Scene Listing

||

Scene Schedule

||

Scene Schedule RSS

Owner	Pose
Lilian Rook	One last stumble through the Corridors, fleeting through the lonely dark, leaves Petra utterly on her own. The liquid shadows dry up behind her more quickly than she realizes, taking with them her ignorance of the knowledge that she is functionally stranded until she calls someone to get her. Which feels unnerving. But also feels great. Because that was the point.     There are only so many places that are sufficiently isolated for the Corridors to easily connect to, in the last place marked by Lilian's little class traitor friends. A seldom-frequented file room, by the looks of it; locked, but she's inside of it, so who cares. It's enough for her feelings to start percolating just beyond the edge of her conscious recognition; it feels so different from what she knows of where Lilian lives, despite being owned by the same man. A few footsteps outside clicks it into focus, when she absently realizes none of floorboards squeak. Not even a little bit.     Surprisingly, the floor plan she intuits from a couple of corridors isn't that expansive. Three storeys, an obnoxious U-shaped courtyard and pool visible through the inside widnows, maybe three or four bedrooms, a small indoor library past one door, and space for some no doubt hideously overblown lounge on the floor below, but ostensibly designed from the very start to be lived in by one or two rich people and occasional guests and distant relatives. The style is only somewhat newer, the decor reeks of rose-tinted goggles of two centuries ago, the arrangement is wildly, noxiously rich and privileged, but the comparative smallness of it-- the way it somehow evinces a feeling of being sized and contoured exactly to one person's world feels . . . purposeful, somehow.     Finding a personal study is easy; Matthew isn't the type to keep his PC in his bedroom like a millennial. The fireplace in the room can't be good for cooling, and the little window over a bay of some sort isn't sufficient, but most of it seems to be given to books, pictures, plaques, curios, and extremely aged artifacts under glass. The desk is just like in his office, but visibly worn and dented in a million subtle ways from long decades of love, even if you'd have to look closely. The other is clearly a replica. The computer on it is more modern than anything Petra is used to, but still a generation behind Lilian's, and the paper thin curved screens are left on a simple idle-based lock screen. That, and a locked cabinet, are all that's between her and the last set of records.     It'd be tempting to desperately ignore the little photographs in their picture frames, if there weren't obviously one spot left unexpectedly vacant, and another frame lying on its face. There are scores of them; most are filled with people Petra's never seen or heard of.     Women dressed for picnics in the attire of the 20s; a little Matthew in Sunday Best with a father and grandfather behind him; one of himself without the grey or the suit, sharing drinks with a gaggle of lads with their own rough-cut trail sticks from before the invention of the automobile; half a dozen elderly men and women on a bench in a gorgeous park; a smartly-dressed little boy playing piano before an audience in a little theatre bombed in WWII; an unfamiliar girl's wedding at a small country church; his own, with a beautiful redhead Petra immediately sees the resemblance to Lilian in; the two of them with a little girl of their own, who looks more like she does.     None of the house. None of Lilian. Not even the facedown photo; n that one, Matthew is with an older boy who looks like him, fishing, the woman and little girl in the background. That fucking cane is set in a repurposed umbrella stand, alongside an old, scuffed, worn darkwood sibling, a knobbly old blackthorn stick, and an appropriately antique umbrella occupying a slightly mis-sized fourth space between them.     There's coffee steaming on the desk, too. It takes but seconds for thumping footsteps to come from just outside.
Petra Soroka	It ends tonight.     Petra steps out of the inky darkness of the Corridors with stiff, shuddering momentum that doesn't falter for a moment when she hits wood with her boots rather than the nothingness of the shadowy floor. It takes striding across the room and trying to pull open the locked room for her to even slow down from the near-run, and she freezes when the door bangs in the frame.     She takes a shaky breath, trying to calm the reactor spinning up in her core. Contain it, stay focused, do what she came here to do so Lilian can be okay. Her feelings come second to the task itself. Petra quietly clicks the lock open, then steps out into the hall, grateful for the quiet of the floorboards until the reason why settles into her stomach.     It's uncomfortable, how *familiar* the house feels. The comfortable admittance of luxury that's only enhanced by the downplayed nature of it, the boundaries between where wealth exists as a performance and simply as an expectation, feels like a dozen other houses she's been in, carted around as a kid to visit her dad's business partners. Not that any of them were immortal wizards ruling the world through a shadow government, but... the association still unnerves her.
Petra Soroka	Those rambling thoughts disintegrate when Petra puts her hand on the frame of the entry into the study. The last computer is there, within reach, and theoretically Petra has the option of just erasing every file on it and disappearing before Matthew knows what's going on; to call him later, and not have to endure the suffocating pressure of being in his presence, made a million times worse by being the target of his anger rather than his tool. But that wouldn't accomplish what she's here for.     The pictures instantly register to Petra as radioactive-- the words that Matthew said were already so, so much more than she should ever know, and just being here feels dangerous. They do, inevitably, catch her eye, purely by how much effort she put into not looking, but she refuses to internalize anything about them, even if none of it is damning on its face. Nothing that Matthew does or owns should be given any attention, because all of it, no matter what, exists through his lens; the same picture in Lilian's hands would be a pleasant shared moment.     'Fuck you, Petra Soroka, for trying to be the cane and crying when you broke. The real one did too.'     Petra's eyes settle on the cane for the few moments before the footsteps reach her. God, just seeing it makes her so angry, she could turn it to splinters even if she was standing right in front of Matthew. Maybe that would even be for the best, so Lilian isn't forced to do it herself again. Is that right? Is it better to keep her away from the reminder, and show that Petra is able to help her break things that she had to fight off herself before, as a form of comfort? Or would she resent not getting the opportunity herself?     Petra still doesn't know. The nuances of that line of thinking are still so far beyond her, with just three weeks since seeing what people like Matthew can actually do. But it's okay that she doesn't know, because she does know that she can trust Lilian to decide.     "Hey. Matthew." The moment before Matthew steps into the room, Petra calls out to him, a rattling hum underlying her voice. Droplets of silver rest on top of the hardwood floor without collecting or soaking in, a blanket of glittering jewels already strewn across the ground from her arms, quaking with internal energy. Petra stands uncomfortably rigid in the center of the room, shoulders drawn together under her bomber jacket, arm held out to her side.     "I was thinking that we needed a follow-up to our last conversation. There's been some new developments that I think you'll be interested in hearing."     A spike of metal thrusts out of the palm of her outstretched hand into the computer, shattering it and continuing through to gouge the wall before losing its form and sloshing onto the ground. At the same time, dozens of thinner spears lance out of the puddles on the ground, converging on the cabinet to crunch through the wood and pierce the documents inside.
