text / action - northern section of Xanadu Gardens

[sleepingstar]

[ action ]
[Pai is bowled over by a sudden, aching sense of loss. The Gate is gone. How can the Gate be gone? She's the only one with the power to destroy it. And yet --

A moment passes and she finally registers surroundings (a testament to her disorientation; she's never once been shocked enough to lose sight of her surroundings until now). Wherever this place is, it isn't South America. Which means the odds are good that it isn't the Gate that's gone; it's her.

Who what when where and why are all questions she wants answered, but first and foremost, she needs to establish whether her team is here. She reaches into her pocket for her radio, but finds a network device instead.

Curiouser and curiouser.]

[ text ]
Twice I've gone to the garden, but not once have I found a spring starflower.

[If anyone from her unit is here, they'll recognize the code for her call sign BK-201.]

I think I'll give up and look for moss. I've got two hours to kill.

[After typing out that message, she heads towards the northern part of Xanadu to secure a location and wait for two hours.]

Comments

[mortemscintilla]

[ His point, exactly. ]

[ Fingers linked with Pai's, Hei watches Pavel flail with raised brows and a coolly expectant look, as if to say, Get on with it. When Pavel declines though, a faint smile, full of -- could it be? -- gratitude, twitches on his face. It isn't just that he wants to spend time with Pai. He's also leery of leaving her around civilians too long. After years on the battlefield, it'll be days -- (weeks? months?) -- not hours, until Pai is properly decompressed. (Even if, logically it should take her less time than it took Hei. She's a Contractor, and nothing if not adaptive.) ]

[ Coaxing Pai to fall into step with him, he glances briefly at Pavel over his shoulder. ]

Oчень благодарен.

[ Wryly-accented Russian, but genuine, in its own way. (It's still too much of an effort for him to say Thank You, Please, and Sorry.) ]

[sleepingstar]

[As they walk away from the young Russian, Pai shoots her brother a look. She doesn't even have to say anything -- her eyes speak clearly for her.

What was that?]

[mortemscintilla]

[ Hei's answering smile to Pai -- considerably wider -- is tired and indulgent in the same breath. When they drift out of earshot, he murmurs, ]

The Syndicate made a linguist out of me after you were gone.

[ Which is a facetious shorthand for: There were a lot of unpleasant assignments to a lot of unfamiliar countries. ]

[sleepingstar]

Do you do a lot of star watching with him? [teasing little glint in her eye. There's no point saying she's sorry about the unpleasant assignments; she hadn't been involved in them, and her being sorry would change nothing. But teasing Hei... what else are little sisters for?]

[mortemscintilla]

[ Hei averts his gaze away from her pert face, tucking his free hand into his pocket, the motion self-conscious and at odds with his projected nonchalance. He isn't sure how to tell her -- how different his life is in the City, the hooks of sentiment that have sunk into his skin as the months have passed. In a way, it's still so fucking precarious and novel. The idea of being around people because he chooses to -- because he likes them -- not out of self-benefit and calculation. It's nothing like the transient Contractor lifestyle at home, living opportunistically, with no fixed address. ]

[ In many ways, he's undeniably softened. But he can't bring himself to regret that entirely. ]

A fair share. [ He glances at her from the corner of his eye. ] He's from a futuristic world. Space travel. Real stars. And he's a genius with technology. [ A useful asset, all in all. (But that's not the whole story, is it?) ]

[sleepingstar]

You like him. [Teasing, but she's pleased for him. Humans need people to like, to care for, to love. Hei has spent so long with Contractors, pretending to be one of them, that she was a little afraid he would forget himself. It's good that he has a friend.]

[mortemscintilla]

Not like I like you, [ he says, almost lyrical, as though it's an evasion but a part-reminder too. If you asked Hei, he'd hesitate to use such absolutes as Like or Friend. People are people; things are just things. He's been trained, like Pai, not to rely on anything that risks outlasting its usefulness. Even so, he's gotten used to irrationalities like favorites, to have things mean something that's difficult to put into words or into your armory of leverages. Maybe, deep down, he likes that his dormant humanity surprises him, still. ]

[ It feels nice. But it's nothing compared to having Pai back with him. (If he has to make a choice -- to renounce all the progress he's made, to revert to that ruthless monster he was in Heaven's War, just to protect her -- he won't hesitate. That, at least, hasn't changed.) ]

[sleepingstar]

Well of course not. I'm your sister. [One little word, but it means everything. Shared experiences, mutual traumas, all sealed together with bonds made of blood. Nothing can ever compare to that.]