Circle of Power [Open Prompt]

[Avamande]

So overpowering was Charlie's sense of calm that the reactions of the others to what he did to Peter were muted and greatly delayed. It felt so casual over their bond, such a minor incident to the Mesmer, that sharing his feelings and thoughts the other four mages could not help but feel that it clearly must be. For a time, at least. Perhaps if it weren't for Semblance they would have remained unconcerned about the affair. But for good or ill, they realized the truth.

Peter's very being had been suppressed, chained within his own mind, and what was worse was that Charlie had made the condition contagious. Each fallen ward represented another shattered psyche, another soul permanently reduced, and that realization led to an overwhelming sense of horror - be it by the act itself, or the fact that Charlie considered it unworthy of his concern. Except for the sense of that was fucking awesome that was ushering from Hikaru's mind, much to the consternation of the other three mages.

What? the Reaver thought, defensively. Do you know how much it sucks fighting those guys? This is so much easier.

It is reversible, yes? Helena asked, receiving a rapid mental confirmation from Avamande.

I believe so, yes, and Charlie will do so once we take them into custody as pri- Wait. the Hytori began, only to immediately cut themself off at a disturbance in the aether.

The strike force had continued walking as they thought, taking advantage of the hole in their defenses that Charlie had made while doing their best to remain out of sight and out of mind. This had taken them to what should've been the innermost ring of wards, right before the camp itself, as Charlie's calming contagion spread throughout the ranks of Reconciliators. Until they hit something that he could not overpower, alarms began to cry out of witches in the woods.

They haven't made our position yet, but they'll be hunting, the Augur confirmed. We must make haste.

We could just kill them, the Reaver pointed out.

I'm not certain we're close enough for the portal to take out the entire camp, either way we need to advance before I can bring in the main body, Avamande thought.

[Charlie]

It wasn't that Charlie didn't plan on restoring the ruined psyches of the soldiers. That would imply a level of malice that Charlie wasn't especially capable of. No, the truth was far more alarming. Charlie had given no thought as to how he might resolve the situation at all. Obliterating the hearts and minds of multiple mages was as trivial a matter as deciding what he was going to eat to eat after this little scuffle was over. A leg of lamb absolutely slathered in garlic sauce, of course.

He swelled with pride when there was at least one person that appreciated his skill, and that alone was enough to make the horror radiating from the others exceptionally easy to ignore. Right? Charlie agreed with Hikaru. Negation mages were remarkably difficult to work around. Present company excluded of course, Avamande was a gem. And now we don't have to worry about them setting up any wards after we set up the portal.

Charlie's lack of follow-through did have one major boon though, and that was his willingness to do what others, especially his friends, told him to do. Avamande was smart and had a knack for these sort of things, so Charlie felt confident in their assessment. Oh, Yeah yeah yeah. I can put them all back together, no worries. He confirmed, nodding along despite his affirmations being obvious through the mental link. Once this is over, I'll cut their connection to my aether so it stops spreading. At least it was Charlie's own aether reserves empowering the cognitive hazard, that way there was some limit on how far the contagion could spread.

Then Charlie heard the alarm, and drew back his focus to look through all five sets of eyes. He was glad to find that they had not been found yet, nor was anyone specifically advancing on their location. That was no reason to delay though, and Charlie's problem-solving instincts kicked in. While a far cry from smart, Charlie could be clever and had a vested interest in being alive. Yet another thing Avamande had been right about.

After tapping into the knowledge of all their magics, Charlie presented his idea.

Avamande, can you 'project' yourself or whatever and scout out the camp? Once you find a good spot, come back to yourself and then we'll all blink to it together, then bring the house down. Charlie's thinking was that it would be safer to defend Avamande for a short while while they spatially mapped the camp rather than try to advance as a group past people keenly aware of their existence. The reason for blinking into the camp afterward together was similarly pragmatic; Charlie wanted to be where all their own fearsome mages would be. The rest of us keep an eye on them while they're searching yeah? Buy 'em time if we gotta. Charlie delivered the last sentence with less enthusiasm than the ones before it. Buying time was not at all the position Charlie personally wanted to be in, but he wasn't about to leave Avamamde unguarded while their soul left the mortal shell.

Sound good?

