A post for things to happen

[medpacksapunch]

[continuations &c to go here]

Comments

Day 122

[medpacksapunch]

((from here))

Water would actually be pretty nice.

Re: Day 122

[doesnothappen]

Just a second.

[heads into the cabin and comes out again a moment later with a couple of cups of water]

Re: Day 122

[medpacksapunch]

[accepts, smiling gratefully]

Thanks a lot.

[drinks her water, then sets the glass near the door]

Okay, so-- like I said, the first step is going to be making sure you have something similar enough to chakra, and that you can mold it.

Re: Day 122

[doesnothappen]

[nods]

How do we do that?

[medpacksapunch]

Mm, well... all living things have the potential for it. I take it it's not something... people where you're from use though? I've talked to a couple of people here who sound like they have similar concepts. Internal, spiritual energy or something...

[doesnothappen]

Well... I can think and move my body around, so there must be something inside that makes it go. And some people can do spirit stuff, but that's... different, it's in the mind or somewhere else. Nobody can do stuff like you or Josh can do.

[medpacksapunch]

Hmm....

[sits, patting the dirt in front of herself]

I'm going to test something, explain the spirit stuff to me, in the meantime?

[doesnothappen]

[also sits, mirroring her]

It's not something I understand very well. I'm not sure it makes sense. I'm not sure it's real. But maybe there's... a shadow world. Part of the world that isn't anywhere, and only your spirit can go there, because it's made of dreams or memories or ideas... shadows. But some people, some of the time... maybe women of power, or people as they die... can go there, and the things they do there can change the real world.

[medpacksapunch]

[blinks, but reaches out, placing both hands on his shoulders]

I see...I'm not sure that's helpful for us right now after all, but it's interesting. Here, relax for a second.

[doesnothappen]

[takes a deep breath and nods]

[medpacksapunch]

[does the same, concentrating hard-- he might feel a slight tingle in his shoulders where her palms press against him]

[--Stops, after a minute, dropping her hands down into her lap as she tries to catch her breath]

S-Sorry, it's... I'm still really new at this, too...

[doesnothappen]

[touches his left shoulder where her hand was]

No, thank you for even trying. Don't make yourself sick, all right?

[medpacksapunch]

It's okay. I was just-- seeing if I could feel your chakra network, or... whatever it would be called. It's not my specialty though-- it's Neji's. You didn't feel-- inert, though. Which makes sense, you're alive, but...

hmm...

[thinking, thinking]

[doesnothappen]

I could feel you were doing something. It sort of tingled.

[medpacksapunch]

Well, that's probably a good sign.

[huffs]

I think... the first step is going to need to be getting your to recognize your own cha-- energy. Even though it's woven into your nervous system, with enough practice and attention it's something you can attune yourself to.

[doesnothappen]

...maybe we do have something like that.

Chakra... could you use it to slow down your heartbeat? To stop it, even, and still come back?

[medpacksapunch]

[thinks]

Maybe? That sounds like something you'd need some really precise control for, though. Once you get good enough at chakra control, your only real limit is your body and physical resources, so I wouldn't doubt that there's someone who knows how to do that.

[doesnothappen]

There's a woman at home who can do it. She's very old, though, and has a lot of power. I don't know how she does it. So how do I recognize it?

[medpacksapunch]

Mm, well... it's not going to be very exciting, but probably the first thing we'll need to practice is a lot of meditation. Like-- you know how most of the time your heart beats constantly and you don't pay attention to it, but if you really focus on it you can be cognizant of your pulse and your heartbeat, even when you aren't working hard.

That's what we're aiming for. It should feel like-- [falters a little, chewing her lip] Potential? Of course, all energy is potential, but... if it wasn't so unpleasant I'd have Neji come show you his chakra-blocking thing he does. It's almost easier to understand what it feels like when you're suddenly lacking it.

[doesnothappen]

I can live with unpleasant. If you think it'd help, and you think he'd do it...

[medpacksapunch]

He might. He's been... he's really great, lately.

But anyway, what he does is-- he blocks your chakra pathways, so it doesn't flow to whatever body part he's affected. It's pretty disabling; there have been times when I have been able to move my arms for hours, because my body just wont respond... though it's not always that severe. A lighter touch is like -- It's a bit like-- like trying to breathe in low oxygen. You can do it, but it's hard, and it kind of hurts and is bad for you if you keep forcing your body to do it.

...am I making any sense at all?

[doesnothappen]

He makes you completely exhausted because your body can't find its own energy, and he can do it to particular bits of you?

[medpacksapunch]

Yeah he's-- okay, he hasn't really explained it in detail to me, but what I assume he's doing is using his own chakra to force closed specific chakra nodes in my body. Like pressure points-- they just get cut off from my chakra circulation.

The healing I can do is the same basic principle-- pushing my chakra into another person's body -- but obviously we manipulate it differently, and with different effect. If I were really good at it though, I could put somebody into a coma by pushing enough of my energy into them. That's why control is so important.

[doesnothappen]

The way you talk about it... "network" and "circulation" and stuff... it makes it sound like blood, if you could push your blood outside of yourself with your mind and make it do stuff on its own and... not die from it.

[medpacksapunch]

Mm, that's a decent way to think about it, I guess, for now. And you are working with a set limit-- like the way a body only has so much blood in it. Some people have more chakra than others, but if you use up all your chakra you could die from it. Chakra exhaustion is a real danger.