet you. They are very big fans, you know."

[Kuzuru]

The demon stuttered as he listened to Luci’s invitation. It had been a long time since someone had openly solicited his wrath, and to do so in such a laissez faire manner sent tingles down his spin. He chuckled, clapped his hands together, and tilted his head backwards. For a moment he stood there, his mind swimming with possibilities. Kuzuru turned his head towards the Sage and spoke in as innocent a tone he could muster, “and what say you, mysterious stranger, would you be so kind as to willingly offer up your location?”

The Sage, who had been eyeing the demon with an equal mix of trepidation and curiosity, answered, “I have no desire to expedite any encounter with one so openly after my throat.”

Kuzuru sighed, “oh very well, I suppose the hunt is indeed part of the fun, and don’t you worry your pretty little head mister, you’re definitely on my list.”

“How thoughtful of you,” the Sage replied.

The demon turned his attention away from the party pooper and towards the tie-dyed dreamer. Her skin was the inside of a kaleidoscope on LSD, a constant shifting of colors and hues that the cool kids would refer to as “groovy”. He wondered what color her blood was, although he figured the more appropriate question was “what color wouldn’t her blood be?”. Kuzuru slicked back his hair and found that his hands had picked up some errant pigments and he had sent streaks of purple, green, and blue through his black locks. He inhaled. This place felt like a subatomic slumberland, only conscious in the back of some stoner’s mind and kept alive with half-measured breaths. “Well, darling, in case you were holding your breath waiting for an answer, I graciously accept your offer,” Kuzuru said, dipping his head into a slight bow before continuing, “I’ve never heard of Princess Hellstab or the Deathblades, but I assure you I’d never dream of disappointing them, now shall I bring you a rose and some chocolates, or would that be in bad taste?”

“Well I love flowers,” she said, and then added, “and the Deathblades love chocolate, so that would be wonderful.”

“Perfect.”

The demon scooped up a stray paint can and began to paint once again. His hands, however, were unfit for anything besides battle and his portrait slowly became a jumbled mess of shaky lines and unkempt angles. Were one to stand sideways and squint, perhaps there was a method to the demon’s madness, but as it stood he just simply sucked at painting. He shrugged and looked over his shoulder at the other two. “Don’t mind me, I’ll be gone soon enough,” he said, “I’m a light sleeper, I doubt I’ll be asleep for much longer.”

[The Humble Sage]

“Oh? You aren’t planning to stick around? We were thinking of painting a lovely battlefield piece later on. Plenty of severed bits, maybe that would be more your interest?” The Sage asked Kuzuru with disdain. The demon simply looked at him with a smug grin, not even bothering to respond. The Sage stared back with an intense gaze. He knew not whether he was in danger currently, he had not yet tested the nature of his connection to whatever this place was, but this Kuzuru felt confident enough to make ideal threats at two primes knowing quite little of their abilities. His Arrogance was appalling.

“You carry a big sword, warrior,” the aging man sighed, “and in the shadows of twilight you think yourself tall. Know that night comes to every man. And what you have wrought so far…” He shrugged and turned away, moving to inspect his surroundings. “Your impact upon the world is but the scattering of a bloody drizzle. Within the hour all trace of it is gone from the earth it beat so futily. In the end your actions mean nothing.”

The Sage began to stroll a short distance down the street, staring idly at the architecture around him. It seemed to have shifted since his arrival. The remnants of Coasta del Sol and Cinnabar still shone through in the style, as well as the third method that was foreign to his palette. However another, angular style seemed to be growing more and more prevalent in the vague buildings that lined the streets. The world reflects the minds that inhabit it… he realized with a mix of fascination and concern at the implications of this.

His thoughts were interrupted by a fit of laughter from behind him. The Sage turned back to face Kuzuru, and Luci looked up from something she was painting on the street itself. “Mean Nothing?” the Demon repeated with an astonished grin, “Mystery man I just don’t think you understand me in the slightest! I right injustices across the land and bring order to a lawless world! In eight full worlds of self-absorbed brats…” Kuzuru raised his arms out to their impressioned surroundings, “I’m the one cleaning up everyone’s mess!”

“By hunting petty thieves and wandering spirits at the behest of those who reinstate our lawlessness?” The Sage asked with skepticism, “Your explanation rings false to me, Bounty hunter.” He pointed towards the defiled picture of Ballad’s corpse, still dripping red paint to form a pool only along the bottom of the wall… the Sage noted with curiosity, but continued before Kuzuru could interrupt. “That is not the face of justice, nor even one of vengeance. That is the work of pure malice.”

“Hey!” Luci called with a stern look, “Did you just call the Westside petty thieves, pal?” She looked like she was about to say more when Kuzuru cut her off with a short laugh.

