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 Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2011 6:16 am
Alkaid was lost. Not physically, but emotionally. She hadn't felt so confused and unsure of herself since the night she had woken up without an identity. Just the sight of Nemesis had brought the cold, hard reality of her decision crashing down on her.
She had been prepared to die.
She had retreated from the world now. One of her favorite places, before and after her faction change, was the old sky scraper. It was tall, though outdone by more recent architecture surrounding it. It had life though, it was a part of a culture she would never belong to, and best of all - it was close to the stars. It represented so many things in one tall tower and she was always drawn to it.
Now she sat perched precariously on the edge with her knees pulled tightly to her chest and her arms wrapped around them. It left her open to attacks, but more than that, she was open. Her face held every emotion she felt in one mixing pot of an expression and even as her eyes gazed up at the star splattered sky overhead, she looked lonely.
She dropped one knee and freed a single arm so she could reach up and out, grazing her fingers across the image of her star where it shined over head. More than anything, she wished it were possible to just whisk herself away to the one place she felt like she belonged, but it wasn't part of her reality anymore.
She dropped her hand to the rough pavement of the ledge beside her and then dropped her gaze to the maze of cars below. She was stuck between worlds and stuck between armies. She was a power of the stars fighting for Earth and every day she was reminded of how much she didn't belong. She'd seen it in Ladon's face days before and she had seen it in Nemesis' face more recently.
Up here near the stars, but unable to reach them, she felt it all the more fiercely: she would be alone until she took her dying breath.
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Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2011 1:33 pm
In the past few weeks, Sailor Requiem had been an awful Senshi. She still made her nightly rounds on patrol and checked in as required with the Blood Moon Court, but she hadn't gone out seeking actual danger. Instead, most of her evenings out as Requiem would entail wandering aimlessly and thinking about things. Life. Death. Her future, and if she'll ever even have one outside of this tiresome war. But what she thought most, and wanted to think about the least, was the Negaverse. Her thoughts weren't as filled with hatred as they once were, as she'd like them to be.
Sure, she still hated them. She knew they were the enemy. But she felt sympathy for their losses, and felt great curiosity for an explanation of their motives. Her "chat" with Tanzanite at the Blood Moon Court torture camp had been entirely unhelpful and only polarized her, until she her confrontation with Wolframite and witnessing the death of Dioptase. She felt awful and twisted for what happened. She knew she was one of the good guys, she was a hero - but was she acting like one as part of the Blood Moon Court? Was the death of Dioptase somehow heroic? Isn't heroism supposed to contain honor? She couldn't find the honor in what had happened; but found honor in the respect that the Negaverse later paid to their dead.
Overall, it was fair to say that Requiem was very confused and had much to think about as she wandered through Destiny City at night. She found herself going to scenic locations, and tonight's destination was one of the city's old skyscrapers. It had a very pretty view of the city and was gorgeous at night when the stars were above, and she hadn't been taken since she last went with her parents a long time ago.
She looked up at the stars, remembering the last visit and thought about all that had changed since. As her eyes panned across the sky, she noticed an energy signal from one of the girls nearby. It was similar to that of a Negaverse agent, but something was off like...
Alkaid. Requiem had heard the name in debriefings of the Blood Moon Court. They had met before, although never formally introduced, they only found each other in combat. First in Elysion, and then in the night of Dioptase's death when she was stabbed in the leg. Her brow furrowed and she thought of how easy it would be to kill the damn girl - shut her in a coffin and toss her over the edge. Too easy. Too cruel. No honor.
She took a different approach instead: forget hostility, it was time for a talk.
"Hey," she said, making her presence known. "Don't be alarmed, I don't want to fight you but if you do try to hurt me, then I won't hesitate. I just want to talk."
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Posted: Sun Apr 24, 2011 10:31 pm
The second that Requiem opened her mouth to announce herself, Alkaid's entire body stiffened. She had noticed the energy signature approaching her at the same time that Requiem spoke, so closely that it was hard to tell which one had truly surprised her first.
She was quiet and unmoving as Requiem laid out her bargain, listening to the senshi but staring down at the streets below where cars and people milled around like miniatures. Alkaid didn't want to be questioned tonight but neither did she want to fight this girl again, especially not at the top of a sky scraper.
So, she chose the lesser of two evils.
