Internally I'm Screaming

Primam Chorus -> Main

Carrd Link // Tumblr Introduction Link

Crystal -> Mateus

Raiding? :: Yes

WoL? :: Yes, but not in the way you might think. Also debatable.

Omni-levelled 100 :: DoW // DoM // DoL // DoH

Nomin tal Kheeriin -> Secondary

Carrd Link

Brain Rot Tumblr Link

Crystal -> Coeurl

Raiding :: Not yet

WoL? :: Yes

Omni-levelled :: DoW // DoM // DoL // DoH

Tandem Chorus

Carrd Link // Tumblr Introduction Link

Crystal -> Mateus

Raiding? :: No

WoL? :: Yes, but not in the way you might think. Also debatable.

Omni-levelling :: DoW // DoM // DoL // DoH

Jaydin Byrd

Carrd Link

Tumblr Blog Link

Crystal -> Mateus

Raiding? :: No

WoL? :: No

VPR // BRD // AST // DoL // DoH

Manaka Shimizu

Carrd Link

Tumblr Blog Link

Crystal -> Mateus

Raiding? :: No

WoL? :: No

SMN // RDM // BLM // WHM // RPR // BTN // CRP // ALC // CUL

Lyjr Artjorm

Carrd Link

Crystal -> Mateus

Raiding? :: No

WoL? :: No

PLD // GNB // BTN // CRP

C'vurihn Tia

Carrd Link

Crystal -> Mateus

Raiding? :: No

WoL? :: No

BLM // RDM // CUL

Amaya Bikol

No Carrd

Crystal -> Coeurl

Raiding? :: No

WoL? :: Yes

Surprisingly, supplies that Nite had requested were delivered promptly. Part of her chalked it up to the idea that a baby being taken care of probably stoked the flames of expedience. Regardless, she was more than grateful for the pediatrician-approved water and formula to at least feed the baby — clone or no. More than that, Nite had also been presented with what was claimed to have been 'three months' worth of diapers, baby clothes to keep him warm, and a baby sling so that Nite (or literally anyone else) could carry the infant around as needed.

What really perplexed Nite was how the clone did not budge or move around like it did before in the time they were still bound to land. It was possible she was just missing the times it had, but… Well, she tried to push away the thought that he had expired from her mind, instead working with the more technical members of Lieutenant Drautos' squad to get a crude dock made for the tube before setting off in what was told to them as being three days. Progress at least looked positive, and Nite was able to get the tube docked.

The real moment of truth was when she gently, but firmly, gave a twist of the tube so that the lock released. What had not been anticipated was the sudden release of the stasis compound spilling upon the floor that was reason for one of the nearby members to dive down with a nearby bucket. Because the release was far less gentle than the gradual draining the machines back at the Karnak Magitek Facility offered, it was quite the jolt for the young clone when it was lowered somewhat unceremoniously onto its gel base.

Crying immediately filled the room once Nite got the glass lifted and set aside. She acted quickly before the baby wailed for too long and carefully scooped him into her arms, rocking him gently and attempting to shush him in what manner she only assumed how. When she looked toward the other two that had been helping with this matter, they seemed almost too stunned to move. Both of the men had their eyes on the baby before Nite finally snapped orders at them: "Don't keep it waiting! It needs clothes and a diaper! Get someone to heat up some water so we can prepare some formula for him as well!"

In the time people left Nite to take care of what she demanded, she had gotten the baby cleaned up and dried off. Diapers were first, then it was onward to seeing about gently getting the infant into a onesie. The task felt far more daunting than most missions with how poorly prepared Nite felt for the task.

With the infant in her arms, Nite bounced a knee — whether it was to help keep the baby calm, or if it had been a nervous tic was something even she could not say one way or another. All that mattered was that the crying had become less loud than before while they waited. That in and of itself was a relief that allowed Nite to just slouch back into the chair she was in, her head resting against the back as she closed her eyes.

The moment was short lived — of course it was. Boots thudding against the ground was what roused Nite from her momentary respite. Walking down the hall was no one that had been helping her to get the tube opened. Instead, it was Lieutenant Drautos with a baby bottle in hand. His sleeve was rolled up, and one of his hands was bereft of a glove. Judging by the way he offered the bottle to Nite, she assumed that he had done a temperature test to make sure the formula was just warm enough to consume safely. So Nite took the bottle, its warmth just noticeable to her fingertips before she tilted it and got the nipple eased into the infant's mouth.

