awashlogs | Event Fourteen.

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Event Fourteen.

Roses bloom and cease to be,
But we shall the Christ-child see.

t's very, very cold. It's cold enough that you'll see your breath fog in the air before you, that goosebumps appear on your arms and legs and a chill goes up your spine. You're inside, in a huge palace with sweeping arches and rooms, but it's no real shelter from the cold -- it's just as cold inside as out.

There's a throne room, a kitchen, various rooms and even a dungeon to be explored -- and outside, a frigid, frozen garden, a lake that's naturally frozen over, and miles, and miles of snow as far as the eye can see.

But be careful while you explore. The snowflake soldiers are naturally dangerous, but even more dangerous than that...there's that creeping sensation of numbness going up your arm, a pang through your chest, and the slow, slow freezing from the inside out.

Try not to leave any of your friends behind, okay? Even if they might look a bit too uncannily like some of the statues hanging around for decoration when they're frozen over.

Welcome to Awash's fourteenth event log, everyone! Further information on this event can be found here at the OOC post. You are welcome to make your own logs for this event, but please keep in mind the lack of laptop function during this event when it comes to forum posts!

If there are any questions, please ask them here. Thank you!

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[ It may not be the oddest lack of interest in her she's ever seen, given what she'd been dealing with back home, but to see that kind of thing from Damian? Yeah, it's a tad alarming.

But that's not a familiar tale, so she shakes her head. Stories about snow, yes. Stories about queens, sure. Just not that particular combo. ]

[Whether or not he'd be exasperated by this, he's currently... indifferent. The longer this goes on, the more concerning for Damian Wayne to be so placid about everything. Not having emotions sucks.]

The devil makes a mirror that reflects the worst parts of people and things. [He just--starts. He's telling the story even if he has no lead-in.] He tries to take the mirror into heaven, but it laughs so hard it falls back down and shatters. The splinters are blown all over the world by the wind, and they get into people's eyes and hearts.

The shards freeze the hearts and cause the eyes to only see the bad in everything else.

Kai and Gerda are childhood friends and, one day, Kai gets the shards in his heart and his eyes. He turns into a terrible person, and the only beautiful thing to him are snowflakes.

[For a moment, he pauses. The ice encloses itself around his wrists, up along the back of his arms.]

During the winter, he ties his sled unknowingly to the Snow Queen's carriage, and she takes him to her palace. Everything believes him to be dead, but Gerda goes to search for him, asking everyone if they've seen him. She has to pass three or four tests before she finally reaches the palace.

Once she's able to get inside, Kai is trapped on a frozen lake under the throne, forced to spell out words the Snow Queen gives him with shards of ice. If he can do this, she'll release him.

[Again, he pauses, almost like he's having to think. But this time he just doesn't begin again.]

[ Damian, you really could have just said "shards of a mirror froze a kid's heart and there was an evil queen and his friend saved the day by doing something". Then again, this matter-of-fact need to go into the whole story is more like Damian than this... almost empty, hollow person has been acting since they'd run into each other.

So Kisa listens intently, even though a part of her is unusually impatient for him to hurry it up, especially when she sees the ice continuing to creep along his body.

That's not good, and when he stops again, she silently (of course) taps his (very cold) arm. Damian, please don't pick this time to leave out the most important part of the story??? ]

[The touch gets him to look at her, and he stares for a long time directly through her and out the other side. Slowly, he blinks, once, and then seems to focus again on her face.

If he tried to move, he doesn't think he can. His legs are probably glued to the floor with ice. That's what he'll become, isn't it? A slab of ice, and he'll be destroyed. His brows pinch just slightly, briefly. A moment of feeling, however quick. Being disappointed in himself.] Right. The story.

Gerda runs across the frozen lake and cries on Kai, and her tears melt his heart and the shard. She sings him a song, and he cries, and the splinter falls out of his eye. [Ah. His hands look like awful, gnarled things of ice.

