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Carna     Carna was slain in Ariamis, not long after a previous trip saw her giving all the energy she had to Enark to use in a spell. Dead Lights being what they are, the buffer between a fragile sort of sanity, and a monstrous state, dying without that buffer sent her hurtling towards the precipice, taking on the body and mannerisms of an Unlit.

    But she somehow retained enough of herself to contribute in the end, to that final sacrifice that would help that aspect of Priscilla, of Life Hunt, of Ariamis, of... Whatever that was, to heal a little bit and make the Painted World healthy again.

    Or at least healthier.

    There had been a recovery effect in place there, healing bodies and minds alike. It restored Carna's body.

    But she has not woken up since then. Enark had done all he can in terms of healing and restoration, but she remains laid out on a sofa in his study, as still as a corpse. The Blue Scholar is at his limit for what he can do for her. His command of Time Magic is exceedingly limited. He can not reverse her to how she used to be or anything ridiculous like that. Her injuries are all healed. She looks better than she has possibly ever, more complete and 'alive'. So his healing magic is ineffective.

    He is not about to try to make a M.I.M.I.C. of her and try to convince people it's the real Carna. No, no, no, no. That is a terrible idea.

    So he has called for aid. In this case, he has asked Priscilla to meet him alone in his study. When she arrives, he will greet her and explain the situation, but after that the question remains... "Do you have any ideas of how to awaken her? I have a proposal but I can not guarantee its success. I would like to know if you have any thoughts on the subject." He is seated in a (non mimic) chair, with some other bits of (non-mimic) furniture scattered around. It looks like there's some kind of gauntlet or something being worked on at one of the tables, and the gifts people got him for Christmas, and an assortment of other objects he has accumulated or purchased since he first became aware of the Multiverse.

    He has a robotic tea server he got off of Amazon that will offer tea if desired.
Priscilla     Returning to Enark's study feels a little odd for Priscilla. In a way, it's sort of how all of this began, in her mind. It's also in the place she was fully introduced to how mind-blowingly awful the concept of mimics here is, and so she had necessarily spent the first fifteen full minutes coming back to this cozy and oddly nostalgic place poking all the furniture before deigning to sit anywhere at all.

    It does at least answer a particular question that had been nagging her for a little while; one that she articulates immediately. "I had wondered where Lady Carna had been, if I am to speaketh in truth. Whilst thine company is always welcome, thine troupe wouldst appear to hath dwindled in number in days recent." She gives the corpse lady, oddly looking as healthy as she had ever seen her, a second glance.

    "In further honesty, I am not certain why her recovery shouldst be so forestalled. Thou hast done more than admirable work in repairing the damage to her body, even of that before we didst ever meet. Why is it that she yet refuses to open her eyes?"
Carna     "Lanterns are not something I am terribly familiar with. They did not exist when I sealed myself away. Or if they did, they were very rare indeed. I can only theorize that since her personality, her very mind, is heavily based upon the fragments of souls that she devoured in the past, that if she was rendered barely more than an Unlit, she might..." He pauses, his hands folded in his lap. He looks to Carna, her hat and cloak set aside. She looks like nothing more than a healthy red-haired woman perhaps in her 20s or early 30s. Asleep, perhaps, if not for the absence of any breathing.

    He looks away uncomfortably. "...The person we knew as Carna might not exist anymore. The solution I would propose might not necessarily fix that. But it might at least awaken her. And even for that, I can not be sure." He shakes his head. "I had convinced myself that she was a person despite knowing her nature. But when you strip away the parts that make her who she is, this is really all there is. Just a shell. The fact she is not trying to eat anyone is perhaps a sign that not all is lost. But I did wish to speak with you first, as her superior, her ally, and someone she... Well, she never actually said it, but I think she was trying very much to follow your example. Before this spread to others, I wanted you to know, so that you could decide whether anyone else should find out, in the event that it is true."