“So you got me.” he said with a leer, “I don’t give a damn about what you’ve done, old man. The point of this is simple, so listen carefully. When I find you, because I certainly will, I will kill you. This will not be something that you can avoid. And when that does happen, you should know that I am the one in control of your fate.” The Daemon shrugged, “Or maybe I won’t! Perhaps you’ll get away! Wouldn’t that be an exciting turn of events? Point is, in that moment either I am in control, or I am not in control.” Kuzuru held up one finger in front of his face, eyes wide, “Whatever meaning you’re drolling on about doesn’t even matter.” The Demon inhaled sharply, eyes closing. “That’s called LIVING!” he said with gusto.

Luci watched the exchange from a short distance away, a pensive look on her face as she doodled with the spray can. The porcelain face stared back at her blankly. Luci stopped, sitting as she watched the painting trying to finish itself, its features contorting in an effort for wholeness. It was almost piteous. Relenting, Luci finished the piece, though she wasn’t about to let the painting have whatever it wanted. “Living is stretching.” She said softly to herself as she finished the can.

[Luci]

Luci breathes in deeply through her nose twice, then exhales through her mouth, watching as the portrait imitates her movements. She breathes in the scent of honeysuckle and lilac, she breathes out the scent of vanilla.

She lets the spraycan fall to the gutter where it makes a soft splash. Luci frowns and turns her gaze to the street, where dark red ichor is starting to ooze up from the storm drains.

The Sage pulls away from the sidewalk, eyeing the fluid cautiously, but Kuzuru laughs deeply. "I get it," he says, chuckling. "This is, what, the blood of my victims?" the demon asks as he dips his hand into a pool of what is indeed fresh blood.

A single droplet hangs on the tip of his finger. Kuzuru inhales the scent of life, and exhales the scent of hell. The gutters continue to pump blood into the street.

Luci eyes him cautiously. "I didn't Make it," she says with certainty. "Are you sure it's not, you know, maybe your subconscious-"

"I do not," snaps Kuzuru, somewhat defensively "have oceans of blood welling up in my subconscious mind."

The Sage is inspecting the growing pools of blood behind a pair of worn spectacles. "This," he says conclusively "is what one might call, a bad omen."

A gunshot echos throughout the dreamscape. It starts to rain.

"Oh, that's not sanitary!" complains Kuzuru. He wipes the blood rain from his face, glaring at Luci and the Sage standing worriedly beneath the Sage's umbrella. After an awkward few moments, Luci and the Sage shuffle around so Kuzuru can share the umbrella. The street is flooded, the blood almost up to their knees. Luci lights a cigarette with a shaky hand.

"Say Luci," asks the Sage conversationally. "Have you ever heard of a catboat?"

"Well," says Luci cautiously. "Is it anything like-"

"It is nothing like a cat crossed with a boat," the Sage interrupts. "A catboat is small sailing vessel, about twelve feet in length, with a single sail on a single mast set well forward in the bow of the boat."

"Like this?" asks Luci as she sketches on the wall.

Another gunshot is heard, but the trio ignore it.

"Yes, but the sail comes forward more," he replies pointing. Luci nods and makes the corrections. The Sage smiles. "Perfect!"

Luci grins, and starts to paint a life-sized version of the boat on the wall, under gentle direction from The Sage. By the time they full the painting from the wall and into the Astral Real, the blood is pooling up to their waists.

The three primes hop in the boat, which rocks unsteadily in the current. An earsplitting wail rocks the fabric of the Astral Realm, causing the buildings to shudder.

"Sounds like someone's having a nightmare," Luci says softly. "The poor thing," she adds, looking at The Sage.

"I suppose you will want to ease their passage into our metaphysical playground?" asks the bemused Sage.

Luci nods sadly. "He's a very active Dreamer. He might hurt someone, or attract...attention," she says, her weird gold eyes darting around uneasily.

[Kuzuru]

Well now, this had turned from a pretty good dream to a damned excellent one. Kuzuru inhaled, sucking in as much blood-scent as his nostrils would hold. What was sour to most held a sweet intoxicating edge for the demon. He shuddered. His body was on fire, thousands of nerve endings bristling with sensation. Still as much blood as this was it all felt hollow underneath. To him it was whipped cream, sweet and light, but full of air. There was no purpose behind this storm of sanguine liquid. Bloodshed without purpose, without reason, was a hollow treat. Kuzuru glanced towards the other two and locked eyes with the psychedelic dreamer.

“Will you be joining us Mr. Bounty Hunter?” Luci asked.

Kuzuru smirked and answered, “I’d be delighted to, though, I’d appreciate it if you asked your boyfriend there to stop giving me the evil eye.”

The sage did not respond. Kuzuru waited for a moment and then addressed him, “you don’t care for me do you?”

