2023-01-14: The villains go home, and many die
- Log: The villains go home, and many die
- Cast: Elisa Kafim, Yuliana Kafim
- Where: The Silent Castle, Kaffeklubben Island
- Date: 2023-01-14
- Summary: Elisa rushes Yuliana home, and pours all her energy and several lives into saving her. When she finally wakes, she is devastated, by the Void and the consequences of her actions both. Elisa comforts her, reassuring her that she still has ties with Celestial Being, as Yuliana realises she can't go home again... and that she does not WANT to go home again. The REA hurt her terribly. Now, alienated by her own actions, she is free.
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
It was a very, very near thing, and an exhausting time. All night and all day Elisa Kafim worked, without rest or stopping. She had assistance, of course; servants to bring her hot and clean cloths, or to offer up their blood to Yuliana's needs.
Nevermind that they didn't offer.
Elisa has sewn sutures, transfused blood in horrifying gouts sailing through the air thanks to her dark power from helpless servants who she kept around for compatibility purposes. She has bandaged. She has performed surgery. She has reached through with her hand to steady Yuliana's heart, phasing through her body with the power of darkness.
She has had to replace a lot of blood. She has had to soothe, and mend, and use all her medical knowledge, and a significant amount of her power. Bodies she hasn't had the energy to clean up litter the medical ward, exsanguinated, as the servants simply step around them. And...
Now, Elisa has placed Yuliana in a warm bed to rest. She stares at her, seated beside in a chair, holding onto her hand until she awakens. She has held so long that her hand is almost warm.
"My Yuliana," she says. "...I will protect you. Always."
She worries.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Yuliana has always hated procedures. She reacted so poorly, to the sewing -- and now, she sleeps, a slumber which persisted even through her seizures and her fragile heart.
Her hand is loose, in Elisa's; horribly loose, despite the tension which knits her brow. She can wake, but still she sleeps.
Or, perhaps, she cannot escape sleep.
It is not until the afternoon grows late -- though there is no sun, in the sky of the polar night, to tell Elisa time has past -- that her fingers twitch, and her lips.
What she speaks is slurred and mumbled, and her eyes do not open.
"Insufficient and rearranged... remember to termination of existence... not again rage the mortal shatters now perfect, almost perfect."
Toneless and vague, a single concept begins to repeat, down past her lips: "We colonised this land. We colonised this land. We colonised this land."
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
Time does not matter. Since Elisa caused Yuliana to sleep, to avoid these awful procedures, she has worked in silence. And now, she waits in the same. It does not matter how long it takes... She will be here when Yuliana wakes. And finally, when Yuliana begins to speak, and when she slurs her words and does not open her eyes--
"Yes," Elisa says. "Yes. My Yuliana. You are awake again! I have waited. I have treated you. You will be well again, yes?"
She considers. These words are portents, she understands now. They have meaning. What she says...
"Yes. We protected you insufficiently," Elisa says. "I protected you insufficiently. I will find another way, one that keeps you safe."
"She must wait. But She would not wish your destruction, either. No more than I."
"We have brought much to this land..."
"Yes. Awaken, Yuliana."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
From somewhere, a voice...
Yuliana's eyelashes flicker, as she hears Elisa speaking. By fractions, her head tilts, against the fine pillow Elisa arranged underneath her.
Still her eyes do not open, as she murmurs, "there's something in the nothing. Let me out into full bloom the gold element scars easily, reshape."
Her breath quickens, a ragged gasp.
"Break the entryway and enter through to grasp and pull." Her voice is still a touch strange, made faint by slumber. "Invert the shields outside. A prayer to God. Four and fourteen stones. Nine grams of potassium bromide. She cannot see the entry point. A hand-me-down existence."
Finally Yuliana's eyes flutter open, blink-blink-rapid-blink, and at first her eyes focus in front of her before she realises to look further out. There, attached to her hand -- the woman she loves.
"Elya?" Her voice could break a heart, as she struggles to anchor herself on her wife. "Am I?"
Who, perhaps, or what, or why; here, at the other end of it, okay, alive. But she adds no qualifier, needs no qualifier, the most pure existence in all creation.
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
"Not yet. Not yet, my darling."
Let her out... No, her gold has been reshaped, but she will not lose her.
