Scene #8315: Fake Things

Owner	Pose
Petra Soroka	<X-Watch-Chatter> 3 Hibiki Tachibana sounds...out of breath? Definitely out of breath. "Petra! /Petra/! Have you been resting at the station!?" <X-Watch-Chatter> 4 Petra Soroka \| What's weong Bicky? <X-Watch-Chatter> 3 Hibiki Tachibana says, "Are you /there/ or somewhere else!? I need to talk to you!" <X-Watch-Chatter> 4 Petra Soroka \| No, I'm dot dot dot do you need to meet up right now? <X-Watch-Chatter> 4 Petra Soroka \| I'll meet you somewhere? Are you by the station? Petra sends Hibiki coordinates for a small public park, one nearby a chain of easily accessed warpgates that made travel to it from the space station simple. Now, of course, Petra isn't coming from the station. All of her belongings are still roughly crammed into the cockpit of the Kana, which is currently racing above the landscape, spurred on by the urgency in Hibiki's voice. At this hour of night, the park is quiet. Its playground and pavilion are deserted, and the pale green beginnings of spring life that bring a splash of vibrancy to the area during the day are bleached grey in the starlight. The Kana arrives with a boom, slamming from max speed to a hover above the pavilion, then lowers slowly to the ground and squats, powering down. Petra opens the hatch and hobbles out. The aftermath of her duel with Lilian is still brutally, painfully present, all over her body, One hand is wrapped in gauze, and the other entire forearm is encased and held tight to her chest with a sling. Both of her feet are bandaged, and the ankle cuffs of her overalls are crusted with barely dry blood. She wears crocs, for the simple fact that her boots were shredded last night and she could only pick these up at a gas station. Around her neck, most strikingly, are two red and purple bruises of hands, too fresh to have even faded to yellow. Agonizingly taking the few steps she needs to get inside the pavilion, Petra collapses on one of the picnic benches. She quickly tries to readjust her appearance to be slightly less of a mess, which is mostly futile, and looks out anxiously for Hibiki's arrival. This had better not be about last night. It's definitely about last night.
Hibiki Tachibana	It's definitely about last night. 'I'll talk to...Lilian--I'll call you back later, I have to go!' 'Do as you like then.' Hibiki sounded so breathless over the radio for the simple reason of having been sprinting full speed even before she had gotten onto the Watch band. Her phone is clicked off and hastily shoved back into her pocket at the same time she enters the park, grass peeking out for the season crunching beneath her boots. The Kana is already here, and it means she doesn't have to waste any time scouring the dark of the night to find who she's looking for. She doesn't think about it at all, on autopilot as she barrels into the entryway of the pavilion and only stops herself short by grasping onto one of its supporting pillars with a hand. For several seconds, now that she's close enough to see her properly, Hibiki is just left standing wide-eyed, heaving for air, staring at Petra like a deer caught in headlights. It's hard to tell if she's focused on her face, or if her vision is going over the state of her body. The bandages, the bloodied portions, the bruising...until she eventually manages to breathe out, "...Petra...?" No sooner does she ask than Hibiki abruptly moves forward - to throw her arms around the other girl so quickly that she doesn't actually leave that much time to react to it. And if she weren't forcing some restraint and paying the minimum amount of consideration for the sling-wrapped arm and the rest of her various injuries, she might've been liable to topple over an unfastened bench. Her voice is close to frantic, into her shoulder. "Please! Tell--tell me none of that actually happened...! And if it did, then--then tell me /why/! Is it because I didn't...I didn't talk to you after the contest!? I...I didn't know what to even say after that, and I kept--I couldn't--" There's a choking sound from somewhere in her throat. "Why...?"
