driftfleet | Libuscha IV System Mingle (no. 1)

...Is he here?

[She hasn't met everyone in the fleet, and she hasn't really tried, either. She also hadn't stuck around more than a minute or so after the question had been asked, so she has no idea where the conversation went from there. If the Atroma are looking for max drama, though, it does make sense. Much like she and Taako were here to suffer in uncertainty together.]

... He is.

[Because of course he was. Whatever was behind the Atroma and their little games knew what they were about.

How the centuries had left her so ill-equipped for this. No magic tree could help with that wish. Perhaps not anything could.]

...Yikes.

[Lup chucks another stone, this time twisting to skip it once more, and shakes her head.]

Sounds like the elves of the fleet are a hot, hot mess all around. Great to know.

That is... one way to put it.

[Haggar shifts to wrap her arms around her knees, and gives a short, breathless laugh at the irony.

She sobers, just as quickly. She had just... told most of her story to someone she had only just been getting to know. Honesty was one hell of a way to test a bond, but it was actually...

She could tell herself she wouldn't care, if it backfired, but she would. She wouldn't be who she was if she didn't take chances, as much as she felt far more inclined and hesitant or wary about doing so now. Mostly when it came to people.

You're still here, speaking to me, she thinks but does not say, only wondering at what it could mean.]

I sent a message to him, this past month... but he has yet to respond. That is where our tale remains, unless other circumstances present themselves.

Mm... yeah, sorry, I can't really blame him. Sounds like he was left in the most shitty situation out of everyone, and that's not gonna win you any favours.

[It's not the kindest response, but then, Taako isn't here, and sometimes even Lup can't mince words. There's a lot that could be said here, good or otherwise, and this hits a little too close to home for Lup to just accept it baldfaced.

She is still here, and she is still speaking to her, but Haggar might not like what ends up being said.]

I've been ditched by family enough times that if they came to me with an apology, I'd probably spit in their face and ignore it, too. Get used to rejection long enough that even when it doesn't come right away, you assume it's going to happen eventually. You close yourself in to protect yourself. Wait for the other shoe to drop.

[Time after time, it happened. They were passed around for years because no one wanted to commit. Two of them, double the burden. "It's your turn," they heard sometimes, dour and frustrated or just plain tired of it. She knows what it is to feel unwanted, to never have a place to call home because no one was ready to welcome them. She's a better person than she could have been because she had Taako, and Taako... well, part of why he is the way he is now is because he doesn't have that anymore.

She can't imagine going through all of that alone.]

I'll tell you this- brace yourself for rejection. It could happen a hundred times. Two hundred times. He could say awful things to you, or he could say nothing at all. And if he's anything like us, he'll probably try to push you into giving up on trying.

[So she leaves him alone. So she leaves. Because sooner or later they always do.

Her lips purse, and she finally looks over at Haggar again.]

Your job is to defeat those expectations. If you really want to be a mom, that's what you have to do.

[She knows better, not to want or expect any sympathy for herself. That had not been the point. It was Lotor who needed it, for a child born to a mother who couldn't recognize or love anything around her, while his father had all but actively stamped out all traces of her race that he could find...

"Hot mess" was putting it lightly, for what it was. It was undeniably shitty. Her son deserved better. For him to reject or ignore her now after all he had said to her... it was not as if she could force him to accept her now, when he did not have her when he needed her most.

But she had been bracing herself, for whatever Lup would have to eventually say, for bearing her part in listening to all that she had. With even a fraction of what she had gotten from Taako, she knew it would also be harsh. Especially now that the young elf knew far, far more than any other in this moment.

And so Haggar listens, quietly. This was important. It was important... to listen.

Lup was sharing a piece of her own past. The other side of rejection. What Lotor must have felt, time and again, until he had finally given up. Why Witch was what defined her to him in every single way that mattered. Don't talk to him, don't touch him, don't look at him, go away. All of that anger. Rejection, she knew already; this was inevitable, that animosity was what tied them together.

And yet, there was such a difference... hearing it from that perspective, from someone outside of it all and yet now hopelessly entwined. To hear it from a child who had dealt with her own rejection and then to have the only family she could truly call hers having forgotten her while still being so close. Knowing that, too, was important.