Lilian Rook	It's inevitable now. Petra can't even beg Xion to save her fast enough. She'll be there. In the way. With him. She can feel his presence oozing through the door. Matthew isn't psychic, but some single, individual note of the atmosphere that Lilian carries with her is palpable ahead of him like fog crawling under the frame; the sense of gravitas narrowing her world around the edges and funnelling her attention in, and the already ambient sense of her heart lying in an inch of ice cold stagnant water.     He opens up the door to his study, business as usual, having left his coffee on his desk and apparently walked off to get a set of papers, and Petra is momentarily hit with how little difference she feels between him here, in his own home, and the way he had presented himself at her jail cell, wearing a three piece suit on official business.     He looks up from the corner of his documents in one hand, and his eyes catch on the metallic glitter spattering the floor, twinkling in the light. From there, he quickly glances up to Petra, and his airless, frigid gaze locks with hers, in a way that drives all the air out of her chest, squeezed out under the sheer chiselled weight of disapproval barely hanging over her, and then abruptly defibrillates her with a bright shock of realization.     He hadn't really looked at her before, but he has no trouble at all with finding and recognizing her face. Whatever quirk of damaged neurology or inscrutable psyche causes that habit in Lilian, it is hers and only hers, not passed down from him. The world and the people in it have never been so fake to him as to his daughter.     "Petra Soroka." says Matthew Rook. Tones of smooth-worn gravel and grinding architectural slip. "What in God's name are you doing in my house?" The words alone are enough to feel like a Sword of Damoclese has inched lower to her head; one more akin to an old fluted column that'd crush the life out of her, mashing her organs and squeezing out her blood, rather than something that could cut neatly. "The settlement is being processed. It's barely been a few weeks; this sort of speed is ordinary. If you'd like to proceed however, you'll have to answer some very serious questions about how you got here and why." Crushing hostility dangles on clanking chains a foot from her skull. She sees the way his eyes narrow. 'New developments'. Something else for Petra to run to him in tears about. Something else he can use.     Up until the exact instant her metallic blood skewers his computer and turns his cabinet to flinders. The look of sheer, animal shock on his face tells her everything she needs to know: 'When the fuck did you ooze silver? Since when did you have powers? You're supposed to be normal; I averted my eyes in that cesspit of a cell.'     "What are you doing you idiot girl?!" he roars instead, tossing aside his papers and advancing across the room in the rapid strides that come just before punching someone in the back of the head. She can see the instant he restrains the urge just enough to direct his hand downwards, grabbing at her scarf and jacket, and then holding it there instead of lifting her. "No. No, let me guess. You don't have to say it.    threatened you, didn't   ? Whatever that      said to you, whatever    has; do not. I can see to it. I can protect you, but you must slow down and speak to me." Just the hand on her collar strains with such bone-creaking effort that she can feel it in her neck; the immense stress of denying the irrepressible neurochemical urge to give her what she deserves. His grip is flush with the same white-knuckled impulse that calls to mind Lilian crumpled against the wall.
Petra Soroka	Petra meets Matthew's eyes, despite every cowering impulse to the contrary. His first words in that self-assured voice feel like he's scolding her, and she has to resist the wave of fear and desire to recoil and apologize. She's obviously, visibly the one out of place here, the one who stands out as wrong and not blending in, with the entire room, and house, and world outside lending their weight to the way that Matthew stares at her.     The only way for Petra to stand up to it is to push back harder, furious that she'd even feel the impulse to back away. She swallows hard, eyes locked on Matthew, and her body is so tense that her jaw creaks like a metal beam about to snap, trying to collect herself enough to respond, before Matthew grabs on to her scarf.     Immediately, Petra's hand snaps up to his wrist. Tides of silver surge out of her sleeve to arch around her hand, trembling like water over a speaker, and her core reactor dully shrieks through layers of metal and cloth. Wordlessly, she pries his fingers open and guides his hand away to his side, her entire body below her head jittering with suppressed energy.     "Stop fucking calling her that. I'm not going to put up with it. I'm not one of you." She says it so directly, with such steely determination and raw disgust, that it's impossible for Matthew to reconcile with the choked voice on the phone talking about his child. "*Lilian* didn't send me. And if you need me to fucking slow down when I talk so it can get through your thick fucking skull, then I can do that. Let no one ever say I'm not fucking disability conscious."     Petra falls quiet for a moment, suddenly not sure how this next part goes. Not out of indecision, just a lack of lines to fall back on, words to fill the space of performance that she intends to convey. Before Matthew Rook can get a word in, she defaults to blurting out exactly what she means.     "I'm blackmailing you. I have your financial records, I have a million messages of you sending bribes, insider trading, embezzling. I have enough evidence of the abuse that you put your daughter-- the best and most heroic person in your world and in the multiverse-- through, with criminal acts of spying and accessing medical records illegally. A fucking model of how her power works, and even with that, isn't it pathetic that you lose to her every time?"     She takes another breath, trying to keep her mind in pace with her mouth. "Lilian isn't yours to control. I gave all of your data to a Watch propagandist, who's prepared to release it all and spin it to look even worse for you than it already is. You're going to call Lilian and tell her, using her name, that you don't have the power to push her around. That you can't force her to leave the Paladins, or Sapient Heuristics, and that you can never hit her again."
Lilian Rook	It's so obvious, from the moment she does it, that Matthew really doesn't like her meeting his eyes. In the cell she had been his ally; a victim of convenience, allied against Lilian for their mutual benefit. Here, she can practically hear the slur on his lips. The one that should have no relevance to her, not existing in her world, but which she's only heard uttered with such vehemence that it can only hit close to home regardless.     The only thing he likes even less is being grabbed, and forced. The flash of anger in his eyes is, appropriately, enough to remind him that his youngest daughter is stronger than him too; oh how he must hate being overpowered by women, metal or not.     "You nasty spineless little t--" begins to slip from his mouth, thick with venom and smoggy contempt, from Petra suddenly having the temerity to reverse course on the only moment he'd ever been interested in sharing with her, and tell him his business about what to call his daughter. The casually nasty insult barely registers next to that betrayal.     The rest is cut off by the blunt, incredulous shock of Petra just blandly stating her entire scheme out loud. To his face. Like the most incredibly inept manipulator he's ever stumbled across in his long, long life of dealing with manipulators, and being one. It's so much that it takes him two starts to get a sentence going, that itself only amounting to a "Do you actually expect me to take you--" before he pauses, equally abruptly, to consider the especially salient fact that he has bothered to know nothing about the Watch save for the fact that they ruined everything at work once before, and that, if Lilian is with the Paladins, then . . .     "Do you honestly think I have any kind of control over them whatsoever? You're absolutely delusional." says Matthew. "But if this is how you want to crash and burn, then don't mind me at all. I'm only disappointed in you that you'd rather die on this hill and go down as a traitor than listen to your own instincts and good judgement." Gradually, he reaches into his breast pocket, warily watching Petra with an appraising gaze. And then he changes to the inner lining pocket instead. It'd look like he simply forgot which pocket his phone is in, if Petra didn't know better; what he must be simulating in his mind.     It's odd to see a man of his age tapping a touch screen like that, but the technology is sixty years older here than it is for her. "You'll see what I mean shortly enough. I can tell them whatever you think is true, but they'll see right through it. You fucking people have already caused enough trouble for us, and even they're sick of it; don't be surprised if something yours goes mysteriously missing, or even if one of you ends up dead, for all the trouble you're still threatening to cause. They've already made up their mind to take responsibility for all of this; I won't help you a second time when you finally realize you can't control them either."     He puts the phone to his ear.