[Avamande]

Hunger filled the collective unprompted at Charlie's lust for lamb, the other four mages having made sure to keep the telepathic equivalent of an ear towards his thoughts after Helena's question. The general assumption by most of them was that the Mesmer was an extremely mentally disciplined agent, reflexively filling his conscious with a distracting thought in response to a direct query. It was. Probably for the best that they didn't interrogate his mind any further to find out the truth. Hikaru even made a mental note to use the leg of lamb if he ever thought a Mesmer was rooting around his mind. Any consternation that they may have felt dissipated at his confirmation that he could indeed reverse the pacification, the mages focusing on the task at hand with clear consciences.

That is... actually quite an astute plan, Charles, Avamande replied to his suggestion that they search for an ideal summoning point by astrally projecting. I will need the four of you to keep watch of my body while I am out however, and do take care not to move me too much. It would be quite embarrassing if such delayed my return to my body.

After receiving confirmation from the others, an extremely excited confirmation from the incorrigible Reaver, Avamande sat themself down upon the ground and began to focus on separating their soul from their body. Truth be told it wasn't a particularly difficult or advanced magic, and a true master could accomplish it at will, but embarrassingly the mage had almost never used the technique. After a few moments, a spectral shade of the Hytori was standing above their own prone body.

The spectral image of Avamande gave the others a curt nod before they faded from sight, the Traverser modifying their projection to be invisible, before scouting the camp for the ideal location. While they did that however, the Reconciliators were on the prowl, their number already fanning out through the woods for the foul Kalzasern witches.

[Charlie]

We've got you covered. Charlie thought, coalescing the general feeling of agreement to Avamande's request into a complete thought. Once Avamande was down, the remaining four mages positioned themselves naturally around them, looking out at the woods. With four sets of eyes, they had almost a complete view of the surrounding area, though it was somewhat disorienting. An additional boon was that because they had an aura-reader in the lead battlemage, she was able to perceive auras when looking through the eyes of the others. And since they were of one mind, anything she found was instantaneously relayed to the rest of the collective with the only delay being the firing of synapses.

This immediately bore fruit when through one set of eyes a Zaichaeri aura could be seen trudging through the dense woods. It was by sheer luck that he was wandering closer to the Kazasern holdout, and by sheer arrogance that he was alone. There was a smattering of other auras, duller than his but almost certainly within earshot. At once, all minds except Charlie seemed to know what must be done. The reaver dropped his hand low, and a short spear collapsed into being within it just a few heartbeats later.

The weapon lurched forward without so much as a twitch from its owner, and a weaving of Masquerade pulled around it. By the time it left the mage's sphere of safety, the spear had vanished entirely, but Hikaru was still able to see the weapon's aura thanks to the shared Semblance. The weapon surged hard out to one side and weaved in a wide arc around its initial target. The spear slipped past branches and around trunks until it was about twenty meters away from the Reconciliator and off to his left side. At his limit for distance, Hikaru then spun the spear on a dime and sent it crashing forward with unholy speed. Birds rose to flight as branches exploded into splinters, and the Zaichaeri mage turned towards the sound right before the invisible spear took him in the neck and impaled him to the tree behind him.

Upon experincing this though Hikaru's eyes, Charlie retched a mouthful of bile and doubled over. Never had he killed, nor even see someone die violently. Even from this distance, Charlie could hear the last, desperate gurgles of the Zaichaeri before he finally stopped twitching and fell still. To make matters worse was the intense feeling of pride that radiated across Hikaru as he resummoned his, as well as the silent appreciation from the others for a clean kill. Hikaru grabbed Charlie by his collar and pulled him back upright in a manner rough, but not unkind.

Thanks... I think I'm good. That was just a lot, Was all Charlie managed to send over the link before Hikaru dismissed his spear and a blistering hot pain shot through their minds. It was dulled by Hikaru's own experience with Reaving, but to someone unused to battle like Charlie, it was debilitating. He nearly fell again, but Reaver still had a hold on him. It was only by sheer luck that Charlie didn't scream, the pain having sucked the wind out of him entirely and leaving him gasping like a beached fish.

