7389/In Erebos: Catching Caitlin

In Erebos: Catching Caitlin
Date of Scene:	15 August 2021
Location:	Tartarus
Synopsis:	Caitlin falls, Donna flies. They almost fight, but end up hugging instead. Nadia joins them, and the three go Up.
Cast of Characters:	Caitlin Fairchild, Donna Troy, Nadia Pym-van Dyne

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Caitlin Fairchild has posed:
Immediately following end of Scene #6961

The primal fear of falling is one that Caitlin's largely gotten over. Short of dynamic atmospheric re-entry, it seems like no fall is sufficient to do more than strain her knees a little.

But the fear for her friends-- that is real and nauseating and the grip it has on her heart lessens as the murky shadows of the stairs of Erebos whip past her. There is blackness above, blackness below; shadows and shade obscure surfaces and conceal outcroppings. Only the wind in her ears and the periodic glimpse of stairsteps flashing past gives her a means to mark the time.

The horror that threatens her psyche relents and draws backwards into her subconcious, her primal Id no longer convinced that someone is trying to take control of her mind again.

There is only the eternal plunge into the darkness.

Donna Troy has posed:
    Nine days. Nine days is how long, so Hesiod said, it would take a bronze anvil to fall from the Earth to the depths of Taratarus. How long has it taken to climb the stairs? Far less time. Hours. Less than a day. But that doesn't matter. Things like this - /places/ like this - are not subject to such simple rules.

    How far does an anvil fall in nine days? Call terminal velocity 300 feet per second. Call it a million feet an hour. Call it 190 miles. 4500ish a day. More than 40,000 miles.

    In the first second after Caitlin takes that leap, this rushes through Donna's mind. 300 feet per second. Caitlin can walk away from that. Caitlin could fall from orbit and survive. No, the more important number is nine days. Nine days falling, without food or water. Caitlin cannot survive that.

    There is a rule, when Amazons find themselves required to go through Doom's Gate, and meet the challenge of the stairs. If you lose someone, if they've gone back down, you keep climbing. You hope they figure it out and follow. It sounds harsh, but it makes sense. Go down after them and there are two people who need to challenge the stairs again, not just one. A rescuer is as likely to be a burden as a help to the person they rescue. Once you're safely at the top, you consider a rescue party.

    "KEEP GOING UP! WE'RE NEARLY THERE!" Donna bellows. The torches lining the walls of the stairs are becoming more infrequent, the light growing dimmer. This is a good sign. Soon they'll be at the top. Very soon. How many more steps did the Lampad say there were to go? Six hundred? How many have they climbed since then? They must be so close. Damn it, Cait. "DON'T LOOK BACK! KEEP CLIMBING. UP! EVERYTHING ELSE IS A LIE!" Including this.

    Donna slips the end of the lasso from her wrist. Nine days. She leaps into the void.

    Air rushes past Donna as she hurtles downwards,. Below her, she can see Caitlin's form dimly visible in the darkness, and it strikes her how calm Caitlin looks. Just falling, as if it wasn't a thing to worry about. Donna flattens her limbs to cut through the air as smoothly as she can, and accelerates. Closer. Closer. Overtaking.

    Donna curves down and back up again, slamming into Caitlin from the side and driving the pair of them hard into the stone wall. Torches shake in their brackets, and the pair of Titans tumble down a score of steps in a tangle of limbs.

    The thump of the impact can be heard by the rest of the Titans above, followed by the distant sound of Donna's voice, calling "..got her... keep going up!"

Caitlin Fairchild has posed:
"No!" Caitlin cries out. It's more anguish and frustration than grief. They tumble and skid across the hewn stone slabs, a great echoing crash of tangled armor atop those seemingly infinite stairs. "Let me go-- you have to let me go! I can't keep going up those steps!"

Caitlin grabs Donna, wrapping a shoulder and a leg in an iron-like grip. She twists and hurls Donna away from her to a position higher on the infinite staircase.

