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001: [Video]

[Carter turns the camera on and it broadcasts. He doesn't know it's doing this, as he thinks he's just filming a video of himself.]

Entry one. Title: This Place is Fucked Up. Did I mention it's fucked up? Exhibit A, the bathroom--

[Carter swings the camera around and shows the bathroom, which has a wall of shrunken heads. Their eyes roll and they cackle when they see the camera. Carter backs out of the bathroom and closes the door.]

Can you believe that? My door is unlocked, too. What amateur kidnappers. Where's Reefs? He's gonna kill all of you. He's a hard motherfucker. Anytime now. Hey, do you see that?

[The camera flips around to show a Nameless, its mouth stitched shut and carrying a stack of laundry. It passes by the open door to Carter's suite. The teen gasps audibly.]

That guy had a sewn mouth! What the fuck! What the fuck! That is some fucked up Somali-pirate shit!

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...

[...]

Are you fucking kidding me?

[That sounds like the absolute worst. There was a time when Lily would blindly believe everything she was told, but that was several years ago. She quickly learned that nothing was ever as it seemed, and there would always be someone around to explain any incidents.]

[What they said was rarely the whole truth.]

[Lily sighs, smiles, and reaches out tentatively to touch Carter's arm with her good hand.]

You're never gonna have to listen to a handler again. Ever. You're free.

[She's touching him.

She's touching him. People don't just touch Carter. He stares at the hand on his arm. It's pale and white and the nails are smaller and more delicate than the nails on his own hand.

Lily is so nice. She's probably the nicest girl he's ever met in real life in his entire life, and Carter sucks in a breath as tears well up in his eyes. And she offered to make him family.]

Oh, jeeze.

[He wipes at his eyes. He's a fucking crying baby, but he can't help it. He's feeling so kindly towards Lily that if he looks in her eyes now, he knows he'll send her into a coma. But he doesn't mind. Carter would do it now and watch her body for hours, just as a favour.

He reaches up and covers her hand with his own for a second, staring at the ground and feeling tenderness in him. He has to be careful now not to bliss her out. Avoid her eyes. Stay a little disengaged. Carter drops his hand.

It's too hard, though. He has to disengage. Carter tries to think of something distressing. Killing. Death. Kids starving in Africa.]

I need a second.

[His voice is strangled.

Kids starving in Africa. Villages drinking dirty water. Seagulls eating trashbags. Birds with broken wings. Dead dogs. Carter stares at the wall and tries to think of unpleasant things, because if he looks at Lily right now? Game over. She's too nice. It was too risky meeting her in person.]

[Oh holy shit he's crying. Was it something she said? Of course it's something she said. Are these happy tears? They'd better be. They look happy. When Lily fully understood that she was free, she cried, too. She cried a lot. It was the best feeling in the world. No more murder and mayhem. Just Lily, her little family, and a magic cruise ship.]

[She waits patiently for him to gather himself.]

Um, do you want a hug? I still have an arm that works.

No, just something in my eye.

[He jokes, but he's half-serious, wishing she would accept the idea that he's not weak. He doesn't want to cry in front of anyone, let alone a strange girl he just met, but maybe Carter's just feeling a little overwhelmed with the prospect of freedom? Of family? It's a lot to take in. It's a big change.

He blinks hard a few times and wipes at his eyes again, and finally glances at Lily askance for a second, then back at the wall. He smiles at the wall, pretending he's facing her.]

Nah, I'd put you in a coma if you gave me a hug. But I can fix your arm if you want. I'd be a lousy resplendent if I couldn't.

[She can't even hug him? Hugs are what give Lily life. They're so cozy! But she doesn't want to go into a coma, so she just smiles and nods, glancing down at her arm.]

Oh! Yeah! Please. It's getting really annoying.

[She shrugs off her sling, lets it drop to the floor, and starts to unroll the bandages around her arm. Lily heals on her own, so the medic didn't wrap her up too tight. Steam leaks from her wounds as the bandages fall away.]