Luckily, the ruse worked. When the Reconciliators discovered the body of their fallen comrade, they correctly surmised a Reaver was responsible. However, they now followed the only trail left to them, the one made by the spear and leading distinctly away from the Kazasi mages. They fanned out now in a tightly knit search party, but would find nothing but their own shadows to jump at.

The pain among the collective faded quickly, and Charlie pulled himself back upright and wiped his mouth. That happens every time?

Hikaru nodded, having long since gotten over the mundane pains that came from Reaving.

Fuck...

[Avamande]

Avamande's soul flew across the field and through the trees, bearing down as quickly as they dared to the Reconciliator camp. The first kill initially registered as muted distaste at the shared sight, the mage pausing for a moment as the sympathetic disgust flowed from Charlie's mind and into theirs. Hikaru set the both of them to rights however, and the Hytori continued, only wincing at the flood of pain as the Reaver retrieved his blade. They weren't certain if the feeling was mitigated at all by being shared among all of them, but the mage dearly hoped it wasn't. The idea that it was more painful ordinarily was unpleasant to consider.

Zaichaer's military was a finely honed machine, and the Order of Reconciliation was little different. The discovery of a dead mage immediately triggered an alarm, with all patrols converging upon the last identified location. Not being fools, those who were manning the camp immediately redoubled their perimeter, scanning the skies for assault by Avialae. Augurs and Negators were in full force, attempting to defend against the case of a feint.

Through their link, Helena instructed Avamande on an old war trick to deal which had previously been used to great effect by Elementalists. A Traverser could, theoretically, make use of it as well. As they approached the camp, they slowly sunk into the earth, the astral projection swimming through the ground. The planet, too, had an aura, and it served as shield from the sort of sweeps that men of war did when looking in every direction for foes. It was slow, dull, difficult work to struggle against the will of a world, and far from the stuff of song.

But it worked.

Peeping out through the surface of the earth, they glided across the lower strata of dirt, searching for an appropriate hole in their defenses. Constructed of a simple and quickly built wooden palisade surrounding tents, the Order was prepared to fight witches throwing fireballs and Avialae swooping down from the skies with Reaved weapons. Monsters, but ones with honor, who fought face to face and strength to strength. Not this. Not what the coldblooded Hytori was bringing to bear. Every man was upon the perimeter, and the tents themselves were abandoned save for the sick and wounded.

Compared to the struggle to reach the camp, the return for the Traverser was but a thought, their eyes flaring open as soul merged once more with body.

I have it. Are all ready? they asked, and upon receiving assent, they Blinked.

[Charlie]

Those that remained with Avamande's physical form were left to respond to respond to every broken branch and maddened shout with an overwhelming paranoia. With so many eyes drinking in so much information, the group became the warden of their own panopticon. Anything out of place, real or imagined, was conveyed to the group as a whole. Tension wound through them, pulling tighter with each agonizing second. Only Charlie was really worried about being caught, while the others approached it with battle hardened wisdom. If they were found, they would fight, and Avamande would have to improvise their escape. It was far from ideal, but every one of the warriors had been far closer to death than this.

Their confidence did soothe Charlie, or rather seemed to bury his worry under the tide of assurance. That too was dangerous. After all, Charlie's confidence was not owed to any particular skill. Still, it won out over the alternative of letting his unease linger in the minds of others. Operations like this were often a series of choices between bad and worse, and this was no exception.

So of course the group was glad when Avamande returned to their body. Tension eased in an instant, Charlie's especially. Even in the hivemind, his thoughts were easy to pick out.

As one, the mages begun pulling in aether, each one pushing past their usual limits. It was well understood that any fears of overstepping were unaccountably small when laid against the possibility of not ending this conflict in a surgical excision. Even Charlie followed suit, and his eyes burnt like a pair of dying stars. He almost managed to look heroic, but he couldn't wipe that stupid grin off his face. Hey, his plan worked. Charlie deserved to enjoy it.

When they replied to Avamande, it was with a single voice owned by all.

We're ready

And together they fell upon the enemy in a storm of steel.

A thunderclap heralded their arrival, the elementalist surging the air outward with such force that bodies were sent flying. The earth itself rose to meet these unfortunate souls. Stone shaped into great spires, and the air filled with screams. Adding to this was the Reaver's hungering spears, now raining down from the sky by the dozens. The weapons dematerialized as their allies advanced, never impeding their movement.

