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 Posted: Tue Nov 19, 2013 9:30 am
Who: Anastacia, Anita, Cruz, and Zeke
When: About fifteen to twenty minutes after take off from the final fight scene
Where: Over Kahadlok
Weather: Clear and sunny at dusk
There was thunder in Zeke's ears, but a peculiar sort of thunder. There were no cracks or booms over the span of seconds like after a lightning flash. Instead it was a constant roar, like he were caught in a wind tunnel.
He tried to move, but only his head would. The vet opened his eyes and blinked away the blur that covered them. There was dull, black metal overhead instead of a darkened canopy of trees. There were sounds coming from somewhere behind his head. Radio chatter and feedback, though none of it made sense. How had he gotten here? Where was he exactly? Zeke tried looking around. To his right was more black metal - a door - with a thick plate of glass on top serving as a window. Through it he could see nothing but sky. He then turned his head right and found three people sitting there. All of them he knew and all of them looked like hell: Cruz, who looked distraught, Ronan, who was apparently dozing in his seat, and Anita. She was closest and he tried to move his arm to grab hold of her ankle or pant or anything he could reach just to get her attention. His arms wouldn't budge. He could just wiggle his fingers slightly but even that took effort. Zeke's mind whirled, trying to piece together what he remembered to fill in for the time he had lost when he had blacked out. There was no result for that, but everything came crashing back to one person - Anastacia.
Zeke's heart started hammering in his chest and he tried looking back over, doing so too fast and putting a crick in his neck. The vet winced and let his head fall to the side Anita sat on again. He had to get her attention. Anya wasn't here and if Anya wasn't here...
He couldn't let himself think those things, though they pressed at the corners of his mind and made his eyes wet with almost certainty. The raver licked his lips, which were so chapped they were starting to bleed, and knew speaking would be tough. His throat and mouth felt like they had been stuffed with cotton and he was so very thirsty, but he had to try. He had to know!
"Ani..." The partial word came out as a wheeze. Zeke pinched his eyes shut, mustering what little energy he had left in him to say just one simple word. "Anita."
It wasn't much louder than his first attempt, but he tried. The vet kept his eyes trained on his friend, hoping beyond hope that if his first attempts failed the sensation of being watched would cue her in to him.
Unbeknownst to Zeke, Anastacia was neither dead nor left behind. She had been placed in a corner near the back of the helicopter and ever since take off had not even shifted from that spot. Like the others on the first trip back to base, Anya was a mess. Covered in mud, the blood of four separate people, bits of leaves, grass, bark, and twigs she wasn't even a shadow of her former self. Her hair hung lank and stringy in her face, still wet and turned brown halfway down her head on all sides. Cesc's attempts to correct it had been undone by the air that had come blasting off the helicopter's rotors on landing, but the spider queen had made no move to correct it.
She made no moves at all. Sitting in her corner, she was staring outwardly - eyes wide and paler than normal face taut as she remembered every little thing she had done and had done to her this entire trip. Her arms were across her chest and she was trembling all over. Her rune was dim and the cloud around it withdrawn into the rings of her ribbon as though trying to hide from the world like its bearer wanted to do. Her crown had fallen, dangling as limp as her hair around her face. Her wings were resting on the floor behind her, splayed out and acting as a topping mark to the Widow's defeat. She made no sound as she "sat" there. The world outside of the one she was viewing and those within it were simply not there.
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Posted: Sat Nov 23, 2013 2:25 pm
What happened once Anita settled down in their hastily established med station was a complete blur. She remembered moving, remembered Zeke and Anya both laying prone and injured, Ronan getting picked up in a stretcher. He was resting, now, too. Quiet. It sounded eerily quiet despite the exterior roar of chopper blades.
She glanced up from her perch, tucked into the corner of the bench seat and leaning against the wall. Cruz was tucked at her side, both arms wrapped tightly around her waist while his tears stained and soaked her dirty tank top. Their bags, or what was let of them, were resting in the back in a bundle. Duncan managed to help her slow the bleeding on her arm and temporarily patch it but, once they got back to the village, it was going to need more intensive care. Already it was starting to bleed through the material, though thankfully it kept its pace slow.
