Epistrophe
He started with an obdurate heave, driving himself out of bed like an inhuman colossus roused from its ancient slumber, ennervated and vigorless.
Harrison froze for a fraction of a second, as in Solomon's eyes was held a disdain for action so deep and heartfelt it was almost scary. He rummaged around the backpack for a second and fished out a wooden baton, hand-carved and heavy. It was not made from a mere random branch, but out of professional craftsman's wood: lignum vitae.
"Here, I'm not coming, but this is in case you encounter danger," he explained to Harrison, handing it over to the athlete's remarkable confusion.
"Danger?" asked Harrison, looking dubiously at the self-defense implement in his hand.
"The Academy can have weird creatures, sometimes. I've read about it. It's not completely unknown for a new Enrolled to be attacked. It's not much but at least this way you're not empty-handed when running away from a demon or whatever."
"Thanks." The appreciation seemed sincere. It wasn't what Solomon was after, though. He pressed on, boldly pursuant of that one conversational thread.
"Oh yeah, in case you encounter any other students, I'd appreciate if you didn't mention me or what I might be able to do to them. I want to make my own debut."
"Alright, sure. Won't betray your secrets, man."
"Also..." Solomon offered him a square, emotionless look.
It was a complete shot in the dark. A darkness he didn't even truly expect to hold any monsters. A bullet potentially wasted on deaf ears. An impulsive and ultimately meaningless attempt: something he'd learned to steer away from, as the crushing defeat of its failure to meet its target was only that much more embittering.
Solomon wasn't certain why some part of him even felt the drive to bother with the attempt.
Regardless, he attempted to channel as much sincerity as he could, and said, "Don't trust them."
Imagine, for a moment, the feeling of being completely blind from birth, and yet accustomed to living in such a manner. Comfortable with it, as you recognized your own house and its shape innately through a mixture of proprioception and touch, every step of the staircase leading to the porch as familiar to you as the contents of your pockets. Capable of telling if the couch had been moved based on the acoustics of the living room. Able to liberally move around, clothe yourself, and cook meals without issue.
A certainty would exist even with this utter blindness, that you understood the artifice of your own universe.
And then one day, coming back home, you take a step inside and your foot immediately sinks down into an endless pit where there should've been a floorboard.
It was that feeling that coursed through Solomon's entire being, in the second after those three words left his mouth. As if thinking on it, Harrison looked down at the baton, and then did something unexpected as the fabric of the future seemed to change - catching Solomon completely flat-footed.
"Alright. I'll keep that in mind. Why?"
It broke the world. It broke the house. As if a mad scientist had kidnapped you to inject you with an experimental medicine, allowing you to see for the first time. The reassurance of nothingness was gone, stripped away like so much padding, and you were left cold and alone in a dreadful wind. No more refuge from the blinding enlightenment the world offered for those with eyes. No more could you walk slowly, but now you were expected to run ahead, to sprint and compete for advantage.
Solomon, for seconds, felt rudderless, like an engine with all impetus lost, a once-perturbed patch of water returned to perfect silence. He stared at Harrison for what felt like an eternity, but was really only a second.
"You're not supposed to ask why," answered Solomon with a slight stammer. "You're meant to shrug, or blow me off, or make a comment about paranoia, and then..."
He pressed a hand firmly to his forehead, and found sweat accumulating like moisture on a cold bottle. His eyes widened, and Solomon's sight expanded beyond measure. His eyes widened and widened, until they could not widen anymore.
And then widened more, beyond width, consuming all that could be seen. Drinking in every sight in the world and more. Avariciously grasping for every morsel of sight.
He felt sick, almost down to the bone, as if a string made of pure biliousness were flailing throughout his innards, snarling organs and crushing the fluids out of them. His balance flipped over, he stumbled back and almost fell down like a clumsy skater on ice, before Harrison reacted and caught onto his shoulder and lapel, dropping the self-defense baton to prop Solomon up on his feet. Solomon couldn't see Harrison, as he was far too busy perceiving everything, attempting to adjust to it.