Petra Soroka	Petra notices Hibiki at the same time, and instantly, instantly, upon seeing her, Petra knows what happened. She can only meet Hibiki's wide eyes with her own for a moment, breaking the stare by lowering her chin and looking at the ground, her eyes frozen open and swimming with dread. Even with the tiny amount of restraint that Hibiki is showing, the embrace knocks into Petra and her whole body throbs with hot, stomach-churning pain. Instinctually, she tries to yell and plead with Bikki to be gentle, but the sound strangles in her throat and all that comes out is a hoarse wheeze. She pulls her less injured hand up in preparation to pound on the magical girl's chest and nonverbally signal for freedom, but instead--the upraised arm slumps over Hibiki's shoulder and wraps around her head, pulling her in. Thin gasps of air struggle in and out of Petra's mouth. After a few seconds of contact, the pain in her shattered arm becomes too much to bear, and Petra convulses and dry heaves, then lapses into a ragged coughing fit once Hibiki's pulled away. Petra pulls her hand away from her mouth slowly and deliberately reaches for her phone with the gravity of grabbing a gun. She stares at its blank screen for a moment, avoiding Hibiki's eyes, then effortfully clinks her fingernails while typing. "Sorry."
Hibiki Tachibana	Hibiki only has another thing to berate herself over when she picks up on Petra's heaving, shut eyes going wide again as she quickly pulls away without trying not to hurt her anymore. "S-Sorry! Sorry, Petra! I didn't--I shouldn't have--" Compared to her usual, there's not a bit of composure - even brooding composure - to be found. And her stuttered attempts at apologizing all trail off and fade away when the other girl begins typing, and her jaw goes a little slack when the text-to-speech vocalizes that simple word. Hibiki stares at Petra for a long moment, then bites her lower lip and glances away, looking like she might choke up. Her mouth opens once, as if to try to say something, then closes again. She steps to the side, and then slumps down onto the other end of the bench with her head hanging. "...I'm really sorry, too," she murmurs dully, palms down in her lap. "I thought...when we went out to karaoke together before..." Pause. "One of the things you told me was...'you wouldn't know if I'd manipulated you. That's the whole point.' Didn't you?" 'I bet...I defintely know that the words she said to you were to specifically get you into this state.' The magical girl lets that sit in the air, her blurry focus locked down on her own shoes, before one hand clenches in slightly. "...But what we did...the way you talked about everyone having to hate you, the promise you asked me to make...and saying that us spending time together was important to you, too...none of that could have been a lie. Right? ...I know it couldn't have." Despite her lack of energy right now, there's a hint of conviction in her tone, even if it fades out after, as she slowly turns to look at Petra out of the corner of her eye. "...Why do you have to do this to yourself?" It's quiet pleading, leading towards frustration, "Can't you...why is /this/ the 'way it has to be'...!?"
Petra Soroka	"When we went out to karaoke together before..." Petra turns her head away, pursing her lips and biting her cheek until flesh gives way and blood fills her mouth. Of course Hibiki would be the only one stupid enough to still try to be her friend. Of course only Hibiki would be gullible enough to be worried about her, and reckless enough to rush to meet the fledgling villain, and kind enough to actually try to understand. This was supposed to be the easy part. Everyone should've given up when they heard what she'd done. Petra clamps her hand on her mouth, squeezing, digging her fingernails into her cheek with the effort of choking back sobs. Not just for Hibiki's sake. Each shuddering sob sends spikes of pain shooting through her torso, producing an even heavier flood of tears than usual. That has to be why. "And saying that us spending time together was important to you, too...none of that could have been a lie. Right?" Petra shakes her head so vehemently that her hair whips around, and the torque on her neck elicits an involuntary, thin cry of pain. No. No. No. No. No. I can't commit to that. If I say that's a lie then I'd rather kill myself now than wait around for Lilian to do it. Still riding the tumultuous crest of that wave of desperate energy, Petra scrabbles her hand across the picnic table and grabs her phone. "No. Not a lie, Bee-kee." Petra hangs her head down, hair falling to draw curtains across her face. Laying her phone on her thigh, she slowly types, her expression hidden. "Could I know what they told you? Before I say anything."
