Her planet had always been a source of comfort and peace, from the very start. It had always felt safe, welcoming and deliciously private. No one came here save who she brought, and no one else got to decide what she did with it or what she did while she was there. She had visited it for fun, for relaxation, for comfort when the stress of life and her failures grew to be too much. It had been like a quiet friend's shoulder to cry on when her heart had broken and warm arms when she was in distress. It had become even more important since the day she had transcended and opened the link between them more fully. Since then, she had enjoyed a deep sort of connection that she had never experienced before and it had been like finding a missing part of your soul.
Ida was safety, comfort, friendship, love, support... Until it had struck out at her. The day she had brought Scholomance there in a bid to open his eyes had opened hers instead and she couldn't forget it. She had nightmares, once or twice, of vines bursting up from the ground to trap her and run her through with thorns like swords. She'd had another of the dark, dead zone spreading like a disease across her planet until everything was withered and gray. It scared her deeply to think of such a thing happening, even more than the trapping vines. Ida was supposed to be lush and pastoral... That vision didn't belong here.
Paranoia had prompted her to bring a can of spray paint with her on one of her weekly trips. Every time she visited, she checked the line of where green met black. It was impossible to tell if it had moved, but it nagged at her until she brought the paint and made a careful line in the grass, butted up against the start of the dead zone. It would mark the current boundary and if it moved, she'd be able to tell. It offered a little comfort, though not much.
Questions about the strange Orchid temple, for lack of a better description, nagged at Ida as well. She hand seen Orchids anywhere else on the asteroid. They had been in a place of obvious prominence and they made up her very sphere. They were important, but why? The questions are what prompted her to start searching her Tower more methodically than she had thus far. She started at the base, in the room the doors let into, but as before, it offered little information. It was, as far as she could tell, simply a sort of foyer or lobby, a place to greet guests or hold small social gatherings in its comfortable chairs. Halls branched off to either side and Ida made her way down the left side, exploring the rooms off of it as she went.
There was not much to see... Though full of pieces of the life's of people who had once lived and worked here, they did not hold any clues she could make sense of. They seemed entirely mundane and Ida suspected them of being storage and workshops on this level, at least. The hall even curled all the way around to let out into the lobby again, leaving her disappointed.
The next level received the same treatment as The sun tracked slowly across Ida's sky, and the next. She found what she suspected to be patient rooms and some offices. Medical apparatus hung from walls and ceiling, but it was too different from the things she was learning to use in school for her to do more than guess at what they did. Even the beds she assumed were meant for patients were different, grown up out of the floor rather than free standing. maybe they are meant for long term stay, she mused as she ran a hand over one of the smooth, curved 'railings' around the edge. It reminded her of a nest, almost...
Ida grasped the edge and pushed herself up, swinging a kneed over the railing as she climbed into the medical bed. Stretching out in it was surprisingly comfortable... It was longer than she was, and wide enough she probably could have lain side by side with Hver in it. The thought made her blush, smiling to herself as she laid back. It was a tempting thought to pursue...
The orderlies lifted the patient gently from the gurney into the cradle of the medical bed, settling them into the center. She looked pale and drawn, her lips tinged blue. Ida watched with a critical eye, both to the sick woman's comfort and the placement of the proper nodes along the edge inside the bed.
"You may go now." She said with stiff formality her workers had not earned from her, but it was hard to enough just to maintain a pleasant mask as she watched the woman in the bed for any sign of movement. The orderlies saluted her silently as they left. No doubt they would be talking behind her back, but she suspected only part of it would be her reaction to this particular patient. The rest would be the patient herself.
Ida paced to the bed with even steps, the soft material of her dress sweep around bare ankles. Gold, rare on this planet without mines, glinted and jingled about her wrist as she reached to touch the screen on the side and call it to life. Information scrolled past, limited vitals the bed was able to sense.
In her mind's eye, she didn't see heartbeat or respiration read outs... She saw broken and twisted bodies. She saw women and children bleeding their lives out into the soil of her world. Anger bloomed, hot and heavy in her chest.
Even as advanced as her world was, even as much disease as they had learned to cure, there were some illnesses that were beyond even their reach. Broken minds that sought pleasure in death, that delighted in pain and fear, we're not something you could simply synthesize a cure for and feed like a pill. This woman could not be cured... And the people she had slaughtered in her derangement could not be brought back.