A sudden movement in her peripheral made Anita flinch and she looked up wildly as Zeke adjusted his head. She stared at the man, her friend, and felt her stomach flip.
"Y-...yeah?" she huffed quietly, carefully tucking an arm around Cruz's shoulders.
His head lifted too, just enough to peer out from over his arm and around Anita's torso. The frei's green eyes were wide and red rimmed. They ached and burned but refused to stop their tears. Their moisture absorbed nicely against his dry skin and provided a strange cooling sensation against how hot everything else around him felt. Even Anita's body temperature was above normal and it was admittedly uncomfortable to keep so close to a heat source but he defied the very idea of parting, of losing contact.
Anita swallowed anxiously and tried again, leaning forward a bit more. "Zeke... it's--it's gonna be okay."
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Posted: Sat Nov 23, 2013 7:57 pm
If Anita thought Zeke looked bad, the vet lying strapped to a medical board on the floor of the helicopter thought she looked worse. His vision remained a touch blurry even as he blinked over and over to clear it, but even through the film he could see just how torn up she was. Her hair was matted, she was covered in dirt and muck, and her clothing just as filthy. The wound on her arm - the red a stark contrast to the white of the bandage - looked particularly nasty. He could relate. Cruz looked better, but Zeke could see how reddened his eyes were from the tears that just weren't stopping.
"Where's..." He swallowed and could damn near feel the muscles in his throat moving against one another. "Anya?"
Saying the spider queen's name brought a few tears of Zeke's own to his eyes, which rose to their brims and then slid back toward the vet's ears. Any other time he might have turned away, muttered "s**t" or some other obscenity under his breath, and tried hard to hide it - but not now. Instead his eyes burned into Anita's, flicked over to Cruz's, and then back again. The look on his face was intense; begging her to tell him, terrified and uncertain of what the answer might be, but touched with some hope that her response would ease the grip on his heart.
She leaned forward toward him and that grip tightened, sending a preemptive shock through his body. For a brief, shining moment Zeke felt his toes again but as quickly as it happened the feeling died back into tingling, heavy numbness. It was going to be okay? Not until he knew where Anastacia was and knew that she was okay...or as okay as she was going to be after the hell she had trekked through. Until he knew he would be lost and nothing would be good or right or okay ever again. The corners of his mouth twitched. Zeke wanted to tell Anita 'no', to repeat his question again, but no sound came out. Instead, the vet could only mouth one thing: "please".
Please tell me. Please tell me where Anya is. Anita...Anita, please.
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Posted: Sun Nov 24, 2013 5:49 pm
Compared to others, Anita wasn't too bad off. The wound hurt -- a lot, it was probably the worst injury she'd ever received. That still wasn't stacked up with the worst part of this whole mission. She stared uneasily at Zeke as he welled up and spoke. It was surreal seeing him like this, hearing him weak and distraught.
"Sh-she's here, Zeke. Anya's here," she nodded to assure him further, her eyes wide and threatening to gloss over after seeing his own leak.
Anita bit her lip and craned her neck, scanning around the interior for the spider frei. She knew Anya was here, she'd seen her, but she forgot precisely where until she took a second look around. There she was, tired and quiet, neatly tucked into a corner. She was awake but motionless, inattentive, just as dirty and in need of medical assistance as any of them, but she was here. She was alive. "Anya's okay."
Her words perked Cruz's attention as well and, when Anita looked over, his gaze followed. The frei's claws accidentally dug into her sides and Anita bit back a yelp. She hissed as he pulled back, startled and apologetic, but he didn't take his eyes away from Anastacia when he finally caught sight of her.
She was okay.
He'd scarcely seen her brought into the helicopter. Certainly hadn't seen her awake, but the closer he looked the more he realized that Anita was right. She wasn't dead.
