COMMUNION
Communion with Nebula is as much an oxymoron as she sometimes is. It's the feeling of soft snow, gentle and embracing with its touch. A snow that feels too easy to fall into, like one's own nature. In the opposite extreme there's a fire that's searing to the touch - a constant thrum of anger. In this space, it encompasses all of it, though it's embers now. Embers that are quick to catch and burn and die again. For those who see into it enough it's in moments when she's angry - but most notable when she feels weak, when she struggles, when she worries.
This burning sensation fights ever with the cool nature of the snow. As if the anger isn't nature here and the fire is becoming more malleable in its embrace. Ever lingering, but faltering under the softness of that snow -
The snow is ever gentle and embracing, but lacks the cold (it is warm, it is self). But there is something that twists and coils in the sensation that is cold and empty. Something not alive is ever present, silent and moving, but is overwhelmed by the rest. It is not focus nor is it the all of here, but a moving part.
When Nebula speaks here it lacks the husky, mechanical sound her voice does in person. It's softer, but not warmer. It's just as conflicted and in this voice you know that this realm, in her mind, is the place she finds most comfort. Is the place she's far more willing to be herself than anywhere else: It's freedom. But the rage can burn up quickly, taking flight into sky-covered landscape. It feels like anger is the quickest thing to cling to and accept and even in this shared space any other (positive) emotions are in conflict of understanding.
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post-Harbinger Oracle
Nebula.
Have you eaten yet today?
[The voice was prefaced by the mental equivalent of a knock, permission, but the rest is just simple. Yes or no?]
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[ The voice in this space lacks the mechanical sound it does in life, but the dryness is there: ]
No.
[ It is an answer, but she pauses. Not quite hesitation so much as consideration: Just shutting the door at that is probably rude, so she adds: ]
Why?
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Because there is food being foisted upon me and I abhor waste.
[She… cannot even be annoyed at Nebula’s response. She would do the same. “Yes” or “No”. Maybe “why?”]
And… there is a food product being sold here that seems to be… an homage to you.
[Which might explain why she… thought to call Nebula particularly.]
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Is there not someone else nearby?
[ A child perhaps. In the tone of 'why me,' but the follow up does add to that answer even if she does the mental expression of a deep scowl. ]
That's ridiculous.
[ It's not like she doesn't have some vague knowledge that earthlings are cosplaying or talking about her and the other Guardians in her infrequent visits to Earth - ]
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[She isn't... familiar... with the concept of... "fans". Let alone fans of her or people like her. Yet-]
- I know it is ridiculous.
[But it seemed as if... she had a right... to know...]
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[ Or, perhaps, any of the natives who have been talking like they knew her. They don't and she's one step from proving that to them. ]
[ For a moment, there's no answer. Just quiet, not peaceful, and the anger doesn't roar up despite her tone: ]
Fine. You owe me.
[ Owe her what? Who knows! ]
Where is the damned place?
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... Also. Um. Who is the one getting free food here???
Deep breaths, Hayame. You took on this responsibility. You promised you would try to play nice.]
The southeast corner of the market. Here.
[She projects a vision of where the restaurant is, a small two-story family-run affair with a small garden out back for outdoor seating. Where Hayame is, because she does not fit inside well. ... No comment on who owes who.]
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[ Unhelpfully, playing nice isn't really a phrase Nebula was taught in life. She's trying not to be outwardly antagonistic, but when your version of being honest is also being critical and a bit abrasive... ]
[ At least Nebula appears to be listening - waiting - intently and gives a brusque: ] Understood.
[ Before shutting off the connection as firmly as someone might slam a door. ]
[ ... That's thankfully not an at Hayame thing, but at anyone ever in Communion. Not that Hayame knows that and nor would Nebula apologize for it ever. The woman is at least not one to waste time and it's not quite half an hour before she's made the approach to the garden area. Looking slightly more like an offended cat - or a wary one. It's probably both. ]
[ A pause. Grunting in greeting is on the table. So is saying nothing at all, but perhaps that's weirder. She settles on a touch irritated (almost like she's not sure what to do) sounding: ]
Hey.
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But it's not like Hayame expected the other woman to be soft and grateful about this. It's not like she would in her place. Their conversation is over, so it ends. They "slam the door" at almost the same time. It's not like Hayame wanted to gab about things while Nebula made her way over there anyway. They'd talk when she arrived, in person, like it was more proper.
Nebula might notice... that her appearance at the restaurant causes something of a commotion, though the proprietor seems a bit too shocked to act on it just yet, stunned still with hands over their mouth. Hayame isn't hard to find in the back garden seating, at least- she's the only one out there, her table piled high with plates full of food despite the fact that she has a large pile of dirty plates stacking up. She's eaten a lot so far already, a centaur could put away quite a large amount, but this was ridiculous.]
Greetings.
[She inclines her head and gestures to the empty chairs- there's options, beside or across from where she sits... kind of like a dog, on her haunches.]
You may help yourself.
