Laura | X-23-23 (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
shoplifter) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
riverviewlogs2018-04-01 09:34 pm
shoplifter) wrote in riverviewlogs2018-04-01 09:34 pm
I almost drowned (and all I got was this stupid shirt) Part Open, Part Closed!
who: Laura, Stephen, Loki, and any visitors to Option B.
what: The flooding from here.
when: End of March
where: The rushin' waters outside the city, and also the hospital.
warnings: A near-drowning of a child. Maybe flashbacks or heavier material about the hospital, if it reaches that kind of point.
End of March — The Floods.
OPTION A. | Closed to Stephen and Loki
[The flooding's gotten much worse. And with the flooding comes terrible creatures outside the wall, ones she hasn't had the pleasure of running into — giant crocodiles, things with curling, wriggling tentacles, and all manner of fish and bug and frog. She has elected to at the very least kill them before they can get into the city somehow, or scare them away if it's possible. The waters are getting worse, the creatures are more plentiful, and... maybe she is getting stuck in the crossfire more than she'd like to admit.
She leaps from tree to tree as best she can, and scales along the sides of quivering buildings.
Maybe she can just hang out in the — oh, it's raining. This is just great.
How can this get any worse?]
OPTION B. | Hospital | Open to All
[Laura nearly drowns, basically. It's a good thing Stephen and Loki had been around to fish her out. And for the next day or two, Laura lays in a hospital bed looking surprisingly okay for someone who doesn't want to wake up yet; not a scratch on her, because that's just how she works. Maybe it was the rock her head hit during her rather dramatic fall into the pulsing waters below.
But eventually, she does wake up. And it, unlike the fall, is not dramatic at all.
She opens her eyes and stares at the ceiling, knowing exactly where she is. For some reason, though... the fear and panic is abated. Stephen and Beverly work here. The hospital is not bad — it's... not. And though her arms get pimpled at the memory of the sterile world she'd come from, she does not jump up or move to flee. Instead, she says, to the ceiling and whoever may be close by:]
... I am hungry.
[Nailed it.
She can be found hanging out in her room, nurses anxiously peering in (they haven't forgot her last rage, alright?). She's going to try her best to be good for any doctors or nurses this time. And hell, despite being nearly eaten by monsters and almost drowning, she looks 100% healthy.
Also, she may be half-way climbing out a window at some point, when you visit.
........... Oops?]
what: The flooding from here.
when: End of March
where: The rushin' waters outside the city, and also the hospital.
warnings: A near-drowning of a child. Maybe flashbacks or heavier material about the hospital, if it reaches that kind of point.
End of March — The Floods.
OPTION A. | Closed to Stephen and Loki
[The flooding's gotten much worse. And with the flooding comes terrible creatures outside the wall, ones she hasn't had the pleasure of running into — giant crocodiles, things with curling, wriggling tentacles, and all manner of fish and bug and frog. She has elected to at the very least kill them before they can get into the city somehow, or scare them away if it's possible. The waters are getting worse, the creatures are more plentiful, and... maybe she is getting stuck in the crossfire more than she'd like to admit.
She leaps from tree to tree as best she can, and scales along the sides of quivering buildings.
Maybe she can just hang out in the — oh, it's raining. This is just great.
How can this get any worse?]
OPTION B. | Hospital | Open to All
[Laura nearly drowns, basically. It's a good thing Stephen and Loki had been around to fish her out. And for the next day or two, Laura lays in a hospital bed looking surprisingly okay for someone who doesn't want to wake up yet; not a scratch on her, because that's just how she works. Maybe it was the rock her head hit during her rather dramatic fall into the pulsing waters below.
But eventually, she does wake up. And it, unlike the fall, is not dramatic at all.
She opens her eyes and stares at the ceiling, knowing exactly where she is. For some reason, though... the fear and panic is abated. Stephen and Beverly work here. The hospital is not bad — it's... not. And though her arms get pimpled at the memory of the sterile world she'd come from, she does not jump up or move to flee. Instead, she says, to the ceiling and whoever may be close by:]
... I am hungry.
[Nailed it.
