Zompania Draft: Coming Home

[frost_jewel]

Who: Anyone drafted to Zompania, or recruited as reinforcements, or left behind in the village. SO. Everybody!
What: The draftees and reinforcements return to the village.
When: May 26, early early in the morning
Where: Back in Luceti
Summary: Most draftees and reinforcements return to Luceti in the very early hours; now, instead of a medevac site for the draft, the village is a welcome (?) refuge from the nightmare of Zompania for its own. There's a high likelihood it still looks a lot like it has in the past few days; those in the fight didn't even get a chance to shower before returning.

(This is the place for all your post-draft trauma and reunions and every other thing. Have fun! And don't forget to entry-tag your character.)

Comments

[Home]

[whiskytraitorfirefight]

[Flame Building is quiet, partially the time, mostly because a good portion of the residents were sent on the draft. Ginia takes the elevator and leans against the wall as the elevator - god, that green is hideous - rumbles upward. Too quiet, too normal. No Third Party lurking around the corner, no floors smeared with blood, the smell of rotting food or burning bodies in the air.

Ginia barely has a chance to test the door before it flies from her hand. She stares blankly at the open door then looks up at Evan. Laika is on her soon, whining and barking, tail swishing as she paws at her chest and licks her face.

Dogs are easier than people. Ginia holds Laika and falls to her knees, burying her face into her dog's head. Just give her a moment, she hasn't had many the last few days.]

[lostinmyway]

[This time, she kneels down and shakes his shoulder a bit.]

Why don't you go sleep in your bed? I think it would be a little more comfortable.

[lostinmyway]

[Grune hasn't been on very many drafts, but she's been in enough. And before, on the Legacy, there was a war. She knows what would had to have happened to make Ginia's notebook look like that. And that means Ginia wouldn't have had a nice time on the draft at all.

She looks up.]

Would you like a hug?

[lostinmyway]

Well...all right.

[She stops healing him, but then she hesitates for a different reason.]

I don't think you smell terrible. [But he doesn't smell very good, either.]

[lostinmyway]

[Her own smile is much fuller.]

Hello. Welcome home. Would you like some cake?

[whiskytraitorfirefight]

[Ginia pauses, unsure how to answer. While one part of her shies away from contact and warmth, another part of her wants to remember what warmth is.

Practicality and a hint of fear win out.]

I don't want to ruin your clothes.

[amonglions]

[He comes when he's called like a good dog and shrugs Gai's arm around his shoulder opposite Elizabeth's. The kid weighs a lot, deceptively so, and Booker shifts a few times to get a better hand hold.]

Are we gonna be making a habit of this?

[He wished he was joking.]

[voidseeing]

You think I enjoy this?

[It's snapped with a bit more venom than he really means, but he's rather touchy about his weakness around other people, especially Booker. He hates the fact that he is a dead weight at the moment, unable to even stand on his own without assistance. Still, he doesn't hate it enough to be willing to take the option of sitting helplessly on the ground instead, so while he grumbles, he allows Booker to adjust him.]

[tearmeanewone]

Booker, Gai-- [Elizabeth can shoulder half of Gai's weight, thankfully, and she settles on the other side of Gai.]

If either of you have any love for me right now, you will focus on getting all three of us home without fighting, or so help me God I will make both of you listen to me cry all the way back.

[That threat wouldn't be hard to make good on. She takes a few deep breaths and starts them walking.]

[distressedude]

[He stands for more than a few moments just staring back at her, almost as though he was having trouble recognizing her. In reality, he was just trying to convince himself that she was real. And even when he finally does, he feels at a loss for what to say. What can he say?]

[First and foremost, he wants to apologize. Apologize for knocking over the chair. Apologize for getting the kitchen floor covered in mud and who knows what else. Apologize for not being able to protect Tear and Asch, so they might come home as well. Apologize for not being able to prevent the deaths of all those people in the city whom Nephry knows nothing about.]

[He wants to apologize. But the words just don't come out.]

[So instead, all he can manage is to nod, before turning to set the chair back up again. But as soon as he reaches down to do so, he catches sight of his own blood-stained hands again, and things better of it.]