Now, there were only little murmurs and suckling sounds instead of the crying. What a relief. With the quieted infant, so too did Nite's leg stop bouncing around in whatever fashion it had been.

"… Have kids of your own back home?" Drautos asked, watching the infant in her arms carefully.

Nite shook her head. "No…"

Then her attention went up to the lieutenant. "What about you? I assume you're the one that took care of getting the formula. You familiar with taking care of any young?"

"Mm…" Drautos grunted at first in response, glancing down at his boots. "You could say that. Plenty of displaced families and children when Mors pulled back the Wall. It left a lot of us open to Niflheim's attacks when they took it as an invitation to push more of their army in our homelands."

The way Drautos said Mors' name was laced with a kind of venom. To have been fair to his plight, Nite supposed she would have also been upset if she experienced losing being part of a safeguarded town or city in the same manner. All she really knew were the stories her family shared with her about Sasune no longer being safe for them — that Lucis and Insomnia was their best option to ensure she had a better life.

"Though you have experience with that, I imagine," Drautos said, shifting attention onto Nite in the moment. "We don't have a lot of people able to travel from Kirika unless they find more dangerous ways of travel. I hate to imagine what you had to face."

"It wasn't much…well, not that I can remember," Nite revealed. "I was too young to really understand anything that happened. Most of what I remember comes from what my parents told me."

"Yeah?" Drautos pulled over a chair and sat across from Nite. "Let me guess: coming to Lucis meant having a better life away from Imperial rule?"

"… Yeah. Except they set their sights on Insomnia — the closer we were to the Royal Family, the safer our family would be." Nite looked down at the baby in her arms. He was still nursing away, only grunting every now and then in quiet fashion. The more she recalled her parents' reasoning for pursing a life in the capital, the more she felt herself understanding them since that was what she was currently feeling as she looked upon the baby's face.

"A common sentiment shared between a lot of the refugees that seek sanctuary in Insomnia even now," Drautos replied, leaning back in his chair and turning his attention toward the window. With his gaze settled upon the waves that rolled outside, he continued, "That Wall being stripped away from the rest of Lucis brought us to the harsh reality that we really do have to start fighting for what's ours."

"Would that Kirika had such defenses developed to have stood up to the Empire," Nite commented, thinking back on what she had learned of her parents' homeland. However, that sentence seemed to have been enough to halt further discussion. For the best, Nite was far from certain how her knowledge on Kirika's defenses would have held up. Less so the Crystal that had already been taken and was in Niflheim's possession after having been wrested from Inner Sasune.

The bottle went rejected after a time, and the baby yawned, showing off its toothless maw momentarily before falling into slumber. Aside from very few things that were learned from books, or what she had seen, Nite was very quickly circling back to realizing that she had no real idea how to properly care for the infant.

"Lieutenant…" Nite began.

"It's just Titus for now, Argentum. At least until we're back on track for Lucis," Drautos responded, then motioning with his hand for her to continue.

"Right…" Nite drew in a breath and then asked him, "would you mind helping me? I thought to myself I'd be taking on this responsibility, but…I feel as though I'm much out of my depth."

Titus' eyes went from being focused on Nite to then going back to the baby. An incredulous and amused scoff left him then. With a nod, he gave a simple but assured response: "Sure."

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Confidence welled in Nite in time when it came to taking care of the baby thanks to Titus' information and guidance at times. Despite that, there was still no name for the infant. Honestly, she and the others had just gotten used to calling him 'B' — a shortening of the word 'baby'. Whatever name B would end up getting in the future, though? Nite tried not to think about it. Once they were back in Lucis, surely B would have ended up becoming someone else's responsibility. With the conditions from which it came from, no doubt the Ears of the King would have done something to put it in someone else's hands who was capable — certainly far more capable than Nite felt she was.

… Then again, the decision could have laid with the Shield of the King if his Royal Guard were the ones deployed for extraction.

The quarters that Nite was given to share with the woman who brought her to Drautos initially had to have a baby hammock crudely set up — something that could sway with the waves without tossing the baby around hither and thither. With luck, the trip overseas would have also been a smooth one. If there was anything that was a modicum of comfort, it was that the weather forecast seemed to claim smooth sailing for imports and exports. Claimed.

