And then I make him think his head exploded (self mod)

[Dhanya]

Timestamp: 45th of Spring, 510
Purpose: Hypnotism practice

Pygmy had been staring into the mirror for an hour. She had borrowed it from the family down the road, promising to return it in a few days. She'd implied she needed to check her appearance for performances, not wishing to disclose her ability. Playing with minds wasn't the politest thing one could do at a talent night.

The meditation thing had always been boring. Sort of useful but... boring. It always took a long while before she could get past looking at her hair and wondering if she should do something about her eyebrows before she could get well and truly numb. With the numbness she could still feel her own breath, flowing in and out, punctuated by minor snorts of annoyance that made her sound like more of a goat than she cared to. She would always be at the point of wondering if she should just go get a cup of tea and try later when it finally happened.

"You are ssssuch a crazy bitch, you know that?" Her reflection said, fluttering her lashes.

"Finally!" Pygmy said, standing up.

She was no longer within her room in Vanator's tent. She was inside her own head, in a space she had tucked away for practising. It had once been furnished and had resembled Jenon's study. It was white and empty now, waiting to be filled with clutter and understanding.

"Normally you have someone else here for this kind of work." Reflection-Pygmy said, referring to the man Pygmy did not wish to speak about.

Pygmy had never learned whether others used this method for learning more about themselves and their djed. She often wondered if it was just some sort of kid method that Jenon had used to get around her simple Kelvic brain. It worked well enough. She didn't know what else to replace it with.

"I don't really want him around, just quietly." Pygmy replied, giving the floor carpets.

"Well, he's you anyway, just a Jenon shaped version of you."

"Does talking to myself make me sort of... Deluded?"

"Do you want honesty or something you'll be comfortable with?"

"I am learning from me already!" Pygmy said, smiling though exasperated.

Yes, there was a difference between what she wanted to know and what was true. She was fairly sure there was a chasm between what she would accept and what was true. Pygmy was fairly sure that would extend to others as well.

This was more personal revision than newfound insight, though.

"How do I... How do we determine what other people want?" Pygmy asked.

"Easy, ask them and then remember the exact opposite because everybody lies!" Reflection-Pygmy said. "Or sex, everybody wants sex."

"Except Jenon."

"As far as we know..."

"Gross, gross, gross."

[Dhanya]

Slowly she populated her mental space, filling it with objects that were useful or comfortable. It was not difficult to map her development in the changes. She now had a set of riding tack in a far corner, nicer than the one she owned in reality. There were also bags of grains and seeds and jars of preserved foodstuffs. Delicacies she normally couldn't find on the road. A newfound practicality that still touched upon her vanity and her desire for the finer things in life. She wondered at her own lack of pride, knowing that to achieve such comforts would require some capitulation on her part.

She wasn't ready to give up her freedom, not yet. The room became more threadbare. There was sand beneath her feet now and sky instead of walls. The other Pygmy was gone, though she could have been called back quite easily. Instead, there was Jenon, sitting at his desk. She had placed him on a patch of grass, quietly reading as if there weren't a whole world around him.

Pygmy walked over to the desk and knelt before it. She looked into Jenon, trying to remember as much of him as she could. He was faded now, in her memory. Details stood out, the lines around his face and the complex details sewed into his cuffs. She could no longer remember the colour of his eyes.

"What do you want?" She asked him, trying to see beyond what he had made obvious.

Writing, scholarly pursuits... Emotional distance and awkwardness.

"No wonder you never married." Pygmy mused, flicking a lock of hair from his face and banishing his image.

[Dhanya]

Pygmy imagined Jenon's garden next and placed within someone she had less difficulty understanding. Katya's features were less firm in her mind, she hadn't liked being stared at in the way Pygmy had stared at Jenon, though the sense of her was much stronger. Pygmy could see the wolf in her. Her leanness and strength were never more obvious than her pride. Katya wanted little but with great passion.

Pygmy blinked as Katya's human form disappeared. There was no flash of light within her mind, there was no need of it. Her mother had glowed from within. The wolf before her was enormous and beautiful to Pygmy's eyes.

Katya had wanted to be free to be with her pack, people who had loved her and fought with her to survive. Brave and hardy Kelvics. The only other goal she had ever desired was for Pygmy to find the same. To love and be loved. To serve and be served.

If she had ever wanted to lead a woman such as her, which was largely the point of the skill she was honing, she would only need to offer a taste of that desire. There had been so much anger and conviction within Katya. Like Pygmy, like all Kelvics, her needs were simple.

Pygmy reached out to touch the image of her mother, knelt so she could embrace her.

"I love you, mum." She said, knowing full well that she would never be able to use her skills against another Kelvic, unless it was that or her life.

She allowed her mother to fade, bringing forth Jenon yet again. Comparing him to Katya, it was easier to see his weakness. He cared about appearances and not seeming as awkward and sentimental as he was. When it came down to brass tacks, he would choose what looked best to those he socialised with. She wondered how it hadn't been more obvious before. He followed the flow of the water, while Katya raged against it. Of the two of them, he had the easier time. It just did not make him happy. If he'd been offered both, perhaps. Although Jenon had never been very good at knowing what to do with happiness.

[Dhanya]

Pygmy called upon the djed within her, kept in a pool for safe keeping. She was out of practice, there wasn't too much to call upon. She considered how she would shape it, fan it out to touch another mind. How she could use it against someone else.

She thought about Jenon's buttons and all the little ways to push them.

Fear would have been simple. She would just have had to leave a niggling doubt that he had left the fire stacked high with wood in the library. Perhaps a worry or two about dying in ignominy, all his investments burned to the ground or stolen, rotted away to dust.

Happiness would have been a trickier thing. Even procurement of something he enjoyed did not produce much of an outward response. He always seemed to enjoy summer or the promise of it.

She was making herself sad, now.

She could have easily made him angry or bitter or any number of negative emotions. How terrible that she couldn't think of one way to make him feel genuinely happy. Hypnotism wasn't just about the darker side of life. You could use it to calm people down or draw them away from a stupor.

Pygmy still didn't know enough to be able to see that Jenon had loved her as much as he had been capable of love. She had made him happy and she would likely never know.

Pygmy released her djed, allowing it to lose shape and drift back within her. She'd thought enough about how to use it that day. She was just getting back into the saddle, no need to rush. She could at least remember the basics.

She allowed herself to feel her own breath again, the fabric beneath her legs and over her torso, lying across her lap. She had pins and needles from sitting still for too long.

[Tundris]

Dhanya +2 Hypnosis +1 Observation Lores: Redefining Past Heart Breaks Breaching the Surface of Hypnotism A New Perspective In Hypnosis Notes: Your rp is always a pleasure to read. I love to see people really getting into their character, you're one of few people still working on their first character