Welcome to Gaia! ::

Summary:

Dear Diary,

I don't know what is going on lately, but I just feel so pent up I want to explode! It hasn't been as long since my last entry, but again, a lot has happened.

Athene, the senshi of beads and Tsui, senshi of tigers, have teamed up with me and we call ourselves PSSG, which is short for the goofy 'Painite Survivor Support Group'. We've all had bad run ins with the general and its sort of something that brings us all together, you know? We've decided that we're going to try and help new senshi AND knights learn about the war and what they're supposed to be doing now that they're powered. Even if we didn't have a purpose, I would love being part of this team... I love being part of something and I love having people I trust around to watch my back. They're some of my dearest friends... and we've even gotten Chaonis to join us!

I'm so incredibly happy that he's part of our team now... for a lot of reasons. Not long after we joined up, we went to the carnival and it was a horribly nightmare of a disaster. Youma and agents broke out everywhere and people were getting hurt and drained and even killed... I felt so helpless to do anything, even upgraded. I got into a fight with a nega named Opal and... she managed to get her hand into my chest and touch my star seed. It was like nothing you can imagine to feel her inside of me. It was just... horrible. Awful. It made me feel weak and dirty and helpless... and that wasn't even the last time I felt like that. A few weeks later I was fighting an agent named Bischofite. He's almost as scary as Painite, but she's like the monster in the closet, while he's a murderer trying to stab you with a knife. That probably makes no sense. He had gotten a guy and hung him over a vat of acid. It was like some terrible super hero comic. I managed to distract and fight him while this other senshi, Leda, showed up and saved the civilian, but he managed to get ahold of me and then he shoved his hand into my chest to. It was even worse the second time and I can't think about it without shuddering and feeling my skin crawl. I want to cry just writing this...

Chaonis is a much happier subject, so I'll go back to him I think. I wish he had been there... he's so strong and I feel so safe with him around. Its part of why I'm happy he's joining the team. We could have used him at the carnival and with the group getting used to fighting together, I just know we're going to be a really strong group. I guess I don't know much about Chaonis outside of being a senshi. He hasn't powered down in front of me yet. I kind of wish I knew if he had a girl friend or not, even though I'm probably beat red just from writing this down. I really like him, but I'm pretty sure he thinks of me like a little sister or something. Ah well. I'm too shy to tell him I like him, and he's probably taken anyway. Hot guys who save girls' lives are never single. Its probably like a rule or something.

I'm not sure where things are going any more. It seems like all I fight now are negaverse agents and nothing I've ever seen makes me think any of them are more than liars and murderers... I feel like I have to do something, but I don't know what to do. Maybe I'll talk to one of my team mates about it, see if one of them knows how to get rid of this feeling of needing to do something drastic.

[Word Count: 653]

I will organize these later... totally not in order. xD;



Ida sighed as she hefted her stack of books higher on her hip and squinted down at the piece of paper she held. If there was one thing about school she hated, it was writing papers. It wasn’t that she disliked learning or researching or visiting the library… if anything, she loved those things, especially at Tony’s library, because she knew both of his personas and he was always so helpful with the research. No, it was the sitting down and committing things to paper that always stumped her. Organizing her thoughts into something coherent was hard… and make it span the required number of pages without padding the margins was even harder.

Reading over the information about the book she was searching for, the teen frowned up at the shelves and scanned them again, her eyes finally falling on the volume she had been searching for for ten minutes. She loved Tony’s library, but sometimes that system really stumped her up. Tucking the paper into one of the books she held, she pulled the new one out and trudged back to the study tables, earning a glare from one of the other students when she let her books drop with a thump. An embarrassed smile was offered back before she slouched down in a chair and purposefully hid her face in one of the books.

At least this time around the subject was half way decent… They had gotten to choose it, so of course she had chosen to research flowers. Granted, it was an odd topic for an persuasive paper (the type she hated the most), but at least she already knew a lot about the subject and could talk at length about them. It was one of the advantages to working in a flower shop, really. The topic she had chosen to argue was a benign one… the therapeutic properties of a flower garden on those with mental illnesses. The mental illness part was a bit of a stumper, but at least she did know some of the theories on how the peacefulness of a garden helped calm the mind. Now she just needed to read up on the subject and somehow regurgitate what she read into a paper on it that would convince a hospital to build a garden.