Petra Soroka	"I'm only disappointed in you that you'd rather die on this hill and go down as a traitor than listen to your own instincts and good judgement."     "This is the first time in my entire life where I'm not betraying anyone."     Petra's eyes slide off of Matthew's face, staring indistinctly through him. Right at the cane. She keeps talking as he types, distantly, as if he's not even there. "No more playing both sides. Lilian was right. There's girls like us, and there's people like you. I'm choosing where I stand, like I should've done fucking forever ago." "...control over them..." "...can tell them whatever..." "...even they're sick of it..."     Belatedly, stretching a muscle that she only identified weeks ago, Petra whips her head back to glare at him, every droplet on the ground spiking up simultaneously to form a knee-high silver lawn of razor sharp blades. "I fucking said *properly*. She. Lilian. You'll fucking say it to her on the phone too. Don't dodge around it."     Increasingly effortlessly, crackling through the carpet of sensory antennae sticking up from the floor, Petra's synaptic connection jumps between herself and the phone, making sure she hears every word that Lilian says. With him actually going through on making the call, Petra can't stop herself from trembling, desperate to see it through and for Lilian to be alright on the other side. Unstable nerves vent her anticipation into casually venomous barbs, just before he starts the call.     "Really. I'm not threatening to cause trouble at all. If anything, you get off unfairly well here. Not only am I going to be covering all of this up *for* you, but all you have to do to stop me from ruining your reputation is the simple things I tell you to do." Flatly, without a hint of a smile on her face, eyes locked on the phone to his ear. "Isn't it nice? A father-daughter bonding experience."
Lilian Rook	'Lilian was right. There's girls like us, and there's people like you.'     The glint of understanding in Matthew's gaze is as immediate as it is sickening; the dread comprehension of someone seizing on the slightest hint of an outgroup, and knowing exactly how to hurt someone within seconds; which is to say, a little like Petra. The field of quicksilver spines leaping from the carpet, of course, causes him to flinch-- anyone with a survival instinct and without years of combat experience would-- but the contemptuous smirk on his lips couldn't be any clearer.     "I see I've misestimated you, Soroka." he says. "No honour amongst               is there? You sick little fucks are all alike." The ringtone is playing. "Give up with the blustering. I've been alive for too many years for a little     throwing a tantrum to fool me. You can't so much as give me a black eye without losing your little 'girlfriend', isn't that right? If the slightest thing happens to me, you know who it'll crack in half; permanently. You wouldn't have gone through all the trouble of dealing with the Watch and breaking into my house if you could." Who talks to a nineteen year old girl like that?     "Fine. Fine; have it your way. You'll see what it gets you. You'll see that I'm right and every snivelling little misstep you make will only make things a thousand times worse for you later; mark my words." <J-IC-Scene> Lilian Rook says, "But when you're the only one on your side, every time you cave in, every time you crack act on your feelings, it'll burn you far more deeply than anyone else. You'll regret it, for the rest of your life, every single time." <J-IC-Scene> Lilian Rook says, "So you learn that skill, or you die."     Petra's synaptic network catches the other side of the line with a slight layer of grainy distortion.
Lilian Rook	"Sir." "Lilian." ". . ." "Are you listening?" "S-- s-sir? Why-- I- Yes. I am." "Your little friend has come by to see me. You know the one." ". . . Petr--" "Yes, Soroka; don't speak over me." "Yes sir." "We've properly discussed the matter of your 'recent indiscretion'. They've brought to my attention a number of details that were unavailable from the facility staff reports. Ones that change my assessment, of course; I wouldn't bother to call otherwise." ". . . Apologies, sir, but, I don't understand." "Are you-- I'm obviously saying that I'm-- Pay attention." "M-my apologies, sir." "Your record has been cleared. The incorrect information has been deleted from our databases and removed from private file. I'm repealing the restraining order and dissolving case charges. I'm also relieving you of protection duties; you may cancel your unenrollment in your little programs at any time. It didn't happen." "I . . . hh . . . Why?" "You're used to your brother and sister covering up for you, aren't you?" "What did she do to y--" "Figure it out on your own." ". . . Oh." "I'm washing my hands of this. Your noxious 'friends' are more than I can tolerate. That Persephone girl was bad enough; assuming she is--" "Leave her alone. I already fixed it." "I told you not to speak over--" "You phoned me to tell me that you've dropped everything, scrubbed all mention, thrown all your ammunition in the fire, and you're letting me get on with my life, aren't you? So what she did doesn't matter anymore-- I already fixed it." "Don't get ahead of yourself; you haven't the slightest--" "You've never called me Lilian in my life." ". . . Oh who cares. I'm sick of this. You win. Enjoy yourself with whatever twisted degeneracy you do these days. Don't expect me to come to your rescue ever again when it bites you in the ass. Don't even bother writing your weekly reports either. If I ever speak to you again it'll be too soon." "I'm-- . . . I'm sorry, I just--" "Yes I'm quite aware that your spineless streak is entirely selective when it comes to your little friends. I don't need to hear your excuses. You're off the hook. Free to go. Once again, I can't keep you out of trouble. Happy?" "N-no! I--" "I can't force you to do anything; same as always. What's the problem? Isn't this what you always want? I can't even use your name, never mind--"
Lilian Rook	"You just did Matthew." "Lord almighty, how could I forget; you're always right and it's pointless arguing with you; spare me the trouble. At least get yourself presentable; your doctorate ceremony is in less than two months. Don't expect me to be there." "No, I-- I actually am. I'm telling the truth. This wasn't supposed to-- I didn't ask her to! For once I actually agreed with you! I shouldn't-- this shouldn't keep happening to-- just because I--" "Spare me. I don't care and neither do they. I'd tell you to grow up, return my things and move out the instant you graduate, but I suppose I can't even do that now, can I?" "Aobheil gave it to me. It's not yours." "Go to hell Lil--    -- I don't care anymore." ". . . I always had a feeling it was like that." "What?" "I think I sort of knew that you knew who I was too. You were always trying your hardest not to slip up and call me by my name, weren't you? Like you'd lose your grip on that child who didn't exist if you did." "We're done here." "I suppose we are. Goodbye, dad. Don't call this number again."     Petra, silently, hears that Lilian hung up first. This is as far as Matthew gets without immediately hurling his phone against the wall; it hits one of Petra's blades first and neatly shears in half. "There! Are you happy now you nasty little shit?! I did everything you demanded, so don't push your fucking luck. Now get the fuck out of my house before I have you arrested properly this time."
