Scene #9517: It Was Different, Last Time

Owner	Pose
Lilian Rook	It starts while Mesmer is at work outside of work, though it'd begun a long time before that. It can happen because Mesmer's interest in something, anything, other than run-of-the-mill clinical madness is strong enough to keep her on that little spit of rock for more than one visit. Though Lilian had frozen research on the contents of the tapes by project lead order, out of some unknowable impulse, she'd permitted research on the physical satellite and its remains to continue, as well as recordings and interpretations of the instrumentation and magnetic medium. As long as Mesmer has the willingness, she can travel to and from Abu Ail Light via LSCC Warpgate and avail herself as she pleases of the archaic, half-chromed facilities, smack in the middle of nowhere. There aren't so much as insects to disturb her there. The start for Mesmer is heralded by a man in a suit, as it often is. An unremarkable go-between who is only not conceivably a family representative for speaking Japanese for the nine whole words he shares. His only purpose is to hand her a letter, which itself is unremarkable in every way save for penmanship and a strong grasp of English as well. It isn't long, but neither is it suspiciously perfunctory. It's nonspecific, but the details aren't vague, either. The stranger knows enough to mention the FDMO, describe as 'friends of the Paladins', and to repeat several significant details of both the complex and the Voyager operation. The stranger is savvy enough to offer only Warpgate coordinates, a time, and an assurance she will only be received alone. The stranger is wise enough to tell her that they know everything about why Lilian froze the project, and to guarantee that Mesmer can get full control over it, if only she listens to what they have to say. Even the time is convenient for her, though not especially so. The letter smells faintly of plum blossoms. The start for Petra is heralded by a text message. It says: "Do everything I say and I may yet forgive you." with no coordinates and a time five minutes earlier. For Petra, it's a familiar place. For Mesmer, it'd be rational to assume that she's been taken to a completely different world. The dull droning of the sea is replaced with so smoothly with the subtly different whisper-hiss of the ocean that it takes a moment for it all to kick in; the scent of wet greenery and old smoke, the sound of wild birds and wind-stirred bamboo like rain, and the everyday movements that fill the little valley carved in the crescent wedge between two coastal cliffs, as if collapsed into a smoothy sloping bowl. The gigantic wall of fog, starting sharply and ascending for god knows how high, which surrounds the area in a perfect circle some miles across, is both uncanny-strange and harmlessly irrelevant. It's still not as weird as the traditional (early 1900s) Japanese rural housing, having been renovated with 'camper grade' modern technology, being meshed together with an unrelated cluster of once-prefab huts on the rockier ground in this place, complete with inhabitants somewhere over a thousand in number, happily speaking two completely different languages at each other, splitting wood, drying clothes, and performing intensive maintenance on hydrogen fuel cells.
Lilian Rook	All of that is basically irrelevant next to the man in the suit having been waiting for Mesmer by the other end, near one end of the beach, pointing her up a winding path lined with hand-hewn wooden fences and inactive LED guide lights and towards an old country house that would have been considered a 'mayoral estate' or perhaps 'old money mansion' in rural Japan circa the eighties; just before he reaches over and switches off the Warpgate setup behind her; skeletally portable and inefficient, likely only activated sixty seconds before her arrival, and liable to take an hour to warm up again. And certainly that much is irrelevant to Petra having been politely asked to wait around for a new arrival and show them in, pending further instructions after.
Petra Soroka	Petra's electronic devices have taken on a strange position of importance when it comes to her relationships with the Blooms. For one reason or four, their ability to reach her instantly through a phone or DS is absolutely critical on a continuous basis, compared to the frequency they talk to her in person. Nika's talks are important enough that she carries a backup DS everywhere she goes, Ash's texts come and go by their whims, and it's Petra's most fundamental duty to respond to Lilian's moods or summons. Her phone is sort of like the Petra Bat Symbol, if Batman's main responsibility was to go "yes queen you're so right" whenever it lit up. Sakura, though-- "Do everything I say and I may yet forgive you." That's a text Petra can think of receiving from any number of women, but coming from Sakura, it has tectonic importance. Knowing Sakura, this is immediately understood to be a way of utilizing Petra as an external chesspiece, an extended tool to manipulate whatever Sakura needs to be put into motion. Petra frets momentarily about preparations, for the extremely vague instructions, but quickly appends 'And do nothing I don't say' to the end of the message. Petra's still in her General Works uniform after beelining to the Dragon's Garden, black outlined with white. She's at least taken the effort to straighten out her tie and smooth out her shirt rather than showing up looking like a slob, anxiously awaiting each instruction with her Silver to alert her to new messages without a second's delay. This being Sakura's orders rather than Lilian's means that Petra has no idea whatsoever on what to expect. Stepping into the Garden, a few steadying breaths remind her that she doesn't need to expect anything, rather than just doing it. She can be suuuuuuch a good externalized actor for all of the Blooms, because she's such a good girl, and if Sakura is just summoning her to be a butler for some new acquaintance just to see if she'll do it, then she's gonna do it so well and everyone will be so proud of her. If Sakura starts asking her to do degrading things to test the extent of her willingness to act senselessly on command then she'll do that too. These are the thoughts occupying Petra while she waits by the door with her hands neatly folded in front of her lap, until that someone's arrival snaps her out of it. Submerged in her particular mindset as she is, the extent of her flinch reaction to Mesmer is a startled blink and a word, rather than anything more violent. "You?!" She clears her throat and tilts her head. She has the vague shape of a justification for why Sakura would do this forming in her mind, but can't properly put any words to it yet. "Okay. Well, come on in." She opens up the door for Mesmer, and leads her in, checking over her shoulder repeatedly to make sure she's still following. Calling out to the inside of the house, "Sakura, your guest's here. Do you, um, want me to make anything?"
