Scene #8445: Family, Huh?

Owner	Pose
Persephone Kore	Here I am. You can feel me, can't you? Persephone's approach normally is like the sunrise. This is like the sun blooming in the night sky. All at once, you're in the epicenter of my aura, being squeezed out and embraced by my warmth. It hits like a wall. The Queen in Veils kneels in the front yard, underneath the great tree. Starry steam gently effervesces from its surface, fresh from the teleport. Its upturned hand rests on the ground. Persephone stands in its palm. Her hair flows and swirls as if in microgravity, and the grass and plants do the same, bending away from her and swirling in elaborate patterns. Even the tree's branches rustle. Persephone's face and posture are uncharacteristically tight. "Lily-R." Her voice has an edge of frustration that Lilian hasn't heard in a year and a half. It isn't raised, but her aura carries it through the whole house, creaking wood. "I'm taking you or I'm taking him. Pick." There is no 'okay?', or 'you know?', or 'ahaha~'. Nothing to soften the blow. For only the second time in Persephone's life, this is a confrontation, not a conversation. I want this more than you. I'll win. It's for your own good.
Lilian Rook	Of course Lilian can feel it. Anyone can feel Persephone before they can even see her. Even those who wouldn't recognize who it is would still be unable to ignore that human feeling of 'someone is here', amplified up to the gravity of the moon. Lilian's familiarity is such that it'd wake her up at this hour, if she were even asleep. But more than just feeling 'Persephone', Lilian feels it. That pressure. The creaking weight of expectation. The way Persephone never is. he command of a goddess who is very disappointed in you right now. Because someone shitty enough to make her that mad once can obviously do it twice. What'd I think would happen? Outside on the garden under the moon, Persephone stands amidst the gently throbbing vortex of air and gravity for an uncommon span of moments, given who she is here for. The impulse to move first, and reach in, is already near at hand when she hears the faint sounds of rapid thumping on the floor above, audible for only the sounds of birds and insects having completely silenced in her presence. Coming all the way to the front, a window is unlatched, curtain pushed hastily aside, and the glass is thrown up, in the same continuous moment she hears "Phony?!" The sound cuts out, and the curtains flutter aside over an empty corridor. The grass is bent in front of her, a few arm's reaches away, anchored under her swirling aura by a pair of sneakers. Under the long shadows cast by the elder tree, Lilian stands across from Persephone in faded blue jeans and an oversized forest green hoodie, staring into the grass in silence. Her arms are clutched to each other as if the summer night were frigid. Her hair is bound up so tightly that it seems to half-vanish in the dark. The centimeter more skin that shows up pale white in the moonlight highlights where something sharp had started in on a sidelock. The thin gauze pad on her cheek is fresh. It'd be nice if an owl or a cricket would break the stiff silence between them. Short as it is, the look of Lilian standing there, hunched in on herself, not meeting Persephone's eyes, makes it feel like forever. "You can--" she starts, but preemptively gives up. "You shouldn't be here, Persephone. Just because you know where I . . ." Lilian swallows. "We resolved this last time, didn't we? There was a whole . . . fight about it. All of us. We all decided it was fine like this." Pale fingers poke out of her sleeves where she squeezes her upper arms. Her neck shows where she looks to the side, now. "Please don't change your mind about it. Just . . . not now."
Persephone Kore	Maybe it's just the moonlight, maybe it's the emotion of the moment, but Persephone's eyes seem more orange than amber. They're open wild and wide. The thing keeping her from seeming like an imposing divinity was always that softness, that gentleness in them. Like water in space, it's both frozen and boiled off. "Shut up. I didn't change my mind. The world changed. You know it has. Maybe I should have taken this from you before, even? But you always hold so tight to the things that hurt you." Her touch, at least, is still gentle. She reaches out- reaches down, even more than usual, standing on the Queen's palm- and grazes the bandage with her fingertips. Why are you the way that you are? She needs to be that tiny bit more sure, to steel herself against her own kindness. "He hit you. Didn't he. Don't you dare pretend. Don't you dare be so cruel to someone I love." Her hand, as it leaves the caress, balls up tight. Her fingernails dig into the palm of her arm-warmer. "You. Or him. You do not get another choice, Lily-R."