    He looks down at the floor. "...And whether we should be trying to bring her back at all, or simply 'cutting the cord'."
Priscilla     "I am familiar with the basics of the idea." Priscilla says, taking on the ghost of a frown as she is made to reconsider the knowledge that she frequently pushes to the fringes of her consideration, regarding what Lanterns actually are. "That she wanders about not, seeking to devour the souls of the living, is indeed an auspiciously fortunate omen, but I believeth that greater and more relevant indicators didst exist well before this; most especially merely moments before this issue didst taketh its shape."

    She sighs, audibly and outwardly, after that, clearly taking her time to consider the weight of the circumstances, and what Enark has to say. Yet, she does not take nearly as much time as it seems she was about to. She doesn't pause for long at all, despite the delicate and personal situation, adopting a tone of quiet, firm confidence after the space of only a few seconds, unusual in span.

    "If Lady Carna as we knoweth her is truthfully gone along with the puzzle pieces of a soul that didst create the pattern of her conscience, then there is already naught left to 'pull the plug' upon. What we see before us wouldst then be entirely an empty vessel, and one yet worthy of life. In the eventuality that Lady Carna herself is irretrievably lost, I wouldst thinketh it fitting still that one carry on in her place; to utilize the body and skills and tools she didst build and hone so that she couldst one day see the World of Ashes, as a gift from she who came before, and to see her work through. I believeth she wouldst wish such. If this is not the case, and Lady Carna is with us still, then there is no question in the matter at all. She is owed as much, both as a trusted Partner of the Concord, and as one who gave away part of herself for the well being of mine home."
Carna     Enark keeps his head down, his shoulders somewhat hunched, his body tense as he listens to Priscilla's answer. Then, though he himself has no need of breath he releases one held. He smiles and closes his eyes. "So it was best that I came to you after all. This is why Carna, and I as well, follow you. You are someone who, even for a coward like me, who would push upon you a terrible decision you have had to make already once before, rather than make it himself, can reach the right conclusion. The one I was too afraid to make." He raises his head. "You inspire people to be better than they are now. Thank you."

    He then grows serious, frowning. "Before we make this attempt, I wish to ask something of you. You carry many souls, do you not? Do you know if they retain any element of the people they once were?"
Priscilla     "Thou do thineself disservice, Sir Enark. The only creatures able to stay unwaveringly true to themselves for their entire lives art the insects in the earth. A man is allowed to be afraid, from time to time, and be known not as a coward, so long as he maketh the right decision by the end, regardless of what it is that pushes him towards it. I hath met many men far less than brave enough to even lean upon another in such a matter."

    Not words Priscilla had expected to say, said in response to words she had not expected to hear. It is deeply tempting to contemplate on them for a good long while, but the business at hand keeps her pressing forward at an assertive. "More than thou realize, good Scholar. I can be certain that some of such doth, while others doth not. What is thine intention that they be?"
Carna     Enark seems embarrassed but pleased with Priscilla's words. "I will endeavour to live up to your view of me. I have much to make amends for." Then he looks to Carna's unmoving body as he hears the answer. "That is good then. I was worried they might not work the same in Lordran as here. My idea is this: To force-feed souls to Carna." He faces Priscilla again, sitting up straight and gripping the arms of his chair.

    "If a Lantern's strength is based upon the number of souls or the amount of Dead Lights consumed and used to reinforce themselves, then being totally absent of such must mean she is a truly weakened state. Perhaps too weakened even to awaken, let alone hunt. The civilian Lanterns that inhabit Tacet Sanctos near the Church of Bleak Mercy have faced a similar predicament. They have died over and over to the extent that they no longer even properly possess the instinct to feed themselves. If Carna is in a similar position, then though she is physically more intact than they are..." He gestures indicatively, trusting the Concord's leader can make the connection easily and may have already done so before he finished.

    "In essence, her 'battery' of energy has been drained. We need to give her a boost and see if it is enough that she might function again."