Petra Soroka	"No honour amongst          is there? You sick little fucks are all alike."     Petra tilts her head to the side and smiles, baring platinum white teeth at Matthew. "You really don't know anything about me, huh? Or about us. You can't just shoot at me blindly and expect to draw blood. That's so desperate. It's embarrassing." Rather than burning Petra like it would Lilian, Petra seems practically reinvigorated. The weight of the world is nothing compared to two girls who just got another thing in common.     On the topic of black eyes, Petra stays silent for a few seconds, her own eyes sliding down to his throat. After a moment, she lifts her gaze to idly scan around the edges of ceiling. Some sort of hook? A light fixture would just break, right? He's way heavier than me. Maybe he has a balcony. I'm sure he'll figure it out. She answers him while looking around, sounding almost cheery. "Oh, you're right. I've gone through a lot of trouble I wouldn't have had to otherwise." "Figure it out on your own."     He's too embarrassed to say it. Petra presses her lips together, fists clenched, trying not to get too excited. "For once I actually agreed with you!"     Petra's building smile flickers, but doesn't disappear. She can work on that, once Lilian is away from him. She'll understand that it's okay, if it's just Petra. 'Just me. I'm still the only one who understands'. "I suppose we are. Goodbye, dad. Don't call this number again."     Petra is already walking past Matthew when he throws his phone, whatever else he has to say being irrelevant to her, picking up speed as she moves. She pauses, just for a second, partway out of the door already, to say one last thing before leaving, bubbling with relief in stark contrast to his tantrum. "I'll be happy soon!"     With that, Petra practically runs back to the storage closet, giving Xion a quick and nearly incoherent heads up call along the way. I know it's a little selfish. I know they're her friends too, and I couldn't have done anything without them. But right now I-- She plunges into the oily portal without slowing down, leaving sparkling-starlight bootprints in the winding black path behind her, until the exit to Lilian's room appears after the shortest number of non-seconds possible.     --Just want to be with her. Petra exits the Corridors into Lilian's room with an attempt to skid to a halt that comes just too late for it to actually work. Before getting anything other than the beginnings of a strangled shout out, she trips over her own feet and faceplants on the floor with a crash, followed immediately by the portal winking out of existence. Scrambling back up to her feet, she launches herself at Lilian to wrap her in a hug, making an excited series of wordless starts of noises, before finally just getting out one.     "Lilian!"
Lilian Rook	'LILIAN'S ROOM:     An enormous four poster bed with scarlet sheets and pillows dominates a quarter of the room, near the lengthy glass panorama and sliding door out to a seaside balcony. Another quarter is given to a walk-in closet that appears to be outrageously wide and deep even from the entrance, meant to have multiple people's belongings in it, now locked tight.     Stacks of shelves, cabinets, and dressers fill another quadrant, including more than a hundred books, artsy little odds and ends, souvenirs of Multiversal travel, a large and fastidiously warded jewelry box, a transparent case filled with endless rows of awards, and a large and impressive cosmetics kit and even larger and more impressive mirror which, oddly, has seen noticeable scratching.     The last quadrant is filled with a long desk and table set, with a personal computer little more than a keyboard and touchpad attached to a holographic emitter, and a separate tablet on the side, ostensibly both used at once. A thick sketchbook is left on the surface, and various landscapes and group selfies are put up on the wall, many of--     The Present:     The lights are out. The curtains are almost fully drawn, letting in only a sliver of the moon. A spare blanket is thrown over the dresser and mirror. Winter Crow is stripped and disassembled on the desk, a half-stack of alchemized ammunition strewn around it, and left long enough to gather a thin layer of dust. Most of the pictures are taken down and stacked up, though one has recently been turned up to look at, depicting an older woman with three identical triplet girls in her lap, in a reading nook with a book and hanging succulents.     Lilian's red and black school blazer and white blouse are thrown over the edge of the bedframe, shoes left scattered by the foot. An oversized t-shirt and baggy pajama bottoms are folded up beside it, telling of the reluctant return from the the one place she is expected-- blissfully pressured-- to be as she always is, studying until the dead of night, and the transitional slide into being as small as possible.     It leaves Lilian herself in an unenviably half-dressed state, hair down, black chain visible against her bare sternum, caught with her phone in her hand. Curled up against the headboard, knees to her chest, she stares in numb contemplation at the blank screen. A stack of fresh gauze and tape sits on the nearby desk, and an old film is in the bottom of the wastebasket. Her face looks fine. When did she hide that little act of quiet resistance? For how long?     "Petra?!"
Lilian Rook	Upon abruptly crashing into the floor, Petra can see the packed bag under the bed, and why is there a little ceiling hook? the vacuum wrapped stacks of clothes stuffed out of sight. She hears the rustling of bedsheets as Lilian hurries across, slides from the edge, rushes over to help her up, and then the mortified squeak when she tackles her in the open, bomber jacket to warm skin. Her second direct hit.     "What are you-- how are you-- you shouldn't be here!" Lilian gasps, arms frozen by her sides. Her eyes catch on Petra's for an instant, and then as if becoming suddenly aware of how half-normal she looks at that moment, she glances away. "I know . . . Even if there's no more order to . . . You can't do this. You know better than anyone what went on. What I did to you. Why can't you let me just . . . Why can't something happen that I deserve for once? You don't have to-- You shouldn't have tried to fix it. You shouldn't have tried to apologize for . . . whatever you think it is that you should have. You can't just-- People keep fucking with my family because of something I did-- how am I supposed to take that?!"     Lilian's teeth grit. Her hands curl up by her sides. Her shoulders shake gently in Petra's grip. And then her arms squeeze around her waist. Lilian whispers, from the back of her throat, "God I'm so glad you're okay. I was so worried."
Petra Soroka	"You know better than anyone what went on."     "I do! I do. And I'm here anyways. That's all that matters, right?" Petra clings to Lilian tightly, babbling while trembling so much it feels like she would be blown away if she wasn't holding on to her. "Deserving isn't real. Who cares about that? I-I-I'm the only one that m-matters, I'm the only one that gets to s-say if it's okay. No one else-- g-gets to decide. No one else will ever know so they'll never get to judge and if they did I would be with you anyways."     "I-I forgive you. Completely. For everything." Petra pulls her face out of Lilian's shoulder to stare into her eyes, fingers digging into her back insistently. For how wobbly and choked her voice is, and despite the tears leaving glittering metal tracks down her cheek, her gaze is rock-steady, not wandering at all while she talks. "I-If you can tolerate me, then I'll be with you. All of the horrible stuff we've done to each other-- that's just the way we are, right? People like us, we're-- we can be better, for each other. Because I-I-I get it, so I forgive you. It's okay. You don't need to justify yourself to anyone else, because I'm the only one who g-gets to see that part of you."     Petra leans into the hug, pressing her cheek against Lilian's. The direct contact of skin on skin from Petra's fingers and face fizzes against Lilian like soda bubbles, and in some soothing, wordless sense, the popping and crackling sensation comes across as a full-body radiation of *joy*. Petra's shoulders quake, and she squeezes Lilian tighter to hold herself still. Her voice is lower, pressed so close to Lilian's ear like this, and slightly strangled with the precursor of teary laughter.     "Besides. First Code, right? I-I-I've been fighting literally every day since I got out. For you. Sometimes literally fighting, against-- god. I don't want to ruin this by talking about them, actually. But I-I was, every day; I met Angela, and she and Xion helped me do all of this, and some others, a-and I even talked to *Persephone*, even though that was-- well."     Petra is audibly smiling, while smooth metal tears drip from her face to roll down Lilian's back. "I shed a lot of blood, ahaha. Even if most of them just ended up wasting my time, the apathetic pieces of shit. But still, really, my fucked up blood is really heavy, so when does it outweigh the blood of your line?"
