Still I'm spinning like a roundabout in motion

[allmydiredreams]

On the front of the Kashtta, there is a small heap of angles, knotted hair, and tattered clothes. It's up against the Kashtta's wall, one hand pressed flat against the building's wall and face totally obscured by tangles. For a good few minutes, it doesn't move, but then with a small gasp, the hand balls into a fist, hits the wall, then uncurls

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[allmydiredreams]

Babel smiles, returning the hug instantly. Even if she's not sure who she is, where she is, or what's going on -- and right now she's both sure and not sure -- it's habit. She is a point in the universe, certainly, but what point that is is still up for debate.

But she can never argue with hugs.

"Everything's okay in the end," she whispers. "If it's not okay, it's not the end." She can feel Iris's bodybeats so loudly, so strongly, that they threaten to overwhelm her again, and she taps them out on the other girl's shoulderblades without registering she's doing anything. "Bullshit, all of it, all a bunk and a bunker won't keep you safe in the end--nothing won't keep--"

There's a gasp as she cuts herself off. "It's close to midnight," she tells Iris, pulling out of the hug and holding the girl's shoulders. "She thinks, has never been so unsure, so sure, so..." And then she breaks off again, letting go of Iris and looking away, down at the sidewalk and out toward the cars, the people passing them on the sidewalk.

For a second she seems to completely forget what's going on -- and indeed, if she could, she would. And then she looks back at Iris, gives her a sad smile, and plonks her head against the Tower again. It's comforting, in a weird way, this tower that hurt her so much when she was living in it, but she's not sure she could manage to go inside just yet.

[sophicsulphur]

If it's not okay, it's not the end. Iris likes that one. And she likes the tapping, too. She doesn't know why, not consciously, but it feels like Babel's counting out a rhythm that's very close to home. Like she's matching her, in some way, even though that's not a heartbeat-tempo and she can't think what else it could be.

She wants to meditate to it, to let herself get lost in the tapping, let her selfhood slip away until the slight touches are all that's left. Right on her wings, too. Her would-be wings. It's easy to put her focus there, into those twin knots of energy and hope. They're already magically hyperaware, like the universe has two fishing lines run through those spots on hooks. And when it pulls, she dances. She follows.

--she needs not to think about this right now.

But then Babel's pulling away, and she hears it's close to midnight. "Do you have to go?" she asks, tilting her head. It makes a strange kind of sense, to her heart. She's so much like the light to Allen's shadow. Perhaps she disappears at the stroke of midnight, like all good fairy tales do.

[allmydiredreams]

Babel's lips tilt into a bit of a frown at the change in Iris's beats in response to...her own beats. On the one hand, there's a small stab of hope -- could she feel something similar? This naive mortal girl? There are differences in her beats that pin her as Wanderer, and maybe, just maybe--

No. "No." She doesn't have to go. "Yes." She always does, at the end. "Not now, just...when it all comes crashing down." There's a little sliver of hope now, just a little; maybe this time she won't. Maybe this time the clouds will leave her alone. They've been so absent.

[sophicsulphur]

Iris stands up, ruffling the back of her hair with a hand. "I suppose we all have to go then. Go and not-go. Nothing ever ends. Even when everything ends."

"--But until then. Find me." Her words are quiet, reverent. It's not a command; it's an option. An offer. "Find me any time. Here." She touches her heart. "Or here." Her hand goes to her head. "I know you know how."

It's her Babel-attuned way of saying, If you need me, I'll be there.