There's hardly any time to think more of it, since it's those last words of Lup's that without warning sends an almost violent shiver through her composure, her eyes closing tightly and gasping softly at the sudden burst of emotion, one arm tightening around her knees, the other hand pressing to her brow instinctively.]

So it is...

[Not that giving up was in her nature, stubborn creature she was, but that was only half the battle, to persevere, when her stubbornness had led to their pain in the first place. Maybe she was a step ahead now than where... she might have been, anywhere else, but she still didn't know what she was doing.

Still, even more quietly, she says:]

Thank you, Lup.

[For listening. For staying and even trying to help when she could have easily gone away or given a harsh rejection.]

[A bit of the tension in Lup's posture drains out of her, and after a long moment she nods. They're both here, and alive, which means things can change, even if it takes a long time. That's more than a lot of people get, and that's worth fighting for.]

Yeah, no problem. Maybe if you guys can work things out it'll be proof that, I dunno, we're not all hopeless fuckups. And hey, I like helping. Hey, tree, you hear that? I helped somebody! Is that good enough for you, you cryptic piece of shit?

[She turns to look at it, studying the scenery for any changes, but is met with silence. With a scowl she faces the lake once more and flops backwards in the snowy grass, arms stretched over her head.]

Figured as much... stingy bush.

[There's a soft sigh, followed by a wry sort of laugh. She was not alone on this road and that was such an important distinction, as much as was ahead.]

You have not yet been helped.

[Lup still had her own burdens, even if she had done much just to listen to these.]

Ugh...

[Haggar isn't wrong, Lup just hates to acknowledge it. Yeah, she'd volunteered initially, but admitting to anything is harder to actually do. She's quiet for a long, long moment, just laying there wishing something else would happen.

Nothing does, of course, so… here goes.]

Over a century ago, a light fell from the sky and onto my home planet. We called it the Light of Creation, and it was the most powerful source of magical energy to ever exist. The nerds in charge debated for weeks to figure out what to do with it, but eventually they decided to use it to advance a project they'd been working on, a ship that could travel beyond the barriers of our planer system. By the end of the year, they said, the mission would launch, and seven people would be chosen for it. [Her fingers curl and uncurl in the grass.] We were in school, then- post-grad. They chose us. Me and Taako.

[Funny how success both damned them and saved their asses. Not that Taako remembers this, either.]

A year later, we took off, and it worked the way it was supposed to. But as we were leaving the system we saw what we couldn't see before- another plane, looking like a bucket of tar and hundreds of times bigger, dropping down on ours. Swallowing it up. We tried to warn them, but nothing worked, so we ran away. Flew out of the system to wait it out. When things got quiet, we flew back, but… it wasn't our system anymore. Somehow we ended up somewhere new. We landed, checked the place out. We couldn't find our world anymore.

A few days later, a light fell from the sky.

[She listens.

Talk about something being familiar, with those implications. A different story, a different play, and yet. There it was again: the ironies of other realities and their similarities. Creation and destruction. Dark and light energy. Cycles. Projects. Discoveries that could change their entire understanding of the universe, for those that could live through to see them.

The dangers of the other side. A beginning, with only destruction to follow. A single team set against it all...? All of this too, too familiar, as it warred with that contradiction in her very self because she once could not care. Of course it was difficult for the other to speak, with the weight of that loss.

And then the pause comes, and she speaks softly, once the meaning has sunk in fully.]

You have experienced this ... countless times.

[That source of energy dropped out like candy onto an unexpecting planet, to be marveled at before the darkness chased it. That irony. It twisted inside of her, as that emotion had before.]

[Lup barks out a laugh, brief and sour.]

Oh, we counted. We had a chronicler for our journey. 99 times, it happened. Once a year for that century. Every time the Hunger came, we escaped, and the ship ripped us apart and put us back together in exactly the same state we started out in. No aging, no changing. We couldn't bring anyone with us, and the only way to save the plane we landed in was to find the light before the Hunger came. Didn't happen as much as we'd have liked.

