Participants:
Scene Title | Don't Push Me |
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Synopsis | Just Don't. |
Date | January 5, 2019 |
Hospital in Kansas
Hospitals are a place for getting better, where peace, quiet and healing reign supreme. It seems at times that nobody ever told that Eve Mas. "Pardon me! Excuse me! Ahh!" Come from down the hallway of Kansas hospital, she came dressed. A sheer, light fabric black dress and thigh high boots click on the linoleum, a hum rings through the air as she peers over the doors as she walks by. The drive was easy, her new friend Beatrix kept her company but had mysteriously vanished after they arrived in the city proper, no matter she would call Vinny once this was all over.
Surpriseeeeee.
Coming to the door that is supposed to have the people she's looking for inside the oracle takes a moment to collect herself, there's a friend in there she hasn't seen in awhile. A pale hand goes to sweep midnight black tendrils of hair of her doe brown eyes, "Helllooooooo, it's your nurse with your meds and jello." She jokes as she raps her knuckles on the door.
When Eve knocks on the door, Barbara can't help but look up in surprise from her bed. It's been a long week since she woke up, still enduring tests and checks to make sure everything is okay following the nearly month long coma she was in. So far, everything's been fine as far as the doctors can tell, and she hasn't had any more visions - power induced or otherwise. She just has a headache and recurring nightmares, neither of which is new.
Furrowing her brow, she takes a deep breath as she nods to Eve. "Eve Mas," she says quietly. She doesn't know the other woman well, but she certainly remembers her well from the days before the war. "What brings you out to Kansas City? I hope it's not just to see me. I'll be back in the Safe Zone soon enough."
Niki looks up from her book when her sister speaks. She’s familiar with Eve by reputation more than anything these days. “I hope it’s the red jello,” she jokes. “That’s my favorite.” Setting her reading material aside, she sits up in her seat straighter.
With any luck, her sister will be discharged from the hospital in the next day or two and the Zimmermans will be headed back to New York to step back into their normal lives. As normal as they ever get, anyway. Niki’s expression is one of polite expectance as she waits for Eve to explain the purpose of her visit.
"I've been meaning to see you for a while now…" a shifty eyed gaze to the window and then back to the Zimmerman laying in bed before her gaze settles in Niki and she smiles faintly, "You look so good whole." The pale woman had first met Jessica, way before she had gotten the chance to meet Niki. "You've been in my dreams.. my visions.. both of you. The echoes screaming, golden eyes.." Eve trails off before snapping back to reality and digging into her messenger bag for a few moments with squinted eyes before pulling out what seems to be sketch pages.
"Lingering just above me, right there." The sketches depict the Zimmerman girls, one of all three wearing white with golden eyes, the other of Barbara and what appears to be Niki standing next to each other and the last of Barbara only, the redhead looking down at what appears to be someone falling the painting from the perspective of that person whose pale limbs are flailing in the foreground. "That's me." Pointing at the white arm in the last sketch, "Don't push me." A hesitant smile on her lips before Eve is half circling the room.
"You're connected. I've seen you with another set of sisters. They are clones but their eyes bleed gold. Just like yours." Eve's eyes bulge and she looks between the two hoping they know anything of what she speaks of and that she doesn't look like a complete crazy woman.
"Do you know a man named Adam Monro— ah well you were trapped with him. When we released you." Said to Niki.
"No." Barbara makes a motion with her hand with the clear intent to silence Eve. "No," is repeated more quietly. "I have had enough of…. Visions for a lifetime," she remarks, leveling her eyes at Eve. "I am here because of them, and this can wait until…"
Adam Monroe registers with her, recognition delayed by her desire to rather adamantly put an end to this conversation. Swallowing down a lump in her throat, she slowly looks past Eve, over towards Niki. A worried look is offered her way, but there's more to it than that, a subtext a sister should only be able to pick up.
They both know that name. It's a question of how open they want to be.
Niki’s first instinct is to back up her sister. They want no part of this, whatever it is that Eve is peddling. They’re just trying to go about their lives and they don’t want to be mixed up in any of this garbage. “My eyes don’t bleed gold,” she insists acerbically.
But the name Monroe has her snapping her mouth shut. Red-painted lips press together in a grim line. A glance over to Barbara confirms that, yes, she does understand what she’s conveying without words. “Yes, I’m familiar.” She’s not prepared to be more forthcoming than that, currently.
