12510/A New You: Aftermath

From Heroes Assemble MUSH
Jump to navigation Jump to search
A New You: Aftermath
Date of Scene: 20 August 2022
Location: Somewhere in Montana
Synopsis: Clarice brings Lydia to Montana to recover from her ordeal. Lydia is a bit too harsh on herself, and for a turn, Clarice is the one to comfort her.
Cast of Characters: Clarice Ferguson, Lydia Dietrich




Clarice Ferguson has posed:
    Out in the middle of the wilderness in Montana is a small cabin. A tiny dirt road leads to it, and it is miles and miles from any sort of civilization - enough time to bring in backup should the worst ever happen.
    This is where Clarice has brought Lydia.
    At the moment, Clarice sits beside the unmoving, corpse-like body of her sister - a thermos of strong coffee nearby to keep her awake as she waits - and works on her homework. If she's going to be trapped in the middle of nowhere, she might as well get something done. Leaning back against the headboard of the bed, cramped into the full sized bed beside her sister, Clarice balances a keyboard on her lap as she works on an essay.
    She //hates// essays - but she needs to know how to write them if she's going to earn her GED.

Lydia Dietrich has posed:
    Lydia is out for a good couple of hours before she starts to moan. "Wha..." She manages to get out as she slowly starts to get up. "Wh... where am I?" she says, looking around. Her voice lacks that otherworldly quality that it had back in the warehouse, when she was fully possessed by Viscera. "Ow, my head."

    Holding her head in her hands she breathes, "I'm free..." As she's assessing her mental state she finds that Viscera hasn't totally left. There are still strands of it left in her psyche, and she still has that awful, awful power. "No, dammit."

    Finally she looks up and finds Clarice there, working on her homework. She's a welcome sight to see but... "Clarice! Thank god. Don't... don't touch me. Viscera's power isn't totally gone. /Viscera/ isn't totally gone. I still need to..." she frowns. "Clean it out, somehow."

Clarice Ferguson has posed:
    "Montana," is Clarice's answer to Lydia's question, a wry smile on her lips. No doubt, that's what draws Lydia's attention to her, as the magenta hued mutant looks away from the screen on the laptop she was working on, to watch her sister instead. Reaching out, she closes the computer, and turns to sit cross-legged on the bed, watching her.
    "I already touched you, Lydia - when I brought you here. When I got you settled on the bed... it's alright. I'm just glad to hear you're a little more yourself."

Lydia Dietrich has posed:
    "Montana?" Lydia echoes. "Okay. I guess it's a good a place as any." She frowns and scoots back on the bed until her back rests against the headboard. "I'm more myself than I've ever been since I got turned," she says, drawing her knees up to her chest. "The Predator is gone. Not... asleep like what I usually do but just... *gone*. I don't have to remind myself that you're more than just... food." She grumbles, "Still smell delicious, though."

    "I... God, I made such a terrible mistake, Clarice," she sobs. "I let it take over and it ruined /everything/. The things I let it do... what I did to Jon and those animals and... and... those /people/." Tears of blood start dripping down her cheeks. "I'm such a /fool/. I'm a horrible person to let that happen."

Clarice Ferguson has posed:
    "You're not a terrible person. You're a good person. A terrible person doesn't cry like this. A terrible person doesn't pull away for fear of hurting someone. A terrible person doesn't think of others at all. You're a good person... who fucked up." Clarice gives Lydia a wry smile as she watches her cry, concern etched on her features.
    "And I'm still here with you to figure out how we pick up the pieces, alright? You're going to be okay - it's just going to take a little while."

Lydia Dietrich has posed:
    "I... /am/," Lydia insists. "That was /me/ who did all those things. The darkest parts of me. Parts that I didn't even know I had inside me. It was /all me./" She hugs her legs closer to her chest and buries her face in her knees, getting them wet with blood. "I don't deserve to be okay. I should be locked up, at the very least, lest I hurt anybody else."

Clarice Ferguson has posed:
    Clarice watches Lydia in silence for a moment, a frown pulling at her lips. Finally she asks, "Should I be locked up, Lydia? I hurt people. I kill them. I //enjoy// it. Am I a terrible person?" she asks.
    "You're a better person than I am. You always have been - you always will be. You know that, yeah?"

Lydia Dietrich has posed:
    Lydia looks up, pain and hurt in her eyes, "Did you do what tantamounts to rape to one of your best friends? Have you turned somebody into /furniture?/." She shakes her head. "What I did was worse than anything you've done. By a mile. We're lucky you came when you did. Viscera had plans that made what I did look tame in comparison."

Clarice Ferguson has posed:
    "I set the cause of Mutant Rights back - especially in Genosha. I murdered people who were fighting for our freedom. For equal rights. For basic dignity, so... yeah. I think what I did was pretty bad," Clarice replies. "And I've helped Mister Creed find victims to torture. I've stood by and watched him do it. I've done bad things."
    She reaches out, trying to put her hand on Lydia's arm. "I believe you're still a good person. Alright?"

Lydia Dietrich has posed:
    Lydia shies away from Clarice's touch. "Don't... don't let me touch you. It's still in me. I can still do these horrible things. I don't want to empower it." She rubs her eyes with the palm of her hand, smearing the blood around her eyes. "Thanks," she says weakly. "That makes one of us. I don't know how I'm going to face the JLD after this. I need to, though."

    She shakes her head. "I don't know how I'm going to be able to work with them. I did... too much. I should... just go to them to help me get this /thing/ out of my head and then retire and just work on my books." She shakes her head. "Maybe pick up teaching some night courses at the University to pay the bills in the meantime. I obviously can't be trusted with the fate of the world again."