[Sure as hell wasn't for lack of trying. They'd worked so hard, year after year- studying, searching, fighting, training. Sometimes it was enough. Sometimes it was all for nothing.]

At the end of it all we were… we were tired. We were desperate. It was getting stronger, faster, and every time our escape was harder than the last. We needed to make it stop. We needed a plan. Finally we figured it out- if the Hunger can't track the light, it can't follow us. And if it can't follow us, then it can't consume any more planes. We could stop. We could save the universe. It was gonna be hard on the world we finished the journey on, but it had to be better than total destruction, right? After a hundred years, that… that's what we believed. We thought we knew how to do it.

[Sitting up, she holds out a hand, creating the illusion of a ball of light. Slowly that ball is divided into seven parts.]

We created these, using the light- seven relics, one for each of us. Terrible, powerful magic items, that would draw attention and be desired by all who came upon them, but it wouldn't be enough to draw the Hunger in. They had to be wanted, just enough to satisfy the light. Once it was done, we sent them out into the world.

[She spreads her fingers, and the lights split away, and each one becomes its own red ball of destruction, angry and violent. The implication is clear: it didn't go well.]

[99 times. One for each... year. It had been a long time since she had truly felt and understood the passage of a year--roughly the amount of time it took for the war to escalate, and all the changes that came with it. All her time here barely added up to that much, just yet, but it felt long, even if she had experienced many, many years for time to have barely any meaning at all. Perhaps it was about the level of awareness that came from being around others, odd day-to-day experiences which would otherwise blend together.

A year. To learn a new place, to gain all they could, then to watch it disappear, over and over again. How many could endure that and still bear sanity? But there was work to be done for it, work against it, work to understand it. To defeat such a foe, one must become stronger, cleverer, put all they could into gaining more. An approach she understood well.

She watches the display, curious as the explanation continues, but she understands that implication.

She also knew what Lup had said before, about her memory being erased from the minds of others. Another part of the story, but maybe not... here. The villain part, perhaps.]

... a plan to change the rules. Did these relics result... in a different cycle to affect that reality?

[Given the nature of that destruction and that display. There was something to be said for having a unique point of view when it came to this sort of situation. It wasn't as if she wasn't familiar with a powerful entity being split apart and sent away to hide from a greedy, seeking source. But it could not remain hidden forever.]

...Yeah. Instead of one massive destruction at the end of a year, it was many years of constant ruin, spread across the globe- on a smaller scale at first, but they added up the longer it went on.

[The illusion changes, balls of light transforming into objects one by one, each with a story of its own. A long staff of white oak. A smooth polished river stone with no defining features. A ornately decorated silver chalice. A delicate monocle on a silver chain. A long sash woven together with brown reeds. A tiny bell encircled by a diamond pattern. A silver-plated gauntlet.

The illusion of the gauntlet in particular is violent and angry, flames writhing around it, lashing out periodically while the others sit dormant and calm. The spell born of her imagination can't help but betray her bias of which was the most destructive.]

People, whole towns would vanish, trapped behind unbreakable barriers. A child with a sweet tooth unknowingly transformed an entire town into peppermint, people and all. A town was lost in a time loop, reliving the same day over and over for seven years. Monstrous illusions were brought to life and destroyed everything around them. Coastal cities reduced to rubble by tsunamis, castles broken to pieces by tornados, countless storms summoned out of control. Ex- [Her voice falters for a moment, the only stutter in an otherwise deadpan recital of sin.] ...Explosions of fire consume cities, battlefields, whatever they can reach- thousands dead every time, leaving nothing but a circle of black glass scarring the world.

[The illusion of the gauntlet flares again, flames licking at the relics around it, until she clenches her fist and the whole thing vanishes from sight, and she glares at the empty space where they'd floated as if they could feel her ire, her guilt.]

We saved the world by feeding it poison. Super heroic, right?

[Haggar can clearly see that particular attention given to the gauntlet, even as her eyes gaze over the illusions of the damaging relics, their curious designs, the nature of their power.

The amount of destruction on that level to a single world, those results seemed extreme, but it made sense; that was the way of magic. The world itself was destabilized by so much going on in it.]