Her expression is pale and terrified. Not just fear, but true existential dread. Caitlin curls her hands into fists and readies herself for another charge from Donna. "You have to go on without me," she pleads. "I can't keep doing it. She's going to get loose. I can feel it." Caitlin sniffles and wipes a wrist under her watering eyes. "Go on. Just go without me. /Please/," she begs.

Donna Troy has posed:
    "No." Donna climbs to her feet, and with her eyes very firmly fixed on Caitlin, she starts slowly descending the stairs towards her friend, one careful step at the time. "No Cait. I'm /not/ letting you go. It's a lie, Cait. Remember? Oh I know there's truth in it. In whatever you saw. That's why it's a /good/ lie. That's why it got to you. But it's still a lie."

    Donna stops half a dozen steps above Caitlin, the expected charge not coming, and holds her hand out. "Cait... please. Trust me. Take my hand. We're /almost there/, Cait. You can do it. /We/ can do it." Her voice has a calmness she doesn't feel, and her words are precise and slow. "Together, you and me. C'mon. Caitlin and Donna. Nothing can stop us when we're together. Whatever tells you something different is a lie, and you know that."

    Donna stretches her hand out towards Caitlin. "Take my hand, Cait. We'll catch the others up at the top. It'll be fine. I promise you. You can't believe whatever you saw, whatever you heard. That's just the lies of the stairs, the lies of this magic that doesn't want you to leave. But you can believe /me/, Cait."

Caitlin Fairchild has posed:
Caitlin shakes her head, numbly. She backs away from the extended hand as if a snake was rearing at her. "It's not," she moans in desperation. "It wasn't. I had a-- a vision. A vis-visitation. It was my father, Donna, my dad." Her eyes well with tears. "And we were running up the steps. We were running away from things, but always going up the steps. And then I s-saw Athe-thena. I t-talked with her. And it was /her/, Donna, I know it was." The assertion is made with the most certain vehemence Caitlin can muster.

"And she told me what was coming, and I felt everything starting to turn- to go black li-like what happened on the dreadnought, with Victor, and I knew-- I /know/ I can't hold her back. I'm a liability to everyone, Donna, you know I am and we both know what a risk it is if I slip a gear and blackout on those steps. I can *feel* it," she babbles, fingers weaving through her loose hair near her temples. Knuckles whiten with the pressure on her head. "There's no w-way the rest of you can stop me without someone getting hurt bad."

Donna Troy has posed:
    Donna keeps her eyes fixed on Caitlin, but lets her hand drop a little. Not all the way to her side, but it's no longer reaching out quite as much. "Listen to me, Cait. Listen very carefully. The stairs... the magic... it's cunning. It found a way in, but that's what it does. You mustn't let it persuade you. There's a simple rule to these stairs. If something persuades you to go down, you know it's a lie."

    The hand lowers a little further. "I know, Cait. I know what you're talking about. What you're scared of. It's real. But the idea that you can't hold it back? That's /not/ real. We're nearly at the top, Cait." Her voice remains soft and steady and calm, like she's talking to a child. "So close. Five hundred steps maybe, and we're there. Home. We can do this, Cait. Together, you and me."

    The hand rises again. "You're not a liability, Cait. You're my rock. I /need/ you, Cait. Take my hand, and we'll go the rest of the way together. Just you and me. You don't need to worry about the others. They'll be at the top before we catch up with them. Come on, Cait. Ten, fifteen minutes. That's all. Then we're home."

Caitlin Fairchild has posed:
The stairs are a terrible location for pacing. Less than a yard wide; Caitlin's shoulders can almost brush the inner wall and hang over the abyss simultaneously. She turns this way and that, the trembling corners of her lips pulling downwards in a pouty grief.

