The Spirit Bridge

[redgar]

The Spirit Bridge

I started this rp last year, but through some serious mismanagement on my part I had to let it die. Fortunately WhyNotFly got me thinking that it would be good to bring it back, so this time we're both modding it so she can make sure I don't screw it up again. Yay!



Joseph stood in the middle of the circle, breathing hard. He glanced around himself, double checking that he was truly ready. Both circles were perfectly round, the stars in the middle of them were exactly drawn without holes or defects. He compared the runes around the circle’s edge to those in the book he held. Yes, they were all correct. Good. Fine. Ok. So, he was ready now. Ready to begin the summons. But he couldn’t bring himself to do it. His tongue felt frozen, his jaw was locked shut, and his entire body seemed to be frozen in an agony of indecision. Joseph shook himself, reached into his pocket and drew out her photograph again. He looked at it for a second, and his body relaxed slightly. He kissed her smiling face, put the photograph back in his pocket, and flipped through the book to a certain page.

He took a deep breath, and started to read. The well practiced latin formulae flowed from his mouth, a seemingly never ending stream of words. On the fourth minute of speech, the lights in the room flickered and went out. The only source of illumination was the candles standing around the circles. On the fifth minute, a cold wind began to blow through the room, causing the candle flames to dance and wave. On the sixth minute, the empty circle across from Joseph began to fill with a thick boiling smoke. It billowed up towards the ceiling and extended across the circle from edge to edge. Low rumbles of thunder seemed to come from the circle, and flashes of light lit the cloud from within. Joseph finished. His mouth closed. There was seconds pause. Then two red glowing eyes opened in the heart of the cloud and stared at him.

Joseph found himself shaking. Sweat beaded his forehead, and the whites of his eyes showed. He’d never seen anything like this before in his life. A voice rumbled through the room, making the floor shake.

“Who dares to summon me?” It asked. Joseph cleared his throat, and forced himself to speak.

“I am Joseph Killian,” he said in a squeaky voice, “and I am your master. You will obey my will.” His voice carried no conviction. A laugh boomed through the building, making the walls shake.

“I recognize no master,” said the voice, “and you are a fool to think that you can control me. You have not the strength to keep me bound much longer, and you must know what happens when your strength fails.” The eyes seemed to bore into Joseph, rooting him in place. “If you have a request for me, I suggest you make it quickly. Time is trickling by, and you do not have much left.”

“I…I…I do have a request,” stammered Joseph. He was still shaking, but now that the deed was done he felt braver. “I charge you to return the woman known as Amanda Green to life.” He spoke the last sentence in what he hoped was a tone of command. There was a pause. The red eyes seemed to be considering him with something like amusement.

“Very well,” the voice answered, the cruel humor dripping from his words, “I will return her to this world.” The eyes disappeared, and the smoke began to swirl inside the circle. Faster and faster it spun until suddenly it drew back like curtains, and a ray of light seemed to emanate from the ceiling. On the floor, in the center of the pool of light, was the woman from Joseph’s picture. She lay curled up, with her eyes closed as though she was sleeping. Joseph’s eyes filled with tears as he beheld her.

“I have fulfilled my word,” the voice said, and the eyes appeared above her body, “but now you have exhausted your energy. Your magic will soon fail and then you shall be mine.” Joseph drew himself up, and opened his book again.

“I have only a little energy left,” he said, “but I will use it to make sure that you cannot take anyone else ever again.” With that, he began to read from another page in the book. The eyes blazed with hatred, and a scream of rage resonated off the walls. The boiling cloud of smoke flew at Joseph, but could not cross the lines of the circle. Joseph spoke faster. The cloud of smoke again tried to get at him, but could not. Then several things happened at once. Joseph finished speaking, his body burst into livid green flames, and the whole building exploded.

Fire crews succeeded in putting out the fire several hours later, by which time the whole building had burned to the ground. The crowd which had gathered to watch was dispersed by police. There was a great deal of hustle and bustle. As such, no one noticed two things. The first was that before the flames had even been put out, a woman had stumbled out of the wreckage of the building. She had fled off down an alley before anyone had a chance to notice her, but not before glancing back at the fire with hatred in her red eyes. The second was that as the explosion had happened, several orbs of light had flown out of the building. They had hovered above it, as if dazed, while the fire was put out. Then as the crowds began to disperse, they had flown after them, hovering above specific people, as if waiting for the moment to strike.