Ah ha! It's the reaction she needs to see even if it's unpleasant. Eve backs up slightly at Barbara's avoidance of the subject until the twins share a moment over the name Monroe. "You would be more than your sister! You weren't in Level 5 for long dear right…? But long enough to hear his drawl.. cheap bas—" The oracle stops herself. "I wish I didn't have to come here. I wish you weren't already connected by.." well she looks the both of them up and down. She had thoughts.
"That thing that use to live inside your boss Kam? It's in you already, maybe since before you
peeked your little heads out into the world," she sounds regretful, it shouldn't be like this. "There's a connection I can't place, why you two?" She doesn't know much about their history, "I know your father—" a pause because both women know she was right in front of the man when he committed suicide in front of her and her friends. "Was a science fairy. One of the best yes?"
Golden eyes, her back stiffens as she remembers her encounters. The battles already lost. "I would hope they don't bleed that amber glow, it gives me the shakes." Shuddering before looking closely at Barbara, "We might not be close or friends at all. But you are my Sister Seer and if you're in trouble.. well I'm here." Nodding to herself, that's right. Eve to the rescue.
Barbara seems to be somewhat passively listening; Niki's admittance that they know of Adam Monroe means she'll do at least that. She's quiet and still… at least until the mention of her "boss", Kam Nisetta, comes up. Very suddenly her posture straightens and she sits up, eyes widening as she trains her gaze exclusively at Eve.
"How do you know about that?" is practically growled, something rather uncharacteristic of the postcognitive. She begins to shift in her bed, leaning forward and reaching for Eve. "You listen to me, Eve Ma-"
Niki’s arm comes out to reach across to Barbara like a mother reaching out to hold her child in the passenger seat after slamming on the breaks. “Babs.” It’s not chiding or warning, just spoken in an even tone to get her attention.
“We don’t need rescuing,” Niki states with only the barest of an edge to her words. Her arm comes back to rest on her chair. “We’re fine.” Maybe that’s a little more wishful thinking than actual reality, or maybe it’s just deflection. Either way, the blonde is wary of the precognitive. Even if she knows she should heed the warning.
Holding up her hands, the pale woman dances back and does a twirl in her spot, fabric flying in the air with her in a circle. "Wait." Tip toeing over to the door leading out to the hall the precog peeks outside before slowly closing it with an audible click. Rounding on the two women Eve looks as pleasant as before but there is something just beneath the surface. She's been running alongside this a long time. When she's sure that nobody outside is listening she sags against the wall near the door, a haunted look on her face. "I have been closely connected to this thing for longer than I thought." Another moment, she wishes she could smoke a joint.
"Back right before the war, the night we blew that massive crater in Massachusetts.." the memory of their "escape" shudders through Eve though she hadn't been present for that massacre.. Else. There's pain on her face. "I died." A wave of her hand because she's now died twice and she's not exactly sure how that makes her feel but.. "Adam brought me back with his blood. I got to peek into what happened and.. this was all planned from before we were born. I've been looking for him the last seven years." She doesn't say thought of because.. "My first dream ever.. there was a child.. it wasn't in the future.. it seemed to be in the past. The child had golden eyes and the eclipse began.." rocking back and forth.
"I went back in time this year… To feudal Japan, he was there in all his armored glory. That blade. He had slain a mountain of people," Her face turning up at the memory of the gore and the smell that had clung to her. "I crawled through the muck and rose to meet him with a time fairy friend. Stole my head from my shoulders just like that," snapping her fingers at the memory.. really in the moment now. "But she was there.. It wasn't Kam.. but a woman with gold eyes and a red kimono. Another host, she looks lovely.. powerful. Tremendous." Eve's knees shake, "She brought me back, it did. The golden eyes, I think it's known me since then. I think—" She stops and looks finally to the twins in the room. "I went to speak with Kam about it later, she pushed me towards Adam and away from the Entity. She said the Company did something. Like a Ritual.. a Baninishing. Though Mother and Father still sing for our blood, their blood."
"I'm sorry."