Foundation Scions	It's a moderate hassle, actually, convincing even the away-team security guard Laplace stationed with the lighthouse, that Laplace's very-own Mesmer, despite also being its designated representative amongst the FDMO, ought to be authorized for unescorted travel to an off-world site. With forms on hand to acknowledge the risk of denying an accompanying guard, and to accept the risks and potential financial burden the Rehabilitation Center may meet if an injury were to befall her (they must be upset about the broken fingers still,) it's an embarrassing task to acquire base permission to follow up on the letter. Unrestricted command over this research project has to be worth that, though. Despite the hassle, and despite packing up a duffel of the more valuable bits of Artificial Somnambulism equipment from the Abu Ail research setup, she's prompt in meeting her arrival time- and she meets it with a sneer on her face, stepping from a dry, dusty-yet-sterile collection of buildings, to a world of dampness, springy soil filled with bugs and worms and rot, and a lip-curling thin rain to cling to skin and vinyl fabric. Of course she should have brought an umbrella, and of course she didn't think of it. At least hearing someone out, even in a strange place, should be a simple enough task. Here, the suit-wearing man is nearly as overlooked beyond base purpose as he was when handing over the letter- Mesmer can't stand to talk to liasons, no matter whose, the simplest way is to nod along and barely listen until they get tired and leave; being shown up the path is painless enough, even with a metal-clinking duffel bag that certainly won't be useful here, but is better than leaving expensive gear un-watched. 'You?!' "What?" Mesmer is, about equally, confused. Incoherently, passive-snarking, "I hadn't imagined perfumed letters to be your modus operandi." No, wait, that doesn't make any sense if she's surprised. Mesmer glares anyways, and corrects herself in a still-weird way! "No, it's clearly not. Who is it you're working for? The letter was vague." 'Okay. Well, come on in.' "Fine. I won't be removing my shoes, however." This looks like the sort of place one might be expected to! It probably is! It's really fucking weird for her to specifically say that, though, especially with a suspicious glare, and it's weirder for that to be her only complaint about following Petra into someone else's house. The duffel full of Artificial Somnambulism gear, however, is left in the first dry spot inside she can find, or handed off to whoever might take it.
Petra Soroka	"I hadn't imagined perfumed letters to be your modus operandi." Petra opens her mouth to mention that one of her many jobs involves hand delivering letters to people, and then closes it again when Mesmer moves on. She doesn't need to know that anyways. Instead, she shrugs. "If the letter's vague, then so am I." "I won't be removing my shoes, however." Petra unclips the lid of the bottle clasped to her hip without looking back at her, and a fist-sized blob of Silver snakes its way out. It spills to the floor, forming puddles step by step under Mesmer's shoes to keep them from touching the floor.
Lilian Rook	If a certain someone were told that Mesmer finds dull and abandoned sterility and loneliness more appealing than this, they'd say they aren't shocked. If all four were told it, they'd all say the same thing in slightly different ways that mean completely different things. In reality, however, the only thing that certain someone is told at all is: 'Sakura, your guest's here. Do you, um, want me to make anything?' "No no, please. Something unexpected has happened, but I won't be long, and I would rather that you are here than somewhere else." Petra may not come here often, but it's been enough times for her to remember that there should be a rotating cast of bald guards around the front. The same static-wash sensation awaits at the threshold, where the sliding doors take one into a space that doesn't betray that it's too large until they've been through several more of its ilk, but it's unusual that she'd be un-greeted as well. A woman in a traditional housekeeper outfit, scrubbing fresh blood off the floorboards on her knees, doesn't count. Nor does a sudden pictochat forced-connection and the message, HAZEL: Hi Petra! I'm in the courtyard right now if you want to look for me. Sorry for not meeting you. I told Sakura that everything going on was stressing me out really bad and she said that's where I should go. I'm fine though! Can you tell me about the new person? The length of it indicates that Nika queued up several thoughts in a row and had them sitting before Petra got there. The soft urgency, but lack of audible pain in Sakura's voice, from rooms away, suggests that someone else is injured. The groundskeeper is too upset someone from a few minutes ago to do more than look upon Mesmer like a reprobate for leaving her shoes on. Following the drizzle of blood through the house paints a strangely winding picture of the route, despite ostensible pressing need, evinced by disturbed table corners and knocked-over pottery. It runs opposite the side of the old mansion that Petra knows Nika's Play Cave is situated in, and dodges around the courtyard, extending into the west-facing wing and eventually arriving at what must be an infirmary that has only just recently learned of the Showa era; a necessity that is blindingly obvious and yet feels strange that it could possibly exist here. Surrounded by seafoam-coloured beds and archaic cabinets and medicinal stands, refusing to use any of them, a seven-and-a-half foot tall masked man man wearing muted grey and forest green kneels woozily on a hastily dragged-out mat on the floor, partly supporting himself with his enormous black crow wings against the floor. By his side, examining a left arm that shows white bone and smells septic from the door, is a completely ordinary-looking young woman who must be an inch shorter than even Mesmer. Divested of ceremonial layers of clothing-- apparently a minute ago, given they're all heaped on the corner of a patient bed-- down to the juban, sleeves rolled up, hair hastily tied back, wearing no more protection than disposable gloves, she looks completely out of scale, and completely out of her element.
Lilian Rook	"It was my own mistake. Please, let the healers see to it." "It's a wound you've sustained in service to the Himorogikage. That makes it my responsibility as much as anyone's. More than." "I apologize, my Lady, that's unacceptable. I, as every one of us, bear our swords to--" "I know, Kuhinbo. I know. Did you ever hear of a famous literary work from a foreign land? It's called 'the Iliad'. There's a woman name Helen." "I don't understand." "No, I suppose you wouldn't be familiar. It's human history, after all." "Please. If you insist on doing this, at least allow your sworn allies to finish the rites. If you must yourself, I would gladly wait until the ritual can begin." "Mm . . . But if I observe the entire ritual, I'll be in no state to speak to our important guests for hours. It's better this way." "Then all the more reason! It will keep until after!" "I'm sorry Kuhinbo. I know that you're trying to be compassionate, but to me . . . only being relied on when no one else can do it, and even then only as prescribed by safeguards; that only makes me feel like an irreplaceable tool, not someone that you all care for." "But we do!" "I know! I know. But if if I never do this of my own volition, I'll begin to forget that I'm a person and not a thing. Please just stay still." "But--" "I order you to stay still." ". . ." The only indication that Sakura gives to knowing that you're even there is a very brief glance; one loaded with so much anxiety that you can tell just by looking that the aggregate dread has already crushed the air out of her chest. You see her silently count down from ten by the motion of her lips, not quite building up steam so much as a sense of inescapable centertainty on 'rei'. Mesmer detects no arcanum whatsoever. Instead, she is certain of the exact moment that the girl's brainwave pattern exactly matches the tengu's, just before it is completely swallowed by a stress and pain response of such blinding intensity that no conscious thought should be possible, much less signals corresponding to dreaming memory encoding. Petra doesn't need to be told what it means when the tengu's mangled arm is obscured as if three-dimensionally submerged beneath the surface of a radioactively red-shifted pool. Neither of them can miss when Sakura screws her eyes shut, a ragged scream tears its way out of her throat, and she flinches away from him as if hideously burned. Curling her left arm against her body and clutching it with her right hand, she hunches her body defensively against some outside threat that her physical delicacy surely could not cope with. The scream is stifled down into jaw-clenched vocalization of distress, then into a sharp and nasal whine, and then teeters on the edge between hyperventilation and shallow sobbing, until she opens her eyes, and with violently shaking fingers, reaches for her discarded outerwear. The tengu, arm miraculously good as new, even the clothing repaired, droops his head in guilt. He hastens to reach ahead of her, collecting and handing over an antique opium pipe between his clawed fingers; one that Sakura accepts with a shuddering nod, and fumbles to light, twice, before finally starting to calm down shortly before the first drag should have any effect. "Th-thank you." "Please don't say that. Not now." "You-- have my thanks regardless. Please, Kuhinbo; if you feel guilt, then see to the cleaning in your wake." ". . . If that is your will." "It is."