Another gust sigh broke from her as she propped her head on her hand and leafed through the book, scanning the pages for something interesting or pertaining to her topic. A history of flowers was certainly interesting, but it had little to offer her. Orah spent nearly an hour pouring through the books before she finally couldn’t stand it anymore and thumped the last one closed.

This was so stupid… and she desperately needed a break. Gathering up her books, she made her way to the counter to check them out and hopefully get a nice chat with the librarian and his little dog. That would definitely help her relax enough to get back into this tedious research.

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Orah waited anxiously behind the curtain with the rest of the Meadowview Choir, her fingers nervously twisting a strand of rich brown hair. Tonight, the choir would put all of their practice and hard work to the test as they finally performed for an audience. Biting her lip, the teen smoothed her plain black dress over her hips and shifted in her place on the risers, glancing side to side at her fellow singers. They could do this... no problem. She might feel exposed out here on stage, but she had to keep reminding herself that she was one of a group, and that group had come to work together seamlessly. All she had to do was sing her part and everything would be fine.

The curtain rose as the first strains of orchestra music floated down from the speakers in the auditorium. As one, the choir took a deep breath...

Ach, wie so bald verhallet der Reigen,
Wandelt sich Frühling in Winterzeit!
Ach, wie so bald in trauerndes Schweigen
Wandelt sich alle der Fröhlichkeit!

Orah’s chest rose and fell as the music poured from her throat, her hands clasped in front of her demurely. All around her, other voices joined hers to fill the air with something bigger, something more than any one of them alone.

Bald sind die letzten Klänge verflogen!
Bald sind die letzten Sänger gezogen!
Bald ist das letzte Grün dahin!
Alle sie wollen heimwärts ziehn!

The german words felt sweet, and the lack of understanding just let her enjoy the heart of the music all the more. She felt set free, but also sheltered, cared for, protected... she wasn’t a singular girl, small, plain, average... she was beauty and music, color and life...

Ach, wie so bald verhallet der Reigen,
Wandelt sich Lust in sehnendes Leid.

The sound flowed out over an audience that held silent to listen to it, washing over them like an invisible wave. Feminine voices rose and fell in time and harmony together, the notes intertwining to make the whole of the song.

Wart ihr ein Traum, ihr Liebesgedanken?
Süß wie der Lenz und schnell verweht?
Eines, nur eines will nimmer wanken:
Es ist das Sehnen, das nimmer vergeht.

This was why Orah had joined the choir, this feeling of being of uplifted and surrounded, of being part of something... of feeling like maybe she mattered, like she was being helpful and needed, even if only as a small cog in the machine, or one note in the song. And even if she failed, it wasn’t so bad... the other voices would cover it, hide it from the listening ears. All she had to do was try her best, but the world wouldn’t end if she failed.

Ach, wie so bald verhallet der Reigen!
Ach, wie so bald in trauerndes Schweigen
Wandelt sich alle die Fröhlichkeit!

The song wound down as they always did, voices singing the last verse before trailing off into expectant silence... then the applause as the audience praised them for their singing, for their lovely performance. A large grin spread over Orah’s face and she bowed with the rest, her curls tumbling over her shoulders. This was the other part she loved... the approval for a job well done.

All too soon, it was over, students finding parents and the great group of people dispersing to their homes. But it was okay... soon enough the girls would be back together again, working hard at for the next time they would be able to sing together again.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~



“What’s the story, morning glory?”

Orah jumped as her dad came out of the back room with a chipper greeting and she laughed as relief flooded her.

“Geez, Da! Make a little noise, why don’t you? You scared me half to death.” She giggled as she turned from the register of the store to give her father a tight hug around his pudgy middle. What did it matter if he was a little over weight? He had more important things to do than watch his weight, like raise two kids and run a business… at least that was her opinion.

