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| Scene Title | A Question |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | Is asked. |
| Date | May 1, 2019 |
The sun was low, not yet night but the sky was clear on the street of the Clocktower Building.
The sound of skates on pavement can be heard and Eve Mas skirts the corner her black trench coat flaring open behind her. Droplets of rain fly off of her. Her face is wet too. Eyes wide and glowing red. She's just come from Red Hook where a sudden storm had taken root. Strangely it wasn't anywhere else. "Curious curious." She mutters as a flare of pain blossoms from her center. She had Dispersed earlier in the afternoon but still the strain of holding herself together wears on her.
Her silver sparkly roller skates bump and roll onto the road, she misses the bump in the concrete and almost trips over before catching herself with a cry. Unfortunately her trajectory carries her full force through the doors of the Clocktower building. "Whoaaaaa wheeee!" Eve ends up in a tangle of limbs of the floor in the lobby.
With eyes closed she rolls over and a jolt of red lightning runs down her front.
"Oww."
The exasperated gasp of shock that comes from the woman at the front desk is accompanied by the clatter of a chair being pushed back as she jolts to her feet. “Fuck!” Mira Sadowsky doesn’t receive many unexpected guests in her role as administrative support, but every so often something like this happens, and she’s forced to remember that the world of predictability died in atomic fire over a decade ago. This is a world of unexpected surprises, and no one expects the Mas inquisition.
“Evemas,” Mira blurts out as one word, a hand up at her chest to feel the pound of her own heartbeat, “we invented doors to avoid these kinds of entrances!” She isn’t mad, just frightened. Even as she sputters out that greeting, Mira is calming, though the rapid rise and fall of her chest from hasty breaths doesn’t show it.
"I'm okay!" Waving her hand in the air shakily and a grimace follows the pain from the fall is overtaken by the overall pain Eve feels in her whole body. Slowly and awkwardly the pale woman gets to her feet wobbling for she idles there, wet hair on her skates. "Sorry about that the sidewalk isn't perfect everywhere whoopsie." Running a hand through the back of her hair, her crimson eyes stare into Mira's face. "You look well! Rosy cheeks." Plastering a cheery grin on her face while tilting her head to the side.
She should have brought sunglasses.
"I…" taking a look around the lobby remembering the last time she was here. After sleepwalking from Gillian's to a parking garage and running barefoot here. Eve was making it a habit to arrive at the doorstep of the Mothers out of sorts. In this moment Eve tries her best to calm herself, being alone and asking questions or seeking answers often proves hard because of her eccentric behavior. The unique way she sees things even without foresight. Shhh just ask for the mother, no no. Don't touch anything. Mentally chiding herself before she ruins something with her volatile form.
"I have a rather pressing concern… a question I think I'm meant to ask, are any of the Mothers in?"
Mira has slowly advanced back to her desk, one hand up as if surrendering to the police, the other slowly snaking down as she sits back down behind the desk and triggers a silent alarm. “Ah, I’m— sorry— who?” It takes her a moment to parse exactly what Eve might be asking, remembering their previous encounter that went about the same.
“Alice isn’t here,” Mira says with a shake of her head, clicking the security call button again, “she’s on a business trip. I can’t— ” there’s a soft ding from the elevator, and as the brushed metal doors slide apart it isn’t the charming Zachary Stone that emerges this time, but rather a blonde-haired woman with chocolate brown eyes, dressed entirely in black. Mira fires a quick side-long look at her as she steps out of the elevator. “I’m sorry, she— ”
“Eve can stay.” The woman says with a look back to Eve, and with a tumbling sense of vertigo Eve feels both a sense of familiarity and a sense of confusion about the woman. She approaches, her ink black silhouette like a cat crossing a picket fence. She offers out a hand to the ex-seer, dark brows raised.
Mira, only now relaxing in her seat, watches the exchange with no small amount of confusion. “Eve Mas, my name is Aria Baumgartner, I work for Ms. Zimmerman. Is there something that I can assist a war hero like yourself with?”