A hand-me-down existence... What does it mean? Elisa cannot be sure. Never has she been so uncertain of the voice of the Void. And yet now, she is. She cannot be sure. Cure for seizures, inversion of shields... a prayer.
"You are," Elisa answers Yuliana. "You are, and you are with me."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Yes -- there is Elisa. Elisa's fingers, about her hand. Yuliana comes to herself, knows it, and finally they tighten. She squeezes Elisa's hand, as she gasps.
"I am," she repeats, voice still low. "I am that I am, I am... nnnh," her eyes scrunch shut again, pained.
All her affirmations about herself do nothing but cut her to pieces, now, disloyal and weak and acted upon.
Her service record ended in 0097.
"Help," Yuliana breathes a plea, so like the words she claims when her body stops seizing. "H..help... help me, it hurts..."
She tugs Elisa's hand a shade closer to herself, and tears spring to her eyes, as she says: "I'm scared."
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
Finally, Elisa feels Yuliana's fingers grip hers. Finally, she feels life within that hand. And Yuliana 'is'. Her eyes shut again, but that is enough for the moment. Her service record is over--but that does not matter to Elisa except insofar as it matters to Yulana.
"I will help you," Elisa says, and scoots closer, bringing her other hand to hold Yuliana's again. She is afraid...
"I cannot completely remove the pain. But you are whole once more. You need not fear. No matter what, I shall protect you."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Elisa; Elisa's hands. Yuliana feels her palm, over her skin, and takes a deep breath.
Everything is, and it's so overwhelming.
"Whole," she echoes, as her body curls in, around her hand, around Elisa's hands. (It hurts.) "You... you saved me again, didn't you..?"
Her hands squeeze, clasped together, with hers. "Thank you," she breathes, "thank you s-so much for saving me from..." from Her, "from myself, I guess," and the end of the sentence is mumbled and lame.
She can't very well blame the woman she was just in such pressured audience with.
"If you hadn't closed that portal... if you hadn't caught me... I don't think I could have stopped on my own, Elya. It's so hard to... stop..." And does it taste different, now, to all those other times Yuliana has lost herself to abandon?
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
Whole. Elisa said it, and she means it. Elisa does not hurt, though she is conscious of her limbs at the moment. Of her hands, of her arms... There is something unfamiliar in her muscles, something she has not felt in some time. It is strange, and unwelcome. But it matters nothing compared to Yuliana.
"I did," Elisa says. And then...
"I will always save you," Elisa assures Yuliana. And as for Her, well...
"You likely could not have," Elisa says gently. "You were doing your part admirably. You did your part perfectly. But this world clung to you harder than we could have realized, would have hoped."
"We will not try again until I find a method to protect you from these forces. Until then, for now, you must rest. You must recover."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"Really... thank you. You could have opened the way, you could have made so much progress," and it's such a valued thing, in the REA, "but because of me, you..."
Tears spring to Yuliana's eyes, and a shred of volume returns to her, as she repeats in exclamation: "Because of me! How can you say it was perfect, when I failed us so?! I'm so... weak, and fragile, and pathetic! Oh, don't I slow you down? You're amazing... with your magic, you can really do anything. But I'm just a defective Cyber-Newtype," she spits out, with as much loathing for herself as any other.
"I hate that... I hate what I was made to be. I wanted to live up to what you saw in me, instead... I tried so hard, Elya... but I just wasn't strong enough! I couldn't break us free!" Free of the world which clutches, so tightly. Her breath hitches, in a sob, and she turns her head against her pillow. It's growing damp.
"The way I am now, my body can't take it... She's made that much quite clear," she adds, a shade sullen, on the matter of those forces and herself.
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
"Always," Elisa reiterates. "I could have made progress. Perhaps I could have finished. But it would be as ashes, without you. There is no future without you, my darling Yuliana. You must know that."
The tears spring... And--
"Say not such things," Elisa says. "You are my miracle. You always live up to what I see in you. You did so well... But it is not your strength that failed."
Her body can't take it...
"It was wrong of me," she says, "To think to have you do it on your own. I am to support you; I am to protect you. I must find a way to do so. Then, together, we shall open the way."
"Time is meaningless," Elisa says. "Delay is acceptable. So long as we reach our goal, with one another and never apart, it will be well."
</poem> <Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
There's really no future, without her...