“Sorry about that, I thought you heard me come down the stairs. Those dang things need a good hammer taken to them; I think the nails are coming loose.” Despite years spent in the U.S., Art Gowan had never completely lost his rolling Irish accent and it was one of the many things Orah loved about her father. Her own accent was nearly indistinguishable, but then, she had only been four when they had left Ireland for Destiny City.

A sly look came over Art’s normally placid face and he gave his daughters ribs a poke with one blunt finger. No amount of washing could remove the stains of dirt that seeped into the cracks of his skin, but that was one of the hazards of working with soil all day long. “What were you thinking about that had you so distracted, hmm? Was it a booooy?” He teased her, his green eyes twinkling with mirth. Absent minded and often distracted, he still retained his good humor, especially with his children - or at least one of his children… Matthew didn’t seem to appreciate it as much as he used to.
Orah felt a hot blush creep up her neck and into her face as she gave her portly father a horrified look.

“I was not thinking about a boy!” Though, of course, now she was… a particular boy she just happened to think was amazing and hot, but who didn’t seem to even notice how she lit up every time he was around… “You’re being silly, Da! If I liked a boy, you know I’d tell you about it. I’d probably have brought him by already to meet you, so you can put that thought right out of your head.” Orah said as she flounced back to the register, covering her heated face with straightening up the counter area. Frankly, that was an outright lie, but there was too much of a line between her two lives for her to do anything of the sort. Had he been a normal boy, from school maybe, what she said would have been true… but it was better to tell a little lie than to let her father start poking around in things it was better he was oblivious of.

Art threw up his hands in self-defense, though a smile lingered on his creased face. There really must be someone… he’d never known her to get so flustered over a comment like that before. He wondered who the lucky guy was and if he’d actually get to meet him any time soon… though, maybe it was just a crush and she hadn’t said anything yet… that seemed like something his shy flower of a daughter would do.

Still grinning, Art clucked his tongue as he headed into the back of the store to start getting some inventory ready to put out on displays. Let her keep her little crush a secret. As long as it made her happy and didn’t interfere with school, he was happy to let her.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~



Sitting on her bed, dressed in her fluffiest, most comfortable pajamas, Orah clutched her knees to her chest, her face buried in them, and stared out the window at a peaceful DC night. At least, it looked peaceful from here. From personal experience, she knew it was far from it. There was a war going on, and if the place didn’t look like a typical war zone, that’s because the soldiers weren’t normal soldiers either. No, the war was magical in nature, and everyone took pains to keep it all under wraps… even if it seemed like the Negaverse was making a change to that policy with that scandalous documentary that had aired the other night.

The teen squeezed her knees tighter as she pressed her eyes against the soft flannel fabric, trying to calm her breathing down. The light by her bed was on, but it was the only light. She had been unable to stand complete darkness, not after what had happened, but the almost harsh brightness of the main light had seemed far too much for the introspective mood she was in. The dim, warm glow of her bedside lamp had been a perfect medium and the shadows she could see were familiar ones that lacked the fear of the night outside.

Sarah… she was never going to be able to forget that name, or the night she had watched her die and come back to life as something else… something twisted and horrible. Every time Orah tried to sleep, the dreams flooded her mind and sent her shoot up in bed, her heart beating so fast she felt like it would explode. That was a big reason why she could find enough peace of mind to sleep right now. Never before had senshi life and real life blurred together quite so much as it had that night and it had hit her in a very deep place. More than ever, it all felt so real and immediate and the possibility of it spilling over onto her family terrified her. Orah had to admit that thus far she had been blissfully unaware of the danger, overlooking it as something that happened to other families, other people that she didn’t know. She couldn’t hide behind that safety screen anymore and she felt woefully weak and vulnerable. If something happened to the people she cared about, she honestly didn’t know what she would do. Explode into a million pieces maybe?