There's a bit of dread that creeps into Eve's stomach when the elevator dings after Mira has been fiddling around on her desk. The Fuzz. She's used to this, security. Being thrown out, she knows the motions. Her gut tightens in a knot and she winces from a hot jolt of pain running up her legs and fizzling at her brain.
Prepared with a plethora of lies and excuses for the would be security officer Eve is confused when the blonde woman walks out. Who… Red eyes squint in confusion as her vision spins and she rights herself with a blink or two before looking down at Aria's hand and hearing how she greets her. Flattery will get you everywhere. Eve's eyelashes flutter and she smiles over towards Aria, that too wide Cheshire Cat smile. "Well.. I… I…." obviously flattered the former seer stutters before she extends her own hand to shake, quickly though lest any wayward strands of blood lightning peek out.
Of which one lone line of red lightning pops from her hair to her shoulder. Eve doesn't make mention of it instead focusing on what she is here for. "I uncovered something, sneaky secrets, death memories," Eve stops herself short before she dives into a tangent and scares the kind woman off. "…and it led to a question… I think the Mothers- Ms. Zimmerman and the other fine ladies who run this establishment might have a clue about." She's nervous and it shows.
"Could we.. um talk somewhere more private?" Giving Mira a look with a wiggle of her fingers, no offense meant to Mira of course.
“Of course,” Aria says with a raise of one brow, her expression having been an impassive mask all the while otherwise. “Ms. Zimmerman is in Kansas City meeting with the President, but I am permitted to act in her stead here, and…” Aria rests a hand at the middle of Eve’s back and guides her toward the stairs. “Given my particular talents, perhaps it is not entirely without reason that I be the one to help you.”
As she guides Eve to the elevator, Aria looks over at Mira. “Can you hold my next appointment, Ms. Sadowsky?” Mira nods once, her expression a basket full of worries, and watches wordlessly as Aria escorts Eve into the elevator, all the way through to when the doors shut. When they finally do, Mira exhales a sigh and collapses forward onto her desk, letting her forehead bounce twice on her keyboard.
“SCOUT better be less crazy than this,” Mira mumbles to herself.
The Clocktower Building
Penthouse Level
When the elevator doors open into the penthouse, the lights are dimmed and there is music emanating from somewhere in the open concept space. A single glass of wine sits on the kitchen island visible from the doorway along with an open book and a pulled out stool. It appears as though Aria truly has the entire building to herself right now.
“Why don’t you explain what’s got you here in such a fluster,” Aria begins, slowly walking from the elevator back to where her glass of wine is kept, “and I’ll try to hold my already numerous questions to the end.”
In the elevator Eve had removed her skates and so she pads out barefoot looking around the place, not like she doesn't actually believe Aria she's been quite nice so far. The sense of knowing hasn't left her but when she tries to connect the dots it just becomes static, blank.
Eve goes to lean against the island, peering at the book and wine, she interrupted some ''me time' it seemed to be a knack of hers. Fixing Aria with a stare the pale woman considers just how truthful to be. Well if she was here in the Mothers stead… "Back before the war when the Ark exploded… I died in a car accident. Fucking Debbi-" Eve halts and holds the island with a bone white grip steadying herself. Stay. On. Task.
"I was brought back by Adam Monroe, I went to a Sister Seer to show me what happened, the Plague picked me up, he whispered in my ear. He showed me kindness like he knew me." A feeling grows at the base of Eve's neck as she leans forward with each word. "He knew my parents, he said he made a promise…" The shock of it all still has her reeling all these months later from that revelation. "I wanted to ask the Mothers if they knew anything about that. Their reach is long and into the past even. Maybe some records that survived.. maybe a piece to this puzzle. There's so much missing from my head." Knocking on her temple with a weak smile.
"If I'm going to go through with it I think I need the answers, the answers my sight would never give me." Eve doesn't sound helpless but she's about there. The loss of her Foresight, she feels it in these recent days. It wasn't the same, the signs were there but her senses weren't beyond human capabilities.
Aria takes up a perch on a tall stool at the kitchen island, regarding Eve in a sidelong look out of the corner of one eye. She picks up her wine, then looks down to the counter. “I don't know how much help we can be to you, Eve.” It isn't the answer Eve wants, delivered over the rim of a wine glass before Aria takes a sip. The telepath turns on her seat to face Eve, propping herself up on one elbow against the countertop.