Lilian Rook	The giant man's standing and leaving, through an adjacent door rather than the one past you, finally leaves you in privacy. Sakura smoothly shuffles herself to face you while kneeling, blows smoke, and then hesitating to pull out heir hair stick, peels off her bloody gloves before shaking her hair loose. Still shivering with stress-related adrenaline, she says to the both of you "Such convenient timing. This makes explaining everything much faster." She tries to smile and laugh, and coughs instead. "Ah, I apologize. I should still receive you somewhere more comfortable, no? All of the others will be along in a few hours, but I thought it was . . ." She looks away. Guilty? "Important. For you, specifically, Mesmer Junior, to be able to speak on your own behalf by then."
Petra Soroka	"Something unexpected has happened, but I won't be long, and I would rather that you are here than somewhere else." Petra winces a little. 'Something unexpected' means something bad, that's probably causing trouble for Sakura, and it's not hard to guess that it's an injury. The impulse to offer her help wars with the assurance that if she was able to provide it, then she would be commanded to, slowly puffing up her cheeks until she sighs. "Hi Petra!" Petra has to wonder sometimes how much more difficult her life would be without the Silver, specifically to make Pictochat-based communication viable. Mesmer sees Petra crouch down to one of the Silver puddles on the ground without warning, pressing her palm to the almost-matching one in the reflection and picking up a DS from its grip, flipping it open to type back with morphmetal rolling across the touchpad. Silke: Yeah i'll definitely be there once i'm done helping Sakura out. I don't know what she wants yet though (1) Silke: I can but i really don't like her so it's going to be biased lmao. She's got reddish hair and always carries around medical machinery because she's a nurse and she's mean to everyone as her default way of talking to them and she hates Lilian specifically. I can't think of anything good to say about her (2) Silke: sends a quickly drawn picture of an evil-looking Mesmer shooting brain radiation out of her gun at a dizzy blob person along with a 3 in the corner. Silke Her name's mesmer (4) Petra's eyes slip off of the screen to the blood splatters on the floor, lips pressed together. A wound alone wouldn't stress her out, but she has an impending sense of uneasiness at the end result where the blood leads to Sakura, and Nika mentioning her stress makes Petra sympathetically more vulnerable to being uncomfortable herself. Silke: Oh and i've got something to introduce to you and Ruble you're gonna love him (5)
Petra Soroka	Following Sakura's voice, because if Petra is here rather than someone else, she can be called upon like a summoned ally, Petra eventually leads Mesmer to the infirmary. She watches the exchange with nervous energy, fidgeting in place and encoding each word of Sakura's to the inscribed tablet of memory in her mind, diligently not interjecting in a matter she can neither have any practical or cultural utility with. Her lips start to move when Sakura finishes talking, and then freeze before a sound escapes at the look on her face, eyes widening. When Sakura screams, Petra lurches a step forwards by instinct, reaching out with a sharp gasp. "Sakura-?!" Her hand drops again helplessly, cutting off from saying anything else. She worries her thumb between her fingers, looking between Sakura and the tengu as if she can preemptively divine which nutrient it is that helps Sakura recover-- food for Lilian, drinks and sweets for Ash, electricity for Nika, and... opium, huh.-- and finding with great distress that she has significantly less insight into how to assist here than the random no-name person who caused this in the first place does. Once he's gone, Petra puffs out air, cold sweat beading on the nape of her neck. "Sorry. I've just-- never seen you do that before. Are you sure there's not anything I can get you at least?" Petra turns slightly, the words outpacing her thoughts. "Is that-- do you really need to do--" Rather than trailing off euphemistically, Petra's protest that the world doesn't deserve any sacrifice from Sakura halts like it hit a brick wall. Every Bloom's wish, by necessity, is something they needed more than anything else, and it's fundamentally a part of the way they view and interact with reality, whatever else it does to them. Combined with what Sakura said to Kuhinbo, Petra conceptualizes the step below 'tool', as 'porcelain doll'. "... Nevermind. Here's Mesmer Jr., and Mesmer, here's..." Petra shifts, gesturing with a flat palm. "Sakura." She still doesn't know what she's here for, so she's lingering anxiously in service-posture until given the command to fetch tea or something.
Foundation Scions	Mesmer stares, actually quite worried, at the moving Silver that Petra pours out, trying for a cautious moment to step anywhere but onto the pool, and nearly stumbling, not because she wants to track dirt inside that badly, but because she's fully uncertain how the hell to interpret the material as anything but bad to step in. When it proves impossible to avoid, she treats it like dangerously slippery floor, either way. It's, likely, rude of her to right any of the unbroken-yet-knocked-down pottery she passes, but it's irritating to see in a way that blood on the floor can just be ignored as too normal- shelves should be orderly, items upright, tables back flush with falls and lined up to the edges of flooring material. This isn't her house, she's likely hardly a welcome guest, and she's started off being rude; she's thinking of that too as she still follows the compulsion to right the items she's not able to ignore. Frankly, with the alternative of blood to accidentally step in, the Silver isn't so bad. Before eyes and mind have processed the infirmary, the smell alone, on unconscious, immediate reflex, spikes cortisol in preparation for the pattern of walking into a medical disaster- which it is, just not one she has anything to do with rectifying, which does utterly nothing to lower the stress of it. An undressed, septic, bone-depth laceration, that's grounds for immediate surgical exploration, to excise decayed flesh and find a way to cover and seal the area, it's grounds for extreme levels of antiviral remedies, complicated by the fact this clearly isn't a human- this isn't her job to treat, thank goodness, some perhaps-supernatural being of a wholly different world certainly would need specific research to be able to even come up with an idea of preliminary treatment. Watching Sakura's face in, at first, stressed confusion, the mouthed countdown is blatant, had conversation not eluded to the unpleasantness whatever method of healing she was about to utilize- it's a similar expression she's seen on those who've committed to trying to set their own dislocated joints; unenviable. For the last bits of the countdown, Mesmer looks away, a half-conscious courtesy, and because it means she isn't facing Sakura when she winces out of a mixture of sympathy and the viscerally weird sensation of paired brainwave-patterns, like off-key resonating notes, before the following burst of activity. Sometime between Sakura screaming, and fading away to quiet, Mesmer's hands affixed themselves to their opposite forearms, pinching at mist-wet sleeves and the skin underneath, jaw-tense. One might think the frequency she hears screams would make it easier. Quiet, interrupting before even being addressed, she blurts out a "What was that supposed to be," and stares, dumbfounded, at the pristine healing. 'This makes explaining everything much faster.' Semi-earnest confusion, starting quiet and rising back to a conversational-volume with dead-flat tone, "How so?"
