2024-09-22: .reality is no prison, but eternal competitioN
- Log: .reality is no prison, but eternal competitioN
- Cast: Yuliana Kafim, Elisa Kafim
- Where: The Silent Castle, Kaffeklubben Island
- Date: 2024-09-22
- Summary: Elisa retrieves Yuliana home after Leina's Psycho-jammers spark her madness, but that madness remains, when she wakes. Trapped in her derealisation and seeing things which others just don't see, she even says her wife isn't real -- and so Elisa takes drastic measures, using her mind control to assure Yuliana that she is. She's easily able to define reality as a constant competition of strength, after that. But Elisa, unlike her wife, is patient; she doesn't lead Yuliana to forsake Leina so easily, even though she assures her it was Leina who brought her to this state. (CW: Coercive control, mind control)
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
OST: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDlxCumFalE Maclaine Diemer - Fear Not This Night
Yuliana was -- strange, after the battle for Choir's supplies. Raving despite herself, all disconnected -- even as she tried to keep in touch with the allies around her.
She kept saying... it wasn't real.
No wonder Elisa brought her back home, after that.
And after a proper meal -- Yuliana hadn't been eating properly out there, either, even if she'd had more food than some people did to let her take her medicines -- she laid down to rest; her slumber is fitful, mumbling in her sleep, hands grasping vaguely into Elisa's nightgown.
"... nothing...", she murmurs, in that border between life and death and sleep and waking.
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
Elisa Kafim has been busy, in the time since the battle. She could not simply sweep in and solve the problem outright, but her medical skills were of use. And now, with Yuliana home, after a proper meal...
Elisa waits. She waits for some time. The witch is patient with her wife; Yuliana needs sleep.
But she approaches the border, and Elisa sees that. Elisa's green eyes remain on Yuliana as Yuliana murmurs. She considers, for a long moment.
"My darling," she says gently. "Are you awakening?"
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"Nnn..." Yuliana murmurs, eyes scrunching up; just because she's waking, doesn't mean she wants to. But her endless eyes blink open, a moment later; a moment more, and they focus, on Elisa's face.
"Are you there?" She asks, as her hand fumbles up, to feel for her wife's cool cheek. "You're not... there..."
Pat, pat, and she mumbles, "She's not... real. It's empty..."
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
"I am here," Elisa says.
She watches endless eyes focus, and then, listens. She places a hand on Yuliana's. "Feel my skin; touch my face. I am here. Your physical senses can tell you so. Note the calm of my body."
"What is it that you are thinking?" Elisa wonders. "What is it that is on your mind?"
She has to ask, of course. She cannot simply 'know'.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"Nnn..." Yuliana's fingers curl, around Elisa's cheek, as if she could hold on to her wife (and stop herself from going -- where?); she tries to focus on that calm, that chill, the sensation of her cool skin under her calloused fingerpads.
Tears spring to her eyes, as she asks: "But isn't it a lie?"
Tormented as she is, she still curls in, tighter, tilting her head close to hers. "There's nothing there," she says, as she has so many times. Except -- "She isn't there. Our world is built on a grave! Nothing, there's nothing -- all this is -- it's nothing! Lies we tell each other, as we wait on the truth of oblivion! This existence isn't! It's empty, it's a lie! It's a lie!"
Her breath comes ragged, as she preaches: "Nothing exists. Nothing." And, in agony: "I can't... feel anything..."
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
A lie, Yuliana purports. And Elisa frowns in thought.
She has not had to interpret such omens in some time. But she is used to doing so. So she pauses, to listen, to consider. She isn't there... A grave. Could this be to do with...?
"The only truth is that I am here," Elisa says. "The only reality is that I am present, with you."
"Nothing exists," she agrees. "But we also do. We are real."
"If our world is built upon a grave, then we shall be the fungi that transform the corpse of what was into what can be."
"But I am here, Yuliana. You can rely upon that."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"How can it be?" Yuliana asks, teary-eyed. "I don't. You don't. No one does, not really. A pleasant lie. A veil over nothing at all. No one exists! We've no existence!"
She used to believe something much like this, when Elisa met her.
But she believed, with all her heart, that she was real.
That she was the only woman... who was real... because she was the only one in communion with the Empress. Through that connection, Elisa was made real, as well.
But now -- She doesn't exist.
No one is real.
What has Leina done?
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
"...Mm." No one exists. Indeed. Elisa remembers this belief. And for her to return to something like it...
"What did that woman do to you?" Elisa wondersdemandsrequires.
She doesn't exist.
"What has she done, to make you feel this way?"
She. Leina.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"What I called Angelo's trangressions grew quiet," Yuliana says, "and I moved to what I called Leina, and I made to disrupt her. She threw me into, that..."