Ida's fingers twitched and finally she reached to activate one of the functions of the bed, stepping back to watch. Vines wiggle out of the nodes and her eyes narrowed as they began to wrap around wrists and ankles, crawling their blind way up legs and arms. One curled around her throat, restraining her fully to the bed. Then, suddenly, protrusions formed and shot out, piercing the woman with needle-like thorns.
It gave Ida a strange sense of satisfaction to watch her groan in pain as she was pierced by thorns and as soon as she realized it, horror swept in to take its place. Bile rose in her throat and she swallowed thickly, shocked at herself. This was not the oath she had taken... This was not Ida's principle of healing, no matter who came to their doorstep. It was not Idan, to delight in another's pain, no matter what they might deserve. Ida pressed the back of her hand to her mouth as she spun and left the room with a quicker step, needing fresh air to clear the smell of blood from her nose.
Ida squealed as she thrashed and threw herself out of the bed, staring at it in horror as she stumbled away from it.
Was that the source of the vines? Was that what they had been used for? That was... That was horrible... How could someone do that to someone else? The senshi darted out of the room much as her predecessor had, seeking the relief of empty hallways. The sound of her boots on the wood floors sounded softly, the only sound in this empty and discomforting place. This place that had once made her feel so safe and welcomed...
Up the stairs and down a hall brought Ida up shirt before a large, arching double doorway, save there were no doors in the portal. She stopped, pulled out of her thoughts by the unfamiliar place. The hall curved, cutting off sight of this from the stairs... It's why she had never seen it. Slow steps took her through and to her startlement... Inside was a replica of the Orchid temple in a far grander scale.
Ida turned slowly as she stared, her eyes sweeping up the walls to the arching ceiling, bowls protruding from the vertical surface to hold bunches of Orchid plants and the bright faces of their flowers. Great sweeping beds of them spread out from her feet, filled with flowers. Curving, graceful paths cut between them and wandered off to other doors and to the stately formation in the center of the room. Even this echoed the one in the small village, but at three times the size, and rather than three curving trunks, this one had six curling around a broad open area in the center and reaching to the ceiling.
From where she stood, Ida could see benches and small spaces where people must have come to sit and relax. It was like a great indoor garden, and if her mind had been in a better place, she might have found it wonderful and peaceful. She still felt that, in part, but there was still the creeping unease. As she wandered towards the center, her arms wrapped around her waist, the memory took her less deeply this time, softer... She could still the the world about, as though overlaid...
Ida laughed as she drew another graceful curve with her stylus on the architect's drawing pad.
"Your designs are always so still, Aorn." She smiled to take the sting out of it, adding a flourish at the top of an arch. "Yes, these are power collectors, but that doesn't mean they can't be beautiful AND functional."
The design was a broad hall, lined in arches. Ida had drawn a triple helix shape in the center, liking how it drew the eye and commanded attention.
"This power comes from our planet. It is what makes everything around us possible. It comes directly from Ida to us like mother's milk, to nurture us and help us grow, and these power centers are where that gift is collected. Don't you think that deserves a little celebration?" The dark woman reached out to rest a hand in the young designer's shoulder, offering him a warming smile.
"Don't worry so much, Aorn. You're still new to this position. You'll grow into it and your designs already hold so much promise. In this case, just... Imagine it like a gift you would like to give your mother. What beautiful thing would you like to make for her? Draw that." She said as she chuckled and gave his shoulder a squeeze.
The memory was a surprising one and Ida stared with new eyes at the sweeping lines of this room as she passed between the curling pillars into the bed in the center. A power plant? Was this how they gathered the energy used down below? It was... Amazing. She could hardly take it in. This room, these flowers... They were the heart of the link between the people of Ida and their planet. They had made all of this possible and it filled her with a light and airy feeling.
Things like this... This was what she wanted to protect. Places that had meant things to people, history still standing and living even after a thousand years. A planet struggling to come back to life after tragedy... Now threatened by a creeping waste.
Something caught at Ida's boot and she stumbled to a halt, glancing down with brows drawn together. Something had caught around the toe, which was strange considering she'd seen no exposed roots anywhere here. As she watched, the bit of wood moved... Stretching up to curl across the white leather, the tip seeking back and forth.
Ida jerked back in horror from the vine that had grabbed her during her visit with Scholomance, the same she had seen torturing a woman in her vision. It curled into itself at the loss of her support, then reached again, growing up from the ground. Ida choked down her panic and spun on a heel, beating a quick retreat before more joined the first and pinned her feet to the ground. There was no Saturn page to free her this time and she did not want to end up like the woman in her memory....
Word count: 2110
