[COMPLETE] It has been, and always will be

[The Semblance of Unity]

Temperance looked up sharply as Sonny arrived. "Can you be given permission? No, never mind - how long has he been dead?" The permission was certainly an issue, but not one she could afford to be concerned with. She could feel the blood inside him, still and soft. What was the point of becoming more magical if not to prevent things like this?

Maybe she could. Slowly, she tried to coax his blood into moving, tried to push her magic into his veins. Maybe their was still time - although for what, she wasn't quite sure. Temperance breathed out slowly.

shibrogane

idk trying to pop him back up but idk how long he's been deadski so....

 

[shibrogane]

"I'm okay." Sonny leaned into the hug, burying their face in America's shoulder. "Ezra didn't hurt me. He just wanted Pax's thumbprint. I tried to stop that, too, but I couldn't."

Temperance spoke and Sonny's demeanor became cooler, resentful, almost sulky. "A while," said Sonny. "Days. I don't think what you're doing will work."

But something was stirring inside the body. The blood began to move at Temperance's urging, pulling at her energy, from the energy of the trees around her. Slowly, she would become aware of another presence at the edges of her conscious: a presence that, in a voice that was overwhelming on the psychic level, was screaming NO.  

[The Semblance of Unity]

She almost recoiled from the voice, but her hands didn't leave his body. "Tell me why," Temperance said aloud. Adoelle had wanted to die, had succeeded because she hadn't been quick enough or clever enough or magic enough. But here, she might be able to make a difference. There was always an option that wasn't death, always.

She kept her energy up. Maybe Sonny was right, maybe the voice was right, maybe... It was hard to think past the voice that must be Pax's.

shibrogane

 

[lizbot]

Uneasy at both the shift in Sonny and Temperance's demand to...who? America turned to look at the nurse with her hands on Pax and power int he air. "Temp? What are you...what are you trying to do?"

She switched her sight to Mr. Bitterberry's and the perspective abruptly switched, looking down at Pax and Temperance from the jay's perch above their heads.  

[shibrogane]

"He doesn't want to come back," said Sonny, their voice climbing a register in their uncertainty. "Temperance, you're going to hurt him--"

Mr. Bitterberry could see clearly the happenings: The spirit, the presence that hovered at the edges of Temperance's mind, was clearly being pulled back to the body. Temperance could see it, almost, as a shimmering wintergreen thing, pale and beautiful and reluctant to return. I CAN'T GO BACK, the spirit cried, audible only to Temperance, DON'T MAKE ME GO BACK  

[azuredreams]

Jeremiah was quiet, watching as Temperance worked. Somehow, for a moment, he thought of Autumn- the things Autumn would try with her ability to heal. Was that what she was doing?

With Sonny's words, he was certain of it. "Pax has been brought back once already," he said quietly, his own voice uncertain in the face of whatever magic Temperance was attempting to work. At least, he assumed that they had been brought back before, given that Pax and Pride had died at some point. Undeath bonds.

"It cannot be good to be brought back again." They had failed even with whatever time they had been given by an Ascencion that was not their own.  

[Grey Dragon]

Kaleb felt almost a momentary relief that the magic he had felt, the magic disrupted by both America and Temperance, had called not an enemy to them but someone who had tried to protect the still form amongst the roots. But it was a hollow relief when faced with the reality of Pax's stillness.

He felt rather than saw the magic Temperance attempted, but only began to make sense of it in light of the confusing discussion. She was trying to bring him back to life, and apparently, Pax was responding. The small teen felt a lump in his throat, what sort of life had Pax lived, to refuse the offering of life?

"Can you... Does he have to be alive to speak with him?" Kaleb asked, addressing both Temperance and Sonny with a timid voice and worried expression. "Can we still do what we need to do, without bringing him back?"

The Semblance of Unity

 

[demon_pachabel]

The farther they got into this strange murder-mystery program, the more confusion Cass felt - perhaps it was somewhere between 'this person can revive the dead' and 'I'm just following spirit-dad because I am a lost duckling and my writer got behind somewhere', but Cass just nodded thoughtfully in the background and pretended she was on top of everything and her A-game.

