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 Posted: Mon Jun 03, 2013 8:27 pm
Delphine had left her apartment early in the evening - no longer did she have to sneak out to avoid her parent's prying eyes. There were perks to living on her own, and her aunt had even given her a job that kept her remotely busy during the day and gave her some money to work with. It wasn't a lot, but it was enough. Her father took pity on her from time to time and gave her money when she asked for it. Usually it was with the promise to pay him back some day, though they both knew it wouldn't be any time in the near future. All in all, she was doing fairly well, and now that her life had pieced itself back together she could focus on other things.
Trips to planet Nemesis had decreased over the past couple of months, mostly because when visions did come they only proved to be upsetting. Sometimes, it was better not to focus too much on the past - but most of the time she found herself doing just that. She had to wonder if the bitterness she felt in her past life somehow still resided in her starseed, carried over in its rebirth. Delphine had her suspicions that part of the old Nemesis still carried on in her soul - why else would she have such vivid memories of the past?
And here she was, pondering the past again!
Sailor Nemesis shook her head, her braided pig tails loosening and unraveling a little. The Eternal Senshi of Decay was sitting on the roof of a long abandoned bakery. She was sure that someone had bought the place recently and that it was going to be renovated, but for now it remained uninhabited. There were more than a few energies in the area - it was clear this place was well-patrolled, at the very least. However, that made it one of the last places Nemesis would like to be. She didn't necessarily like meeting new senshi - she didn't want to waste time leading and instructing when there were others who were far more equipped for the task.
She was a fighter, a woman of action, despite her current appearance of sitting on her bum and doing nothing. There were probably some captains or lieutenants running around, but she couldn't be bothered to beat the crap out of them tonight. The new senshi needed someone to practice fighting on - let the weak take on the weak until they grew strong. Then, maybe, Nemesis wouldn't be so goddamned annoyed with them all.
Finally the senshi rose onto her feet, blue eyes scanning over rooftops and street lights. It was definitely time to abandon this area before she got stuck in a meet and greet.
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Posted: Mon Jun 03, 2013 8:51 pm
Just as Nemesis rose to her feet, a soft thud announced the arrival of someone else. It had taken a lot of practice to learn how to jump in heels without making enough noise to alert every Nega in a half mile radius, but she had done it. She managed to rise at the same distance, standing very still on the edge of the roof while she waited for Nemesis to recognize that she was friend and not an ambush.
"You're the strongest aura in the area," she propped one hand on her hip and thrust it out a bit as she spoke. Her tone was light and there was a very faint smile curling the corners of her lips, but the look in her vibrant pink eyes was anything but airy. "And you know it, because you're sitting out here in the open where anyone can find you."
She took a few steps closer then, closing the distance between the two vastly different ranked senshi. Midas hands trailed the tails of her bow like scarves, wavering lightly in the breeze across the rooftops.
"But, you know," she brought her hand up as she spoke, propping it just under her chin, "I don't seem to know you at all. I've been gone a while though, so maybe I just never got the chance. I'm Midas, senshi of Greed and genuine fan of getting-s**t-done. And you, my lady, look like an expert in that field of study.."
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Posted: Mon Jun 03, 2013 9:19 pm
Nemesis laughed, the sound itself rough, but the action rather spoke to her pleasure at Midas' greeting. Weak senshi that Midas was, she at least had her head properly in the game whereas some eternals still had no idea what they should be doing. "I'm Nemesis, Eternal soldier of Decay. You're right, I like to get s**t done, and I have to say that I'm pretty ******** good at it." Then, she pointed out what obviously mattered to her most in this conversation. "However, it doesn't look like you've made much progress in getting s**t done yourself. It must have been a long while that you've been gone, if you're still just a senshi."
It wasn't that she was just judging Midas because she hadn't powered up to Super, rather being a Super Senshi proved that someone had the drive and mettle to try and fight this war. Midas could say the right things, but Nemesis saw nothing that proved that they were anything more than words.
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Posted: Mon Jun 03, 2013 9:31 pm
"Touche."
Instead of arguing with Nemesis, Midas simply nodded and returned her own knowing, half smile. She knew she was weak, she was aware that outwardly she appeared fresh on the scene. But she also knew that looks could be deceiving.