Lilian Rook	'I do! I do. And I'm here anyways. That's all that matters, right?'     Everything about Lilian's expression says that she wants to agree. The fingers digging into Petra's back don't want to let go. It's just that her head won't let her. "That's not-- how could that possibly be the only thing that matters?! There are so many things-- so many things that happened, and, are still happening, and--"     'I'm the only one that gets to s-say if it's okay'     "Why don't you get that there's so much wrong with me, Petra?! You know now, right?! What's-- what happens when everyone tries hard enough to cut and jab and pull apart all the pieces and drag it out right?! That doesn't just concern you! And even if it did, how could you possibly-- possibly say that's--"     'I-I forgive you. Completely. For everything.'     Lilian's breath hitches. Petra pulls her face out of her shoulder, just to see angry tears swimming in Lilian's eyes. She was looking at her. She looks away too slowly to mask it. She lifts her arm to press over the lower half of her face; the other slides further and grips tighter around Petra as if to compensate.     'I-If you can tolerate me, then I'll be with you. All of the horrible stuff we've done to each other-- that's just the way we are, right? People like us, we're-- we can be better, for each other.'     "How can you possibly be alright with this?" Lilian chokes up. Her anger vapourizes, replaced with a hoarse and teary whisper. "That's just who we are. Isn't that horrible? At least you only-- they all lied to you and set you up and fucking-- cleared the range with me as the target. Of course I forgive you-- It was only half your fault in the first place, wasn't it? Anyone can do shitty things if they're misled and harassed and pushed like that."     She takes a less steady breath, unsure of whether what she's saying is really true. "People can even kill, when they're so cornered and scared." she says, forgiving murder in the breath after demanding Petra not forgive her. "But I had all the power from the start. I wasn't ever in any danger, right? Nobody was . . . Nobody made me. What does it say when we're even when everything I did was for no reason?"
Lilian Rook	'You don't need to justify yourself to anyone else, because I'm the only one who g-gets to see that part of you.'     "How could I even justify it if I tried? All I had to do was . . . If I could just act normal for five--! Why is it everybody else's responsibility, Petra?!" Lilian successfully raises her voice to a pitch of tense outrage, squealing like stressed metal. "All I ever do is endure things, and, wait and wait and wait for someone else to make them easier, because, I can't act like a normal human being for long enough to just fix them, and, then I get all, fucked up, in my head, that nobody is doing anything, and--" Only for it to crack and descend into rasping shudders again mid-sentence. "A-and then months and months later I-I just--"     "I don't even know! Something cracks and I fall to fucking pieces, and then I-- I have to run around picking up all the sharp little shards, falling over myself trying to make it up to everyone I cut with the shrapnel, and they all just forgive me for it and we all go back to normal, and only at the very end do I fucking realize that it wasn't even something I'm supposed to be 'enduring' at all; it's something nobody else even notices because they can just handle it like a sane person, because they're normal, and it was always completely fucking stupid to be staring at them and waiting for them to come 'save me' from it."     The surge of palpable relief-- of giddy joy and cathartic closeness, radiating from Petra, sets every muscle in Lilian's body quivering tensely. Petra can feel her heart thumping far too fast against her collarbone just from the embrace.     "You shouldn't have saved me either." Lilian whispers. "I'm not the victim. I'm never the victim. I'm the disaster and everyone tolerates me as long as I'm useful. I can't do it again, Petra; I can't stand another round of I'm-so-sorry and forgive-me-please and I'll-be-better and trying to pretend to be normal for another year. I'm completely exhausted from struggling my very hardest to meet their baseline and only ever having disaster below me; never anything good above. It's just sensible to quit, isn't it? Before it gets worse again."     Petra is more than familiar with the silent, desperate wish for someone to say 'no', even if it's never Lilian she hears it from.
Lilian Rook	'Besides. First Code, right? I-I-I've been fighting literally every day since I got out. For you. Sometimes literally fighting, against--'     "I'm so sorry for putting you through that, Petra. I don't know what I did to make you, but . . ."     'I met Angela, and she and Xion helped me do all of this'     Lilian's breath flutters for an instant against Petra's chest. "A-ah."     'a-and I even talked to *Persephone*, even though that was-- well'     "She--" Lilian takes in a deep, angry breath, then loses hold of it instantly. "I'm so angry, that she took revenge on my family for things I did. It was just . . . coincidentally, you know . . . I appreciated . . . not having him here, for a week. So I can't even get as furious as I should."     'I shed a lot of blood, ahaha. Even if most of them just ended up wasting my time, the apathetic pieces of shit.'     Lilian tenses. Petra can feel it, this close. The same tension she'd borne at that fucking maid-off.     "Is that why he suddenly called me, dumped that message, then disconnected?" Lilian breathes it more than she says it. The subject is obvious. "All this time-- That's weeks and weeks-- Who else did you talk to? Who else knows what's going on? Just Xion and Angela and Phony?"     'But still, really, my fucked up blood is really heavy, so when does it outweigh the blood of your line?'     Lilian gives up on trying to keep her face dry. She squeezes Petra with both arms, hard enough it'd have injured her two months ago.     "I don't know! How could I know?! Am I supposed to understand how to measure them?! How much everyone else has spent on me, compared to how much I've stolen from my family; how am I supposed to compare them when I don't even understand what anyone is feeling?! I don't get it at all, okay! I don't understand why you went through all this, and why Phony was so furious and miserable, and why Xion and Angela helped, but everyone else didn't; I don't fucking understand why Matthew hates me more than Allison, or why my brother fights with him but won't see me when my sister looks at me but avoids him, or why two girls were my friends when everyone else loathed me, or why Cecilia gives a shit at all! I don't get the people out there and I don't get the people in here, so how should I know who I'm supposed to listen to instead of myself?!"     Lilian finally releases Petra, dropping limply onto the edge of her bed, head in her hands, momentarily forgetting her state of feminine semi-undress. "I used to think I at least understood why he wishes I were dead. Because to those two, the child they wanted was real, right? They saw-- it should have happened, right? Not me. It made sense, why they act the way they do, if I thought of it like I killed their child and they were stuck with me. I could deal with it that way; if I was making up for taking something precious from them, then I knew what to do, and I knew why I was enduring it. But he . . ."     Lilian slides her fingers apart, daring a glimpse of Petra between them. "You heard him do it, didn't you? When he slipped up, and just . . ." Lilian lets loose a shaky, chest-emptying sigh. "If he'd already accepted it, on some level-- if he was just trying so hard to pretend-- then why? Why would anyone do any of this? If nobody makes sense then how am I supposed to know who to believe?"
Petra Soroka	"That's not-- how could that possibly be the only thing that matters?!" "That doesn't just concern you! And even if it did, how could you possibly-- possibly say that's-- "How can you possibly be alright with this?" "How could I even justify it if I tried?"     "I don't know." Lilian's torrent of questions slides right off of Petra's smooth, glasslike brain. All the self-loathing, all of her protests, all of her condemnations of herself, are absorbed and discarded with practically no consideration at all.     "I don't know. I don't really-- have the words for any of that. But I don't think that matters at all. If we argued about it then you would win because you're so much smarter than me, so I won't argue." Petra's voice softens, slowly sliding into serene, exhausted relief. "I'll just be here. I already worked my brain too much today, so I won't think about it anymore. I'm just going to do what I want. I want to be here."     That's all there really is to say about that. Petra squeezes Lilian again, in response to the quivering and shudders and racing heartbeat, silent for a little bit. "... We're both like that. Broken shards barely stuck together, that fall apart way too easily when touched in ways that should be normal. They even used that same word for me, back in the Watch. 'Shrapnel'. Stop worrying about 'all of them'. They don't know anything, they never have." "I can't stand another round of I'm-so-sorry and forgive-me-please and I'll-be-better and trying to pretend to be normal for another year."     "Then don't. Don't quit, and don't cater to them. Why have they earned that from you? Why should you have to bow and beg for them to forgive you, when they all fucked up as bad or worse than you. Just because they're made of mud, rather than pottery or glass."     "Stay. Please. I--" Petra's voice cracks, and she stumbles for a moment, reaching for a thought that she's unsure if she should say or not. It spills out anyways; there's no point in secrets. "It's not going to get worse again. I won't let it. I-I-I told Hib-- fucking Tachibana, that if someone like me came around next year, like you said they would, and started treating you like I did, I told her that I would fucking kill them. Not take them to karaoke, a-and zoo trips, and everything else. And I mean it. It's not happening again. I won't let it. You deserve better."