At least until the glanced over to Jeremiah, drawing herself closer to the man to linger by his side and gently bumping her shoulder against his arm before offering him up a smile. Looking tired there, need a small shoulder to maybe lean on?

azuredreams

 

[Smerdle]

Rabbit drew in a single sharp breath when Sonny appeared, then slowly knelt as the prognosis grew more and more dire. This was horrible. Unnecessary. He was upset. The sirens would be too. And yet, if Pax didn't want to come back, it wouldn't be right for him to be forced. Still, Rabbit didn't try to stop Temperance. Not yet.

"What happened?" he asked Sonny instead. "Did Ezra kill him?"  

[Melancholies]

"Pax has been dying..." Shiloh said quietly to Rabbit, but it was still up in the air as to whether or not Ezra had dealt the final blow or whatever hypothetical thing. He watched as Sonny showed up, finding it a little ironic that all three of the principals had been unceremoniously united here with them. He knew Temperance had a wide range of healing abilities, but the ability to bring someone back to life?

"Sometimes," And he swallowed hard, knowing it would sound callous, knowing him and Temperance didn't see eye to eye when it came to the nuances and values of a life, "You have to know when to let 'em go. I think he must've been really tired..." His gaze flicked to America again, to Jeremiah, to Sonny, "It's been like this since what, early March?"

He sighed and squeezed Jamie's hand, the secondhand sympathy he was feeling very palpable in their mind link. His eyes didn't well the same, but they went glossy if only because the emotion felt like his own. He let go of Jamie's hand in favor of wrapping his arm around his shoulders in a side hug, the entire scene feeling like a sort of sadness he wasn't supposed to be privy too. All he had to do was recall Silk's story of Melany and her back, and most of his own sympathy started to fade.

Still, it was hard to watch everyone get torn up like they were.

saedusk

The Semblance of Unity

@ temp

Smerdle

@ rabbit a little

 

[shibrogane]

"He died," said Sonny, "he's been dying for months, I told people to help them and they said he would, and I said how long I could hold him but I couldn't anymore, there's too many blocks on my power--when you all came here you bound me up and now I can't save them--but he didn't even want to be saved, that's why it was so hard--"

They shrugged away from America, started two steps towards Temperance before stopping.

"You're going to regret it," they said, lowly. "That's not a threat. It's the truth. You're being ******** selfish."  

[The Semblance of Unity]

"Get off my a**, Sonny," she snarled. It was hard to hear, to concentrate when everyone was talking. Temperance turned her eyes to the spirit, shutting out everyone else around her. No matter what she did, it had to be gradual, she couldn't pick him up only to slam him magically back down. Pax had been back before and there was a thin line between cruelty and ethics.

She knew she could do it, and a part of her wanted to so, so badly. Death was never the answer, there was always another way. But he was far enough gone that pulling him back to a sick body might damage him irreparably. Temperance took a deep breath. "It's okay," she whispered. Slowly, slowly, she let it out and pulled her magic out of his body tendril by quivering tendril. If she forced him, he'd probably find another way into death, and it hurt to admit that. That here, she was too late. Like always.

Then she removed her hands and set them listlessly in her lap, staring at them. "I suppose," she said in a voice oddly devoid of inflection. "There is nothing else to do here."

Quote:

Temperance is ready to go

 

[lizbot]

Letting out the breath she'd been holding, America returned to her own eyes, and turned an apologetic look at Sonny. She had a dozen reasons to apologize to her friend, but for now she said, "Thank you, for all you've done and tried."

Stepping forward, she put a hand on Temp's shoulder. "We've still got work to do, and...it's good to know. That you can, if it's needed." Just hopefully it wouldn't be.

the semblance of unity

 

[shibrogane]

Thank you, whispered Pax. Sonny's hand dropped.

"This is where he wanted to be," said Sonny, "I just didn't want anyone to... hurt him." They stepped forward, and with a complicated gesture, the watchward rose up again. "I... something bad is coming, so... please make sure it stops, okay?

"I need to get back home."

Quote:

Temperance is ready to move on.

 

[Melancholies]

Shiloh watched the entire scene, but raised an eyebrow at Sonny's comment, "Something bad? Wait—like what?" He furrowed his brow. Was something happening with the group that went after Ezra? His stomach dropped at the thought of Oliver...