Barbara stares at Eve for a long moment, before glancing to Niki, and finally up to the ceiling. "I know," she says quietly. "I've seen it. A lot of it, as far back as 2011." A deep breath, and she shakes her head. "I still see it, sometimes. Those visions are haunting." A huff of a breath, and she turns her attention back to Eve. "But Eve, the more you talk about it, the worse you're making it. It thrives off the knowledge of its existence." A shake of her head. "Or so I'm told, at least."
Fingers curl in, gripping the bedsheet a bit. It's clear she wants to get up, and she could, but… she still needs to take it easy.
This would not be taking it easy.
"What do you want? Or… need?" is instead the question she settles on. "If you know this much… I don't know the particulars, but Kam made it sound… unpleasant what happens."
“You sound insane.” Which isn’t to say that Niki doesn’t believe what Eve has to say. As much as she might like to write it off, she knows better. A concerned glance is exchanged with her twin, hardening into something steelier when it settles back on Eve.
“We’re trying our best to keep away from the sort of thing you’re describing.” What appears to be happening right now is inspiring the opposite of that. Niki frowns and rests a hand on the edge of Barbara’s bed, as if ready to hold her back.
Eve leans in as Barbara speaks, there's comfort for her that someone else has been experiencing this as horrible as it is, "Infection, spreading, an idea that blooms with the power we give.." she does agree it does get worse and she perhaps has had a large hand in this, "I think he brought me back to speak. He wants it back. I… was afraid of containing it once I learned from Kam but by then… it had spread to places I hadn't even been." The seer looks fearful but she presses on looking to Niki, "It has been an insane year."
"I wish you could avoid it, run to the farthest island and bury yourself in the sand but even then…" Doe brown eyes flick to the window and Eve hunches over, mouth twitching.
"I think there will be a time when I will need both of you guys' help with this." The paler woman sits and taps her fingertips lightly on the exposed skin of her thigh, the sounds of a ticking clock ring throughout her mind among the echoes that grow more distorted and elongated as the ticking doubles in effect. A grimace plays across wine colored lips, "Or vice versa, I had to make contact. I wanted you to know you weren't alone, sisterhood of a different kind. Ladies have to stick together. Who run the world? Girls!" Eve snorts and tips her head back before catching herself and adopting a serious expression on her face.
"We have to be prepared. There's nowhere to run, when everywhere is vulnerable. Paper thin, it's all paper thin." Trailing off in a singsong voice as tears brim and Eve draws in a ragged breath.
Barbara stares at Eve for a moment, still somewhat ill at ease. "If we give it power, this conversation isn't helping," she notes. Despite Niki's response, Barbara purses her lips and looks off to the side. "What you're talking about, Eve… It's bigger than any of us. I don't know how much we can prepare for it."
A long sigh. "Or how much anyone will want to prepare for it. I have kept quiet on the matter out of respect for a friend," in this case Kam, "and out of fear that my mother - and others - may worry that I've finally had one vision too many." Fingers curl in and out on one hand, before she lifts it up to point at Eve. "How would you prepare for something like this, knowing that you're only helping to make it worse?" It's not an accusatory statement despite carrying that implication - Barbara sounds more like she's searching for an answer she can't find here.
Niki is silent as Eve continues to express her warning and her wish for solidarity. “We’re not going to find any answers here or now.” She ruefully shakes her head. “I’m sorry for the turmoil this is causing you, but we’re not the answer to this.”
Climbing to her feet, the blonde gestures to the door. “I think it’s time for you to go.”
"Stopping it from coming?" Eve shakes her head, "Stubborn stubborn, never give up." The Entity would not. "Once it's here.. But us together? We're family. Blood for blood, gift in gift? Unstoppable, that's what we are." Maybe she should have just erased everyone's memory of this afterall. Nobody wanted to go near it even if it was speeding right towards them, Eve felt like she could see a comet in the sky out the window rapidly approaching their atmosphere. "Make sure not to push me. Don't push me off the edge." Eyeing Barbara wearily like a friend that might snap at any moment.
Backing up slowly to the door she dips her head in Niki's reflection, she really did miss Jessica. She had to win her former friend's heart back. The pale seer thinks up her best cookie recipe because that's surely the solution to this all. "Banishment didn't work, neither did forgetting."
Chipped nails drum on the wall and then the door slowly making her way out to the hall. There's a sadness in her eyes, "Sacrifice is the only way…" not sometimes.