ORIGIN

Vargas stared, aghast.

Part of him was roused toward growing furious. He'd been more than patient, and Ruby-One was at this point asking to be shown its place. But the other part was horrified, and tempered his reaction somewhat. "This is not," Vargas growled, with the first low tone of warning he'd ever shown it, "how you speak to a Master. I have killed far stronger than you, Ruby-One. But before you escalate this further... No one told you that you must stabilize your inherent Chaos?"

It had said it didn't go near it. But it was already several Cycles old; it would have died, by now. Had it been stabilizing itself by accident, in passing-? Or did it know, and it simply wasn't doing more than the bare minimum to keep itself from death-?

He looked then to V-Onyx-Three, and shook his head and spoke in a calmer tone. "No. You have both done well. Better than I had expected. You are dismissed, Onyx-Three. Not you, Ruby-One. You will accompany me to the Black Spire and you will stabilize yourself in my presence. I need to see if the weakness of your control is a lack of practice or a lack of magical stability."

He stifled a sigh as he turned away, making for the Black Spire. It would not have been a sound of annoyance, in any case, but one of exasperation, and that would not have helped Ruby-One to hear. It would have irked it in turn, he was quite certain.

Though had he known the sheer depths of the Chaos currently surging through its mind, he might have realized that this would have been but a drop in its seething ocean. (Or, in the worst case, a straw to break the Chaos-camel's back.)

"It cannot be pleasant, it eating at you like this," was what he said aloud, a musing that--unlike his previous thoughts--was utterly blind to the effects it might have. A socially smarter creature might have realized that making Ruby-One think further on its own chaos, its own discomfort, was more likely to upset it. Or maybe it wouldn't; it was more Vargas musing aloud, contemplating in rare sympathy. "I do not know why you dislike the Black Spire, but it should calm you. Calm it, in you," he amended. He didn't know the exact mechanics of how it worked--whether it siphoned off an excess, or resonated with the creature's stone to impose a somehow standardized 'amount' of Chaos. Or if a Chaos creature's magic began to spike higher and higher as its overall level dipped, and the "filling up" of the Spire's power stabilized it. What mattered was that it worked to do so.

How much of an effect that would have on Ruby-One's temperament he could not say, but it was the logical first step. No point in punishing the creature if it were acting out due to circumstances beyond its control. Again, Vargas made the mental note to chastise both its 'parents' for never informing it of this.

"Here we are," he said, quite unnecessarily, as he stalked into sight of the towering, jagged monolith. "Go near to it, sit, let it permeate you. Its power will regulate your own. You may find it easier to think. Your emotions calmed. Not perfect... you will always be of Chaos. But... easier to manage." He'd repeated that word--easier--because that was what it was. It wasn't a solution, and it never would be, but it was a necessary balm. He stepped aside, eyeing the Oilstone, then looking to Ruby-One. He'd stand, and wait, and see what happened.

Whether it would help.