    He shrugs. "Or so is my suggestion. I have so many theories about things that sometimes even I tire of hearing them."
Priscilla     "Such is all anyone shouldst ask of thee." Priscilla says to Enark, allowing herself a moment of gentler tone. "One who fears making a mistake ever once, for the idea that it invalidates all else he does beyond, is one who is useless next to one who errs much and grows from each consequence."

    If Priscilla were more given to naturalized expression, this would probably be the part where she puffs out her cheeks and makes a big, distracted sighing noise, but instead, only the tip of her tail twitches. "Such had occurred to me, yes. At the very least, it is a request I cannot begrudge, for all that Lady Carna hast given without expectation of any return. If it is I to whom the need for such charity falls, so be it. It is the duty inherent to mine position to support and provide for those who giveth their all to our Concord. I assumeth thou wouldst wish not to muddy the waters of the unfortunate woman's mind with souls that possesseth fragments of their own?"
Carna     Enark takes the praise well, but tries to focus on the matter at hand. He has spent too long overthinking things and doubting himself already. It is a lesson he did not learn until the end of helping Priscilla: That helping others in order to try to resolve one's own inner turmoil or provide evidence of one's own worth is not truly aid offered to another, merely a tool for benefitting oneself. He is not about to tangle up his own issues in helping someone who needs it.

    "The opposite, actually. We might try at simple pouring souls into her, in the hopes that is enough. But if there is truly nothing left of her, the souls with personalities and memories might be the very foundation of the woman who will be with us from now on. In the latter case, it is important to carefully select them. We would not wish for, say, that Seath character or the Wall of Cruel Customs to become a core aspect of her personality by accident, for obvious reasons." He stands suddenly and moves over to the sofa.

    "I know I am placing yet another burden upon you, to decide which souls will be put into the forging of a new being, a new person, to replace the old. If you would rather, souls without memory might be used for the raw power needed to awaken her, and we might simply leave it to chance with an infusion of Dead Lights... Allow her identity to form 'naturally' so to speak."
Priscilla     "Such is indeed no small responsibility." Priscilla remarks in a carefully even tone. "Unfortunately, or perhaps, depending upon ones perspective, far more fortunately, there is such a lack of knowledge, of basis, and of guide to judge by, that any choice is informed only by intentions at best. A guess that cannot possibly be an educated one, no matter how one wouldst think upon it and for how long. It is certainly the sort that is daunting to men of thought such as thineself. However, let it be said that it is one liberating in its infinite vagueness, for no wrong choice can be reasonably regretted whence there was no more obvious alternative."

    Regardless, Priscilla has to do it.

    Priscilla also has some idea, at least some deep, baseless feeling, of what to do.

    The vast majority of Souls she produces as a ball of wispy white fire are, in fact, blank slates. Pure energy --spiritual essentia-- of units numbering in the tens of thousands, worth a hefty fraction of all Dead Lights she had accumulated in Lumiere thusfar. In amongst them, however, are just two faint recollections of who they were before. Anchors; guideposts; beacons of identity to channel a new one into being, or to bring the old one back to shore.

    The last sense of duty, of determination, of mission, and of sacrifice, of a Darkmoon Knightess.

    The enduring embers of curiosity, of yearning, and of darkly pragmatic responsibility, of the last vestiges of a Great Witch.

    Such is what she chooses to infuse into Carna, whether that be the Carna she knows, or whoever or whatever might inherit the mantle of a very unique, and very special Lantern.
Carna     Enark steps back, anxiously waiting to see what comes of this idea of his. It was not based upon nothing, but he is fully aware there is an overwhelming amount still unknown about Lanterns and Unlit. 'Please let this work,' he mouths silently to himself as he watches the souls pour into Carna, passing through cloth and flesh. At first nothing seems to be happening. But then Carna inhales sharply, her eyes shooting open, her back arching, and she begins to scream inhumanly as light and dark pour out of her eyes and mouth in liquid form. She bends like she's being tortured, electrocuted, and then it all congeals and flows back into the orifices from which it came as she falls flat on her back.