Lilian Rook	'Shut up.' hat's the first time Persephone has ever seen Lilian flinch like that. Not guilty or self-conscious. Arms up, head down, neck guarded; shrinking down an inch. "Sorry I-- . . . Shouldn't have . . ." Lilian gasps and goes quiet. "I just wasn't . . . ready, for . . . It's really late." 'You know it has.' "Nothing changed." The words come out too quickly for Lilian to police. Her eyes flicked back to Persephone without her realizing, briefly shining with electricity, before her gaze goes dull and listless again at the sound of her own voice. "Just me. I changed. I got . . . worse. A lot worse. And, nobody stopped me, because--" Lilian's breath hitches, and the bottom drops out of her tone. "--It's not their job. You looked away for a little while, every did, and you should have been able to trust-- I just couldn't act normal for five fucking seconds so . . ." "I'm sorry. I didn't want you to have to . . . I thought you'd be happier, if you remembered me the way I was back then. I didn't want to ruin 'Lilian' for you. But. That's the part that changed. I'm sorry." She doesn't move when Persephone approaches, at first, only stepping back in the last few looming feet of the Queen in Veil's motion, ceding ground and looking up too late. Lilian freezes at Persephone's touch. Transfixed as if by electrocution. Her eyes widen in shock, then a slow moment of comprehen-- Do it. Go on. I dare you. Make my day. We both know how well and utterly fucked you are this time, too. Have you forgotten? You don't have the stones. You could have tried to kill me at any time, even years and years ago. We both know what a fucked up little psychotic bastard you are. But you didn't, and you won't, because you couldn't. And do you know why? Because somewhere in there, deep, deep down, beneath all the layers of insanity, my is still in there, and knows what's right. knows who is, knows I'm father, knows this 'Lilian' character isn't real. You can't do it because you'll never stop being my-- It takes a split second, after the muted crack has already faded, for Lilian to realize that she'd slapped Persephone. A second longer to hear how fast her rattling breath is; how loud her heart is pounding in her ears. Her fingertips are trembling. "I-I'm--" She steps back again. "I'm so so so sorry. I didn't mean it I--" Another step. "I can't explain-- please just-- anything but that. Don't ruin 'her' any more than I already have. Please." 'Didn't he. Don't you dare pretend.' Lilian's hand jumps to her face, as if she can suddenly hide it so late. The word 'accident' is already forming on her lips by spinal reflex. She bites her lip instead; blood wells up at the same time as tears. "Why does that matter? I get hit plenty on the job." Lilian whispers. "At least he deserved to." 'You. Or him.' "He's not here." Lilian shouts, despite herself, and that finally sounds genuine; carries a bit of heat. "He never wants to be here. This is where all the people that mattered to him don't exist anymore. And you're already going to wake up my s-- Neither! He won't just show up for you to fix, and I'm not the person you remember! You don't want me anymore! I'd sooner die then let Marc or Dylan or the Triplets or anyone else know what I've done"
Persephone Kore	Oh. Lilian. Oh, no. Persephone must have been tearing up in horror even before the slap, because when it strikes her, tears glitter in the air like a constellation. They slow in their fall, and stop, and then boil-freeze like in space. Phony rubs her own cheek, and looks back up, and her face is eerily, bittersweetly fierce. You're hurting so badly, aren't you? But I'll be strong for you. Lilian is not permitted to step back. I wish she knew how serious I am, and she's plucked into the air, given nothing to push off of. Then the Queen in Veils closes its other hand around her, six-inch-thick fingers squeezing impossibly gently and impossibly tight. Even inside its grip, it feels like there are hands all over her, almost every inch of her body, shifting in currents with the flow of my thoughts. Behind her, windows start to crack under the ambient pressure. "Lilian. This is not a conversation. This is a demand. He is killing you so he can make someone else out of your bones. I won't let you pretend you deserve that. I don't care what you did, and I won't let you make me care." She leans in, hand on the back of Lilian's head, and kisses her on the lips. It's a kiss of anger, of frustration, of won't you let me tell you you're worthwhile, of stop trying to be so cruel to yourself, of I am getting what I want. "I love you, Lily-R," she says in the breathy aftermath. "And you're not strong enough to stop me from saving someone I love." Then she straightens up and holds out a hand towards the house. She can see the hearts of the servants inside. And so it's trivial to pick one at random, wish I had them, and punch a hole through the front of the house by pulling them at near-lightspeed towards her hand. Her heart crushes theirs into subservience. Talking to anyone but Lilian, the angry fondness drains from her voice, leaving only aching determination. "Where is her father? Tell me."
