[When the phone rings, she's equal parts surprised and not. She'd thought there would be a response, of course — hoped there would be, at least — but why she'd thought it would come by text, she isn't precisely sure. Maybe just to follow the same format she'd used. Maybe because deep down she doesn't really trust her own voice right now, and text would give her that extra layer of removal between the nerves fluttering in her stomach and the thoughts she's ultimately trying to express.
But the phone rings, and she wants to pick up and she doesn't. Her thumb hovers over the button for a good few seconds before she ends up making her decision, leaving a few bars of Uptown Girl playing merrily in the still night air in sharp contrast to her mood before being silenced when she picks up the call.]
Cloud...?
[She wants to laugh, almost — the kind that wobbles the whole way down, and doesn't really have any humor to it to begin with.]
I think I'm in trouble.
[When I'm in trouble, I'll know who to call, she'd teased him once. This probably wasn't what he'd meant, and yet here she is all the same.]
[Of course he would call. A text like that, in his mind, requires the immediacy of an actual conversation -- not the alternate, anxiety-ridden circumstance of staring at his phone screen, watching the little "..."s at the bottom with each text, waiting for a reply.
This way, he can also hear that shake in her tone. He knows that this is something serious, and he's already tossing off the sheets, rolling out of bed, his hair a mess but not caring one whit. He can find his shirt and pants in the dark without flicking on the light, all while keeping his phone pressed to his ear with his shoulder. Maybe it's presumptuous of him to assume that she needs him anywhere, but better safe than sorry.]
What do you mean, in trouble? What happened?
[His own voice is purposefully steady, even if he can't completely hide the concern.]
[What happened, he asks, and for a second she's silent simply because she hasn't got the slightest idea where to start. What happened? She came here, she got this app. Do you remember when I was in outer space and I was afraid, she almost says, but that's a non sequitur and it has nothing to do with his question anyway.
A breath of wind whispers past the mouthpiece of her phone, betraying the fact that she's outside somewhere, and when all her attempts at casting around for words eventually culminate in her not finding any anyway, she actually does laugh in a way that's almost-but-not-quite crying, and fills the silence with a sniffle while she tries to get her words together.]
I, um.
[So much for eloquence. She speaks four languages and she can't string a sentence together in any of them.]
I've been — I've been having memories. All month? I thought if I just...threw myself into something else, I could ignore them, but I couldn't. I just kept remembering...myself, the other me, doing things. Impossible things. But then I thought if I could just prove I wasn't — if I couldn't even do the things I was remembering, if I could just...prove...
[For a second, she loses her train of thought, and drifts. It's a few beats, then, before she's back again.]
I thought I could prove that isn't me, if I couldn't do the things she would do, but she, she always calls herself the greatest thief in the world and I think — I think I might be, too.
[He waits patiently for the answer. Waits while she strings her words together, fidgeting with the hem of his shirt as he manages to pull it over his head, while still keeping effort to keep his ear pressed to the phone.
She mentions memories, and already Cloud doesn't like where this is going -- talk of them still makes him feel anxious, making him believe that they herald impossible, unwanted changes with too many repeated experiences. They inspire doubt and insecurity and all things he sure as hell doesn't want to deal in his own life right now; even less so that she has to suffer through them as well. Carmen, who's so much stronger than he, sounding like she might crumble under the weight of the one she's trying to explain to him now.
She can probably hear the frown in his words, but also the defiance threaded through his concern. But he doesn't know what he feels defiant towards, if only in the fact that he wishes he could vanquish that doubt for her own sake.]
[Eight words shouldn't be enough to make her feel like her stomach is going to drop out. Funny, how there are so many things she's able to confront so fearlessly, and yet there are still a handful of seemingly insignificant things that leave her feeling vaguely like Sisyphus — and too often, expressing her feelings and vulnerabilities proves to be one of the latter.
Maybe the moment of silence in which she doesn't answer him is answer enough, in and of itself. But she can't just leave it at that, either, and when she sucks in a breath in preparation for a reply, it trembles.]
I think so.