Foundation Scions	'Ah, I apologize. I should still receive you somewhere more comfortable, no?' "No," Too fast, "Here is fine enough." No, it's not, Mesmer doesn't like at all the idea of talking in an infirmary, let alone one with the stain of decay sitting heavy in the air, but it's better than anywhere else in a fancy house, and by a decent margin; infirmaries have work and a purpose to them, mansions are just hostile territory. "You know who I am, clearly, please explain why that is. While you're at it, please explain who you are. Before it makes conversation inconvenient, preferably." "On my own behalf? Frankly, I've little idea what you're referring to speaking about. The information on the tapes, my proceedings with research being halted? It's a strange job, with how little is being said clearly- and one I'd like to return to my work on." A tense exhale- "If it's to be worth the hassle, there's no point delaying further." In the exact tone of offering to fix a sloppily-buttoned shirt that's more annoying to look at than wear, Mesmer states, a moment after, "If whatever that pain you were under hasn't abated, I can shut it off for you."
Lilian Rook	HAZEL: I don't know either! When she's working they always take her to the room with all the candles and she's so sleepy and tired and can't talk well for hours after. HAZEL: 1 HAZEL: Thank you for saying it! Sometimes people think that I'll be scared if they just don't really like someone and that always makes me feel annoyed and upset. 234 HAZEL: I'm gonna get Ruble! :rublesoniclegs: 5 HAZEL: Tell me when you're done! 6 The courtyard was a good idea. Nika isn't someone who particularly needs to be sheltered; she's normal, which means that horrific gore and her best friend's anguished screams aren't good for her. They aren't good for Sakura either, of course, but she seemingly hasn't let that ever stop her before. 'Sorry. I've just-- never seen you do that before. Are you sure there's not anything I can get you at least?' "I'm not allowed to show you." Sakura smiles shakily at Petra. The proclamation is thin and uneasy; not just for shock and nerves, but for an instinctive feeling of complication about doing something she's not supposed to. "I knew I could trust Nika to keep quiet about it. That girl is a wonderful friend." she sighs, then inhales, as if taking a breath of air above water. "And no. Any more than this and it'll affect our conversation. It's only nerves and stress anyways; psychic and not real harm." Just saying 'real' strains her lips at her eyes where they won't wander. 'Is that-- do you really need to do-- ... Nevermind.' Tension and relief, wariness and validation, like a two act play. Sakura smiles, glum and sweetly bitter. "If was me that damned everyone to suffer this. I should do what I can, when I can, to make amends for my good intentions." '... Nevermind. Here's Mesmer Jr., and Mesmer, here's...' "She's skinnier than I remember." Sakura says, mysteriously, and shakes her head at something disapprovingly. The ratio of frivolity rapidly dies down as the sweet smell of burnt poppy starts covering up the dregs of rot. No doubt the saccharine afterscent is part of the point. 'What was that supposed to be' "My job." Sakura says, idle-singsong at first, then shrugs. "And the only thing of value I have to give. The miracle I was cursed with." 'How so?' 'Here is fine enough.' Despite being smaller than Mesmer, Sakura raises an eyebrow at her with a motherly kind of silent awareness of her behaviour. Nevertheless, she is clearly doing her best not to agitate herself. With her shakes slow to subside, even the tone of voices she uses is the kind that patients use to soothe and ground themselves when instructed to. "Because, Mesmer Junior, when I tell you that my name is Sakura, but the people here call me 'the Divine Child', believe I am a heaven-sent miracle, hide me from the outside world, and offer up their lives to chase a madman's prophecy on my behalf, I know that you will discard the frivolous and wishful notion, comforting as it is, that I am merely a 'raving delusional', because you have seen the miracle with your own eyes."
Lilian Rook	'You know who I am, clearly, please explain why that is.' Sakura slowly shuts her eyes. Her smile reads as-- well, significantly drugged, now, but less than the dosage should afford. Otherwise, 'how amusingly impatient' and 'finally someone who asks'. "I know who you are because 'Voyager' is something new to me, and so it was too important not to behold your work myself, even if only from afar. And though I have no power but to heal their wounds, there are people in many places who will do as I tell them, because of who I was born as. Does that answer your question?" 'If it's to be worth the hassle, there's no point delaying further.' Hearing that, Sakura takes a deep, bracing drag, counts to a less visible number, and then exhales again. When her eyes flutter open again, it's more obvious to Petra that she doesn't have any makeup on; it stands out because she remembers them as deep brown, but they're very clearly amber in this light, and that draws attention to her lack of clothing and styling, and that to every other incongruous flaw in the perfect rendition of yamato nadeshiko that occupies the icon of 'Sakura' in hr memory. "Please sit, at least. Petra will open a window." she says. Herself, standing up, she wobbles on the first step, takes hold on a disability rail overhead, and lowers herself onto the edge of a pristine patient bed, still smoking where she shouldn't. 'If whatever that pain you were under hasn't abated, I can shut it off for you.' Sakura shakes her head. "I wouldn't deserve it. After all, the fact is . . ." Twiddling with the pipe for a second, Sakura looks directly at Petra, and with a voice of professional regret, like reading off a sad but routine diagnosis, she says, "Petra. If Mesmer Junior refuses to cooperate, or attempts to leave early, if she becomes violent, irrational, or approaches me suddenly and unasked-for, your instructions are to kill her. Immediately." She lets that hang in the air with the smoke for a while, and waits until the latter clears. "I'm sorry, Mesmer. You've suddenly learned something that puts myself and the people I care about in a very dangerous position. I can't have your memories altered and your data falsified, because . . ." She smiles again, grimly sympathetic. "You're a Mesmer. They'll know, won't they? It's unavoidable. I have to know that you can be trusted, or I will have to hold my tongue and watch as my organization puts you to death. And it must be before Lilian finds out that you are here."
