5th transformation . spam & open video

[permutates]

[ spam ]

[ She's been working herself hard. Maybe too hard: she spends hours a day in the gym, sometimes as many as eight when she's not sleeping. She's read books on how to get in shape quickly and safely - more or less - and she's pushing herself as far as she can go. Trying to find her limits.

Today, she can also be found coming out of the CTS with Kelsier, bruised and mussed and a little bloody, and grinning ear to ear. If you're trying to impress me, it's working, he tells her, and she kisses him on the cheek and flushes bluer and makes her way to the Infirmary to make sure she's got nothing worse than bruises.

She hasn't reached her physical limits yet, but emotional is a different story. Being a child again, with that faith in Charles, has shaken her. Her conversation with Charles before that shook her. And sometimes, even when she's feeling fine - maybe when she's feeling the most fine, paradoxically - she starts crying. And sometimes she can't stop. Tucking herself into a corner of the gardens and trying to muffle the sounds of it so no one catches her at it. It's embarrassing, and she can always eventually manage to pull herself together and make it back to her room. ]

[ video ; open ]

[ Raven is blue, with red hair, not hiding. ]

What's something you've done here, for the first time? Or thought or realized, for the first time.

[ She's not sure what she's looking for. Maybe a little hope. ]

Comments

private/video

[permutates]

Snow?

[itstopped]

[He hesitates, always a little awkward with sympathy.] Well, anyway, this last port... that was the first time. Earth.

[lawofthejungle]

Got myself hung on a coatrack. Gotta say that's a first.

Interestin' pick fer a topic.

[routemistress]

Fallen in love. Been someone's mum. Found a brother. Killed and been killed.

...I'm nine 'undred years old, my love, and I've done most things before. They still tend to be first every time, I find.

[ Video ]

[warisart]

[There's a long, long, long moment of just staring.

And then Ben clicks the feed off.]

[permutates]

It was Earth about fifty years after I left it. It was... pretty amazing, for me. So I guess it was a lot more for you.

private/voice

[indispensible]

I don't know. It might be.

No, he hasn't.

[Gym Spam]

[la_belle_rogue]

[Rogue spends a lot of her own spare time in the gym. There's not a whole lot to do being unpaired. Well, when things are quiet on the Barge anyway. So she spends a lot of her down time working out. The CTS was a great resource, but sometimes the old fashioned way was the best.

Rogue was already into a long run loping run on the tread mill. She was working her stamina more than her speed, and she'd built up a decent sweat by now. She spotted Raven right off when she came in. It wasn't hard with the other woman being such striking colors.

She raised her hand in greeting and nodded. She wasn't all smiles for Raven, but she certainly wasn't being distant. This Raven had a chance to be something better than the one Rogue knew, and she wanted to encourage that.]

Hi.

Spam

[chlorophylliac]

[Ivy, on the other hand, is generally not very tactile. Once upon a time she couldn't reliably control when she would or wouldn't kill someone; since then, she's become more disciplined but thinking of herself as untouchable has been a source of strength for her. It allows her to maintain a sense of control. And when people slip through the toxic perimeter she's set up around herself, inevitably she gets hurt.

And yet she keeps letting it happen. Like an idiot.

She wraps an arm around Raven and draws her close, pulling her into a half-hug, and she tells herself it's the emotional aftermath of the flood working its way out of her system but it isn't. Not really.]

private/video

[tolaywaste]

Ben.

Talk to me.

[permutates]

Hung, like... hung?

[ Like dead, she means. ]

private/video

[tolaywaste]

My [very small pause] friend.

Snow White.

I'm not joking, I swear to god.

[Private]

[mistconduct]

Um.

Made friends. Fell in love.

Fuck, did I seriously fucking say that.

[permutates]

It doesn't get... old?

[ Video ]

[permutates]

What?

[itstopped]

Well, technologically speaking, it was actually pretty far behind where I grew up-- no offense. But in other ways...

[He's got that poker face, and it doesn't let much through now, not with a total stranger that happens to be blue, but something softens around his eyes, a faint curve to his lips.] Yeah. It was... it was nice to feel the sun again, if nothing else. [But obviously, it's more than that; it's not as if other ports haven't had suns.]

private/voice

[permutates]

Then how do you know?

private/video

[permutates]

[ A disbelieving laugh. ]

Snow White? With the apple and the dwarves.

[Gym Spam]

[permutates]

Hi.

[ Her steps hesitate, but it's just a half-second. She's still not at all sure what to make of this other woman, or sure what Rogue wants from her. And there has to be something, right? She summons a smile, and then she moves to another treadmill, one a couple down from Rogue. Not next to her, not the farthest from her either. ]

private/video

[tolaywaste]

Yep. That's her.

private/voice

[indispensible]

I saw you with him. That's all. Walking.

[Private]

[permutates]

Yes.

To a stranger.

private/voice

[permutates]

Oh.

[ Makes sense. ]

How did the flowers come back?

private/video

[tolaywaste]

I know how this is gonna sound, but I need you to look like literally anything else while you're talking to him. Just right now. Please.

private/voice

[indispensible]

It's . . . complicated.

[But she said she was going to tell, so. A frustrated huff. She's not a very good storyteller.]

There were two gods, and one man took the power of both. He changed the world.