Introduction

The existence of spirits has been known to humanity for a long time. They occupy another universe, though what that universe looks like is a mystery. But humanity eventually discovered that it could summon spirits from that universe to our own, and bend them to it’s will. As one would expect, the people who discovered this ability soon grew to power, and became the ruling powers of their respective nations. They knew that their power rested on controlling the knowledge of how to control spirits, so they limited the knowledge of how to summon them, and kept it from the general public. Ordinary people, those who didn’t know how to control spirits, became fearful of them and willingly subjugated themselves to the rule of these Summoners. So it continued, right up to the early 1900s.

Then a woman named Amanda Green was murdered. Her husband, Joseph Green, went mad with grief and became obsessed with bringing her back to life. He stole books on summoning, he went to cultist meetings to find powerful entities. Finally he discovered the existence of a powerful demon who, rumor had it, controlled who lived and died. Joseph was insane enough to summon it and command it to bring his wife back from the dead. Then he tried to bind it to the earth so that it could no longer decide who lives and dies. Unfortunately his body was unable to provide the energy for such a spell, and it went awry. Instead of binding the demon to the earth, he bound it to Amanda. She became a vessel for the demon, which stumbled off into the world, determined to return to it’s own universe.

The spell had another effect which no one had looked for. It ripped open a hole to the universe where spirits reside, allowing several of them to cross over into our universe. The hole promptly sealed up, trapping them in our world. Seeking shelter, the spirits bound themselves to human bodies, and accidentally trapped themselves there. Since then they have lived in these bodies, sharing them with the humans they bound themselves too, and living in the world as best they could.

Spoiler: Notes on Spirits: 

Spirits are not native to our universe. As such they can only exist here when they are summoned. While here they are in constant pain, and since they are pulled here by those who summon them, they hate all Summoners. Since only a few humans know how to do this, spirits don’t necessarily hate all humans, and have been known to befriend humans on occasion. Of course there are those which think of humans as evil and will take every opportunity to destroy them, but there are not many of these.

Spirits are magical by nature. While in our universe they can change shape, though other spirits can always tell if what they are looking at is magical in nature or not. They cannot create objects out of thin air, or change something into something else, but they can create illusions, move immensely heavy objects, command the elements (although those of water and earth are much harder to control than fire and air), create shields to protect themselves and others from magical attacks, and do many other wondrous things besides.

Spirits are not invulnerable, however. Silver hurts them badly, the more pure the more it hurts. Pure iron hurts them as well, though not to the same extent that silver does. Both silver and iron are also magically resilient, and can therefore penetrate shields and other magics which spirits might work. They can of course be killed by each other, and many of them have been in duels between Summoners. Several of the larger wars between groups of humans have been almost entirely spirits v.s. spirits, and the casualties of these wars are always high.

Spoiler: Notes on Possession: 

Spirits have the ability to live inside human bodies, though this is not usually done. If a spirit occupies a human body, then both it’s mind and the mind of the human occupy the same body, which can cause a degree of confusion at first. Both the human and the spirit are privy to each other’s thoughts and life experiences, and this connection often leads to a greater degree of understanding than would be otherwise possible. The human and spirit can communicate to each other through this telepathic link, which means that a human with a spirit inside of him could be having a conversation with another human and with the spirit at the same time.

Spirits can control the human body and move it as they see fit. When a spirit moves it’s human body, the physical attributes of the human are amplified, allowing the human to run faster, jump higher, and strike harder than any other human. The human body also becomes more resilient so as to be able to withstand it’s new power. The spirit can communicate with others by speaking through the human’s mouth. However, the human can resist the spirit’s attempt to move their body, and can move parts of their body that the spirit is not. This can lead to some rather amusing events when the human body does two things at once which are counterproductive to each other.

The human can also call upon the spirit’s magical abilities, but similar to the spirit’s control of the human body, only if the spirit allows it. In effect, the spirit can use it’s magic through the human. Also, all humans can see as many planes as the spirit can, though of course the spirit cannot transform the human into another shape on any plane. This also means that a human possessed by a spirit will appear to be a human on all seven planes, though the human’s aura will appear stronger than normal.

