#with lifera

LIFERA:  *It's quiet beyond the door but for a soft caw. It's many moments more before it's finally opened, and the woman on the other side is small, almost smaller than ever, hair a tangled, clipped-together mess and clothes simple and hardly anything like an empress at all. She seems slightly surprised, at first, that the figure isn't one she's expecting, but the vague surprise on her face twists quickly into something much different when she realizes who, exactly, it is that she's looking at, and she's frozen in place, a coldness growing in the pit of her stomach and chilling the blood in her veins. She had thought little could move her after everything that had happened. Of course, she would be wrong.*

DAELOS:  *The mental image he had of her was from so, so long ago that when it collides with the troll looking back at him he can't even bring himself to move across the threshold. He freezes at the same time she does. He hears the little click in the back of his throat from far away, as if it's happening to someone else, someone else's body. He must have looked different to her too. His body has definitely aged, while all her aging has taken place on the inside, and he can feel it filtering out through the way she's looking at him. It still doesn't feel real. It won't until one of them says something, but he doesn't even have the slightest half formed idea of what to say.*

LIFERA: *It doesn't seem to compute that he could actually be here, and she's wondering if this /isn't/ actually all just imagined after all, that maybe she's still back on the Alternian meteor, being poked at and cut up. It's a lot of things to try to piece together at once, and yet, she can't even find the words for that. Only one manages to work its way out.* ... What...?

DAELOS: *As soon as she talks, the glossy film over everything seems to tear and he actually remembers to breathe again. He didn't think about what to say on his way here, he only thought about seeing her again and didn't consider what would happen after, nor any other detail of the situation. It does take him far too long to find his voice and by the time he does, the silence is pressing.

 DAELOS: They told me

DAELOS: They said you were alive and I 

DAELOS: I had to see for myself

LIFERA: *He speaks, and maybe it is real after all. Or, at least, that's what the ache in her chest tells her. How did he know she was here? How did he get here? Why...? Where has he been? She has too many questions and so little room in her mind to free up to ask them. Instead, she just says,* I'm alive.

DAELOS: *There are so many things he would ask her too, but he is overwhelmed. For a second his mind's eye interrupts him with the form of that ghost, ghashing it's teeth and shrieking on the bones of Beforus. Sinking down into the black. His eyes suddenly start to sting. He clenches a huge fist and presses it to his mouth, making absoloutely sure nothing dangerous will come out before he allows himself  to talk again. He will not lose his composure here.* 

LIFERA: *The sight of him here, like this, is so surreal, and even more so to see the strange emotion in him, the kind that burns in her. Not this, too, not now. It comes out before she can help herself.* Daelos...

DAELOS: *He flinches at his hatch name with her voice wrapped around it, but looks up despite himself. He had never found it possible to intentionally begrudge her much of anything.* 

DAELOS: I know *he begins uncertainly*

DAELOS: I know it's strange

LIFERA: *But nevermind all of that. Nevermind everything. Shouldn't he hate her? Shouldn't he? Why was he here, after all of...*

LIFERA: ... I was wrong.

LIFERA: I--

LIFERA: I've always--

LIFERA: I wasn't-- I shouldn't have...

LIFERA: *She doesn't mean to do this now, not now, but seeing him like this, it's clear. The sentence comes out in a croak.* I don't know what I've done.

DAELOS: *She's drawing him in, right back into the mess that he thought he had outgrown. He shouldn't care about this anymore. But it still hurts, and for a moment the pain is just as fresh, as if it hadn't happened sweeps and sweeps ago. Her words make him feel feverish with skin-crawling revulsion. He jerks like he's going to reach, maybe for her hand but he doesn't actually let himself complete the gesture.*

DAELOS: No, Lifera

DAELOS: That is not the case

DAELOS: It was all my doing

DAELOS I ruined everything

LIFERA: No. *It's firmer than her words before, but even still an ache.* )(ow can you say that now? You can't-- *Her throat feels tight, and she has to swallow.* Not now. This was-- me. It was always me, always doing what I thought I should, what I thought would-- and-- *Her words taper off into little more than a squeak, and she can't keep her face turned toward him anymore, not for the tears that roll down her cheeks.*

DAELOS: *Seeing her in tears, especially over *this*....this of all things, after all they've lost...it guts him to the core. He's a notorious coward and he's scared to go near her, but his instincts always win our over his fear. He steps into her space, to slid his gloves hands over hers as she turns away from him and sobs, his voice almost as choked as hers, but gentle.*

DAELOS: You did not force me to carry out those e%periments

DAELOS: I wanted to do it

DAELOS: You did not force me to be careless

DAELOS: I was in a rush to please you

LIFERA: *He touches her, and she wants to draw back; she flinches, but she can't bring herself to. Instead, she shakes her head, still unable to look him in the face. She tries to even out her ragged breathing, to make some sense of anything, but it feels like an uphill battle as anything ever has.* I was-- an idiot to think I could-- ever... Loo-- look at what I've done.