... You felt as if there was no other choice. When it comes to a desperate time, you do what you feel you must.

[... That's not comforting, but her meaning, she hopes, is more plain: there is no judgement here, for whatever that wrought. Sometimes in order to fix a thing, you broke a few others along the way. Eggs, worlds. It was terrible, but. They were fighting something that seemed unwinnable, and felt that they were losing against time. What more could they hope to do but become stronger, become wiser, gain something from that mess while buying time and feeling the burdens of the loss.]

...But I doubt that you would have left it to that.

[She could not escape that haunting familiarity of it, even with all the differences.]

Edited 2018-12-06 04:18 (UTC)

...We were supposed to.

[Lup lets that hang for a moment, her voice quiet, thick with frustration. That had been the plan. The whole plan. They didn't have a choice- after this was done they had to let the relics go. They just didn't think it through enough, in the end.]

The light of creation is... it's probably a mistake that we even got it. It wasn't meant for normal people to wield, it's too powerful, and it sends off these waves that force people to seek it out, to crave its power. It's what always drew the Hunger to it, how it always found us. The relics had that same power, but it was fractured just enough that those waves couldn't reach beyond our planer system. And since it couldn't be sought after by the Hunger, it needed to be fed by the people in the world, instead. It was... it was supposed to be the safer option. But we underestimated how powerful the relics would be.

[They were reckless, too eager. Tired of losing, of running away. Desperate for a victory, even a conflicted one. They didn't have a better plan- Lucretia's barrier would have destroyed everything, despite how firmly she believed that it would work. And the Hunger would have ruined the world and continued to ruin every world that followed, like it always did.

They were given a choice, and in their hubris, they didn't see it as a choice at all.]

Twenty months. That's how long I could handle it. We sat all safe and snug in our ship above it all while we watched the world burn itself over and over. Thousands and thousands of people died, because of us. Because of me. Every story of destruction down there destroyed us all a little bit, too. Finally I just... I... I left. Just up and bailed in the middle of the night. Went to find my relic, hide it away, fuck up our grand plan, because I couldn't...

[She trails off, burying her face against her hands, her voice trembling.]

Fuck. I tried to fix it alone and I just made everything so much worse for us.

[...Well. It was difficult to find a way respond to that, now that she's come to the more personal part of it all. The mental toll of that burden, even if - 20 months was hardly something she could conceptualize, compared to her endless centuries.

She recalls... parts of what the elf had told her before, about what must have been circumstances that followed her choice to run, and whatever else that led to her being erased. Though she also said she had some... knowledge of things being resolved too.

All those little pieces. And having asked Lup if she had any plan at all... before, well, this explained that, did it not?

... but Haggar does feel something, something other than just the gnawing familiarity of the descriptions. Power, creation. Was that not similar as the comet striking Daibazaal all those years ago, the power to create a weapon to fight the darkness, quintessence found in the rift and the desire to pull it from all else to keep everything alive, safe and well. Even in the best hands, all that sort of rightful thought could go wrong. She knew.]

... I am sorry.

[She murmurs at last, as much as she is surprised the words even come to her. She had never felt that enough to say it before. But she can understand that burden of difficult decisions.]

[It takes Lup a while to respond again, keeping her face burrowed, as if hiding it will make her misery less obvious. In the grand scheme of things, and compared to an ancient like Haggar, she's still quite young for an elf, and sometimes it shows. Hell, she'd barely become an adult before she left her world and began her century-long apocalypse tour. Many of those experiences are still too fresh, the Umbra Staff and the consequences of her choices first and foremost among them. Sharing this shit to anyone except maybe Taako or Barry isn't her usual MO, so dealing with it is... hard.

Fucking tree. This whole planet has her emotionally and mystically off-kilter. They're all lucky she's got such a solid grasp on her crazy murderlich soul or half the town would be on fire by now.

Finally, finally she lifts her head, wiping surreptitiously at the corner of her eyes, as if there's a subtle way of doing that.]

...Yeah, me too. That's the story, anyway. Congrats, we're both shitty people.

[It was such a strange, strange world, with all of that energy ringing eerily around them.