Anita tried to cradle Cruz against her but he hardly budged. He was okay, though. She knew he was okay. She needed to pay attention to Zeke.
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Posted: Tue Nov 26, 2013 8:05 am
She was okay. Anya was okay and she was here.
Zeke's eyes slid close. The pinched look of pain, worry, and everything else he was feeling up until that confirmation drained from his face and was replaced by one of relief. There was a few passing moments where it might have seemed like the veterinarian had gone to sleep on that note, but that was not the case. Suddenly there was the sound of Zeke sucking in air.
"Thank you." The words came out on his exhale with effort but he was finding it was getting easier to speak the more he tried. Small blessings. A couple more tears leaked out - hot, stinging things that were accompanied by sniffling - but there was no masculine shame in these ones. Zeke even managed a weak smile, which reached his eyes when he reopened them to look at Anita. He wanted so badly to follow her gaze, to be able to sit up and turn around to see his Frei, but his position and current physical state hindered that. He trusted the girl who sat next to him however, and her word was solid gold. Anya was here, wherever that was, and she was okay. Judging by the lack of fear in either his friend or her Raevan's body language and faces, Anastacia was no longer enraged. He hoped she was sleeping. It would be another small blessing and one he knew she could use. A dreamless sleep after a living nightmare; it might be the only one she got for awhile after this.
"What happened?" The question took a bit to work its way out of him. The last thing he remembered before waking up was Anya being carried over by someone - maybe Xiu? - and having Iorek and Cruz nearby. The thought of the Gargoyle put alarm back on the vet's unshaven and filthy face. Anya was here - thank god or whoever sat up there - but what about the rest of his team? What about everyone else who had shown up to that battleground? And those who hadn't? "Where is everyone?"
Iorek, Cesc, Alex, Zul, Jeremy, Duncan, and all the other faces he had seen on the bus - they all flashed before his wide, searching eyes. Zeke did try moving this time, and he lolled his head back and forth as though expecting to see them sitting in places he had already seen were vacant.
Sitting in her corner, Anastacia continued to not move although her Guardian just a few feet away was currently trying his damnedest himself. When Anita and Cruz passed their gazes over her, she did not feel their eyes. The eyes she felt were the ones in her head - the ones she had encountered during everything that had happened back on the ground. Zeke, Cesc, and Iorek; her teammates on this excursion into hell. Several faces she did not know, a few more she barely knew or didn't know well enough to have too much of an opinion on. The hunter. The eye.
The eye itself was a hot yellow searchlight in a fog of jet blackness leering out with a pupil reminiscent of a cat. She had been on top of Zeke when she had spotted it, trying to cover her Guardian in her sticky white strands and then do...things to him. Awful things. Terrible things. Things that she had considered violent, disgusting acts committed by creatures - yes, creatures - that were sub-human and on par with animals. And she had wanted to do this so badly it almost hurt her inside, but then as she had reeled backwards to bind her Guardian more she had seen that single yellow eye. From there, the rest was history.
Anastacia had felt the presence of the hunter emanating from that eye and she had remembered her first prey-thing. The hunter had been the one to set her off like a bomb and it was the one who had needed to pay the most. Zeke and Iorek - who had been her third and second targets respectively after interfering with her hunt - were forgotten. The world became nothing but that eye - the hunter in a new form - and she had gone for it with every ounce of predatory anger she had in her.
But it was the eye who had beaten Anastacia down and it did so without effort. Suddenly the Virus Frei felt her skin being drenched in hot, burning liquid and she had fallen. It came from her wounds, from the offending marks that had been given to her on the first night, and then from everywhere. It had covered her and just as quickly turned the predator into a pain-wracked shell of her former self. Oh how she had thrashed! The muddy ground offered no relief like it had before. Her skin started to boil and bubble like a witch's brew, then burst open to release more of that horrible liquid. There was no end in sight, but suddenly there were people upon her. They put their hands on her and with their touch started to slough her flesh off.