"What if you're wrong?" Tears dampen her green eyes and she turns her gaze on Donna again. She leans minutely towards the Amazon warrior, a subtle betrayal of body language. "Donna if you're wrong, if I snap, you-- you're the only person who's got a /chance/ of stopping me," she says. Arms fold across her stomach, posture bent with pain and humiliation. "And the only way you're gonna do that is to let me fall. Are you willing to bet everyone's life on you making that call, in time?"

Donna Troy has posed:
    "No." Donna takes a single step down, closer to Caitlin. "I'm not wrong. I know you, and I know what these stairs do to people. And I'm not betting anyone's life on that but my own. Cait, the others must be at least two hundred steps ahead of us by now. By the time we catch up with them, they'll be at the gate. Even if I /was/ wrong, they would have two dozen Amazons to help them. It will be fine. Just trust me, please Cait? You know I don't let you down."

    She takes another step closer. "And I'll never let you fall. You know that too. You're my best friend. You're my sister. I love you and I am /not/ letting you go. This is my fault." Donna gives an apologetic shake of her head. "You're not used to this. To the magic. In my head... I put you at the front because you're Caitlin, and because you're /Aikaterine/. Because you're an Amazon. It seemed to make sense. You at the front, me at the back. Together we'd get the Titans through it, like we've got the Titans through so much in the past. I didn't... I didn't think it through. I know what you're scared of. I should have taken that into account. I should have walked alongside you all the way, should have been there with you. I'm sorry Cait, I really am."

    Another step, and she holds her hand out again. "But that was then and this is now. I'll be there at your side, Cait. Every last step of the way. Trust me, please? Take my hand."

Caitlin Fairchild has posed:
Caitlin twists and paces more as Donna descends-- but Donna's presence is something inexplorable and difficult to contend with. There is a reason, after all, why Donna so often leads the Titans in the field; it's not just tactical acumen, or raw strength, or combat expertise.

It's because Donna puts her faith in people, and the will to rise to someone else's expectations is a powerful motivator.

Caitlin tries to resist; looks over the steps, looks behind her. But she doesn't so much as backpedal. In her worst moments, when Caitlin was in despair, was lost, Donna has always been a beacon.

"I'm a really bad Amazon," she gets out, finally-- but reaches out and grips Donna's fingers. Like a lifeline thrown to a drowning sailor she holds Donna's hand and lets herself be pulled to safety.

Safety being more a direction, than actual security per se-- just two staircase steps in the correct direction.

Caitlin stops on the step below Donna. The difference puts their head on a level with each other. There's still something forlorn and resigned in her damp green eyes when she looks at Donna, but she curls Donna's hand close and hugs it despite her uncertainty.

"It's my fault, Donna. If anyone should be sorry, it's me." She looks at Donna then leans her head forward to rest it against Donna's brow. The redhead could carry a mountain on her shoulders if need demanded it but the weight of her failure still makes her shoulders sag.

"Thank you."

Donna Troy has posed:
    Donna leans her head forwards too, foreheads touching. "Let me tell you something you probably never thought about, Cait. Back... before. In the early days. I mean before you knew about Themyscira and all this stuff. When the whole warrior princess thing was just Xena jokes. I came to America, and I met you, and I met the Titans, and you became family. There was so much I couldn't tell you. You knew I was foreign, that I was different. And that America was foreign to me. Oh we've talked about it since, things like how seeing real, actual, living and breathing /men/ was a novel experience. How much of a shock to me it was seeing people who were /old/, or /unfit/ for the first time. I've never mentioned before, but it was the first time I'd ever met anyone who wasn't immortal, either."

    Their faces are too close, but there's a sniffle, and Cait knows Donna well enough to know without seeing that her eyes will be wet right now. "Ever since I've known you... ever since I started thinking of you as family, that has hung over me, Cait. That you... all of you... I'd lose you. I don't know how long you're going to live, but if your lifespan turns out to be typically human, then by the time I'm Diana's age I'll have... I... Cait, there is no way... I /can't/ let you go. Understand? It's not going to happen. If you fall I will go after you, all the way to the bottom. If I had to knock you out and carry you up this entire staircase I will, and don't think you could stop me. Even if you lost it, don't think you could stop me. Nobody could. Understand? Nobody. Remember what I said in the Seven Worlds? I will conquer Tartarus to get you out of here if I have to."