“I can ask,” Aria says with a crease of her brows, “but I can tell you… I've seen the Vanguard and Institute record archives, and there's very little about you in them. I don't recall anything about Adam Monroe,” though she doesn't seem unfamiliar with the name, “but that doesn't mean what you've heard didn't happen. But…” Aria looks into her glass. “It doesn't mean it did either.”
When Aria looks back to Eve, her expression challenges the former seer. “What I do know is Adam Monroe, by reputation. He's a manipulator, a liar, and a would-be mass murderer. You can't take anything he may have told you at face value, because it's told to you for a reason.” She sips her wine again, then sets the glass down.
“I can ask Sabra to review the Company’s archives for anything, but I can't promise there's anything to find. To me, though, it sounds like a lie.” Aria looks down at the floor, then back up to Eve. “Adam Monroe was in Level 5 of the Company’s Bronx facility from the 1970s right up until you helped release him in 2008. The odds that he knew either of your parents, given their presumed ages, feels unlikely.”
"He is The Plague, perhaps the second to ever have a gift." Bestowed upon him that is. "Lies are all he knows. I would be inclined to agree with you, but he didn't tell me. He didn't have anyway to know I would find Young Cassandra to project the memory… he made my parents a promise. A debt to pay them.. for their sacrifice. His words." Eve doesn't continue, she stops. It all feels too coincidental. Her connection to the Dragon… Adam…
"…and I can guess why he brought me back besides that… he wanted me to speak of the Dragon… I didn't fail at that." Eve looks down at the floor too, also looking sheepish at her involvement in Adam's release. "Releasing him was the worst thing we as Pariah ever did." She's been trying to repay that debt since. Rubbing her face furiously the former seer keeps her face in her hands, mouth only uncovered.
"I've been chasing him for almost a decade. Following the trail, I use to use my sight to show me the clues… the pieces of the puzzle even though sometimes they are so soggy." Her tone is filled with bitterness, she loves a good game more than most but this one was getting… she couldn't last forever well. That was before her change. "There was something that happened… a ritual. To banish the Dragon. Adam was there… The Founders… but nobody remembers. Memories plucked away to keep us all safe. It didn't even matter." Eve sounds sad.
"Nothing makes sense, they both trick and lie lie lie liaaarrr. Push you in their curated direction filled with dancing fairy lights to distract you. I can't see anymore, what path there is." Being without her precognition had become such a hard reality as she no longer chased the visions.
“Eve.” Aria slides off her stool, wine forgotten on the counter, walking over to the former seer to put a hand on her shoulders. “You’re rambling. Slow down, I can’t keep up with this.” Aria’s blue eyes flick back and forth, searching Eve’s for signs of lucidity, or perhaps intoxication.
“There’s no way Adam had any interaction with your parents, unless it was when they were children. Whatever you were told, whoever told it to you, it can’t be true.” Aria’s brows crease together, head shaking. “And what— what ritual what are you talking about? What memories?”
She doesn’t know. Of course, because nobody knows.
The madwoman stops as Aria places hands on her shoulders, slowly she rocks back and forth. Nodding her head, "Even if my old gift is gone, my brainpan is… mangled. It still saw all the things I saw." All those years. Eve places her own hand atop of the telepath's, crimson lightning rippling along her arm but thankfully not leaping to Aria's body.
Looking up towards the blonde with mostly clear eyes save for the red that glows in her irises. "The ritual… Kam said it was like cauterization. The only way to beat the Dragon-" Eve stops and tries to calm herself, breathing more and closing her eyes before reopening to stare still into Aria's eyes. "The Dragon is an ancient entity, something whose true origins are unknown. Speaking of it gives it power, makes it spread. It's why nobody remembers in their tiny tiny heads. It was the only way." Humming softly in her chest Eve holds Aria's hand fast to her shoulder, clinging to it and allowing the contact to ground her.