I got in a fight this morning.

[Her arm is fucking mangled. The worst wounds have been sewn up, but the smaller ones were just cleaned and left alone.]

It's not too bad.

Edited 2014-11-09 22:27 (UTC)

[Carter stares at the wall, waiting patiently. The tears are gone, because he knows exactly what to do and how he can do it. Healing something as simple as a broken arm is child's play to him. Literally, something he did in hospitals as a child (beneath the watchful eye of his handler, of course). He can heal a broken--

Carter yelps when he glances over and sees Lily's mangled arm. He quickly looks to the wall again, eyes wide.]

Not too bad?! What happened? Did you fight a bear or something? Jesus, is there any shrapnel in it? Nevermind, I'll fix it.

[A healing coma would fix her arm easily right now, but wouldn't it be more heroic and awesome if he showed enough self control to do it without knocking her out? Carter wants to try. So instead of doing the smart thing, Carter decides to try and heal Lily right then and there, in the hall. He is truly a teenaged boy. He gropes blindly sideways as he looks at the wall for her arm and picks it up by her fingertip and elbow.]

What happened? It helps if I know.

[Lily winces just a bit at his touch. The throbbing pain in her arm has subsided--that's always the first thing to heal--but moving it still aches just a tad.]

I fought a leopard, actually. But I did fight a bear once. [That was an experience.] It was a were-leopard, and apparently he gets, like... murderous, when the moon's full. He got my arm pretty bad, but I punched him in the face. Then my friend Ben came in and ripped his throat out. [It was awesome.] My arm's healing, see? [She gestures to the steam leaking from her wounds.] But I heal a lot slower than I used to.

[Steam rises around Carter's fingers and he hazards a glance at it. Clots hold in blood and the flesh is enflamed and hot to the touch. Her heartbeat registers to the touch and her skin is marred with steaming, complicated scar tissue that's healing away. It's a type of regenerating that he's never seen before. ]

Okay... This won't hurt a bit. Just tell me if you, uh, get dizzy.

[Carter breathes out, then inhales and closes his eyes. He thinks about Lily and how she made him feel. Healing her will be easy, Carter thinks. All he has to do is remember how she offered to take him in. She's kind. She's pretty. She's outgoing. She's strange like him. It's easy to summon empathy and with it comes a swell of power.

Carter lowers his head and lays his forehead against the back of her hand. A warmth starts from the point of contact, and with it a soothing, golden shimmer that works its way up her arm. The throbbing ache she feels immediately ceases, and instead Lily can feel a laugh bubbling up in her throat. It's not that she can't feel her arm and all the nerves in it, it's that suddenly loves everything. Even the pain. It's just a wonderful sensation amongst others in the choir of her sensory organs.

The pain is far away. It's not just far away, it's in total perspective. She's so much more than her mangled arm and anyway, that's being taken care of, so why not daydream about something more pleasant? Like maybe Carter standing up and hugging Lily? And then she's hugging all her family at once; everyone she's felt loved by is there and they each swarm around her like glimmering, almost-seen fish. Love bubbles up around her mind and supports her like a gentle bath. She's okay. Everything is okay. She doesn't have to DO anything, she just has to relax and feel okay. And feeling okay doesn't feel selfish, it feels giving because Lily can remember everyone and how she's connected and how she's still connected.

Her arm is healed now, but Carter's eyes are closed and he's concentrating on the feeling of family she shared with him. It's nice to stand there and share with her the relief and happy-sadness that the idea of other special-kid friends means. And then Carter feels her wrist go limp. He snaps his eyes open and darts forward to catch her and barely does. ]

Oh, Jesus. I went too far.

[The relaxation Lily has felt before is now out of control. Before it was pleasant, now it's all-consuming. Lily will be unable to feel her toes, much less walk, for some of the most joyous, happy hours of her life. Carter winces and gently lays Lily on the ground, her head resting on his calf. ]

Aw, fuck. She's in deep.