She can be found hanging out in her room, nurses anxiously peering in (they haven't forgot her last rage, alright?). She's going to try her best to be good for any doctors or nurses this time. And hell, despite being nearly eaten by monsters and almost drowning, she looks 100% healthy.
Also, she may be half-way climbing out a window at some point, when you visit.
........... Oops?]
no subject
Are you scared it will hurt you? Or the people who go through it?
no subject
[ Those are, of course, the logical and obvious reasons to be afraid of a power like his. It'd probably be easier, in a way, if his reservations were for simple mechanical reasons like that. Cisco sighs, the light in his hand dimming as he grows distracted, trying to think whether he should tell her the truth, and if he does, how to phrase it. ]
I'm... scared that if I have too much power, it's gonna go to my head, and make me go bad. People... who have too much power, sometimes it messes with them, and makes them think they're better than other people, and then they start to think other people are disposable, or that it's okay to hurt them. I don't wanna think like that. Not ever.
[ It's more complicated than that, of course. There are particular reasons why he is afraid this particular kind of power will make him evil. Eobard, evilest of evil douchebags, saying Cisco's powers were a gift from him. The glimpse he'd gotten of Reverb, his doppelganger, who seemed to have no qualms about hurting people, even killing them. But he really doesn't want to get into any of that, so he just laughs softly, admits: ]
I guess that sounds kinda silly when I say it out loud, but...
[ He shrugs. ]
no subject
I don't think someone like you could ever become evil.
[And she seems to have more to say — after a moment, it almost feels she's given up expanding on it, but she pushes forward anyway, because it seems important.]
We watched many videos on how to kill people in secret; babies were the easiest lesson, because they were so small and already had so many weak spots, you could do it and make it look like an accident. But I — [She swallows hard, looking aside and fidgeting with the Rubix Cube.] I thought they were cute... I did not want to hurt them.
A lot of us didn't want to.
[She's not very good at this, she knows. There are people way better at peptalks.
But... She tries anyway.]
I think... it is harder to make someone evil when their heart is good.
Yours is very good.
no subject
But before he can get too lost in these thoughts, she's speaking again, struggling with the words a bit. Cisco listens, expression going from quietly curious to horrified. He knows that Laura is telling the truth. Even if she were the type to lie, it's written all over her body language, in her tone of voice.
And maybe it's just a combination of the setting, and the vulnerability from using his powers, and how small Laura looks in her hospital bed, but Cisco can't help it. His eyes go hot and suddenly his vision is swimming, his throat closing up as he tries - unsuccessfully - to hold back tears. ]
I- I- I guess you're right.
[ Cisco swipes at his cheek impatiently as a tear spills down it, inhaling shakily. ]
I'm sorry they tried to make you- make you hurt people. None of you... should've had to go through that...
no subject
Lo siento. I was trying to make you feel better.
... But I am not very good at that.
[She's sure that's pretty obvious, at this point, that she is just awful at making anyone properly inspired; Transigen did not offer etiquette classes, which is just a shame, isn't it? But now she feels a little bad, to have upset him.]
no subject
[ Cisco wipes at his face with his sleeve, forcing a smile that's tremulous - not that Laura is likely to see it through her hair. He reaches out, cautiously, touching Laura's wrist, just for a moment, to get her attention. ]
Don't apologize. I'm- you're not bad at it, okay? I'm just- I just cry real easy, alright.
[ He tries to put as much brightness in his voice as he can, even though it's still tight with emotion. The last thing he wants to do is make Laura feel like there's something wrong with her. None of this was her fault, after all. ]
I mean, everything makes me cry. Dogs in the park playing fetch. Music I've heard a hundred times before. A soap commercial, once, which Eddie won't let me hear the end of. Alright?
[ Cisco is, of course, exaggerating, and there's a pretty big difference between welling up a little at a happy dachshund running on absurdly small legs and crying because people put children in a program where they were tortured and taught to kill. But if it's a white lie, it's only half of one, and he thinks, forgivable. ]
And you're right. I'm gonna remember that, next time I'm feeling scared to try.
no subject
... Alright.
[She smiles, just faintly, and carefully turns the panda-themed ring on her finger.]
Good.
[It's not so bad, being an easy crier.
She envies that a little, but it surely seems more human.]