listen to the murmurs, carry them inside you

[avephoenix]

Who: Faith and you (will match format)
What: Faith is revived and has to deal with the mess her double made
Where: Hope's temple (closed to Kate) and around the city (open)
When: January 30 through February 2
Warnings: Talk of death, a lot of self-loathing, mentions of destruction by fire. Will update if more come up.


hope's temple (for we are a woven thread, find the strand)

[She wakes with a start and a shuddering breath, and for one blissful, beautiful moment, Faith has no idea what's happened.

Then it comes back -- her memories, and her double's.

Oh. That's why the temple looks the way it does, with scorchmarks from her fire along the walls, and the smell of smoke hanging in the air.]

No. [It's a rushed whisper, like it could send her back in time to stop this happening.] Oh no--

[The gods don't need this. They just want to be understood. Of course that's why her double tried to hurt them.]


around the city (feel the hollow dream slip away)

[She has so much work ahead of her.

Faith goes to check on Hope's temple now and then, wondering when's the best time to step inside and offer to help. She goes by Sorrow's, too, but she's even less inclined to go in there quite yet. After the kindness he'd shown her, she'd gone and done this.

And she knows it wasn't her, really, but it was part of her, the loathsome parts, the person she never wants to be, the person she could've been if she'd let Rosenberg have her way and maybe train her as a successor. Who knows? Faith doesn't, and she never wants to.

So she goes to the abandoned buildings her double burnt, cleans up whatever she can. Goes and gets water and rags and tries to scrub out the soot from the walls and the floor.

Sometimes she goes to the bar for a drink.

Always, her eyes look blank, even though she smiles at anyone who looks at her. The fire seems to have gone out in her. Maybe it's because she was dead for so long. Maybe it'll just take a bit to come back.]

Comments

i know i can make it i know i can make it throoough (you know what this is)

[dedikated]

( Hangovers get worse the older you get. Yet, sometimes, that doesn't matter. Times like when your best friend dies and all you can do is keep trekking back to where she's supposed to revive, hoping and all the same trying not to believe the images in your head.

Kate's pressing the heel of her hands to her eyes, trying to quell the headache and nausea, when she hears the voice. The familiar lilt.

Faith. )

... You there?

( She's not just making things up, wallowing in her own grief in the most insane of ways, right? )

be the best that i can be

[avephoenix]

Kate?

[Faith sits up, sucking in a deep breath. Oh god. Oh god, what has she done?]

Kate-- [Her voice cracks on her friend's name. Did she get hurt too, somehow, and Faith doesn't know it? What more did her fire do?]

i wanna be the very best (wait, not that? shit)

[dedikated]

( Oh thank god.

It's like all the tension disappears from Kate's body at once, like the headache pounding at her skull turns into a throb instead of a scream.

She's alright.

She is back.

This place didn't take her. Because Kate doesn't know what she'd do if Faith left, too. )

You alright? ( She stops a few steps short of where the altar should have been, behind Faith and not even trying to contain the relief in her expression. Faith'll be honest with her, right? That's how it's always gone. Faith's expressive. She tells the truth.

Kate just expects it. )

i know it's my destiny

[avephoenix]

I--

[She's okay physically. She's back, but what has she returned to? All this damage--]

I did this.

you're my best friend

[dedikated]

Not you.

( Some fucked up double. Something that's all the things they know not to be, but Kate doesn't know how to word that. She just knows that wasn't Faith. Could never be Faith, because Faith would never consider herself the legend people kept pushing her to be-

Not in this way.

Kate's double helped. Even now, she can feel the cold of her, the memories of her watching Faith's double's destruction with an impassive glance and the toss of pink hair. She knows those parts of her, too well, knows them from dreams of meeting Rosenberg again and the nightmare of what appeared in the fog. Knows she never wanted that person out again.

Knows she exists, all the same. )

Just someone fuckin' with us.

oooo you're makin' me live now honey (wait what)

[avephoenix]

[Faith knows that, but it's little comfort.]