The blue has reached his lips, his eyelids, his nose.] She kisses him... and gets rid of all of the cold... and below them on the lake is the word he had been trying to spell for the queen. "Eternity."

And they leave the palace... walk into spring back home, and... when they arrive, they're older... and it's summer. [It looks as if he may have forgotten why he told the story to begin with. Weird.] You should... hide until... it's over.

We'll all go back to the town.

[ This is incredibly surreal to listen to as Damian slowly becomes more and more frozen over as he speaks. Throughout, Kisa attempts to find something familiar, a clue, a way to reverse this. Does she have to sing to him? Make him cry? Does she cry? But in the story, what gets rid of all of the cold is a kiss???

Obviously she can't sing to him, and Damian is less likely to cry than she is, even on a day where he isn't apparently dead inside. Even now, like this, he's still trying to reassure her, but she doubts. What if they can't? What if only the people who aren't frozen over return to town? What if he's stuck here forever?

He'd told her before, that the town liked to test their bonds. What kind of friend would she be if she just left him here and hid?

The cold makes her shiver. Being this close to Damian doesn't help; he's more ice than warm presence at the moment. But she drops her hand away from his arm, only to grasp one of his mangled-looking hands.

She won't leave. ]

[There's really no way he can curl his fingers around hers without busting his hand into pieces or hurting her, so he doesn't, but he also doesn't pull his hand away. Something feels as if he should be grateful, or embarrassed, but it just won't quite get to the surface.

In the back of his mind, he can hear a Wayne, a Batman, telling him to do something. To be stronger. To fight it. Hell, he can hear a Damian telling him the same thing. There's a lot of them here who need to be saved, yet look at him.

It's so much easier... being cold, all over, inside and out. It's easier here to be frigid.]

It's up to you... and the others without broken mirrors. You can help the people being frozen. If the town is following the fairy tale. You know what to do now.

[The added chill of the ice circling his torso really doesn't feel like much else over the already intense numbness.] Damn... [His sigh rolls out bitter, icy fog.]

She could free him because... her heart was pure. That means you can do it. Go help the people with shards inside them. I'll see you back at town. [He tries to draw in another breath, but it's labored from the ice. He hadn't realized how far... this fast... already down his legs mostly and up his shoulders.] Don't look.

... ...!

[ She feels as though she should say something. Anything. Her lips move as though she's trying to muster the words, or her voice, but nothing emerges. Even silently.

What does it mean, to have a pure heart? It shouldn't be that only the people with unbroken mirrors can help the others, but that doesn't feel like that's what Damian is telling her. So why is he so certain that she can do something when this whole time, she's only been able to stand there in horror and watch him... freeze? Die? Is he dying?

Oddly enough, she's too frozen (thankfully not literally) and overwhelmed to cry, even with the desperation now creeping into her gaze. It's... too much. He's telling her she can save the others but her mind's still swirling with this story. A kiss. Tears. How is she supposed to tell the others when Damian's always been the one to most easily understand her?

Kisa doesn't look away. Maybe because she's far too afraid to. Or too overwhelmed to. Any variety of reasons, really. ]

[If he’s not dying, it sure feels as if this may be what dying is like. Cold and numb and distant. A little more than hopeless.

He’s not sure why there’s an inkling of concern with her watching him freeze over. He supposes he doesn’t want her to lose determination so easily when she would be fine. Even with the knights. She has the potential to help everyone else suffering with shards, if only she would try.] You can’t be scared. [Despite lacking the usual conviction, he gives the words with logical optimism.]

And you can’t give up. You have... all the... tools... You can tell... the others, too. You aren’t... useless...

[Tipping his chin up is an attempt to keep the ice from climbing his neck, but to no avail. He drops his chin back, and the ice grabs it with its translucent tendrils. His brows pinch. For a moment, he tries to move his arms at the shoulders. The ice crackles away, but leaves behind a sharp, burning sting.