Lifting her head again, Orah looked out of the dark city and studied the lighted windows of other night owls in her neighborhood. Lucky people… they didn’t have her worries, her responsibilities. At least, unlike last time, she wasn’t thinking about quitting. That would solve nothing, and she knew that. No, she was going to have to fight twice as hard now, tooth and nail, to keep the war away from her family. She was going to have to be stronger than ever and maybe let go of some of the softness she had managed to keep with her so far. Maybe if she beat down enough negaverse officers she could finally find peaceful sleep again… maybe then Sarah could truly rest in peace and she would start seeing her human face when she closed her eyes, and not the twisted face of a youma.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~



The tantalizing smell of cookies filled the small kitchen of the apartment above the flower shop and the young daughter of the shopkeeper hummed as she pulled a tray out of the over and placed another onto the rack. Orah sniffed appreciatively and felt her mouth water as she placed the cookie sheet on the stove. Wielding a metal spatula, she careful worked the cookies up and transferred them to a cooling rack alongside a good dozen others that were already on their way to being cool.

Suddenly a brown hand shot into her vision and snagged one of the cookies, quickly withdrawn to be followed by a huff huff sound as the owner of the hand tried to cool the hot cookie he had just stuffed into his mouth.

“Matthew!” Orah squealed as she rounded on her brother, swatting at him as he teasingly held the cookie out of her reach. “Those are for my friends!”

“But I’m hungry!” The brunette said around his mouthful, the words nearly garbled as he tried to keep his mouth open to cool. His had a mischievous look in his green eyes and was obviously enjoying both the delicious treat and the fact that he had riled up his older sister. Her buttons were so easy to push too… The way she was constantly fussing over him was annoying and any time he pushed back, she always got so flustered.

“You bottomless pit… we ate less than an hour ago! If you want a snack, go make a sandwich or something…” She said as she scowled at him, hands on her apron-clad hips. Orah didn’t understand his near constant need to get a rise out of her… she was just trying to take care of him and her father too, and it was a hard enough job without him trying to work her up. Not that she really blamed him, when it came down to it. Matthew had only been two when their mother had died and he claimed he couldn’t remember anything about her.

It was sad… Orah had clear memories of the graceful, elegant, Middle Eastern lady. She tried so hard to fill the hole her mother had left in their lives, but she was afraid she would just never be able to really do that… and clearly Matthew felt the loss almost more than she and her father did.

At least he’d gotten over the stage where he got into fights at school when the other kids made fun of his single father household. Going with her father to pick him up and explain the situation to the teachers had never been fun and everyone had gone home unhappy.

“I’m hungry for cookies.” Matthew teased his sister as he dodged her, snatching up a few more cookies as she tried to bat his hands away. Grinning with teeth streaked with chocolate, the teenager danced out of his sister’s reach with his ill-gotten gains clutched to his chest. “Thanks sis!” He teased her as he darted out of the room, presumably to hide in his bedroom and eat his loot in peace.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~



Visiting her asteroid was always a bitter sweet affair for Ida. On one hand, she loved being in a new place where she was guaranteed there would be no one around but her. Nothing but the wind made any noises there and nothing but flowers swaying in the breeze made any movement. Warmth filled her whenever she was at her home world and a sense of peace and rightness filled her. One the other hand, Asteroid Ida was a desolate place… sure there was some grass and some wild flowers springing up through the seemingly rich soil, but there were no animals there except a few bugs that lived off the flowers. Everywhere she looked, talk tree-buildings reminded her of what used to be there – or at least what she suspected used to be there. Sometimes she saw flashes of things in her head when she was here, things almost like memories, but of people and things she could swear she had never really seen before.

Now that she was a super senshi, visiting Ida had been easier to do more frequently and its senshi had made use of the place as a sort of retreat when she needed a break from it all… like a club house out in the woods or in a tree in the back yard. Not that she’d ever had one of those, but she figured the idea was probably the same. Some place that was all your own that you could truly be yourself in. There was so much to explore on Ida and the more she saw, the more the fragmented images started to come together into something more meaningful... like the first building she had entered when she visited for the first time. She could remember waking up in the bedroom and looking out over the lush gardens that used to surround the city and sitting at one of the desks and talking to someone who's face she couldn't quite remember. It was all so dream like... but today wasn't a day for memories. Today was a day to have a little fun, to relax.