Any keen eyes looking at the spider queen now would see her finally move - a shudder as she remembered this part. Her skin hadn't flaked off; it had fallen away in ribbons and strips. Following her skin went her muscles, her tendons, and whatever else made up the meat inside a person's body until it reached the bone. Her wrists had literally melted and peeled and burned away until they had been nothing but pain and bone. She remembered quite clearly that she wanted to die then. Although she had screamed and screamed and fought...no one would let her go. She had been dragged away by this point, her teeth in her initial captor's arm and something metallic-tasting and hot in her mouth from the effort. She wanted it to end - she had wanted to be let go so she could crawl away somewhere to endlessly wait for her own demise - but she had not been let go.
Then Cesc was there before her - filthy and with pain in his eyes as he had looked at her. He had taken hold of her and she had put her teeth into him instead. She remembered the strangest sensation then and it seemed to come from the normally pink Raevan himself. Although she had been contorted in pain up until then, this sensation relaxed her in his arms. The hurt did not subside but she had relaxed all the same. Anya remembered his breath on her brow as he kissed her there and the words that followed the action so clearly. Cesc had been sorry, so sorry. Over and over he said that to her, even when suddenly - finally - the pain drained from her and she fell against him in a heap.
From there they had been together, Cesc resting and Anastacia starting to view the first rerun of everything that had occurred. They had stayed there for a time - how long she did not know - but then the younger Frei had lifted her and taken her away. It hadn't hurt that time. Eventually she had been placed here...and now the movie started over on its loop once again.
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Posted: Tue Nov 26, 2013 6:06 pm
Relief washed over her as understanding did the same for him. Anita's eyes closed as she released a controlled breath and allowed herself to deflate against the seat. Her head lolled gently, resting on the wall, but the vibrations, however subtle, bothered her enough that she moved away again soon after.
At her side, Cruz's attention was completely stolen. His arms slowly pulled away from his guardian's torso and he hovered just a bit higher, neck craned. It was dark but he could make her out, see her silhouette, her pale but dirtied and stained skin, long and vibrant hair. Anastacia was motionless but her eyes were open, her rune was active, he could see her breathing and the occasional twitch of her shoulders just from her body idling.
God. What happened?
Anita scoffed quietly without meaning to. At the question, she turned her head to look out the nearest window. It was getting too dark to see anything properly. "Jeremy... did something," she mumbled more quietly than intended, "There was this big thing. It looked like it had the doctor." To be honest, she didn't know quite what the hell happened. At the time, Anita had been far too preoccupied with making sure Melisande didn't make an unnecessary sacrifice. All she really recalled was a strange flash of light, the darkness surrounding the cliff almost being sucked away, and -- her wing.
"It's over. They got him." Anita nodded, though she knew it was fairly weak. "Everyone's--" she hesitated, corners of her mouth dipping slightly as she looked to the side. There were more people than just the ones who showed up at the cliff, weren't there? More teams? Anita swallowed. "There's not enough room, so they're making multiple sweeps. They'll get everyone back. They mentioned emergency aid once we get back to the village." Who knew how long that would take, if this whole trek took nearly two days on foot.
She wrung her hands, clinging to her jeans. For a moment she stayed quiet, head hung, and Anita watched Cruz from the corner of her eye beneath completely filthy and disheveled bangs. "You should rest. I'm sure they'll give us better answers once we get back." What else did he have to worry about? Anya was alive and nearby, and, to her knowledge, no one died. That was great. As sarcastically great as she could manage to feel.
The croc's motion was hesitant. He weighed himself against the subtle movements of the helicopter's interior compartment, the turbulence outside, and raised himself off the seat. Anita watched him warily. Cruz touched along the wall to keep himself steady, fingers splayed at the ready to grab anything in case the chopper's balance was thrown off somehow. The reptile approached the seated arachnid, floating lower the closer he became. By the time he was barely a foot away, Cruz was practically lying against the floor and staring up at her with tired, red rimmed eyes. For several moments he was quiet, silent. The only sound he heard was the beating of his own heart and the thrum of propellers.