Yuliana blinks, her gaze growing vague. "The truth. I saw the truth. They have to know. It isn't real. She isn't real. I thought I was real. I thought they were real. But there was nothing. I went away. No -- the world went away. Wasn't there. Never was." And there may be something to her ravings -- because Yuliana disappeared from Elisa's sensations, back then, the feathers at her ear no longer able to feel her wife.
Her fingers tremble, against Elisa's skin.
She says it's the truth, but she doesn't like it.
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
Threw her into... The Psycho Jammer, then?
So of course...
Elisa's eyes widen slightly in recognition, and she understands. "Yes," Elisa says. "I understand. I also failed to feel you, for those moments. But it does not mean that we are not real. It means that your senses were interrupted."
"...That you could not see it does not mean it was not there. The Empress is quite real, indeed. That is why we must destroy Her."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"Interrupted... but didn't I See? I was blind, until I Saw! These fundamental truths about reality -- truth I hold alone --" Yuliana tears up, again, her breath catching in her throat. "Why me? Why only me? I don't want this nihilism!"
She draws in another shaky breath. "Far away, far away and gone, never there, I'm alone, we're all alone! Lying to ourselves, don't you see? Lies of a world, there's no world, no world to go to, ascend to nothing!"
She has always been a mad Oracle, consumed by her strange visions. But it was never like this... before.
She's never said something which cuts to the core like this, before.
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
She Saw. These truths that she holds. Only her, only her...
Elisa listens. She hears of this fundamental loneliness that Yuliana mentions, but to her it is no sin. All that exists is Strength. All that exists exists at the sufferance of those with the Will to make it so.
So it is only natural, the solution that she reaches.
"Yuliana," Elisa says gently, and closes her hands about her wife's fingers. This... is mercy.
"I am real."
The Power threading into her voice will be Yuliana's foundation. It will build her back up where Leina has torn her down. The Power will sustain her.
"My voice speaks truth into being," she explains further, her words echoing faintly. "And I endure."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
The words wrap around her soul -- join the others, defining her, there -- and Yuliana's eyes widen, as she gasps, gaze focusing on her wife again. "Elya?" She asks, trembling in her relief. "Oh, Elya! You're really here--!!"
She weeps, but she weeps for the joy of it, the succour of someone existing. Her head cants, into the pillow, as her fingertips curl against her wife. "Can you help me?" She implores her, desperately. "I don't want to be a lie. I don't want it all to be a lie. You know, don't you? What's real? Can't you see?"
It's a lot of power to put in one woman's hands, but Elisa is the rock which these rivers of madness part around, steady and eternal.
... just as the Empress must have aided her, years ago.
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
As Yuliana's gaze focuses, Elisa stares into her eyes. She is here, she said. She exists. And Yuliana weeps.
"I can," Elisa says. "For you, too, are real. You are no lie, my darling. I see what exists..."
"And you and I are at the heart of it."
It must be so. And now, Elisa has supplanted the Empress in yet one more way. As is her right.
"We are no lie, my love. Remember that."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"I'm real," Yuliana repeats, and repeats that concept, because the other -- that Elisa is real -- isn't something which she needs to process at all. It's simply the truth.
If she said it wasn't, two minutes prior, she was just confused. No one can blame her... for being a little confused.
"We're at the heart of it."
She sighs, her fingertips straying over Elisa's cool skin, as if embedding it all in her memory. "The truth comes down to us," she affirms, yielding to her wife's wisdom.
And she searches her wife's eyes for that truth, as she asks: "But what of the world, Elya? I remember... Kawochka. Is that really... are they, really?" Real.
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
"You are," Elisa confirms.
And they are at the heart of it. But Elisa hears Yuliana wonder; she searches, and Elisa's eyes are calm. They are even. They watch Yuliana as if she is the only thing in the world. Perhaps she is.
"That which is 'real' can prove its strength, of course. Perspectives may vary... and Kaworu has the power to prove himself 'real'. But 'strength' is what determines it for truth."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"What is real... is strong," Yuliana repeats, slowly. "The only reality is strength...? So... they prove themselves... real. The strong... become real...? Or... are only real things strong...?"
Her mind labours over it, struggling to assert logic and reason on a reality enforced on her. It must make sense; Elisa would not have said it, if it did not.
"Am I real... only because I'm strong...?"
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
"What is reality is determined by those who are strong enough to enforce it," Elisa says. "If you are stronger, your reality can be enforced."
"...My reality includes you. So you would be real even were you not strong. But at heart, you do have power. You have strength. This strength drew me to you in the first place."
"Together, we are stronger. Thus, together, we are more real still."
"That is the way of things. The Empress is real. ...Real, and our enemy. So we must supplant Her reality with our own."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"A constant competition... for what is real," Yuliana echoes, looking to her wife. Her gaze gentles, when Elisa includes her; her smile is loving, and the light in her eyes, thankfully, has not yet gone out. "Of course... I'm under your protection, zhenushka," she remembers the promises of her darling wife, with relief. Tears spring to her eyes, again. "Thank goodness... I don't feel strong, right now."