Feeling silly, but at the same time eager, Ida slipped into the large building at the edge of the dead forest, the one she had dubbed ‘hers’. Okay, so the whole planet was hers, but this particular tree seemed the most like home to her. Dropping her bag, the senshi powered down and stripped out of her school uniform, pulling out a costume she had sneakily bought on her way home one day with pocket money she had saved up for weeks. It was stupid and silly, but for once in her life Orah was going to do something purely because she wanted to for herself, not because she wanted to do it for someone else. So much of her life was filled with taking care of other people, and normally, that made her happy. But lately... it felt like she gave and gave and got so little back. No one knew she was a senshi save a few friends, and no one ever thanked her for anything she did while powered. Orah needed a moment where she didn't have to worry about someone else, for once.

The outfit she pulled out was the filmy, draping fabric of a greek goddess, a stupid, over simplified costume fro holloween... but it had looked so pretty in the picture. Honestly, for once she just wanted to feel beautiful, and indulge in a fantasy she had had since she was a child. Hair in a loose, waving flow down her back, the senshi of orchids stepped out barefoot to wander her home world. The next couple of hours was filled with activities she’d never been able to indulge in as a child… pretending to be a princess as she walked what used to be lush gardens, gathering wild flowers that sprang up everywhere they could find purchase. When she felt tired of wandering, she sat down for a bit in the shade and wove some flowers into a crown to complete her look, tucking it down over her dark curls. It was a dream-like afternoon, something she had desperately needed. For a time, Orah completely forgot about Earth, her responsibilities, and the chaos of the war. For a short, blissful space of time, she was Princess Ida, alone in the universe, with only flowers and the breeze of her world to keep her company.

As the sun began to set, the teen moved back to her tree and unpacked the other goodies she had brought. A sandwich, a thermus of soup and a can of cola made a satisfying dinner and a candle gave her a warm, romantic light when the sun had set. Reluctant to go home just yet, Orah took some time to explore the rooms of her old home once more and let the memories she could feel bubbling up in her brain sweep her away. She got lost in it and almost without thinking, she wandered deep below ground in the tower's lower floors and into something that looked like a workshop. Oddly though, like everything else here, there was precious little metal or plastic to be seen, just lots of wood and green things, and surface made of some clear substance... maybe sap or resin? It was hard to tell. A workbench took up most of one wall and it was while wandering down this that she found a pile of mismatched parts, piled in a heap. Someone had probably had no use for them and left there here to gather dust, but to Orah, they were fascinating. They looked so much like machinery, but different too... and of course, non-functional. A few of the pieces she tucked into her pack, deciding that they could maybe be remade into something like jewelry, so she could always keep a piece of Ida with her.

Near the back of the pile, she stumbled across something a bit different than the other bits and she pulled it out curiously, brushing off the dust with a fold of her dress. What...? A compact? It was roughly the size of her hand, round, and had an image of an orchid across the face of it. Opening it up showed more defunct technology, but the whole thing was so interesting... and it fit so well in her hand... It was an easy decision to tuck that into the pack as well and finally it was time to go home.

The goddess costume she left in the bedroom's closet, in case she should ever want to wear it again, and left the candle on the desk by the bed. Orah made a note to bring more things with her next time... things she could use to make the space more comfortable for the times she visited, like today. Taking one last look around, the teen sighed and a small smile quirked her list. Her little hide away... did any other senshi ever feel this way about their home planet? As she pressed the button on her phone to return home, a gentle night breeze picked and rustled the grass where she had been. Ida would sleep quietly while it waited for its senshi to return again.

Abruptly, grass was brushing against Ida's hips and for a long, long time all she could do was stand there and stare out over the gently rolling hills of her asteroid, her mind in such a tangle of thoughts and emotions she was unable to do anything else.

