Toffee Cabin, Alcove B4

[glacial_witch]

After a day like yesterday, all Karla wanted to do was relax. However, that was apparently not to be. She'd had several calls to make, both of which were probably going to lead to Discussions. Actually, she was rather hoping they did--she missed Jack utterly and, well, when it came to the whole Gaia/Edge/Midgar thing, she really needed guidance.

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[findingelena]

Elena had facepalmed greatly after getting Karla's message. Not at Karla, but at herself. How had she not seen that coming? Or thought to warn Karla about it?

How did Karla know Cloud, anyway? She felt like she was forgetting something important.

The important thing was to go talk to her, right away. And apologize. And find out what was going on.

So Elena was knocking on the alcove wall, worrying, and ... mostly that. Knocking and worrying.

[glacial_witch]

Karla practically flew to her curtain, and all but dragged Elena inside. "Here!" she hissed. "He's here! How could you not tell me he's here?! What if I'd said something wrong?!"

Hello, Elena. Lovely to see you again. How's things?

[findingelena]

"I didn't think of it," Elena admitted, folding her arms. "I was more worried about Zack. And Rosalind. And making sure Reno didn't try to kill him again."

Look, they were mostly on the same side now, but they hadn't always been. Being on the wrong end of that Buster Sword was not something you forgot easily.

[glacial_witch]

"So you guys weren't on the same side?" Karla asked, confused. "Or did they just not get along?" She could see Reno and Cloud trying to kill each other even as besties.

She sighed. "I slipped up. Told him I recognized him before I knew where I recognized him from. So now I need to know--what can I tell him?" Karla looked at Elena. "I swore my silence to you and Reno by the highest oath my people have. I will stonewall him if necessary, but I do need to know what's going on."

[findingelena]

"We weren't," Elena said, chewing on her lower lip. Shit. Now was not the time to get into the whole ugly back history to Gaia, or how the Turks were generally considered to have been 'the bad guys.' "It's complicated. Wait, how did you ..."

She frowned. "You recognized Cloud? You mean, you knew the places he was talking about?"

[glacial_witch]

Karla rolled her eyes. "Of course I recognized him!" she said. "You were there--"

Oh. Right. The Church--Aerith--had shown her Cloud's image. Elena and Reno had still been smoking cigarettes and playing cards at that point.

"Aerith showed me," she said, apologetically. It wasn't Elena's fault at all. "I was worried about someone coming and accidentally harming the web I'd spun. She showed me Cloud, how gentle he was with the flowers, to assure me that the web would be fine. Which is why I can't tell him how I recognized him."

[findingelena]

Elena hoped that Karla wouldn't mind Elena flopping down on her bed. It was the closest place to land, and she needed one.

"She ... showed you?" Oh, fuck. "It never ... occurred to me. I -- I should have ..."

She shook her head. "I should have warned you, anyway," she said. "I can't believe I didn't think to. I've just been ... all over the place lately."

Her dead sister. Her dead mom. Stuff like that.

[glacial_witch]

Karla could understand that a bit. It wasn't like she'd sought Elena out before this, either. Between the trip to Edge and the craziness of this past summer, it had just seemed more convenient to let sleeping dogs lie.

"Yeah, she did," Karla said, falling silent for a moment. "Mother Night and may the Darkness be merciful. You want a drink? I'm up for a drink." She was already calling in the glasses and bottles--though not the honey-pear brandy. That had been promised.

[findingelena]

"Please?" Elena said faintly. "I ... I don't even ..."

This island was getting exponentially more complicated. Maybe she should have left already.

She rubbed her temples for a long moment.

"I'm sorry," she said. "It didn't ... occur to me. He's ... he doesn't have the same timeline problems Zack does. I mean, he knows what ... happens. Most of it, anyway."

[glacial_witch]

"He still wants answers though," Karla said, pouring them both generous glasses of wine. "Even if he's not entirely sure about what. He seems to be...not particularly fond of the Turks. Claimed you guys were..." she frowned, trying to remember his phrasing, "...trying to right the wrongs without paying for it. You and Shinra."

[findingelena]

Elena needed that drink, and downed most of her glass in one go.

"He's no choirboy himself," she said darkly. "ShinRa did some bad stuff. I'm not going to lie and pretend we didn't. But blowing up mako reactors for an eco-terrorist group doesn't give you the high ground."

And there went the rest of her wine.

"We're not trying to right the wrongs of -- whatever the fuck he's talking about. I asked you to come to Edge because people are dying, and I don't want people to die. I don't know where he gets off. At least we're doing something, and not just hanging around moping."

NFB, please

[glacial_witch]

Don't worry, Elena! Karla's right here to top you off!

"You didn't ask me," Karla reminded her as she poured. "I volunteered, because I thought I could help. All you did was try to persuade me it was a bad idea and then give in when you saw I was dead serious." She glanced up and gave Elena a smile. "And then took care of me when I needed it."

"Though, I'll admit I'll understand this all better if I knew more about what the Hell was going on. You can leave Zack out, if you want. But Cloud said he was after Zack in the timeline. That he is about...sixteen? In Zack's time?"

And that's when it hit her. Cloud was here, in high school. That put him at what...nineteen, maybe? Which meant Zack's lifespan...could be measure in months. "Oh no!" she cried out, eyes welling with tears. "So soon. Does he really have so little time left?"

Re: NFB, please

[findingelena]

"So little ..." Elena frowned, not following at first. So soon? He was sixteen in Zack's ... oh.

"He's older than Reno," she said. "I don't know how he's a student if he is, but Reno's ..."

Dammit. She didn't know how old Reno was, no. It didn't seem important, okay?

"... older than me, and I'll be twenty in a few months."

Re: NFB, please

[glacial_witch]

"Wait, really?" Karla said, feeling more than a little stupid as she wiped away the tears. The question of how Cloud could be a student was ignored in favor of relief. "I just thought...since I know that Zack...fuck, I need another drink now, too."

Karla was kind of at her limit with death right now. Whether it was dead parents coming to life or friends sacrificing themselves for whatever, she was just a little tired of it all.

"So, what can you tell me," she asked. "And what, if anything, can I tell him?"

Re: NFB, please

[findingelena]

Elena still felt like a heel about that. Karla had helped her rebuild Edge, and in exchange, got to find out that one of her friends was going to die. Fun!

She shook her head. "What does he want to know?" she asked. "I don't understand. He was there. Why does he ... I mean, what did he ask?"

Re: NFB, please

[glacial_witch]

"He said he wanted details, at first," Karla said. "He wanted to know what I knew, and who had told me what. I told him some things--things I've managed to piece together on my own, or that you told me before I swore not to say," she added, a bit defensively. "On the one hand, he said he didn't want to know what his future held, on the other, he seemed angry that I knew anything at all. And he blames Reno for everything."

She knocked back her glass of wine and then snorted. "Like it was Reno's fault I was determined to Heal Edge if I could." She glanced over at Elena. "I still wouldn't take that back, you know. Even knowing what I do, I don't regret it."

Resented it? Maybe. Mostly them not telling her before, for the way she found out. Regretted, though? Never.