If she were real based on her strength alone -- she would be real, and fake, and real -- it would be dizzying. But Elisa is strong... and she's protecting her. It's good, isn't it?
"Mm... the Empress is strong... so She must be real," Yuliana agrees, working it out for herself. (And she justifies Her reality on Elisa's logic -- rather than simply knowing it to be true. Elisa is real, but Elisa, it seems, is different enough from the Empress for those to be different statements.) She sighs, her lashes veiling her eyes, as they half-close in her reluctance. "Her reality is cruel to me... but, Elya... when there was nothing... I truly wished She were there. If I had to live there, myself, all by myself, nothing but myself... oh, it frightens me."
What kind of a person... would that make her?
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
"Yes," Elisa answers. "For all reality is competition."
She smiles back. That light... yes. Good. "You are," Elisa affirms of her protection. "You are stronger than you know, but need not always be so. I will be there, when you are not."
And when Elisa isn't strong? Who will be there, then? ...Don't worry about it.
Elisa and the Empress have diverged in reality, now. They are not the Same. And Elisa notices that reluctance. What she wished...
"But you need not live in that world," Elisa says, "Where you are alone. For we are together. And always will I find you."
"Always."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
OST: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFrjMq4aL-g Transistor - Paper Boats
Reality... is competition.
"You're so good to me," Yuliana murmurs her appreciation, when Elisa promises to be there for her. "No one was ever there for me... before. I'm safe with you, Elya..."
Yuliana would of course defend her wife, but -- what about those morals she still has, for some reason? What if they got in the way?
... maybe Elisa is just more faithful than her wife.
She assures Yuliana that they're together, though, and Yuliana looks back to her, smiling gently. "I believe you," she says, and it might not be entirely just due to her dark magics. "Oh, Elya, I was so scared... but I believe you. I won't ever be alone... since I gave myself to you."
She presses her forehead to her wife, closing her eyes, and breathing in. She calms, for a moment. But then...
"Why... did Leyasha hurt me so, Elya?" Yuliana asks, all too vulnerable. "Why would she do that to me...?"
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
"You are safe with me," Elisa confirms for Yuliana. Much could get in the way, on Yuliana's side. But it is the frailties of mortals that make them endearing... supposedly. Kaworu seems to think so, at least.
"That's right," Elisa says. "You won't be. You gave yourself to me... and I am yours, too. We are together in this way. Always."
She reiterates it. Over, and over, if needed. And when Yuliana comes close...
It would be easy, so easy, to act rashly here. It would be simple, to finally rid herself of a problem. But...
She does not do that.
"She fundamentally misunderstands reality," Elisa says sadly. "So long as her moralistic viewpoint remains, she will always hurt you. She has the potential to be truly strong. But will she ever grasp it...?" A sigh.
"We shall see. But she thought it would help you, to do this to you. ...So you can see where her ideas of 'help' will get you."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"Together," Yuliana says, affirms what togetherness means.
She is frail as a mortal, but isn't she beautiful despite that? If Elisa is patient, surely Yuliana will ascend to something greater than mortality. She married in, after all.
Yuliana sighs, listening to her wife's sadness. "Her morals get in the way," she agrees, and it bothers her. "She wants me to be her idea of perfect... as if I'm not already! She said I should wait for the Yumi Foundation to help, but it was taking too long! The children were upset, Elya," she whines, and when she looks to her wife, now, she's close enough to swim in her vision. That's fine; it's fine if she can't see anything else. "What was I to do...? I've no patience, but force to spare!"
She pouts. "Leyasha said I was being hasty," she complains, bitterly. "She said I was just making things worse. But at least I did something..."
Leina's help, it seems, was no help at all.
<Pose Tracker> Elisa Kafim has posed.
Surely.
Elisa nods, ,and she sees this agreement. Her ideal of perfect. Yes, that is just right. Elisa doesn't smile, but she watches avidly, encouragingly. "Yes," she says. "They were taking far too long."
"'Hasty'? Decisive. If there are further problems later, then we deal with them as they come, of course."
"You did something. To act is greater than not."
"My darling..."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
And under Elisa's avid gaze, Yuliana's cheeks warm, flattered by her clear approval. "They were!" She agrees, with an edge of petulance. "We were waiting for days! Anyone would get tired of that! People need to eat, after all--!"
Her smile widens, as she repeats, "Yes. I'm decisive. I haven't lost the ability to do that, after all. I'm a leader." She was told she was, in any case. "And I know you'll support me."
She strokes Elisa's cheek, gazing lovingly into her wife's eyes. "Elyula," she purrs, saccharine-sweet, and surely she's in a better mood, now.
Her wife saved her again.