Lilian Rook	"I'm still . . . really, really sorry. For everything, Perseph--" There is a period of one and a half seconds where Lilian knows what Persephone is going to do, which is really just about all the time in the world. She drilled herself to death on what to do about this a year and a half ago. Back then, she'd used it to evade telekinetic blows that cored out mountains. Here, all she has to do is disappear into the forest. In that ridiculous attempt at an acceptable outfit, she'd blend right in by eye, too. Lilian flickers on the spot, and goes nowhere. Two frames; a half-inch back at most, and it gives out. Because I always sort of wanted this to happen, didn't I? I used to fantasize about someone coming in the dead of night and sweeping me away so I'd never come back, almost every day. How pathetic is that? An attempt to scream, or maybe just yell for the sake of it, dies and becomes an exhausted hiss of air as the Queen in Veils' fingers close around her. No matter how much her body tenses up, it won't cooperate with any intent to do anything. It's not fair. 'I don't care what you did, and I won't let you make me care.' "I hate this." The words escape her as a thin, miserable quaver. "Being invisible to everyone. Like I don't exist once they don't have to look at me. They keep talking to me, and begging for my attention, and, they all want me back; they all want me to forgive them for something or other and-- But they don't really care what's happening, do they? Or at least they don't even notice. They just want to make sure that I don't h-hate--" Lilian breaks apart into rapid, shuddering breaths. An attempt to hold back lukewarm tears that immediately fails. "And then there's-- The couple of people, like you and Tamamo and-- maybe even Petra for some reason-- You see it and you care and you won't not notice, and that's-- but-- The reason I'm here is invisible to you, right? You want me back so badly that it doesn't exist. So you don't care-- what I'm doing; you want to make sure you forgive me by pretending you don't see what's wrong with me." "Why is it that . . . even you won't look at me. All of me. Why are people always just deciding for themselves what I deserve?" Lilian's eyes flutter wide and teary in the spine-stiffening moments of Persephone leaning close and dirtying her hands with me and holding her and look away or it'll seem like you want it you fucking freak and god just let it feel like it used to. Her sharply stilted turn-away is cut short by Persephone's touch and whatever words were about to come with the encroaching sob just a second away are extinguished by her lips. Lilian tenses from the chin down, coiled up in paralyzing shame, and then the touch of anger in Persephone's kiss causes the fight to drain out of her, until she goes gently limp in her inescapable grasp. Thank god.
Lilian Rook	Remembering to breathe comes all at once, and on a considerable delay. A soft gasp becomes two, and then a slow, descending sigh. "I'm not the one who needs to be saved, Persephone." Lilian whispers, only half-heartedly. She knows she can't stop her and she can't change her mind and even if she were to go back in time to when she could give it everything she had, it'd only be a stalemate anyways. "We all agreed on that, remember? We had months of arguments back then too. And a big fight, too. And people died then, too. Because everyone agreed that you and Carpathia's dream needed to be saved from me; not that I needed something" Only for already being fully aware of its pointlessness, Lilian dares look Persephone in the eye, and the almost-smile on her lips only perfectly matches the dull edge in her cracked voice. "Come on Phony. We all knew it was like this. Everyone saw it a year and a half ago." There's less people around than before. It'd be so simple if Cecilia was there, but of course she isn't; he wouldn't have been sloppy enough to forget some excuse to keep her away from Lilian for the near future. Vague residue is recognizable as a recent departure from Katrina; unusual to have been here at all. Anyone will do. One of the other maids from the same wing. "Wait. Wait stop--!" Seeing Persephone reach towards the house suddenly puts the edge of agitation back in Lilian's voice. The cracking of windows is enough to escalate it to fear. "Persephone! Stop! Don't-- Leave it alone! Leave them alone!" The crunch of broken wood is enough to make her shriek. "STOP! THIS ISN'T-- DON'T MAKE IT WORSE!" But there's no use yelling at her. Persephone is in the mood to get what she wants, and I don't want to want anything.)] A terribly groggy looking woman, blonde hair falling out of her nightcap, catches a single glimpse of Persephone, experiences a moment of visceral terror, feels it sublimate into awe, and stammers out, in the middle of the lawn, without understanding why, "A-At his offices, I believe. M-Miss. H-he said he would be for the 'immediate future', having . . ." Somehow, under Persephone's immense gravity, she steals a glance at Lilian anyways, and her expression strains. ". . . business to compile. Records to make copies of, and such. S-something about . . . c-contingencies. Begging your pardon miss, b-but I don't . . . H-he doesn't speak that much to us. J-just the Head, Miss, and she's on . . . leave." "I-If I might ask, If you see him . . ." The woman swallows. "Please remind him of how disappointed his son will be, if he should hear." The lack of an eldest or youngest in that dialect is deafening. "I'm certain he hasn't forgotten."
