The sigil glows, colors suffusing it--green, pale pink, gold, orange, the colors of the early sunrise--and then vanishes beneath their hands and before their eyes. It leaves the black marble behind, the casters' blood filling the grooves where it had once been. Renard lifts his hand and clenches it tight as the void dissolves around them.
The world reforms around them. Across the gaping hole in the world, the rift in Waite State Forest, is Sunny. Her manic energy is gone. Her hair hangs lankly in her face, all of the life bled out of her face.
(Among them is the door crew--Nathaniel, Algernon, Jeremiah, and Jack--apparently no worse for wear and much more well-rested than the rest of them.)
She opens her mouth to say something, but before she can form the words she, too, is overcome by the colors of that early sunrise. She shimmers in the sunlight (the storm is gone) and she disappears.
They're free to go home.
The changes in the world can wait until tomorrow.
Keep an eye on the main forum for the effects your sigil has had on the world of Ashdown!
To claim your event credit, please post a link to your record in this thread with a 450 word response to all that has happened. :>
Shun hadn't opened his eyes until he realized something was changing around them. Lifting his head, he looked around as the world began to reform once more in place of the void they had been in. He could see Sunny once more, though she no longer seemed to be going out of control. Shortly after spotting her, he could see the crew that kept the door open within the area as well.
A quick examination from where he stood told him that they all seemed to be relatively alright. In fact, they looked like they were in better shape than the rest of them right now.
The detective's gaze shifted over towards the horizon where it seemed that the sun slowly began to rise for the day. It appeared that not a whole lot of time had passed back in Ashdown while the rest of them were in the rift. Slowly, he exhaled as he watched the colors slowly bleed into the sky. It had been one hell of a 'night'.
Catching a glint in the corner of his eyes, he turned to see Sunny for a split second before she vanished. He tilted his head, not entirely certain what that meant. Did she leave on her own volition or was it something else that caused her to disappear like that? He wasn't sure if now was the time to be asking.
Quite frankly, he wasn't sure what the state of... anything was yet. Just looking around, everything appeared to be normal, but it could be anything but. He supposed it was at least a good sign that everything wasn't crumbling around them now that they had cast the sigil. It was just difficult to tell what its side effects may or may not have been right off the bat.
After several moments, he pushed himself up to his feet. There was still a fairly large sense of unease at the whole situation due to the fact that it almost seemed too normal. It just seemed highly unlikely that things had gone off perfectly. There was bound to be some sort of consequence to all of this. He just couldn't see it yet.
He rubbed his forehead, then turned to the four that had stayed behind. They likely would have questions.
"I can brief you about what went on in there. Either now or later," he stated. Shun was tired... exhausted... after the whole ordeal, but he would tough through it if they wished to hear it now while everything was still fresh. He did, however, add, "Regardless, there are likely to have been some changes to the world as we knew it. I just... do not know what those changes are yet."
If not, then he could at least finally get some rest.
The sigil gleams, it glows, it shines and fills their sight with light before vanishing to leave blood-filled marble -- and the world vanishes around them in time with the rhythm of their heart and the clench of Renard's fist, and Sunny falls away in the sunshine as the world rises to life, and the ground beneath them is grass and dirt and real and real and real.
Alexis lets all the magic fall out of their water at once. They're so tired. (And if it splashes on the people around them, it's a hazard they don't particularly mind.) They're so tired. They'll need to close the wound on their hand -- wash up properly in the brave new (brave old) world with such people in it, people they -- people they have to trust now -- they have to --
There is no click in their mind cluing them into any new power. So they aren't one of the chosen, then, probably. It's -- it hurts. It hurts. They would have bled for these people, died for them, killed for them -- so what? Are they going to have to kill whoever's chosen, this time, and repeat all over all over all over again -- cut their wrists rip their throats out feel their fingers crunch between their teeth their teeth their teeth --
(Alexis can't stop shaking, and their fingers are numb, and they can feel the urge to vomit rise at the back of their throat as everything hits them all at once -- the girl, the woman, with their face and the blood streaking on her fingertips; the man with Alois' voice, a shot ringing out and blood blood blood and the clothes feel WRONG on them WRONG - WRONG - WRONG - they stumble, then, move to cling to Zac like a lifeline, and their shoulders shake with the force of their sobs -) "He almost shot me," they mumble, and their tongue is heavy in their mouth and their eyelids are weights too heavy to lift. "We died, Zac, we all died, we died- "
Their speech is no more, then, and they can only hold him close and cry with the weight of all these days in the wrong time finally releasing. Alexis is tired. They're so, so tired, and they want to go home, and they don't even have a goddamn home they have Nasir who's lovely but -- it's -- home isn't real, it's not real, it's not --
(Mercer's there, and he looks fine, but this isn't the time and this isn't the place -- one day they'll ask him. One day. Maybe if Zac backs them up. They'll ask him all the things he's curious about, like how he knows and why he always looks like that nowadays.)