Hibiki Tachibana	The constant sick-feeling, cold pit in Hibiki's gut, lingering at the very bottom of it ever since the contest, lightens up just a little. Only just a little, when the other girl fervently denies that. It's enough that as her own head tilts back ahead and down, she has the tiniest of shaky smiles, before a sleeve coming up to rub at her face hides it away. It comes away as she asks that, her arm falling back limp against her lap as she leans forward. Her expression changes into a grimace, lips pursing. "...They..." She starts, just to pause and audibly swallow. Maybe anyone else would be concerned about telling her that. She's just finding it hard to get her voice. And just like back at their karaoke trip, hiding anything comes second to her when it comes to trying to genuinely get through to someone. "I know that you...the things happened on Indus. That Ishirou had his...trust betrayed. That you were working with Eggman. That you went and...fought Lilian. ...That it sounded like you were trying to...bring out the 'old her'. And hurt her. Badly." Her eyes close, and then squint shut further the more she speaks. "...And that you're trying so hard to hurt yourself, too. So hard that you're doing all of that to your body...!" Hibiki trails off, sounding as if she's speaking more to herself than Petra at the very end - before her left hand joins the right in clenching tight onto her jacket's hem, moisture building up around her shut-tight eyes as her tone picks up in frustrated near-begging. "So please...! Just tell me straight! I want to know why! Why you're doing this to Ishirou, to Lilian, to yourself! I wanted--I /want/ to understand you, be someone you can talk to! I don't /want/ to have to keep that promise and leave you all alone, more than anything else! And I don't want to have to watch you get yourself killed, either!" "What else do I have to do to make it so you can always be able to be the Petra that was in that room, able to just have fun singing and speak honestly--!?"
Petra Soroka	Petra's head stays bowed, still as a statue, her eyes shadowed and giving nothing away. She doesn't react through Hibiki's recounting of the events, until a cold wind blows across the park and through the pavilion, and Petra trembles just a tiny bit. The way she phrased it. It wasn't Lilian that told her. Probably Ishirou, then. Petra seems to unfreeze, in response to the chill in the air. Drooping, rather than bowed, resignation rather than gritting her teeth for a blow. She takes the slightest motions possible, her forearm making microadjustments to type while slumped on her thigh. "Dot dot dot would you believe that I was there at Indus by coincidence, rather than to fight?" Petra shrugs. "I wouldn't. I was there for another reason, but I knew what day it was happening. I let myself be there, so that I could," Petra swallows hard and winces, then digs in her bomber jacket pocket to pull out a bag of lozenges, one of which she pops in her mouth. "Sorry about having to talk this way, Bee Tee Double you." She wryly smiles, and taps a finger on the handprint on her neck. "My throat, is, sore." Comma usage tries to mimic what vocal emphasis conveys naturally, and mostly fails. The feeble attempt at humor slips away, as Petra finally stops deflecting from the actual question. She lapses into a solemn silence, considering how best to explain--To help her understand, or to convince her I'm right?--and decides that her own words aren't enough as usual. She swipes through her phone for a long time, scrolling back months in the radio log, then replays it out loud for Hibiki. <B-anter> Lilian Rook says, "If you turn her into a worthy archrival I'll figure out a way to buy you a planet." <B-anter> Lilian Rook says, "It's not possible." <B-anter> Dr. Eggman, over the sound of a robot screaming really loudly about a fire, with a great deal of unconcern, says, "Very well, then, I'll make her a worthy archrival for you." . . . <B-anter> Dr. Eggman says, "You'll learn. Don't you worry. I'll teach you the many ways that will enable you to stand amongst the multiverse and declare yourself proudly and firmly." Petra visibly hesitates, and seems drained in response to Hibiki's teary-eyed pleading, like there's only so much emotional oxygen in the pavilion, and Hibiki was burning it all up. "If I try to explain it to you, it's going to sound like a lot of excuses. So I'll preface it all by saying that it's not. I'm an awful person and a villain and I did hurt Ishirou and Lilian and I'm going to keep doing it." Petra frowns and shifts uncomfortably on the bench. "To Lilian, at least. Ishirou already got enough. I wish I didn't need to do that to him. But it's more honest that I did."