    The dead woman stares blankly at the ceiling for several long moments, mouth hanging open, sharp teeth exposed. Then her eyes sink closed once more and she lies still. However, there is one significant difference. In her deathly 'sleep', a creature that does not even rest the way the Living do, begins to breathe autonomously in the same manner as she would if she were alive.

    Enark, spooked by the initial reaction does not know what to make of the results. Clearly SOMETHING changed.

    "What if--" he begins, but then Carna sits up suddenly, gasping again, and making him leap a few feet off the ground. "COULD YOU PLEASE STOP THAT."

    The Lantern looks around blearily, in wild confusion, not showing any sign of recognizing her surroundings, nor the faces of Priscilla or Enark when she looks upon them. Somewhat to be expected for a Lantern. But then said Lantern begins patting herself down, as she tries to move and finds herself off-balance. It's unclear what she's looking for, except perhaps wondering why her proprotions are different from whatever she was expecting.

    "Where am I?" she asks. The voice is the same, but the tone is all wrong. "Who are you? What have you done to me?"

    Enark opens his mouth, and then closes it. "Those are all very good questions. But let us start with this one: What is the last thing you remember?"

    Carna -- or whoever this is now -- seems far more emotional, distraught, afraid, confused, than ever she has been seen showing before now. She puts a hand to her head as her legs swing off the side of the soda, and she finds them to be unexpectedly long. When her hands finds itself interwined with red strands, she stares at the color for several seconds, seemingly forgetting the question.

    Enark looks worriedly to Priscilla. He was the one to mention this might happen. But now that he's actually dealing with it in fact instead of theory, he has no idea how to deal with it.

    "How about we take this slowly. There is actually a journal you kept. Perhaps something in it will jog your memory?" he turns to look for it, with the rest of Carna's possessions.
Priscilla     Priscilla has no better idea than Enark as to what will happen when she does what she does. Even with what is permitted in Lordran, only putting the same soul back in the same body yields a predictable effect. What they're doing here is the realm of near-mad experimentation. What she has over him could perhaps be described as confidence, but perhaps also faith.

    Confidence alone wouldn't keep her standing there, firm and resolute, in the face of the bizarre and horrific thing that happens to the Lantern for several moments. At the interplay of light and dark oozing out of her as body horror, Priscilla looks onward with the faintly furrowed expression of someone who should be sternly murmuring 'come on, you should be able to do this', as if she were coaching an inconsistent young prodigy, rather than trying to resurrect the quasi-dead.

    Priscilla is already saying "Sir Enark. The journal." as soon as Carna is patting herself down, seeing it as unlikely that she has somehow taken on the entire personality and memory originally belonging to the individuals of whom she had soul fragments of. Her interest, keen, analytical, and piercing to be under her gaze, is in whether they might have awakened something within her instead.

    "Though Lanterns art amalgamations of many, they were, before all, originally dead, yes?" she asks Enark, mostly just watching the Lantern steadily as she regains as much semblance of life as she's ever seen.
Carna     Enark retrieves the journal from a large pile of weapons and equipment, that he had the foresight to remove from the presence of one who might awaken in a frenzy and start getting stabby. He answers the question from Priscilla with a very ambiguous shrug. "We know so little about them. The Unlit they originate from ascended from far below Lumiere, in an area now known as the Bowl of Filth. We do not know where the Unlit themselves came from. They might never have existed as living people in the first place. A death beyond death. The mystery of not knowing was one of the main compulsions that drove Carna, was it not? And... I suppose the other Lanterns as well." He wanders over and hands the thick soft-leathered book to Carna, finding the material subtly revolting. Probably made of human skin or something disturbing like that. "Disjointed memories seeking an anchor, a meaning, beyond the hungers that drive them. The hungers that DROVE them to ascend to begin with." He sighs.