Haggar sits quietly, while Lup rightfully has her moment. Lup was young, for all her experiences, while the witch had never been young. The memories that had returned to her at all were all adult memories, too, however old she had been before time stopped. She should not have been able to relate so deeply to another person and yet here it scraped, raw. It was new, frightening, even.

Probably the world. Probably the tree, everything about it, being there. What else to do but listen and wait. Feel.

At least one of these stories had a better chance for a change in fate, for all that they owned their choices.]

You deserve better.

[She replies softly, an echo of her earlier words but even moreso now, with knowing why Lup had responded in the way she had. Perhaps it was simply her unique perspective from... having done so much worse, with less remorse. From finding too much familiarity in what Lup had been fighting against.

The elf still had not been helped.]

All of this... you wish you could tell him, do you not.

[Because Lup had not truly been alone, for all that she was now. And that regret, that perhaps she might not have been, if she hadn't taken on the burden. The implication was all too clear, there.]

[At that, Lup scowls, shaking her head and glancing away.]

That? Fuck no, not that. He deserves a break from those shitty memories, I'll grant him that. But I can't have one without the other, and... I do want him to remember me, and all the shit we've been through together. So yeah, I do want it, and of course that means he's the only one I can't tell.

[Maybe "helping" shouldn't be the goal here, because as things stand right now, the help she wants is impossible. Unless the tree gives her what she's seeking, that is, and that remains to be seen.]

[Haggar was too new at this, and she frowns deeply. Such were the drawbacks to being an actual terrible person, she couldn't really know for certain, what to say or do next. She wasn't exactly equipped for comfort, but she knew quite well a distracting movie wouldn't help, not with this level of pain and stress. Finding something for her to blow up might release some steam, but in the context, probably not the best suggestion, given all their talk of how destroying things made them awful in the first place.

What had Lup called it all? ... Ah.]

... it is, as you call it, a "hot mess".

[There was so much Effort put into actually saying that, Lup, please appreciate it.]

Above all else, you want to protect him. Even if it hurts you the most. But... it leaves him no choice, either.

[He who had said he'd rip the universe apart for his family, if only he'd known. What pain indeed.]

[Lup glances sidelong at her for that one, her eyes widening, and then her lips quirk into a cocked smile. Hearing that phrase out of Haggar's mouth is pretty godsdamned funny.

The rest... she's not wrong there, either.]

That's why I'm here. If the damned tree can give us something from home, I want what'll fix his memories. If, and it's a big if- if I get it, then I'll tell him how bad it might get. He can decide for himself if it's what he wants.

... if that is your wish, then it may be more likely to receive it now than it was before.

[Haggar lifts her gaze toward the tree, indicating that Lup should take a look at it as well. Something about it seems different, or perhaps it's something in the air that feels different, something brighter about the way it glows, a shifting of chimes.]

We know not yet what it can truly provide, but if it desires to grant it in any capacity, then you will have your answer. And hopefully... success will follow.

[For herself, she does not know what sort of gift would help her with her more unique problem, which is why she focuses on Lup instead. For her past back, her life back, something to help improve her relationship with her son, no physical item could give that to her. She might have to settle for clarity, she thinks, but does not say.]

[Lup glances over at the tree, following Haggar's gaze, and... something is different, actually. She hesitates a moment, then stands up and approaches the clearing, following a soft white light that increases in intensity with every step she takes. It soon becomes obvious that the source of the light is a crystal resting in the wall nearest the tree, and as soon as she's within a few feet of it the light explodes in a blinding flash, accompanied by a shattering noise. When the light fades, the crystal is broken, and lying in its remnants is... just an umbrella. A fancy umbrella, granted- colourful, peppered with stars and tiny bangles of varying shapes, lovingly decorated and with a few battle scars earned over years of use. It's also rich with magical energy.

Lup stares at it, silent, frozen in place. She makes no move to pick it up.]

...Wh... why... why is this...

[Her voice is faint when she finally speaks, stumbling over her words, a tremor passing through her body. Why? Why is it here? It shouldn't be here! It should be gone, she's not trapped anymore, it shouldn't have followed here here...!]