"Holy shit, you alright?" Harrison asked, on the border of being terrified. He'd call medical aid if Solomon didn't answer. "You look like you've seen Jesus."
"I'm... good," Solomon answered, if barely - a combination of breathlessness and brain-deep nausea making the words more like choked-out grunts. "Set me down."
Harrison moved over a foot and planted Solomon's ass on the edge of the bed. Solomon allowed himself to rest down on the bed and looked at the ceiling, analyzing its color.
It revealed a structure, a hint of the meaning of the color white, and the paint that acted as its medium. It revealed secrets to him, as the barriers of physical reality corroded off. He could not see the individual molecules of the paint, but in a way, he almost didn't need to. Holistically, the structure revealed more about its details than any microscopic analysis ever could. In that wholesomeness, he found answers he'd never dreamt of: secrets inherent to color white, and inherent to ceilings, that if plumbed for even their merest scraps could be utilized to change the course of civilizations: to render every prior invention of mankind utterly worthless and meaningless.
He moved from seeing the ceiling to seeing the rest of the room.
After realizing that Solomon's pupils had shrunk down to mere to pinpricks, and were moving rapidly as if observing a thousand events, Harrison ran off to call help. He suspected a seizure, and Solomon could see that suspicion: as a cloud of emotions and thoughts over his mind. Peering beyond them, he could see the finest moments of Harrison's football career, and its shaping influence on him as an individual. He could see the relationships and correspondences between Harrison and his friends.
Solomon moved on to view the near-future, and saw the Educator arriving, cloaked and hatted, yet still faceless, to sit down at the bedside and mutter something to him. Instruction. How to control the mirages, to not become enslaved to them.
"There is no such thing as fate, for men like us," said the Educator, both in that moment, and in a moment several years ago, and then in a moment of his youth, before he was known as the Educator. A hand wavered in the air, and branched off in a million directions, fingers like so much twine, and Solomon could not see the youthful Educator anymore, his existence a hidden thing, a secret beneath the surface of whatever he was viewing. The ones in the present and near-past continued: "Only the sheer hubris of hoping to change God's design to suit our image. And in due time, we may achieve that dream. For now, rest and see what Eden has to offer us."
And he saw.
Across the world.
In a ruined city overcast with grey skies and black trails of smoke from pits of fire, an orphaned youth sheltered under a torn blanket, sleeping and dreaming, his face contorting full of hate and hunger. He dreamt of revenge. He dreamt of murder on the man who'd done this to him. He dreamt of the sister who'd died. And in his dreams, the youth and Solomon could both see a black lamb, as fragile and delicate as a newborn baby, its forehead adorned with a blood-red mark, a bestial mark that promised salvation. And behind the lamb stood four shadowy figures, cloaked and clad in seals of honor, all on horses. His coming to power would presage the apocalypse. There was absolutely nothing that could stop this, not even the uttermost efforts of the Olympian, the Educator or Solomon himself. It was needed for the world to move onward.
Across the worlds.
On an Earth already ruined long ago, he saw a man in featureless armor as white as an eggshell, perfunctorily slashing down with his hand in a chop, to remotely detach the skull of a horrific and truly evil hell-abomination from its neck, flames spluttering out instead of blood. He was intent on studying the bodies, reverse-engineering the pure evil within them in order to locate its theoretical opposite coordinate: pure goodness. In another slash of the hand, he did the same to a thousand other monsters, and then his face slowly turned in Solomon's direction, as if noticing his presence. Solomon looked elsewhere before the vision could develop beyond that.
Across the everything.
He saw the universe was a spiritual alchemy, a decoction of an elder power, an alien star, started by a primordial flame: his existence a shard of magnified dross, a castaway of the process charred into being unrecognizable and worthless. It was the process of making something out of nothing, an infinity carted from oblivion.
He saw... himself vomiting into a bucket.
The Educator's voice returned into focus, like a rainstorm gaining sudden volume and resolution as you stepped outside into it. Distant, still, standing across the room.