Petra Soroka	Honestly, Petra thinks that letting Mesmer touch the Silver is something far better than she deserves. Cleanliness and order seem right up her ally and everything, and even more than that, it's Petra's. Allowing Mesmer to step on it is an indignity that Petra suffers in order to spare the house, bloodsplattered or not. Silke: There's totally other people who do get angry when I directly say that I don't like someone. Even people who agree with me. But that makes me annoyed and upset!!! 2 Silke: So thank you also. Silke sends a sketched out version of her :sticker_puppyYes: along with 'Will do! 6' Silke Oh we have so much to talk about actually i want to hear about you and Ash. But after i'm done! 7 "I'm not allowed to show you." "Yes ma'am. That'd be why." Petra hesitates, then falls silent. She's filled with an uneasy mix of being gratified that she's now in a Forbidden Circle, the squirming desperation to proclaim and prove herself as also being worthy of trust like that, the certainty that Sakura doesn't actually see her that way and would rather she hadn't seen that, and the overriding command that she gave to stop talking about it. She eventually settles on murmuring, "Nika really is the best." "And the only thing of value I have to give. The miracle I was cursed with." Quest icons are rapidly popping up in Petra's mind, but the first objective of all of them is currently obscured. It is Petra's universal goal to encourage these three women to want more for themselves and become happier with their status as being more important than anything else in the world, or at the very least for her to be able to help address the adject misery that defines their existence. The outline of Sakura's is clear enough, but this is one that Petra feels unequipped to handle. She stays quiet, depositing her DS in her pocket but maintaining her connection to it through the Silver. Subtly, she shuffles herself over to be implicitly standing 'on Sakura's side', rather than by Mesmer at the entrance, a little ways behind her to the side. ". . . but the people here call me 'the Divine Child', believe I am a heaven-sent miracle, . . ." "In my opinion, all women are heaven-sent miracles." Petra says quietly, to not interrupt. It's reflexive but also heartfelt, not so much in its universality but in its application to Sakura specifically. She's just got different and more specific reasons to think so. Naturally, the window is opened as soon as Sakura asks for it.
Petra Soroka	"I wouldn't deserve it." "Deserving is something invented in hell. I've never forgotten that." Petra suddenly blurts out, certain that Sakura was watching at the time all the way back then. She clenches her fist by her side, knowing that this is an inopportune moment for a little moral declaration but committed to taking her shot, and she takes in a breath. The thought strikes her, then, that the same kind of dedicated servictude that she devotes to Lilian might have the opposite effect on Sakura. Convincing her to be more selfish and seize more control over the world around her clearly isn't the way to go with the 'Divine Child', and the way Petra uplifts and idolizes Lilian is meant to enshrine her as a goddess rather than a person. Her fist slowly loosens, fingers hanging down. "... I just think the people I like should be happy." "If Mesmer Junior refuses to cooperate, or attempts to leave early, if she becomes violent, irrational, or approaches me suddenly and unasked-for, your instructions are to kill her." Petra's hand shoots up to her mouth, covering a sudden startled smile and gasp. "Wait-- really?? That's why? Oh my god, you do like me!" The Silver under Mesmer's feet blossoms out into a ring on the floor, surrounding her with a slow roiling current of heavy metal. After a jagged bristling to imply the threat, the circle softens and squiggles, drifting along with Mesmer's feet without aggressing her as long as she follows Sakura's instructions to sit. "Can do, ma'am. But," She looks over at Mesmer, not sympathetic in the slightest towards her, but warning instead of hostile. "Well, hopefully I won't have to."
Foundation Scions	'My job.' Mesmer blows air out of her nose at that, and the following sentence; not a laugh, or a reply, but an uncharacteristically more base reaction from her. 'She's skinnier than I remember.' "Excuse me? I don't understand. Have we met?" Of course she's speaking rhetorically, defensive to the odd comment- "If photographs of me are present on some multiversal databank, somewhere, I'd appreciate if you'd say where, as they certainly aren't authorized. If they're doctored, that's an additional concern. I'd really like an explanation." Under breath, annoyed, "It's legal disputes either way; annoying, time-sucking, blood-sucking, they should just know better and make it easier for everyone..." Mesmer's hands haven't left her sleeves, twisting and fiddling, clearly causing some unfocused, barely-noticed measure of pain and irritation, but it's an uncertain and stressful situation to be in, she's acting how she would in a break room waiting on up-in-the-air information and not knowing what to do with herself. '...Because you have seen the miracle with your own eyes.' "It isn't more comforting to be surrounded by the delusional. But whether my eyes-" Cutting off, Mesmer squints, and puts a hand up to her temple- first to press a button on her headband, hidden by her hair, and second to actually tap against skin. Whatever brainwave-pattern she's looking for in her own head, isn't found, and she carries on. "No, my eyes are fine. Whatever it was that you did, happened. Was it you, or he, or something different, that molded both of your minds into one pattern?" Mesmer turns, to Petra, and far later in this conversation than makes any sense, asks, with not-hidden surprise, "Are you two friends?" 'I know who you are because 'Voyager' is something new to me,' "I was under the impression it was new to everyone. Do you mean it was novel?" Mesmer agrees with it being novel, she thinks it's novel, she likes the way it's novel! "Yes, that answers it well enough. For protocol, I'd prefer if neither you nor your 'group'," Emphasized, Acquired classified information from an in-progress research site, before its final compilation and publication, especially not mine, but if it's happened, it's happened, and I'm sure that it's known that it has. I doubt there's a patent at risk." Patent risk, seriously? She's thinking on a different planet. 'After all, the fact is . . .' Ah. There it is. Mesmer would prefer to say that the instructions Petra's way, to put her down if X, Y, or Z occurs, was par for course, or something she could take in stride- it isn't. Eyes wide, heartbeat spiking, and that twitch in her lip, she looks between Petra and Sakura, smoking on the infirmary bed, as if expecting somehow one of them will give a cue that it's a joke- it isn't. "Forget I asked." Breathy and nasal, it's an easy tone for her to keep flat while as scared as she is. She takes a step away from Petra, towards a different infirmary cot to sit on, then nervously twists her eyes to the ground and those pools of Silver she'd been made to stand in, like they'd turned to burning lava in her perception. When she herself sits down, she makes sure to keep the bottoms of her boots solidly off of the floor. 'Wait-- really?? That's why? Oh my god, you do like me!' Eyes squeezed shut, for a moment before remembering how risky even blinking could be, Mesmer whispers, like she's manifesting something, "Shut up, shut up, just, go away and shut the fuck up, don't be excited to kill me-!"