This isn't... this isn't what I wanted! Why the fuck did you give me this? Why'd you give me this, you fucking twig!?

[She takes one step back. Then another. Her heart is pounding, loud and fast, a heaviness in her chest forcing her to hunch over. She's unsteady, all of her center thrown off balance with this one small, inconsequential object shoved in her face after months of trying to forget that it ever existed. She needs Barry, to hold her hand and ease her back down from this, to remind her what keeps the monster in check. She needs Taako to make her laugh and remind her who she is.

Barry's not here.

Taako doesn't know me.

I don't have- I don't have them- and this took them away from me--!

She wrestles with it for a long moment, breathing heavily, staring down at the umbrella as if it's the greatest threat to her in the entire world right now. Her hands clench and unclench, one gripping the front of her shirt, over her heart.

hold your anchor

hold your bond

you can do this

just remember

he doesn't

And then she screams, a wave of violent, forceful wind bursting out from her body at all angles, pushing everything away. The grass beneath her flattens out, the branches of the tree bend upwards, and even the umbrella is launched several feet to smack against the trunk.

She's all but forgotten that anyone else was even there, but the message is pretty clear: stay away.]

[Haggar had gotten to her feet during Lup's initial approach to the crystal, in part because there was something entrancing about the rush of that sheer, pure energy being gathered in one place, feeling it tug, tug, tug, the ebb and the flow, and in part because how could she not observe, to see what would come of such a wish. What was hoped for, what was needed.

... And once that flash fades, it was clear that something was wrong, even before the elf can find her words. Certainly the item that appeared before them was not something that she wanted, that she had hoped for. Had her intent not been clear? Even then, there's hardly time enough to follow that thought further, because Lup screams, and then there's that sudden burst that sends Haggar staggering, momentarily breathless.

That... reaction. An untold portion of the story, perhaps. The item did not seem to resemble any of the relics she had been shown; it was something else entirely. Something powerful, but something not wanted. And yet it must have belonged to Lup, the designs seemed personal, perhaps, otherwise why would she have been granted it at all? A bad memory, a connection. Strange, how this power worked, and yet there was still, no real time to ponder such things, when it was clear that Lup was suffering so badly. Such a sharp, piercing pain, that burst of sympathy.

But for this, she knew not what to say, in the face of what only seemed like a betrayal. Whatever Lup was wrestling with mentally did not need another voice chiming in just then, Haggar could tell that much. She was... unused to feeling so helpless at someone else's pain, even if this too, was familiar. Ten years or ten thousand years, pain was pain.]

[Lup stands in place for a several long, tense moments, legs braced, arms at her side. Power radiates off of her body in mighty waves, more magical essence than she's ever shown in Haggar's presence before- more than she's shown in her whole time spent in the fleet so far. Arcs of red lightning weave in and out of her like tiny snakes, unnatural but harmless- to her, at least. The sparks that flick free of her body char the dirt and grass at her feet, the snow melting and steam beginning to rise.

When she finally moves, it's not to walk but to stretch out her arm, hand still clenched into a fist, and suddenly the red lightning becomes fire, starting at her hands and spreading downwards, twisting around her, a miniature firestorm of arcane power. Her gaze is fixed to the tree, teeth clenched, rage in her eyes. As if sensing some imagined intent to stop her - whether from the tree or Haggar, though the former hasn't moved and she's not even looking at the latter - the flames spread to create a wall around her, directed outwards, not blocking the rest of her spell but trying to keep anything else at bay.

The fire builds, and builds, and builds, channeling more and more with every second into her fist. Her eyes are aflame, her clothes and hair blown about in the heated wind. The ceiling of the cavern is darkening, thick black clouds forming, that same red lightning and fire building within them, as well. Her fingers twitch, waiting at any moment to launch that fire at her target, to destroy the tree and rid herself of every wretched part of this. It would be so much easier to let the lich within have her moment, to let the magic take over, to let her forget. She doesn't care what's in range of the spell. The tree, the umbrella, the lake, Haggar. Herself.

Fuck it. Let it all burn.]

Libuscha IV System Mingle (no. 1)

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1/2 man it's been ages since i did one of these

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