[It's more than just that. But it's easier to blunt it with the illusion of uncertainty, and blur the edges just to make things a little less definite.]
I — moved it. It wasn't to keep it. I just wanted to prove I couldn't take it in the first place — that no one could take an entire building. Not even her — me.
[The silence speaks for itself. It's a confirmation, but Cloud wants more than that -- he doesn't care if she stole something, not really. He thinks, maybe, if he were in a similar situation, he might find himself wanting to test his own limits. To push that envelope of defining what is real versus what is ridiculous.
Cloud wants to know what it is that is supposedly so impossible, so infeasible, too -- and when she says that she took an entire building, it's his turn to pause. It's... not something easy to wrap his mind around. He immediately thinks of those tv magicians who steal things like the Statue of Liberty, or the Eiffel Tower. Is such a thing possible? But he'd not doubt her to tell him the truth.
And so his response is not something that demands explanation. For now, it is only:]
[It catches her off-guard, how surprised she is when he doesn't tell her she must be wrong, or that she's talking nonsense. It surprises her even further when there's no reluctance or scorn in his answer — not that she would've expected something like that out of Cloud specifically, but simply because it's what she would expect of anyone, confronted with someone confessing to a crime like the one she's evidently committed.
(The other her had been so proud of herself. I am the greatest thief in the world, she'd announced, reveling in the title like an accomplishment. Is that why she's so averse to letting herself see what she's done as anything but horrible now?)
But he doesn't condemn her. He doesn't even challenge her. He just — wants to know where she is. And she finds that really, what she wants is to be found.]
The forest. A little to the north of Apprassage.
[It's a long way to run, which is probably why she chose it that way in the first place.]
I always know what to do and this time I just...didn't. So I came here.
I'll be there as soon as I can. Don't go anywhere, okay?
[Don't run off without him, Carmen. He wants to be able to help her, even if it's nothing more than someone to be uncertain with, someone to decry Retrospec and its memories and abilities and the consequences of such. He's not sure what else he can provide, but he knows that... being alone in these revelations cannot at all be a good feeling. Something must be sinking at the pit of her stomach right now, he's sure of it.
And so, after a quick goodbye and some hurried time to get dressed properly, Cloud finds himself on his motorcycle, riding through Recolle. To Apprassage, then north, as far as he can go on his bike. At some point, he needs to park it along the path, it's no longer suited for wheels -- his own boots will have to do.
She'll see him approaching, eventually. His silhouette is hard to miss.]
[It's a hard wait, to say the least. It's cold out in the middle of the night, and dark, and hard to sit still from the tension and the nerves. And it occurs to her, briefly, that if she wanted to get out of the night she could very easily just...go inside the building she has out here with her, which doesn't belong in the forest in the slightest, but it's bad enough that she'd managed to take the thing to begin with, much less actually interact with it in any meaningful capacity.
So she doesn't. She just waits, and fidgets, and thumbs back through the text messages on her phone until she finds the last one she'd received from Japan, back when calling out and sending in still worked, and then when that just ends up leaving her mood even worse than before, she navigates away and queues up some music to listen to instead.
Maybe it's partly so that whenever Cloud does arrive, it'll be easier to echolocate to where she's waiting. Maybe it's partly because she always has had an odd sense of humor that way.
Suffice to say, the tune fills the air, and when she eventually spots him coming through the dark, she's quick to leave her phone behind and gravitate toward him — for a few steps, at least, until she stops short like she's second-guessing herself.
Also, that...sure is a history museum taking up a fair amount of space in the forest a little way behind her.]
[Once the loud thrum of the engine ceases, it's easy enough to hear the music. It gives him an initial idea of where to look, where to walk, following the iconic sound of the Beatles declaring their desperate need for assistance. He'd find it amusing, if not for his growing uncertainty regarding what's the matter -- if anything else, it's terribly fitting, which doesn't make him feel much better about the issue.
He makes out her form first, and it's what his eyes latch onto as he hurries his steps to meet her halfway.]
Carmen. I'm here.
[Those steps, however, slowly begin to lose momentum as he notes... a building behind her. One that he's certain doesn't belong in the forest, one that he recognizes; he rides past it on occasion.