(Against Zac, even his skinny frame, Alexis is too-frail and too-bony-- their clothes are soaked tight to their skin, their hair undone and wild, their lips scabbed messes of blood and pain and their hand is bleeding sluggishly from where they ripped their palm open with their own teeth and they want to go home. They want to go home. They want to go home.)
Dawn is America's favorite time of day, poised right between restful quiet and solitude and the lively brilliance of a world waking up. It always seems like she can hear her own heartbeat most clearly, from one breath to another, when the sun's just starting to light up the edges of things, make everything really there again. It's a good color, in her opinion, for they're trying to do...what they've done.
And then there's Sunny and America's face lights up, filling with relief and joy and maybe some apologies, maybe a good dozen or so we can's and I need to's and and let's and you. There's a lot of you's speeding around that expression, and the tune of them shifts when America notices something missing, something drained from Sunny's features.
And the the light of day hits Sunny's edges and instead of turning a bit more real, she simply fades altogether.
She races to where the girl had stood, and in an echo of an earlier moment, America feels around the space where Sunny had been, head whipping around, just in case. "Sunny...?" Her voice breaks on the name and she can't, absolutely cannot, let herself think they did it wrong. Sunny was magic. Sunny is magic, all of it. She's done this before, right? The world is still here and it's beautiful as ever and no one was dead, no one was shattered under the experience or lost to the tides of magic.
Inhale. Exhale.
She turns a smile, hopeful and optimistic and tired, toward the rest. "I think we did it. Have to find her later," because belief was a powerful thing, "but we did it!" And then she goes quiet again, breathing in and then out, standing where Sunny had stood and gazing down at the rift and wishing, briefly in a rare moment of regret, that Sunny could have had some of them standing next to her. Just seems lonely, like this. But maybe there hadn't been a choice. At least not then.
Closing her eyes, America thought of the sigil, its branches full of possibilities and hopes for better choices guiding the eye up and up and up. It is okay. They are okay.
She checks in with the folks that linger, the ones she knows and the ones she might know better real soon, cause this was a beginning, right? They had done something and this was the first day of everything else. There's numbers to be exchanged, and mentions of maybe meeting up later, singly to teach or explain where they each could, and maybe as a group because they'd done this together and maybe there was still more to do. And there's questions, does other Ashdown still exist? What was it like, where you went? Are you gonna be okay? Do you need a ride home?
America isn't the first to leave, but not the last either. There's a lot of later, later. There's a lof tired and some unease and if nobody had shattered under the casting, maybe some had come real, real close. After awhile, though, it's more than time to go home. there's a timetravel joke brewing somewhere in the back of her head, and maybe after a bit of sleep she'll be able to annoy Taym with it, maybe she can try explaining puns to Mr. B again or try out one of the new numbers scrawled in her little notebook.
They are okay.
some ooc
if anyone wants to handwave some contact information exchange for later rp ^^^^^
He doesn’t feel… changed, if he’d actually mattered to the sigil, shouldn’t he feel different? He feels, numb, and sick to see sunny. The manic energy is gone, but so is the life in her face. It’s like she’s there, and already dead. Like they killed her.
And then… soundless, wordless, she vanishes.
His skin prickles, a distant feeling sensation like needles in his skin, the aching pulse of the cut; bile in the back of his throat is a bitter pang. He’s not surprised to be so sure that they failed.
“We didn’t die.” He assures Alexis. “We’re still here.”
He’s sure of that if nothing else because the cut hurts, even now thinking about the deaths, it’s a grounding throb in pulse with the time of his heart. Arms holding him close, and he responds, hesitantly feeling like a puppet with something greater plucking at his strings.
“It’s ok… we’re home.” He said softly. “We’re home.” He repeats, and he’s not mentioning Sunny, he can’t.