"-and gets plenty of water, as..."
His voice trailed off as everyone in the room - the Educator, Harrison, and Ms. Parker - turned to look at Solomon, throwing up into the conveniently provided container, as if realizing he were conscious once more. They politely looked away to let him do his business. It took Solomon almost a full minute to get everything out of his stomach. He felt deeply sick nonetheless, for entire seconds after, as more images came running through his mind: vistas of horror and warfare, delight and redemption, of everything and-
"Mr. Lancaster," said the Educator, approaching. "I need you to look at me."
He did, and saw a thousand faces, each one an indistinct blur: the faces of everyone he'd ever met, and people he'd never met, and would meet and would never meet and-
"Not like that," said the Educator, resetting the arcane process before the faces could resolve into something else. He did so with nothing more than a flick of his index finger, holding absolute, godlike power over the visions. "Just at me. Concentrate."
He tried. He tried and it was difficult and he surrendered immediately, incapable of carrying on through the hardship of it. He wanted to cry and couldn't manage even words of self-pity at his immediate failure.
"I see we'll need to employ special measures. Very well." The Educator leaned down and pressed a thumb to Solomon's forehead, and in a snap, everything was focused, aligned and normal suddenly, and the secrets of reality were completely walled-off once more, and the things he'd seen were distant and not here with him. He was sitting in a room, listening to the ticking of the clock on the wall, the Educator, his homeroom teacher, and Harrison standing in front of him. "There. It should be better now."
"What happened?"
"I had to seal off a section of your third eye," said the Educator, and it felt almost like a lie, its shade a touch whiter than most such fibs. "For your own psychological well-being, of course. Rest assured, we'll add handling its power to your remedial lesson schedule." That, in turn, wasn't a lie whatsoever.
"Third eye?" asked Ms. Parker, clearly not recalling a mention of anything like that among the discussions circulating about the Magician.
"Sometimes, an Enrolled can develop spontaneously, usually in a maladaptive manner," said the Educator, and it felt once more like an innocent misdirection, although only a modest one, not injurious or intentioned maliciously. "Fear not, I am experienced with such events and I've handled the issue here reliably. Mr. Lancaster won't experience any more adverse reactions so long as he limits his insight to viewing the immediate threads around him, and avoids shuffling them around too much."
It had the furtive cadence of doublespeak, a second meaning beneath the first. It seemed the Educator was telling him it was fine to continue making predictions, as long as he didn't do the same thing he'd done with Harrison a couple of minutes ago, and didn't cast his sight out too far and beyond.
It wasn't sight, Solomon corrected himself. He'd experienced those scenes with the fullness of his being, like a sponge drawing in moisture. Its translation to a mundane human sensorium and memory was something his body did automatically, in an attempt to make sense of channeling those experiences without a physical sensory medium. The complete and utter confusion of so much additional input was part of the reason behind his physiological weakness and loss of equilibrium.
It didn't change the facts of what he'd experienced. Entire universes beyond his own, even if his memories of them were already faded like ghosts, only a couple precious scenes clutched onto like coruscant gemstones. It felt as though his entire life, Solomon had been a fish swimming in a pond, unaware of the world beyond the water.
And then, by accident, he accelerated himself at Harrison at such speeds he'd leapt right out of the water and into the fresh air and brisk sun, experiencing its incandescent and blinding rays for the first time. He'd seen dry land, even touched it with a fin. Maybe in a million years of evolution, he could even walk upon its sands.
It almost hurt to realize the Educator's instruction of not seeking out the sun and dryness above was crucial to his own wellness. It was like receiving an ideal gift, a resolution to all of one's problems, only to have it snatched away in the next moment.
After all - not through manipulation and not through magic - he'd changed Harrison's mind.
He'd always made his words sincere when giving out advice, and nothing about that changed this time.
Yet this time, somehow, the structure of Harrison's mind accepted the deviation from its intended course, and weighed Solomon's words with the due gravity they deserved.