His eyes widen slightly, looking up at it, though it looms in the distance.]
[She nods slightly, resisting the urge to wrap her arms around herself by pulling them behind her back instead.]
...I know. I can't explain it, either.
[She starts to look over her shoulder, then seems to think better of it and hesitates, looking down at the tops of her shoes before finally letting her gaze drift back up to Cloud.]
I shouldn't — no one should be able to do something like this.
[He shakes his head at her last statement, because while it's true, and nothing like this should be possible, here they are. So much to take into consideration since Retrospec came into their lives, so many things that shouldn't be real actually existing. While Cloud cannot quite understand how this might've happened, he is quick to accept that it is merely the truth of what she can do now.
Whatever that means for her in the long run remains to be seen.]
How... how did you manage it? Was it like...
[He thinks to his recent conversation with Noctis, and what he was told about his new abilities. What a word to use, but he knows no other-]
[That seems to throw her for a loop for a minute, and it's a minute she fills by looking down at the palms of her open hands, like she's expecting to find herself holding the answer there, somehow.]
...I don't know. What is "magic", really? Something that can't be explained through reason or science?
[It's not really a question; it's more just a rhetorical thought to fill the quiet in the air, while she tries to come to grips with something that she doesn't actually want to believe, but can't deny the evidence of when it's right in front of her.]
[But it's a thought that abruptly gets cut off by the audible sound of creaking and groaning filling the air, and by the time she's whipped around in the direction of the sound, the museum has already begun to shrink where it stands.]
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no subject
But the phone rings, and she wants to pick up and she doesn't. Her thumb hovers over the button for a good few seconds before she ends up making her decision, leaving a few bars of Uptown Girl playing merrily in the still night air in sharp contrast to her mood before being silenced when she picks up the call.]
Cloud...?
[She wants to laugh, almost — the kind that wobbles the whole way down, and doesn't really have any humor to it to begin with.]
I think I'm in trouble.
[When I'm in trouble, I'll know who to call, she'd teased him once. This probably wasn't what he'd meant, and yet here she is all the same.]
no subject
This way, he can also hear that shake in her tone. He knows that this is something serious, and he's already tossing off the sheets, rolling out of bed, his hair a mess but not caring one whit. He can find his shirt and pants in the dark without flicking on the light, all while keeping his phone pressed to his ear with his shoulder. Maybe it's presumptuous of him to assume that she needs him anywhere, but better safe than sorry.]
What do you mean, in trouble? What happened?
[His own voice is purposefully steady, even if he can't completely hide the concern.]
no subject
A breath of wind whispers past the mouthpiece of her phone, betraying the fact that she's outside somewhere, and when all her attempts at casting around for words eventually culminate in her not finding any anyway, she actually does laugh in a way that's almost-but-not-quite crying, and fills the silence with a sniffle while she tries to get her words together.]
I, um.
[So much for eloquence. She speaks four languages and she can't string a sentence together in any of them.]
I've been — I've been having memories. All month? I thought if I just...threw myself into something else, I could ignore them, but I couldn't. I just kept remembering...myself, the other me, doing things. Impossible things. But then I thought if I could just prove I wasn't — if I couldn't even do the things I was remembering, if I could just...prove...
[For a second, she loses her train of thought, and drifts. It's a few beats, then, before she's back again.]
I thought I could prove that isn't me, if I couldn't do the things she would do, but she, she always calls herself the greatest thief in the world and I think — I think I might be, too.
no subject
She mentions memories, and already Cloud doesn't like where this is going -- talk of them still makes him feel anxious, making him believe that they herald impossible, unwanted changes with too many repeated experiences. They inspire doubt and insecurity and all things he sure as hell doesn't want to deal in his own life right now; even less so that she has to suffer through them as well. Carmen, who's so much stronger than he, sounding like she might crumble under the weight of the one she's trying to explain to him now.
She can probably hear the frown in his words, but also the defiance threaded through his concern. But he doesn't know what he feels defiant towards, if only in the fact that he wishes he could vanquish that doubt for her own sake.]