Last night... had it really been last night?... she could swear the night had never ended, that she had never somehow stumbled home and lain in bed staring at the ceiling for the remaining hours until the light of dawn had touched her room in shades of pink and gold. Orah had begged off work and school, claimed she was sick with some sort of twenty four hour bug. Her family had accepted the excuse to play hooky from responsibility with an ease born from sheer lack of use, at least mostly. She was never sick, never took a day off unless she had to, so why should they wonder? She could tell that Matthew had though... had read through the mask she had put up and seen the emotions she was so desperately bottling up.

There was no where she could safely deal with this upswell of emotions... at least on Earth. No where she could go where she'd be guaranteed privacy, where she'd be safe to properly lose herself to the storm that was swirling in her chest. That's why she was here, on the planet that shared her name. Here was the one place that truly belonged only to her, where she was safe from chaos and loved ones worried about her suddenly unraveling mental state.

The soft breeze tugged at her hood as Ida felt the chaos inside of her well up, clogging her throat and squeezing her heart as though trying to force it from her chest. She couldn't deal with this... it hurt so much to even think about... and like last night, the young senshi threw her head back as she screamed into the blue, cloudless sky, venting all the anxiety and pain she felt into the atmosphere. It was only when she ran out of breath and her throat stung with a rasping ache that her screaming stopped and Ida let her knees collapse under her, sending her sprawling into the soft, green grass. Brown eyes stared at the sky as she struggled to process through all the thoughts that rushed about and clogged up the normally smooth flow.

Bischofite was Alois. As he bled his life out on the ware house floor, the general had lost all of his power and reverted to the person behind the face paint and feathers, the man she had for so long assumed was some sort of twisted horror bent on killing everything she held precious. She remembered the first time she had set eyes on him, back in that fetid alley. He'd suspended a helpless man over a vat of acid and it had been something like a villain in a movie, threatening the man's death if she didn't exchange herself for him. She remembered the first time she had seen the young man with the golden eyes and dark hair... when he had come into her shop requesting flowers for the grave of his father and she'd shared her own loss with him for the first time, attempting to find common ground with this stranger.

How could these two people be the same? That was the concept she was having such a hard time wrapping her head around, and yet she suspected that had more to do with the feelings inherit in it than in the lack of similarities between the two. Someone who had stood outside of the events, who could see things from both sides might have put two and two together, but she had been too wrapped up with trying to befriend him to wonder if he led a double life like she had.

Ida had to face that part of what bothered her about this was that she had trusted him. She had invited him into her home, introduced him to her family... had spent so much time with him over the course of his withdrawl, and all that time she had been sitting beside the monster from uncounted nightmares she'd had at night. She had given herself to the man that she had watched turn an innocent girl into a mindless monster, a girl she had known from school. The same hands that had run over her body had plunged into her chest and touched her starseed, threatening to rip out her life...

The feel of things crawling down her cheeks jerked Ida from her thoughts and her slender fingers found wetness on her skin. Once aware of it, she realized she had been crying for a while now and soon sobs shook her as the senshi lay collapsed in the grass, small white and blue flowers nodding their heads serenely around her. Looking upwards, Ida stared into a sky that ran from periwinkle at the edges to a deep royal blue towards the center. Pain seemed a palpable thing now, ripping through her with each choking sob she gave and shaking her whole body. She had been such a fool... such a blind, stupid girl to not have seen what was right in front of her. He could have killed her, killed her family, burned her world to ashes around her while stripping every naive and innocent scrap from her soul. He could have so easily, and happily, ruined her life in horrendous ways... but all he had done was leave greasy black fingerprints all over her spirit, fingerprints she couldn't erase no matter how hard she tried. She was irrevocably stained now, tarnished, and she would never be able to get that part of herself back... a part she had given up to him because she had wanted to, because he had made her feel things that had excited her.

What was wrong with her?