Foundation Scions	'You're a Mesmer. They'll know, won't they? It's unavoidable.' Sparing herself a moment to control her breathing, strict and habitual, Mesmer speaks up again- "Likely, unless it's me performing the data falsifications." She didn't really need to confirm that, even if it's true. "But I'm not going to believe your apologies, so you can save the breath, they don't make this pleasant." Growing more and more tense, maybe understandably, she continues, I don't actually care if it's a matter of course, or your hands are tied. Say what's needed so I can walk out of here alive, that's it, that's all. I'm cooperating." Not once in any of that do Mesmer's eyes stay in one place, mostly Petra, any action she takes, or any motion of Sakura's, in some worry that it's a pre-established signal to Petra to kill her, as if knowing will do anything. Mesmer doesn't reach for anything, nor does she try and get up.
Lilian Rook	'In my opinion, all women are heaven-sent miracles.' Sakura smiles, weakly, between breaths, sentences, and washes of opioid stability. 'Deserving is something invented in hell. I've never forgotten that.' It turns into a tired double-blink of soft surprise. She pauses in the way that she does when thinking how to wash herself of the excesses of language when Nika is having a hard time following her propriety-based double language, and then says, "Then I would feel scheming and ungrateful. Like taking accepting dance tickets from a patient right before I amputate her legs." Somehow, having this concept acid bathed for shining clarity and presented right back to Petra seems like a promotion. "For some people, if they go too long being constantly numed to pain, they become numb to happiness as well." 'Wait-- really?? That's why? Oh my god, you do like me!' Sakura quietly laughs through her nose; it's mostly only visible by the tiny puff of smoke and the slight twitching of her shoulders. "Please do better to conceal your excitement. I haven't asked you to do so lightly, so it might easily lead to the mistaken impression that you would enjoy the idea of murdering Mesmer Junior in our house, rather than that you enjoy being relied on." 'If photographs of me are present on some multiversal databank, somewhere, I'd appreciate if you'd say where, as they certainly aren't authorized. If they're doctored, that's an additional concern. I'd really like an explanation.' "Does speaking like that help you say calm?" Sakura interjects, a little hazy about it, but only just barely. She looks at Mesmer with something other than curiosity in her eyes. If she had to call it anything, she might go with 'the sense of being triaged by a professional on their tenth consecutive hour of overtime'. "I have no reason to lie to you, and no manner of private dignity which would compel me to feel embarrassed, either. I've watched your work with 'Voyager', from here, using what your people would call 'arcanum'. I can see anything I want to, across most of this planet, if I know what to look for. It's one of the few things I can do to be useful to anyone while still abiding everyone's wishes that I stay here where it's safe; and so I do, as much as I can." Taking another drag, Sakura says with a pensive-wistful smile, "I'd worried that perhaps you were like me, and it would be difficult to separate you from 'the place you were born to be', but it seems there was no need." 'No, my eyes are fine. Whatever it was that you did, happened. Was it you, or he, or something different, that molded both of your minds into one pattern?' Sakura stares at the smoke that escapes with her last exhale, and watches it dissipate, without inhaling again, until she must be starting to feel dizzy. "I wished that our rotten, irreddemable, hell-like world wasn't like this. Just for a moment, I believed that things could be any other way. I envisioned, so very clearly, the blissful phantasm of possibility that someone might help me without being so violently punished for their kindness, and then I switched 'this' and 'that', before 'the way things are' could say otherwise."
Lilian Rook	Finally breathing in again, Sakura coughs, covers her mouth with her sleeve, and gathers herself with a shake of her head. "The cost of that miracle is as you have seen, Mesmer Junior. If I am to gainsay the gods and decide that a brighter world than this one exists, then the misery that I banish is mine to take on instead." The words are airy; nonspecific and mystical to the point of being almost outright condescending. Sakura grips a fistful of her juban around her thigh until her knuckles turn white. "The kind world I see, where people live and are happy, I give to everyone else. The cruel one, the bell un-rung, takes its place somewhere inside me, where it can harm no one else. The pain itself, the fear they felt, the sense of safety they once had and the moment of its violation, the shape of who they are and the grief that comes from the world mangling it; everything between 'now' and 'before it ever happened', I have to remember." Sakura stares at the remainder of the catridge in her pipe, and seems to lose interest all at once. "But it doesn't hurt. It doesn't injure me at all. I'm sure you've even sensed that it uses too little magic to notice. For the inconsequential price of a little temporary distress, the sick are cured, the mad are made sane, and even the dead may be returned in joyful tears to their families. So." Her eyes slide from the place in the air that once held smoke, dissolved int nothing, and fall on Mesmer, leaden, opaque, and dark. "No thank you. I don't need anything." Sakura says. Her smile doesn't change that stare at all. "If I get even one bit greedier, I might turn into a demon." 'I was under the impression it was new to everyone. Do you mean it was novel?' The asinine specificity of that question seems to spark some dim ember of interest. Sakura clears away half of a mental haze that has nothing to do with sedatives just by blinking again. "No, you heard correctly, Mesmer Junior. Most things in this world aren't new. 'Voyager' has never happened, and I don't think it will ever again. What it represents is too important. More important than me, more important than you, and even more important than Lilian's feelings. I understand why she wants nothing more to do with it, but I must know everything there is to know, before it's too late." She glances at Petra, as Mesmer begins, understandably, freaking out about being at risk of death. "And no, we aren't friends. But the people I love are friends with her, and so I've started to grow fond. And if nothing else, Petra is someone I can depend on to always act exactly as I expect her to. Don't you understand what a virtue that is?" 'I don't actually care if it's a matter of course, or your hands are tied. Say what's needed so I can walk out of here alive, that's it, that's all. I'm cooperating.' "I know." Sakura says. Her smile is soft and insincere. She pretends that it doesn't sting to hear half-convincingly. "You have somewhere to go back to. Things to do and people who need you. You didn't do anythng to deserve being killed, and it's not fair that this should happen to you. I'm familiar with people in your position, Mesmer Junior. So please listen closely? Okay?" She does her best to look sincerely approachable, but she can't let go of her clothes. Her brainwaves pulse anxiety corresponding with talking Mesmer down from a ledge.
