Participants:
| Scene Title | No Permission Needed |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | Elisabeth stops in to see Redbird Security's newest guest, and comes with some assurances for Gillian, offers of friendship and comfort, and also a request. |
| Date | September 29, 2010 |
Redbird Security: Gillian's Apartment
In the few short hours since Gillian moved into the apartment, there's already been time for some mess to be made. The blankets in the bed are dishelved, the clothing from her bag has been laid out on the floor, and there's towels and thanks to a quick trip down to a local store, she has some water bottles in the fridge, a few things to cook with, and some pastaroni boxes for quick meals. Never know when she'll need to visit. But the one thing that's gotten the most use, would be the shower.
Not long before the knock sounds, it's been used again, filling the room with a scent of shampoo and soap, and steam. "Just a minute!" Gillian's voice calls, reaching to grab a long t-shirt off of the floor and slip it on over the underwear she'd been walking around in, before she makes her way to the door, to open it. Perhaps she was expecting someone else, though, because there's a startled expression on her face. "Elisabeth— I— hi." The dyed red hair is darkened with the dampness, but still looks decidedly redder than it ever had in the past. "I didn't know anyone knew I was staying here yet."
Elisabeth's blue eyes hold concern, but there's a smile on her features. "Richard sent a text a little while ago," she tells the other girl. "You don't honestly think you'd surface and not have him tell me, do you?" She pffts. "I've been worried about you; I had to come and see for myself that you were okay. I brought housewarming presents!" She holds up a box. Apparently she had time to stop by her own apartment too, because the bowls inside the box are still frozen. "Thought you might like a few things in the freezer in case you didnt' want to cook," she says.
"I'm surprised Card knows how to send a text," Gillian says in a joking tone, before she waves the other woman in, to carry the bowls toward the kitchen. Having things to heat up will definitely make the job of eating easier, at least for tonight and the next couple of days. "I don't know how long I'll be staying here— I still have obligations and where I've been staying is closer to the Lighthouse." But this is closer to everything else. "Feels like I've missed a lot of things in the last few months."
"See, you know him well!" Liz retorts on a laugh. "He knows, but barely. Yeesh, I've never met a man so anti-21st century as him," she adds as she enters the apartment and closes the door behind her. Tilting her head, Elisabeth studies Gillian closely. "You have," she says quietly. "And we've missed the hell out of you, to be quite honest." She smiles slightly. "Gilly…. " There are so many things she'd love to say, but how do you start? "I'm glad you're okay." Or at least as okay as it gets.
"I wish you could have pulled me out of that place sooner than you did," Gillian admits quietly, standing with the freezer open a little longer than she probably should, before she snaps out of it and takes the bowls to put in there. "I mean it probably wouldn't have changed that I'd be afraid to go out in public afterwards, but it might not have been that bad." Hiding in the Garden didn't really help. "I'm not mad that you guys didn't, though— I'm sure you acted as soon as you could."
"It would have," Elisabeth says softly. She comes to the edge of the counter and watches Gillian quietly. "It gets better. The agoraphobia. The sense that you're being watched even when there's no one looking at you." Of all people Liz herself probably understands the best. "I wanted to barricade myself in my apartment," she admits, her eyes shifting restlessly around the kitchen as the memory brings her anxieties back to the fore. "Even now, I … don't go anywhere without knowing at least three escape routes. And I still feel my neck prickle in places like the park."
"I think the one of the only escape routes I got right now is them thinking I'm dead," Gillian says with a shake of her head. "It's hard to run from the government— I was even in a car when they got me. I'm sure if they knew I was alive and if they wanted to take me, they'd find a way, and nothing I would do would stop it." Except by not being available to be had. "But— hopefully they'll think Gillian Childs died when that building was blown up, and I won't have to worry about it— for a while." With that, she closes the freezer behind the housewarming gifts.
"Yeah," Elisabeth says with a sigh. "Let's hope, huh?" She smiles a little. "Richard's the only reason I made it through. And I know… how you're feeling, okay? So if you need to talk, Gilly… pick up the phone. Day or night, okay?" She offers a faint grin.
"He's a really good guy," Gillian says, voice a little distant for a moment, before she catches it and shakes her head. "I— did he tell you that we've— um— been involved before? I mean, I'm not wanting you to shoot me if you didn't know, or don't, cause I've been shot before and it's not on the top of my list of experiences to have again, but he said the two of you have an open-ish relationship, so…" There's still some doubt in her voice, as if she's just not used to the idea of people not being rabidly jealous at the idea of— that sort of thing.