Petra Soroka	"Is that why he suddenly called me, dumped that message, then disconnected?"     Lilian feels Petra tense up against her at the same time, fingers slipping off of her back to ball into fists, then spasming and grabbing onto her shoulders. "Fucking-- he *called you*, and then only sent you *my words*?! God! This is--!" Petra shudders, trying to lower her voice from where she was building up to shout.     Petra collapses onto the bed alongside Lilian, three weeks of spring-loaded tension suddenly taking their mental toll. Physically, however, she has no problem keeping her leg bouncing with pent-up energy, and her hand gripping the bouncing knee with the force of wanting to snap someone's neck.     "God. Fuck them. Fuck them all. Candelario, and Ishirou, and Tachibana. The rest, who saw you in Rita's world and said nothing. Because of course they told me about that, without doing a fucking thing. I *fought* them, to get it in their heads, the way people like them are supposed to. It wasn't worth anything. I thought I could make a support net, that could be close to you when I couldn't. Outer rings of a world that's safer for you. I was stupid for thinking they'd change, after so many years. Fuck them all."     She leans against Lilian, shoulder to shoulder. "Do you want to know the most fucked up thing, Lilian? Something I realized, during all of this. Right when I got out of jail, I immediately-- immediately started reaching out to people, and yelling at them, fighting them, helping them to get their favor, doing-- whatever, anything, to get them to help care about you."     Petra's voice drops, and she puts a hand on Lilian's arm to squeeze it, trembling with dull anger. "All of them. They all made noises like they cared. Took pride in 'learning their lesson', to fucking wash the pain out of it. Talked to each other about how much better they were going to be to you now. And then they just, stopped there."     "They never did anything. I didn't even know that they weren't, until *he* fucking sent me that message from you, so proud of himself like he couldn't even hear what you'd *said*! Then they all got so fucking *offended* when I was still mad at them! They don't know anything! They don't care! I fucking hate them!"     "Lilian." Petra's voice takes on a dangerous, vibrating edge, and her gaze slides from vaguely glaring at the ground to staring at Lilian's eyes. "None of them have invited me to go do anything, since I came back. None of them have even reached out to me without me yelling at them. No more karaoke trips."     "We were both wrong, before. The way to get them to hate me wasn't to fight you and hope they'd protect you, or to hurt them and get them angry. They hate me now that I'm on your side."
Lilian Rook	'If we argued about it then you would win because you're so much smarter than me, so I won't argue.'     "It'd be nice." breathes Lilian. "If someone else were right for a change. More than anything, I'd . . . I want to be convinced, one day, that something is fine."     'Stop worrying about 'all of them'. They don't know anything, they never have.'     "How am I supposed to stop? Isn't that exactly when you worry? What are you even-- what does that mean, Petra?" The silent, pleading looks intensifies to the visual equivalent of metal fatigue. "If they don't know anything about me, doesn't that just mean I'm impossible to understand? If they don't get it, how am I supposed to reasonably expect anything better? That just means it's my fault for being incomprehensible, doesn't it?"     'Then don't. Don't quit, and don't cater to them. Why have they earned that from you? Why should you have to bow and beg for them to forgive you, when they all fucked up as bad or worse than you. Just because they're made of mud, rather than pottery or glass.'     That's where Lilian stops. Seizes up. Draws quaking breath and forgets to let it out again. Her guilty gaze wanders-- anywhere but here-- and the words that come from her mouth taste like bile; dull and monotone, strained out with great, needful effort.     "Why do they have to earn it? I haven't earned staying with them. I have to make it right because . . . 'they' means 'the entire world'. It means 'everyone else'. It doesn't matter if they're made of mud; Earth is made of just, rock and dirt, and we all need it to live. It doesn't matter, if they fucked up too, or if I'm furious with them, or if they've done nothing to keep me; 'they' will keep existing, forever, no matter what I think."     "It's already so hard to balance that pressure. Just . . . staying on the ground, without being crushed by their weight, but without exploding and carving them all out around me either. Matching the force pushing out to the force pushing in-- . . . do you even understand that? I'm already exerting effort just to exist. With them. Around them. Everything is uphill and upstream forever. What's the point in making it even harder? What the fuck do I gain? I can push as hard as I want and take up as much space as I think I deserve, and then it's just even more exhausting to defend it, and nobody is any better and I'm not any happier."     'It's not going to get worse again. I won't let it. I-I-I told Hib-- fucking Tachibana, that if someone like me came around next year, like you said they would, and started treating you like I did, I told her that I would fucking kill them. Not take them to karaoke, a-and zoo trips, and everything else. And I mean it. It's not happening again. I won't let it. You deserve better.'     Lilian is dead silent as she slumps onto the bed. Those words rob all the weight and energy from the motion, collapsing from sitting onto her back; drained and boneless. "You really are the only one who listened to me, then." she whispers, and only sounds more spent for the effort.
Lilian Rook	'Fucking-- he *called you*, and then only sent you *my words*?! God! This is--!'     "Yeah." Lilian croaks, forearm over her eyes. "The only call I got in all this time; besides Sabrina and Eleanor. I . . ." She starts to laugh, and fails. "I felt so stupid. I really got my hopes up. That something was happening. That they weren't all just going to leave me here, for the rest of my life, and not just let me become a 'story' for future Elites; something they whisper solemnly about like it's some tragic tale when I'm right here. I don't know why I thought I deserved that, in the moment. They should want to never speak to me again."     'Because of course they told me about that'     Lilian breathes in sharply, slowly struggling upright, as if already afraid of being Watched, like this..     'Outer rings of a world that's safer for you.'     "What about a world that's safe from me?" Lilian barely manages to whisper. The last two words catch in her throat.     'Right when I got out of jail, I immediately-- immediately started reaching out to people, and yelling at them, fighting them, helping them to get their favor, doing-- whatever, anything, to get them to help care about you.'     "Everyone who talks about communicating with their fists is a liar." says Lilian. "Even Xion is figuring that out, and she used to really believe too. Those people fight to show that they're serious; to make someone pay attention. Not to feel anything. If we fought with feelings, we'd be like those children in space, wouldn't we? They only . . . rope you into it, so they can hit you back, and feel proud of taking your punches, and shake your hand and feel like they didn't fail to understand."     Lilian dully accepts Petra leaning on her shoulder. Her right hand lifts to the pendant, squeezing her fist around it. The chains are fine enough to clink with shaking too subtle to be seen. "I'm sorry you fell for it. They must have hurt you, musn't they? Fighting with your fists means they beat you for l--iking me, doesn't it?"     'All of them. They all made noises like they cared. Took pride in 'learning their lesson', to fucking wash the pain out of it. Talked to each other about how much better they were going to be to you now. And then they just, stopped there.'     "Learning what lesson?" Lilian says. Her voice comes out as a rasping growl; she hadn't meant it to. "That they all drive me crazy? They've been that way for four or five years. What lesson was there to learn about me dragging myself to the Union New York with my face fucked up and everybody staring?" There it is. "Another fucking fascinating fact? Another fucking arc?" The clinking grows louder by degrees.     'They never did anything. I didn't even know that they weren't, until *he* fucking sent me that message from you, so proud of himself like he couldn't even hear what you'd *said*! Then they all got so fucking *offended* when I was still mad at them!'     "What the fuck." Lilian whispers under her own voice. The ragged snatches of audibility are the sounds of four months ago, not four days ago. "What the fuck-- Hate me like a normal person or forgive me like an idiot or ignore me like a coward, don't-- don't enjoy it. I'm not-- this isn't entertainment. You got-- at the very least, they should care about what happened to you."