Dozens died before a single sword could be raised in their defense. Fire from candles, so eager to burn, leapt from such humble containment under urging from the battlemage, and soon the air thickened with smoke. Around the group, the air remained clean, fresh even. Still, the smoke did reduce visibility, but with such carnage being wrought it was scarcely the main concern.

Until, in one of his last defiant moments alive, one of the Zaichaeri drew his pistol and fired blindly into the smoke, hitting Charlie in the leg.

It missed the artery, and went clean through, both things the medic would surely care about back at camp. Charlie, however, was in a truly unholy amount of pain, and collapsed down to one knee as all strength gave out in the other. All his aether, once wound so tightly, now lashed out in a retribution so hellish, Charlie could never have managed it had he been in control.

The deadening Silence smashed against feeble minds, but passed mercifully over Avamande and the others. Weapons once grabbed in desperation now clattered again to the ground forgotten. Some even burned alive, mind too dulled to consider self preservation. They did not scream. Gods, they didn't even scream.

Following the display, Charlie fell onto his back, and splintered his connection with the rest of the hivemind. Their connections with one another were intact, but they would no longer share in his pain. Immeasurable pain, by the way! Pain so intense that every attempt to vocalize it was left an empty sound.

As Charlie sat clutching his thigh, blood pooling around his fingers, he hoped at least one of the medics was cute.

[Avamande]

Bringing so few people across so short a distance should not have been taxing for a Traverser as experienced as Avamande, but after struggling against the earth itself they were near their limit. This was, in a way, fortuitous, for as soon as they had Blinked they collapsed to the ground like a puppet with its strings cut. Safe from enemy fire, they were able to rest and regain their aether, pulling deep into their reserves to assist the others.

It wasn't the most dignified way to fight, but there was very little dignity in war. When the time came for a story or song to be told of this day, it would likely say that Avamande had sat directly within the field of fire, meditating as magic whipped around them until their great work was finished. In reality, they didn't bother to move a single muscle, channeling the vast amounts of power while slumped face-first into the dirt. Victory did not care whether she was won stylishly, merely that she was won, and the mage was determined to win the day.

So intent were they upon the vast Railway that they were opening that they barely noticed the killing and the dying, the shared sense of their melded minds fading away as they poured their very essence into the reservoir of aether required not only to create it but sustain it. The others did their jobs, and Avamande would do theirs, and that was enough.

And then a gunshot rang out, and the meld was filled with terror and pain. Charlie's emotions had always been so loud, and the animalistic surge almost overwhelmed the others with its strength. Silence followed, horrible and still silence, and suddenly the human's mind had left their chorus.

"Charles," all four mages whispered at once, as Avamande ripped a hole in reality above their heads. Coming dangerously close to overstepping, they flung themselves and the wounded mage up through the Railway with a surge of Kinetics, leaving Charlie on the ground as they looked at the strike force ready to head through.

"Now," they commanded as they clutched hands with a pair of Avialae, the chain of battle mages forming up to physically travel with the Traverser.

Blood poured down the Hytori's face as the mother of all headaches began, sense and sensation fading away as they focused the very last dregs of themself to bring the Kalzasern force through. Wings unfurled and mages took the sky as they fell from the hole that they had made, but Avamande simply fell.

The last they saw was the portal winking shut, the last of the mages having just gotten through, and then blackness took them.

[Charlie]

The stories never made such a big deal out of being shot, and Charlie was cursing them now as he stared down at the blood sluicing out from between his fingers as he clutched his thigh. Even his mind, so overextended on aether, could only focus on that all-encompassing agony for a time. The battle had been largely forgotten, and self-preservation right out. It was fortunate then that his psychogenic lash made the battle so utterly one-sided. Yes, it was fortunate, Charlie thought when the pain had gone from unbearable to merely gut-turning. This entire battle had been won off his back, hadn't it? Yes, that sounded right. They couldn't have done this without him. In a way, getting shot had merely been the price he paid for heroism-- and he was a hero! They'd sing songs about this battle, great ballads exalting his bravery and might. They would sing about Avamande too, of course. They were an excellent sidekick, of that there was no mistake.

