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Post by Ylanne on Jun 28, 2020 20:43:59 GMT -6
"For some, perhaps," said the old woman, shrugging. "I haven't been to see a priest in years now, I think. There's nothing he could do for me. If by the grace and mercy of God, I might be spared, well, that'd be quite a miracle." In icons of Christ crucified and triumphant, flogged and enthroned, the merciful Theotokos, the solemn Sava, she saw only shadows. She saw not blessings or salvation in the church walls, the holy gates, the altars, the naves. She felt only absence. God was not with her. God had forsaken her long ago. "I already know what damnation awaits me." She glanced at the guard, who'd hardly looked in either of their directions since Drulović had arrived. "Aerilyn, I know you'll finish this task for me. You must. You're much younger, and freer, and you haven't carried the weight of the things I have. It's no small thing I ask of you, and yet, it's simply one small thing to be done to make things right. There's so little else I can do with myself anymore."
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Post by demikara on Jul 2, 2020 16:03:27 GMT -6
There really was no telling her no, was there? Aerilyn was well aware that she was being easily manipulated, but found she didn't mind so much. "I'll talk to Kim again. Hopefully he was just being skittish." He would be fine, she hoped. Or at least he could be pressured into doing it regardless of his nerves. "Hopefully with the extra information finding the grave site will be easier." To the north, in cold, hard, crumbling soil. She could look at geological surveys, perhaps? "Is it near any former cities or towns? Do you know?" If it had one been a thriving planet there would be plenty of ruins to choose from.
At least that meant more potential for shelter which would make her job easier.
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Post by Ylanne on Jul 2, 2020 16:40:38 GMT -6
"I'm afraid I couldn't say with any certainty," said Drulović, shaking her head slowly. She hadn't moved much since Aerilyn had arrived. The long days for trial were physically exhausting. She wasn't entirely sure she'd make it to dinner that night either. Why bother struggling down the hallway for a mostly inedible meal? Perhaps by Sunday, the pain would decrease enough that she could try again. "They'd stayed for a time in a city called Ą̊k͜paå̃thȑ, but I doubt Ms. Sampathkumar lies there now. The city is ashes now." It had burned for two months, casting an eerie glow visible from nearly an entire quadrant of the planet when the winds cycled off. And even those violent winds could do nothing to stop the blaze. They'd all wondered which sorcerers had divined it. The city had burned so hotly that it didn't even cool for six months after the last of the flames licked at the old gates.
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Post by demikara on Jul 2, 2020 16:49:34 GMT -6
"It's a starting point at least." She decided. Aerilyn's gaze was heavy on the other and she reached across the table, hands just short of the other woman's. "Who will look after you while I'm gone, huh? Not that I'm doing a stellar job, but someone has to at least advocate for you to get food you can eat and the help you need." And it couldn't be Ahmad. "Will one of your agents bring you something you can eat during the trial? Could you ask for that?" She probably wouldn't. But Aerilyn had to at least suggest it.
She'd try again for some sort of kindness to be put forth. Something had to be done, something had to give from her age and injuries. Surely they wouldn't insist Arianne die alone in prison? That was a cruelty Aerilyn couldn't understand.
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Post by Ylanne on Jul 2, 2020 18:59:37 GMT -6
"I'm no errant child who needs to be looked after by a nursemaid," Drulović chided gently, her eyes sharp as ever. "I'm doing just fine on my own. The food is certainly lacking in quality, but, well, so is the food over at North Bautista Hospital, where jello seems to be the chef's favorite substitute for an actual meal. Here, I imagine it's the mystery meat." She chuckled a little at that. She'd begun to make a game of it, guessing what kind of animal had been mutilated and overly processed to create the slimy, thin slices of meat they served at lunch and dinnertime. It didn't matter much, anyhow. She couldn't chew it. "You're far more useful and helpful to me taking care of my unfinished business, Aerilyn. I need for you to see to it. I assure you, I'll not die of starvation. I'm much too obstinate for that."
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Post by demikara on Jul 6, 2020 18:13:00 GMT -6
"You still need looked after." Aerilyn pointed out very gently. "Even if only as a friend. And I'll take care of the trip and return the ashes." And if the winds died down entirely on the planet, she was blaming ghosts and converting. Converting to what, she didn't know, but she was converting. Magic was weird as hell and she didn't want to deal with any but her own for the most part. "I do wish you could eat more though. You're already small, and this makes you smaller."
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Post by Ylanne on Jul 6, 2020 19:21:59 GMT -6
"Ą̊k͜paå̃thȑ is a uniquely dangerous place," said the old woman, sighing. "But I trust you'll return just fine." She stared absently at the people in the cubicle closest to them. She recognized the man - formerly a high justice, stripped of title and office just as she had been. He sat back ramrod straight, chin high, expression revealing nothing at all, while a man only a few years younger sat somberly, head bowed and hands clasped furiously together. Their conversation was inaudible but Drulović had heard it before. The old man was raging against the injustice of it all. He cast a scornful look in her direction for a moment. His partner was terrified that he wouldn't ever return home. Well. There would be no home for either of them. "Tell Mr. Fazari to sneak something in for me, if you're so worried about it. I could do for a bit of pie or casserole - something soft and warm, like my grandmother used to make in the old iron griddle." She could almost smell the fresh baked apple pie from memory, hear the sizzling metal in the kitchen, smell the sweetgrass from the open windows. That house too had been long lost to the ravages of war.