“A surprisingly astute observation for one so crass,” the sage answered and turned his attention towards the helm.

“Don’t you worry your pretty little head, I’ve got interests other than your death atop my list” Kuzuru called after the sage and then turned his attention towards Luci, “so darling, and forgive me if I’m being forward, but it’s been bugging me for a while, are you even human?”

[The Humble Sage]

“Ehm… not really…” Luci starts to explain, but the Sage is only half paying attention to her explanation. The River of blood that their rainbow-hued boat was sailing in seemed only to be getting more and more powerful. Whatever trauma this dreamer of theirs was experiencing, it was certainly not something that they could afford to underestimate. The Sage was painfully aware how out of his element he was. He had guessed right about the Stained-Glass girl's strange abilites, and the Bounty hunter had yet to prove more than a nettlesome tag-along, but if this situation turned ugly, the Sage would be relying on them for support.

The Stained-Glass girl seemed less at ease now that they were on the move, and The Sage noted with a passing bout of concern that they were leaving behind whatever haven they had been in, the phantasmal buildings giving way to a much more open space. The current of fleeing life flowed on ahead of their painted vessel, twisting and turning in an almost corkscrew path against a vast nebulaic world. They were horribly exposed to whatever else was dreaming nearby, and the Sage knew it.

Casting his attention back to the conversation behind him the Sage caught the last few words of Luci’s explanation, “So, I may not be a person by technical definitions…” She gave the Demon a smug grin, “But I am way more human than you can handle.” For his part Kuzuru seemed to have been surprisingly subdue during the exchange, barely interjecting except to ask a question or two. He’s studying her… the Sage realized, surely she can tell… right?

He didn’t have time for their game at any rate, and The Sage turned around to face them, interrupting before Kuzuru could probe for any further information. “Luci,” he interjected and the swirling mass of color turned her head to face him, a quizzical look on her face, “You said that our dreamer might be making enough noise to draw attention to us. What kind of attention are we talking about?”

The Psychedelic painting pulled the dying stub of a cigarette out of her mouth. “It’s just the nature of the place, pal.” She exhaled deeply, a curl of smoke sinking downwards into the river below. Luci watched it disappear below the crimson tide “Well that was disappointing…” she muttered before continuing, “We’re in the world of dreams. It changes if we want it to enough. You wanted an umbrella to protect from that bloody rain, so you got one. I just finished my cigarette and it did nothing so…” she held up a fresh and smoking cigarette in two fingers, before winking at the Sage.

“Let me guess,” said Kuzuru with his arms crossed, “There’s a catch.”

Luci just laughed, “Of course there’s a catch, Kuzie! Do you control your own brain? Deep down? The more unstable the dreamer, the longer, you stay dreaming, the more the uglier side starts to peek through.”

The Sage scratched his beard as he pondered this new information. “But to shut out your emotions, even in self-defense, hardly seems like the way to gain control of your subconscious. The fundamental schism of mind and soul would only serve to exacerbate the…”

Kuzuru interrupted with a drawn blade, “…And right on cue.” He said, pushing the Sage to one side. The aging man caught the edge of the vessel as it swayed alarmingly with the sudden motion. Looking behind him, he saw the demon’s blade slicing quickly through a blood-covered being that had risen from the tide on which they rode. The thing made of blood dispersed, sloughing back into its constituent current with a wet squelch, and Kuzuru snapped his blade clean. “Watch what you’re thinkin’ about there old man! That Pokemon was after your hide!”

“That’s exactly my point, Bounty hunter!” The Sage argued stubbornly, “By forcing ourselves to be devoid of thought, we separate from ourselves the…”

“I said, stop thinking about stuff like that,” Kuzuru spoke roughly, decapitating a second blood-being, this one resembling an orc, “you’re the one calling all these things, right?”  

“Both of you shut up.” Luci ordered, moving to the front of their swaying vessel. “Arguing like that will just call worse things than these. Besides, that Orc- guy was mine. Real Jerk.”

The Sage shrugged, still half-sitting from where he had nearly fallen out of the Cat-boat. Kuzuru scowled and turned back to scanning the lack of discernable horizon. “What’s that?” he asked pointing at some small dark spot a good way ahead of them on the river.

Luci sighed, “Great.”

[Luci]

The blood river starts to widen as the party gets farther from Luci's dreamscape. Luci sees the city slowly give way, mixing anachronistically with Kuzuru and the Sage's subconscious. Growing through the windows of the skyscrapers now are great palm trees, and between them are alleyways filled with smoking lava. And all around, the tangy scent of fresh blood.

"Just fucking GREAT!" Luci reiterates, with more passion this time. Ahead of them, something huge is bubbling up out of the blood, and creating large choppy waves around it as it displaces the fluid. They watch as a huge bloody hand ascends from the depths, with long sword-like appendages stemming from each of his fingers.