"Then talk," it could have been harsh but instead it simply sounded resigned, as if she had no will to argue with what Requiem wanted. She finally turned her gaze to look up at the dark haired senshi, staring at her long and silent with those deep orange eyes. Then she simply waved a hand out along the ledge beside her and let her gaze drop again to the streets. "I don't feel like waging war tonight."
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Posted: Mon Apr 25, 2011 12:13 am
Requiem stared. s**t, they were actually going to talk. What was she going to say? She fidgeted with her hands by her waist as she took a while to formulate a question, or a sentence, or words. Hell, any sound would do to kill the damn awkwardness. She made a weird, uncomfortable face that laid all her awkwardness to be quite visible.
"Uh," she dragged. Aha, brilliant! She did it! She made sounds! It was time for her to move on to making words and sentences. "I like your hair." She supposed it could have been a worse start. She could have said she didn't like it. She paused once more. "I, uh, I'm not very used to talking with the enemy. Are you an enemy? I'm not really sure what the whole deal is with you 'corrupted Senshi' or whatever. Or not corrupted. Whatever you call yourselves, you probably don't consider yourselves corrupted. That would be like me thinking I'm an evil b***h for being a Senshi or...I should stop talking."
She broke eye contact from the blonde-haired dark Senshi and looked out to the city's skyline. It looked so peaceful from up here, hard to believe there was a raging war going on down below. It was like being on a plane looking down at a city, thinking how insignificant everyone else's problems were from looking down from above, but in the case the problems were far more significant than her eyes could even see. Their issues were global.
"I'm sorry about what happened, you know," she said, turning back to the blonde girl. "Not all of it. But there's been a lot of deaths and a lot of losses, it isn't right. Everyone's sound young, I mean what, how old are you? You don't look all that old. I'm not yet eighteen - and we're battling to the death? What the hell." She was rambling, and this girl probably wasn't the person she should be rambling these feelings to. "I hope the deaths on your side were at least honored fairly and not treated like the innocent civilians the Negaverse leave dead in a back alley somewhere."
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Posted: Mon Apr 25, 2011 2:50 am
Alkaid just listened. She wouldn't deny that it was strange having one of her former comrades and current enemies spilling out her guts to her, but at the same time, she also knew what it was like to be unsure and standing on the other end of a conversation like this. Her patience never served her better than it did just then.
"Thanks, but my hair is kind of a huge pain in the a**." It was a nice enough start, if.. a random one. The best Alkaid could do was answer her honestly. But then the rest of her worlds bubbled out and Alkaid was already forming answers in her mind before Requiem had even finished. This was a conversation she wanted to have with all of the Senshi, just to try and help them, to save them from dooming themselves.
"Yes, I'm the enemy, but in the end we're still senshi. I'm just the one that sees the future and what we're doing to this planet." She glanced up at Requiem briefly and then up farther to the stars, reaching out with one hand and making a sweeping motion that encompassed the sky overhead.
"Look at it, Sailor, look at all the hundreds of thousands of stars. Beyond them are even more planets and other bodies that we can't possibly count." She dropped her hand with a frown and leveled her gaze back on Requiem. "Then consider that we are all, every single one of us, crammed onto this one little planet. Do you think that can happen without upsetting something?"
She blew out one long sigh and looked away again, as if she were deeply tired and could feel it all the way to her bones. It was the sigh of someone much older and experienced than the teenager that sat on the top of the building. It was something one would expect from a veteran of war, from an old man in a wheelchair telling his grandkids about the Nazis.
"I don't know how old I am. I don't know when my birthday is, I don't know where I was born, or even who my parents are. The only thing I know is war." Alkaid shifted then, pushing herself up to her feet (though careful to make sure she didn't make any movements toward Requiem) and finally stopped to stand on the ledge where she had just been sitting. She was tired of looking out at the world for the moment. "A war means casualties, both soldier and civilian. What do you think happened when America bombed Japan? What do you think happened when Hitler invaded most of Europe? Civilians were killed by both sides, soldiers died gruesome deaths. It is an inevitability, Sailor."
She should have felt uncomfortable standing on the edge of a roof with her back to a dangerous fall, especially with an enemy standing so close to her. Yet, she didn't. In the grand scheme of things, Alkaid's new allegiance had afforded her the power to save herself from such ordinary deaths, even if she knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that she would eventually die for a war that the world had no idea she was fighting.