“… I want out of these damned pants.” He said with a sudden vehemence. He’s tired of the era they left, tired of expectations and norms and worse. So tired, but at least it’s a feeling he can hold on to.
“Let’s see if we can get you a bandage for that hand.” He murmurs.
He carefully guides Alexis towards Jeremiah, his legs feel wooden and his steps are stumbling. He wants to ask what they did, but he’s afraid to know; so afraid to know. She’s dead… he’s sure of it.
“… Oh…” he says after a moment, stopping his approach to Jerimiah. “s**t, no - he can’t, he can’t see me.” He says looking crushed. “Let’s…”
He glanced around at the others there. “Come on, we’ll go back to my, place, Temperance is good at fixing things. She can help.”
He looks around, searching, searching the ground for, something but it’s not there. Why would it be there? There is no reason to find it. It was a foolish thought that he pushes carefully aside, ignoring the weight of it, pressing on him like a judgmental gaze.
He glances at America, offers a smile that he doesn’t really feel. “Sure, yeah, I think I’m alright. I… if you find out who is part of the thing, I just want to talk to the people who are part of this later. I just had something to share. If you could pass that on.” He offered, for what little it was worth.
He likes her, she taught him how to make that necklace, and he had very little to offer her in return save information.
“Temperance, I just… I got to make sure she’s okay.” He added. “Can, can someone make sure Jeremiah is alright.”
We failed, Ashton thinks, and it is a distant thunder in offbeat rhythm with her heartbeat. We've failed. She can't feel any severe change, any click, any difference in the air -- her vision is blurring. Ascension Shore, the witch on the beach, who texted her once - she has vanished into only so much sunlight, like she was never there, between one heartbeat and the next - in the space of what is, merely, a blink (or not even, maybe half of one, maybe a third - it is too many technicalities for Ashton's aching head to carry within it, and so it doesn't, and she approximates).
Beat. Beat. Beat.
Her head is throbbing something awful.
They failed, but none of them are dead (was Ascension ever a real person anyways, she absentmindedly wonders, and dismisses the thought for a later time), which. Actually, that is quite a cause for thought, Ashton's brain stutterskips back - did they fail? Or is this just a world so great and wonderful like the one they thought they'd come back to that there's no immediate difference?
Breathe in. Breathe out. It's a terribly good thing that she isn't fond of these clothes, anyways (as they were never really hers, they belong to the year 1969 and an unreal timeline and a terrible time and place unlike any she'd ever known - he? she was male for those two days until the void when it clicked and shifted, the way it so often does); they are dusty and torn from rubble, and blood makes her hair sticky and matted; the texture is awful, really, just awful. Some of her hair will be requiring a trim, if the blood doesn't wash out properly, and why is she so concerned with the sourceless blood and not her damned concussion? Everything is so awfully foggy, and her ears are ringing like the worst siren in the world, and -- there. Someone she has little connection with, but someone she can trust to get her to the hospital safely.
"Temperance," Ashton enunciates clearly, her steps slow, and her eyes are a little blurry but she can't mistake Temperance -- the two of them look alike, don't they, even a little bit, even if they're in separate programs and Ashton will go on to greater things in the field of medicine than Temperance ever will (focus, Carver, focus) -- "can you take me to the hospital, please? I think I have a concussion." She can't stay quite steady without a hand on the trees, and the way her upper lip pulls back to show her teeth is more than a little -- feral, perhaps. Inhuman. "Whatever happened -" and she would give America her contact info, she absolutely would, but her head is cotton-stuffed and crystal-sharp - "I need to be able to. Think about it without this."
Chel doesn't gracefully enter as they maybe should have. It seems nothing she ever did would be graceful in regards to the magical or world-changing events that shaped their lives. She tripped through the door to Other Ashdown and crashed into magic and would probably do so for the rest of her life. She didn't cast well, wasn't motivated by personal gain and failed at almost every opportunity presented to her.
But she was here. As the sunrise color washed over the group, the sigil, the blood, the void itself, Chel had to at least think, at least I'm here. A witness to it all. She thought, maybe, if some people were destined for greatness, there had to be some people destined to witness it. At least she could say she hadn't run away. Being a coward was the evilest of sins in Chel's skewed moral book, and she could at LEAST say she hadn't betrayed that ideal.