Lilian Rook	'None of them have invited me to go do anything, since I came back. None of them have even reached out to me without me yelling at them. No more karaoke trips.'     "What the fuck?!" Lilian snaps. The sound cracks in her throat. A droplet of blood beads where her bare skin squeezes the pendant, and rolls out of her clenched fist. "When I took you away, none of them could shut up! They were all weepy and grieving, talking about you and rationalizing it all; they looked at me like a monster, or at least conflicted! Everyone wanted to know about you! About what I was feeling! I could hear them, constantly! Wishing they'd tried harder, reached further, smothered you more, paid more attention to me; every fucking day! It's all they'd think about! 'If only we'd saved her'! The only people who were any different were obsessed for the opposite fucking reason!"     Lilian shoots upwards from the side of the bed; for a moment, without losing Petra's eye contact. The room echoes the click-clack of her frenetic pacing. "Everyone freaked the fuck out then! They were doing group therapy about you! Saying they wanted to help! Talking about it and weaving this grand fucking story about how they'd lost you! While you were right there! Even if I'd have won, they could have at least tried to fight me, right?! God-- I was miserable! I regretted everything so, so much! I talked to Rita, and, and Tangent, a-and Xion, and--" Lilian whirls on Petra, the old, mad fire in her eyes; and for once, it isn't directed at her. "I promised them all I'd get you out! I swore I'd fix it; save you! That they could have you back, even though they didn't deserve you!"     "So what the fuck do you mean that they won't look at you anymore?!"     'We were both wrong, before. The way to get them to hate me wasn't to fight you and hope they'd protect you, or to hurt them and get them angry. They hate me now that I'm on your side.'     "FUCK them!"     Lilian tears the pendant from her neck; the chain unlatches at the usual point, but miniscule engravings glow all the way through her clenched fingers; fine text. "What was any of this?! I thought it was-- That made sense too! For a little while, it did! That they couldn't understand me, and they hated me, and were scared of me, because I always fuck things up! Because I took someone precious away from them! Because I'd practically killed someone! I knew I was supposed to endure you! For their sakes! I was trying not to do it again!" She storms towards the desk. Petra catches a glimpse of furious tears.
Lilian Rook	"I really thought I got it! I really did, this time, Petra!" She slams her hands down on her dusty desktop, leaning hunched over the work surface. Blood trickles from her palm and over the lip. "I thought we all agreed for once! You mattered and I didn't! Your pain made sense and mine was selfish and evil! You were normal and I wasn't!" She reaches for the disassembled parts of Winter Crow. Petra can hear the frenzied clattering of metal. Lilian shouts over it.     "I was supposed to tolerate you, as part of their world, and when I cut you out, that was theirs-- I transgressed so I deserved to be punished, and getting you back was how to set things right! That's why I stayed here! In this miserable fucking unbearable shithole with that monstrous piece of shit! That's the whole thing I was taking RESPONSIBILITY FOR!!"     "So if they all threw you away the minute they fucking got you back-- if you don't matter to them after all, then WHY DID WE GO THROUGH ANY OF THIS?!"
Petra Soroka	"The only call I got in all this time; besides Sabrina and Eleanor."     Petra's voice rasps and shakes, staring at the fingers of the arm over Lilian's eyes. "Sabrina and Eleanor. Xion, Angela. The only ones who helped me. Rita and Nephra-- didn't really get it, and didn't really help, but also weren't fucking liars. AME, from the Watch, apparently doesn't know you much either way, and she's helping with the blackmail." 'Helping', present tense.     "Nobody else fucking bothered. I-- I can't stand them. I can't stand any of them. How can they feel so *little*?! It's like we're fucking invisible! Persephone-- even if she didn't end up helping, even if all she ended up doing was mocking me for not understanding you as well as she does and then doing something that made Matthew try to pull you out of the Paladins-- she fucking *did something*! What's *wrong* with all of them?!" "Another fucking fascinating fact? Another fucking arc?"     Lilian's building anger is reflected and magnified by Petra, in support rather than opposition this time. She stomps her boots into the floor and pushes herself to her feet, stalking around the room.     "I'm so fucking glad to hear you say it too. God, I've missed talking with you. I feel like I've been going *insane*! They all keep saying it-- that they're learning! That they need to be taught! That it's my fucking responsibility to drag them kicking and screaming into doing one decent thing for you, with specific *instructions*!"     "Fucking Ishirou! Yells at me and calls me a bitch when I try to explain that you need help, and then I learn that he'd already *seen* you and still didn't care! Then he doesn't do *shit*, and shows up for *another* girl's therapy session! And he was *confused* when I was angry! Tachibana! Clenched her fucking fist and said she'd do 'whatever it takes', and the next time I see her she's back to being a sulky piece of *shit* who has energy to help *other* people, but never you! Candelario tried to use you as a fucking *shield* to get me to not go after Dimo! Saying that it'd hurt your *reputation* in the Paladins, just because he knew that I cared about you!"
Petra Soroka	"Wishing they'd tried harder, reached further, smothered you more, paid more attention to me; every fucking day!"     Petra falls into place to Lilian's left and pacing slightly behind when she starts marching across the room, the thumping of her boots naturally in time with Lilian's. "No, fucking believe me, they still did all that. It's only ever in the *past*. It's always a fucking story. An arc, some sort of shared regret that makes them better for 'next time', and then when another chance comes around they don't do *shit*! They love to fucking *commiserate* about how they wish they could've done better, and then never actually want to *do* it!"     "They were all doing group therapy about you! Reassuring each other that you were impossible to understand, but that they were all trying their fucking *best*! Patting each other on the back for resolving to be better without *doing* anything! And they expected *me* to join in on it, and when I said they were all sick, they treated me like I was insane! Like I was going to lose my mind and start killing them! A fucking time bomb!"     When Lilian spins around, Petra matches her glare in intensity, shoulders drawn back and shaking with anger. She grabs Lilian's free hand to squeeze between both of hers, pulling it to her chest in a miniature hug. "They never wanted me back. The 'me' that they wanted was never real and I fucking hated her anyways. It doesn't matter if they want me back, or deserve me back, because I *refuse* them." "I knew I was supposed to endure you! For their sakes!"     "They're not *worth* it! Fuck them! You shouldn't have to endure so much!" "You mattered and I didn't!"     Petra follows Lilian to the desk, pacing in a tight loop behind her, because of course she won't let herself be more than a couple feet away from her, at this point. Droplets of quivering silver blood dot the floor in frenzied circles where Petra paced, warping maniacally with every metallic clatter of Lilian reassembling Winter Crow.     "How did it all get so fucked up?! The whole *point* was that it was the other way around! You matter more than me! You matter more than any number of them! God! It's so fucking insane! You never deserved *any* of this!"     "None of this should've happened. None of it was for-- making up for anything, none of it had a purpose, none of it was earned. None of it matters. It was always just trying to score imaginary points. But that means we can decide for ourselves what matters. I choose you. Fuck the rest of them."