    Carna continues looking at her hair in her fingers, before crimson eyes skitter to the journal, and then to the other two people present. They briefly alight on the recliner chained to the floor, but there's too much to take in, and she pays the same amount of attention to that as the gauntlet on the table, and the attire of Priscilla and Enark.

    She cautiously accepts the book, and asks, "You're saying I'm dead?" She pats her stomach again, pushing inwards as if seeking entry. "I remember... Hurting. Right here." Her gloved hand then goes up to her neck to feel around. "And here." Well, two people died to produce the souls she bears now. "But I don't remember anything else." She looks askance at the book in her hand as if only just realizing she took it.

    She starts frantically pulling at the leathers of her outfit all of a sudden, trying to seemingly tear the armor and garments off of her. "I'm suffocating. I can't breathe in this. It's too tight." Her breaths come in shorter and shorter gasps as she begins to panic, possibly mistaking her lungs not working like a living person's for something restricting their functions.

    "Ah, actuallly, err..." Enark turns and gestures towards a wardrobe. "There are some looser clothes over there if you'd rather--"

    The new Lantern is already dashing over there and disrobing violently the moment she has something between her and the others, clawed fingers accidentally carving into her own skin and sending blood spattering on the floor as she tries to adjust to having tiny knives for fingernails.

    Enark looks helplessly towards Priscilla.
Priscilla     Priscilla's eyes follow Carna's. Where the woman looks around, and where she focuses her attention, so shortly after forgetting everything and waking up anew, is telling. A little spark lights the crossbreed's eyes, perhaps rather than the Lantern's, when her gaze lingers for just a second on the auspicious recliner. Still, Priscilla says nothing just yet. She is not the kind to wear her expectations on her sleeve so early.

    "Lady Carna, slow thineself, lest thou stain thine clothes through entirely." Priscilla picks on the calm and trivial concern, drawing attention to the bleeding without being stressful or alarming. Enark is there anyways, so it's unlikely she can do any damage to herself that he can't heal. To him, she says: "On one hand I am left to wonder if her clothing simply was too tight, being a corpse for so long as she was. On the other, is there no other sort of magic thou possesseth of aid here?"
Carna     "Well, she at least seems to be coping with the idea of death fairly well--" Enark begins, as the leather armor starts being tossed over the partition. He steps back, and faces away completely, even though there's a barrier between him and their 'new' companion.

    "Carna? Is that supposed to be my name? Does being dead give you claws? And sharp teeth?" There's more cloth rustling. A tense edge pushes the pitch of Carna's voice higher and higher with each question. "Why won't you answer my questions? Where am I, and who are you!?"

    Maybe coping isn't the right word.

    Enark calls out, "There was an... Accident. You suffered severe injury and appear to have lost your memories. Our attempts to help you have restored your body but we do not know what will become of your memory yet. My name is Enark, of the Blue Scholars. You are presently in a location within a world known as Lumiere, which is, yes, located in what might be termed 'the afterlife', to simplify it to the point of near-inaccuracy."

    Enark then answers Priscilla with, "I can heal her wounds. Unless you are suggesting a build a simulacrum of her, my hands are a bit tied. I was delving into territory far outside my understanding just with the proposal to invest new souls into her."

    "New souls?" The Lantern's voice calls out. "Is that why this body doesn't fit? Because it's not mine? You just crammed my soul and a bunch of others into somebody's corpse? I'm a zombie now?"

    Enark squints a bit, wishing maybe he'd not just started talking to Priscilla like Carna wasn't in the room. In his defense, she was doing it first!

    There's no more blood going flying, but when Carna eventually steps out from behind the partition in her near clothes, there are definitely blood stains on the old faded-blue robes, especially around her mouth as she prods at her sharp teeth, carving up the inside of the orifice in the process. "And what about my teeth and fingers? Are those part of the package too? I don't see them on either of you." she asks when she finally stops gouging herself.