When they returned she didn't do much but stare at everyone with a pensive face. It seemed like something more should have happened. An apocalypse on the other side, or maybe magic creatures running around or something, but no. It was a quiet time in the forest and seemed almost completely undisturbed.
(Chel supposed it was better undisturbed; Sunny had disturbed it quite enough, eh?)
She looked to Sunny- poor thing. Chel was certain America or any of her closer friends would be able to comfort the matted, torn woman that stood in the forest more than she ever would. If she was being honest, Chel still didn't trust magic, and by extension she still didn't trust Sunny. The woman hadn't kept her promise at the ball and she'd created giant holes in space and time. Even as beaten as she looked and with all the work they'd done on the sigil, Chel would never trust that Sunny didn't have one more trick up her sleeve. She could burst at any moment.
Jack. Sweet Jack looked as spotless as they'd left him. She took a step to talk to him, but Shun began to address the four who had been left behind and thought better of it. She wasn't sure what all they'd been through on this side, and she was even less sure of what she'd been about to tell Jack anyways. Instead, she let Shun explain the situation. He was one of those destined for greatness.
She put a hand on the small of his back in solidarity. Maybe to prop him up a little bit too. He was looking a little bit tired in the madness- hell, they all were.
"Let's ********' go home," was her contribution to the conversation.
Everyone had a lot more to say than he did, but that was always the way of things when the freaks and weirdos of Ashdown got together. With every supernatural fact he learned, every event in magical history he was present for, came the certainty that there were thousands more he would never hear of, let alone understand. He couldn't decide if he was jealous or grateful, not when their sigil was busy bringing about the end of this world. At least the apocalypse was pretty.
Rabbit found himself incapable of forcing his eyes shut, so he stared instead, watching the tree and the keys and the knot spark to life and feeling the world remake itself with more grace than he thought possible amidst all the blood. Their mysterious visitor—Sunny's father—gestured, and the real world faded in like mist around him, leaving Rabbit in the same spot where he had stood before he'd committed to the void life. Sunny was there, and she looked as much like a human as any of them did, but as he watched, she quietly disappeared. The hole was gone, the sun was shining, and he was too keyed up to rest even though he knew he needed to. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a whole pack of cigarettes and a lighter in one go, but instead of being weirded out or questioning why, Rabbit grinned at them as he opened the pack.
For a moment he thought about checking on the guys who'd stayed behind, asking them what might have changed, but there would be time for that later. The time they had bought. He suspected the four of them would know about as much as he did anyway. Rabbit tucked a cigarette between his lips and turned away from the group, anxious to be moving again. He wouldn't bother Temperance, not now. His arm wasn't bleeding that badly anymore anyway.
He didn't run into very many people on his way back home, but after the reaction of the first one he passed, Rabbit realized how he must look, covered in bodily fluids and 80s fashion. The second man was met with a knowing nod. Of course he'd meant to leave the house this way.
"Halloween party," he said with a smile, only wondering after he received this second frown if it was still Halloween at all. It was quite a bit colder than he recalled, and he picked up his pace as all of these bits of information began to settle. There were Christmas decorations in the windows of some of the shops he passed, Hanukah ones in others, simple fake snow in the rest. Suddenly, he couldn't move quickly enough.
When Rabbit reached his apartment, he knocked, having lost his keys to the void, and as the door swung open, he drew a deep breath, ready to launch into a tale of time-traveling, world-saving adventure. Unfortunately, the woman who answered was most definitely not his sister, and the look she gave him was the worst of the three he'd received, far more fearful than judgmental. After what felt like an hour of apologies, he hurried back down to street level, texting Olivia on a phone three percentage points from death.
Quote:
where do we live
He sighed.
It was a question rife with consequences, but he could think of no way to find the answer on his own that wouldn't take time to execute, time he didn't want to spend right now. He was going to tell her all about it anyway, this would just speed things up.
Well, she thought as the sigil began to glow, they'd obviously done something. Soft, inviting. But she couldn't help but think that they had too little knowledge and even less time, so it felt as though their efforts were crude, hasty, unrefined. It would be a miracle if this even worked. Vaguely disgruntled, she resisted the urge to swipe at her nose. The blood she'd chosen might have seemed a little disgusting to some, but it was as good as any other. 'Blood by any other name would smell as iron-like.' Or ******** like that. Preacher watched, amber eyes open wide as the void dissipated around them in a confusing swirl, like some kind of drain plug had been pulled. It reformed, as it was, (sort of) in that same rush.