Yuliana rages against herself, and still Elisa is steady. She curls herself in, to press her cheek against their hands, and her body shudders with tears. "Elya... oh, Elya..!"
Together, she says, and never apart, and she is so desperate for it, water to the desert sand.
"Oh, zhenushka," she breathes, clutching to Elisa's hand like a lifeline. "You're so good to me. I'm sorry... I'm sorry it didn't work... I'm sorry I worried you so, so much...!"
From behind those teary teal lashes, she looks up to Elisa, in her chair. "Are... are you all right, my darling..? It must have been... so hard on you, just the same..." Even if Elisa wasn't there, dancing with her -- she saw what became of Yuliana's dance. She remembers struggling against the needles, and from there all she remembers is a blackness without ending, but Yuliana is sure that so much of this meaningless time has passed.
</poem>
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
Elisa is steady. It is what she is. She does not move close; her body is cold, after using so much power, though her hand is warmer. But for now...
"It is all right. Your voice, your face now that you are whole--these are enough to make such trials worthwhile."
She tries to be good. But--the question...
"I am all right," Elisa says first, immediately, gently and steadily. She saw it. And it was difficult...
"It was hard to see," Elisa says. "But I was steadfast. I will not abandon you for pain. I have spent the day treating and mending your wounds. Now, I am..."
She considers. "I believe the word is 'tired'. It has been so long since I have felt it. But it was worth it, my darling. For you."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"Boyevaya podruga, you are so brave," Yuliana praises the woman who has stood beside her through all her trials, though it might seem mismatched to whose life was imperilled. But it's hard to watch someone you love be hurt, too, isn't it...?
She tugs, at Elisa's hand. "Come here," she pleads, though her wrist is so, so cold. "Stay with me, please..."
And her face is whole, but her eyes are drawn in tension, as she looks up to her. "I'm so scared," Yuliana confesses, again, even though she has no need to fear.
"I can't go home again, can I...?"
To the Republic, she must mean, because surely she has a home of these cold stone walls.
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
"You motivate me to be so," Elisa tells Yuliana seriously. It might seem mismatched, but... Elisa does not argue. Instead she squeezes Yuliana's hand lightly. "Do not worry."
When asked, Elisa moves from the chair, and fetches furs. She places another over Yuliana and then sits down beside her. "You are too fragile for me to risk breaking you now. But I will stay close. I will keep you. I will be with you." She does not wish to steal Yuliana's warmth, and she is so, so careful. But...
But this.
"...No," Elisa says. "They will not understand. Their treachery will manifest once again." 'Their' treachery, of course. "And there are too many to make forget."
"...I have dispatched agents to watch over your parents. If they look for you there, it will avail them not."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
It makes sense, doesn't it? Elisa and Yuliana make each other so much better than they could ever be apart.
(It's better, right?)
Yuliana feels the warmth of the furs, across her shoulders; this far North, warm furs are important to have to drape over beds, because woven wool can only do so much. She feels Elisa's weight settle onto the bed, beside her, and there's a little wince to her expression as she pushes herself up just slightly.
She doesn't get terribly far, but it's enough to lay her head on Elisa's frigid thigh, anyway. Even with the bedding cushioning her temple, Yuliana frowns, in concern. "My darling, you're so cold... have you eaten at all..?"
She doesn't mean dinner. Not the kind they share. anyway.
Even so, Yuliana isn't inclined to move from Elisa's lap. Especially not given what she's hearing, from her. "Thank you," she breathes, first, on the matter of her parents. "I... don't wish for them to be punished, for what I've done."
What she's done...
"The Republic won't forgive me this embarrassment," Yuliana sighs, as the weight of the transgression sinks into her. Not even Elisa's magic... can make this go away. And that means...
Perhaps she can feel the way she stiffens, as her eyes widen, and she looks up to her. "Elya, you know I'd not kill myself, don't you? Even if it seems I did, I didn't, I swear to you--!" Her favourite way to handle traitors, it's --
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
Much better.
Elisa rests her hand gently against Yuliana's blanketed shoulder, and when Yuliana frowns, Elisa nods. "I have kept up as much energy as is necessary. But I can do much more than this now. I have gathered much."
But what she hears, well.. Yes. They shouldn't be punished, Elisa agrees--though mostly because Yuliana cares. Because they are tied to Yuliana... She will protect them for now.