What did you do? Did you steal something?
no subject
Maybe the moment of silence in which she doesn't answer him is answer enough, in and of itself. But she can't just leave it at that, either, and when she sucks in a breath in preparation for a reply, it trembles.]
I think so.
[It's more than just that. But it's easier to blunt it with the illusion of uncertainty, and blur the edges just to make things a little less definite.]
I — moved it. It wasn't to keep it. I just wanted to prove I couldn't take it in the first place — that no one could take an entire building. Not even her — me.
no subject
Cloud wants to know what it is that is supposedly so impossible, so infeasible, too -- and when she says that she took an entire building, it's his turn to pause. It's... not something easy to wrap his mind around. He immediately thinks of those tv magicians who steal things like the Statue of Liberty, or the Eiffel Tower. Is such a thing possible? But he'd not doubt her to tell him the truth.
And so his response is not something that demands explanation. For now, it is only:]
...Where are you right now?
no subject
(The other her had been so proud of herself. I am the greatest thief in the world, she'd announced, reveling in the title like an accomplishment. Is that why she's so averse to letting herself see what she's done as anything but horrible now?)
But he doesn't condemn her. He doesn't even challenge her. He just — wants to know where she is. And she finds that really, what she wants is to be found.]
The forest. A little to the north of Apprassage.
[It's a long way to run, which is probably why she chose it that way in the first place.]
I always know what to do and this time I just...didn't. So I came here.
no subject
[Don't run off without him, Carmen. He wants to be able to help her, even if it's nothing more than someone to be uncertain with, someone to decry Retrospec and its memories and abilities and the consequences of such. He's not sure what else he can provide, but he knows that... being alone in these revelations cannot at all be a good feeling. Something must be sinking at the pit of her stomach right now, he's sure of it.
And so, after a quick goodbye and some hurried time to get dressed properly, Cloud finds himself on his motorcycle, riding through Recolle. To Apprassage, then north, as far as he can go on his bike. At some point, he needs to park it along the path, it's no longer suited for wheels -- his own boots will have to do.
She'll see him approaching, eventually. His silhouette is hard to miss.]
no subject
So she doesn't. She just waits, and fidgets, and thumbs back through the text messages on her phone until she finds the last one she'd received from Japan, back when calling out and sending in still worked, and then when that just ends up leaving her mood even worse than before, she navigates away and queues up some music to listen to instead.
Maybe it's partly so that whenever Cloud does arrive, it'll be easier to echolocate to where she's waiting. Maybe it's partly because she always has had an odd sense of humor that way.
Suffice to say, the tune fills the air, and when she eventually spots him coming through the dark, she's quick to leave her phone behind and gravitate toward him — for a few steps, at least, until she stops short like she's second-guessing herself.
Also, that...sure is a history museum taking up a fair amount of space in the forest a little way behind her.]
Cloud...?
no subject
He makes out her form first, and it's what his eyes latch onto as he hurries his steps to meet her halfway.]
Carmen. I'm here.
[Those steps, however, slowly begin to lose momentum as he notes... a building behind her. One that he's certain doesn't belong in the forest, one that he recognizes; he rides past it on occasion.
His eyes widen slightly, looking up at it, though it looms in the distance.]
Is that...?
no subject
...I know. I can't explain it, either.
[She starts to look over her shoulder, then seems to think better of it and hesitates, looking down at the tops of her shoes before finally letting her gaze drift back up to Cloud.]
I shouldn't — no one should be able to do something like this.
[But there it is.]
no subject
Whatever that means for her in the long run remains to be seen.]
How... how did you manage it? Was it like...
[He thinks to his recent conversation with Noctis, and what he was told about his new abilities. What a word to use, but he knows no other-]
...magic?
1/2
...I don't know. What is "magic", really? Something that can't be explained through reason or science?
[It's not really a question; it's more just a rhetorical thought to fill the quiet in the air, while she tries to come to grips with something that she doesn't actually want to believe, but can't deny the evidence of when it's right in front of her.]
Maybe. I just...decided to, and then —
no subject
What?!