Owner	Pose
Donna Troy	The three Titans, accompanied by Jon, enter the main room of the tower through a Rabbit Hole straight from the Justice League Dark meeting. Donna gestures towards the huge sofa, and tells Jon "Take a seat. Masala chai, right? Oh and... " she hands him her tablet. "Take a look at Cait's full report while I'm making it."     She moves over to the kitchen area to start making the drinks, calling back "Terry? Anything for you?" as she sets the now-dozing Kaida down on the counter to rest.     "That went... pretty well, I think. All things considered." She turns her head to look at Jon. "This discussion... could have been shoutier. Some of the things you said suggest maybe shouting isn't needed. But I'll let you see the full report from Cait before we get into that. It only lasts a few minutes."
Terry O'Neil	"Hot cocoa," Terry says, settling down and making himself comfortable, crossing his leg at the ankle over his other knee. "That went... well. Long, but well. I want you to know that I exercised enormous restraint in not petting that cute floof and in not stealing Phoebe's cookies..." he pauses. "on second though, Donna, see if there are any cookies there, too?"
Jonathan Sims	Jon nods. "Yes, thank you." He takes the tablet and sits down. He snorts softly, amused, as the phone slides, but the amusement fades as he keeps watching. His brow furrows, and then unfurrows, and then slowly settles into a frown. His jaw slowly clenches, and every line of him is stiff. It doesn't take much to recognize the signs of a man deeply affected by what he's watching, not least because he was /there/.     "She doesn't mention that she threw a car at us," he says in a tight, clipped tone. "Could've killed us, if... if not for..." He stops, jaw clenching even tighter, if possible, knuckles white on the tablet.
Donna Troy	Donna sets the cocoa going, making a cup for herself as well as for Terry, and pours out the masala chai. The Titans stock the rather excellent South Cloud Chai from Tielka. She fishes a jar out from a cupboard, where it was hiding deep behind some heavy crockery, and empties out the cookies held within onto a plate, then puts the plate and the three drinks on a tray to bring over to the seating area.     "What with Cait being away from the tower we've been relying on store-bought cookies," she says. "But I put a few of her own to the side. Cait's an amazing cook, Jon. Do eat one before Terry and I finish them all off."     She takes a seat and grabs a cookie and her own cup of cocoa before tilting her head to Jon. "A whole car, not just the tire? Tell me, was this before or after she was hit with that... whatever that horrible ray was?" She's silent a moment, not long enough for an answer, but long enough to let it sink in.     "Seriously Jon, you guys hit her with weapons of unholy arcane power, and you think she's the bad guy because she threw a /car/ back at you? Bit of perspective here. Cait does not aim to kill. She tries to judge the combat, and use the force that is necessary. Her opening attack was, as she says... a sonic assault. Intended to disable. You shrugged it off. She stepped things up. If you want to persuade anyone, let alone... the /universe/, that you're the good guy and she's on the wrong side, -- well you can't complain that she's only using far less abominable weapons in response to your attack, rather than no weapons at all."
Terry O'Neil	"I wish I had gotten my amulet sooner..." Terry says, sipping his cocoa, and eats the cookies with great restraint, to make them last. "I can disable Caitlin. She is super strong and she can throw things. But..." He gestures, and creates the illusion of a tiny Caitlin perpetually falling between two Rabbit Holes, "Unless she can suddenly fly, she is totally defenseless against the Alice Special. It's a great and very amusing way of taking someone out of the fight. And if they're invulnerable, you can just let them build up momentum and then change the rabbit hole angle at the last moment and turn them into a cannonball against their own allies!" He pauses, and then clears his throat, realizing he got carried away. "Enthropy energy, Donna."
Jonathan Sims	"She threw the tire at me first. Just me. I'd be dead, if not for a shield Lady Death put on me--not for my sake, I think. For my daughter's." Jon looks right up at Donna, and says, "Maybe she's justified in that. She surely did think I was trying to kill her. But that car? We were down. /Cael/ and I were /down/. I had a punctured lung, I was coughing up blood, Cael was trying to defend me... and she threw the car at us. Maybe she /thought/ she wouldn't kill us? But I tell you now--I would be dead, if Michael hadn't stepped in and disintegrated that car. I don't think my shield could have stood up to it."     He sighs. "And that 'non-lethal sonic attack?' Cael /bled from the ears/. Lydia /fled/. I shrugged that off because I have sonic boom-filtering earbuds. That's all. Cael had a concussion, and if not for healing, concussions can be /permanent/. That's why I tried Void energy--because everyone /around/ me was going down."     He shakes his head. "Your friend is /misjudging/ the battlefield. I am no sturdier than a normal mortal, without my shields. Most of the people out there, fighting? Don't even have shields. She is /going/ to kill someone if she doesn't keep herself in check."     He looks at Terry. "She has wings now," he says bluntly. "She can fly."