To know Solomon was not permitted to do so again was crushing. It felt like having the Gate of Heaven in front of him, its tantalizing entrance studded with cumulonimbi and a fence wrought of silver, only to realize he still had to wait in line.
"I hope you can be patient until then," the Educator said, almost as a final warning - softly-spoken yet hiding a depth of fright, as if carrying a portent of doom were Solomon to do otherwise. The Educator turned, in one step, to address the other boy in the room. "Mr. Armstrong, I'd very much like if you didn't harry Mr. Lancaster too much. He'll need some bedrest for the upcoming future. A lot of bedrest and time to contemplate. Healing begins in the mind, after all. And a tired mind is an injured mind."
"Yes sir."
"Superb. Ms. Parker, I'll leave the rest of this affair in your capable hands." He offered the woman a respectful nod, then clacked his cane against the floor. "Excuse me."
And like that, he disappeared. Solomon could see almost a thread, annoying, flailing right in front of his eyes as if attempting to grab his attention. He knew it was a bare remnant of whatever means the Educator used to translocate himself, and that by tugging on it with sufficient force, he could follow to see where he'd gone.
He didn't. Instead, the back of his head slammed against the pillow in exhaustion. He'd really wanted to sleep before. Now, he was dead-tired.
"Ugh."
"I'll... uh, empty out the bucket," said Harrison after a second, looking at Ms. Parker. She only offered a stiff nod.
---
After the incident, you've managed to keep the entire thing on the down-low: Harrison's firmly on your side, so as far as your Class is concerned, you were sick after eating some expired food you brought with you for lunch. No one knows you'll be receiving special lessons unless you tell them.
Aside from that, you've managed to maintain the secrecy of your Role.
For the moment, your entire sense of self is shaken up, and you have 120 Will (+10 from last action, +5 from resting on your pillow, +15 from default turn income] - although the discovery was a shocking and life-changing one, you're upset you'll need training to engage in the fullness of your new sight.
At the moment, you have seven (7) Coffee Jello packets left, and you must ration them wisely. They restore a variable amount of Will, increasing and decreasing dependent on circumstances as well as your current amount of Will (more is restored if low) and can provide discounts to certain actions, such as Classwork and Exploration.
Select a maximum of three Actions:
[ ] Classwork [-15 Will] - Standardized and individualized. At least a single action should be devoted to this each turn, unless you wish to fall behind: more if you wish to excel.
-[ ] Standardized - Attend classes, turn in your homework on time, and prepare for the upcoming pop quizzes and tests. Learn Tarot history, mysticism, occult meanings, and more standard subjects! Modest advancement in your Enrollment.
-[ ] Individualized [-15 Will] - A set of more individualized one-on-one sessions with the Educator, focused almost solely on improving the nature and powers of your Role. Highly preferable. Requires a special dispensation from him, issued only to the best students who excel in standardized examinations. The extra Will cost represents effort spent on studying and cramming to earn these sessions. Awesome advancement in your Enrollment, as efficient as ~2.5 classes of standardized Education.
-[ ] Remedial Classwork - The Educator invited you in for remedial classwork focused on your 'third eye.' You're free to take his offer whenever. Almost no effort expended on Enrollment, if any.
[ ] Bonding [-5 Will] - Deepen your bond with a student or faculty member you know!
-[ ] Harrison
-[ ] Damien
-[ ] Penelope
-[ ] Write-in
[ ] Interaction [-10 Will] - Attempt to make contacts with your upperclassmen. Gain social advantages and earn favors!
[ ] Exploration [-20 Will] - Apparently, your Classmates are putting together an exploration group that aims to receive the Educator's dispensation to explore the world outside the Academy! An exciting opportunity, as these worlds can hide arcane secrets that lead to furthering Enrollment, as well as the occasional artifact or potential ally. Many of these can be kept post-graduation. Infamously, the Mars Colonization Class brought the entire Martian civilization with them after graduation!
[ ] Decompression [+10 Will] - Default if nothing is selected. Just slack off.
[ ] Write-in
