2022-12-19: Your comfort and mine warms these frigid halls
- Log: Your comfort and mine warms these frigid halls
- Cast: Elisa Kafim, Yuliana Kafim
- Where: The Silent Castle, the North Pole
- Date: 2022-12-19
- Summary: Yuliana returns to Elisa's side, and reassures her of her presence. Elisa, in kind, reassures Yuliana when she speaks of the horrors she witnessed in Denver. Yuliana's foundations may have shaken, but she'll always, always have Elisa.
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
The Silent Castle looms, living up to its title in the darkness. On Earth at the North Pole it is night time now, as it often is. And within...
Snapshot: the foyer of the castle is empty, quiet and dark. Nothing stirs.
Snapshot: the north tower looms, too, part of the Castle and lit recently but not now with green power. Zoom in; blood drips from a windowframe. Black candles more than half melted sit in a ring, and Elisa at the center. The room is upended; furniture overturned, curtains shredded, chests of drawers strewn about. This is not a bedroom, but it was once a nice sitting room. And there is blood in a circle around her tablet.
She paces before a fallen couch, the mistress of the Castle. Elisa is in a black robe and nothing else, the hood down, her bare feet ruining a ritual circle that no longer matters. Her phone is intact, but only through magic; it has been smashed repeatedly in her rage and concern.
"Where," she murmurs. "Where, where, where..."
She got Yuliana's message. She has been waiting.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Getting a battered old Gelgoog through space, into atmosphere, and all the way home is -- well, let's just say there could be many words written on just how easy it would have been for a lesser pilot not to manage the trip.
Yuliana isn't a lesser pilot, though. This is her first time in Zeonic trash like this, but she's experienced enough to force it to her will.
She avoids any further conflict in her retreat.
That hulking mobile suit lands, in the snow; Yuliana wrenches the cockpit up, and slides down, the boots of her green normal suit impacting the cold ground. She's still got her bag, slung over her shoulder. She would've had to -- Shari sent her off in a Flight Alto, not junk like this. She evidently had to survive with what she had on hand.
Yuliana hurries to the doors of the castle, and does not dwell on the way it's being completed so quickly. She has no thoughts for people who don't matter, right now.
"Elya!" She calls, as she runs through the Silent Castle's halls. "Elya..!" Up to the north tower -- she saw that blood dripping, through the suit's cameras. It's as good an indication as any where to go, in this vast fortress.
And so Yuliana, in her normal suit -- though the helmet's down, of course -- bursts into the remains of that sitting room, shrugging off her bag in an aside motion as she runs to the witch pacing the room. "Elyula, my darling," she runs to her, she grasps her, she lifts a hand to her cheek to turn her eyes to her, "I'm here, I'm here! Your Yuliana has returned to you! I'm sorry, I'm so sorry... oh, you know I'd have checked in with you if it were possible at all, I always do!"
Seeing Elisa's distress in full only brings more anguish to Yuliana, as she hurries and hurries to reassure her, reorient her, recentre her.
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
Elisa knows that Yuliana is a very good pilot, and she knows how it important it is to her to 'go places' and 'do things'. It is a thing she can accept. ...She is aware of much. But above all, she is aware of--
Yuliana's call.
Yuliana bursts into the room and Elisa grasps Yuliana in turn, hanging onto her as if she could hold nothing else in the world. "Oh! Oh, Yuliana, it was terrible!" she says, buries herself in her wife. She has returned. She would have checked in...
"I know, I know. But it was so long, and I could not locate you, and you would not ANSWER!" Distress is a good word for it. The blood beneath the cloak is not Elisa's own, however.
"I tried. I made the sacrifices, I sought the Sight, and yet I could not reach you! Oh, Yuliana..."
She does not let go. It may be uncomfortable. But she does not let go.
"Whatever happened?"
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Yuliana gasps, as Elisa embraces her, so, so tightly. One of them is stronger than the other.
"Shh, shh," she soothes her, despite the pressure, gently stroking Elisa's hair as she buries herself in. If it's a little stained with red, it wouldn't be the first time. "I'm here, I'm here, I'm in your arms, I'm yours..."
Distress is a good word for it, and it breaks Yuliana's heart, again and again, over and over. "I'm sorry, dearest, it must have been so hard... I sought only to return to you, I swore I'd get through it... you were always in my thoughts, always!" And there is a little pained sharpness to her insistence, because it is uncomfortable, yes.
She doesn't tell Elisa to let go. She couldn't tell Elisa to let go.