The ship starts to rise, riding atop a growing wave. Kuzuru slashes at a bloody tentacle that manages to worm it's way onto the deck, and the sage politely pokes a blood-orc through the eye as it tries to jump aboard.

The wave crashes, and they bounce off the surface of the river as it lands, gaining speed before they hits another, more sharply slanted wave. A gust of wind catches the sail as the boat crests, propelling it into the air twenty feet above the raging river.

While the men scream like they're auditioning for an action-comedy, Luci removes her trusty spraycan from her holster and fires from the hip, painting a long golden cord from the can to a palm tree jutting out of a skyscraper. With lightning speed she wraps her spraycan around the mast of the ship.

The ship catches and swings like a pendulum, the palm tree splintering with the strain.

Luci releases the glowing golden rope at the top of the ships arc, sending them flying forward again.

The ship veers right this time, heading directly towards another skyscraper.

The trio frantically rushes portside to try to get it to change course, but the sailboat merely tips left, and the hull smashes into the building, breaking glass but seeming to glide easily on the surface of the wall. The crew lurches forward as the boat snags on another palm tree jutting out from one of the windows, and the boat slides the entire length of tree before flying off the tip. They hold tightly to the deck as the ship spins around several times in the air, threatening to throw them off, but manage to land with nothing more than minor bruises in the choppy blood ocean.

A skateboard enthusiast might point out that they had successfully completed a wallrun-railgrind-900 with a sailboat.

The trio is far from safe. Above them the giant hand flexes, then reaches out lazily to slash their boat.

They scatter, barely managed to evacuate before the catboat is shredded by the wicked blades on the giant fingers.

Underneath the blood, Luci is panicking. She cannot swim through the thick fluid, or even tell which way is up. She kicks desperately, her lungs burning. Darkness starts to creep into the edges of her mind.

Luci feels someone grab her by her hair and pull her up to the surface. Kuzuru shoves her onto a piece of the catboats driftwood, and she takes several deep gasping breaths as she scans for the Sage.

"And here I thought you had a pair of natural flotation devices," the demon says with the air of someone who was very proud of their joke.

Luci's face is wracked with concern as she gazes out into the ocean of blood. Above them, the hand is cracking it's kuckles.

Kuzuru laughs. "The old man? THAT'S what you're concerned about right now?"

Luci stares at him with her big gold eyes. He sighs.

"Fine. Stay here," he says as he lets go of the driftwood and floats out into the whirlpool.

"Be careful!" Luci calls. Kuzuru laughs again.

"I'll be fine, I'm in my element," he says with a grin.

Luci watches the bounty hunter dive into the blood. It is a very tense few moments before Kuzuru breaches the surface, the Sage under his shoulder. Luci watches as they manage to find another piece of driftwood to climb onto.

The hand seems to have noticed them again, and it's long deadly fingers start stabbing at the Sage and Kuzuru .

Luci scrambles to pull out a lighter as the pair dodge the attacks wildly. She flicks it hurriedly, cursing as it refuses to light. She tries to wipe off the blood, but there is nothing dry enough. After a few nerve-wracking tries, it lights. A quick blast of aerosol from her spray can is all it takes to turn the tiny flame into a roaring inferno.

Luci stands on her piece of driftwood with shaky legs and begins to whip the long tail of flame around and around her head, ringing her in a crackling halo of fire. The fire starts to grow into a shape; first a large birds head appears, it's eyes the same bright gold as Luci's. Slowly it's body emerged, made of deep red and orange flames. Then a massive set of wings unfurls, crackling with sparks, and blue torch-like flames licking at the bottom. Finally its tail emerges, a vibrant plumage of golds and reds and oranges and every color of the pyromaniac rainbow.

Luci makes a whipping motion and the phoenix streaks off towards the hand, bellowing it's beautifully haunting war cry. The hand notices the attack, catching the bird in mid-flight and crushing it in a tightly balled fist.

The phoenix explodes, blowing the hand into a fine red mist. There is a very brief moment of calm, and then a powerful whirlpool emerges where the hand was.

Luci tries to latch onto a building, but her rope isn't long enough. She sees the worried looks on her companions faces, and tries to smile at them as they sink.

Eventually, they try to swim through the thick liquid again, but the current of the whirlpool is too strong, and they are pulled down, down into it's depths.

***

In an alley in Teir 5, mysterious graffiti is bleeding from a wall.

A pair of rainbow eyes with pupils of liquid gold.

An ink painting of a raven.

A portrait of a man with a description written beneath it.

A dripping rainbow chameleon atop a bay window.

A crude yellow smiley face.

A portrait of Ballad with bleeding gashes covering his face.

A shaky, jumbled mess of lines and angles.

A surreal futurist portrait of a woman.

Some were even signed.