Yes, Charlie's delusions were grand indeed. So grand that they eclipsed all rational sense that might have served as a lifeline to pull him back to his senses. The Mesmer had overstepped before, it was common when he had first gotten his rune, but never like this.

As Charlie continued to think about all the grand things he'd done, the young man was suddenly sent flying up through the portal, and it did his senses no favors to see the skyscape twist and invert as he passed through the portal and fell onto his back, crumpled in an undignified heap that he was certain the scribes would ignore when they writ this into the history books. But he hadn't been laid down for a few seconds before he heard someone shouting and calling for a medic, which had been on standby for this exact eventuality.

"We did it, Avamande!" Charlie shouted, voice strained yet utterly exuberant as two men hefted him under his arms and by his ankles to bring him to the surgeon's tent. "We're heroes! You hear me? Best in the world!" That he might have been distracting the hytori didn't cross his mind at all. What did cross his mind was seeing Avamande slump over and go limp. Utterly deranged as Charlie was, he wasn't about to leave one of his friends behind. That would look so bad!

"Get your hands off me and help them!" Charlie shouted, jabbing a finger towards Avamande and trying to wrestle free of the soldiers very patiently trying to offer him aid. Charlie only allowed himself to be helped without further incident when someone came by to collect Avamande, have correctly surmised that they had overstepped gravely and would do well to at least be under observation for a time when they woke up.

And when they did wake up, who else but Charlie was waiting there for them, sitting on a cot facing the hytori and enjoying all the best bits out of half a dozen different packs of rations, no small testament to how much the average soldier seemed to like him. And at least with Charlie still recovering, it was a safe bet that he hadn't insisted on their adoration.

Charlie also had a clean, fresh bandage on his thigh, but judicious use of Jovmandr's elixer had meant that the worst of the pain had been dealt with.

"Mornin', sunshine!" Charlie said, tossing a packet of crackers to Avamande from his cot. "I feel like this goes without saying, but we won!" Charlie laughed and punched both hands in the air, still savoring that reality. "And don't you worry. I told everybody everything." Of course he did. At the very least, Charlie had quickly adopted the time-honored tradition of soldiers to gloat endlessly.

"Oh! That reminds me. When you're feeling up to it, the head battlemage wants to talk to us. Said it was important, but not urgent, and to make sure you've recovered." Charlie raised his eyebrows. "Heard it through the grapevine it's a bit more than a 'thank you for your service', but people have been pretty hush hush about it."

[Avamande]

It would be romantic and high minded to say that Avamande had forced themself to ignore Charlie's cries as they focused upon their work, casting aside their friend's triumph as the overstepping men fell prey to his delusions. A suitable story of sacrifice and service, placing the good of Shokaze and country above concern for one of the few friends that they had in the entire world. Naturally, it would also be a complete and utter lie. By the time the Hytori had started getting the rest of the strike force through, they had lost the ability to even perceive anything the human was saying, their entire cone of perception reduced to frantic and bitter need.

Overstepping was, at least, something that the armies of Kalzasi knew how to treat. With all of their limbs still firmly attached to their body, the premiere cure for a Traverser in such a state was simple bed rest. Aetherwine provided at regular intervals served to slowly refill the body's natural reserves without dangerously flooding it in the way that downing the glass would, and broth served to deal with more mundane needs.

Avamande waking was a strange thing to witness, there was no gradual stirring to consciousness, nor was there a yawn to greet the world. Instead their eyes just snapped open at once, the overstepped mage transitioning from the Land of Nod to the mundane world in a sudden flash. Their hand raised up to catch the crackers on reflex, the Hytori frowning as the packet sailed right past them. "I am still tired I see, I was going to Hitch it," they murmured. Groaning, they leaned over in their cot to pick up the dropped food, tearing in to them with a sudden relish.

"What, precisely, have you told them?" Avamande asked wryly. They expected the typical embellishments, but there was a ghost of a smile upon their face as they wondered just what those embellishments were. Charlie was one for stories, and for once there was an interesting truth to build a fable off of.

Before they could much consider that however, Charlie continued his bad habit of speaking more than was perhaps healthy. A curious expression crossed Avamande's face, wondering just what Helena had for them. With a sigh, they slowly eased themself off of the cot, reaching out a hand toward where their robes hung. Their frown only deepened as nothing happened, and the convalescent mage walked over to put the clothing on the regular way.