Yuliana draws another breath, explicitly, as her own weight sinks into Elisa. "Our mutual friends," Celestial Being, "happened to notice a signal in space... well, it was something of a project of mine, so I went to assist them, but... that awful clone wrecked my Flight Alto in the conflict! I had no choice but to flee into the colony, a-and -- and the reactor it was using -- the power was erratic, we were trapped there, I could not get a single signal out, I tried..."
Her breath hitches. "And -- and I was surrounded by enemies, Elya! Surrounded! All those Newtypes... oh, they were awful... the only friendly face I found was that bartender Lettu invited!" The one plagued by Triple Zero, but never mind Ennil's details.
"It... it was awful, Elya... what I learned, what they took from me..." Yuliana's fingers tighten, as she presses the side of her head against Elisa's, pained.
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
Elisa does not notice how tightly she is holding at first, but she is sensitive to Yuliana's needs, and that little pained sharpness causes her to relax when Yuliana sinks into her. It is less uncomfortable now, firm and secure but not painful. ...yes, Elisa's hair is a little red-stained. It goes with the purple.
Their mutual friends... "Yes," Elisa says, "I noticed the signal." But she did not go. She was too far, and was... occupied. But now, "I see... So it is the fault of a strange technology..."
Surrounded--by enemies! Elisa pulls back to look into Yuliana's eyes, concerned, tender. "...Oh, yes," Elisa says, recalling the woman from the wedding. "We shall have to thank her properly somehow for being a port in the storm for you. Yes, that will be good."
"...Here," Elisa says, and pulls back the rest of the way, to lift a couch and right it again, so that Yuliana has somewhere to sit. "Rest," she says, "And tell me of what happened." She takes a seat and opens her arms to Yuliana. "What did they take? Whom must I destroy?"
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"Mm," Yuliana hums, with gratitude, as Elisa softens her grasp.
Yuliana looks to her, with all that pain in her own eyes, unveiled and needy. "Yes," she agrees, with a small smile, when she settles on Ennil. "I left her in a hurry... it was a shame." The best of a series of bad options, in the moment.
But Elisa pulls back to right the couch she'd upended, as easily as she might rearrange a pot of flowers; gratitude comes to Yuliana's eyes, again, as she nestles in beside her terrific wife, legs all hooked about her legs. She removes her normal suit's gloves and tosses them aside, so that her fingers can bury themselves in Elisa's bloodstained robes directly.
"It... was a research colony," she starts, looking up to Elisa, close to her face. All the conflict on hers is all too visible, at this distance. "A Cyber-Newtype research colony. I -- had to work with some trash from Zeon to get through, that Zoltan... but when we found one of those facilities, he... he realised I came from..." Her fingers tighten in Elisa's robes, as pain lances through her parted lips, her creased brow, her desperate eyes. "He mocked me! Said a queen oughtn't be afraid of her subjects, unless she knows what she's worth--! As if there's someone just waiting to kill me if I step out of line! But -- but isn't that certain, Elya?! Why else would they send the sensitive into my grasp!" Cascade, she means.
The subordinate with a gun pointed at her.
That's not quite the situation, but... no wonder, perhaps, Yuliana could be led to believe it.
(The truth -- that the REA is playing the game of war thre steps ahead, and even as they develop Yuliana to countermand mass Cyber-Newtype warfare they are also working on methods to thwart Yuliana's power -- is more terrible, still, from a broad perspective.)
"And... and then... more Newtypes plagued me, but that Leina, she told me... she'd spoken to Ritechka," and Yuliana is more upset, still, to speak of this. "She was... in the lab with me, a long time ago... we were tested together often." So her affectionate Russian diminutive must refer to Rita Bernal, who does appear, in Yuliana's notes. (Not frequently by name. Experiments are assigned unique identification numbers.) "I suppose she must have -- I thought she'd have just read the files, my name came up, but -- but she said just what I said, back then! She..."
Yuliana trails off, for a moment, and swallows at a lump in her throat. But Elisa has asked, and she will tell her. She will.
"She said... I-I... oh, Elya, they were a distraction, weren't they? Newtypes? I was to be distracted from -- f-from my own -- what the Republic did to me! And... and so, I... I hated her," and why does she sound upset about that?, "though we were trapped together... I blamed her..."
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
"A shame indeed. We shall find her again."
Elisa enwraps Yuliana with her terrible bloody cloak, and listens to her, looking down into her eyes. She seems almost present in the moment for once, without her usual distance. It is warming, but her scrutiny is intense. Very intense.
Came from... hmmm.
Perhaps a queen should not fear her subjects. But... Yes. The situation--
Elisa knows it well enough. "It is a problem," she agrees. "She is not your subject, but perhaps your enemy."
Leina... and Rita. Hmm. "As if by some kind of spirit... She knows. Hmm."
A distraction...