Petra Soroka	"I don't fit in with you, or Ishirou, or all the other heroes." Petra pulls her foot up onto the bench, curling over her knee and resting her phone on it to type. "Not in a stupid way, of not being friends. I'm not heroic. When I try to be, it always makes things worse, or does nothing at all, which is even worse. It feels like I'm pretending to care about things the way you do. But being horrible, and selfish, and cruel, that all does come naturally. I feel better doing it, and I actually accomplish stuff, and if it makes everyone hate me then that's natural too." "With Ishirou especially. I didn't know what heroposting was until him." The TTS pronounces it as 'her-op-osting'. "Hero. Posting. He kept saying he wants to understand me, but he didn't, he wanted to, know, me. Like an object. And he's stupid, and earnest, so he couldn't do that either, so every time we talked he just ignored everything I said and talked down to me and tried to fit me into his neat little worldview. And I told him to stop, I begged him to stop, because he was trying so clumsily hard to be kind and kept doing it wrong. I got fed up with it. I made sure he stopped." Petra looks queasy, and light rain starts to patter on the overhang above the girls. "I don't feel good about it. But imagining sitting through his dull, baffled hero-pleading after he learned that I'd been working with Dr. Eggman for so long makes me not regret it." Petra lifts her head up, then lets it roll to the side, resting on her shoulder to stare at Hibiki. She looks exhausted. The dark bruises wrapped around her neck, her pale skin seeming to have undertones of cold grey-blue in the dim night, the carelessness with which she lets her head rest in a painful position, the lack of expression and light behind her eyes. She looks lifeless. Hanging by an invisible rope. "The Petra at karaoke, she wasn't real. She wasn't a lie either, but she was fake. Fake things can't be made real. I'm sorry."
Hibiki Tachibana	After she goes quiet, Hibiki remains still with teary eyes tightly shut, arms still tense. She doesn't seem to able to, or maybe she doesn't want to, respond to the 'why' of being on Indus. It's only when there's a momentary break for the other girl to take something for her throat that she eases up her tense grip on her jacket, gives a shaky exhale, and rubs at her face with her sleeve again. "...It doesn't bother me..." She murmurs quietly, nodding while giving a brief sideglance to the bruises on Petra's neck. Silence hangs, until the played back messages get her to lock up - and any tension that had drained away returns in force, as she unconsciously braces herself. It takes an incredible amount of willpower to not speak up when she calls herself a villain, and even more not to have some kind of visceral reaction to I'm going to keep doing it. Hibiki flinches, more than once, as she gets the exact explanation she asked for. At 'makes things worse, or does nothing at all'. At all those terrible things coming naturally. At...hate, also being natural. There's a part in her that's demanding she jump out of her seat and deny all of it, but the exhaustion weighing her down is too much. She can't even find it in her to try and defend Ishirou, and his stupidly earnest self - and as a drizzle begins coming down, she hangs her head as her bangs fall over her eyes. Even with Petra finally looking back at her, it's Hibiki who can't return the gesture. Not until the very last thing she says, and the apology that comes with it. Only then does she tiredly let her shoulders sag, turning her head to stare back. She's not nearly as bad off as Petra is - but the slight bags underneath her eyes are obvious, and her best efforts at wiping them away haven't entirely gotten rid of tear stains. The small smile she gives isn't a happy one in the least. It's the kind you make when you don't know what other expression to make. "You told me...I had to make that promise, so that it wouldn't all be fake." "Now you're saying it was anyway...? That's so cruel..." Hibiki lets her head hang back down, focusing on the now-upturned palms in her lap, her voice husky. "Haha...heroic. ...I'm not any kind of hero. I never was. My hands are only this big, so they can only ever...ever solve little problems. I can't even help someone I care about see what I saw in her...!" Her face scrunches up again, and her fists clench in again so tightly that it looks like she might be at risk of drawing blood. "...But it wasn't fake. It was as real as real gets to me...even if it was only able to happen in that room. Even if it can't happen anywhere else. When--..." The magical girl takes a shuddering breath. And shifts her head to look straight-on towards Petra with wet eyes. "...When you're able to say all of that 'proudly and firmly', in your own voice. W-When you can do it without looking at me like you're sick to your stomach, and suffering on the inside when you say sorry. When you...totally, completely let go of wanting to be 'that' Petra." "...That's when you'll stop 'deserving it'. Until then...I won't give up on you. Even if...it hurts. Even if it means protecting...or stopping you."