Donna Troy	"You use weapons like this because you're desperate," Donna counters, sipping her cocoa. "How do you think Caitlin feels? She's trying to save the world, and she has been abandoned by her friends. How desperate do you think she is? She thinks, and I'm not saying she's right, but she /thinks/... that you are trying to stop the world being saved. She sees you fighting alongside /demons/, Jon."     She sits back in the sofa, folding one leg beneath her, an oddly comfortable sort of way of sitting, incongruous to the discussion. "I'll tell you what the primary duty of my people is, Jon. Terry knows this, he has seen it. Caitlin knows this too -- she was accepted, by Athena personally, the great-granddaughter of Gaia, into the Amazon fold. On Themyscira, there is a gateway that leads to Tartarus. To one of worst of the hells. The monstrosities that live in Tartarus are... unimaginable. If they got out, they could destroy the world."     "The sacred duty of the Amazons is to stop that happening. To guard that gate with our lives, and keep the world safe from an invasion from hell." She gestures towards the tablet. "I'm on Gaia's side, Jon. You say you are too. I'm /struggling/ with seeing you fighting alongside a Hell Lord, bringing the forces of her own corner of Hell to this world. Really struggling. She says it right there. You did exactly what Michael told her you would do, when Michael told her that /you/ are the bad guys."
Terry O'Neil	"Wings? No problem. I have a boyfriend with wings, you know, I know how to safely bind wings..." he trails off, and then clears his throat. "I probably shouldn't have shared that. But. Caitlin's wings won't be an issue." He nibbles on the cookie, "She may be misdjuding the field because her own judgement has become so completely impaired. When I was in the presence of Thing One, I could /see/ all of that tacky golden holy light and radiance and /earnestness/ and sincerity and the facial expression. It was like watching the love child of Captain America and a Margaret Keane painting. I didn't go for it, but let's face it... as devout a Catholic as she is, Caitlin was pre-disposed to swoon. She's Saint Teresa in ecstasy because it justifies everything she's ever believed, ever /hoped/ for herself, because she has always considered herself a broken thing." A sip from his cocoa, "And Michael is predating on that. He may not /think/ he is. He may think he is being merciful and pious and caring in giving her all of this, but he is seizing upon an internal lack and filling it up with himself. She has drank his kool-aid and she is totally whacked out in her sense of proportion and everything else. Caitlin in her right mind would /never/ have done that. She's in a cult, and the worst part is that most cults say they talk to angels but can't produce them... this cult can... so it's going to take a /lot/ for her to get deprogrammed. And Michael is playing dirty pool."
Jonathan Sims	"I'm not your bloody people, Donna!" Jon shouts. "I'm not an Amazon! I don't have /training/ for /any/ of this! I fucked up, I /know/ that. Forty-eight people /died/ that day! /Forty-eight/! It was almost fifty, including me and my bloody girlfriend, so I don't need your sanctimonious bullshit about 'how Amazons do things' right now!"     He stabs a finger at the tablet. "All I see there? Is a litany of my mistakes. Every tactical decision I should have made, every piece of information I should have had, and didn't, because I wanted /so badly/ to not believe this was a battle. So, yes, I got in the middle of it, and the bloody Archivist made a /stupid/ decision because I get cocky and foolish when I've got that outfit on. I... you don't /understand/. I was /made/ to... to /destroy things/. I got that power from /Ammit/. From the Eater of Bloody Hearts. Please, /please/ stop lecturing me about /Caitlin/ and... and try to understand? Because... because nobody is! Nobody... knows what this is, what it's like. To... to..."     He puts the tablet down and stands, starts pacing. "My gods tell me to kill things. Ammit... Ammit wanted me to... to /kill/ her. Do you understand... what that is? To know your gods... /destroy/ hearts? Destroy /souls/, if they're judged unworthy? I can't... I can't fathom... everything the Archivist has judged over millenia... /gone/."     He pulls off his glasses, pinches at the bridge of his nose. "I'm not... I'm not /blaming/ Caitlin, okay? But I can't fight her. Gods, if I fight her, she's going to kill me. I'm not /good enough/ to fight her without the Void energy, and I am... /never/ doing that again." He laughs shakily. "Never again. I... I don't /care/ what Ammit wants. I'm /done/ destroying things. The look on her face, the... /terror/ as I was unmaking her... I am /never/ going to forget that, so long as I live."
