Solo Slithering Scarf!

[Alric Wilmot]

74th Day of Fall 513 AV Alric stumbled back into the door frame with half-lidded eyes and a glare that could kill. He had had a very hard night, and a rather poor morning. Yesterday he had unsuccessfully attempted to teach his doll how to preform hypnosis. It turned out that he was as of yet too unskilled in Animation to pursue such an ambitious cause. It caused him not only heavy personal djed drain, but completely unprepared to awake early as he normally did. He still did of course, but his body had screamed in protest. But he could not oblige it. Miro and he had an agreement to work glyphs for most of the remainder of Fall. Alric was only left the mornings to work and experiment with Animation. So far everything was going well, but last nights failure angered Alric more than he cared to admit. Since he could not find any new techniques listed in the book, he decided to simply make more golems.Yesterday had provided him with some good inspiration at least. It had mentioned that a famous wizard had Animated his favorite scarf with the behavior of a snake. Well, Alric already had a snake, so he decided to go get a scarf as well. So, once again he had woken with the sun, fed the snake he kept under his bed, and went out to buy his latest golem. He did not bother finding anything expensive since this would most likely be damaged in his upcoming plans. So a simple wool scarf, an unimaginative grey was what he found. It had cost very little, despite the fact that he was sure the woman who made it took quite a bit of time on it. But he was not one to complain about an article of clothing being too cheap. Still, for how productive and simple the morning had been, he was still feeling the effects of his failed attempt. Angry, and wanting to just get it over with he retrieved the knife and chalk from the table where he had left them and fell to the floor. He covered his face as he tried to empty his thoughts and remind himself that he was still new to Animation, and thus had to expect failure every once in a while. Still, that did not mean he had to like it. He then realized that he had forgotten the snake. With a quick curse to himself, he stood up and stormed down the hall to his room. He knelt down to pull the bag out from under his bed, but was aghast to find that there was no snake inside it. A hole was at the bottom, where the snake undoubtedly bit its way through. Alric felt a headache come on him as he began to tremble with anger. Why was everything going so wrong?! Finally, with no other outlet he screamed in rage and pounded his fist on the floor. Ionu was playing him the fool, even outside his city. He was sure that his god meant some mischief or other amusement. He suspected, no, knew, that the god was eager to see where he would go, what he would do. But Ionu was a fickle master and did not like passionate meaningful lives. It wanted frivolity, distractions, fun. And Alric desperately wanted to give such to the world at large! But now, for now, pain and suffering were needed. His pain, and his suffering, and his turmoil. So much work needed to be done to shape the world into a place of eternal bliss! So what did Ionu do with its servant who willingly thrust himself into hard work? Why make him suffer and have a bit of fun at his expense of course! Alric nearly cursed his god before calming himself, and reasoning that Ionu was busy with the upkeep of Alvadas. There was no way the Mistress of mischief and mayhem had left the city of illusions to play with a singularly marked disciple. Alric tangled his fingers into his hair as he remembered that. Ugh, He loved Ionu so much, why did she spurn him so? He needed to move on to today's work, and moping about his god was not going to get it done. So what if Ionu thought him of little consequence? She would love him all the more for how wrong she was about to be proven. He closed his eyes and focused on his bubble of influence. The key to Hypnotism. He expanded it outward, enveloping the entire house. Come to Alric. Come to where you escaped. Reveal yourself. He used the most basic of techniques, a hypnotic suggestion. It was only a snake he was trying to find, and animals he had hypnotized a dozen times before. They did not act on words, as they did not understand them, but they did comply to base suggestions and images. He kept still, letting out pulses of the same suggestions, trying to snare the snake, and desperately hoping it was still in the building. Then Alric felt something glide over his foot. He looked down to spot the snake, innocuous and looking quite the opposite of guilty. Alric gave a scowl, but in truth was glad that he had overreacted. He was just really high-strung as of late. He sent the snake a series of emotions ranging from calm to tranquil to prevent the thing from biting him, and picked it up. He was surprised at how dry it was. From the way the scales shone, he has assumed that snakes were oily. Though he doubted Ionu had anything to do with it, he was still enamored with the seeming contradiction in senses. Maybe he would not put the snake back in the bag after all. With his breakdown halted Alric's smile decided to return, and Alric left his room back to the circles he had drawn earlier. He placed the snake in the proper circle and placed the scarf on the opposite end. He sat in the middle and pricked his finger