Welcome to Gaia! ::

Day One/Day Two


Waking was a process of cataloging her aches and scrapes and stiff muscles with calm fascination. Too pale fingers traced along an already fading line of mended flesh across her thigh. Ignore it, it'll heal, she recalled Stryker's instruction with quiet awe. She'd known, she'd even experienced it a bit from time to time, but there'd always been so much else to claim her attention that she hadn't truly taken the time to appreciate it. To comprehend the scope of what it meant. With a smile, she stepped out of the cave's shelter and into the rain.

The wind was down again, and the fat wet drops that soaked her through once more weren't unwelcome. The states of warm, dry, comfort weren't what she wanted, not yet. The day before she'd felt close to something and she wanted to chase it down and see if she could find it again if the storm would only allow her. The buzzing, restless energy of the day before had faded, allowing her the luxury of a more considered start. She took the time to stretch and work out the pains of a restless night's rest against cold, unforgiving stone. She waited until her limbs felt loose and ready, and when she started running it was at a relaxed pace that lasted until she reached the tree line.

Debris from the storm littered the jungle's paths, creating hurdles and obstacles that had her changing her body's motion, smoothly shifting between gears to meet ever greater demands. Go. Faster. Leap. Higher. Push. Harder. Grab. Climb. Jump. Stretch. Duck. Dodge. Go. Faster.

She'd always been physical. Being good at a sport was a tangible, easy thing to point at and say, "This is me, and I'm awesome." And it's not like anyone could argue once you'd won, right? There were no downsides, no moments of doubt or second guessing when you'd just won a thing fair and square. Winning a game or a race or a match was honest. And all it took was work, just a little bit of continuous effort and you got immediate proof of improvement.

It was this mentality she used when approaching nearly everything in her life.

Usually it worked out.

Her heart thundered in her ears and it filled her with joyous appreciation because it was so, so strong as it worked in tandem with lungs and blood and muscle and bone for every increasingly powerful movement. The entirety of her body kept up with her every demand, speeding and slowing at will. Even when she fell, and oh she did she fall, her body reacted with smooth efficiency at recovering he balance and resuming the path she'd chosen. Never in her life had everything worked this well, she'd always been good, but this was more than. This was what it felt like to be perfect.

Poetry in motion. She'd never really appreciated the phrase before now.

Around her, the colours grew more vibrant and details of tree and rocks and the shadowshadowshadows creeping along the edges of the path began to stand out in sharp relief, imprinting her with vivid impressions that soon melted and molded into the perfection of her body and its motion. The jungle began to thin, the obstacles soon left behind, and before her waited a long, straight shot across the farmlands.

Faster. Faster.

Bare feet shifted down and then pushed off and up to sprint but they never hit the ground.

She was no longer running.

She was flying beyond both earth and storm.

She was the wind.

She had been absent, and despite himself, Kostya found himself worried. He enjoyed her company, and America was often the sole reason why he was so busy. A repair here, a task there, a spreadsheet to calculate the exact nutritional needs of Obadiah to get him back to a weight that would not get him sent to the Sahara.

America was gone, and in his quiet desperation, Kostya baked.

Otto had appreciate the efforts of a vanilla cake, red velvet cupcakes, and now he was working on a pie. He opened the door to Obadiah in his "do not kiss the chef" apron, a spot of flour on his nose from working on making a pie crust from hand.

"Yes?" Kostya asked, beatific.

It took a moments for the words to sink in, and his opinion of America dropped from not polite to inefficient and foolish.

He was not appeased.

"Can be having vun second," he said, closing the door in Obadiah's face. The apron was swiftly removed, face scrubbed, pastry dough put into the fridge with the apple preserves soon to follow, and a clipping of a certain runic tamagotchi to his belt.

The door was reopened. "Did give vhere? Only general? Exact time left?"

His disapproval deepened. Irresponsible.

"Agree," Kostya said, tone mild in the storm of Taym's derision, "vill check beach on vest side through bluff and cove." He checked the status of his phone: battery at 56%. "Am having enough power until night."

As if on cue, the window swelled, clattering in the windows and shattering another one down the hall, the sound a distant echo. Quietly, he summoned Syntax, for the glow if nothing else.

He did not defend her, not because he was just as disappointed, but because America was the President, and even now in the face of her poor decisions, she commanded more respect than Obadiah at all times. Loyalty was wound into his very being, and Syntax commented that it was a lot like something hardcoded into his motherboard. All encompassing, impossible to alter without damaging the foundations that laid beneath. In his file system permissions, only read was checked, not write.

"Be checking in every thirty minute or complete area of note?"

But for the hair, she made a pale, almost grim figure racing before him. Mud liberally splashed across bare feet and legs; dark stains across shorts and tank indicated that but for the rain, the rest of her would be in a similar state. America was pure steady motion, and maybe there was a voice calling out to her from behind, but so was everything else straight ahead.

Something caught and snagged her with enough force to tear America away from flight. All that was left to her was to fall and slip back down into the earth with an abruptness that left her panting in the mud, staring at the man with the knife in stunned incomprehension.

America breathed in deeply, and then out, and again, in deep powerful swells. Under the mud she was pale, like every piece of life and colour had been pulled in and concentrated into an almost painful flush and the feverish brightness in her eyes. She listened and watched him and knew him for Taym, and a sudden resentment flared up.

What right did this man have to stop someone in motion, to stop the sheer ******** perfection of her when he was content enough to just stand still and brittle and wasting away? When he could be so much more? Maybe he just didn't know what they were capable of. Maybe all he needed was to be shown, because they'd failed so terribly in the telling and some things were beyond words. Poetry in motion.

"Run with me," America gasped out, trying to get up and tug him with her, feet sliding in the mud.

She laughed, and there was both joy and confusion in it. Her own expression became pleading in turn, "There's nothing wrong, okay? I'm strong. We're so strong, Taym. We're capable of so much, I didn't understand before. I'm right here, right next to you, and we can go places. We can reach where others can't and it's amazing." She moved forward, against his grip and tried to push into him, make him step back with a pressure as gentle as she was capable of it right now. All he needed was a little momentum, all he needed to do was move. "Just let me show you."