"The only thing I know for certain is that I have given up everything. I gave up my life, I gave up my world, and I was reborn as a soldier." She unlocked her hands then and spread them wide out beside her. "What you see is what I am, but for all that I have lost, I have gained faith in my cause. I know what I fight for and why, I know what my fate is." Then she dropped one arm and held the other out, palm up, as if she were questioning the girl before her.
"Do you know who you are, though? Do you know why you fight? Do you doubt yourself when you channel your power against an opponent?" She dropped her hand and, for the first time since their conversation began, Alkaid actually looked sympathetic - even a touch sad. "I will die one day, maybe not long from now, and my only regret will be that I have died and can no longer serve. If you think you'll go to your grave with any regret other than that, you should abandon this cause and save yourself."
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Posted: Mon Apr 25, 2011 11:39 pm
Requiem raised a brow as Alkaid spoke. It was a problem that everyone was crammed on this tiny planet? Yes, it was. But the problem wasn't the Senshi - it was the Negaverse killing everyone. The planet isn't being overcrowded because of the flock of Senshi and Negaverse on the planet, and that isn't the issue. They could live together peacefully if it weren't for the Negaverse hacking away at the population, stealing starseeds of the innocent for their own energy gain.
Her expressions of doubt shifted to concerns and pity as she spoke about her lack of memories regarding her past. She gave up everything? For what? To be on the side of evil? To be prepared for death? What the ******** type of Kool-Aid was the Negaverse serving these Senshi?
"I feel sorry for you," Requiem started. "You say these things, but I'm not buying it. You are proud that you lost everything to become a soldier for the Negaverse? You are proud that you are slowly losing your humanity, and seem to have already lost your memories? And what do you get in return? You get to be on the side that kills the innocent humans? I'm sorry, but I truly feel sorry for you if you think that is right."
She did not say these words with an aggressive tone. Her tone was nothing but sincere and concerned. She did not hate this girl. Requiem had a hard time believing that anyone would willingly lose their humanity and willingly defect from the Senshi to the Negaverse. No, surely she must have been forced into it: tricked, deceived, brainwashed. And Requiem would have none of it.
"I know why I fight. I fight in this war for them," she said, waving her arm, motioning towards the city as a whole. She started to raise her voice; her frustrated anger had kicked in, although there still remained a hint of sadness to her tone. "For the people. To stop the Negaverse from killing them, these innocent people that you apparently cannot remember once being. Do you remember nothing? Can you honestly say that if you had a choice: you could be a human in ignorance of what is happening or a soldier of the Negaverse that pushes forward this war?
Humanity or demon, peace or war, your blissful-in-ignorance life back of this, which one would you pick?"
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Posted: Sun May 01, 2011 2:15 am
The good thing about Alkaid was her ability to remain passive and patient with even the worst attitudes in her face. Nemesis could attest to that one. What was beginning to anger her wasn't Requiem's tone or frustration, but her own inability to drive her point home to the sailor scout.
"Who says I'm losing my humanity?" Her brow rose at that question, her hands slowly falling back to lace her fingers together once more. "That implies that I am heartless, which is untrue. I would not be speaking to you now if it were." There was a small shrug then, and she glanced up at the stars as if she were simply observing them. "I have certainly lost my memories but they were a sacrifice, everything that I am is a sacrifice for someone - not necessarily all for the Negaverse." Then it was there, that sadness, stirring deep in her eyes at the thought of Nemesis and everything they had been through since the night of her corruption. She closed them instantly, even though they were turned skywards. One would be the end of the other, of that she was sure of.
"Don't feel sorry for me," she opened her eyes again and settled them on Requiem once more, "I am in the position that I am because I cared for someone else. I still care, but in a different way, and I will kill her if it means saving her starseed from the destruction of the Negaverse." Then there was a smile - a strange little smile that seemed so final. "I will kill you all if I can do that."
She sighed then, however, and shook her head at Requiem. The dreads swayed slowly behind her with the motion. "That is the problem with you and what the senshi preach. This is not black and white, this is not evil and good. This is a war of salvation." She glanced down at her feet, then swept her gaze out to the cars and people milling around below. "All the Negaverse wants is for us to leave so Earth can once again belong to it's people. They will stop fighting when we are all gone."
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Posted: Mon May 02, 2011 11:58 pm
Requiem listened intently as Alkaid spoke. She became corrupted because she cared for someone else? Who? She almost asked, but bit her tongue, not that she would have expected a straight answer. It was one thing to talk about reasonings with an enemy, it was another thing to discuss personal lives. As she had already learned, enemies aren't too keen on sharing personal information even when under torture.