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Post by demikara on Jul 8, 2020 8:27:21 GMT -6
"I'll do my best. I should probably prepare things in case I don't." That would be fun.It wasn't something she wanted to bring up with Ahmad, though she knew she could. This could be more dangerous than she was prepared for after all. "And I'll tell him he should have been doing that all along. I can't promise it will stay warm, but I'll see if he can't sneak in something soft." And delicious and easy to chew. Arianne would be able to eat at least something, if they worked at it.
Even if they were going to have to take advantage of less than legal routes to do so. "I'm sure we can probably manage some pie." Somehow.
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Post by Ylanne on Jul 8, 2020 8:49:48 GMT -6
The guard standing near them pretended not to hear. Drulović snorted. In her dotage, she would become a smuggler of pie. Who would have imagined it? But quickly, her expression turned serious again, though the harsh lines on her face seemed to carry the weight of exhaustion more than anything else. "You haven't already prepared for the possibility of your early death, Aerilyn? I'm surprised; I'd have thought you had accepted its possibility long ago." The old woman had tried to teach all of them. They'd required it of their agents, the preparation of a will and codicils, an annual review of next of kin designations and power of attorney, and preferred funerary arrangements. Her own had been tucked away with Nenad since her return from Lipljan. "It's nothing to fear. Death comes for us all in the end, and we must inevitably reap what seed we each have sowed. We all answer for it in the end."
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Post by demikara on Jul 8, 2020 14:11:16 GMT -6
"I admit, working at Gambit's leaves you feeling very much like you'll die any moment and that you'll never die at all. I'm afraid its a handover from my time there. I've also been working such a low risk job lately...I've let things lapse." You should go over your will and things every other year or so after all. "I'm not afraid if death though, not for my sake. I'm more afraid what my death would do to Ahmad." His support system was shakier than it used to be, with Arianne in prison. He had least still had the rest of his family though. He wouldn't be completely alone. But he would be alone enough.
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Post by Ylanne on Jul 8, 2020 14:40:32 GMT -6
"He'd be emotionally devastated, of course," said Drulović. She removed her hands from the table, resting them on her lap, and nestled a bit into the chair, wincing. "But he'd survive it. He knows well what we risk. He's risked his own life, albeit reluctantly so. It's no easy thing, to survive the death of a life partner, but I'm afraid most of us will suffer that pain sometime in our lives. Your responsibility oughtn't be to attempt to protect him from it, but to prepare him for it instead. He's grown, now." As young as Aerilyn and Ahmad both were, the old woman knew they'd long since left childhood behind. If they were fortunate, they might live long before either of them passed into the night. But she knew better. She'd seen it happen too many times before. "You'll need to prepare for it for both of you. Death rarely comes announced."
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Post by demikara on Jul 9, 2020 8:47:02 GMT -6
"I know. But I still worry. He'll drown himself in video games and forget to eat." She sighed. "Or he'll sit there with the system on just staring at it until he eventually goes to bed." She had seen his trauma response. "He brought up coming along himself at one point. We settled on me bringing a bureau comm, so I won't be out of contact." It was a simple thing, but it helped him calm down and she could understand that all too well. She'd do what she could to settle his worries and always did.
Well, she was stubborn on the type of work she did, but Aerilyn couldn't imagine a life not in security of some sort, even if taking the security position she had now felt more like a retirement job than anything else.
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Post by Ylanne on Jul 9, 2020 10:37:45 GMT -6
"How now, pilfering government supplies fitted with classified technology for unauthorized personal use by non-employees," said Drulović with a slight upturn of her lips and the faintest hint of bemusement in her eyes. "I approve entirely." Her gaze turned soft. "I'm sure Ms. Wiryaman won't mind too much either." She hadn't spoken to Lisbeth in months now, not directly anyway. It would have been too difficult. "Mr. Fazari loves you dearly. If that time comes for you, he'll have to let you go. I'm afraid he won't have any other choice available to him. He knows that." Though she knew she would, in all likelihood, not be available to him either. Even were it not for the prosecution gunning for her, she felt age weigh on her daily. No one was meant to live forever. Technology and magic could only cheat death so much for so long. In the end, she'd come for them all.
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Post by demikara on Jul 9, 2020 16:12:32 GMT -6
"It's one small thing. I'm sure it won't be a big deal to do." Aerilyn grinned, but her smile softened at the note that he loved her. She loved him too, very dearly, even when he was driving her mad with his love of video games. She knew she drove him just as mad with her gun collection. "I'm afraid I'm stubborn. It won't come easily to me. Not on this mission." Though the planet would do its damnedest to kill her, she was sure of it. She didn't plan on making it remotely easy.
"I'll have to get some stims as well, just to be sure." They'd help boost her magic, even if she would crash spectacularly once they were out of her system. She just had to be sure to crash on the ship and not on the planet and it would be fine.
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Post by Ylanne on Jul 9, 2020 16:45:48 GMT -6
"I'm sure Ms. Titon would be more than happy to oblige," said Drulović, though in all fairness, the bureau's cyberintelligence head was never really happy to oblige anyone with anything, and was probably more likely to threaten defenestration than to actually produce. She'd had to warn Lisbeth carefully to make sure they never assigned any interns - or really, even any junior staffers at all - to Titon. The inevitable and very deserved lawsuits were not worth it.
Drulović blinked slowly as she watched Aerilyn, her eyes tired and pained. No, she realized, she would not be making it to dinner that night. Maybe breakfast in the morning. Or lunch, if nothing else. The food was nothing to look forward to for anyone. "I should hope you plan to leave soon, though. I'd have thought you ought to have already been gone and finished with the whole thing by now. I trust you'll be on your way without further delay, then."
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