Elisabeth quirks a brow and smiles. "You told me that. Aboard the carrier," she replies easily. Perhaps not in words, but Elisabeth understood. The memory of that conversation after watching the mushroom cloud of shadows over Antarctica brings vividly to her mind the pain of that episode. But the blonde takes in a quick breath, and then tilts her head as she focuses on the implicit query. "If you're asking me if I'm okay with sharing, the answer is yes," she finally says in a casual tone. It's a wholly different way of life from most people's mindsets, and she knows that. "You don't need to ask my permission, and neither does he."
"Right— It feels like so much has happened since then," Gillian says with a shake of her head. Also considering what'd just happened, she hadn't thought at the time that it was going to lead to mentioning the idea of sleeping with him again… "That's good, though. I mean for me. May sound weird, but he's about the only man I want touching me right now. Well, the only one who would of the ones I would want, at least. And— I really needed to get rid of some tension, too." And sex is certainly good for that.
For a long moment, there is silence from Elisabeth as she considers what was just said. And then she says softly, "It doesn't sound wierd." She smiles a bit. "You and I might be a bit more alike in some ways than I thought." She has tended in the past to use sex to blow off steam, which is perhaps why that part of things is not as big a deal to her. It's… a hint awkward, having this conversation, though. While Richard knows full well about Felix and Felix is fully aware of Elisabeth's feelings toward Richard, she doesn't think they talk to one another. "Will you do something for me?" she asks softly with a hint of uncertainty in her blue eyes now.
Probably not, but men and women tend to be different about certain things too. Still, Gillian's got a bit of a nervous sound to her laugh, as she looks at the fridge as if wondering where all the magnets are. Maybe she should get some. But there's a question of her, and she looks back. "If I can, sure. What do you need?"
Elisabeth's smile is … pained is not the word. Affectionate, mixed with some amount of wistful perhaps. "Just… if he talks to you, will you listen? There are things he won't confide in me. I don't know if it's because he's afraid of my reactions or if there's more to it. I don't want you to tell me about it or anything like that, just… if the opening presents itself, will you be his friend please?" It's perhaps an odd request from a man's current lovers to one of his ex-and-possibly-future ones. "Whether you ever sleep with him or not, that's between the two of you." She seems entirely unhurt by the possibility, but she says quietly, "But I love him more than I ever thought I'd love another person in my life. And I'd really like to know he's talking to someone who gives a shit about him."
"I can do that, yeah," Gillian says with a smile, obviously trying to get rid of the akwardness. How would it be to love someone, but understand them being with someone else? She's not sure she could do it. "I don't know how long I'll be around, but as long as I am, I'll definitely try to be his friend. He does his best to be mine, and I need that a lot too."
Elisabeth simply nods. "That's all I want." She grins. "Whatever else you get up to, lady… enjoy it." She winks and turns back to the apartment. "Now. Tell me what I can do to help you. I'm not good at faking IDs, but I do have some names of people who might make that work." She glances over her shoulder.
"I got my ID stuff already, thanks to certain people in the Ferry," Gillian says, moving out of the kitchen to pick up a bag and flash and ID at the other woman. One for a Gwen Chevalier. Even a Registered Evolved card, which comes out afterwards, with a Tier-0 level with the power to sense active Evolved Abilities. "Since I need this to get some places, I figured using my ability to know when other people were using theirs was simple enough to make me not need to worry about a blood test, and still pull it off if asked to perform. So I don't really need anything else, other than what I got already."
"Excellent. Cuz I definitely could not have gotten you an Evo fake card." Elisabeth grimaces. "Abby's fake got pegged and my contact in the PD who was helping us out is under investigation." She twists her lips in annoyance and sighs. "I honestly should have thought through sending Abby through more before I told her who to see," she admits. "Some days I wonder if her actual power is to be a bullet magnet or something."
While she listens, Gillian tucks away both of them, not wanting to explain how Wireless managed to help her out with both of the IDs, but grateful, none-the-less. Especially if Abby got in trouble. "Abby got in trouble? I saw her the other day— I had been warned against registring as Non-Evolved, since— all it takes is a drop of blood to disprove it. If I wanted to keep the ID very long, I had to risk that much."