"It is the First of us… gifted us with our gifts. For some reason it was around again in the 70s time." Eve keeps the comment on how if this thing spreads like an STD then what a great time to come back into power. "The Founders could only banish it. Make everyone forget it ever existed."
"The how lost. I'm on the search for it. I traveled back in time and met it when maybe it first met Adam. It's been in my mind… brought me back to life… it's robbed me of my sight. My visions.. and now.." Eve looks down at herself. Her changed body.
Aria is still, regarding Eve the way one might an unfamiliar dog off its leash. She reaches back for her wine, downs it in a single swallow and places the glass back on the island. “You're saying that you believe,” You Believe, “there is some… malevolent thing out there, that becomes stronger the more you know of it?” Eve is familiar with Aria’s tone, with the skepticism, with the fact that she is mad and no one believes her until it's too late.
“You believed all of this,” Aria reiterates, looking Eve up and down, “and your first thought was to come here, and spread the word to whoever would listen?” It isn't just skepticism in Aria’s tone now, but also frustration. “Eve…”
This tone it seems, has become a trigger for Eve. Crimson eyes narrow and she leans back at first. "I experienced and that led to said belief." The pale woman shakes her head from side to side, the blonde isn't getting it. Nobody does it seems. Until it's too late.
"I held my silence for a year as I worked mostly in shadows to discover how to end this with others." Eve looks frustrated as well, at this whole situation, at herself. "We can't hide from it. We can't make it just disappear by forgetting we have to destroy it. We have to be better. What the Old Ones couldn't do." She doesn't say that she had a choice, to throw a grenade and ruin that Crossing, for the Dragon but for Otter Eyes, Liz and Magnes.
"I'm tired of this! The sacrifices! My eyes, my body, my mind! For decades!!" Eve stands abruptly, moving past Aria and coming to the window. Her back turned on the telepath. Shoulders working up and down as she breathes heavily. "All to be laughed at… ridiculed… not believed… it's always too late." Wrapping her arms around herself as red lightning ripples over her form, crackling and popping alike.
"The last resort is to do like last time. Find a way, for total redaction but that's just a band aid."
Something Eve says elicits a subtle twitch of Aria’s brow, but she otherwise remains placid. Breathing in deeply, the telepath nearly reaches out but stops herself short, fingers curling against her palm and hand coming back down to her side. “Eve,” Aria starts to say, but then stops as she watches the crackling bolts of electricity dance up and down the former seer’s body. “Ms. Mas,” is how she chooses to continue instead. “I think the line between what's real and what's paranoia aren't always clear for you. Because, as you implied, you've got scrambled eggs up there.”
Still tense, Aria looks to the clock, then back to Eve. “You're contradicting yourself, talking about things as having been forgotten by everyone, then speaking of events like they're a certainty you remember clearly. You're not a time traveler, you're not a postcognitive and I'm fairly certain you're not a precognitive anymore either. You're just a person.” Aria takes one calming breath. “A person who has suffered,” she says quietly.
“You've spent so much time fighting battles in your mind, you've never taken time to heal.” Aria’s voice tightens, a mixture of fear and uncertainty. “Maybe… maybe a small break is in order. Something with family. So you can pull yourself together.”
Aria fails to know the unintended sarcasm of her words.
Eve presses her hands against the window, staring out ahead over the city. "..it's hard for me. Sometimes. Most times. To deliver the message clear. Yes, scrambled eggs." The pale woman takes deeper breaths, she's trying to restrain herself. She feels it, her emotions just rising to her throat. "You don't understand.. I'm sorry."
She doesn't laugh at that last bit. It might end up with her in tears. Slowly Eve turns around to face Aria again, there's no time for breaks. "I met a woman, Odessa." Her tone is soft, her words carefully placed one in front of the other. "She's a time fairy. Our abilities crossed. On Refrain." Holding up a hand before Aria can say much more to interrupt, "We ended up on a battlefield. Ancient Japan, Adam was there he had slaughtered an army. He cut my noggin clear off. That thing I told you about. Was there too, with it's golden eyes. It literally. Put. Me. Back. Together." Said through her teeth before she laughs finally, a light chuckle instead of the insane cackle.
