2023-02-13: .i am held by you and goD
- Log: .i am held by you and goD
- Cast: Yuliana Kafim, Elisa Kafim
- Where: The Silent Castle, Kaffeklubben Island
- Date: 2023-02-13
- Summary: Yuliana sleeps, and Elisa watches. This is the way of things. And in strange times Yuliana wakes and speaks with the lefthand voice of God, and it is left to Elisa to comprehend and act on those maddened visions. Her grief is still present and strong -- and so, too, is her thirst for vengeance. No more will Yuliana spare her people; they're her people no longer. All she has is Elisa. Elisa has her. (Content warning: eldritch horror)
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
One would think, having slept for a week, that Yuliana wouldn't be terribly fond of sleeping more. But a coma is a different beast to normal slumber, and Yuliana has been through much, of late. What can be said of her, at least, is that after some monitoring from her ever-diligent wife, she is at least capable of moving from the medical wing to their own bed, broad and four-pillared and draped in silk and furs.
She takes Elisa with her, of course. That her ever-watching wife does not typically sleep means little to Yuliana, who values her closeness, anyway.
So now does she rest, tucked in against her, hands curled by her chest. One of those horrible black tendrils snakes about her, to curl at her back; her legs tangle. All caught up, all enmeshed, her breath -- at least -- is warm, and even, and steady.
She dreams, and she is far from here, in an abyss without ending.
Nilj lloufia, begins something like a song, tou outh pia th'ou-ll llfh'ou-ni niy. With three throats and seven mouths chants She, and Yuliana knows, now, the way the words have twisted and torn. Kh'ou-ni:a th'ou niy, kh'ou-ni:a th'ou niy...
"I am here," she says, with a throat still rightside-out. "Y oni llia:," she says, and it is ripped apart.
Lliash'th u'iallia jow lloj, ot lliath'wll.
"Return..." The word ribbons out as her throat ribbons out, and the immutable feeling quakes her to her bones.
MINE.
The signs of Yuliana's nightmares are surely well-known to Elisa, after so long. The way her breath quickens with her heartrate; the way she shifts and flinches, though she's held so safely in Elisa's arms. The night's torments leave her close to waking. It's part of why she's so snappish, in the day.
And now, there's a new indication of just what's plaguing her, in her dreams... as those wings about her ears fan out and flap, bonelessly, against the side of her head.
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
As requested, Elisa Kafim has 'returned' to this world, has focused her attention and her presence on Yuliana again. She dose not sleep, no; she watches, she waits. And she watches and waits now, for it is the time for that. She listens, and rests. Yuliana's breath is steady, but...
It is she, now, who is far away. Far away, where Elisa must go. Where she must bring.
Elisa holds onto her still, and does not move to wake her. The signs are clear; she will wake soon enough, from this dream. Elisa will wake her only if her distress mounts too high. To interrupt this communion would be... inappropriate.
Nevertheless.
"So, this is what you see now," Elisa muses, softly. "This is what you hear..."
"You have come to understand more. Is it because of Her gifts...?"
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
The way her influence sweeps out over the castle, as Yuliana's fins unfurl, isn't something she thinks of in slumber. Still, it is so.
And Yuliana knows,
NILJ GH'IALJ
The cry,
NILJ LLOU-KGH'
Of oblivion.
NILJ KOTH'IA!
"As I must be," she promises those dozen-jointed fingers, as they grasp her.
Her eyelids flutter, finally, as she wakes.
It is more obvious, now. Once upon a time Yuliana feigned sleep even on waking, until she was able to orient herself in space; after so long waking in Elisa's arms, she gasps more blatantly, without so much care for hiding her shift in consciousness. "Oh," Yuliana sighs, on her outward breath, and her fingers clutch at the front of Elisa's nightgown. Blinking, blinking, and her gaze turns up to the darker woman beside her.
Her cheeks flush, just so, though it's no surprise she was watching her. "You're both... so possessive..." Yuliana murmurs, fondly, and for a moment she even sounds coherent.
"Seven acts of God through days am I possessed, all creation, repeat to ascension. They are empty now. The corpses left cages from their ribs." For a moment, anyway.
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
Elisa notices. Ah, yes, she notices.
Yuliana wakes, and she does not care to hide it. Elisa looks towards her, intent, focused. She looks to her eyes, her face, her lips, her eyes again. There is almost coherence there... Almost.
Both. Yes...
"Seven..." Elisa, once, dismissed these things as the ravings of a woman in the throes of communion with something greater. Now she knows better. They mean something; they are important. And so...
"Is it the acts that are empty? Or the days?" Elisa wonders. "But the corpses... I left few of those. None, after Ivnerre..."