"Let's not keep her waiting then."

Helena brooded in her command tent, shuffling through a wealth of captured documents. It was standard practice for the Order of Reconciliation to burn such things when one of their camps seemed likely to be overrun, but Charlie's Silence had prevented the junior Warder from carrying out that task. "Avamande, Charlie, a job well done to both of you," she said, reading the last of a piece of paper before setting it aside.

War weary eyes snapped up to regard the pair of mages, the woman having come perilously close to overstepping herself in the battle that had followed. "It won't work again of course, they'll prepare for it next time. Abjinurium buried in the earth, full globe wards instead of hemispheres, dead man's switch augurs. They'll adapt, like they always do, and hit us with something worse for having won today. But it worked today, and we did win, and that's what matters," Helena said, focus on Avamande. "Won harder than we ever expected to as well. We took more prisoners than we know what to do with, which isn't a small feat by any means," she continued, gaze switching to Charlie. "I think the pair of you have earned something for your troubles."

"Ma'am?" Avamande asked, quirking a brow.

"I've dispatched a formal report, with commendations, to the Queen."

"Ah." There was a silence that was a half second too long to be entirely comfortable. "Thank you." To be known to the Iron Queen was... not on Avamande's to do list, but... perhaps this would prove useful. Or at least not harmful. "I shall prepare for the return to Kalzasi."

[Charlie]

"Oh just that we snuck past the perimeter, launched ourselves directly into enemy territory, then brought the house down on 'em!" Charlie said, banging his knuckles together for effect. The word 'we' was doing a truly herculean amount of lifting there, but at least wasn't entirely without merit. Charlie's role had indeed been pivotal, but in a way that didn't make for a terribly interesting story, so he gladly attached himself to the more active participants in the operation behind enemy lines. Besides, the hivemind had made it so difficult to sort out who exactly had accomplished what, or at least that was what he told himself.

"We broke the stalemate like it was nothing! I heard that the fight was over with almost as soon as the portal closed." Charlie went on, as though each of their assembled group suffering some measure of overstepping was scarcely worth mentioning. That he didn't think to bring them up did at least bode well for the other mages, all of whom were recovering in their own ways from the strain. Charlie himself was admittedly still recovering as well, but it was much harder to tell given that he always seemed a bit delusional when it came to his own power and skill.

Charlie hopped up from the cot and winced as a jolt of pain shot through his leg. Though magical means had been used to stabilize and soothe the wound, the underlying pain remained. He had tried to reason for more medicine to be used, but had been flatly refused. Luckily for Charlie, the medics had filed away his insistence as simply a side effect of his over-exertion of aether instead of more aptly surmising that Charlie was a bit of a wimp.

They headed to the command tent, and Charlie was remarkably silent as Helena spoke, though he couldn't help but stand a bit taller. While of course he knew the extent to which they won and how instrumental Avamande and himself had been to that fact, it still warmed his heart and stoked his ego to hear someone in a position of power agree with him. It so rarely happened! But he hadn't been expecting the offered reward, and Charlie's surprise painted his face. With wide eyes and exuberant joy, Charlie turned to Avamande, and stutter-stepped as he first thought to hug them before swiftly realizing that was neither necessary nor welcome.

"By all the rites of gods and men, we did it!" Charlie all but shouted, earning him a withering look from Helena that brought his volume down to a more acceptable level before he continued. "I mean, uh, Thank you, ma'am. Truly. I'll begin my preparations to return to the city as well."

To this, Helena held up her hand. "No, Charles." She said, his full name lancing into Charlie's heart like an icepick. "I'm afraid we'll need you for just a little while longer. Those men you silenced, we'll need their minds put back in order before they'll be much use to us. Most can't even say their own names."

Rubbing the back of his head, Charlie nodded. He'd forgotten about that, a stunning indictment of his fitness to have such power in the first place. "Oh, yeah. Right, sure!" He said swiftly, before promptly correcting himself when Helena fixed him with a look that could crack stone. "I mean, yes ma'am! As soon as I can channel again safely, ma'am."

Helena nodded. "Good. That will be all. You're dismissed."