If he’s broken, he’ll be destroyed, he thinks.] Don’t let... the others freeze... Kisa.

[ You can't be scared, he says, as though he hasn't been telling her not to look, to try and protect herself as though he knew all too well that all of this was terrifying.

He's placing so much on her shoulders, and even though Kisa had told him that she'd wanted to be better... right now, she wants to run and hide. Until someone fixes this. Until someone saves all of them and they can go back, and Damian can be his grumpy, embarrassed self. After all... what happens if he's wrong? What if she can't help them?

Jion had told her it was okay to be afraid, to run away or look for help, and she thinks about it, briefly. Damian's clearly telling her to help the others without so much as asking her for help. Does he think it's too late for him? This...

"For those things, you’ll be able to deal with scary things," Jion had also told her, with a warm smile.

It hits her then, so hard that she almost chokes from the realization.

It's not that she can't be scared. She can be scared.

But Damian's also right. She can't give up, and as the ice continues to devour him from the inside out, something flashes in Kisa's eyes and she gently slips her fingers free of his hand.

Only to press both palms against his very icy cheeks, take a deep, bolstering breath, and lean in to kiss him.

If Damian thinks she can help save everyone, then she wants to start with him. ]

[Really, Damian isn’t expecting to be helped, not that he can feel regret or fear. It isn’t anything against Kisa. He is too stubborn to ask for it, wanting instead to help himself. In the case he can’t, he’ll perish. What matters, above his own safety, is the safety of others. Maybe that is the turn-around. He isn’t thinking of himself.

So to say he’s surprised when Kisa kisses him is an understatement. It’s not instant mortification and embarrassment. He’s frozen still, feeling nothing. Gerda’s kisses had been on the cheek, the hands, but Damian is a fool who wasn’t specific. She might as well had let him die.

The ice crackles gently. The warmth that swells up suddenly from the pit of him speckles his neck and cheeks in a burgundy flush. The feelings which had been missing flood back—embarrassment, shock, shyness. Slowly, the ice melts away, starting from the neck, sliding off in thick chunks and shattering at their feet. Everything tingles fiercely, not unlike going inside after being out in the snow, when the warmth returns.

Finally, he can move his arms again, flexes them, his fingers, his legs. He’s as red in the face as ever, and maybe it’s from the broken spell, or maybe it’s from the realization she had smooched him for that to happen. His head sags some in her palms, and he reaches up to rub his chest with a hand. The heavy, painful shard is gone. He sighs quietly.]

[ Well, maybe if Damian had thought to specify that instead of talking about ice spelling out the word ETERNITY, these kids would be ten times less embarrassed!!

But alas. What's done is done, and as Kisa draws back, it's to see the ice begin cracking and melting right off of Damian, as though it really had been just that simple all along. His face grows warm - worryingly warm - beneath her palms, and once it sags, she carefully releases him and clasps her hands together over her chest. He's definitely red-- maybe because all of the heat in his body just came back all at once? Surely not for the same reasons that Kisa's cheeks are warm.

Damian's moving again, at the very least, no longer icing over, but he hasn't said anything.

Surprisingly, he won't be the first to do so, as Kisa finally makes one more attempt to be brave. ]

Damian...?

[ It's entirely quiet, just barely above a whisper, but she's still so concerned. ]

[It isn't until he's warm again that he realizes how cold he had been before, how... dead-feeling inside. As much as he complains about hating other people and as much as he enjoys his alone time, he's really not into the whole apathetic shtick.]

I'm fine. I just... didn't... [Wait. She talked. He pauses, a long pause, just of him staring at her in mild surprise. But he doesn't actually say anything about it, and he doesn't draw verbal attention to the for once rumble of her voice.] I'm fine now.

[Maybe a bit chilly once the buzzing heat settles in his limbs and his face. He doesn't feel a hundred percent well, but good enough. Better than being an icicle.]