It felt like hours that Ida lay in the dirt, writhing with inner turmoil, staring upwards. The sky was so blue... so peaceful. The sun was gentle, warm... the grass and the soil beneath felt familiar and welcoming, like the arms of her father around her. As the senshi lay there, she felt like a thread of her soul came loose and spun off into the sky, as though she were unraveling and with it went all of the pain and betrayal in a slow, steady drain. Muscles slowly unclenched, slowly relaxed one by one as Ida let her misery bleed into the atmosphere of her precious planet. For a moment she could almost swear that it took the pain from her, absorbed it like a plant taking in dirty water to purify it... leaving behind a strange weightlessness that nonetheless ached a little around its empty edges. Peace, though slow to come and tenuous, filled her gradually until finally Ida looked upwards with a dry face and weary eyes.

Last night's events were not the end for her, had not broken her. She was hurt, damaged, and would be forever less than she had been before... but once she accepted what had happened, maybe she could move forward. She could learn to live with the shame...

She could not change what had happened, or how it had happened. She couldn't change who Alois, who Bischofite had been. She couldn't bring back the young man she had very nearly almost had feelings for. The future was uncertain from this point, but this had been a resolution of sorts, an end to something in her life that had been a source of growth as well as deep pain. She knew where she stood with Bischofite now, he had precious few secrets to keep from her, though she could not say the same about herself from him. She didn't know where she was going to go from here, but for now she simply wanted to be and let her planet soothe her mental and emotional wounds with its gentle warmth and welcoming embrace.

Ida had always felt like a sanctuary to her, and today it had cemented that idea. It would become an escape for her, a place to rest and recuperate when the stress of life grew to be too much. She knew now that here the pain would ease and bleed away into the reawakening planet, turned like a decaying body into fertilizer for its new growth. Eyes closing, Ida let an exhausted sleep take her, sending her winging into oblivion for a blessed amount of time.

She wandered the dusty corridors like a ghost, silent and mournful. White boots disturbed the stillness of centuries both with their passage and the soft sound the golden heels made against the wooden floor, but there was nothing here to remark on it save the trail of footsteps she left in her wake.

Silence is good right now. I find that I'm poor company lately and the looks of worry are such a strain... There is nothing any of them can do.

Brown fingers remained firmly at her sides, at times clenched in dark purple fabric to resist the urge to trail along a bannister here, a beautiful statue there... No matter how many times she had scrubbed her hands, to the point of leaving sore redness behind, she could not rid herself of the oily feel of being unclean. She didn't dare touch the things here, not yet... She was dealing with her own taint, but she was loathe to spread it. This place felt sacred to her... It didn't deserve such a fool for a protector or to take on any of her stain.

You left behind greasy black prints on my spirit every time your fingers touched my skin... but the more I scrub, the more it spreads. I'm stained, now. I don't know if I'll ever be clean again.

Doors both open and closed passed silently by and with them came half remembered people and things. Remnants, phantoms of a life that felt more like a dream. They bustled with a purpose in and out of the rooms, tending to the people within. She thought perhaps this place had been a hospital of sorts, but many of the memory-rooms looked far too comfortable and lived in for the hospitals she knew on Earth. Long term or live-in care maybe? It seemed likely.

They're more real to this place than I am. I'm the one haunting these halls, lost and alone.

Soon familiar-not-familiar steps were under her shoes and she climbed higher into the once-living tower, a bank of window holes filled with something like, but unlike glass, giving her a breathtaking view of the empty city as she ascended. So many tree buildings like this one, all just as empty and filled with memories... But this one was different. She'd explored some of the others, but as she stepped into the spacious top floor, the reason was apparent.

The living space was luxurious, but lacked what she would consider a lived-in feel. Granted, it had been centuries since anyone had lived here, but there were so few personal touches. Nothing of the woman she had been, when she was born on this planet. This had been her suite once, she felt certain of it, but it held no sentimental feeling like other places she had seen. Maybe it was... simply a place to sleep... to be closer to her work....



The memory flooded Ida with more force than any she'd had thus far, making her stagger as she put a hand out to the wall. What...? No, that was a stupid question. After that day with Alois, she knew exactly what she had been doing with that man. Her face heated as she felt the residual tingle of a touch remembered. So, who...? Even as she tried to grasp for a face, his eluded her, as did any name to put to him. She couldn't even remember the color of his hair, or his eyes... just his voice, murmuring things only said between lovers.