"You would think that was the worst trip on Refrain you can take and once you wake up? You're in your room and it was all a delusion or a nightmare. One of my dreams I use to have but no," Looking Aria scare in the eye. "Odessa and I both were covered in blood and guts from that battle. The smell, oh goddess the smell. Go ask her. Barbara saw visions of it." The former seer stops and lays her head back against the cool glass. "I will rest, after this is finally finished. I promise."
The root of her anguish is plain though you don't need to have telepathy to see the visible wince when the words not a precognitive anymore can be heard. Slowly nodding her head, Eve cries a bit. "New Mexico, the Looking Glass. The portal, the thing came through. It took over my body. They said I did horrible things." Elaine. "And then I exploded. And now I'm like this my visions are gone. The voices silent. I've lost my connection."
"Just left with a piece of it here," at least she thinks so as she touches the place where her heart lies and then her head. "The only way to defeat it is together that's why it had to be this way."
Aria walks over to Eve, brows knit with uncertainty, and reaches out to lay a hand on the former seer’s shoulder. She turns Eve around so she can face her. Aria’s expression is one of both uncertainty and contrition, searching Eve’s eyes for meaning or purpose that simply isn’t there. Eve doesn’t understand the why and how of her own situation, and that is of no help to Aria. “Eve…” Aria finally says after too long moments of silence, “I don’t— ”
A chime comes from the elevator.
The sound causes Aria to startle, pulling away from Eve and looking to the door with surprise registering in her expression. As the doors open, the broad-shouldered frame of Zachary Stone comes into clear view. But the assistant to Alice Shaw is not far ahead of the woman herself. Aria’s entire demeanor changes when she sees Zachary, receding from him like a tide drawn away by the moon. She circles away from Eve, moving back to the kitchen island where her wine glass sits untended.
“Ms. Mas,” Zachary greets, stepping aside for Alice to exit the elevator. Alice levels a fixed stare on Eve, one that only reluctantly lifts up to meet Aria, one brow raised expectantly. It’s as if Aria’s parents came home and found out she was having a party. Eve recalls those looks.
She loves parties.
Eve wants to say something to Aria but that moment passes and her hand drifts from the telepaths as the elevator dings and Zachary and Alice walk out onto the floor. Red eyes widen a fraction and she looks from Aria to the newly arrived duo. Oh she knew that look, she knew it real well. "Hm…"
Slowly she turns fully towards them placing her back at the window. The former oracle does a little courtesy towards Alice and wiggles her fingers at Zachary, "Oh hello hello! Sorry to barge in on you guys! Miss Aria here was just keeping me company while we waited for you!" Sharing a look to the younger blonde in the room, I got you girl. Eve doesn't dare wink in her direction but she smooths down her hair and tries to look less distraught like she had a few moments ago.
"Well you were right Miss Alice, was… well you see I'm clearly not dead, anymore." Is quite an opener but it's what Eve's got.
“I know,” Alice says without a measure of surprise at all. “You make yourself quite known around the Safe Zone, Ms. Mas. I’ve been out of the country for eight weeks and I still knew you were… back.” Aria remains quiet as Alice speaks, and the older woman motions Zachary to give she and Eve some room, and he meanders over into the kitchen where Aria is keeping her own company.
“We make it our business to know things,” Alice continues, walking over and placing a hand on one of Eve’s shoulders, escorting her into the sitting area rather than letting her loiter like a phantom in the foyer by the elevator. “Secretary Chesterfield sends her regards. I informed her you are in good health, and she was quite relieved.” Once Alice has gotten Eve over to one of the low-backed white-upholstered chairs in the sitting area, she herself settles down in a seat.
Alice regards Eve with partly-lidded brows, lips pursed together in thought. “Why are you here, Eve?” She doesn’t ask Aria.
"Cat! How lovely, thank you for letting her know. I do appreciate it, she's so good. I need to have her come for a Jam Night at the bar." So good, her friend, former comrade, god damn Secretary, things were wild for the PARIAH/Phoenix gang after the dust settled. "Knowledge is power and what not, yes yes." Eve follows Alice's direction as she guides her to the sitting area where Eve takes one seat and tucks her feet underneath herself, the skates placed on the floor near her.