Humans which are possessed by spirits do not age, and therefore cannot die of age. However they can still die to violence or disease. In addition if the spirit somehow leaves the human, the humans age will suddenly catch up to them and they will die almost immediately.

Spoiler: Notes on Gameplay: 

Since this role-play will deal with a human possessed by a spirit, you will be playing two characters at the same time. You can have your posts be narrated by the human, or by the spirit, or both. The spirit will have been summoned to the world many times before this, so it will have many memories of the past which the humans can see at will, so you might want to decide where and when your spirit has served Summoners. For example, if your spirit was once summoned in feudal Japan, you could have memories of events which took place there. These events will not have taken place exactly as they did since this world is different from our own, so you can have some creative license in those memories, but try to stay as accurate to real history as you can.

Spoiler: Character sheet: 

Human name:

Human age:

Human sex:

Human appearance:

Human personality:

Human history before possession:

Spirit name:

Spirit age:

Spirit sex:

Spirit personality:

Spirit history before possession:

Human and Spirit history after possession:

[redgar]

Spoiler: Charles Murray and Ashomohr 

Human Name: Charles Murray

Human Age: 121 (was possessed at 21 years old)

Human Sex: Male

Human Appearance:
Attachment 6083

Human Personality:
Charles is quietly confident, observing everyone and everything around him. He is exceptionally good at reading people, and this empathy makes him easy to get along with. His quiet nature can sometimes come across as aloofness, but those who get to know him know that he is a kind and honest person. He is very honest and does not enjoy lying to people unless it is absolutely necessary. He also feels very protective of those who he counts as his close friends, and will not hesitate to leap into harms way to protect them.

Human History:
Charles was raised in an orphanage, and has no memory of his parents. He never could understand why they abandoned him, and this hurt him at a very early age. He decided that he would never do that to anyone ever agin, and this philosophy is one that he has chosen to live his life by. His kindly demeanor attracted many of the younger children at the orphanage, and he became something of a leader there as he grew up. When he was eighteen years old, Charles left the orphanage to get work with the rather idealistic goal of being able to take care of the kids he was leaving behind. At the age of twenty one he was walking home from work when a building in the next street exploded and rushed to see what was going on. Little did he know that it would change his life forever.

Spirit Name: Ashomohr

Spirit Age: 3,000 give or take

Spirit Sex: Male

Spirit Personality:
Ashomohr is the definition of a smart mouth. He has no problem with cutting people down to size with his own sardonic brand of humor, and a lot of times has a problem keeping his mouth shut. This gets him into trouble more often than he would like to admit. However, Ashomohr is extremely clever and though he is not the strongest spirit he always manages to find a way out of whatever predicament he gets himself into.

Spirit History:
Ashomohr was summoned for the first time in Ancient Greece, at a point in time when the Summoners were highly respectful of the power and majesty of spirits. Though they still commanded him, they at least treated him with a high degree of respect. After their time past, his name was uncovered by the Romans, who held a similar degree of respect for the spirit world. In the 300s AD however, Ashomohr found himself serving in Medieval Europe, which regarded spirits with a mixture of fear, hate, and distrust. Ashomohr responded by withdrawing behind a veil of disrespect and contempt. He remained like this all the way through the early 1900s when his world was turned upside down.

Charles and Ashomohr's History:
The moments following Ashomohr's binding to Charles' body were very uncomfortable for both of them. Charles had no idea what was going on and was terrified out of his mind. Ashomohr immediately grasped what had happened, and was not happy with it at all. He eventually managed to calm Charles down and explain to him what had happened. Charles was as unhappy with this new situation as Ashomohr was, and the two of them decided to try to find a way to undo whatever had been done to them. They searched and searched for over fifty years, stealing books from Summoners, asking spirits they met, and going to meetings of secret cults. Not once did they find anything. Both of them eventually despaired and stopped looking. Ashomohr sank into a deep depression, and Charles was constantly fighting it off.