You did it. I told you that you could. [Much to their embarrassment, but it's fine. They aren't going to talk about it... probably. If they don't acknowledge the kiss, it never happened! It was for safety, not... personal enjoyment...!!] Even if you didn't have to do it for me.

[ Yeah, we're never going to talk about this kiss ever again. It was duty! Duty and friendship!! ]

... I...

[ The way he stares at her makes her very tempted to clam up immediately. Does her voice sound weird? Why was he staring??

A soft breath, and then Kisa swallows hard and keeps speaking, just as quietly. ]

I wanted to... you're just as important.

[Holy shit. Kisa is absolutely talking, and he hadn't just been hearing things. He doesn't quite know if it's got something to do with this place specifically, or if she has decided to simply start chatting.

But he enjoys it? At least... he thinks it's nice. That she's overcoming her dislike of speaking, that she doesn't want to be quiet any longer. She wants to have a voice.] You're right. [He can't forget why he's Robin, or why his father is Batman.

Even if it's about himself.] Everyone is important. [He pauses for a long moment, unsure of how to say what he wants without sounding... stupid, he thinks.] It was brave. It takes a lot of courage to try to save the first person.

I guess I owe you my thanks.

[ It's for a fairly simple reason-- she's been trying to coax her voice out, slowly, painstakingly, but with the knowledge that she was going to have to tell other people how to help their friends... it's better for the ones suffering if she speaks.

And Damian was someone she trusted. It's probably fine to start with him, even if she inwardly cringes at just how strange it feels on her throat to speak again and how softly hoarse she must sound. ]

I was... scared...

[ She unclasps her hands, only to press one palm over her chest. ]

That you were... wrong about me. That I... couldn't do anything. I thought... you were going to...

[ Die. Be frozen forever. Etc.

Of course, she hasn't cried during this whole thing, but now she's tearing up. ]

I-I'm so glad... you're okay!

[Oh hell, now she's crying, and he's not sure how to broach or deal with this kind of thing. Plenty of civilians cry, but it's never... There's never quite this level of sociability involved in it.

For a few moments, he stands resolute, shoulders stiff, fists clenched at his sides, struggling with what he knows he should say and do and what he doesn't at all wanna hear come out of his mouth.]

I'm okay. Stop... [His voice, already soft, trails off. He can't tell her to stop crying. He cried in front of Dextera for a bit when his father vanished? Who is he to tell someone to stop crying.

Besides, here and now, crying is good.] I'm never wrong. I wasn't wrong about you. Nothing would have happened to me because I knew you wouldn't allow it. [His fingers loosen. He reaches out and puts a hand on her shoulder in an awkward gesture of goodwill. Knows it's still too detached.

So he takes her head between his hands and pulls her forehead against his chest. He doesn't know if it counts as a cuddle, and it's not a hug necessarily, but it's as close as he thinks they'd be able to exchange consolation without her going furry.]

It'll be okay.

[ Damian doesn't need to be lugging a tiger cub around in the spirit of camaraderie and goodwill, so really, this is for the best.

Even though Kisa can honestly say that she has never quite been in the strange and semi-awkward position of having someone draw her forehead against their chest with a mild thunk. At the same time, it's about as close as Damian has ever gotten to outright holding her (for a variety of reasons), which she knows is probably a Big Deal for him.

Slowly, she reaches up, resting her hands on his, even if they're both not the warmest at the moment. And, even more slowly, she breathes out and blinks back tears. ]

... Mm.

[ Well, they'll probably have to deal with getting Damian properly warmed up after being an ice statue, but he'd just said he was never wrong, so she'll have to believe that.

After all, he's right here, breathing and no longer detached, and that's all she could have asked for.

It'll be okay. ]

[Thankfully, Damian doesn't hold her head hostage for very long. When he's sure he's given her enough to show he at least sympathizes, he releases his hands and lowers them to his sides.]