Within that time, Nite learned that the woman she shared a lodging with went by the name of Mella Citrea — 'Mel' for short. The best word that Nite had to describe her was 'sweet' on a day to day basis, though Mel hardly allowed that to let people treat her as a pushover. The more important thing was that Mel seemed happy to take over for Nite when it came to taking care of B when he needed it and she was away.

"Do you think the grand marshal will have him taken into custody?" Nite found herself asking when it was just her and Mel one night. She needed her curiosity sated in some fashion. Lieutenant Drautos had already supplied her with a non-answer when she inquired with him.

"I imagine that'd be more of the head of the Umbrae's decision since you work under his branch," Mel thoughtfully replied after some time. She had B in her arms, and she was the one who currently fed him his bottle. "But…maybe it's safe to assume that the Royal Council will hold a vote. Never had anything like this happen in my years of service."

"I suppose…" Nite slumped down into her bunk. It was far from being comfortable — the sooner they were all back in Lucis, the better. "New for a lot of us…"

The uncertainty was the scariest part.

"What do you hope will happen?" Mel asked.

That really was the question.

Nite had no real idea.

"I guess that he gets to live a normal life?" Nite replied after a pregnant pause. Again, the image of the clones in their tubes flashed in her mind — more the ones she saw being turned into pure energy. "It would be far more than any like him will ever get to experience…"

Rolling over on her bed, Nite looked at B. It was hard to look at him without thinking back on all the things she had done at the Karnak facility — especially with how fresh it all still was in her mind. Each time she found herself back there was a time her heart picked up the pace within her chest. It hurt. It just hurt. Verstael was a genius, that much was true, but his genius came with a callous desire for monstrous advancement that led to creating cattle-like beings who would know nothing but death. That was what Nite came away with ultimately.

"Do you want to hold him?" Mel asked. It seemed B was finished with his bottle for now.

"… What?" Nite shifted her gaze up toward Mel's and slowly pushed herself back up into a seated position.

"You've been watching him for a bit… Did you want to hold him?" Mel expanded, adjusting her hold on B before leaning forward to offer him to Nite. A chuckle escaped her. "I mean, it almost feels like you've been inseparable from him since we got you extracted from that magitek facility."

A faint buzz started to full Nite's head just then. Of course she was insistent on being around B and caring for him. There was no other person she trusted more than herself with B's well being. Even then, could she trust herself fully after the heinous things that were done by her own hand as well? That stung to have been confronted with. She could tell herself all she wanted that she merely had a role to play, but it barely scrubbed away the guilt that still clung to her like sticky tendrils of tar, threatening to drag her down into something that felt irreversible.

Hells, it already felt irreversible…

Maybe it was.

Nite slowly reached out and took B, making sure to be gentle with him. Holding him like this was always one of those…odd moments. Odd because it just felt…natural? Right? Like it was meant to be? That thought alone was also pretty terrifying if Nite had to be honest with herself. Like, maybe it was simply the thought of being pregnant that scared her more than actually having a baby in her arms now that she had been caring for B for a little over a week at that point. Despite all the things she had not learned as well, watching after him and making sure he was taken care of was less daunting without the whole idea of the nine month commitment and general distaste she had regarding everything surrounding being pregnant.

"Would you want to keep him?" Mel probed, snapping Nite out of her thoughts.

"… I don't know," Nite replied truthfully. B was fast asleep, looking at peace without a care in the world. Why would he know of the horrors of what his life was going to be to let that keep him up? Nite was envious of that fact — he could live blissfully unaware of everything that could have been. That alone was worth protecting and keeping from the light of day the older he got.

Nite scoffed as she thought more about it.

"He doesn't even have a proper name yet," Nite commented, lifting a hand and gently stroking B's cheek with her thumb.

That seemed to have made Mel chuckle lightly. "Did you have one in mind? I think I overheard some of the other Pervolo guys trying to come up with a name for him. Not really a great selection, though. I think the nicest one they managed was something like 'Collis'."

It took Nite a moment of recalling her Old Lucian lessons before she shook her head. "Right, because of the mountain…"

"Mhm," Mel confirmed.

Nite heaved with a silent, slow sigh, and then she returned her attention upon B. There was no name that just popped into her mind whenever she looked at him. Naming things was never really her forte, either. The best she had was, "I suppose I'll just have to wait and see what is decided for him before worrying about what kind of name he should be given."

"Don't want to get too attached?"

Withdrawing her hand from B's face, Nite nodded. "… Yeah…"