Seven acts through days. The days do not number seven. But these 'acts', perhaps they can be repeated...? "Yes. I am listening, my Yuliana."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"They," she echoes, and looks, more or less, at Elisa. "So I wear the lady's slippers, yet the mile's walked alone. All is lost. All is Hers."
Her brow knits, lips parting, exposing the fang to one side of her jaw. She is not, entirely, looking at Elisa. "Such anger... were You afraid? Tou outh pia th'ou-ll llfh'ou-ni niy... but through You am I torn. Please, I don't understand..." Those gutted words are difficult for a human throat, all turned inside-out and tormented, but she commits no mispronounciation or error.
A sharp little gasp, and her gaze orients again on, "... Elya," Yuliana murmurs, looking into her eyes properly now. "It was... another bad dream... unmaking and remaking."
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
They... 'They' are empty.
Elisa listens, still. She listens carefully, and watches. Those words...
Yes, Elisa thinks. She was... concerned. Her anger...
"Yuliana," Elisa says. "My Yuliana." That is all, for now; that is what she shall hear, and she shall think on it. But for now, she looks to Yuliana instead. "With difficulty you have returned," Elisa says. "But here you are, with me once again. They will not have you again."
She reaches out to cup Yuliana's cheek, a rare motion of her own. She strokes with her thumb.
"Her gifts will help with that. You have something to protect you now... Even when I cannot." She hates that it is necessary, and yet, it must be necessary, for it has happened.
"But come. Awaken, and be with me."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"... lliath'wll..." Yuliana echoes, breathlessly, as Elisa bids her to return. "To a place of... llph'ou-th'iakth'you ot sh'ofh'iath'lj... such is Her will," she murmurs, lips parting for breath.
But there's a cool hand at her cheek, and Yuliana sighs, nuzzling the side of her face into it. "Elya," she murmurs, again, lifting her gaze back to her, all held safe by her. "Elya..."
She grounds herself in the contrast, cool thumb on warm skin. "Elya," she smiles, a third time to bind her. "I am yours... I am with you. She wished for this, as well... that you would protect me until we are able to reach the place we belong."
Her head-fins curl forward, as she glances aside. "She has... perfected me. It is easier, now. To see, and to know. I..." Her voice wavers, for a moment, as she looks back to Elisa.
"... am I... really beautiful, even like this..?"
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
"Yes," Elisa answers. "Yes..."
Elisa's hand, as always, is cool. And she holds her close. Still, Yuliana speaks that language... It is a thing that is familiar to her, now. Elya, she says, three times, and the third is indeed the charm, for Elisa smiles at Yuliana.
"And so I shall," Elisa says. "I have ascertained the way. Give me but time to prepare it. And prepare it we shall."
Perfected her... Yes.
"You are," Elisa says quick, fervently. "More than ever before. That perfection... Yes, I see it. All will know, in time. And they will know through my perfected Yuliana. Yes. I adore 'like this'. The signs of Her favor..."
"Yes. I, too, favor them."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"Oh, Elya," Yuliana sighs, grateful, for her dearest wife has thought of everything. She's ascertained the way... and so, the way is certain.
Elisa's response is quick, and fervent, and Yuliana's cheek is warm against her fingertips. "Zhenushka," she murmurs, naming her her wife with such affection. She tilts her head, just so, to press her lips to the edge of Elisa's wrist. Her gaze drops in that gesture, too, only to find Elisa's eyes a moment later.
They differ in more than their shades of green, now.
Now, her eyes resemble...
... Alma's.
But Yuliana's shine in the reflected light of the fireplace -- the only light to speak of, in these last vestiges of polar night. (The sun has begun to peek out from the sky, but it will be months still before it never sets.) The light has not fled from her gaze, and it is lit with bright affection.
"I'm glad... if you couldn't accept me, I don't know what I'd do." It's a very romantic statement; don't examine it. "They'll know... through your Yuliana," she affirms, smiling.
"Maybe... maybe all those awful things... maybe they had to happen," she tries to justify it, to herself, even as her eyes shut against the idea. "Trapped in that awful cell... you know that whenever I looked up, I'd see the sniper's barrel staring back at me? At any moment... they were always looking at me. Without even a corner to hide in... that wretched panopticon!"
Yuliana's head jerks, in a little shake. "And then... and then, the Republic... they opened me up, they put things in me, they took things out... they, they did everything, everything they'd wanted to do! Dr. Devi even tried to use your Power on me!" She sounds almost petulant, about that. How dare she do such a thing?
"But... but maybe... maybe that much sacrifice... maybe I needed to sacrifice that much, to be perfected. If it had meaning... if it had some meaning, wouldn't that be fine..?" She sounds so lost, trying to justify all that pain.