Part of me.

[Her vision blurs as she looks around the temple again -- she can't not look, even though it hurts.]

Part of me I should've had under control.

i would d i e for y o u (shit)

[dedikated]

( Part of them.

God does she know it. Even if she wants to believe anything but, even if she bites down on her tongue to prevent asking if that means Faith thinks some of the things her double threw in Kate's face over the network.

She knows it. To just be random, moustasche twirling villain versions of themselves would be too easy. No. Hers was all the things she wanted buried with the past, with the end of the fog, the containment of what they'd brought.

It hurts more that way, then. )

Pretty sure they would've dug it up anyway.

( She thought she'd had that part under control, ever since the events from months ago forced her to confront it again. )

[avephoenix]

[She's in a daze as she scrubs, torturing herself with her double's memories, playing them over and over again in her head as she scrubs the walls like the soot is her shame. It takes a few seconds before she notices Shadow, and then she stops, looking over at him with a broken smile.]

Mr. Hedgehog. [Her voice is heavy with guilt, rough from crying. (The crying happens in brief but sudden spells, like a few minutes ago. Her eyes are a little red from it still.] Come to help, have you. Should let me do it on me own.

[Like a penance.]

[avephoenix]

[His sharp, blunt response snaps her more out of her daze. Yeah, she deserves that.

But also--]

Who're you helpin', then? 'M sure they're grateful.

[avephoenix]

[That's a good question.

Faith has answered it for teammates before, for herself. She thought about it a lot during the battle against Rosenberg, and even after, after the burning of Manchester.

What does it matter, what side she chooses, what she as a phoenix does or does not do, what the average superhuman does or does not do.

What's anything matter here, where the whim of a god can wipe away all you've done.]

Dunno. [She gives a halfhearted laugh, one as quiet as her voice.] Guess in the end it's got to matter to yo. To oneself.

around the city!!!

[hasitsthorns]

[ Rose had waited at the temple for as long as she could. She had ideally wanted to be there when Faith returned but other things called her away in the end. Battling her own literal demons had been a bit rougher than anticipated before she was faced with a slough of metaphorical ones as well. There were so many tears in the life she'd carefully crafted here in Hadriel that needed to be repaired. Part of her wondered if they really could be though. If she should even bother.

Newt and Hermann left somewhere admist the chaos. Hunger that won't quiet claws at her insides insistently. Faith (and others, of course, though she selfishly thinks they don't matter as much) is dead.

Was dead.

Rose stops short on her way towards the orchard as she catches the woman's scent before anything else; amidst the ash and burn is her pleasantly familiar smell. Her feet drive her before she consciously realizes she's heading towards the source. The moment she sees Faith she forgets to breathe for just a second before letting out a long exhale of relief.

She's back. They didn't take her away. After Haven, she could never be sure that one day they wouldn't just stop reviving, that the gods could decide it wasn't worth the trouble anymore. Rose hadn't realized just how scared she was of that possibility until she sees Faith standing there in one piece. It's enough to make her misty-eyed, which- Wow, oh no, that's embarrassing.

Don't cry in front of the girl you like, act cool! ]

Hey, uh. Need any help with that?

[ Smooth. Especially with the voice crack and everything. ]

git riddy

[avephoenix]

[It's not until Rose speaks that Faith notices she's there, and as soon as she does, her heart skips a beat.]

Rose. [She heads over, fighting back her own tears that she's not entirled to cry, not here, in front of someome who suffered because of her.

Faith pulls her into a hug as soon as she's near enough, breathing shakily from relief and sadness both.] I'm so sorry.

i'll never be ready

[hasitsthorns]

[ The carefully erected wall Rose had tried to put up in order to brace her for this emotional blow crumbles almost immediately. It had cracks in the foundation from the start - just like Rose herself does - but she hadn't wanted to fall to pieces so easily.