"Ana..." he whispered, brows upturning with worry.
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Posted: Tue Nov 26, 2013 7:14 pm
"There was this big thing. It looked like it had the doctor."
"An eye." Zeke licked his chapped lips, wishing so dearly for a tall glass of water right now. It could be piss warm for all he cared, but his mouth was so very dry and his lips were faring no better. "I saw it. For a little bit, I mean. Then Anya started screaming and all I could focus on was her." He would never get that sound out of his head for as long as he lived. When her anger turned to pain like that? There was no sound more terrifying or bone chilling. He had seen her fall to the ground and start thrashing as though she had been hit with a million volts...and he had been powerless to help her.
That fact alone made an unpleasant taste crop up in the back of his mouth. The vet's brow furrowed and the upset look returned. How could he have failed so hard? It had been his job to protect her - them, his whole team - and he had failed when it had mattered most. There had been some relief when Iorek had come crashing down from the heavens like a big grey meteor with Anya hot on his tail, but it was not a long lived nor long felt sensation.
"Goddammit." His voice was low and his words muttered. Zeke now made sure to turn his head away from Anita as he bit back the bile he wanted to spew at himself. He had been stupid and had let the situation wash over him and knock him asunder. He hadn't kept his head and for that his team had suffered. They had all gotten hurt and that could have been avoided, somehow, someway if he had just kept his head and not let the fear get to him. Goddammit...
Anita was speaking again. Zeke sucked in another breath - as deep as the straps crossing his chest would allow - and turned his head back to her. The upset look had faded somewhat but the inner turmoil would not fade for a long time to come. Like a good boy he listened to her and nodded in a couple places to what she said.
"Good. That's...That's good." The eye had been destroyed. What more could be asked for, really? Multiple sweeps would take time, but so long as everyone got back home alive what did that matter? Zeke sighed slowly, forcing out a little smile at Anita's chide for him to rest. "I don't think I'll be resting for awhile. Need t'make sure Iorek and Cesc are okay. Alex and Zul too." Everyone really. Those he knew and those he did not, they all had to be okay for Zeke to think about resting...and even then he might not after the fact. How could he, when the world had gone to s**t, he had failed those he cared about, and home was still so far away?
"Hey...What about Kyou? You said the eye had him?"
Anya was staring at a point on the ground, looking but not seeing it. The world around her was fuzzier than usual, a blur of blackness filled with strange sounds that were going in one ear and out the other. Over and over that movie played in her head and over and over did the spider queen believe that she had become - and now was - what she had thought was the lowest of the low.
Because of this, when something - someone - green filled the point she had her eyes trained on and spoke, Anastacia did not react. She saw Cruz, but did not truly see him and so if the Crocodile was expecting to be thrown again or yelled at or anything else, it did not happen.
For all intents and purposes, he was - for the first time - safe from the Black Widow and her unyielding hatred for him. All she did in his presence was shiver overall as though cold, an action that was occasionally peppered with a harder shudder, and breathe.
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Posted: Wed Nov 27, 2013 1:45 pm
"Yeah," Anita swallowed roughly, "That."
She remembered Anya screaming. Her group got there after Zeke's but she remembered, distinctly, how big of a frenzy Anastacia had fallen into. Literally, fallen, to the ground, her body a writhing mess. It was lucky the white sigel, whoever they were, came along and managed to subdue her, get her to the first aid station. By the time Anita got back from trying to help Melisande -- trying being the key word -- the spider frei was already calmed and laying still. A gentle shrug was given when Zeke mentioned he wouldn't be resting yet. That was okay. He technically was now, just by virtue of lying still. It was enough.