"Newtypes..." Elisa says, "Are a distraction from humanity's true future. They are an offshoot, an aberration. And you, my darling..."
Elisa must handle this carefully. 'What the republic did to her.'
"How do you feel now?" Elisa wonders. "This character in your story has resurfaced, and made you rethink the setting? Its players?"
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Yuliana is touched, in more than one sense of the word. No inch of her is unclaimed, under Elisa's intense scrutiny, all her scars laid open.
She accepts Elisa's condemnation of Cascade as her enemy instead of her subject so, so easily. But... some kind of spirit...
Yuliana doesn't know. She doesn't even know enough to guess.
Just because Leina said Rita wasn't a person -- well, none of them are people, any more.
An aberration, Elisa says, and Yuliana's head inclines, just so. But she asks her how she feels, and Yuliana's gaze veils, as she looks away. She is ashamed. "I..." She blinks, and there are tears, in her teal lashes. They glitter like a handful of jewels, rich and storied. Yuliana's heart is locked inside itself, of course, but Elisa is asking.
"If that's the way it is... I... everything I've done, everything I'm fighting for... is built on a lie," and her words are barely more than a murmur, strangled through her throat. "I really was created... made to be, and... they knew they were, hurting me," a hesitation, on that phrase, eyes blinking shut for a moment. "They thought I'd be angry with them..."
She sounds so wounded, trailing off to that thought. How could they have thought she'd hurt them? She loved them!
"I can scarcely bear it... who am I, if not a predator? Who am I, if not the answer to empathic violation?" Her eyes shut again, tightly, as she draws in a shaking breath. "Even if it was given to me... my hate's still my own, isn't it?! But even telling myself that... when I thought of Ritechka, my heart was disquiet... oh, I must just be sentimental, Elya. Just sentimental, since I shared a thing or two with her when I was still too young to have my resolve." Even so -- even saying that -- she flinches into herself, shoulders tightening.
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
Elisa doesn't think much of Cascade. She is useful, but that is all. And she knows well how she hates Yuliana.
But how does Yuliana feel? Yes, a handful of jewels, and Elisa does not take Yuliana's feelings unbidden but asks for them. She can be given them, rather than having to steal. And that is how it is.
They knew... Yes.
Elisa looks very serious, as Yuliana comes to these realizations, shares them. She holds Yuliana gently, as she listens. "Sentimentality is part of it," Elisa allows, offers, tempts. "Your feelings are rich, complex, multilayered; you can feel more than one thing at a time, my darling. It is something wonderful about you."
"...Your hatred is your own. But it is only true that it is a 'lie' if you trust that they are right in these assertions about you. ...You are a predator; you are the answer to empathic violation. Those are part of who you are, what you have chosen... and what must be."
"You are beyond these... creatures," Elisa says. "You..."
Mm.
"Who are you? You are my wife. You are that which is most important. You must remember that I love you. 'Truth'..."
"Truth exists only in the utter dark. These creatures cannot touch it. But you can."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Yuliana doesn't think much of Cascade, either, but the meaning is different when she's the subject of the sentence.
Her feelings Yuliana offers to Elisa's altar, without force or suggestion. She is hers, and so too is her heart.
And Yuliana is not the only one who can offer and tempt; she loses herself so easily, in Elisa's explanations. She looks to her again, in all her vulnerability and her pain, and she is soothed by the certainty Elisa wields.
She is Elisa's wife; most important, and loved, holding the truth in her hands. She holds tight to Elisa with her hands, and she is so, so grateful, a trembling little smile crossing over her lips. "Oh, zhenushka..."
Her hand lifts, to cup Elisa's cheek, gently. "Yes... yes, I chose this, didn't I? It must be. It must... the truth... the truth is those Newtypes are loathed, so what else could I do but despise them?" She can't go against a will like that, her only true companion for so many years.
"But grasping the truth..." Yuliana's fingers curl, as she sinks, a little, under that weight, "it's so hard, Elya. In those jagged edges, in the lack, I see... but it... hurts, Elya." A breath of a pause, and she admits: "They begin to suspect... I didn't guard my words enough..."
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
Elisa, at least, is certain. Elisa is sure. Elisa is certainty, when Yuliana has doubt. Elisa is many things, and her temptation is absolute.
'Those Newtypes are loathed', Elisa hears, and she considers that. It is an interesting piece of data. It is different from Yuliana hates them. Perhaps they are not only the distraction she thought them...
It hurts, Yuliana says, and Elisa is gentle, leaning into Yuliana's hand. "I know," she says. "It is terrible. This world cannot support the truth. Not as it is. And thus, the pain. But this... this you chose. This you shall have. And..."
They begin to suspect...
