|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 Posted: Wed Jan 28, 2015 5:39 am
The phone was still a mystery, but so far it had been valuable in resetting a lot of memories from Zia's old life. Which was helpful and also pretty logical, considering she obsessively carried it everywhere and logged everything, especially the index and her notes. It was a small little preservation of what she'd been, and what she was trying to get back to, even though most of the things in Pandora's box were unpleasant to face and sometimes led to shutting down and taking a break.
Some of the more technical things needed figuring out. Sometimes it was intuitive, and sometimes not as much as she thought. Like when she ventured back into the little screen that came up when she hit the green icon with the phone silhouette and saw that there was a missed call from a recognizable name.
Luckily there wasn't much to do besides touch it and the phone did the rest, deciding to call the number back with a small amount of initiation on her part.
She pulled her knees up to her chest and waited for the outgoing ring to stop and indicate some kind of connection.
"Hi?"
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Thu Jan 29, 2015 6:22 pm
Almost two weeks had passed since Chris had been released from the hospital, although he was advised to rest and take it easy as he continued to heal. Getting strange texts from Zia was not something he’d expected, but despite being told not to get worked up about things, he couldn’t just ignore her.
“Zee?” he responded to the confused sounding greeting. He frowned in concern, trying to keep his voice down so as not to alert Paris of anything out of the ordinary. “Are you safe?? Are you hurt?? Where have you been? I’ve been worried sick about you… Everyone’s been worried about you,” he told her, shifting uncomfortably on the bed he’d been made to stay in unless absolutely necessary to get up.
He’d tried texting her back, but the bandages that covered his hands didn’t exactly have the special fabric needed for texting. He’d tried to voice text her, but that got awkward fast when the phone auto corrected to things he hadn’t even thought of saying. A voice command to call her was the only thing he could think of to respond, but even then she hadn’t answered.
Chris couldn’t let himself feel relief just yet, not until he made sure she was okay.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Jan 30, 2015 9:31 am
Zia was silent on the other end, trying to process all of the questions he had just asked her, and wondering how to articulate her questions for him. Once she had sifted through enough information to actually speak, all that came out was an anticlimactic, "Yes." Which only applied to the first question.
"I--... I did a s-stupid thing. And I came back... wrong... I was hiding. I came home, to Dad's house but..." She trailed off.
Robert had passed away weeks ago and it still felt unreal. The fact that it had happened while she was gone, and she hadn't had much time to herself since to really cope with it wasn't helping. Sitting in his house, where she'd grown up, had helped a lot of memory triggers and regression back to the way she remembered things used to be. But at the same time it also felt like he was just away. On some business trip. And he would be calling to scold her for not calling him and letting him know how class went. That is how she remembered things were supposed to be, even with the knowledge that they had not been that way for a long time.
"Did something happen on New Years?" She asked, remembering the news reporting terrorists at a ball, and remembering Finn had mentioned kidnappings. Whatever it was, it was apparently big, but she hadn't had much of a chance to look into it, since after all of the funeral arrangements were out of the way, her mother had dragged her off out of Destiny City.
"I-I've been back for... for a little bit but gone. Out of the country." The rest was much less stilted, since it was drawing on knowledge obtained last week, post-Tartaros, and it came out fluid and a bit bitter. "Caroline thinks a beach trip solves everything."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sat Jan 31, 2015 5:45 pm
He could feel his heart break in the silence. She had been slipping away from him for a while. Things were different now from the first time he’d powered up. The first time he knew of her involvement in this. He knew he could have insisted on being closer to her and helping her, but he was afraid of pushing her even further away in the process.
“I’m sorry about your dad…” he said softly when she mentioned the house. He hadn’t learned about his death until his mother told him while he was in the hospital. He tensed only a moment when she mentioned New Years, but he was soon relieved she didn’t seem to know the details.
“There was an ambush at a New Years party, yeah… Some people were taken… some corrupted and killed, but we got everyone who was left out,” he reassured her, not wanting this to be just another thing for her to worry about. “Who told you? And what stupid thing are you talking about? You'll let me know if you need anything, right...?”
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sat Jan 31, 2015 6:15 pm
"I could've been there," She said in one, quiet exhale. "The ambush and... him. I was... I was too busy hiding after. I mean, I was-- I stuck but after I came back I just hid for a little while because I ******** up my head so bad and I didn't know if anyone would... I mean, I just, I could have been there."
She cringed and pressed the fingers of her free hand against her temple when she realized she was spiraling into that stilted babble again.