once again, as he had many times to start this process. The blood dropped down in a small trickle to the floor and the chalk. No light or sound was made, and the only thing that seemed to change was Alric's perception. Though he could not really see anything, he had many sensations enter his mind's eye. He could feel the snake's soul, and the emptiness of the scarf. He could feel the tether connecting him to the transference of concepts and ideas. He could feel it all. He steadied his breathing and got to work. He removed a small part of the flame that appeared to be the snake's soul and used it to form a copy of the soulcore. The very first step in animation was to create the soulcore, and place it in what you wanted animated. He sent it along, feeling it snap into place within the scarf. The second step was to implant everything the animated item needed to know, and then place directives telling it how to use that information. Alric thought for a bit, wondering what he wanted the scarf to do. At this stage in his abilities he could not make the scarf understand language, or magic, or anything too complicated. He had already found failure in that exercise. He did not want to make it a carbon copy of the rope he had animated either, so what did he want? Did he want it to strangle enemies? Did he want it to fetch small items? Did he want it to just act like a normal snake? Alric stroked his chin, thinking on it. Finally he decided that he would like the scarf as a back-up weapon of sorts. If his rope was gone, djed depleted, and connection to Ionu gone, this would be his last defense. Not very comforting, really. It was frail and small. But he thought that if he was reduced to his scarf then his enemy must be near breaking point as well. Regardless, he got to work. He moved the snakes muscle memories, the way it moved, strangled, and swayed, into the scarf. All the while Alric would attach words to the sequences and images. He was diligent and thoughtful, keeping complete focus. He had been through this process multiple time now and found it oddly relaxing. Why had he been so angry before? It had not accomplished anything. Finally Alric decided to move on to the directives. He needed to have the proper kill phrase too, something that had been drilled into him by his book. He decided once again that it needed to be something other than a voice command, lest he be strangled and unable to thwart his own golem. He tried to remember what the kill phrase for his rope was. It was a number of claps, if he remembered. Then he recalled, it was a series of three consecutive claps. So, with that recalled he sent in the first directive. Directive #1: If three consecutive claps are heard, cease all other directives. Now, he gave thought to what the others might be. Well, they seemed simple enough. Have it strangle anyone who was not Alric Evelyn Wilmot. But how was it to know one neck from another? Touch, maybe? Did necks feel different? Alric thought they must, but things would get difficult if he had to implant how his neck felt. He was not even sure where to begin in that department. So then what about voice? No, that would not work either. His assailant might be silent. What if then by sight? But again Alric realized that the scarf had no way of seeing. It had no buttons or bead to reflect light. So how then could it see? Its threads could hear, feeling the vibration of air. But Sight was out of the scarf's reach. So what was Alric to do? Suddenly, Alric had an idea. It weakened the surprise aspect a bit, but it at least allowed Alric more control. He would simple activate the scarf's strangling directive with sound. It might cost him a bit, if somehow he could not speak. But that was a chance he had to take. He focused once more on the task at hand and set the directives as such. Directive #2: When the phrase: Scarf, Strangle! is heard Strangle the neck you are currently around. Directive #3: When the phrase: Scarf, Bind! is heard Bind the hand you are currently around. Directive #4: When the phrase: Scarf, return! is heard, slither to the one who said it. With the directives delivered, Alric set work to the final phase of Animation, creating the Astral Body. Before he began his studies in Animation he had not know that Animation dealt with souls regularly, nor did he know that the soul had layers. Previously he had only thought that these things were all separate entities living inside a being, and giving him that strange quality that ascended him and made him better than the beasts of the wild. When he discovered the soul's layers he was surprised to find the Astral Body was the source of movement. An ephemeral thing in the exact shape of the body it moved, Alric often wondered why men had bodies at all. Moving on, he concentrated once more on the snake he had made sit still, and extracted from it a copy of its own Astral body. He moved it through the line of djed to the scarf, and molded it as he went. As it flowed into the scarf, the same snapping action occurred as the Soul core. Alric opened his eyes then, and decided to test it quickly. "Scarf, Return!" To his delight, the scarf begun to move as a snake might, and made its way to him. He picked it up and clapped 3 times to deactivate the scarf. He may not yet have been able to make a speaking golem, but he felt that he was close. Much closer in fact than he had been but a week ago.