"What would you have me do?" Elisa asks directly. "...I will protect you from anything, my Yuliana."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
This world... can't support it?
"Oh, Elya," Yuliana sighs, and surrenders, burying herself fully against her. She nuzzles her face into the nape of Elisa's neck, hand dropping down to wrap about her and clutch herself closer. "I'm so frightened... I need you. You're really my rock in the river... you always know just what to do."
Her shoulders lift and fall, in a hitch, as she whimpers into Elisa. "I... I'm not certain of anything! I don't know what to do. Everything's been uprooted... everything about me... if I didn't have you, I'd have nothing to hold on to, nothing! Why... why is this happening to me?! Why do I always have to suffer?!" She sobs, a wretched sacrifice.
"Even when I sleep, I can never rest..! Even living amongst this world, I am tormented! In my dreams, in the torn edges about them -- I see! Always, I see! More and more..! I'm afraid -- I'm afraid someday it will come to me any time I close my eyes!"
In fact, the thing hurting Yuliana...
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
She needs her. Elisa smiles. "I will always be here for you," she murmurs. And then...
But she is not certain. Not of anything. Everything is unrooted. Why does it happen? Why? Elisa looks sympathetic. She feels Yuliana's pain, not in a vulgar sharing but in watching and seeing and feeling her own in response to it. That is why. And so, as Yuliana sobs...
"It is terrible," Elisa says. "But hold onto me. Hold onto me, and see the transience fall before you... and see what you shall see. See what will remain, when you are yourself."
But even when she sleeps...
Elisa looks genuine, when she is pained on Yuliana's behalf.
"Such is the burden of the future. I will take it, one day. But for now, this world will torment you, try to hang onto you as fiercely as it can, and the more it holds and the more you hold the more you will suffer."
The thing hurting Yuliana...
"Yes. It is the world," Elisa says. "It fears what you see. It fears what you are. And so it tries to drag you away. But I will save you, my Yuliana, no matter how long it takes. For now, but hold onto me..."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Hold onto me, Elisa says, once and once again, and Yuliana clutches tightly to her. Her legs curl into Elisa's legs; one arm clutches about her chest, the other trapped there, between her body and Elisa's. Wrapped up in that warm, bloodied cloak, she buries her face into Elisa's neck, listens to her words in her ear.
She makes a sad little noise, as she nods, against her. But -- "But Elya... Elya, I don't wish for you to be hurt, either..!" Yuliana all but wails, after Elisa quiets. "Not my precious Elya..! You mustn't take a burden that will only pain you, please! I love you! If the future carved wounds into your soul, my heart would never settle! Stay safe beside me..! I need you, I need you! Nothing matters more to me than you!"
It took her that long, to protest Elisa's determination.
The power of her love is without limit, too.
She presses herself into Elisa, tightly, and perhaps it's a boon that she doesn't have the strength to crush the wind from her. (Would it matter?) "Elya," she murmurs, into her cool skin, clutching to her, and she is holding onto her, even if she suffers. "Elya..." Surrounded by her, she surrounds herself with Elisa's logic, her conclusions.
"It's... transient," she repeats, she calms herself, and surely she has help. "This world. It's hurting me... it's scared of me..." It's horrible. She feels so bad, knowing the truth. She's glad Elisa wouldn't lie to her to spare her feelings, still.
"Don't let it take me away," she pleads, her voice small, wrapped up in Elisa's arms. "Before I met you, I had nothing... you've made me so happy, Elya... please, please save me."
She pauses, delicately, tearstained eyes blinking open to gaze at Elisa's dark skin. "I always wanted to change this world," she admits, quietly. "To make it better." Even though it's hurt her so much... she was still so loyal, to humanity.
She could still fool herself into thinking her purpose was so noble, even when she grew so cruel and jealous.
"Our world... it will be better for us, won't it?" She ventures, gossamer-spun, fragile. "It won't hurt so much, once this fake world stops fighting us, will it...?"
Offer her some hope, she screams, inside the prison of herself. Anything at all.
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
That sad noise... Elisa smiles, when Yuliana protests for her. "Oh, my darling," she says. "I am strong. I will persevere. Pain is but a minor thing to me, something transient. It will not last. No, in the world to come, we will be together. Forever." The future... And those wounds. Stay safe...
"I will," she says. "We will be together, and finally whole."
It wouldn't matter much.
The world is scared of her, this Elisa believes. The alternative--that what she has worked for, what she toils for, is not the solution--is absurd. Of course it is not the case. But this....
"I will," Elisa promises of salvation. And then... she admits it. Her loyalty...
"It will be better," Elisa says, and does not limit it to them. "The world will expand. The truth will come. And it will be beautiful."
"As you are."