"I was gone for the better part of the last year, over seas." She shrugged her shoulders a little and looked around them as if suddenly seeing Destiny City for the first time, stretched out in miles of bright lights from the rooftops. "I studied the myths of other countries, followed leads to places that could be important, I looked for anything about our past here on Earth." Her eyes drifted back to Nemesis and that knowing half smile curled wider. "It didn't give me much time for leveling up."
She brushed back a few strands of tangerine hair, untangling it from where it was stuck in her lashes. Then she simply folded her arms under her chest, leaning into the brick side of a chimney jutting up through the rooftop. "But I'm back, with my own theories, and looking for people that want to actually work towards the end of this war."
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Posted: Mon Jun 03, 2013 9:57 pm
Nemesis considered herself more equipped to handle an argumentation (or at least win it), but Midas did not give her one. The senshi seemed to accept the fact that she was considerably weak in comparison to other senshi that had been around for a while. It was another point towards Midas' favor that the senshi took Nemesis' complaints in stride. Really, Nemesis would love nothing more than to put some newbie senshi in their place... but Midas was proving not to be that. She seemed rather knowledgeable, even if she lacked the physical strength to match the aforementioned knowledge. It was likely that Nemesis would continue to hold Midas' strength against her, but for the moment it did not get in the way of their conversation.
"Why would you waste so much time chasing down our past here on Earth? We're magical space beings, your time would have been better spent on your homeworld, chasing down remnants of your past life. I'm sure the knowledge you'd gain through that would be more valuable." Nemesis didn't agree with Midas' course of action. She didn't really think that their past on Earth mattered. The only world that had ever mattered to the Sailor Nemesis of a thousand years ago was planet Nemesis. Perhaps there was something to seeking out their past in general, but it was Nemesis' own personal history that she valued. All she needed to know was who she had been, and somehow it had helped her find the direction she needed.
Nemesis knew what she wanted to do, even if she didn't have the strength to do it just yet. "So, what, is this some sort of really lame recruitment bid?" Nemesis scoffed, the smile on her face waning. She had been on so many teams in the past, and none of them had gone well. The Dream Team had split up long ago, and the Blood Moon Court had lost its leader to the Negaverse. Nemesis had to consider herself lucky she did not get drawn into the Negaverse herself.
"I'll end this war," Nemesis announced, completely sure of herself. That belief was unwavering, either she would end this war or she would die trying. She did not need to be involved in someone else's team or court to do it, either. "And I don't see of how you can be of any aid to me, so I'm really not interested if this is some weird recruitment attempt."
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Posted: Wed Jun 05, 2013 11:56 am
For what is was worth, Midas hardly batted an eyelash at Nemesis' insults. She simply nodded slowly and took the stabs of the eternal's blunt knife. This wasn't personal for Midas, it was business, it was war. If a few insults were the worst injury she took, then she was lucky.
"It's not a recruitment bid, not yet," she put up a hand as if to still Nemesis where she was, to hold the eternal in place long enough to give her this speech. "Teams are fine and dandy, but at the end of the day, they're useless." Her hands fell back to her sides and the sailor senshi eventually propped one on her hip, letting the other hang free. The sashes attached to her wrist billowed in the breeze from the rooftop, but she paid little heed at this point.
"Every team thinks they're going to win the war, but they're so concentrated on one another that they ignore their comrades around them. All information is valuable. Anything that anyone knows is valuable." She shrugged her shoulders and glanced up at the stars, pensive for a moment. "Earth's records might contain glimpses of us that aren't destroyed and fragmented, like our worlds. Maybe they have an old myth that explains what happened."
"I'm not recruiting, I'm just looking for allies. Strong, smart senshi that want to do something other than twiddle their thumbs and have tea parties."
