Open!

[oceantier]

Characters: Lapis and YOU (open!)
Date: Early August
Location: Varied
Situation: Varied. All take place after awakening again from her gem and facing down Irvine. Lapis attempts to adjust to life on the Turtle . . . and escape from it.
Warnings/Rating: Still probably spoilers. Also still may be some threat of Lapis fleeing or dowsing characters. ^^;


A. Turtle's Head - The stars weren't the same here.

At the Turtle's head, distant from the lights of the city, the heavens were laid out in full . . . a dizzying array of tiny lights sprinkled across the darkness.

Lapis knew the stars well. Knew she knew them -- that they were as familiar to her as her own hands. Even from Earth, she'd always been able to name any of them at a glance, and knew with barely a thought where her home was at any given instant.

Not so here. The star that lit Homeworld was nowhere to be found.

It was like a tether had been sliced away . . . without it, she reeled, uncertain and grasping, for a solidity that was no longer there. Without it, she was vulnerable to the inky expanse above her, bare.

She curled her arms around herself as though by doing so she could hold on . . . perched on the Turtle's head, tiny under the unknown sky.

B. Keelai - Water Sector - It had been days, and no sign of Jasper.

It seemed inconceivable that the other Gem would not be here. They had been fused -- one body, one mind, inseparable and pinned together beneath the full weight of the ocean of Earth.

Inconceivable that one could be pulled without the other. Impossible.

Lapis remained alert, combing what she could of the Turtle without inciting the attention of the locals. Surely the other Gem would have made herself visible . . . Jasper was that kind of personality, large and defiant, unafraid of consequences -- the sort who would have stood at the center of Keelai and announced herself, unconcerned about the teeming locals around her. Brazen in spite of the fact that they didn't know what this place was, what kind of dangers it could actually host.

Lapis was exhausted. Sleep wasn't something her body required . . . but rest certainly was. After so many hours of alertness, of vigilance, of forcing herself to push forward, she was at her limits.

As the sun rose higher in Keelai, she searched for a place to settle, wary of the kedan that had started to enter the streets.

C. Beach - Anyone watching might think she would never come up. Having waded as far out into the waves as she could manage, Lapis had dived, arching like a fish beneath the surface. One minute would pass. Two. Three. Longer than anyone should be able to hold their breath -- and yet still she did not emerge.

Follow her beneath the surface, look for her in the water, or wait until she comes back up.

D. Outside Keelai - She's just a dim speck in the sky, flying up, up, up, pushing, testing, ignoring the weight that settles through her stomach and heart and head, pressing, clenching . . . She pushes it as long and as hard as she can -- just a bit farther, and she'll push through. Just a bit farther and she'll be free . . .

And then the vertigo twists like a knife thrust through her insides, and she knows she never will. That's the moment before the blackness takes her, and she yields to unconsciousness.

She wakes up hurling through the air, wheeling out of control in wide, erratic circles. She gasps, pulls up hard on her wings. Wrests against the air, wings hauling hard against the wind.

The impact against the ground is hard. She slams into the earth, rolling what feels like a hundred times before coming to rest.

E. Have another idea? COME TO ME.

Comments

B; 8/4 ish?

[ruinsprofessor]

Raine's morning commute to the Healers' Guild took her, necessarily, through Water Sector, and her more recent attempts to vary her route made sure that she saw a great deal of that sector on a weekly basis.

Today, those sights included a blue woman.

That took a second look, to be sure of, but her mana didn't feel like one of the kedan and, what was more, she didn't look comfortable in the streets of Keeliai. A newcomer, perhaps? It was enough to draw Raine aside from her accustomed path, approaching the woman from a direction that ensured she could be seen coming. "Excuse me," she said, polite. Maybe it was nothing, but it was better to ask. "Is everything all right?"

Suits me!

[oceantier]

She'd attracted attention. Somehow she'd attracted attention.

Steady. She willed herself to be steady as the woman crossed the street towards her, eyes intent on her. It wasn't Jasper. It wasn't anyone else. She would attract more attention if she fled.

Steady.

Her arms braced against one another, fingers pressing into her skin. Quickly, sharply, she shook her head, trying to stave off the query. "It's . . . fine. I'm fine."

[ruinsprofessor]

The blue woman also, apparently, bore more than superficial resemblance to the last blue woman Raine had met; her mana, on closer examination, was emphatically aligned with water. Not quite a spirit, but... curious. Very curious.

"Are you sure?" Raine pressed, not unkindly. The woman's body language did not speak of fine. Skittish, perhaps, though Raine wasn't sure she'd go as far as 'frightened.' "I don't mean you any harm, but you seem lost. If you're new here, I can direct you to the Welcome Center or the Hotel?"