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
Of course she has thought of such things. It is her place. It is her role.
Elisa does not remove her hand from Yuliana's cheek, though it is still cold. She rests it there, perhaps she will warm it in time this way. Perhaps not. But she looks into Yuliana's eyes, so different from before...
Yes. There is a difference in them, too. But there is a clarity there, now...
"But I can, and I do." So let us not examine it. "They shall."
But Yuliana moves to justify it to herself. Elisa thinks about it. She considers... That security. Her nose wrinkles, her lips pressing together, at the memory. But Yuliana--
"Dr. Devi was a fool," Elisa says immediately. And 'was' is quite clear.
Meaning... Elisa considers this.
"...Some of it was perhaps necessary," she says. "In order to perfect you. To bring you closer to Her, and Her gifts to the world."
"But I would prefer that it had been able to be done in my own way, to bring you to this point with grace, and the respect which you deserve, instead of traps and betrayal and other perfidy."
"...But they failed to get what they wished from you. They wished to use you to make more soldiers, and instead with my medicine you were stabilized, forever cut off from their desires. So take heart in that much. They failed, my Yuliana. They succeeded only in making you stronger yet. And now, they are gone."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Yuliana has always been the one to warm Elisa up... eventually.
But Elisa speaks of her way, and Yuliana's eyes blink open, looking to her with momentary surprise, though she doesn't gather her words until she's finished speaking. (Traps, and betrayal; these are types of perfidy.)
"Ah... of course, you would have..." Of course Elisa would have her own plan to change Yuliana for the better; Elisa is the one between them who ever turns her gaze to the future. "... then, I'm very fortunate," she concludes, this conclusion and not the other, though she screamed so loudly when she realised her body had changed. "If you hadn't made that medicine... the Republic would never have bothered. I... I would have died... you saved me again, Elya."
Her own hand curls at Elisa's arm, the one reaching for her cheek, and her fingers settle in the crook of her elbow. It's one embrace on another, given the way that black snake still curls, teeth sheathed, around Elisa's back.
"It... it was horrible, Elya," she murmurs. "She said... I'd best serve another purpose, since the battle didn't go as she'd like... and I just listened to her, obeyed her!" She sounds thoroughly horrified, looking back. Elisa's already done enough work for her to be able to say things like that. "And those soldiers... they've been trying that for years, you know..? Just -- the most wretched, disgusting experiments..." She is, of course, referring to that clone she was once brought face-to-face with, awakened as a Cyber-Newtype.
No one can blame her for what she did.
Well, no one in this room, surely.
"But they're gone," she echoes Elisa, again. "They're gone." Her fingers tense, as she draws in a sharp breath. "Even though they're gone, I still want to punish them... and even more, because it sickens me to say it...! How could they do this to me?!" They were not graceful, and they were not respectful, and surely this is why she is angry.
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
Eventually.
Elisa would have prepared her! Would have guided her, as she often must. Not simply let her to die. She is fortunate, she says. "I will always save you," Elisa assures Yuliana. "Always."
It is pleasant, the embrace of the black. It is so much better than when it... Hm.
"Her tools were many," Elisa says. That is all she says of it, for now. No one will blame her, because Elisa will not allow them to blame her.
"Ah," Elisa says, "This, I anticipated." She smiles, and it is a terrible thing, although with an ordinary amount of teeth. "We shall punish them. I have kept Dr. Devi's essence. I shall use it to fulfill our plans. I shall erase her legacy, and replace it with our own. Her punishment--and the punishment of her colleagues--is not yet at an end, though her life is stopped. Rest assured... There will be time for that."
"We will punish them, and all those who support them."
Then she pulls Yuliana closer. "So do not worry, my love. Their hubris will be punished."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"Always," Yuliana echoes, Yuliana affirms, Yuliana believes. "Yes... I know. You're wonderful, Elya..."
... those snakes haven't bitten Elisa since Yuliana woke up so violently, at least. Now she's figured out how to use them, they're positively affectionate!
Yuliana has one too many teeth, as her expression echoes Elisa's, and it's entirely pleasant... for her. "Good," she breathes, and Elisa pulls her close, and Yuliana tucks her face in beneath her chin. (The tips of those tentacles, curling out, are tall enough to brush up against the underside of Elisa's own pointed ear.)
"Because of them, I attacked those who came to aid me... worse, I assaulted you! I'll never forgive them for that. Never," Yuliana hisses venom, against Elisa's skin, but she's angry for her, not at her. "I'll tear my price from their bones..!"
Before she relaxes, sinking into Elisa, her rage turning to love in an instant. "... with you, boyevaya podruga," she promises her combat friend, to be at her side no matter what.
"Always."