Then one day, they saw a woman being raped by a group of men. They leaped into action as one being, scattering the men and saving the woman. This one event snapped the two of them out of their depression, and made them realize that their situation wasn't as bad as they had thought it was. Over the next forty years the two of them have gradually acclimatized to each other, and can now function quite efficiently as two minds in one body. They travel the world together, learning what they can and helping people who need it wherever they can.

[marceleeno]

I'm definitely interested, but what is the setting? Like what city/town/village is it in?

[WhyNotFly]

Yo yo! My name is Fly and I'll be co-modding this lovely rp, nice to meet you ! If you have any questions, feel free to come to me with them! I swear I don't bite.

To answer your question, this rp will be taking place in modern NYC mainly, though some parts may take our characters elsewhere. The important thing is that even though we're setting it in 2015, all of your characters were born in the 1800s or very early 1900s because you were possessed about a hundred years before the rp starts. So if you want to make your character's early history historically accurate then man that would be pretty cool! Obviously we're not going to be fact checking or anything, but it's an interesting thing to keep in mind when forging how your character acts and feels about their modern surroundings.

[Vestige Warrior]

Well you know I'm in. Heck yeah we are possessed!

[WhyNotFly]

Here's my character! If you're confused about some of the concepts of the situation, feel free to use her experiences as a reference, she's pretty basic and a good example.


Human Name: Martha Abernathy

Human Age: 153 (possessed at 53)

Human Sex: Female

Human Appearance: Martha is very pretty, but she certainly looks her age. Bags weigh down her clear brown eyes and stress creased wrinkles into her face. Still, the deepest wrinkles are her laughter lines and anyone could see that this is a face made for smiling. She wears her graying brown hair short, in a slightly outdated bob. She has an inviting, plump, motherly look about her, and radiates an aura of probably being able to make really good cookies.

Human Personality: Always the caring mother, Martha can also be a bit overbearing and fussy. She is too trusting for the modern world and tends to love with all her heart and end up hurt instead of protecting herself. She can be strict though, and if someone she cares about puts themself in danger she'll be the first one to smack them upside the head and give them an earful about how stupid they are. Just before crying and hugging them, of course.

Human History Before Possession: Martha was always the daughter her parents were proud to have. Nothing like her sister who talked back and winked at boys and wore men's boots. Martha was always quite content to learn to cook and stitch, to wear dresses and be polite. To marry a young, honorable man whom her parents chose for her. Have as many children as he wanted and devote the rest of her quiet life to supporting her family from the background. It's what she had always been told she would do and she was fine with that.

She married her husband Thomas Abernathy at eighteen and moved from her farm to New York City where he managed a small textile factory. She grew old and happy enough. She cared for her three children, Alexander, Mary, and Jack.

She never wanted it to change.

Spirit Name: Coaxyl

Spirit Age: 325

Spirit Sex: Male

Spirit Personality: Coaxyl is young for a spirit, and a relatively weak imp, though compared to a human he is still impressive. Nevertheless he has a bit of an inferiority complex which causes him to think he's being made fun of and react violently. He's a mean prankster and a fan of cruel jokes that hurt other people. He doesn't like to admit being wrong and even more he doesn't like to admit caring about someone, though he does have a heart under all that snark.

Spirit History Before Possession: Being young, Coaxyl doesn't have the broad historical knowledge that many of the spirits do. He was relatively easy to summon and control so he was often called upon by apprentice summoners for their first practice. He liked to make himself look terrifying and stomp around making big noises to scare the greenhorns. Every now and then they'd screw up, draw a picture wrong, not connect a line, flub some Latin, and those would be his favorite days. Coaxyl would burst from the circle and knock over burning candles, start dropping anything breakable, and all around make a mess of things. He didn't usually kill, but he did develop a reputation as a spirit that you should make sure is contained, or at least is far away from anything not nailed down.

A few nervous summoners attempted to bring him to fight in wars. He was supposed to be part of a battle in World War II (if it had a name he hadn't bothered to learn it), but kept managing to creatively reinterpret his master's orders to somehow either turn it against his summoner or else do nothing at all. He was horribly lazy and untrustworthy, and after that no one really wanted to go through the pains of controlling him. Easier just to summon something you had to put less effort into. Coaxyl was relegated back to a simple training spirit.