Lilian Rook	'Sabrina and Eleanor. Xion, Angela. The only ones who helped me.'     Lilian glances back. She mouths the words 'Helped you?' and then turns back with a very particular stare. "Persephone fucked up, but . . . Maybe she really shouldn't have listened to me. 'Aren't you supposed to be selfish? I'll talk about what you deserve when you admit that you deserve to exist. She at least got that. My one unbreakable rule."     'I'm so fucking glad to hear you say it too. God, I've missed talking with you. I feel like I've been going *insane*!'     "I missed it too. I really did." Lilian says. She barely breathes the rest. "That's how I've felt every single day. All my energy goes into trying to navigate them. Teaching them and figuring them out. Trying to explain and begging them to stop trampling over me. There's nothing left for me!"     'hey were all doing group therapy about you! Reassuring each other that you were impossible to understand, but that they were all trying their fucking *best*!'     "What the fuck does that even mean?!" Lilian shouts starting to edge at the top of her lungs. "How the fuck is it even difficult?! I told them all of the rules up front! How can they not even tell the difference between the two-- do they just do this?! The tragic victim and the time bomb?! How is it so easy to switch them?! Is this fun for them?!"     'They never wanted me back. The 'me' that they wanted was never real and I fucking hated her anyways.'     Lilian stops just long enough to stare at Petra clutching her hand, glancing down between her face and her hands. Her gaze dances over the glimmers of silver wounds she can see down the girl's sleeves, and then her fingers splay, press to Petra's collarbone to feel her heartbeat-- her reactor whine-- and then she draws her hand back, only to snag her by the wrist and pull her along. "Nobody does. Either of us. any of us. I'm so sick to death of being looked right past. Why did I ever try to show them? If they want a fucking story, a character, then--!"     'They're not *worth* it! Fuck them! You shouldn't have to endure so much!'     Lilian whispers dangerously over the frantic clicking and sliding of metal; the sound in of itself is like assembling the world's most menacing watch, before the rapid click of inserting bullets follows. "I don't care if I should or shouldn't have to. I don't want to. And I'm tired of never getting anything I want. If they have a fucking objection, they can come have a go! That's what they make me do with them, right?!"
Lilian Rook	'How did it all get so fucked up?! The whole *point* was that it was the other way around! You matter more than me! You matter more than any number of them! God! It's so fucking insane! You never deserved *any* of this!'     "That's what they told me too!" Lilian shouts. The snap of the break action punctuates the end of the sentance, followed by the rasp of the slide. "When it was Persephone and I! I was convinced that I had to defend my space and take down my enemy, because otherwise they were all going to replace me with her! The version they liked more! Like they'd cast me out and forget about me! And every single person around me said 'you don't have to do this, we love you, we won't abandon you, you deserve better, we won't choose her over you'. And you know what?!"     Lilian turns from the table, gathering up her thigh holster, hiking up her uniform skirt to snap it back into place, and then thrusts her masterpiece into its secure position. Next she's raiding the drawers, scraping up runestones, sorting them into their hardcase stacks like loading another weapon. "That's exactly what they fucking did!"     "When you came along, I believed them! I sat, and I endured, and I didn't cause a fuss; I didn't defend anything, didn't attack the enemy; I waited and waited for that 'love' to kick in; I waited so long to see them prove I didn't have to do it! And they chose you over me! They abandoned me! And they said I deserved it!"     She drags the stones out by the chain belt, storming over to her closet to find something presentable to wear, and pulls on the top she'd first worn to Petra's jail cell, tattoo visible from the back, and gleaming dangerously on its own in the dim half-light. She screams. "They fucking LIED!!!"     'None of this should've happened. None of it was for-- making up for anything, none of it had a purpose, none of it was earned. None of it matters.'     Lilian laughs, bitterly as can be, as she throws off the last of her uniform and buttons on a new skirt, throws a hoodie, jeans, sneakers, in sequence, violently against the opposite wall, and laces up knee boots in record time.     "Oh my god. They're just like Matthew. Like Allison and my professors and my shitty fucking classmates, but most like him. All this time-- all this fucking time, I was trying to figure it out! Find the rational explanation for why they'd be so horrible; what I did to deserve it!" She pulls on a familiar wristband as she rants in a manic fever.     "And it was completely fucking pointless, because nobody agreed with it! There WAS NO FUCKING REASON! I was the only one trying to find out some pattern, some meaning, and they weren't thinking about it at all! It was always just their shitty fucking animal feelings overriding everything I ever said and did and was and what they knew all along about me and just crammed into a corner so they could stay angry and sad and abuse me and feel JUSTIFIED!"
Lilian Rook	'I choose you. Fuck the rest of them.'     Lilian stops to breathe, her whole body rising and falling in rapid waves at the very edge of hyperventilating. Properly dressed like she hasn't been for weeks, she storms over to the dresser mirror, peels the bandaid off the other side of her face, ransacks the drawer, quickly finishes up with a last swipe of lipstick. "Good. Fuck them. None of this should ever have happened. We should have been together from the start." she says. She tosses the tube back in the drawer, slamming it shut.     Only now does she actually open her right hand, fingers stiffly unclenching around the pendant. Lilian flexes her half-fist several times, black particle blots fizzling into existence and scattering, a little more consistent each time, coerced to exist by force of will; dragged into tighter and tighter spirals as her personal gravity reasserts itself, until finally the gold appears in the accretion cloud, and it snaps down into gleaming armoured fingers, the second skin extending all down to her elbow.     Lilian draws Night Mist in her own room, the dark star-pricked smoke bleeding off in inky paint-trails where she swings it over her shoulder and fixes it at her back by no apparent force. She stomps back to Petra with something terrible in her eyes-- and then grabs her by the chin with her armoured hand, snatching her lower back with a warm palm, and steals greedy, defiant, angry kiss from her, sucking the air out of her lungs, and then gently shoving her off into the nearby wall.     "I'll talk to Tamamo. She . . . kind of gets it. And I'll talk to Persephone, too. The couple of girls left-- I'm going to meet them anyways. I talked to Xion. And I need to talk to Angela. But as for the rest of them--!"     Lilian struts for the door. She doesn't bother tying her hair, it billows out loose behind her. Two fingers touched to just the right place at the side, black-gold motes crackling, a centimeter width of cut hair starts rapidly growing back; a little rougher and less treated than the rest, but finally not glaringly, depressingly obvious. "Speak with your fists? They can talk to my heel."