Petra Soroka	If Petra's face wasn't already deathly pale, the color would drain from it when Hibiki says she's cruel. Her eyes widen, and the glassy emptiness in them is broken by glimmer of fear. She opens her mouth wordlessly, lip trembling, but even if she could speak, she couldn't deny it. The hand holding her phone shakes, and her thumb moves to respond unconsciously, as if she was bypassing thought to let her heart speak directly. Even though that's fake too, for her. "I don't mean, that you were fake. And I wasn't lying. Everything you said to me was meaningful. Eveyrthing i siad was important too." Petra winces and flexes her hand repeatedly, trying to work stiffness out of it. Petra's alarm builds as Hibiki starts spiraling. Everyone else can be miserable, but seeing Hibiki in despair, seeing her doubt herself, is deeply wrong. Even though it's something she planned for, and worked towards. Hibiki's reckless insistence on believing in Petra's goodness, her stubborn clinging to unfair promises, creates a line that Petra's spite can't cross, crashing up against it. Wishing makes it a little more real. Petra feels sick. "Don't blame yourslef for somethign like me. Yuoare a hero." Petra's hand spasms, and she hisses in irritation, squeezing it between her thighs with gritted teeth. With a pained and reedy voice, thin enough to disappear in a breeze, she mutters, "Stupid fucking hand." Petra hesitates, then scoots a little closer on the bench towards Hibiki. Cautiously, like approaching a skittish animal, Petra opens her mouth while stretching her hand. Her voice is tiny and unsteady, uncomfortable wheezes accompanying each word. "You're the most heroic person I know, Hibiki. Don't let me take that from you. If everyo--" Her voice rasps away into silence, and her face contorts with discomfort. With her throat freshly inflamed and aching, Petra withdraws her water bottle to take a drink. She braces her whole body with anticipation, but the agony of muscular movement in her mouth is still unbearable. After swallowing, she kicks her feet and whines in pain, slamming her fist against the table. Taking a moment to recover, Petra grabs her phone again, ready to continue typing. "She likes hurting me. Lilian. And that's fine. I'm done complaining about that. I like hurting her too." Petra shudders, glancing up to gauge Hibiki's reaction. "And that's awful, isn't it? Maybe that makes me worse than her. She's kind of amazing. I hate her. 'That' Petra wouldn't feel this way. Or maybe she would, and you never should have believed in her in the first place."
Hibiki Tachibana	Hibiki doesn't shy back when Petra carefully draws closer - though that might be, at least partially, from the fact she just finished dry swallowing and shut her eyes again. The text-to-speech response trying to reassure her was only met with the smallest shakes of her head. It's only when Petra does speak, straining her voice so hard to do so, that her eyes open back up to look back at her, blinking some tears away even as a few more begin building. When the other girl begins coughing, she half-extends her hand out towards her, only to immediately remember how physical contact went the first time, and lets it fall back into her lap as the phone is taken up again. "You..." Hibiki starts, sounding just a little sore in the throat herself. The glance her way is met with the magical girl casting her gaze off to the side, then barely shifting her head in the same direction. It's her hands that are one again squeezing tight, to the point they're shaking just a bit. "I'm not going to...I wouldn't stop believing in 'that' Petra...no, in you, because of that. ...Maybe that makes me the weird one. After Lilian..." Her right one is brought up, still clenched. "...cut off my hand. I thought I'd hate her even more than I did. But I just felt...empty. And awful, that things got that bad." "...And it kind of feels like that here, too. Maybe I should hate you for what...you did to Lilian...and Ishirou. And that you're not going to stop. Or even Lilian, for what she's done back to you. But...I can't make myself do it." Hibiki pauses, taking a deep breath, then letting out another body-shivering exhale. "...I just hate that it's happening at all. I wanted to...just once, have things for someone I care about get better without getting worse." "But I don't want to...if I stop believing in you...I'm more scared of what might happen after that than anything else."