Donna Troy	"You shouldn't," Donna says, a little coldly. "You should never forget it." She stops herself before she goes any further, turning to stare out of the window at the lights of Metropolis below, giving herself a few moments to calm down before turning back.     "Gaia chose you," she says eventually. "And that means Gaia thinks you are good enough. If you cannot fight her and win, then that suggests to me that /fighting/ her isn't what Gaia chose you for. I'm... I'm not blaming you for making mistakes, Jon. I'm trying you make sure you see those mistakes, so you don't make them again." Donna pinches her nose and puts her cocoa down, folding her hands in her lap. "I'm sorry, Jon. If I'm being hard on you. You said a lot of the right things in that meeting, I acknowledge that. The only advise I can give you is that... gods are not always right. Caitlin may think so, for /her/ god, but ours? Yours and mine? They are wise beyond our understanding, but they are flawed beings for all of that. We should listen to them, but we should also think for ourselves."     She turns towards Terry, looking at him oddly for a moment, before turning back. "None of us are trained for this, Jon. Terry never got any training to be the Cheshire Cat, it just happened. He had to step up and be a Titan, and he was /terrified/ that he'd screw it up, that he wouldn't be good enough. He still is. I have never been able to get through to him just how well he has done as a Titan, just how much good he has done, because the voice in his head that makes him scared of failure is a louder voice than mine."     "I've trained to be an Amazon almost my whole life, and yet... that's thousands of years less than my sisters. I /always/ feel like I don't know what to do, that I haven't trained enough. I understand how you feel, I really do. But in the end... we have to do these things anyway. We have to find a way, and we have to find the right way. Because the price of following the wrong path is too high."
Jonathan Sims	"The Archivist gets training," Jon says quietly. "My cousin was supposed to be the Archivist. She got twenty years of training--mental shields, magic, knowledge, combat training. When it came to me, instead? I woke up one day a few months ago screaming because I could hear the thoughts of the neighbors." He draws in a shuddering breath. "I went mad for weeks. I thought my husband died. My cousin tried to kill me. The only friend I had left in the world turned out to be a demon. And I had gods demanding I kill people, demanding I fight with no training, risk my life over and over and over."     He looks up. "Do you know the retention rate, for Archivists? Something like half die within the first six months, driven to /experience/. Even with training, even with a /lifetime/ of it sometimes, even /with/ their ancestors guiding them. Because of this." He pulls up his left sleeve, shows off a bracer. "Because my gods don't /care/ about /me/. They care about the /Archivist/. And the Archivist is a cocky fool who thinks they can do anything. The Archivist remembers working for the Pharoahs. The Archivist uses Nullspace energy every damn day to judge souls, and to hell with the consequences. So, you use the bracer and get the power, and do foolish things. If you can handle it? You survive, and live well into your 80s or 90s, spry the whole time. If you can't? Or if you refuse to use the bracer? You die. Simple as that."     He picks up the lanyard on his chest, shakes it. "This is the main reason I'm alive. My SHIELD training. Without that, I'd be dead a dozen times over. Neith chose me for this without telling my grandmother. Thoth just gives me cryptic looks when I try to ask questions. Ammit wants me to destroy. Only Ma'at has given me any /real/ advice. So, yes, I /know/ I need to think for myself. I /know/ I have to do these things anyway. I know /all/ of that. And I am /trying/ to find the way. I know damn well fighting isn't the answer... does anyone ever /listen/ to me? If Gaea chose me, then something /I/ can do is the key to this, and I can't bloody well /fight/."
Donna Troy	"Then we're on the same page, aren't we?" Donna says rather calmly, picking up her cocoa again. "Gaia is life, not death. I find it very hard to believe that those five words aren't, in a very abstract way, the key to all of this." She blows on her drink, takes a sip, and looks up again.     "Our gods, gods like yours and mine, they're people. A different kind of people to us, but they're still people. They have rivalries. They have different philosophies. We should not expect them to be right all the time. And that's... hard. Because it means we cannot look to our gods for answers, we have to look to ourselves. We have to listen to what they tell us, and trust our hearts to guide us, when we decide which of our gods' words we should listen to, and which we should ignore. When Aphrodite told the Amazons that formula that Terry quoted earlier, that thing about do not kill those you can merely injure, do not injure those you can merely subdue? I accept that because... because my heart tells me it is wise."     "On the other hand? Fuck Ares. And fuck Ammit too. Ammit is not love, Ammit is a weapon used to terrorize those who do not know how to be good into being good despite themselves. That doesn't make for a good guide and teacher for someone who already wants to be good. And despite everything Caitlin thinks about you, I believe that's you, Jonathan Sims."