One of the names he mentioned was unfamiliar but Anita's eyes widened at Alex and Zul. They'd been there? She hadn't seen them at all, not at the initial grouping and certainly not cliff side. That wasn't a worry for Zeke, though. Not right now. They would be back to the village before too long and then they would get the information they needed, it was no use speculating and piling on more anxiety.
"Um. Y-yeah, it--it had him but Jeremy got it off. He's--" her head hung and she rubbed her face. One of her braids was loose, the tie misplaced, but it stayed in relative position for the mean time. "I'm--I'm not gonna lie, Zeke, he's pretty messed up. He's alive. He just... hasn't woken up yet." She didn't know the doctor well. In actuality they only ever met once, at that first beach fundraiser, and she could hardly recall what he looked like outside of him not being entirely human. That didn't make it any less shocking to see him lying prone, emaciated, and white as a ghost.
No response.
No recognition.
Cruz braced for a hit. His eyes clenched and his fingers clawed against the metal floor. Nothing came. Nothing happened. One eye opened slowly to observe her. Anya's eyes were open, she was breathing, she even blinked occasionally, but she didn't move -- not really. She didn't look at him at all.
"Ana...?" he tried again, pressing his palms flat to the floor. Slowly he raised himself from his submissive position, just enough to become eye level with her. Cruz looked all over, taking in her disheveled appearance. "It's--it's okay. You're good. You're good, Ana..." His breath hitched. Still nothing. Could she not hear him? Could she not see? Why wasn't she hitting him? Did he have to touch her again? Kiss her? Would that bring her out of this stupor? A hesitant hand raised, stopped just by her cheek with a deep and trembling uncertainty. She didn't like being touched. She didn't like being kissed. That was why she hit him in the first place. "P-please... I'm sorry. I'm sorry I scared you. You--you can hit me..." His voice was quiet, cracking the more he spoke as emotion welled in his throat.
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Posted: Wed Nov 27, 2013 4:55 pm
At the news of the good doctor's condition, sorrow gripped his already aching heart. When they had started off on their respective searches Zeke had been one of the ones with the optimistic outlook on the situation. Perhaps Kyou's satellite phone hadn't had a charge, so that kept him from contacting the Lab. Maybe he had gotten so deep into his work that the same result occurred. Or maybe he had simply gotten lost. The latter idea hadn't been far off in truth, but to finally consider the warlock had gotten into such seemingly dire straights while on one of his routine trips had worried himself and his team greatly then, when they had found his tent. To now find out that 'seemingly' was in fact a definite? Zeke felt a well of emotions - everything coming up at once for the man he worked for and considered a good sport. Best case scenario was way the ******** out the window.
"It must have had him for a while then." Perhaps even longer. Maybe the doctor had fallen victim to the eye from the moment he had found it...or it him. "I'm sure he'll be okay though. Once he gets to a hospital...or that emergency aid station you mentioned." This was now the new best case scenario. Zeke clung to it, desperately, but even the normally optimistic man could not deny the doubt that pressed against the edges of that idea. He wasn't a praying man but he would hold onto his hope that everything from here on out would go well.
From there Zeke fell silent, resting even though he had just said he needn't and listening to the constant beat of the helicopter propeller overhead. Even inside it was loud, but the rhythm was kind of soothing. A short time later - five minutes at the most - he turned back to Anita, watching her quietly. By this point his vision had cleared and he could see her better. Still he believed she looked like a wreck or at least had been in one.
"How about you, Anita? You doing okay?" He set his gaze on her arm, wondering just how she got that but not wanting to vocalize the curiosity. The wound was too fresh; physically, mentally, and emotionally.
The Crocodile's trembling words entered her ears but like with the helicopter's rotor and the talking of those sitting farther along, they exited without recognition. Cruz's motions were reflected in all of her six eyes, all of which had a glassy glaze to them. Anya did not flinch. She did not pull away. She only continued the basic, subconscious movements that all living things did; blinking slowly, muscles quivering, skin prickled with goose pimples - shivering and sometimes shuddering - lavender eyes flicking with minute movements. Her breathing wasn't labored but it was shallow - in out in out in out - like she had just been running. The hair in front of her face - lank, stringy, and damp - moved just a little with the action.