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Posted: Wed Jun 05, 2013 12:17 pm
Nemesis could actually agree with Midas on that. From her own experience, teams hardly worked. The last actual team that had seemed capable of doing anything was the BMC, and all that had earned them was the attention of the Negaverse, which eventually tore the court apart. There were numerous casualties on the senshi side, and Chaos had only gained from that battle. Teams sounded fine at a first look, but Nemesis believed she accomplished more acting as an individual rather than following the confinements of a court or the needs of a team. "I've been on a few teams before, and they've never taken me or this war very far." The darkly themed senshi leaned back on her heels, her posture rather relaxed despite how close she had been to leaving at the first sight of Sailor Midas.
Nemesis wasn't a kid anymore - she had been around the block for years, and considered herself amongst the most experienced senshi, if not the most. If she hadn't learned what worked for her by now, she wouldn't have survived this long. The Negaverse would have gained another senshi puppet, or she would have been killed. "And how do you propose we all go about exchanging information without the whole... team feeling? Make one giant team? The White Moon senshi have already tried it, and failed. I honestly think the time has long since passed us to pull together as one unit like the Negaverse has. There's too many, and now the ones who have been around long enough are terribly opinionated and have their own ideas of how to get s**t done." Nemesis was definitely one of those individuals.
"At this start of this, when senshi first started awakening, we had a chance to come together and we totally blew it. So, hey, what can we do but act as individuals? No kumbaya moment for the senshi coming around the corner." Nemesis had never had much faith in other senshi, even from the start. Perhaps she was just pessimistic. Nemesis didn't think Midas' idea was all that much better, but still, it was better, if even by a little bit.
"And what do you want of your allies? Trade of information, temporary team ups?" Nemesis wasn't quite interested, but then again, she also wasn't disinterested.
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Posted: Wed Jun 05, 2013 12:51 pm
Before Midas even took her eyes away from the stars, there was a pleased smile curling up one corner of her lip. Her eyes were watching the lights in the distance, but her ears were listening to Nemesis' words. She'd done it, she knew, in the way the eternal was relaxing next to her. Even if she didn't agree now, she would soon, because Midas had planted the seed in her mind. That little 'what if'..
"Well, unfortunately I wasn't awake at the beginning so I can only do with what I have," she shrugged her shoulders and looked back down at Nemesis, one hand raising to draw back her veil where it was flapping gently across her dark cheek. "I don't know how I'm going to do this yet, but I've got some ideas. I've already realized I'm going to have to work around everyone's.. quirks."
She shook her head and glanced out at the sprawling cityscape of Destiny City, following small darts of light in the distance - cars diminished to nothing but the glow of their headlights. "But for now all I want is just that. Trade of information, team ups if I need you. I mostly just need people stronger than myself to help me get this job done, to help me reach beyond my means if I have to." She glanced back at Nemesis sideways, only turning her head a fraction towards her. "I'm not pretending to be strong, just stubborn enough to see this through and with no delusions that it's going to be a cakewalk."
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Posted: Wed Jun 05, 2013 1:56 pm
"I think you're getting ahead of yourself, Midas." The way she spoke Midas' name was slightly condescending, but it could have been far worse. Nemesis approved of the other senshi a little - her mind was in the right place, even if Nemesis felt she was going about things a little a** backwards. "You need a plan before you can waltz around recruiting people for it. I get it, you think you know what needs to be done, but get your ducks in a row before you start trying to convince people of an idea that may not help us progress towards victory in this war." Midas had some good ideas, but she didn't have a plan.
The truth was that Nemesis wasn't sure she wanted to devote any energy to anyone other than herself. Naturally she came to Gehenna's aid when he needed it, but he was a friend, and he'd do the same for her. She'd run to the Dream Team's aid out of lingering loyalty, though the team itself had long since disbanded. Midas had given her no true reason to help her, except for a promise of victory when there was no proof to validate her ideas. "I really don't see how this benefits me. With or without you, I'll be doing the same thing. What knowledge can you possibly share that I haven't already obtained for myself? You have no battle strength, you just have ideas, and as I've said... ideas are pretty much worth s**t until they become actions."