"I learned about the night I died and with that knowledge came questions, about my past," Rubbing her knees softly the pale woman shivers and lightning cracks at her earlobes and trails down her long midnight mane, "He knew my parents. I'm sure of it. He said they sacrificed. I-" Eve makes guesses all the time and with the things she knew surrounding Adam and sacrifices… it was looking grim.
"So I figured who better to ask then The Mothers, if anyone would know."
Eve and the Deveaux women had something in common, they all made it their business to know things.
“Your father was a mechanic, your mother… was a dancer,” is how Alice chooses to frame it. “There isn’t much more to know beyond that. It’s a tragedy, what happened to them, but I wonder if perhaps Mr. Monroe was trying to fill your head with a number of half-truths and lies?” From her seat, Alice looks past Eve over to Zachery who is pouring himself a bottle of wine and watching Aria, then squares her attention back on Eve.
“But, let’s step back.” Alice says, patiently. “How did you come to learn that piece of information? Have you seen Adam Monroe recently? There’s a great number of people in the world looking for him right now.” Alice leans back in her seat, just a little, her head tilting to the side and one penciled in brow raised.
"…he made it sound like they were something else. They-" Eve stops as that same old same old phrase is used, maybe he's lying to you Eve, getting in your head. The former seer closes her eyes slowly and takes a deep breath, steadying herself lest she explode right here in the Clocktower.
Those red eyes peek out as she reopens and looks across at Alice, "He wasn't trying to deceive me, I was dead." In fact the last thing he whispered in her ear is why she knows it's true, all of it. He wouldn't have laid out his desires so openly, he's a trickster. "How? By digging deeper than anyone is willing to go Miss Alice. This was a real moment, discovered by a friend before she died. Young Sister Seer Cassandra," Eve keeps her glowing eyed gaze on the weather witch. "He owed them a favor, maybe you don't know, nobody can remember because of that… redaction." Pieces, Some soggy and some not are the things that Eve tries to put in place to make sense of the confusing place that is her life and now her past.
"A lot of people are looking for him, almost as if what I've been saying all along was true…" Eve isn't patronizing Alice, it's the truth. "He's leading every soul on a wild goose chase, fearing what he'll do next. You said it yourself. He is The Plague." There's a blink and Eve looks off to the side finally, "But none of those people are the ones that actually set him loose ten years ago." Or met his blade head on in feudal Japan. At least from Eve's perspective. "I'm close, we're close. Tracked his origins."
"It's our mess to fix, our mistake. Our hubris bearing down on us all these years later," Her and Monica and Alexander… and Peter. The rest of Pariah that was not in the Safe Zone and alive somewhere. "We will stop him." There's no other choice in Eve's mind, "My visions started this soggy mess." And now she has to end it.
Alice is quiet, even after Eve is done talking. She looks down at her lap, thoughtful and inscrutable. Her expression is a passive mask, one that not even someone like Aria can truly penetrate thanks to Zachary Stone’s presence. When Alice finally lifts her gaze back up to Eve, there’s a deep crease in her brows and a tightness to her lips. Still, though, it’s hard to read.
“Cassandra Baumann,” Alice says with familiarity. “I would say a tragic loss, but you and I both know we were fortunate there, to have a second chance with her.” The thought has Alice looking down to her lap, idly folding her hands together as she considers something. When next Alice brings those blue eyes to bear against Eve, it’s with greater scrutiny.
“How much do you know about this redaction?” Alice isn’t asking a rhetorical question, either. Eve’s been on the receiving end of enough of those in her life to know the difference.
Eve blinks and settles back in her chair, "That's true… though she's one of the only ones I saw at the initial Crossing before…" Gesturing down at herself, Alice and the other Mothers had to know of her situation but not exactly what she was going through. "With how much is buried in the past, I would say it's most fortunate indeed."
The former seer is more settled, breathing easier, her episode was a mild one for her but the chaotic energies that live within Eve still make her a tad anxious though when Alice looks back up at her and asks that question Eve's expression softens. Richard had said, even the mothers hadn't known about it until he told them.