Jonathan Sims	Jon sits down while Donna's talking, and reaches out for the plate of cookies. Picks one up, and looks at it, frowning for a long moment, as he listens.     "I'm so /scared/ for her," he says softly. "She believes she's doing the right thing, I know she does--and that's what terrifies me. That /surety/ of purpose. I can't fight her, Donna. I will not try to kill her, and I'm not good enough to fight her. I don't know what to do, if she comes at me again."     Suddenly his face crumples, and he squeezes his eyes shut, tears coming out. "I'm sorry I... I'm /sorry/. I wasn't trying to kill her. I wasn't. I just..." He shakes his head. "It doesn't matter. It won't happen again. I'm sorry I hurt your friend. I want... I want... I want this to be /different/. I want to... to be here for some completely other reason, and get to know her, and not..."     He opens his eyes, staring at the cookie. "She tried to get us to surrender. I should be eating cookies she /just/ baked. I... gods, I don't know what to do. Why did Michael do this? Why /her/? It's not /right/."
Donna Troy	Donna puts her cocoa down, and this time it's her turn to stand, but not to pace, rather to walk over to where Jon sits, and crouch down in front of him, resting a hand on his arm with a gentle smile. "If she comes at you again, maybe... maybe next time, tell her that you are sorry you hurt her, and that you don't want to do it again. Tell her you tried one of her cookies, and that you wish that one day you could sit down with her and try one freshly baked, in friendship."     She gives a light squeeze with her hand, then pulls it away, but remains crouched there in front of him.     "Perhaps this is something everyone has to face at some time in their lives, at the time of their biggest trial. The long dark night of the soul. That's what the Catholics call it. The journey through darkness to an unknowable end. However hard it is, the only thing we can do is to face the darkness down, and to walk through it. To judge ourselves before anyone else judges us, and be as certain as we can that we tread the right path, to take us through the darkness. Listen to your heart, and have faith -- not in gods or angels, but in yourself. In the truth of your heart, because that's the only guide you can really trust.
Jonathan Sims	Jon sniffles and smirks. "Trust me, I... I know /all about/ the dark night of the soul. I grew up Anglican--the joke is that it's Catholicism lite. I left the fold, obviously, but I know what it is Caitlin believes in. What she's been promised."     He sighs softly. "Ma'at told me much the same. Not in so many words, but... the problem is that I don't know my own heart very well. I fell in love and I didn't even notice. I wonder, lately... did I burn Michael's wing because I was angry at what he did to her? Was it /truly/ just... 'what I had to do' or was it vengeance? How can I /possibly/ trust myself when I barely seem to /know/ myself?"     He swallows, and fiddles with the bracer on his wrist for a moment. Then he goes ahead and takes a bite of the cookie. Chews and swallows. "It's good," he says softly. "I should get the recipe, when... when this is over."     He's clinging to that like a lifeline. Somehow, they're both going to survive this, and then... what, be friends? Yes. Yes, they are /going/ to be friends.
Donna Troy	Donna lets her smile grow a little when his eyes are open to see, and gets up to retreat back to her seat. "I'm not sure you can ever really know yourself. But at some points in your life, you just have to trust yourself. And the fact that you question yourself... that gives you more reason to trust. If you did not question yourself, if you were not constantly questioning your motives, and whether they were right -- that's when you would know not to trust yourself."     She takes a cookie from the plate, and takes a bite of her own, giving Jon a grin. "It's more than the recipe. There's a skill in how you do it. I've tried, even when I use Cait's recipe, they're not nearly as good as these. And these? They're not fresh. One day, Jon. One day you'll know the true pleasure of Caitlin's amazing baking, fresh from the oven. Hold on to that thought in the darkness, okay?"     "Leadership is hard, and you have had it thrown on you. You're trying to lead people who barely know you, and have little reason to trust your leadership. One thing you could use is a win. That would help people have..."     Donna is interrupted by a loud, insistent pinging. It's clearly some kind of priority alert. She blinks, pulls out her comm, looks at it a moment, then looks up at Jon and presses a button. He hears Caitlin's voice come out over the speakers. <<Caitlin to MARVIN. Priority task, all combat-relevant data about a ... demon. Er, a guy, who can turn into a demon. With whips and a flaming skull and a leather jacket.>>     Donna leaps to her feet, yelling "VORP! RABBIT HOLE, NOW!"