[A small basket contains utensils. She's welcome to them. Perhaps it is best to let her get settled before showing her... That. And maybe if she just starts eating the restaurant staff won't come bustling over asking for drink orders or her food tastes. Maybe.]
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[ She ignores it because she's taught herself too. Even if some part of her keeps that tense feeling of an offended cat - ready to hiss and snarl if someone tries to approach her in any way. ]
[ She's a lot better at faking nice than she used to be, which is why nodding her head in agreement comes easier. Certainly it's why taking a seat comes easier even if she frowns at the food. Poison doesn't worry her. It's anyone inviting her to eat in the first place. ]
[ At least Hayame makes as much sense as anyone as she picks up a utensil and finds some lesser-offending piece of food to put on a plate. Grumbled low, but she has no doubts Hayame's hearing is at least as decent as her mechanical ones: ]
Don't they have better things to do?
[ She's tired of all the fanfare the locales have, like some Gamemaster affair. ]
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Apparently not.
[... Is her first grunt about this entire endeavor, but. A moment after, once she has taken a generous bite of a meat-based dish of some kind and chewed thoroughly, mulling over the hope-filled talk of a certain person... She grudgingly adds,]
... But. The Oracle fights are a way home for some of them, too, not just us.
[Some of the Kenosian citizens had been there so long they no longer felt connected to where they originally came from... but some of them still remembered. Some of them arrived recently enough to remember.]
They cannot fight in the Oracle trials, though, without shards or being part of this... "generation", so. I suppose the only thing they can do to feel useful is... "support" us.
[... That part, at least, she could understand. Not. The form the support took, but. The desire to do something. To be of use, rather than be a tool rusting in the armory. It's why she threw herself into the Oracle fights so fervidly in the first place, no matter that other shard-bearers spoke of mysteries and other possibilities and investigations. She was a warrior. Fighting for the Oracles is what she can do.
She still grimaces slightly, though, around another bite of food, finished with summarizing an explanation someone had given to her before when she had made the same complaint.]
... Doing it with less fanfare would be preferable, but.
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I know that.
[ She does. Cyrus says as much. Her voice is low and irritable, but not at that particular circumstance. Even if she thinks the whole thing is idiotic - it's this behavior, this wastefulness that eats at her more. ]
They can support quieter. Or find one of the idiots who like this sort of thing.
[ Set probably. ]
[ Before she chews down on another piece she adds: ]
Not us.
[ She doesn't think Hayame is much different from her in this regard - although age and species may differ it appeared they agreed on more than they didn't. It's refreshing in this place with people who felt too wishy-washy to handle most days. ]
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... And not to make irritated faces so much. (Is that what she sounded like to other people?) She manages just barely to simply look pressed. Which she is, by all of this, so. They really did agree on more than they did not.]
It seems we will not be so lucky.
[The food is good, and as someone who had to eat a lot of food to fuel her large body, Hayame isn't not appreciative of being offered free meals as a general concept... But all the looking, the praising, the feeling as if seeing them in the broadcast meant that they knew them... It wasn't everyone, but it was enough that it made things... uncomfortable.
And. Thinking of "uncomfortable"... Hayame pulls a hand-drawn insert from the menu that she'd set aside back out from the side of the table, setting it in front of Nebula. On it, the text labels a limited edition item as inspired by the Meridian shardbearers, a series of drinks... and one of them, blue in color with a slightly more purple streak and a specially designed cup, seems to be labeled with her name. Not that Hayame can read it, but the restaurant owner had told her.. in detail. The man barely holding himself back from coming to ask for an autograph, hovering from the main building.]
You have... inspired some followers.
["Fans".]
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[ She should, then, be more understanding of attempts like the ones they're facing now. She can appreciate food - better than most people, even, starvation a beloved lesson of her father. It does not mean she fails to see it as a waste, especially on a person like her. It's why she remains quiet even as she eats, steady, and turns her attention to the menu that Hayame presents her. ]
[ A pause. They do not know the things she has done, the damage she has caused. ]
[ She gulps, not because of the food. And then with the same serious edge to her voice, still so low it's for Hayame's ears only she answers: ]
Then they are stupid.
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Whatever the hell this is.
At least "this" came with free food.]
Maybe.
[It felt stupid to her, too, in some ways... to celebrate them for what they have done in the labyrinth trials. It was such... Even if they'd seen everything that happened in that place, and for some of them, that had been a lot... it did not mean they knew anything at all about what sort of people they were. The tone in Nebula's voice... It sounds so similar to the one she knew she used, when-]
... They only know what they saw. What we are here.
[... Not what they had done in their own worlds. Which reminds, she supposes.]
You said you were a "guardian", weren't you? [Something about saving a galaxy? A whole galaxy???] I thought you might be more used to this than me.
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[ That was the life she had been used to for so long. Even if it's not now, the scars are etched into herself enough that she eats she stews. She feels the burning eyes of the shopkeep and resists the growing urge to turn and yell at him. Yell at all of them. ]
What they saw. [ She laughs, the sound with no humor and sounding more like a rasp than not. ] I did nothing of celebration in there.