Yeah. Well… "Personally, I was more in the mindset of making all of ours register the same way you did. Giving Tier 0 version of their ability. But … it's not my choice to make," Elisabeth says quietly. "The ones that wanted to attempt it, I made it possible. Laid out the risks. Some took it."
"There's risks in breathing these days," Gillian says with a shrug, letting the bag drop to the floor. "Thanks, though. I think I should be okay. This— having a place to go to— and people to talk to, that's important to me. But— if you find out when Cardinal is going to extract Claire, let me know. In case he forgets to tell me about it. I've been seeing her every so often while I can, and I'd like to be there when she gets pulled out of Messiah."
Elisabeth's head comes back around. "He's pulling her? Finally?" Apparently he forgot to inform his second-in-command. "Thank God," she breathes. "I'm terrified for her."
"He said he was," Gillian says with a nod, agreeing with the worry now that she knows a little more about what's going on. "Until I knew about things like that Rupert guy, I'd thought she could handle it, that her issues were things from the past, but after hearing about him, she definitely needs to be pulled out of there. And soon, I hope."
"Well, I've only been telling him that since the bomb," Elisabeth says ascerbically. "Her cover was blown from the start, he never should have left her there." She grimaces. "Sorry. That's between me and him — and it's a long-running conversation. I'm just glad he's pulling her. I didn't mean to drag you into the spat."
"No, no, it's fine," Gillian says with a raise of her hands, as if to show that there's no real spat there with her. "Just make sure he actually goes through with it. I'm gonna try to as well. Cause what she's going through— and what they could be turning her into— Now that I know what that Rupert guy is doing, I think I understand what she told me better, about what she saw during that flash so many people had."
There's a frown. "What'd she see?" Elisabeth asks quietly. Because none of the flashes — none of the ones she's been told about — have been good.
There's a hesitation, but then Gillian nods quietly. "Don't tell her I told you, and try to get her to tell her yourself, but if she's been brainwashed, it might be part of it, and… If she's extracted it may still happen, just to someone else. She saw herself killing some unarmed innocent, with a knife that that tall guy that used to be around gave her. And she enjoyed it. But when she told me, she hated that she saw herself do that— that she could see herself becoming that."
Elisabeth grimaces. "Fuck," she hisses. "Yeah… okay," she adds on a sigh. "Some of that… was happening before Messiah. Which was why I didn't want her in there in the first goddamn place. She never…" Liz pauses and looks at the noe-redhead. "She never really grieved over what happened in Madagascar or Antarctica, Gilly. She…. was too busy after all of it holding me together." There's shame in that. She leaned on Claire when she shouldn't have. "I told Richard after Madagascar… she was close to the break point. And then it all went to hell, and she pulled herself together for me." Because Liz was terribly close to coming unglued.
"She also didn't remember a lot of it," Gillian says quietly, thinking back on what she learned from the young woman. "A lot of it came flooding back when she helped save me from that hospital. Cause one of the doctors that held me there was the same one that had her in Madagascar. And from what he did to me— and what she told me he was doing to her— I can imagine how messed up she is now that she does remember more. So I definitely think she needs someone to be there for her now, and those people in Messiah aren't doing a very good job of it."
There's a brief, immediate nod. "All right. Let me talk to Richard and see when he's planning on pulling her." Cuz Elisabeth damn well hopes it's immediate. She'll be on the phone as soon as she leaves here. "And Gilly? You have my number too, okay? Don't be a stranger," she says quietly with a smile. "I'm glad you're home."
"I may be taking care of some things this weekend," Gillian adds, with a nod about the number. She does have it, despite losing her phone many times. It's what pencils and paper are for. "I'll try to be at the meeting next week, but if I don't make it, I'm taking care of some things— I don't know how long it will take." Or if she'll come back at all? But no need to make anyone worry.
Blue eyes are sharp on Gillian. "Anything you want to tell me?" Elisabeth asks quietly. Because that sounds… final.
"Just making a little gamble and hoping it doesn't bite me in the ass," Gillian says with a shake of her head. "Not much to talk about til I get back, though, but I may need to when I do, and I know I can call you."
Elisabeth nods slightly and says, "You can. Anytime. The number's 24/7 and encrypted." She pauses and says, "Be careful, Gilly. We don't want to lose you again." She moves and briefly hugs the other woman. And then she hightails it off to see a man about a girl.