[oceantier]

She hadn't left. Hadn't gone away. Lapis' fingers pressed harder into her skin, the tips paling from the pressure. For a long moment she was quiet, retreating into herself as anxieties screamed chaos from every direction, loud and louder and louder yet until her thoughts were a swirl of scattered fragments.

She cut through with a breath -- a sudden inhalation from deep in her lungs. And focus. Absolute focus on Raine's face.

"If you're going to try to capture me or kill me . . ." Her eyes bored into Raine's. "You should just try."

[ruinsprofessor]

What in the world? Raine blinked at the woman, utterly bemused. She'd made no hostile move of which she was aware, and her weapon, an oak staff a little shorter than she capped with concentric brass circles, was hardly the stuff of threat, not to mention angled out of the way behind her back at the moment.

Evidently one of them had drastically misunderstood the other. "Why would you think I meant to do either?" Raine asked, frowning now. She hadn't even gathered her mana, which she was aware some mages might count as an active threat.

[oceantier]

One foot edged back, poised on the ball, a tremor shivering through her voice. "At least one of you already tried. A man. With lightning. He wanted to kill me. He would have killed me."

"I have to stay alive. I have to go home."

[ruinsprofessor]

Lightning. Lightning doesn't ring a bell, unless... "There was another new arrival, similarly disoriented, who is -- was apparently under the impression we were the enemy," Raine said carefully. This woman had ascended to skittish, now, and Raine was very still, loath to make any move that might be interpreted as a threat. "That may have been him. I can understand why you're reluctant to trust me in that case, but I promise I mean you no harm."

She paused there, hesitating. The news that they couldn't go home on purpose probably wouldn't be very well received here and now, and so Raine held her tongue on that for the time being. Instead, she added, "You had some new piece of jewelry on you when you arrived, correct? It will be important to keep that safe."

[oceantier]

The gem.

An arm yanked upward, revealing the soul gem -- a lapis lazuli dangling from the inside of one wrist, bound into a fine net of silver and looped around twice. "I tried to take it off . . . and I couldn't. It made me feel strange inside. Wrong. It's keeping me here. Isn't it?"

She didn't wait for a reply. "I'm always somebody's prisoner. That's all this place is, isn't it? Another prison."

Her tone was starting to shoot upward with each word; she backed away another step, then another, her hands tightening into fists. "I'm not just going to roll over because someone's decided to trap me again. I won't be somebody's prisoner. I made my own destiny -- I'm going back to it. You say to trust you . . . how can I believe you're not just like any of the rest of them?"

[ruinsprofessor]

Something in Lapis' words struck a nerve, or the beginnings of one; Raine propped her free hand on her hip, expression turning down somewhat. "Believe what you want," she said, cool. "It's true that we can't go home intentionally, and in that respect I suppose 'prison' is vaguely accurate, but many Foreigners have been here and returned to their home worlds. That gem is something of an anchor, yes, but it's also keeping you alive."

She was still frowning. The other woman obviously had some hangup with being kept prisoner, not to mention the trust issues that Skulduggery's problem newcomer had assisted, but the refusal to listen to reason grated.

It wasn't new. Just unfortunate. "I have some answers," Raine said, still level, "but if you're not willing to listen or believe them, that won't be of any use."

[oceantier]

She wasn't near reason at the moment. Couldn't be. Exhaustion made a thousand fractals in her mind; warnings and anxieties beat with a thousand pounding fists in her brain. She was still pulling the rope, still hauling against Jasper's weight.

Raine simply couldn't be heard over everything else.

Don't trust . . . can't trust anything. Can't stop, not for a second . . .

Why didn't this woman attack? Why did she keep talking -- what was she waiting for? Attack and she would have an excuse to fight. Have a chance to wrest the fear and anxiety from her mind.

With a last darted glance, Lapis pulled back. One step. Then two. "Just . . . stay away. Stay away."

Her wings blossomed around her, and she kicked upward into the wind.

[ruinsprofessor]

Better than Chocolat, Raine supposed. Better, too, than Skulduggery's problem, in that it hadn't escalated to an outright fight. Still... it worried her. Raine stared after the woman for a long moment, till she was too far into the sky to be properly seen, but she didn't try to call her back nor attack, only watched.

Then Raine sighed, and her shoulders slumped, and she turned to finish her trip to the Guild. Realistically, there was nothing more she could do right now, save keep her eyes open for her and attempt to help if the opportunity presented itself. For now, since the new woman wasn't actively attacking anyone, there were more important things to do.