"Finn told me. He only mentioned Hvergelmir, I don't know who all was taken. Do you guys know who didn't make it?" She asked, tense that it might be someone she knew, or worse, someone she hadn't remembered yet. She had taken Chris' wording as indicating he was part of the rescue crew, and had been momentarily-- if falsely and mistakenly-- relieved he hadn't been hurt.
"I thought I had a way out, before Zirconia and her stupid politics with Ares and Cassandra and Black Moon Whoever would eat me alive. I just thought if I could do this one last thing... and things were going to go back to normal. But it didn't work, I couldn't pull if off. It was almost right there in my hands and I just couldn't outsmart any of them."
A brief thought flashed through her mind, "I guess Kairatos didn't tell anyone what I did."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Mon Feb 02, 2015 5:44 am
Chris remained quiet throughout Zia's verbal breakdown, recollection, and everything in between. He leaned his head back against the pillows and closed his eyes to the world. She was getting worse from the last time he spoke to her, and it scared him to know there was very little he could do to help her. She'd sent him a text about his dog that had passed away over ten years ago...
In some ways, he thought whatever she was going through was worse than any torture he'd endured. A week left to rot in your own pool of blood could not possibly be as horrifying as losing yourself. At least he had Paris, but Zia had been so distant from him that he didn't know who she had to go to. Hearing familiar names of who she'd been in contact with settled him enough for the moment.
"Kairatos has been a little preoccupied," he said finally, trying not to sound irritated about his inability to do anything to help his best friend or anyone else, or even himself at the moment with his hands bandaged as they were. "He was one of those who's been taken and tortured for pointless information..."
Okay... he needed to reel everything back in. It wasn't her fault she didn't know about Kairatos, but neither was it his fault for not telling people about whatever she'd done.
"Anyway..." he started again, his voice much softer than it had just been, apologetic even. "You've talked to Finn? Good..." Chris breathed out in relief. "Zee, please... If you can't get in contact with me, or don't want to, please go to Finn... He's a good guy. He'll help you and be honest with you... He's got a good sense of a person's character and I trust him..." he told her, knowing he wouldn't be able to help her with everything, but at least she would have someone with no ulterior motives to go to.
But there were other important things to talk about. "Is Hvergelmir okay? I... don't know who didn't make it..." he said a little guiltily, giving over the names he knew of those who had been taken and wondered who would never be seen again... "I'm sorry Kairatos wasn't able to say anything... Will you tell me now? I'd rather hear it from you anyway... What about Ares? And who is Cassandra?"
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Wed Feb 04, 2015 8:39 pm
"W-what?" Zia stammered, trying to work through a scattered mess of anxieties and feelings. Caroline had moved back into the penthouse so she figured in her absence Xanthus must have vacated or gotten booted when she saw the place pristine and cat-less. He had sent her back a message that had swearing/gibberish words on the top, and so she had been avoiding opening up the text chain, afraid of what else was behind it.
It hadn't crossed her mind he had been taken.
"I-is he okay? Is he at the hospital? Do you know? I'm not sure, Finn seemed to imply everyone who got out was mending, but I don't know..." She babbled, holding the phone with both hands and sounding like she was ready to spiral back into a panic.
It was a long silence on her end while she tried to just not, or at least enough to maintain coherence. Not that Xanthus was a good topic for maintaining coherence. They had lived together for a year, and then seemed to just be impossibly distant in a matter of a day's worth of changes
After a bit of time thinking about how to make words, she inhaled deeply, and resumed talking. "I talked to Finn, yeah. I want to keep talking to Finn. B-but... I... I just want... I miss people. I miss everyone. It was dark for such a long time. I remember so many things but I remember... I just... I miss you."
She drummed her fingers against the phone casing, trying to think of what to say about what had happened. "I asked Ash to send out a broadcast a while ago... I don't know if you saw it. I found Nehelenia's mirror on the moon, and it led to this big... thing. I made contact with the other side, and the priestess Cassandra was there. I thought she was going to help, and take Zirconia home, but it was just another power hungry opportunist. Like all the rest. She lied," She paused to search for compact phrasing again. "I... when I was stuck in my own head. I had to give up a little, to Zirconia. And then we got sucked in Tartaros. Kairatos, Bischofite, Alfheim, and Iris. There was a confrontation with Cassandra. It went really, really bad. I'm not sure who all made it out alive."
She swallowed awkwardly and her voice took on a shaky quality all over again. "Because I didn't."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