It's a thoughtless gesture that the blond wraps her arms around Faith in return with tears already burning her eyes. She's alive. How terrified she'd been that the woman wouldn't return hits her all at once. But she's here, she's- Well, 'alright' is probably subjective. Still. She'll take what she can get. ]

Hey, it's not like you [ a hitch of her breath ] tried to, y'know? [ Die, she means. Some people do. Rose had, not so long ago. But she knows this wasn't the case with Faith, so. ] M'just glad you're back, really. I didn't... I didn't want to think about a time here without you yet.

[ A surprisingly honest admission. ]

[avephoenix]

[Rose is warm and real and here, and Faith feels alive for the first time since she walked outside the house today.

It hurts, to know just how sad Rose must've been while she waited for Hope to revive Faith. It hurts so much that Faith holds her tighter.]

Can't get rid of me that easy. 'M not leavin' for a good, long while, yeh? Not ready to go yet. [She's quiet for a moment, and then she adds in a whisper,] Didn't mean to leave you alone for so long.

[hasitsthorns]

[ Rose wouldn't believe that she could instill that in anyone. Faith is too warm and good for someone like her but she keeps holding on despite herself. She can be a bit stubborn that way though. ]

I'll hold ya' to that.

[ She won't, actually, because she knows how quickly the Door can snatch people away. Still. It's a nice though that Faith might be sticking around for some time to come. It's something to keep her going, at least. ]

Ah, it's alright. That was more Hope than you. He had his hands full and all.

[ Besides, Rose has gone months without seeing her friends. Haven had a habit of dropping them into cold storage without warning. The blond had been victim to it herself once for a month. Thankfully, there isn't such a thing here but... She still worries, sometimes. ]

[avephoenix]

[Good. Faith gives a shaky, breathy laugh, but she only pulls away when Rose has mentioned Hope. Then Faith bites her lips, sheepish.]

'e'll have his hands full for a while yet. My shadow did some nasty work on 'is temple.

around the city;

[hotspurred]

[Henry is carrying two dining chairs scavenged from one of the many ruined shops, one in each hand, when he glimpses Faith inside one of the newer ruined buildings as he passes it on the street. He double-takes and then stops, setting the chairs down before he peers through one of the windows that lacks any trace of its former pane of glass.]

Faith. At last you show yourself.

[She's not normally one to disappear.]

[avephoenix]

Sir Henry.

[Somehow being spotted by a guardsman makes Faith feel like she's in trouble. Her double may not have attacked the guard's HQ, but she'd endangered the city. Sir Henry knows what Faith is capable of now.

She's like a little girl caught sneaking a treat before dinner.]

I was-- erm, wasn't hiding. Just... dead.

[hotspurred]

[Henry's brow furrows at her response, and he leans his armoured forearms on the windowsill. Her guilty reaction — obvious to one who has long been in positions of authority — is noted, but he can guess why. No doubt she had a double.]

Hope began his... resurrections almost a week afore.

[Not only is he uncomfortable talking of them, his voice carries a faint edge of puzzlement. He still would have expected to see her sooner.]

[avephoenix]

Mmhm. [She nods, avoiding his gaze. She's not ashamed per se, just... well, he knows what her double did.] Only just got back, meself. Guess it's 'cos of what happened to his temple.

[hotspurred]

[Henry has not, in fact, taken a detailed look at what happened over the network whilst he was... absent — it felt too much like being privy to everyone's secret shames. Nor was he... around when Faith's double took the centre of attention.]

...The scorch marks. That was your beast?

[Then Henry blinks, and raising his voice a fraction adds:]

Hope punished you...?!

[avephoenix]

[Welp, he'll find out now!]

Yeh. ['Beast' is such a good word for her double.] Did it to Hope's temple, and Sorrow's.

[His disbelief doesn't faze her. Later, when she remembers this conversation, it will hearten her.] Guess that's what he did, yeh. Left me for last.