[When he finally speaks again, his voice is soft and weak.]

...I should... go wash up.

[pendantry]

[Raven is lucky she makes it as far as something recognizable in the village. The limp she sported while boarding the ship resolved into a steady drag instead, one she doesn't have the energy to keep up. Everything hurts, she imagines her hair hurts even though it can't. She knows better than to try to walk all the way home; a memory fragment finds her, the couch in the smithy, a warm-feeling afternoon when she couldn't talk but could find comfort in something.

Half of her face twitches upward in a distant smile, the other half being too bruised and swollen to comply. That was nice, then. It was...good, and maybe it can still be good again.

Despite her determination, Raven only makes it as far as the nearest wooden bench; she sits on it and then lies down on it and it is the fear of losing-consciousness-and-dying that keeps her focused, forcing herself awake through the budding realization that everything might be on fire. She might be, she feels so white-hot and it's hard to keep her eyes open...

Her next solid memory is a brief time awake, in the clinic. That makes up several isolated memories, actually, with long stretches of nightmare-strewn nothing in between.]

[[ooc: Bit of a catch-all for the return day and three or four days after! Raven needs some help getting to the clinic and then she totally needs visitors.]]

[silversnowfall]

[She barely registers the brokenness in her sudden rush across the kitchen. In truth, she meant to wait until he was a little cleaner, but she chides herself for such a selfish thought in the same moment she puts her arms around him to pull him closer. Ion matters more than a change of clothes ever could.

It's out of step for her not to think about his space, whether he wants it, if he might push her away within seconds out of fear or disgust or some other reaction. Maybe she needs to know he's home as much as he does.

A distant part of her notes that it's harder to do this now that he's taller than she is.]

[yourfononsarewhack]

[All valid reasons. His uniform may be bloody now, but it will look good as new the next day, to prompt a new round of mystery about the colonel's uniform: does he have a dozen identical uniforms stashed somewhere, or does he know some secret drycleaning arte? The world may never know.

But now's not the time for lightness. Now, Jade looks on seriously towards her.]

No, all of my wounds have already been seen to by healers and other medical personnel. [He pauses for a moment before going on.] That aside, there's more important news to relate. [He doesn't look particularly happy about it, either.]

[silversnowfall]

[The soldiers who came to Luceti for treatment hadn't said much about the situation in Zompania, not within Nephry's hearing. Jade's sober expression and tone are downright frightening.]

What news? What happened?

[She already imagines the worst, but refuses to give it the dignity of belief until he says something.]

[yourfononsarewhack]

[Jade did what he could to quietly help Ion back to House One. Of course, he might have left the task to one of the others because of the dried blood still caking his uniform.

He realized that sleep would not be an option, especially for Ion. So shortly after they've returned home, and he's changed into his robes, he quietly brews some tea in the kitchen.]

[distressedude]

[Ion doesn't pull away from the hug. Much like when he first saw Nephry in the doorway, it takes a few moments for his brain to catch up and let him comprehend what's actually happening. And though he doesn't return the gesture, still all too aware of how much blood is staining his arms, he can't resist leaning into it, resting his head on Nephry's shoulder.]

[He spent so much time on the draft just trying to hold back his emotions, to prevent them from getting the better of him. And now that he was back, he felt as though he couldn't remember how to express them anymore.]

[Like right now, he was certain that he wanted nothing more than to cry. But the tears just wouldn't come out, even as his shoulders trembled in Nephry's arms.]

[distressedude]

[Ion will be just getting out of the shower himself while Jade is in the kitchen, keeping a hand against the wall to steady himself as he walks. Even though he knows he should just go to bed and try to sleep, a part of him feels as though he can't -- perhaps knowing what sorts of things will haunt his dreams the moment he closes his eyes.]

[He finds a spot in the living room and sits down, eyes staring off at nothing in particular. He's not cold, but still can't stop shivering -- and every so often he jerks his gaze in given direction, as though expecting something to be there when there isn't anything.]

[He'd done well to hold together during the draft. But now that he was back, he didn't really have much left to keep that composure anymore.]