Lilian Rook	Despite her doe-like trembling anxiety about Mesmer committing suicide by cop just to spite her-- as if someone else's recklessness and capacity for self-harm were the same as a gun pointed at her own head-- Sakura does her level best to include Petra and look them bravely both in the eye. "I have called many of the others involved with 'Voyager', as well as Lilian, Oreshnika, Ash, and myself. You two, I have orchestrated to arrive first, so that I may speak to you privately. The subject of what to do with Mesmer Junior will be inevitable, and so I would rather that she be able to advocate for herself, rather than be left in the dark." Even though it'd be so much easier, if she were quietly shot in the back of the head without knowing anything to be afraid of. "I intend to insist that the research continue, so that the remains of 'Voyager' might be brought to me, and in restoring them to how they were, I will learn everything there is to know about them for myself, without any possibility of being deceived or misdirected." She sounds like she thinks it's so tactically savvy of her to suggest it. She doesn't bother to linger on what that means for her. "I know already that 'Voyager' is trying to warn us of an impending threat. I plan to explain that I know the threat is real, and how I know, as well as why it is I believe it cannot be dealt with by your . . . usual methods." Letting slip a little exasperated sigh, Sakura thinks about the idea of a group discussion long enough to finally decide to discard the remaining cartridge and put down the pipe. "If we cannot address the threat, then no matter whatever it is you do, no matter however you might try, Lilian, and this world, will cease to be." She clearly means them in descending order of importance. Just for a second, she remembers the place within herself where heated words can be found. "And I plan to make you all see that if I can make that even the slightest bit less likely, then there is no sane reason to deny me. If you care about anything at all, you'll allow me to do this, and . . ." She doesn't have the energy to sustain it. Sakura looks guiltily at the door. "And then I'll have made people who are very important to me very, very unhappy, I think." She takes a deep breath. "And then I'll tell Lilian. Later. Myself." ". . . Ah. More to the point, anything that happens as a result of 'Voyager' cannot be reported accurately back to your employers, Mesmer Junior. The safety of this entire world depends on your discretion. I hope to argue that your skills and priorities are more beneficial to me than they are a risk, so, please. Do everything you can to cooperate. If you need to know anything else, ask it now; but please be brief. And Petra . . . If Lilian asks, you have to tell her that she must ask me instead. You have to."
Petra Soroka	"Are you two friends?" "I'd--" Petra starts, before finishing lamely, knowing that Sakura's answer is no. "... Like to be, someday." "Shut up, shut up, just, go away and shut the fuck up, don't be excited to kill me-!" Still too residually pleased for it to sound convincing, Petra reassures through splayed fingers, "No, sorry, that's not why; I'd really rather--" Sakura explains more elegantly in Petra's place, and making Sakura giggle is enough of a reward to immediately set Petra's brain normal again. She pulls her hand away from her mouth as if she's wiping away the smile, inhaling the opium smoke secondhand with a soft breath in and out. "Yup. Death threats are serious business, right?" "For some people, if they go too long being constantly numbed to pain, they become numb to happiness as well." That knocks all the argument out of Petra instantly-- or at least, all the arguments that she'd voice in front of Mesmer. She humorlessly half-smiles, quieter than she was. "Yeah. Fair. I just... think the ratio should be better than one to one." Petra doesn't make any undue motions to threaten Mesmer after that, subdued into a static state, like a bear trap rather than a gun held to her back. She turns away from the window, avoiding the fresh air on purpose in favor of the smoke within the room. "The kind world I see, where people live and are happy, I give to everyone else. The cruel one, the bell un-rung, takes its place somewhere inside me, where it can harm no one else." Petra's mind wanders. A thousand years ago, Yuri pounded on the door of the Manager's office, begging to be let inside before Melting Love reached her. Ayin pressed a gun with a single bullet into Angela's hands, babbling without sentences that he couldn't bear to watch any longer, that this world, crumbling from the weight of its pain, couldn't be endured any longer. A moment later, and X was sitting behind his desk confused as Angela recited the same introduction as she had 45,192 times already, perfectly clueless. "But it doesn't hurt. It doesn't injure me at all." The skin-crawling horror rolls down Petra's spine and settles in her stomach. Before she's even consciously made the leap in logic, it feels like some mental motion has come to a halt, resolved into a clenched stance prepared for some dreadful eventuality. Petra's wish, of course, was that those girls who siphoned the unbearable world into themselves and became alienated from the kinder one, could have exactly one person they knew could truly understand. Throat dry, Petra echoes Sakura's last word as a full statement. "So."
Petra Soroka	"And I plan to make you all see that if I can make that even the slightest bit less likely, then there is no sane reason to deny me." A whiff of stubborn contrarianism bubbles up in Petra, as possibly the only one who actually needs to be convinced to not accelerate the end of the world. Between Ash, between thirteen other planets, the threat-- or so she'd like to think-- is only to Earth, and not to Lilian. She holds herself back from speaking for ten seconds, effortfully sliding jigsaw puzzles around to shift priority in her brain before saying anything. 'Believe and obey Sakura' becomes a higher priority than 'advocate for uncertain information that might help Lilian'. "... Got it. You know what I care about, obviously." Petra takes another meditative breath and then sighs, doubling down on her mental hierarchy. "And, I mean it. I'm not only not going to be an obstacle, but whatever it takes to keep Lilian from going away, I'm fully with you. If I learn anything on my own, I'll tell you. I'm there with you, and Lilian, and Nika, and Ash."
Foundation Scions	'Does speaking like that help you say calm?' "No, not particularly, but I'd surely be less calm to find out I've accidentally become a more public figure. Anyone would be." Mesmer doesn't relax at Sakura's following explanation, but the annoyance at the assumed-cause fades. "I'd prefer to not be divined of, scried on, or otherwise watched through... Your world's 'arcanum', but that's orders of magnitude more harmless than I'd imagined. Just unpleasant." 'I'd worried that perhaps you were like me, and it would be difficult to separate you from 'the place you were born to be', but it seems there was no need.' "I'd hardly call Laplace that." [ansi(245, 'If I am to gainsay the gods and decide that a brighter world than this one exists, then the misery that I banish is mine to take on instead.')] There's a momentary stir, like Mesmer is going to interject with something, and it isn't followed up on- for all her demeanor and attitude, it could be a stillborn impulse to snark at 'gods' obviously not being real, or anything of that tone. She stays silent. 'But it doesn't hurt.' "I don't believe you. Neurological and behavioral reactions to pain, at least, that's indicative of harm." Why's she fighting her on this? Mesmer's nose is wrinkled up, angry-disgusted, but far from clearly at what. ''Voyager' has never happened,' "Excuse me? It clearly has happened, somehow, somewhere, at some point in time, the evidence is there, as it has been. I can't stand disorganized phrasing. What is it you even mean?" It wouldn't take a genius to guess that Mesmer is snipping because she's confused, and angry at being confused, regardless of Sakura's clarity of conversation. Then, in a weirdly soft tone, "If there's no point in explaining, that's that, I'd hate to hear something else that would warrant death threats. Does the opium make clarity easier, or harder?" 'But I must know everything there is to know,' Twitchy, tugging at her sleeve-cuffs, Mesmer continues, in that same tone- "So, it's important. That's clear enough. I'd certainly hope so, given these measures- the death threats, I mean. Why you? I wouldn't bet money on you being a scientist, even if you're a..." Thoughts haven't moved fast enough to keep up to her words, there's a pause, and a slow, wary pan around the room. "Is it just because you can, because you'd put down other researchers, so you knowing is fine? So all of the others there have a permission card? So. What's the differing factor?" Like she's realized how many words she's strung in a row, or just re-remembered the circumstance, and all that's led up to it, Mesmer Jr. stops, still sitting where she has been, arms frozen instead of continuing the endless sore-rubbing fidget with her wrists. Forcing her breathing to be shallower, which does nothing for her anxiety, but does wonders to flex the tiniest muscles of needing to be in control of something. When the phrenic nerve impulse catches up to her and demands she get a bit more oxygen, she hides it in a frustrated sigh. 'So please listen closely? Okay?' "I'm listening."