Light glowed softly; the sun was rising. The morning came as inexorably as it always did, an unstoppable force. And there, after all this, was Sunny. Preacher wanted to run to her, somehow apologize for everything that had gone wrong in the twenties, but her knees wobbled as she stood. The cap fell low over her eyes, obscuring her vision. Preacher yanked it back just as Sunny vanished. No! That wasn't... that wasn't the point of it all! She sucked in a deep breath, watched America run over, and then... smile, of all things. Preacher recognized that optimism was important in the light of what they had done, but it was more a punch to the gut than reassurance. Slowly, she walked over.
America had lingered, talking to people, and Preacher watched with one eye while she stared at the ground where Sunny had stood. "Where did you go?" she whispered. This wasn't how it was supposed to work. She stoops down and doodles the sigil in the soft dirt there. Was it really worth it all? How was she supposed to keep her promise if Sunny had vanished? And, sure, it was such a silly promise, but it had stuck to Preacher like hot glue. It burned. The sigil in the dirt here was only a doodle, nothing more, thought it felt a little too much like a vigil instead. Angrily, she scuffed it out with her foot. Pointless. She took in a great gulp of air. Abruptly, she turned and jogged to America.
"You're gonna find her, right?" It was spoken like a challenge. America had seemed to know Sunny, so, surely she would. "You're gonna look n' find her." This time it wasn't a question and Preacher stood there, bedecked in her clothing from the twenties, small and defiant and mad at the ******** world because not everything was perfect. Though she knew, from long ago, that it never was.
She sucked in a deep breath, like she was drowning, like something had just been pulled out of her. Temperance didn't really understand what they had done besides 'it', but it felt okay. It could be right. Her legs and arms seemed to be made wooden, rooted to the ground as the sun broke. Then, like some fairy tail fae, she could move again. Ironically, with the sun Sunny vanished. It... was another person to add to the tally. ********, she felt so tired. This whole thing, nothing was like the video games she'd played. Everything in them was clear black and white of who was the enemy and who was good and if someone died, she could just reload.
There were no save states in the real world. She watched with glassy eyes as America stood, found the energy to be hopeful. Temperance wanted to wrap arms around each person, protect them, tell them things were alright. Sometimes, dan was a hateful thing; it revealed what the night held close. She drifted towards Zac, hearing her name, seeing Alexis draped on him like a dead scarf.
It took her a moment to realize what he'd said. "I'm okay, Zac. And it... it looks like Mercer feels okay." There was a lie here: she didn't look okay. The blood on her hands had dried into a sickly red crackle and the bags under her eyes were as deep as bruises. Despite that, Temperance forcibly ignored the blood on her hands and scanned the two of them quickly and her expression hardened, switching back into another mode of thought. She cataloged the wounds efficiently - what she could patch here, what needed more.... "Let me see that." Temperance prodded at Alexis' hand. "And how is your arm, Zac?" She rummaged in her bag for gauze and disinfectant. The disinfectant would hurt when applied directly to a wound, but it would help. What was a little more pain, anyway?
Later, she would turn at Ashton's voice, face a little vacant at first. Frowning, she scanned the other blonde's face. "Okay, take my arm." The way Ashton was swaying tugged at her. Concussions were dangerous, although often nothing could immediately be done to drastically reduce the symptoms. Rest, activity restriction, no television, video games... However, the symptoms could be treated and Ashton at very least needed an analgesic. "We're going to get out of the forest and take a cab. Thinking can happen... later. Come on, be careful." She wrapped the proffered Arm around Ashton, intending to offer as much support as possible. Perhaps she had a new career as a human crutch. For now, all she wanted was to take care of people and maybe wash her hands. This was becoming a trend.
It was done. It was done, and whatever that meant was whatever that meant. The sigil lit with the colors of dawn, and the elsewhere-place dissolved all around them, returning Jordan and everyone else to the place where it had all begun.
He watched Sunny as the colors of dawn washed over her and she dissolved, as easily and as finally as the void had dissolved, and was gone. Jordan didn't know what that meant. Was she gone, really? Or had she moved on to some other kind of existence, catalyzed by the magic of the ritual they'd all contributed to? Who had become the fourth in the ritual, after all? He didn't even know who'd become the principals, he realized. Probably what that meant to him, on a practical level, was that it wasn't him, which was a relief even though he hadn't expected to be chosen by whatever it was that decided that sort of thing.