[And Carter settles in for a long wait while Lily goes off to live in a fantasy world where all her dreams come true.]

[Lily is a million miles away.]

[She's in the past. She and Even are flinging glitter at each other. Mimmi is reading to her. She and B are learning a language. Kage is telling her all about Zeshat. She's meditating with Oogway, she's golfing with Tyler, she's sparring with Erol.]

[B gives her a necklace, Even gives her a ring, Kage gives her a home.]

[She runs into Chase Stein on deck 7.]

[She sees real flowers for the first time.]

[Lily is out for several long hours, and when she comes to, it's... disorienting, to say the least. She opens her eyes slowly, then raises her hand to block out the light from the hallway lamps. Where is she? This isn't deck 13. Hell, this isn't even the Elegante. Where the fuck is she, and what's going on?]

[She sits up, dazed. The feel of her family's embrace is fading fast, and no matter how hard she tries to hold on to it, it slips right through her fingers.]

[Lily doesn't know if this is the best or worst thing to ever happen to her.]

[She looks to Carter, and she doesn't recognize him for a second. But when she does, she smiles shakily.]

Um, was I asleep?

[Carter looks over, then glances away. He smiles a bit, eyes cast away.]

You were in a coma. A vacation. We called it a bliss-out. You go somewhere nice for a few hours.

[He's nervous, but he knows she's okay and her arm will be feeling right as rain. It's unlikely he'll trigger another one so soon, so he hazards a look at her and flashes a smile.]

Did you have a good time?

[Everyone has a good time.]

Um... Yeah.

[Lily raises a hand to slide her fingertip along her collar, then down to touch the locket hanging around her neck. Has she ever opened this...?]

It was amazing. I didn't even know I was out, I felt... [She shakes her head.] I could have stayed there forever.

[Smile.]

It all felt so real.

[Carter nods silently. She was in whatever felt like Heaven to her. Experiencing her best moments over again, or in a more positive fashion, it was a trip to another land where nothing hurt and everything was resolved and perfect.

A utopia. 'Nowhere'.

It's what he can do. Carter smiles faintly.]

Yeah. A blissout. That's what can happen if I look at your face too much, or get too close.

[He pokes his fingers together.]

Ah.

[A blissout, huh. Lily's going to have to keep that in mind. It was absolutely magnificent. And if Carter can do it so easily...]

[A thought sticks out in her mind. Lily looks down at her locket again. She often forgets she even has this. She hasn't taken it off in months. It's become a part of her, in the same way Even's ring is a part of her, too. And yet, she's never opened it.]

[Why? Why hasn't she opened it? On the Shore, she was too anxious to even consider it. She was too preoccupied with organizing the survivors (and trying to survive herself) to dwell on the past. Lily often wondered what B might put in it, but she never...]

[She raises her hands--oh, her arm healed up nicely--and carefully pries open the locket.]

[A few shining gold grains of sand, and a drop of metal.]

[She shuts the locket quickly and grips it in her fist, looking like she's seen a ghost. In just a few seconds, Lily gathers herself, and looks to Carter.]

Wanna continue the tour?

[Carter watches her hand. She saw something when she was in her blissout, and only now she'd thought to open the locket, perhaps? Or perhaps she just wanted to look at her drops of mercury again. It didn't make any sense to Carter, so he turned his mind from the problem and scrambled to his feet.

Carter extended a hand for Lily, still looking at the far wall. It was habit not to look another person in the face, he still smiled as if he were looking at her directly. Carter just kinda assumed the other person would feel his general 'aura' and read that.]

Hand up?

Oh--um, thank you.

[Lily takes his hand and stands up. Her legs feel a little weak from the blissout, but she can stand on her own.]

[She's been carrying B around with her this entire time. A part of B, literally close to her heart--and he's been there for a very, very long time.]

[This is insane.]

Uh... Alright, okay, let's keep going. [She starts walking again, very quickly.] There's a food court on deck 6, and there's also a bunch of shops where everything is free.