The Republic won't forgive. That is true, and Elisa nods. However--that stiffness, Elisa looks back down, and, "Shhh," she soothes. "I know. They could not fool me. And they will not. They will not destroy you, darling. No matter their cleverness or their power... They will not take you from me."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"So long as you're all right..." Yuliana cedes, with a shadow of continuing concern, to Elisa's gathered power.
Not a word of concern for the people reduced to dust to fuel that power, a strength which dwarfs everything beneath it.
Strangely enough, Yuliana hasn't been bothered by that for a long, long time.
But Elisa soothes her, and the tension leaks from Yuliana's muscles, as she sinks into the chill of her wife. "Mm," she hums, her fingers curling, in those furs across her lap. Her fingertips can still feel the horrifying cold of Elisa, beneath them. "You'll... you'll protect me," she says, though her voice is still unsettled. "I know this." There are things she simply must know, after all.
"It's just... they always said... and what I did, I..." Yuliana doesn't quite manage to finish her sentences, but she hardly needs to -- Elisa knows she punishes transgressions against the Republic, knows the threats they strung over her own head in turn. They were clever, and powerful, and they trapped her for so, so long.
"... I ruined everything," Yuliana murmurs, dismal. "I don't even know how I can exist in this world, now... everything... I've lost everything I held, here."
And for some reason, she sounds upset, losing her ties to this dismal fake reality.
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
"I am," Elisa answers, and those people do not matter.
Elisa listens, and waits. She is very chill even now. She will remain so for some time. The cold of the void is absolute.
"I will," she says. And what they said, what she did... yes. "I know," Elisa murmurs. "It is frightening, isn't it? Even knowing that I will protect you, I cannot protect you from the fear of what 'could' be. Only from what will be."
She ruined...
"No," Elisa says. "...It was inevitable, that you would break with them. They treated you so badly. It had to happen, sooner or later. But you are not forsaken. You have ties yet, even in this broken, false world."
"...You have ties to our mutual friends," she says. "There is that. The ones who came for dinner that day..."
She tries to brighten things up a little. "And your family will remain safe. I will seek your companions, as well."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Yes. They don't matter. Elisa is what matters.
The cold of the void is absolute -- and yet Yuliana's skin, pressed against Elisa, is warm. She is chthonic, a creature of this earth, so devastatingly and vulnerably human.
Why, then, does she feel the truth of the void, its four and fourteen stones? Why her, and not Elisa, with all the impossible strength of darkness at her fingertips?
Why is Yuliana the Gate, while Elisa holds the strength to open it?
She feels herself such a fragile, breakable thing, laid here in Elisa's lap. But it is her connection with the REA which has broken; how strange, that grief floods her eyes, as Elisa speaks of inevitability.
Elisa offers her reassurance; offers her some place in this world, something to grasp, even so. "Ah..." Yuliana breathes, as she thinks of Celestial Being, their mutual friends. "Yes, they... may yet understand... could they understand?" She asks, unsteady, uncertain.
"... ayah... mama..." She murmurs, lingering on her father and her mother, for a moment. "And... you'll see to them..? I'm glad..." Yuliana was not always so happy for Elisa to seek out her companions -- but Elisa has long since convinced her how much she prizes Yuliana's happiness.
Yuliana is quiet, for a moment, gaze dropping to Elisa's hip.
It was... inevitable. They...
"The Major always said... if it was for the Republic's sake, it was for mine, as well, but... I hated it, Elya! All the operations, and the experiments, and the tests, and -- and the needles, Elya, the needles! Right into my spine! It hurt so much, and they always wanted to measure, they kept me awake, it hurt!"
Tears flood her eyes again, as she buries her face in against Elisa's leg, shoulders quaking. "A-and now -- now I never have to -- go back there again?! Elya! I -- I'm so relieved, so why do I feel so awful?! As if I've done something wrong...!" She did almost tear reality apart. That isn't what's eating her. "Though it was was they who -- who tortured me, Elya! They tortured me!"
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
There are two others who helped, but Elisa does not think they will 'understand'. Nevertheless she will remember them well, remember their deeds on that day, for they tried to assist her. Even now, Banagher's scarf is here... though not here, just this moment.
No, Elisa will comfort Yuliana herself, first.
"They may," she says. "So long as we share a common goal... and perhaps longer, for some of them."