She saw the hunter sitting in a tree, fiddling with his newest trap. Suddenly he was so close - she had leaped for him at this "scene" - but then there was something big and grey breaking through the trees out of the corner of her eye. She didn't have time to register it before it hit her and sent her whirling over and over through branches and leaves and all manner of things within or on them. In a moment of self-preservation she had thrown a punch and hit a wall. It had hurt badly and she had struggled to get free. When she did, the one time beast was in her face, throwing her aside like a sack of potatoes before turning tail and running like a coward.
Anastacia's right hand twitched in response to the first part of the memory, her knuckles scraped up but not bloody or bruised. She heard her scream of rage echo through her ears and that constant but now quieter crackling sound therein at the second half. Her head gave a twitch as her body once again shuddered.
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Posted: Thu Mar 20, 2014 11:26 am
Who knew how long the doctor had been under the creature's grasp? He was emaciated and bleached looking, but alive almost like it was keeping him that way -- for what purpose? All she knew was that if just looking at the thing too closely drove many into fits, like Anya, then coming into physical contact would surely have done what it did to Kyou. That only made her think of Melisande and, for a moment, Anita glared at the floor. She felt justified.
"Huh?" Zeke's words registered a second later. "Yeah. Yeah, I'm--I'm fine."
Anita offered a weak laugh and smile. Her left hand found her right shoulder and rested above the makeshift bandaging Duncan helped her apply. It was bleeding through but it was slower now. Every time her heart beat she could feel it trickle more and she cringed. It stung and burned and pulsed, it hurt and she was shaking but she was holding it together. She had to, when Zeke could barely even sit up. When Anastacia was catatonic behind them and Cruz was so shaken.
His heart sunk, lower than his rune, down to the floor, when the spider frei didn't respond. Her twitch was subtle and undetected. Cruz ceased floating and pressed his chest against the cold metallic floor of the helicopter near Anastacia, his cheek pressed to it. Each of his claws idly and noiselessly dragged as he felt lower and lower with each passing second. Like this, he could feel the motions outside, or imagined he could, and each sway of the chopper felt like his insides churning.
He didn't have a stomach but he felt sick.
"I'm sorry," Cruz whispered, voice cracking, "I'm sorry for everything, Ana." Everything he'd done, everything he didn't, and everything beyond his control. Everything that happened to her, to Anita, to Zeke, Ronan and Duncan, the doctor. Everyone. Why couldn't he help anyone?
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Posted: Fri May 16, 2014 9:16 pm
Despite the exhaustion and the trauma of what he - they - had just gone through, when Anita smiled, Zeke found he did too. It was every bit as wan and barely there as his energy, but it was present and the vet even managed a chuckle to boot.
"You look like you just escaped a car accident or something." His smile faded and for a brief moment Zeke looked down at the damage that had been rendered to his person. If Anita had been in a car wreck, what did he look like he just crawled out of? Probably a train derailment, especially with how his head was pounding. He wanted to reach up and rub his temples, but the board he had been strapped to kept that from happening. The vet would just have to grin and bear it. "How about Cruz? Is he okay?" If he kept his attention off the pain it wasn't so bad, really.
Over and over the moments replayed; sometimes moving at a spitfire pace where details blurred together and other times drawing themselves out slow and tortuously detailed. Anastacia's head spun, her temples throbbed, her body ached. In the back of her mind she could feel exhaustion creeping in around the corners of her busy mind. But that all seemed insignificant right now. Like the world around her - the helicopter, the people sitting across the bird, Cruz lying on his chest before her - it wasn't so much as a blip on her radar. The horrors she had just lived and her own self disgust reigned supreme, driving the knife deeper in. Slowly the spider queen bowed her head. Her hair fell further into her face, obscuring what had once been a picture of sharp beauty and cold supremacy. It was as if she felt the eyes on her and was ashamed.