Foundation Scions	'I intend to insist that the research continue, so that the remains of 'Voyager' might be brought to me...' Disappointed, for an odd angle- "'Full control over the project', but only on paper, if you'll, by however trustworthy your method is, be finishing the work yourself. That's a deceptive promise." It's that tiny bit, actually, that lets the stress of the situation start to physically affect her the most- that now, it feels fully like mitigating harm, no small shred of even token reward at the end for the effort. The fate of a world she's hardly been to, that's not in mind, it should be, but it's an embarrassing, stressful double-pitfall to get this deep into something that stands to, likely, only harm her. Nails digging into wrist-skin, under her sleevecuffs, "I suppose it hardly matters." '. . . Ah. More to the point, anything that happens as a result of 'Voyager' cannot be reported accurately back to your employers, Mesmer Junior.' Mesmer sighs, adrenaline-shaky, yet still like she isn't miles and miles past the point in her opinion being communicated through tone and mannerisms ceasing to matter. "I'd ask for vetting and forewarning of whatever it is I'll come up with to report instead; I'd much prefer a revision notice than a bullet, and, frankly, I don't have a clue what the line to avoid is.." Half sarcastic, half scared and uncertain, ill-thought out, she continues on, "Otherwise, I'll be safe, whatever I tell them will be as worthless as it containing the inventory of an alien's Beanie Baby collection. Inane, uninteresting, empty." More nervous, and colder, "They'll believe it if it's what I hand them. That's all, no more questions, not short ones, anyways."
Lilian Rook	'I'd-- ... Like to be, someday.' Weary, overloaded, jittering from stress and barely soothed back down, Sakura smiles guiltily at Petra, and says, "I know. And it's still good to see you, despite everything. So, please, bear with it." 'Yup. Death threats are serious business, right?' "Well they aren't fun." Sakura says, and laughs nervously. Transparently unenthused, she trails off quickly looking more anxious than she'd started. 'And, I mean it. I'm not only not going to be an obstacle, but whatever it takes to keep Lilian from going away, I'm fully with you. If I learn anything on my own, I'll tell you. I'm there with you, and Lilian, and Nika, and Ash.' But that makes her smile again, in a way that's any different from 'sadly', or even 'forced'. Perhaps only 'tired'. "Thank you, Petra. I want to say that I couldn't take it if that happened again, but what I'm really feeling now is that it feels better than I realized to hear someone really mean it." 'I'd prefer to not be divined of, scried on, or otherwise watched through... Your world's 'arcanum'' Perhaps it'd be much clearer to Petra than to Mesmer, that Sakura wears a great many smiles to make up for all the expressions she never learned to make, just like Lilian used to wear so many different scowls. This one is thin and settled and strangely canny-nostalgic. With that pipe, she almost looks like an old woman hearing about her granddaughter's first shitty boyfriend. "I understand, Mesmer Junior, but I do it because I must, not because I enjoy it." she says. The penny-dreadful excuse hits with a surprising amount of weight; in no small part because of likely being the first time Mesmer has ever heard the words: "That 'arcanum' is boring. Intruding into people's lives like that is so . . . tedious, you know? People tend to behave as you expect, and to keep going until something makes them stop. Without being able to think like they do, the things that fixate them are meaningless to a mere observer. As often as not, it's unpleasant, too. Revealing, in the sense of shocking or obscene, without a moral at the end. Sometimes, there might be rare exceptions, but for the greater idea, it's all just . . . politics." The way she chooses that last word, the way her eyes glaze over, somehow feels like she'd used an alien word instead of a generically dismissive one. There's no way this girl thinks of 'politics' like she tried to say it. 'I'd hardly call Laplace that.' "I'm glad." Sakura says. "I think that would be a little bit sad." 'I don't believe you. Neurological and behavioral reactions to pain, at least, that's indicative of harm.' "And yet, there is no harm. It's been checked before." Why is she fighting Mesmer on it? For a second, she got really curt. "Pain isn't real. It's the signal to an injury, and nothing more. A problem with people, Mesmer Junior, is that we were made by a hand that expected us to be injured from time to time; our sense of pain rots and begins to misfire if we never are."
Lilian Rook	'If there's no point in explaining, that's that, I'd hate to hear something else that would warrant death threats. Does the opium make clarity easier, or harder?' "Thank you." Sakura says, apologetically. Why does she look guilty? For smoking so brazenly? Surely it's not that. The death threats? "You caught something I said in a very pecular way, is all." She glances down at the half-spent cartridge. "It's just a means to tilt the scales one way. And it's much shorter-lasting than what they use in our 'rituals'." She smiles like a frown, bitter and reluctant. 'Why you? I wouldn't bet money on you being a scientist, even if you're a...' "Because I'm the only one who knows enough to be able to correct any of what's hurting everyone. I didn't choose the responsibility. It just happened this way." Evasive this time; or more like she strongly disagrees with her own words, except for all the ones that actually matter. 'That's a deceptive promise.' Sakura blinks, and suddenly looks back up at Mesmer, lightly stunned. "I thought you were . . . ?" she begins, then clearly decides restating something incorrect is a waste of time, and shakes her head, slowed down for the dizziness it elicits. "I'm really sorry. I failed to realize that you enjoy that work so much." Huh? "I still think you should complete it. Something that only I know-- that only exists inside my head-- is worthless, isn't it? There are so many more things to learn than just what I tell you . . ." 'That's all, no more questions, not short ones, anyways.' Sakura smiles unhappily, but appears to have run out of will to make Mesmer writhe like this any longer. Removing the little glass capsule, she hands the half-burnt drugs over to Petra to be disposed of, and slips the pipe back inside her outerwear, gathering it up layer by layer. "Thank you. Please take some time to collect yourself. And Petra, please try to be a little bit nice to her. None of this is her fault." Sighing at the bundle of formal clothing practically half her mass over her arms now, Sakura says "You wouldn't happen to know how to dress someone like this, would you Petra? This isn't something I can do on my own . . ."