The Senshi of Decay sighed, a hand reaching up to push her bangs out of her eyes as she thought about her past mistakes when it came to making alliances. Nemesis wanted, needed to see action. Pretty words were what the White Moon senshi specialized in, but pretty words got nobody anywhere. "Look, get your s**t together and go for it. If you need help, I'm not going to turn someone away and just watch them fail or die. I'm around, but I'm not going to answer to your every whim, your beck and call, not unless I know you can actually accomplish something." She shrugged her shoulders, displaying a certain amount of helplessness, as if it wasn't her fault she didn't want to help so early on, but Midas' for wanting her help now. Midas was only being realistic, and Nemesis could appreciate someone not trying to overstep their own limitations, but it simply wasn't enough right now.
Nemesis reached underneath the thick wrap of her bow at her hips and pulled out her cell phone. The kitty emote on the front of the phone taunted her, reminding her that when she got home Invidia would likely be there to annoy her. With any luck, maybe Invidia was off pestering Kamboja or by extension of him, Vanessa. Anyone but who the cat was actually bonded to. Frowning, she tossed the phone over to Midas, expecting the other senshi to catch it. "You should be able to find my number in there, and enter your's. Call me for stupid s**t and you can absolutely forget about me helping you out."
It didn't necessarily hurt Nemesis to do this - it just bugged the crap and annoyed the s**t out of her. The fact that she was agreeing to at least be on call was a miracle in itself, but Midas did have her mind in the right place, and it'd be a shame if she got herself killed or corrupted before she could help the senshi win this war.
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Posted: Wed Jun 05, 2013 2:17 pm
Midas listened patiently to Nemesis' tirade, knowing that everything she was saying was true, all the while still planning to prove her first impression wrong. She was confident she knew what she was doing, even without a battle plan. Nemesis thought she was acting too soon but in Midas' strong opinion, it was never too soon to cover her a**.
And that's exactly what was happening.
She reached for the phone and caught it gracefully, looking down at the screen and scrolling through all the necessary information. She finished the contact and tossed it back, confident that Nemesis was more willing to help than she was letting on. She'd given her a direct line, after all.
"Got it. I'll only call when I really need you." She shrugged her shoulders and opened her own phone to save Nem's information before she forgot it. She closed it again and tucked it somewhere in the folds of her fuku. "I don't intend to waste your time."
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Posted: Wed Jun 05, 2013 2:49 pm
Nemesis trusted that Midas wasn't stupid enough to call her unnecessarily. While she hadn't even made it to Super yet, Midas had been around for long enough to at least know what was really going down. Wasting Nemesis' time would only hinder the fight, because now that Nemesis was back in the game, she intended to go all-out to get results. She wasn't going to let the Negaverse off so easily, not when they still had the potential to harm civilians and had proven in the past that they would do just that. Who knew what the Negaverse's true goal was? All that mattered was that they wanted to change this world for the worse, and Nemesis could not let them do that.
"Good," Nemesis answered, catching her phone with ease and placing it back from where she had originally drawn it out of. "The more of my time you waste, the more chances there are for the Negaverse to get away with something I could prevent." Nemesis was full of self-confidence, and believed that she was a major player in this war. She knew she was one of the strongest senshi out there, and her convictions about this war rarely wavered. She'd go out into the battlefield and get done what had to be done, whether she was liked or hated for it.
"I'd love to chat it up," not really, "but I have things that need to get done. When you get your s**t sorted out, talk to me about it again." She was on board, but only just slightly. If something more promising came her way, she'd likely align herself with it in the hopes of making a change in this war all the quicker. "Good luck, and don't get yourself killed. The senshi need people who have their heads screwed on straight and can get s**t done." Nemesis thought that most senshi were practically useless, so she did value the ones that actually showed promise.
Nemesis doubted Midas would try to make her stay longer than she wanted to, but she left quickly enough anyways just to make sure that she wasn't stopped. Midas had her information - if she needed her, she could simply call her. All that needed to be said tonight had been said, and Nemesis would be content to talk to the other senshi again when Midas had more to say than pretty words. The senshi scaled down the side of the building with ease - she had jumped across rooftops and through alleyways so much that she didn't have to think much about acrobatics, and just did it. She landed safely on the sidewalk, the cement underneath her feet uncared for, with pockets of weed sprouting through cracks. With their conversation finished, Nemesis walked down the street casually, in no hurry to get anywhere at all. If there was a threat out there, they were more than welcome to find her.
She needed a good challenge to get back into the game.
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