But it was far more than simple shame she was starting to feel.
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Posted: Sat May 17, 2014 1:30 pm
She couldn't help but laugh. Yeah, a car accident. She almost wished their injuries were as simple as that. At least then there'd be some actual understanding of the situation. Anita felt like she had more questions than when they arrived, now seasoned with a powerful vitriol she couldn't put into words. That was for the best right now, nobody needed to hear her rant like this.
"You should see the car," Anita managed a smirk while she stared at the floor, as if she and a vehicle got into a fight.
Zeke's curiosity over Cruz brought her back. She lifted her head and nodded, then glanced back at the two freis. Immediately her smile waned and she watched in silence for a moment as Cruz languished on the helicopter floor in front of Anastacia who, by all accounts, didn't even appear to notice him.
"He's okay. He didn't get hurt," she glanced back at Zeke to offer a reassuring smile but it was weak and she turned back to the raevans quickly, "Hey, bud? Wanna come here a sec? Say hi to Zeke?"
Cruz whined pitifully but it was heard by no one. The seconds dragged on as he was unresponsive. Just as Anita drew in breath to call for him again, Cruz pressed his palms flat to the floor and pushed up to resume hovering. His posture was sunk and he floated low, his ribbon dragged across the interior as he neared Anita. Both hands wrung each others wrists near his chest, the motions slow and uneasy, while his head hung.
"She's-- she's not--" his voice was small and hoarse, croaking on the edge of tears.
"Shhh," Anita whispered. She leaned forward to rest her lips against the top of his head in a meager kiss. "I know. She's okay, she's just scared."
He nodded. It took nearly half a minute before Cruz turned to Zeke. The croc was ready to say hello but it turned into an anguished gasp on his tongue. Of course he saw Zeke get loaded up into the chopper, but that was when he was unconscious. Everyone was so hurt, so damaged, and there he was; spotless, immaculate. Useless.
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Posted: Thu Jun 12, 2014 3:55 pm
"I can just imagine..." He couldn't fathom it, nor did he want to. Perhaps passing out had been some sort of offhanded blessing in truth, even if right now he largely felt like a failure and a poor Guardian besides in doing so.
When the Crocodile came over, Zeke put on his best smile for the Frei, but the corners sagged when Cruz came around and Zeke saw the state of him. The green-haired Frei might not have gotten hurt physically but the leaky eyes, wrung hands, and general aura of upset that clung to him couldn't be denied. When Cruz spoke, his words felt like a dagger in Zeke's heart, one that started to twist even with Anita's comforting coo to the Croc. Anya wasn't what? Zeke wanted to see, badly, but he was strapped down and the only mobility he had didn't grant him the ability to look behind his head. Was Cruz crying because of her? Was it the whole scenario and everything they went through just a short time ago? Or was it both? He wanted to know, but he didn't want to upset the green Frei any further either.
"Hey kiddo," When Zeke finally spoke, his voice was as pleasant and warm as he could make it while his sincerity permeated throughout. "Thanks for looking after Anya for me. I got a bit banged up in there but I feel better knowing you were keeping an eye on her." He smiled, hoping to make the poor kid feel better in some small way. "And Anita's right - she's just scared. She'll be okay. Once we get home, everything's gonna be okay."
'Okay' sounded so foreign to say and right now in any context it didn't sound plausible. After these dark few days, it seemed impossible that there would or could be any return to normalcy. Slowly but surely it was bound to happen though. It would take days, weeks, months, maybe even years...but in light of what he went through, it was still hard to entirely kill the optimist in the vet. Foreign, implausible, damn near impossible - it was going to be a long road ahead for everyone, himself included and Anya most especially. Anita and Cruz, Cesc, Iorek, Alex and Zul and so many more - who knew what sort of road lay ahead for each and every one of them.
But even then, and like the constant thud of the rotors seemed to repeatedly say, we all got outta there.
At the end of this day, that's what mattered most.
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