[She sounds distant, as if she's still living in the past.]

And there's a restaurant on deck 9.

[Carter can tell something's wrong. She opened the locket and now she's dizzy, weak. That's not what happens after blissouts. They make people happy and stronger, not weaker, not fainter.

Carter floats to a halt.]

Hey, uh--Lily? What happened?

[His voice is sharper, a little more direct. He looks at a spot over her shoulder instead of at the wall. This is Carter's direct form.]

Most people feel like they could run a marathon after a blissout. You're doped. What's going on? What's in that locket?

[Lily slows to a stop, staring at her feet. She was delighted after the blissout, but upon opening her locket... All of that energy just evaporated. She's uncertain why this is affecting her so much. Lily could hardly explain how she feels to herself, much less Carter.]

A while back, I had friend named B. He was my best friend. And one day, he gave me a locket, and... [She turns around and holds up her locket. It's a simple silver locket with a green four-leafed clover on the front.] I never opened it until now. It's really hard to explain.

[He looks at the locket. It's cute and it has a four-leaf clover design on it. A simple thing, but it's sweet. B was obviously someone special to her, and so he nods and picks at the hem of his shirt.]

What do you think he meant by giving you that bit of mercury in there?

It's, uh...

[Lily almost wants to open the locket again, but she's not sure she could handle it. Part of her wants to cry, and part of her wants to pretend this never happened.]

B could melt. He could melt into this gooey metal stuff. That's what's in here. [She rubs the locket between her fingers absently.] A part of him. Literally.

[Literally a piece of her friend in her locket for her to hold forever. Carter's mouth dropped open. That was really sad and heartbreaking. They didn't know if they'd see each other again, so B gave her part of himself. To Carter, it seems like a sweet gesture of love.]

Holy shit. So that's--him. That's B. Like a drop of him. I wonder if it can hear us.

... I don't know.

[Is that even a possibility? Lily looks down at her locket, blinking, eyes wide. Could B hear when he was made of goo? She never thought to ask, and she's only seen him as goo a few times.]

[... But B is gone. Not dead, if he's anything like Chase. Just gone. Even if he was dead, he still existed in some universe...]

I kinda hope it can. So he knows I miss him, a lot.

[Carter shrugged, but it was an awkward thing. What he wished he could do was give Lily assurance that her friend surely knew how dearly he was missed... but the fact was, Carter knew better than anyone that a person could be just 'disappeared' and it would be like they vanished into thin air.

He'd been disappeared as a kid. He'd even gone onto missing kid registries and seen his own picture. That had been a trip, once he was given internet privileges.]

Y'know, I bet if you talk to it, he'll hear.

[He shrugs.]

Maybe.

Yeah. Maybe.

[The chances are low, but Lily has definitely seen weirder shit in her short life. She stares at her locket, unsure what to say, then decides to bring it to her lips for a kiss. She lingers for a moment, then drops the locket to hang around her neck and smiles brightly.]

D'you wanna get something to eat? The food court is close by.

Yeah, I'm starving.

[Carter's been guarding Lily's body for the past hour or so, so he's been bored and hungry as a horse. Now he knows the ship is safe and they're free to explore--and Lily is healed up and can fight, even if there are were-leopards around.

It's a complicated situation, but Carter is fine with not understanding all the particulars right now. He has a friend, someone who doesn't mind his blissouts, and someone who is worth defending. Well, as much as he can defend.

Carter will do his best.]

Lead the way.

[If she knew how long she was out, she'd apologize! Instead, Lily takes Carter to the elevators and punches in deck 6. When they arrive, she leads Carter through the shopping center and to the food court, blah-blah-blahing about it as she goes. The more she talks about the boat, the less she has to talk about her feelings.]

You can get pretty much anything. Any kind of food. It's not... Uh, the food at the restaurant is better, but this stuff is still pretty good! [She points to a specific food stall.] I like the Indian stuff.

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