Persephone Kore	"Why are people always just deciding for themselves what I deserve?" Persephone pulls back to slap Lilian. It's deliberate, and purposeful, and the fact that it even crossed her mind is monumental, but it doesn't come to be. She flinches, hesitates. The instant her hand should have struck Lilian's face, the house's windows all finally shatter. Slowly, with her face drawn tight in pain: "I agreed on no such thing. You deserve the world, Lily-R. When did you forget that? Aren't you supposed to be selfish? I'll talk about what you deserve when you admit you deserve to exist." "Until then: Shut. Up." The saliva in Lilian's mouth boils off without heat, leaving it cold and dry, because if you're going to say such awful things, I wish you didn't have a voice. She can still breathe through her nose, but the telekinetic vacuum in her mouth and throat utterly prevents sound. She forces a bittersweet smile- it looks genuine, but it can't not be forced- when she looks back at the poor groggy maid. "Thank you. You've been so good to her, haven't you? All of you. I'm sorry for making trouble for you. I really am." Gentle telekinesis returns the maid to the ground and nudges her hair back into her nightcap. She only has to pry a little deeper to find all the details of 'the office'. "But you don't have to worry about anything. I'll fix it. I really will. I promise." The Queen in Veils sets Lilian down on the lawn. I wish I hadn't damaged her home. The shards of glass are all reassembled in their windowframes, and heat and pressure seals them back together, but they still look cracked. Inelegantly broken. God can't lift her own heavy rock. Phony starts walking back up the Queen in Veils' arm, towards her 'cockpit' in the doll's chest. But she casts a look back at Lilian first, full of something that isn't quite anger and something that isn't quite regret. "Goodbye, Lily-R. I love you. Please do your best to love yourself, okay?" Only when the cockpit shuts and the Queen vanishes does the air return to Lilian's mouth. Not even a minute later, a beautiful plasma trail lances across the night sky. Lilian knows which celestial body it points to.
Lilian Rook	I agreed on no such thing. You deserve the world, Lily-R. When did you forget that? Aren't you supposed to be selfish?' "How can you tell me what I deserve when you won't even acknowledge the parts of me that are rotting." Lilian replies in cold, lifeless monotone. The damage is already being done. "I didn't forget what I said. I just stopped deserving it. That's all. And it was my fault. There's only so far that being hurt carries you as an excuse. At some point I have to accept there's something wrong with my heart, and I wish you would too." 'I'll talk about what you deserve when you admit you deserve to exist.' there could only be one of us. And it should obviously be Phony, right? But I just couldn't bring myself to let that happen. I got through my whole life on 'the only rule is that I get to exist' Lilian clenches her teeth with a strangled hiss. "I never did. I just keep on doing it because I can't stop." "Even now, I haven't killed 'Lilian Rook'. That's how selfish I am." Lilian barely resists as she's dropped back down again. The way her own sigh doesn't come out causes her to pantomime a cough, her hands coming halfway to her throat, and then she looks up in dull, pleading-- no, that look is 'violated'. The maid, having no idea what's going on, says "It'll be quite a lot of trouble. But if the young lady will speak to you, then I must trust you." She visibly chews the words on her mind. "Less good than would be ordinary." she says. 'I love you' §I'm sorry I made you§ 'Please do your best to love yourself, okay?' §. . .§ Lilian watches the plasma trail with mute horrified dread. On every single conceivable level, this is my fault my fault I fucked up so badly I can't even take responsibility for it oh god even if I stay home and stay quiet then they still just come after me and oh my god it's my fault I fucked up so bad they're coming after my family now and it's my fault my fault my fault but there's nothing she can do about it now, save clean up after it. Picking up the pieces. As always. Ignoring the grass stains on her jeans, she numbly climbs to her feet, already calculating what it'll take for her to pull the strings she has and collect the emergency resources she needs to fix this as soon as she can. It'll take days, by her reckoning. She-- Lilian experiences a weightless moment of guilty relief. At least three, right? Three whole days without-- "Miss . . . Lilian, would you please come inside? We've woke everyone now; I can't explain on my own."