We shouldn't stay out in the open in case there are enemies. [Now that he's doing better, her safety is the first concern.] Do you have a place to hide that's safe?

If this event is like one we've had previously, we'll all end up in the town again at the end, when the town decides it's finished with its game. We'll have to wait it out. We can help other people we find as we go along.

Understand?

[ A nod, slightly troubled, but there's a more determined set to her features now. As long as they get to go back... then for now, they just need to get through this first.

So Kisa glances over her shoulder and points. There are various places back there. Alcoves, under icy staircases, a room she's claimed as "safe" where she curls up at night. There are definitely options.

Helping other people, though... that's a given, but the mental image of Damian kissing other statues is a weird one. ]

[Following her indication, Damian considers these reasonable places after a moment of consideration. He would have found the same more than likely... if he hadn't been slowly turning into an icicle.]

Alright. [He... holds out his hand for her to take.] We can rest for a while and then go out to see who may need assistance.

[Damian Wayne cannot kiss anyone else period, lisTEN. Well, he could meet maybe two of the criteria, but... no one wants kisses from Damian. Except maybe animals.]

Come on. [He'll pull her along, trying not to be so brisk and hurried.] Show me.

[ Look, he's likely to succeed more at kissing them than he is at crying, she's pretty sure!!

But Kisa keeps a slight grip on Damian's hand and does her best to-- well, follow. Without slipping. Which may or may not go as well as she wants it to, so if she slides or slips, she'll at least try to correct herself before it becomes an actual falling problem. ]

Up ahead... on the left.

[On top of Damian not going so fast, he exchanges holding her hand for holding her arm near the elbow. If she slips and slides, he tightens his grip gently to keep her from going down.

If his dumbass Robin boots are made for anything, it's definitely for the worst terrain. Preventative measures all around.] Here? [When they finally make it, further up and on the left.

He lets (and helps) her go in first.] Leave it to this God forsaken town to throw us in a castle made completely of ice as if we all aren't already freezing to death.

Ah--

[ Kisa sighs quietly, looking around. Yep, this room works. She'd valiantly managed to yank a tapestry down off the wall to use as an additional blanket, but she's still a little worried about Damian, considering that he'd. Been an icicle. Or very close to it. ]

... Um. If you're... still cold, you can hug me.

[ Not because!! She wants to cuddle!! Just! She's a tiger! She has a fur! She'll be warm!!! ]

[Too late. Damian is already trying to give her most of the tapestry.] I'm fine. Your... [No, he can't say that. It sounds stupid. It makes him embarrassed. Just thinking about it causes his cheeks and ears to color very faintly, briefly.

He's somewhat warm for now because of reasons. That have nothing to do with her kissing him!! He'll just be warm for a while, don't look at him.] You need it more than me. I've been trained to withstand weather and temperature. [But he is... sort of cuddling like they had been for the quest. Tucked kind of close, arm and shoulder to shoulder. He's not scared of her turning into a tiger, but he would rather her be human.]

After we rest, we'll keep moving which is best. We'll explore and see what we can find to aid us and anyone else.

[ Kisa's forehead is still lightly creased with concern; she also refuses to take most of the tapestry, because really, she's fine. Damian's nowhere near as frigid as he had been, inside and out, and he's warmer now, in a way that additionally makes her chest feel warm. Relief, maybe.

So she doesn't move away, strangely comfortable like this. Maybe because he's not as stiff as he was the first time they did this. She's almost a little tempted to rest her cheek on his shoulder, tired as she is-- but she's also not ready to end up napping like this. So instead... ]

You... you've trained for this sort of thing?

[ Damian, the more she learns about you, the more confused she is. ]

Event Fourteen.

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i cant believe i had to go to bed before i got this

I'm sorry you had to wake up to it

i was blessed tbh

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kia wtf i'm screaming

I did nothing???

hm. payback.

WHAT THE HELL

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A confused Damian is a great Damian tbf

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