DAELOS: *She keeps trying to turn her head away, he keeps trying to catch her eye again. He shouldn't even be in the same room with her and cannot believe his own selfishness, his arrogance...but it doesn't matter right now. After a confused moment, it dawns on him.*

DAELOS:  You mean Beforus

DAELOS: *his mouth closes and forms a hard line.*

LIFERA: *She's quiet for a long moment, the heaviness of it all weighing her down.* Beforus. You. Meenah-- -Everything.

LIFERA: There's nothing I can fix, there's nothing... left to fix.

DAELOS: *He lets go of her hands for a moment, because he simply cannot believe what he is hearing. How is it possible that she blames herself for everything. His pusher is racing and he can't disguise the passion in his tone.*

DAELOS: We...we two made grevious errors

DAELOS: We did not destroy our own home

DAELOS: Lifera, you *loved* Beforus

DAELOS: You were the only one I ever knew who loved it as much as I did

DAELOS: There are beings out there who chose to take our home from us

DAELOS: Aren't you angry with them?

DAELOS: Do you not want to make them pay for what they have done?

LIFERA: *Hearing this, it just burns all the more, and she's glad he let her go, so that she doesn't have to pull her hands back by force.* Don't you think I wanted that?? To make them pay-- For stealing and-- murdering my daughter, for the cancer they spread wherever the fuck they go and-- This is what happens! For trying to fight. For trying.

LIFERA: No...

LIFERA: I can't.

LIFERA: I won't.

LIFERA: They've already won.

LIFERA: Whatever else they could take from me, I can't stop them. They showed me that a long time ago, and I was just too naive to see it.

DAELOS: *He seems to deflate, the brief flash of fierceness dying from his posture and eyes. He feels it leave him, like it's e%tinguishing*.

DAELOS: They left you alive, but hurt you

DAELOS: I have suffered the same

LIFERA: *If there's any more guilt possible to feel, it's the way she sees him wilt, but she's thick enough with it, what else could she do? Even now, she's selfish, and she has no idea how to stop it.*

LIFERA: ... )(ow do I go on like this?

LIFERA: *The question is earnest, the plea of someone completely lost, broken, and right now, he's the only one that understands, come right out of her past and back into her life, and it feels like she needs him.*

DAELOS *He e%hales, glancing around the room for a moment, different points of interests, including the bird, but his gaze didn't linger. He was 100king without really seeing. His frown is thoughtful, troubled*

DAELOS: It is hard to give an e%act answer, as I am only doing my best

DAELOS: If seeking recompense against our enemies is no longer your path, there must be another somewhere

DAELOS: You need not be alone while you 100k, even if you never find it

DAELOS: I would like to be your friend again

DAELOS: If you would have me

DAELOS: Despite....despite everything

DAELOS: I know it is a 100dicrous request to make

DAELOS: I did hate you at one time, I did blame you

DAELOS: I no longer feel this way

LIFERA: *He speaks, and she loses herself in the words, in the way they make things feel numb in a way that's better than the heart-crushing pain, and at his suggestion, it's even more surreal. Enough to reach up for his face and touch it, like she's in a memory, like everything isn't gone. For a moment, she remembers how hopeful she had felt when he had been there. Her lips twitch almost like she's trying to smile.*

LIFERA: You have always been ludicrous. )(aven't you...?

DAELOS: *He flinches from her touch, like he does with any touch, but settles when he feels the soft pads of her fingers graze his face. He doesn't smile with his mouth but his jaw twitches, and in his eyes there is a mi%ture of sadness and warmth.*

DAELOS: So they say

LIFERA: *She doesn't move for a moment that might have been minutes but still doesn't feel long enough before her hand slides away, but she realizes she doesn't want to hold herself up anymore. She doesn't want to be here. She doesn't want to be anywhere. But he sees it -- he sees her, and even if it's not enough, it's something, so she lets herself or maybe she just can't help how she steps close enough to lean into him, not caring that they're still in the doorway, not caring about anything at all.*