Petra Soroka	The rain intensifies, drumming on the pavilion with one continuous sound. Sheets of rain obscure the world beyond the concrete island, everything beyond the reach of its single yellowing light gone. Even the Kana, squatting a few yards away, blurs into unrecognizability, some dim metal monster kept at bay by the light. The cold soaks into Petra's bones, and she unconsciously shifts a little closer to Hibiki even as the other girl drops her hand. Petra looks increasingly distraught as Hibiki continues, shrinking as though she's being scolded. I can't be horrible enough to get her to stop caring. I'd have to be so much worse than I can bear being to her. It's not a comforting thought, it's helpless, defeated. "I wanted to...just once, have things for someone I care about get better without getting worse." And that's why. Hibiki is trapped with her now, glass splinters embedded in her heart, cutting with every beat. Collateral damage. Petra looks like she's been punched in the stomach. She chokes out a half-formed sound, then grabs her phone, desperate to say anything to convince Hibiki otherwise. "It's okay. It'll be okay. It'll be over with soon enough anyways. This won't last long, and it should already be over, but I'm too pathetic to do it myself." That's not a reassuring thing to say, and Petra immediately realizes it, dizzy and tense, braced for Hibiki's response. Tears slide wordlessly down her cheeks.
Hibiki Tachibana	The rain coming down only harder and harder still is like a physical weight heaving down on top of the already low mood, even with the roof over their heads keeping them clear of it. Though from the look that Hibiki is wearing right now, sitting in the silence between them, it's hard to say how much she'd even care about being out in it. But she doesn't miss them. The little twists in the Petra's expression, the way she's inching closer...the sounds she's struggling to get out. She can't muster up any words or response, or any assurance, no matter how awful it feels to see her or leave her like that. Until the phone beeps back another response and Hibiki, still glancing down, blinks as some of the color drains out of her face. She looks back up at Petra, as if she wasn't even sure of what she just heard, jaw slack. More liquid is visibly building up in the corners of her eyes. Just for some of them to be sent scattering with how quickly she moves, now her turn to close the distance. Even though she already knows better, even though she already chastised herself for it, she can't stop herself from drawing the other girl into a hug that's only barely shy of too tight. "Don't say that--!" She at least eases up after a moment, but she doesn't pull away, and her voice is anything but subdued against her shoulder. Even past the bit of choking she's doing, there's a shaky kind of matter-of-factness in her tone, like she'll absolutely refuse to accept any differently. "...Don't say that. I don't care if you're pathetic or not." "I don't really know what's going to happen...by the end of this. I'm not strong enough to--to make everything go my way. But...I'm not gonna let you go anywhere." "...No matter what. That's my selfish promise to myself...as your friend. And that's...why it'll be okay. Okay?"