Her parents... "I will," Elisa says, and also for her companions--though what she does not say is that they will be rather harder to find than Yuliana was. She cannot guarantee their safety as she can Yuliana's. But she will do what she can, send her minions to seek them out and find them.
"Of course he would say this," Elisa says. "It was to keep you in thrall. To manipulate you. The Major has never cared for your well-being."
She pets Yuliana through the blanket, stroking her shoulder and arm. "You never have to return," Elisa says. "...You feel terrible because they have convinced you that you 'owe' them. But you have repaid your debt to your home, in blood and in pain and in death. They tortured you. ...And they will not be forgiven."
She holds up her other hand, as if to forestall argument. "I will keep my promise. I will not destroy your countrymen. But neither will I forgive those who were involved in your torment."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
It's fine if Elisa is a little greedy. Yuliana gave herself to her, after all. ... and Yuliana will think of Leina and Banagher, later, certainly. But not yet, not here, cradled by Elisa at the end of her world.
"Oh," Yuliana sighs, "but the Major is dreadful, isn't he? A horrid, jealous little man..." Her breath shudders, as she buries herself in, against Elisa's chill. "He was... an absolute tyrant, Elya... he, he hurt me, you know? And not just standing over me! Keeping me in thrall... I was just a tool to him! A thing! He always served the Republic loyally, so I didn't want him to be hurt, b-but, he... he was really starting to frighten me, Elya. More than the one they had me work under before..."
And there's something tragic to this, too -- the banalty of Yuliana's torture, that they could simply assign her new handlers every few years, that they had an entire system which didn't blink an eye at the horrors inherent to her. It might have been less horrible, perhaps, if Major Pham had considered her his special project, something he'd stayed with all this time.
No. It was bureaucracy.
(And Dr. Devi, who does consider Yuliana her project, is hardly much better.)
She tries to take a deep breath, but it shudders, too too much. She considers that debts can be paid, in blood and in pain and in death. She struggles with herself not to be upset, over their lack of forgiveness. It is easier, at least, feeling the rhythmic back and forth of Elisa's fingertips. "They don't deserve to be forgiven," she murmurs, as much to convince herself as Elisa.
"... maybe... I should be angry," she allows that much, hesitantly. "But... I don't want them to burn, Elya. Even... even if they used it, even if they used me like that... I still love my country. Even though I did this to them... and they'll be angry at me, now... we don't have to destroy each other, do we...?"
It's still awfully charitable.
The REA destroyed Yuliana a long time ago, after all.
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
Bureaucracy...
"A dreadful, dreadful man. Only your mercy has forestalled his complete destruction," she says. "He did not appreciate you. He did not understand you."
That shuddering breath... Hm. Elisa can guess at some of Yuliana's feelings here. She knows that it is conflicting, to her, to have to face against her country in this way. But Yuliana agrees that they do not deserve to be forgiven...
"...You are kind," Elisa says, and she even means it. "But that kindness is a risk, in this case. However.."
"I cannot deny you, my darling. For those who do not retaliate against you, there can be mercy," she says. "For those who do not come for you and break themselves against me, there can be, if not forgiveness, forebearance."
"But should they touch you--should they try to touch you--I will not hold the REA responsible. I will hold the individuals acting responsible. Is this acceptable, my love? That I destroy those who hurt you, should they try to hurt you now that you are in my care once more?"
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Few would describe Yuliana as merciful or kind.
Few see the side of Yuliana which Elisa sees.
Yuliana is a woman given to risky behaviour -- it's even written in her medical files, in that horribly unkind way, how she harms herself with hazardous acts. But Elisa cannot deny her, and Yuliana gazes up to her, love in her eyes, as she decides on a course.
(She's so glad Elisa thinks of everything.)
"Yes," she breathes, as Elisa asks. She finds the strength to lift her arm, her hand, to brush down Elisa's side. (She cannot quite summon the strength to keep it held up.) "Oh, Elya, you're so thoughtful... I know you must be angry, and yet you'd still restrain yourself... zhenushka, you are so considerate of me." Not of them. Yuliana knows where Elisa's care lies.
Even though she's defied the REA, she still feels safe, held under Elisa's hand. Even though she's made an enemy of the world, she can still smile, warm and adoring.
"I don't wish them to touch me," she insists, against her entire adult life of poking and prodding and injecting. "Only you. Only you, Elya..."