Human and Spirit History After Possession: If there was something Martha prided herself on it was how normal she was. She led a simple, normal life. But that all changed when she was hit one day with a sudden sharp pain in her head and collapsed while making dinner. As she came to, there was an awful ringing in her head like someone was screaming in her ears. She tried to cover them with her hands but found them not under her control. They were dragged out in front of her and turned about before her eyes.

"What is this?" The words were said through her mouth but she had not willed them. Some other mind was in her head, talking through her.

"Who are you?" She was frightened and angry. This was her body, and she had things to get done! She couldn't waste time putzing about with some voice in her head!

But the voice, who introduced himself as Coaxyl, proved hard to ignore.

Martha's already difficult life became even more stressful, because every moment was a struggle to get her body to do what she wanted. Coaxyl didn't seem to have much interest in letting her get on with her life, and seemed to take her attempted suppression of him as a challenge. When she opened a door he slammed it back shut. If she lost focus he would rattle out curses and insults through her mouth. He'd throw her dishes to the ground. When she slept he'd take the reins and leave her stranded somewhere around town in only her nightclothes.

It was funny to him, watching her perfect life crumble before her. Watching her friends and family grow concerned and then scared. Even when Martha pushed with all her night and said only what she wanted to say and did only what she wanted to do Coaxyl was there inside her head. Mocking her. Telling her she was crazy. Pointing out the way her children looked at her. Reminding her of all the terrible things he would do if she lost focus.

She became afraid to sleep, for fear that Coaxyl would hurt her family while she had no control.

Martha was strong, stronger than most humans, and even in these desperate times she managed to live her life. She remained her kind and caring self and watched her children grow up and marry. She watched her husband sicken and die, and assumed that soon she would follow. At least she would be free from Coaxyl then.

But instead of dying, Martha lived. In fact, she slowly became aware that she didn't even seem to be growing older. She'd thought she was aging gracefully, but thinking back, she looked the exact same as she had for so many years. Looked about the same as she had on that day Coaxyl had shown up inside her mind.

Martha turned on him, accusing him of this being another of his cruel pranks, ordering him to restart her aging, but the spirit had no idea what she meant. It had not been him who had given her this eternity, in fact, he was just as surprised as she was. That was when they both began to realize that neither of them knew what they were, or why they were fused in this way. They'd been so busy bickering they'd never stopped to truly talk to each other.

After much careful deliberation, Martha decided she couldn't stay around any longer. As much as it pained her to leave her children, they all had lives and children of their own, and it would have only hurt and confused them to see her unchanging. And it would kill her heart if she had to watch them die.

What would she do, though? She had no life outside of her family. All her skills had been building up to being a housewife. It had been all she'd hoped for. Coaxyl, unsurprisingly, had no suggestions. Well, a few snappy ones about putting herself in extreme physical discomfort, but Martha figured those were rhetorical. His heart didn't seem to be in it, though. As much as they had fought for control of the body, they had just been ignoring the obvious. Neither of them knew what they were or why they were like this. It was starting to dawn on them that they could be stuck like this forever. What was the point of anything?

They wandered for a few years doing odd jobs here and there before meeting a kind man in a park. A widower, Daniel, with two young children, Annie and Marisa. His sad story touched Martha's kindly soul and his sweet disposition touched her heart. She knew that it could not last forever the way romance had in her childhood fantasies, but she would love them until she had to leave before watching another family die while she remained, eternal.

Martha was determined to be perfect for them and Coaxyl was determined to undermine her once again. Back to normal. They needed this. They needed to oppose one another in order to remember who they were as individuals. They needed to fight to keep from melding into one. Not one monster, but two unlucky normals conjoined. At night they clutched to the memories of their past lives and to the distant hope that those days could return.

[DizzyMaelstrom!]

I really liked this RP. I've decided that I still wanna join. So I'm joining.

[marceleeno]

Idk what personality my CS could have, i know what my spirit personality is but not the human, i guess I'll just fill in what the rp is missing when it comes to personality lol

[WhyNotFly]

Sounds good, glad to have you! And of course, personality can grow and develop as the rp runs.

Wonderful to have you back, Dizzy! I promise this time we won't disappoint.