[And no doubt if Jade enters the room, Ion will jerk his head towards him with a look of fear, relaxing only when he's sure he isn't a cultist looking for blood.]

[yourfononsarewhack]

It's a rather long story, with a number of complications. I know that this won't be easy for you to hear. [He heaves a weary sigh.] We came closer to an absolute death than ever before, and it was only through all of our combined efforts that we were saved from such a fate. However... we still sustained a number of losses.

[He looks her in the eyes grimly. There's even a vague sadness in his eyes. There's no need to drag out the suspense- that could make the shot first.]

Nephry... Tear and Asch have both been killed on the battlefield.

[Home]

[onearmedexmerc]

[Evan almost wants to wince at the blank look he gets from Ginia, but he knows combat fatigue when he sees it and doesn't take it personally at all.

Also his heart is beating double time and another face is being superimposed on her own with the blood thundering through his head blocking his ears feeling like all the vessels are going to explode his breathe stuttering strangely under the rush of blood and okay, now is not the time for him to start having panic attacks. Like at all.

Evan closes his eyes and breathes out sharply, holding his breath until it starts to hurt before breathing in long and slow.

Letting Ginia have her moment with Laika Evan hums the opening to "The Phantom of the Opera" alerting her to his presence before he bends and gently takes her bag, moving away from the door to set it on the nearby table.]

[lordhotman]

[Zuko stares at his uncle's choice for a moment. He looks about to say something but thinks better of it. Instead he smiles faintly.]

It suits you.

[searches_forhim]

"Of course." Jane gestured to an area where cots had been set up for the wounded and chairs for those visiting them. She let Rogue lead, picking a chair next to the one she eventually sat in.

"Steve told me about Thor, but that's all I've heard. I guess... Loki too?" Judging by the way Thor had talked about Loki's feelings for Rogue, Jane could surmise that if he were alive, he would be at her side. Jane put a hand on her shoulder, a little awkward but wanting to try and show her that she understood.

"They'll come back, right? He told me that happens here, that people don't stay dead." It was the small bit of hope that was keeping Jane from collapsing into a heap of sobs.

[searches_forhim]

It sounded horrific. She didn't sob, but inside her heart did. Tears fell, and she reached a hand out to touch Mjolnir's leather strap. She knew she couldn't carry the hammer, but at least making contact with it made her feel as if she were touching him.

"So he died all alone?" She felt that she should have been there with him. Nobody should have to face their last breath without someone to hold their hand. But sacrificing himself to save another, that sounded exactly like her Thor. She knew that his golden heart would never allow him to preserve his own life at the risk of someone else.

"Did Billy at least survive? Please tell me that Thor didn't die for nothing." She finally ripped her gaze from the hammer and back up to Steve's face.

[Home]

[whiskytraitorfirefight]

[Ginia allows her bag to be removed, feeling the ever-present weight slip off her back and shoulders. She's home. She can put her bag down and take off her armor and rest and relax (unlikely).

It takes a few more minutes, but Ginia finds her feet and stands. She follows Evan's humming into the apartment, nudging the door close behind her. Her eyes fall around the apartment - her apartment, their apartment - and tries not to think about similar apartments with blood-splattered walls and broken furniture.

(The same could happen to them. Ginia knew that before, but now it was even more cemented in her mind. The Third Party could do the same to them and they could not allow that to happen.)

But everything is intact, clean, lived in and comfortable. It's her place, far from the Third Party, far from the battlefield, a little apartment among other apartments in a village in the forest.

Ginia inhales and exhales slowly. She swallows the lump forming in her throat. Her hands reach behind her neck, fumbling with the small chain before finally pulling it off with a hard tug. Her eyes, blank, haunted, look over at Evan and she walks forward, offering two metal tags back to him.]

[padme_amidala]

"I'm…" she began to answer when she spotted the cakes. What was this woman doing?

"I don't think they will have the stomach for cakes." she had been in enough battles to know they had a nasty habit of shaking everything and everyone to their core.

[lostinmyway]

Her head tilted to one side. "Don't you?"

Everyone had always liked her cakes before. Weren't they very hungry today?