"Maybe this isn't a black or white issue; there probably are the shades of grey," she said, circling her hand in a small motion as she spoke. "But there's still right and wrong, and the Negaverse are in the wrong. They are the dark side. They've sided with Vader. I may be no heroic Skywalker, but I'm no villain either."
"And what I am is a person of Earth," Requiem continued on. She took a step forward, slowly to remain non-threatening. "I have my own planet that I may have originated from in another life, but all my memories are from here. This planet - Earth - is my home. Requiem is a dead planet of the past, a place that was once a home in a life I do not remember. You may be fighting until we all leave, but I'm fighting until my last remaining home, Earth, is safe from the Negaverse."
"Without your memories, can you even feel that Earth is your home?" her frustration was clear in her tone in this question, but shifted to genuine curiosity. "Or is your home your planet? Do you even have a home?"
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Posted: Wed May 11, 2011 3:53 pm
Alkaid barely understood the awful Star Wars references - she had spent most of her time since the corruption watching documentaries and filling her brain with every type of useful knowledge she could manage. Pop culture was not useful knowledge to her. Despite that, she had been forced to watch the movies with Khaldun not too long ago and could mostly understand what Requiem was trying to say.
Except she was still wrong.
Alkaid knew this frustration, she knew what it was like to try and reason with the Senshi. They were all so caught up in their own personal goals and so damn hard to sway, even just for a moment. They could never be reasoned with and, as she watched Requiem and listened to her long, frustrated speech, Alkaid knew then that her hope of saving Senshi without violence would never be realized.
"I live on Earth, but you are right, I feel no allegiance to it." She shrugged her shoulders and looked out at the tiny lights of cars and the dark blobs of people walking by under street lamps. She brought up a hand and traced the harsh crack of her chest with one gloved finger. "But I can never go home, to my world. I've been bound to this Earth in ways the rest of you never will be."
"You are much more than a person of Earth, don't take that for granted." She glanced up at Requiem, her face a blank mask once more, which was perhaps the best give away that she was feeling some terrible rush of emotion deep beneath it. "Earth is not where you were meant to be, Senshi, and the Negaverse knows that. We all saw Sailor Earth destroy her own people in the mirrors of Elysion and that is why the Negaverse is here. They don't mean to destroy Earth, they mean to protect it."
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Posted: Mon Jun 13, 2011 5:50 pm
"I still sense a disconnect in that logic," she groaned. "Protecting the Earth? That's what I'm doing. I don't see how killing people is protecting it, but hey, maybe there's some wacky-tacky mindwashing that goes down when you join the Negaverse. Who knows. If you can explain it, that'd be great, but I really doubt that there's a logical solution to it that we can both agree on."
She turned her head and rolled her eyes, not wanting to anger the girl. Requiem recalled their first encounter in Elysion, when she had used her power to lure Requiem away. She didn't want to risk her using the ability to lure her off the side of the building. She supposed the only reason it hadn't happened already was because Requiem could easily kill her in this location as well with a simple trap in a coffin and a nice push over the edge. The thought of that brought a light smile. Trapped in a coffin as you fall over a ledge? That's something to include in slasher film of her dreams.
"Look, I have no real affiliation with Sailor Earth," she said. "Nor do I know of him, or what you claim he has done. But destroy the people of Earth? Look around, because the people who are killing the people of Earth now are the Negaverse."
"And again, I'm not loyal to this Sailor Earth. I'm loyal to the Blood Moon Court, and our loyalties lie in different places than the other Senshi running about this city, too afraid to act. Perhaps that makes you hate me more, perhaps it makes you hate me less. I don't want to have to be your enemy - I don't want to be anyone's enemy. Can you understand that?"
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Posted: Sun Jun 19, 2011 5:31 pm
For all that Alkaid was endlessly patient about some things, she was finding more and more that she had no patience left for the Senshi. They talked over her reasoning, dismissed her points with a wave of the hand or roll of the eyes. To her, there was no question about who was truly brainwashed in this situation.
"There is no place for you here and the sooner you all learn to accept that fate, the sooner this world may be at peace." She shrugged and took a careful step backwards, away from Requiem. "We will always be enemies, until you no longer walk this Earth or you're buried in it."
Then she was gone in one swift teleport, leaving Requiem alone on the rooftop.
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