Feeling overheated, Ida retreated down the stairs as she struggled to catch the breath she had been unconsciously holding. That had been so similar, but so very different than with Alois... she clung to the memory even as it soured her stomach. She couldn't deal with that memory, not now, not while others were so fresh... but later she was going to have to figure out who her lover had been. She found she desperately wanted to know and no more memories, half remembered or otherwise, assaulted her as she slipped out of the tower, losing herself in the tall grass of her asteroid and the comfort she always felt under the Idan sun.

Ida could swear that she could feel the difference between Idan ground beneath her feet and Terran. There was just something about her own homeworld's soil, some etherial quality, that she felt like she could pick out when she made the jump from Earth to Ida. Maybe it was all in her imagination, but she felt warmer here, more at home, than she did on Earth.

It had been a long, tiring, trying week since she'd last escaped to her refuge. Seven long, dragging days and seven nightmare filled nights that brought no rest. She'd spent most of it thinking about being here and planning what she was going to bring when she came. Summer on Earth was a boon to her right now because it meant no school to take up her time and pull her back from her escape, even if her family was starting to give her looks for these weekly trips with ever weaker excuses for where she was going and what she was doing. Most of the time it was explained away as visiting friends, or getting a jump on studying for college in the fall. They accepted what she fed them, having no reason to call her out for lying, but they were suspicious all the same.

But, that worry was not for now and Ida shrugged off her Earthly troubles like a too-large coat as her golden heels crunched in the grass. Ida faced herself towards the tree line and set off at an easy pace, her steps holding more bounce than they had moments before on the concrete of the sidewalk around the park. Slung over her shoulders were two bags, filled to their brims with gardening supplies. Watering cans, trowels, hand shovels, seeds and a few young plants tucked where they wouldn't be crushed... her trip here last time had given her new ideas and problems to be solved; like how she was going to keep her plants watered while she was away for an entire week. The young woman half expected to find everything she'd planted dead or not sprouted, without regular watering to help them grow. It had been an oversight she hadn't had a remedy for last time, but this time? Hopefully her solution would work, or her hours spent researching irrigation would be wasted.

To her surprise, the sight that greeted her was quite different. Ida wasn't even sure she had approached the right flower bed at first, though a sweeping glance assured her that this bed was very obviously different from the rest. Rather than the bare dirt she was expecting... small seedlings had sprouted, easily weeks older than the ones she had planted just seven days ago. Dropping her bags to the side, the senshi knelt to inspect her plants, assuring herself that they were indeed the Earth varieties she had brought here.

This rate of growth, though... there was no way these plants could look so matured in the short amount of time they had been here. Ida had planted these things before, she had a rough idea of how long it took them to grow. Which begged the question, was it something about Ida that had done it? Nutrients in the soil, something in what water the plants could find, the air quality? Ida was not a botanist, despite what she might have been in her past life and her current work as a florist.

Rocking back on her heels, the eternal lowered herself to sit with her legs crossed, brown hands against the ground to unconsciously work their slender tips into the soil. The answer was here, and in her memories, she was sure. If she concentrated... maybe she could dig something up... The memory came without even trying, as though it had been waiting for her to release her hold so it could filter into her mind...



Ida frowned as she dropped her eyes to her plants, fingers reaching to run along the edge of one. The peek into her past was enlightening in more than one way... Dactyl, her brother, was also a fighter, defending transports from marauders and the asteroid gave off radiation? The idea was worrying, but thinking about it... people had lived here. She'd been here for how long now? And neither they nor her had gotten sick from it. From what she had observed, it even promoted growth in plants. That wand had seemed to be a way to control the flow of it, allowing one to guide the growth of a plant. Was... was that how the buildings had been made? All the instruments, the arch ways, the furniture... it was mind boggling to consider.

Finally rolling to her feet, Ida broke out the contents of her bags to start work on another flower bed, this time with vegetable plants. She resolved to bring paper and something to measure with next time. It would be a good idea to run some little experiments and see what she could figure out about this radiation business and what it was doing to the plants here.