    Enark sighs and starts weaving a healing Mumur to mend the injuries, drawing a suspicious look from the intended recipient.
Priscilla     "Do it, then." Priscilla says to Enark when he mentions healing her. It's a small task and she can't imagine this situation being any better for Carna having torn herself to shreds in a frenzy. "Being anything gifts thee any number of things. Look not too deeply into such superficial details." says Priscilla, fluffy tail twitching.

    "Perhaps it is best that thou not be beset by information and reminders and attempts to cajole thine memory. Tell me, Lady Carna, even if thou dost not remember that name. Who is it that thou believeth thou art? If thine body is mismatched, what shouldst it be like? If the name is foreign to be, what shouldst thou be called?"
Carna     As injuries mend, the Lantern makes an effort to stop injuring herself, instead staring intently as water flows all around her body, washing away blood and closing wounds. She looks up when Priscilla speaks to her, but seems confused. Perhaps the way Priscilla speaks. Maybe just the whole... 'Everything going on right now'. "I just feel as if there's so much I don't know. There's a void inside of me that needs to be filled." She seems to calm herself as she moves to sits down on the nearest piece of furniture, only for Enark to rush forward and cry out warnings.

    "Not that one! Not that one! It's, err..." he tries to save confusing details as he looks at the perplexed and wary expression on the robe-wearing Lantern, already so different seeming with a simple change of clothing. "...Unstable." he finishes lamely.

    Carna moves away from the recliner and gestures at a different chair, arching her red eyebrows as if to ask 'This one okay?' Enark smiles and gives her a thumbsup. She seats herself cautiously. "I don't remember. I feel like I was doing something. Or seeking something. There are thoughts... Memories... But I can't grasp them. There's too much noise." She holds her head in her hands, covering her ears, and closes her eyes.

    After a few seconds in that position, she snaps her eyes open, and looks around the study in annoyance. "And whomever is whispering around here had better knock it off. I can hear you!" She glares and leans to peer at the far corners of the room, searching for the source of whatever she's hearing.

    "Name... A name isn't important. I think I remember... It started with an 'M'." She lowers her hands to her knees and sits back, attempting to relax. "...Maria maybe? I'm not sure. If Carna is how you knew me, then I will go by Carna for now." She opens and closes one of her hands as she looks down at it, relearning this body, the length of her digits, the shape of her arm. "I should have a sword."

    Enark, finished with his healing work, says, "Ah! You have some equipment over here, including weapons. I shall retrieve them." He then makes his way towards where a sword like solidified blood lies.

    "And what of you?" Carna asks as she looks up at Priscilla, and then at that tail. "You are not... Human. Are you dead as well?"
Priscilla     "Then thou art not so different then thou were before." Priscilla replies almost immediately to the Carna behind the screen, professing a burning need to know. "It wouldst seemeth that there art core parts of one's nature, even thine, which death cannot taketh away. I believeth I am gladdened to hear it, though thou may not think of it so positively."

    There is a brief, tense moment, as there suddenly presents the very real risk of having to do this all over again, but Priscilla remembers to breathe when Carna sits somewhere that isn't full of teeth. She looks mildly fascinated by the following, Softly quirking a horned brow and watching with unblinking eyes as Carna feels out a name that isn't hers; especially interesting seen as Priscilla never did know why she arrived at the name 'Carna' before.

    "There art, of course, many things that art thine, or at least inherited, depending on how thou wouldst wish to think of it. It wouldst seemeth not too much of thee hast changed. Let us hope this disorientation shalt pass, then, if thine core nature is still so well-equipped." Priscilla then gets a barely useful question, and gives a barely useful answer. "Perhaps a quarter so, by mine own reckoning. Sir Enark there is entirely dead, though there art far stranger things than he, or thee, for that matter. Spend some time with thine journal. Re-familiarize thineself with thine possessions. Allow thineself to pursue those memories thou feel the fringes of yet. There is no press of time, at the moment, and thou hast been through much."