Welcome to Gaia! ::

A cold compress was carefully placed across her forehead and in response, Yifei appeared to visibly relax. Her furrowed brow smoothed and the worry lines immediately faded. Over the next several minutes she seemed to finally be breathing normally.

When the dull ache lessened to something more negligible, Yifei took a chance and opened her eyes carefully; squinting as her eyes adjusted to the interior lights that had been turned on. For a moment her vision was blurred but soon it cleared and she saw blonde haired girl kneeling beside her. “Uumm.” her brows pulled together in an utterly confused expression. “Where am I? Who are- who are you?”

Vaguely she remembered talking to another corrupt but at the moment she wasn’t sure if that was real or part of that elaborate dream she just had.

To see such concern on another person's face, to hear the tone of worry as they spoke, it brought to the surface a nostalgic feeling. Only one other person, who wasn’t family, ever worried about her in such a way.

Hannah.

They’d met in high school, albeit briefly, but didn’t become friends until later on. Last she checked, which was by pure accident a couple of months ago, Hannah was still working at the Destiny City Memorial Hospital as a registered nurse. They didn’t speak, more so since the periwinkle-haired woman didn’t recognizer her; plus, even if she did, that would be a HIPPA violation to let others know that she knew a patient personally.

“I don’t have anyone…” Yifei admitted quietly as she shifted to move both feet off the couch and sit up so that Laz- No, Gabby- she mentally corrected herself. So that Gabby could sit down beside her instead of kneeling on the floor.

“I live in an apartment.” It had two bedrooms and two bathrooms. Not that space was needed; it wasn’t like she had much in the way of furniture to begin with. “I don’t even know who my neighbors are.” She could hear one of them well enough through the thin walls and she was well aware that the couple below her recently had a kid; fortunately, Yifei had light footsteps and was mindful when coming home late. “And my General, heh-”

The thought of flipping him off was met with a scolding reminder that the former headache could come back in full force. She winced but the sensation ebbed into near-nothingness; a quiet awareness. “He is busy with his own life.” To put it kindly. “I would only expect him to show up to confirm I was dead” A hard truth but that was because he was her boss, not her friend. No employer truly cared about their employees as long as workflow and income remained uninterrupted and in this case; the collection of energy quota or starseeds, which she had yet to take one from anyone much to his chagrin.

With an unsteady hand, she reached out to lift the glass of juice and gingerly took a sip. It was sweet, but not in the way that would give someone a sugar rush which was nice. “Thank you, Gabby.” A name repeated so she could commit it to memory more easily.

At the mention of bothering a King on her behalf, Yifei looked almost startled by the suggestion and almost immediately shook her head. For eight months she had kept her head low, doing as she had been told, if only so that the sovereigns wouldn’t look in her direction. At least they find out that she had come with more memories than she had originally let on.

As far as Xithrice was concerned, she was little more than a blank slate who had no memories to recall before waking up in the infirmary last December. Granted there were still many holes she couldn’t fill- time gaps that couldn’t be explained; He had briefly filled some of them in for her, however, Yifei felt skeptical that all of them were true. As of yet, he hadn’t given her much reason to doubt him; she just didn’t like him very much.

“Please don’t bother him, your General- General King. My General might be hands off, but he hasn’t hurt me or done anything wrong.” At least not to her knowledge anyway. However, if she knew about the youmaglia in her brain she’d no doubt reconsider her options after perhaps finding a way to torture him for an answer as to why he put a monster in her head without her knowledge or consent. For now, though, Yifei remained oblivious.


“My name-” She paused as the name Mei froze on the tip of her tongue. A name she had not used in some time yet she longed to hear someone say again. But it was not who she was anymore; the people who would have recognized her, instead looked through her when standing right in front of them. A stranger in their eyes; dead and forgotten, except there wasn’t a tombstone in a cemetery with her name on it. To her knowledge, she was still considered a missing person, a photo of her still posted on the bulletin board at the local precinct. “My name’s Yifei. And yes- it has been lonely,” she admitted quietly

For a long moment, there was silence as she took another much-needed drink of juice. The entire glass was nearly polished off before finally, she paused to take a breath and set the glass down on the coaster again “I appreciate you bringing me here,” truly, she was grateful. “I was kind enough for you to worry about me. I don’t know what would have happened to me if you didn’t show up.” The likely probability was that she’d power down and some random homeless person or drug addict would have looted her for whatever cash she had on hand or items that could be sold off easily and that was being kind in regards to the kind of criminal activity that happened around Destiny City. Unfortunately, she was acutely aware of how sideways things could have gone.

“I owe you for saving my life.”

Rather than feeling uplifted by the word ‘family’, Yifei felt her heart sink as her gaze fell to fixate on the glass of juice. It made her uncomfortable thinking of her general as anything but what he was in title. An older brother to her? ******** no- He’d never hold a candle to her actual brother, Shen.

Beyond that vein of thought though was the whispered voice she kept hearing of someone, or something, telling her to ‘obey’ or ‘serve’. Those did not sound like commands of someone that would view her as family as opposed to a servant or slave.

But how could she articulate that to Gabby without having her run to her General King? How could she explain to her these pervasive thoughts and migraines as being anything more than dehydration due to the heat and over exercise?

“Friends is something I can accept, but family feels odd.” Unnatural even. “My interactions with other officers has been limited. I have no memory of how I earned my promotions. Nobody has ever approached me as if they knew me, or called me by my actual senshi name. I don’t know what my place here is, or was. I’m given an order and follow which is a function of work not family, to me anyway.”

In all honesty, she wasn’t entirely certain how important to know if she used to go by any other name. All she was aware of was that there was limited information on her past achievements in the database.

On one hand, it could just mean that she was good at staying out of trouble, whereas on the other hand it could have been filed under something other than Fluorapatite and she just didn’t remember what she used to be called. Hell, she couldn’t even recall the name or face of the mauvian who had awoken her.

Her earliest memory as a Senshi was waking up in the infirmary, Xithricite walking in with a nurse. He had introduced himself and addressed her by the name Fluorapatite which sounded foreign to her but still, she accepted it as her own since he sounded confident in what he called her. Her general had explained that as a result of her injuries she had been in a coma for some time, Xithricite didn’t go into many details and she assumed it was because he hadn’t been there.

Memory loss was common, the nurse explained. However, his expression, with knitted brows and thin pressed lips, seemed to indicate that this is likely to be permanent.

At the mention of food, Yifei’s stomach made its presence known in a loud gurgling rumble that all but demanded to be fed. She looked up, clearly surprised and embarrassed by the sound of it, “I-um … I’m sorry.” The juice should have been enough, at least for a while, but the mention of pizza had her mouth already beginning to water. “Food would be good, please. Any toppings are fine.” Honestly, she wasn’t picky unless it came to seafood, only then did she really have much of an opinion.