[marceleeno]

Human name: Hunter Adburn (Add-burn)

Human age: 116

Human sex: Male

Human appearance:
Dark blue hair, and cerulean eyes with pale skin

Human personality: Hunter is a silent kid, but always seeked adventure, anything out of the ordinary excites him. He reads a lot of fantasy books, just to distract himself from the boring life he lives along with his spirit, not knowing what the spirit could do for him.

He's a jokester when it comes to communicating with someone, always making a smart remark or throwing in a funny joke here and there. It gets people laughing, but it could really hurt others' feelings. He only jokes to hide the fact that he is actually a quiet, scared kid.

He believes that the spirits have had a long vendetta with the humans, always having conflicts with one another. So he studied the super natural, knowing more then an average person should.

Human history before possession: Not much was to tell about Hunter's history, he was born in a family of farm folk, and when he turned 4 his family moved to New York to have better jobs. A year after living in the city, his family was able to afford a house in New York City. The house was said to be a place of paranormal activity, and rumors say that the young and innocent were first hand witnesses of the paranormal. During the Joseph Killian event, Hunter said that he would see a shadow in his closet, which was Sarius. He was sixteen by this time.

The next day he kept hearing a voice in his head, a calm woman's voice that asked him where she was. When he told his parents about the voice, they were concerned, sending him to a therapist and diagnosing him with Schizophrenia. Two years of therapy had to be done before the voice fell silent, or at least that's what Hunter told his parents, before going off to college. Over the two year course, he's been communicating with the spirit, trying to understand what he heard. He thought that the spirit was wise, answering questions he asked, and even being the voice of reason when he is oblivious to consequences.



Spirit name: Sariun

Spirit age: 513 years

Spirit sex: Female

Spirit personality: A calm spirit that always has her head down, she is generally kind despite the fact that she is trapped in the boy's body. She was able to understand humans since she was sealed to one at such a young age.

She always takes caution to stuff that Hunter does not, which is most things. If Hunter acts rash, she sets him straight, almost like a mother would. She does however have a sinister side. Whoever comes out as mean or rude to Hunter, she wants frozen, forever.

She has developed a liking to humans so she doesn't wish any harm to Hunter, as Hunter showed her how kind hearted humans can be. She was not used to such behavior.

Spirit history before possession: Her form is of a Winter Sprite, a winged creature with a face of a human, but wings of a butterfly along with a snowflake in a shape of a gown. During World War 2, when Germany was trying to invade Russia in their last attempt to be the supreme country in the world, a Russian soldier summoned Sariun for the first time. He wished for the lands to be colder, for the storms to be more brutal, so the Germans could never reach their goal. Disgusted by how the humans used her for such a thing, she granted the boy's wish, therefore turning the tide of the war.

She came to the conclusion that humans would eventually kill one another off if such wishes come true. Fortunately for her, that was the first, and last time she was summoned. Until the Rift open and pulled her into the human world. She knew that she would fade away, she thought it was the end. But she woke up in a teenage boy's room, she was panicked and didn't know what was going on. Knowing that she was stuck in the human's body, she knew that they would have to tolerate one another. But she ended up becoming friends with the human instead.

Human and Spirit history after possession: Throughout Hunter's life, Sariun would tell Hunter stories of the Spirit Realm. Although the descriptions were vague, the many spirits she would talk about fascinated Hunter. After the serious reaction Hunter's parents had, Sariun didn't even try to control Hunter's body. But the one thing she could not control was Hunter always feeling cold, although she wishes the side effect never existed, she could not help it.

Hunter just thinks of Sariun as a voice in his head, a voice that helps him in a time of need or even if he needs a question answered. Besides from that Hunter lived a normal life. Except the fact that he always looked younger then he was. His parents said it was because he was healthy, but when his father died, and his mother being delirious, the truth came out. Sariun revealed herself as the snow sprite spirit, and as long as she is in him, he will live longer then a normal human. At first it was exciting, but then as he aged, and his mother died f age, he saw life as a boring idea. He now lives in his family owned house, 116 years old and still looking the same age he did when he got possessed, but today was different, Sariun said that she had a surprise for him.

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I know mine isn't that long, but i wanted him to be possessed at a young age, and i hope it's acceptable!