Jo (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
loquacious_raven) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
schutzhafen2020-07-01 03:45 am
loquacious_raven) wrote in schutzhafen2020-07-01 03:45 am
Entry tags:
Suspension of Disbelief
Who: Jo & Any
What: Quietly trying to cope after orientation (and meeting new people but COPING).
Where: Student commons, outside table.
When: Half an hour or so after orientation.
Summary The orientation professor was a manticore. A MANTICORE people.
Warnings: Extensive vocabulary usage.
She had a great many things to do now. If, in fact this was reality. There was an outside chance that she'd been mugged or worse on the road, and judging by current affairs, the weapon of choice had been a compendium of the fantastic to say the least. Perhaps the Encyclopedia Mythica or the like, though it'd be a strange robber that preferred such to smaller weapons. Strange indeed, but then again, so was the idea that Admissions was headed by a quadruped with a delightful smile.
Granted, the admissions offer had found her in her travels, delivered by courier, so perhaps she should have suspected oddity from the start. Or rather heeded it to say, as prior it had seemed a delightful unexpected venue to avoid whatever investigators her parents had no doubt hired combined with the necessary college education.
Careful what one wished for hmmm?
One sure sign this wasn't a fever dream brought about by blunt force trauma was Munin, her silly little lunk of bird was fresh out of his last wing brace, as healed as he was going to get, and delightedly hopping all over the small, outdoor table she'd claimed. If she were injured she'd likely write him into this mental fantasy as a cuddlier thing, not the noisome featherhead that was plopping all over the two open notebooks and the pad of paper she was trying to write her thoughts out on.
No, a mindscape when recovering would be far less annoying one hoped. She could be empathetic enough of those trapped in vegetative states to hope.
An alternate possibility to physical damage was mental unraveling of course; given her family history it had to be on her pad of possibilities, carefully written between bird toes. It was quite the disabling thought; that this was a normal college and finally her mind was unraveling, painting the world in fantasy. Given how little some of the other new students had reacted to Gulbahar, it was even within the realm of possibility. Vivid, and even tactile, hallucinations was a symptom some schizophrenics experienced. Uncommon, in her own research, for it to manifest so suddenly and completely, but it was possible she could have missed earlier symptoms. Her bird's activity levels might not give her an easy way to dismiss such so that was at least underlined for further thought.
Thirdly, well, the conclusion that this was likely reality, as defined as real and experienced relatively the same by all who encounter it. The other students had given their first staff member room unnecessary to a proper human size. Small details even if there had not been the degree of surprise she had felt herself, well, they might be a shield against madness. Or the conclusion of such.
It didn't help that the newest stories to intrude on personal thoughts were all rather harsh ones. Young soldiers, doing terrible things, and dying just as awfully. She was sketching out details and highlights to quell the tales but the emotion behind a lot of the words that bled through her pen were not helping against the inner turmoil.
Far the opposite in fact.
"Cawwwfeeeee?" her bird trilled finally, tonguing the end of her pen. It was enough to make her blink and shake her head flipping the notepad over. Coffee.
Right, that might help the way her hands were shaking. Caffeine withdrawals certainly. "Good idea," she sighed, pulling the thermos out of her battered rucksack. "NOT for you." That was the last thing anyone here needed, but she was fishing bits of string and some tinsel out of a pocket to distract the young raven from dunking his beak in her personal addiction. She'd given him some shiny can tabs earlier but somehow those had disappeared while she'd been tied up in trying to process things.
Somehow.
Likely she'd find them later in the strangest places yes, alongside small bits and bobs he'd managed to steal from anyone passing by or the like since she'd been distracted. "I will throw you across the table," she growled softly as Munin...stretched his neck to dip tinsel in her cup.
Someone save the bird?
Or the girl?
What: Quietly trying to cope after orientation (and meeting new people but COPING).
Where: Student commons, outside table.
When: Half an hour or so after orientation.
Summary The orientation professor was a manticore. A MANTICORE people.
Warnings: Extensive vocabulary usage.
She had a great many things to do now. If, in fact this was reality. There was an outside chance that she'd been mugged or worse on the road, and judging by current affairs, the weapon of choice had been a compendium of the fantastic to say the least. Perhaps the Encyclopedia Mythica or the like, though it'd be a strange robber that preferred such to smaller weapons. Strange indeed, but then again, so was the idea that Admissions was headed by a quadruped with a delightful smile.
Granted, the admissions offer had found her in her travels, delivered by courier, so perhaps she should have suspected oddity from the start. Or rather heeded it to say, as prior it had seemed a delightful unexpected venue to avoid whatever investigators her parents had no doubt hired combined with the necessary college education.
Careful what one wished for hmmm?
One sure sign this wasn't a fever dream brought about by blunt force trauma was Munin, her silly little lunk of bird was fresh out of his last wing brace, as healed as he was going to get, and delightedly hopping all over the small, outdoor table she'd claimed. If she were injured she'd likely write him into this mental fantasy as a cuddlier thing, not the noisome featherhead that was plopping all over the two open notebooks and the pad of paper she was trying to write her thoughts out on.
No, a mindscape when recovering would be far less annoying one hoped. She could be empathetic enough of those trapped in vegetative states to hope.
An alternate possibility to physical damage was mental unraveling of course; given her family history it had to be on her pad of possibilities, carefully written between bird toes. It was quite the disabling thought; that this was a normal college and finally her mind was unraveling, painting the world in fantasy. Given how little some of the other new students had reacted to Gulbahar, it was even within the realm of possibility. Vivid, and even tactile, hallucinations was a symptom some schizophrenics experienced. Uncommon, in her own research, for it to manifest so suddenly and completely, but it was possible she could have missed earlier symptoms. Her bird's activity levels might not give her an easy way to dismiss such so that was at least underlined for further thought.
Thirdly, well, the conclusion that this was likely reality, as defined as real and experienced relatively the same by all who encounter it. The other students had given their first staff member room unnecessary to a proper human size. Small details even if there had not been the degree of surprise she had felt herself, well, they might be a shield against madness. Or the conclusion of such.
It didn't help that the newest stories to intrude on personal thoughts were all rather harsh ones. Young soldiers, doing terrible things, and dying just as awfully. She was sketching out details and highlights to quell the tales but the emotion behind a lot of the words that bled through her pen were not helping against the inner turmoil.
Far the opposite in fact.
"Cawwwfeeeee?" her bird trilled finally, tonguing the end of her pen. It was enough to make her blink and shake her head flipping the notepad over. Coffee.
Right, that might help the way her hands were shaking. Caffeine withdrawals certainly. "Good idea," she sighed, pulling the thermos out of her battered rucksack. "NOT for you." That was the last thing anyone here needed, but she was fishing bits of string and some tinsel out of a pocket to distract the young raven from dunking his beak in her personal addiction. She'd given him some shiny can tabs earlier but somehow those had disappeared while she'd been tied up in trying to process things.
Somehow.
Likely she'd find them later in the strangest places yes, alongside small bits and bobs he'd managed to steal from anyone passing by or the like since she'd been distracted. "I will throw you across the table," she growled softly as Munin...stretched his neck to dip tinsel in her cup.
Someone save the bird?
Or the girl?