[ If she did to anyone's eyes it was not to hers - All she saw was weakness after weakness. But then, in her opinion, a win would be through fighting and most of those times were worked through with emotion and resilience. ]
[ You were a Guardian, Hayame says and that makes her stop for the first time. To swallow thickly as she glares down at the food. ]
I am a Guardian. [ Refuted, quickly - more an assertion to herself than to Hayame. She had once used those words "was a Guardian," when they'd met - that she had retired and she had. But now in Kenos she's pulled back to that world; And if she's the only Guardian of the Galaxy left in the entire damned cosmos she would die a Guardian. She would die for her family. ]
[ She ignores the emotion behind the conviction. ] I was an Avenger, too. "Earth's mightiest heroes." [ She wants to scoff at the thought but there's a further point. ] And a Daughter of Thanos.
[ Despite the factual way she says it there's something stilted in the phrase, said more like a curse than it is to be proud of. She tears at a strip of chicken. ] ... There were people who knew of us. Or tried to gift the other things. Weapons. Trinkets. Stupid goats.
[ STUPID GOATS!! She doesn't pause. ] Most of them did not look at me. Most of them still knew me for what I did under my father's control.
... I do not blame them.
[ There is nothing about her for them to want to admire. So she tells herself. It sure is a good thing she doesn't know the extent of what Earth people are doing. Cosplaying as her would be horrific to know! ]
crawls back from tokyo
I might have been devoured by shadows, were you not at hand.
[It is merely fact worth noting, as shameful as it was for her to admit. But now... Now, she is confused just slightly by the chance in tense. She was a "Guardian", now she is... ? She is also an "Avenger"? (Side note, other worlds sometimes had such odd words for things...) But it is not Hayame's place to question, now. It was time for her to listen. (Even if being gifted goats was... well...)
And when she is done... and the silent stretches between them. Even if it seems like a question with an answer that can only be negative, can only be suffering...]
... What do daughters of Thanos, do?
[She wonders if it is anything like what stable breed jinba with both their arms do.]
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[ She stews before sighing. ]
You don't know that.
[ Retorted, quickly, fiercely an addition: ] You would have broken through it.
[ The illusion. She thinks, hopes, believes — because she wants to believe she herself would. Because, she can't imagine if she hadn't and what that might mean. (She knows what it would mean, they all did, but that did not shake her faith in Hayame). ]
[ Look, Hayame, don't question things sometimes you have complicated feelings about your retirement and decide this fight is for your family, for the Guardians. And if you're going to die you're going to die a Guardian!!! ]
[ She glances up, finally, at the question and the cascade of thoughts and feelings that accompany it. What do they do...? What didn't they do. She almost laughs, she doesn't, though the huff of one remains in her throat. ]
I told you some of it; How our Father stole and weaponized us in his pursuit of balance. [ It's a brief overview, a quick reminder, because that's all she'd said before. ]
Before he had the Infinity Stones — his Oracles — we were part of his army. The Stones made his work quick, before that... If he wanted a planet wiped out or a person killed, it would be us he would send in.
[ To kill, to destroy. Just as he had done to each of his "children," that he had adopted, blessed with a life by his side. If you could call it a blessing - she doesn't. She doesn't think the entire universe does. But it's neither here nor there. ]
It was the only life we knew.
[ Taken as young as they were, with any semblance of normalcy stripped of them. With loss, grief, and anger the first things they were taught. She pauses; Thinks of herself, from so long ago. How if circumstances were changed it'd be a different Nebula on another side. Lost and full of hate, and with only one purpose.
It's, perhaps, why she adds one last thing: ]
It's the only life he would let us have.
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And Nebula would have to live with her awkwardly, curtly, expressing her gratitude. Briefly acknowledging the debt now created between them before moving onwards.
To something... darker, perhaps, than most women would bring up over a free meal in a lovely cafe surrounded by citizens that admire and look to them for hope after the Harbinger Oracle trial had been broadcast across the city. But they are not most women, are they? This is what they have.
So Hayame listens, quietly, because she was the one who asked. She turns the phrases over in her own head, giving them the weight they deserved. And even though it was a far different life from the one she had led in the sense of... scale, of space... Eventually, she just nods. Having been automatically eating still, she does pause... Long enough to say,]
I see.
[She could end it there. Just acknowledgement, and nothing else, a question asked, then answered. But that does not feel fair, or right, somehow, and having once felt... so alone, in Meridian, thinking that no one else was in position to sympathize with her thoughts or where they came from... and insisting to herself that it would not matter, and if even if not a single other soul supported her she would simply force herself to carry on. Nebula did not deserve that, even if she might not choose to take what she offers.]
My stable master insisted on being called "Lord", though. Not "Father".
[Understanding.]
... And we were meant for the auction block once we finished our training and came of age, not a place at his side.
[A daughter of Thanos and a daughter of Armless breeding stock raised to be an overseer of her own kind sold to the highest bidder.]