    Dangerous words to utter, in this place. A tear rolls down Donna's cheek and lands silently in the dust on the stairs, forming a little ball of mud that will slowly dry and harden, to become one more tiny agglomerate pebble in the uncountable fragments of stone that cover the vast stairway through eternity. The darkness is silent, and Hades does not answer.

    Donna untangles her fingers from Caitlins and wraps her arms around Caitlin's shoulders in a fierce hug, holding her in silence.

    "I dreamed for so long of the day you'd become an Amazon," Donna says, finally breaking the quiet. "From the day I met you, I knew in my heart you were an Amazon. That's why you puzzled me so much. Because you /were/ an Amazon, but you didn't know it. I'll never be able to tell you how happy it made me, Cait. When you became /Aikaterine/. You are a wonderful Amazon. Everything else is a lie." Donna pulls back, her hands still on Caitlin's shoulders, and looks her in the eyes, smiling her wide smile, though her eyes still glisten wetly in the torchlight. "These damn stairs. Come on Cait, the others will be wondering where we are. Let's go. Up, Cait. Always up."

Caitlin Fairchild has posed:
Caitlin smiles back at Donna-- still teary-eyed, still a little uncertain, but her resolve infinitely restored by Donna's peerless faith in her. She nods at Donna's encouragement and reflexively reaches up to brush a thumb under Donna's eyelid to carry a little teardrop away and let it join the dust of the underworld, with the others.

"That was a pretty good speech," she informs Donna. Her grin is feeble but real, a ray of happiness breaking through like sunshine piercing gloomy clouds overhead. "Richard's gonna be real cross that you're stealing his shtick though. You know how he is about speeches." The hand on Donna's cheek stays for just a moment longer and then drops, Caitlin exhaling a steadying breath and putting some posture back into the weary slump of her shoulders. She digs out a clean tissue from a belt pouch and offers it to Donna.

"Okay. I'm good. Let's get this done," she says, and claps her hands once. "Ten minutes, right? You can do anything for ten minutes," she observes with philosophic tone. "I've held my breath for that long." She's as much talking to herself as Donna-- but she steels her spine all the same and starts marching up the steps with a more familiar resolve, jaw set with a familiar expression of determination.

Nadia Pym-van Dyne has posed:
Nadia blinks through tears. Did Caitlin just...? The rope goes slack and an emotionally exhausted Waspette watches Caitlin plunge over the side of the stairs. Then Donna is barking orders at them ..before she is gone too. For a few moments, precious moments, Nadia is stunned. There is a brief fleeting thought that that is might the stairs' doing, but then she realizes she doesn't care and plunges over the edge, wings extending from her back as she flies after Caitlin and Donna, prismatic droplets of water catching the torchlight in her wake.

"DON'T YOU DARE CAST YOURSELF INTO HELL CAIT!!! NOT WHEN WE'VE COME THIS FAR!!!" Nadia shouts as she flies down looking around. Calculations of gravity and terminal velocity flash through her brain as she tries to figure out how far Cait could have possibly fallen. At least Donna can fly, but fly to where. She can't seem to find them below.

Panic begins to set in and she nearly flies up before remembering just in time how bad an idea that would be. Circling around to a lower point on the stairs however, knowing she'll have to climb this part again, she breathes a sigh of relief because there they are.

"Oh thank god, I thought I'd lost you!" She wraps her arms around Caitlin, still crying. "I am so done losing people." Donna will get a hug too, but she wasn't worried about Donna. It's Donna, of course she'd be fine.

"I guess we go Up?" She asks Donna sheepishly.