(28a) Addendum to (28)
The Regency Campaign (30/1573 Nakege
(278+280-1123))
Kalida's Trance
Kalida drifts into her trance. It's been a while
since the last one, and the web is welcoming and familiar. It's
still sticky here, however, and she has a bad feeling about that.
As usual, the web around Nakege is very
dense, but even denser than last time she looked. She uses the
connection to Zel to the ship where the fighters came from.
Zel himself seems pretty straightforward. He's
getting caught in the web here, of course, but it is pretty linear.
The connection back to his ship is easy enough to follow.
Kalida, however, is looking for the Man in Black.
There is a nexus of all sorts of threads going on here. This is big,
with connections going everywhere -- to the blockade, way out of
system, across towards Jewell, connecting with her. The
strongest connection, the biggest bundle, is Kalida herself. There
is a direct causality with her. She is causing this; she caused the
ship to be here, she caused Zel to get shot down, she caused the
nukes to be used, she caused all this. The web tightens in, the
stickiness starting to disturb Kalida.
If Kalida is causing this, there should be
something else connecting through her, or her to somewhere else, a
connection in common. She finds a thread that feels somewhat
familiar, and follows that out to find that it feels like the Duke
of Rhylanor is strongly involved in this too, all linked together in
this tight bundle. She and the Duke have separate connections that
are totally related, parallel threads that wind and coil together.
She's doing well here, the first time in Nakege
that she hasn't been sucked in. This feels good. For the time, she
pulls back from there and looks at the connections from the ship to
the blockade. This is a big mess, and there is definitely a
connection and it's probably all her fault. There's an
opposition/cooperation thing going on, resonating and pulling her
into its song.
The resonating song is so strong, but she tries
to pull back to herself. Something is badly wrong, not just in the
web but physically, she's losing some control of something. She
feels stiff, and things are not good at all.
Kalida relaxes completely and lets go of
everything. She breaks clear.