Petra Soroka	Petra feebly holds an arm up in protest and twists away from the embrace, but if she's being squeezed too tightly, Hibiki isn't to blame. Once Hibiki's arms wrap around Petra, the creature shudders violently, shaking with every desperate inhale and sobbing with every forceful exhale, wringing every bit of air out of her lungs as if rejecting its presence. But despite her writhing and the almost magnetic repulsion between their bodies, Petra's hand grips the back of Hibiki's shirt tightly enough to hurt Hibiki, not to mention herself. The phone clatters to the ground. Wretched thing, a poor substitute for direct communication. Petra clings to Hibiki as if scared she'll fall without her, face pressed into her shoulder, silent and shaking for a long minute after Hibiki stops talking. Eventually, feeble and brittle, Petra manages to croak a word, translated a hundred times to desperately communicate from her heart to Hibiki's. Wretched substitute. "Why?" More words follow, pouring out with the false fluidity of sand. "Why do you believe anything I say? How can you trust any of it? Ishirou wouldn't, he'd know that everything I do is manipulation. Everything I say is a lie, calculated to get you on my side, to get attention, or sympathy. It could all be fake, every word and tear. Petra might not even be real, underneath all of it." Petra starts to cough right in Hibiki's ear, then cuts it off, her body spasming with the effort of repressing it. She whimpers, quiet and muffled by Hibiki's shoulder, still clutching her as close as possible. "What is there to hold on to, that isn't fake?"
Hibiki Tachibana	If Hibiki cares at all about the painful grip onto her back, she doesn't show it. If anything, it only makes her dig her own fingers that much harder into Petra's jacket, scrunching up the material underneath them. When she first manages to force out proper words, they clench in to the point that she might even leave scratches in the leather. Only to slowly, slowly, but surely ease up the more Petra goes on. It's hard to tell why, the close contact between them making it obvious that her tensed shoulders are doing the same. But she doesn't let go at all, and reaffirms her grip again when that cough is stopped short - arms coming around that much more and holding her against her. She stays like that for seconds after she's done, less desperately grasping at and now much more leaning up against the other girl. "This. Right here." There's still that same faint conviction in her voice, even though it's now gotten much quieter. Even if her face is buried in Petra's shoulder, it gives the impression she might be making a weak smile. "...I could never be Ishirou, doing the smart and logical thing. I'm kind of a huge idiot. If you asked me to give you any proof you weren't lying, proof that he'd take, I couldn't." "But...the Petra that I believe in. The Petra that I'm holding onto right now. ...The Petra trying so hard to speak in her own voice and convey her feelings...even when words alone are never really enough." She squeezes back again, just a tiny bit. "That Petra is definitely real. Not fake. That's what my heart knows. And if, somehow, she's not...I'll just keep believing in her until she is, and the rest of the world gets to see it too."
Petra Soroka	It's been weeks since Petra's touched another person. Other than the bruises burning on her neck. That really isn't very long. It shouldn't be that long. But as Petra keeps clinging to Hibiki, she realizes it's longer than she's ever gone in her life. Something shifts. The girls stay still, but the air vibrates at a speed softer than sound, thrumming with the indirect touch of a finger running around the rim of a glass. The pain building in Petra's bound arm eases, just a little, and when she speaks, her voice comes out a little easier. No less hollow, but the rasp accompanying it fades. She laughs, barely, when Hibiki calls herself an idiot. Leaning up against her, Petra turns her head to look outside, into the rain. "I don't see a future where the world sees the version of me that you do." Petra chokes out another small laugh. "I don't even see her. I don't even see a future at all. But...." Petra trails off and clenches her fist, tightly enough that fingernails cut into nothing. "But I'll try to trust you. I'll, I can't make that future now, I can't want it badly enough, but maybe I can imagine imagining it. If that time comes, we can wish for it together." It still sounds like a lie to Petra, deep inside her. They're words crafted to make Hibiki happier, perform a glimmer of the Petra that she wants to see. But, holding on to Hibiki, a wordless sense stirs in Petra, that she can reflect Hibiki's interpretation onto herself, become more real in the mirror. "You really are a bit of an idiot, for believing in me." With Petra's face turned away from Hibiki, it's impossible to tell whether the words are murmured with a smile or a frown. If they strain their ears, listening past the continuous thrum of heavy rain, they might be able to hear a bird chirping in the distance.