Clarice Ferguson has posed:
    "You don't make things //right// by retiring and hiding from it," Clarice points out firmly. "You don't make the world a better place. You don't undo the damage you did. You're more than just a writer, Lydia."
    She lets her hand drop, though it's clear she's not happy about that. "Should I not be fighting for mutant rights? Because I killed people?"

Lydia Dietrich has posed:
    Lydia laughs bitterly, "How can I undo the damage I did? The things that I did... especially to Jon... leaves permanent scars. How can I heal those? How can I work with these people when the sight of me gives one of them PTSD flashbacks?" She shakes her head. "I'll help them if they ask but I just can't imagine them wanting me to be on their team anymore."

    She lets out a heavy sigh, "Frankly I'm surprised that you managed to convince them to give me a chance instead of outright killing me. I know Ma'at wants to. I was convinced Chas wanted to, too, but he was able to burn out The Predator and most of Viscera instead. It would have been safer going in guns blazing."

Clarice Ferguson has posed:
    "It didn't take much convincing - you're their //friend,//" Clarice insists firmly. "They- well. They made sure I knew that things might not go the way I wanted. If things went badly, if we didn't have any other choice... and I accepted that. I accepted that you wouldn't have wanted to be responsible for anymore deaths, so..."
    She gives Lydia a small, tight smile. "I'm just glad it didn't come to that."

Lydia Dietrich has posed:
    "Even Jon?" Lydia asks in a small voice. "After what I did to them..." She shakes her head, "I don't know why they would go with it."

    She lets out another little sigh. "You're right. I wouldn't have wanted more deaths... more /mutilations/ on my conscience. Not that I had much of one at that point." Scowling she says, "Still, I'm glad that I've been given a second chance. It's... more than what I would have given myself."

Clarice Ferguson has posed:
    "I was thinking of //you,// Lydia. What //you// would have wanted. The person I have in front of me right now. My sister. The woman who feels the pain she caused and regrets it. I- I knew you wouldn't want more regrets. I knew there were too many already."
    Abruptly, tears well up in Clarice's eyes as she adds, "I'm sorry. I should have known, I should have seen... I should have been able to do //something// to stop you before it came to all this. I'm so sorry..."

Lydia Dietrich has posed:
    Clarice's tears only spur on Lydia to shed more of her own. "No, /I'm/ sorry. I shouldn't have let the Predator take over in the first place. I should have been able to take control back or.. or... somehow get a message out."

    She frowns in sympathy, "It... knew how to pretend to be okay. The Predator... Vampires... we're /camouflage/ hunters. We hunt by blending in. It knew how to do that." She shakes her head. "I hate that. /Hunting/. The Predator reveled in it, though. I have an alternative where everything is voluntary but it'll take time to get set up." A heavy sigh escapes her, "In the meantime I'll need to come up with something that doesn't involve killing people."

Clarice Ferguson has posed:
    "But Pete //told me// there was something wrong," Clarice says fiercely. "I knew. I should have acted - I'm sorry."
    As for the matter of keeping her sister fed... She takes a deep breath in, and lets it out slowly before she suggests, "You can feed off me once. Pete will volunteer. And Theo- well. He turns 18 in only 2 months, and his opinion hasn't changed on this... Other than that," she frowns in thought for a moment.
    "We could buy their consent."

Lydia Dietrich has posed:
    Lydia looks surprised at Clarice's offer. "Are you sure?" she asks. "I know how you feel about it. It still feels, I don't know, /wrong/ somehow feeding off family." She lets out a weak chuckle, "I know, it doesn't make any sense. I'll take it this time though, and Theo is old enough to make his own decisions now, I won't let a couple of months bar him from it."

    She actually bursts out with a bark of laughter at Clarice's suggestion. "That's not how consent works. Not really. It /is/ a thought, though now that I'm no longer really *with* the Brotherhood I don't have access to their deep pockets. I've got enough to scrape by the next couple of months, but I'll need to find a job that pays soon enough."

Clarice Ferguson has posed:
    "You need it," Clarice says simply. "I won't let you go hungry, Lydia. And better buying someone's consent then assaulting them, yeah? Hell, I can bring in people from somewhere in the world where... giving them a hundred bucks will utterly change their lives. They're be willing to do it. They'll be //eager// - with no regrets."

Lydia Dietrich has posed:
    Lydia doesn't look all that comfortable with it but she nods. "Yeah. I forget that with you around I can think /globally/. You're right though. People sell their blood all the time. Well, their /plasma/ technically, but it amounts to the same thing," she says, working on convincing herself. "We'd pay more than the Red Cross, and I only take what I need, which is nothing more than what they'd normally lose at a blood bank. Yeah. I think I can do this until my network is set up."

Clarice Ferguson has posed:
    And it has the added bonus that they can't change their minds and make a fuss with the law. Clarice sees no need to point this out aloud, though.
    "I know it's hard to see right now, but it's going to be okay. Your family has your back, and we're determined to see you through this. I mean- I already told Theo and Pete that I have you safe. They want to come see you."

Lydia Dietrich has posed:
    Lydia nods, slowly lowering her legs down to lie flat on the bed. "I'm not surprised. I want to see them too but... not yet. Give me a day to recover. I'm still not doing so good."

Clarice Ferguson has posed:
    "You tell them," Clarice counters. She pulls out her phone - and spends a moment with Lydia, recording a video message for the boys. She sends this along with some of her signature emoji conversation - though at least this time it makes general sense. Vampire thumbs up heart. Easy to understand, right?
    With the message sense she adds, "Rest. You'll be okay in a little while - it's just going to take time."