"I know the Company used something to banish what we know as the Dragon and after… they took it all. From all of you, every single one that knew Adam worked with them. Was apart of It, apart of the Company." Eve looks down at her hands, "I don't know where those memories are but I know we need them, no matter how dangerous they may be."
She stops and finally looks back at the older severe blonde, "It's time we ended this, for good."
Alice leans to the side, elbow on the arm of her chair, chin on her palm and one brow perpetually raised. In the moment she is a mirror, reflecting things back to Eve in a way no one else she has ever spoken to about this topic has. She’s careful, deliberate, but most surprisingly out of everyone, she’s listening.
“How would you do that?” Alice asks, bordering on the hypothetical. “End it,” she clarifies, “for good?”
"How do you kill an idea? The most resilient of parasites?" Eve asks aloud and her expression darkens. "Making everyone forget doesn't stick and puts it at an advantage still, because we're unprepared." Like they are now.
"…erase it. Not by making people forget but.." Eve bites her bottom lip in the corner, white teeth peeking out at Alice. Her hands twisting in on themselves as she fidgets. "Take it apart piece by piece.." Like she breaks apart piece by piece, the former seer touches the center of her chest with an index finger. "I don't have a clear theory. I've thought of trapping it in a pretty trinket but that's just going to delay the inevitable." It's frustrating.
"There's more to learn. That's the only way to know how to end it. The answers lie in our past, not our future." It's strange to say something like that for a woman who had for most of her life leaned on her connection to the future.
… "What are your thoughts?"
“Inconsequential,” Alice says pointedly, removing herself from that aspect of the conversation entirely. “For the first time, Eve, you are the one in possession of all the answers. I’m merely…” she spreads her hands, “following orders,” she motions with one hand, “and maintaining order,” then motions with the other, as if they were a balance. “You’re the one out there, doing things, digging up old bones.” Alice lays her hands in her lap, laces her fingers together and slowly lifts one brow again.
“Another question,” Alice asks, thoughtfully. “When is an idea… no longer an idea?” She’d said it was a question, but to Eve it feels more like a riddle.
Maintaining order. Someone had to do it. "Balance," Eve breathes and she nods at Alice, she understands. Digging up old bones makes Eve tilt her head and smiling a small smile. "No stone left unturned."
Alice's next Question has Eve's brow furrowing. Sliding her tongue across her teeth as she thinks the younger woman places her chin in her hands. "Maybe when it's been passed to so many… that it becomes just utter belief. Like church. Though I don't think there is a church dedicated to The Dragon," a nervous laugh emits from the pale woman but she continues, picking away at the answer. "When it latches onto some tangible? Because it is usually rooted… in the metaphysical."
Eve's fingers twitch as she pulls at the answer, twisting the riddle around. "That.. is a hard one Miss Alice." Scratching the back of her head.
Alice scoffs, shaking her head. “A church is just a building full of nothing but ideas and nothing more. Most of them dangerous.” For a moment, Alice blinks a look to her right, toward the window beside her, and becomes momentarily lost in her own muted reflection in the glass. Still looking at that image she finds her words again. “You're not far from the truth, though,” she admits quietly.
Blinking her attention back to Eve, there is a smug certainty in Alice’s expression. “An idea is no longer an idea, when it's reality.” The riddle has an answer. “At that point, you aren't battling an idea, but a tangible thing. And tangible things…” Alice says as she pushes herself up to her feet, “can be destroyed.”
Looking down at Eve, Alice raises one brow. “It's time for you to go, Eve. I've done all I can.”
Looking up, the pale woman rises to her feet before looking over to the kitchen to offer a wave to the people inside, "It can be destroyed… then." Yes… an idea blossoms in Eve's head as she gathers her skates to her chest and pads over to the elevator. "Thank you for your time Miss Alice and Miss Aria come by Cat's for a drink! On the house!" Eve will never not invite a new friendly face to the bar, maybe she could get the blonde to do karaoke.
Eve's eyes are down as she presses the button for the elevator, her head turns to look again at Alice, "I promise to keep digging. I promise to right my wrong." A pledge more to herself than to Alice or anyone else.