He stood on the fringes of the group as the people who knew each other turned to their friends for comfort and familiarity and watched, feeling somehow as though he'd lost something, although he didn't quite know what that was. Was the world different? It had to be, didn't it, after all they'd gone through and bled for? After what they'd seen - he watched as the person with the sharp teeth half-collapsed on someone they must know, and didn't move; after all, he was a stranger.
(A shot, deafening at close range, and the world breaking and rewinding to make it so that death had never happened. Add another moment of horror to the catalog of things that Jordan would never forget, even if it had promptly unhappened.)
He wasn't going to bother Temperance, either. The slice on his arm wasn't bleeding badly, and it would be scabbed over in no time, and she had plenty to worry about that wasn't a school acquaintance who didn't actually need medical assistance. His phone was vibrating in his pocket, sudden and no longer anachronistic, and he picked it out and stared at it and wondered who Ice Girl was. Someone he knew? Or was this maybe the first in a line of changes that he was going to have to pretend weren't changes at all? He'd answer later, he decided, pretend maybe that his phone had run out of charge, which wasn't too far off from the truth with how long it had gone without being plugged in.
He wanted to go home. Or back to his apartment, for what value of home that was worth. He didn't want to go back at all. He lingered as people began to drift away, watched Preacher storm over to a red-haired girl he knew not at all. moved closer to hear what was being said, if only because he wasn't ready to face normality again.
(Tomorrow he would call his brother, make sure everything was okay at home, make sure nothing was wrong, just to reassure himself.)
Posted: Mon Dec 19, 2016 10:19 pm
Thank god for Temperance, America thought. And Zac. And there was Chel, too, supporting Shun in that way she had. Watching the small moments of distress and tired and comfort around her, America offers Preacher a determined look, meeting her eyes straight on.
"Damn right." She absolutely would. "Everything we put in was to make a world with her in it that wasn't some kinda prison, right? That kinda power n'will backing it doesn't just go nowhere. So I'll find her, and I think you'll be looking just the same, so if you find her first you call me."
She glances up at the fellow lingering nearby and points a finger at him, still smiling, but stern as anything, "You too, give me your numbers. C'mon we all did a Big ********' Magic together, we're practically family now, so don't get shy on me."
Her phone is dead, but she's still got her little notebook and a now dull golf pencil. She sees the notes taken along the way and Yes. It All Really Happened.
the semblance of unity
prolixity
lizbot
No Faun
Offline
medigel
Anxious Spirit
Offline
Posted: Tue Dec 20, 2016 5:52 pm
Several people's phones blew up (or would blow up upon recharge) with similar messages from one Dawson Grace.
Quote:
?????
Quote:
wtf am i goign crazy???!?!?
Quote:
pls assist what the ******** class="clear">
xlizbot
meri
xcibarium
eve
xSmerdle
ima assume they exchange contact info in the rp i have to finish.........
The Semblance of Unity
preach
Posted: Tue Dec 20, 2016 9:20 pm
Jeremiah breathes in the air of where he is and when he breathes out he is back with everyone else. The way was held open, they all returned but something prickles at his skin.
This doesn't feel like-
Sunny is there and then she is gone. A beautiful array of colors, something he thinks that does match the sunrise but it pings something in his chest. Something he can't quite explain anymore. They couldn't have failed, they must have repaired it and-
Shun. Offering explanations.
Jeremiah shakes his head. "Text me later, Shun. The world isn't ending anymore and I think it can wait just a little bit while you rest. I've a vague idea, I think, and that's enough to tide me over."
He glances to Chel, nodding at her briefly because she's got Shun and then takes the arm of his husband to make their way home.
Jeremiah notices when Alexis seemingly approaches, held up by someone unseen and he knows - he knows - but there is little to be done when they turn another way. It's just another ache in his chest that he'll focus on later.
Algie's fingers are twined together around his and he, after all the training they had just done, disappears with him.
While waiting for his sister to reply, Rabbit received Dawson's frantic text. It took him half a second to make connections between the ice cream sandwiches and The Sweet Spot and the man himself, but when he did, he beamed at his phone.
