Little Miss Sunshine [ota]

[whenheavenfalls]

They dropped her off before the sun had even hit its highest point; as watery as the light was Ororo knew its position the way a person knew that they had a hand at the end of each arm. It cast weak shadows across the plain building

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[sixinchnails]

The cold wasn't a discomfort to Yuriko personally. In truth, not much was a personal discomfort for the woman. Her bones however, fused with the synthetic metallic component, they protested.

She clicked more as she walked, having to crack her fingers more often. Her practised arts were rough and stiff. But she still pressed to walk outside, still patrolled the grounds as were her duty. She was dedicated to her position, and her responsibilities would not suffer simply because of a bodily discomfort such as the cold.

Stepping outside, her heeled boots different from the military provided boots of the others, Yuriko placed the dark sunglasses over her pale eyes. Depending on the time she spent outside, she would require them.

She wasn't half way across the base when she stopped. Her feet unmoving despite her initial routine to walk the entire base twice during patrol. She was too surprised at the sight before her. Yuriko stood still in the white, her head to toe black uniform making her a sore thumb. She still couldn't move though.

[whenheavenfalls]

The light crunch of footsteps was distinctive in the otherwise silence of the early afternoon. It was quiet around here, which, after the hum of the city, always put Ororo a little on edge. It was like the snow muffled everything.

The sun was too weak to make her squint much as she turned her eyes up; Ororo lifted a hand to brush white hair out of her eyes the better to see the dark figure standing not far away. "Hello?" she called out, her voice deep, resonant.

It wasn't polite to stare.

[sixinchnails]

It may not have been polite, no. But Yuriko found herself continuing to stare, even as she stepped closer, her steps far smaller that they naturally would be.

It was hard not to recognise the face before her, older yes but still as distinctive as all those years before. Yuriko found herself surprised, which was not the natural order of things.

"Hello." She spoke evenly, her face a blank sheet as she continued until she stopped a few feet from the white haired woman. Her former best friend.

[whenheavenfalls]

Ororo's annoyance turned to confusion and then to dread as that darkly-clad figure stepped closer and closer to her. Dark hair became black with a familiar sweep of bangs just as an anynomous face became high cheekbones and small, thin lips that Ororo used to know so well.

Had known, because the woman standing in front of her was dead. Had been dead for eight years.

Ororo managed one backward step before freezing completely. A sound strangled in her throat before it could find air, which was better. She might have screamed. What was this? Who was this that looked so much like a cold, dead picture of Yuki?

Her blue eyes were wide with recognition, her lips slightly parted in shock. Under Ororo's dark skin she was pale.

[sixinchnails]

Yuriko stopped then, staring again. It was definitely Ororo, the white hair, dark skin, shocking eyes and stance. Yuriko's memory wasn't the same as a normal persons -the trauma of the melding, the emotional battering when she lost the use of her legs, it affected something.

But she'd never forgotten the only person she called friend, sister.

It felt like a staring match though, so Yuriko removed her glasses, folding them and clasping them behind her back. Her eyes slowly adjusted to the light, and the pale blue/grey met Ororo's.

[whenheavenfalls]

It was like seeing a ghost.

Ororo's throat was closed against any whimper that might want to give her away, her mouth dry. Her heart was pounding so hard that she was sure it must soon break something inside of her--if not itself. She was shaking--in no part to the cold--yet she still hadn't managed to take another step.

Not away, not to run; not forward, not to touch.

Overhead there was the rumbled of thunder from the lightly cloudy sky.

[sixinchnails]

In the end, it was the rumble that made Yuriko look up, her eyebrows arching slightly. She recalled nights of torrential rain when 'Ro was feeling particularly nasty, ill or upset. Yuki had never minded, sitting by a window and watching.

At least until that day.

Looking back to Ororo, Yuriko tilted her head slightly. "You look well." She was never the most patient, and 'Ro had never been slow. It had worked out well.

Yuriko was still somewhat impatient.

[whenheavenfalls]

The words broke something. They broke the stillness of the moment, that freezing pressure that had built between them. All Ororo could think was of course Yuki would speak first. Of course.

With a strangled sob of sound Ororo ran a few steps--and then stopped just a few feet from the other woman, as abruptly as she'd hit a wall. Tears of shock brightened her eyes.

"You're alive." It was a whisper. Ororo couldn't think of anything else to say.

[sixinchnails]

"I am," she nodded. She almost wasn't. So many times she would've died, by her own hand if needed. But then emotional teenagers did ridiculous things.

There was an odd sense of relief within Yuriko, along with the dull but constant annoyance and blame that she'd carried for years. It could've been misdirected, but at seventeen and facing life without her legs, it had grown and festered and Yuriko had never let it go.

"Why are you here?"

[whenheavenfalls]

The cold question...

Ororo couldn't have prepared herself for any reaction from Yuriko, because Yuriko had been dead. She had seen her bike slide in front of the truck all those years ago, had heard the terrible crunch of metal and the squeal of tires. No one could have survived that. So Ororo had fled without looking back and carried the guilt with her ever since.

And yet, here Yuriko stood. Somehow.

"Stryker," Ororo managed. "He... recruited me. Yuki--"

[sixinchnails]

Her face remained impassive and cold. "It is Yuriko," she said evenly, "or Deathstrike."

She was aware that Ororo didn't believe her to be a mutant, nor did Ororo believe her to have been alive it seems. Her survival of the accident had been nothing short of a miracle to most. The damage to her spine, however, was irreparable. Either way, Yuriko could not simply return to when she was sixteen, despite her deep seated affections. From now on, that was where they had to stay.

"You should not be here."

[whenheavenfalls]

Or Deathstrike.

The words made something cold settle deep in the bottom of Ororo's stomach, like she had swallowed ice. She was not that child she had been all those years ago and so while part of her wanted to cry in relief, to reach out and touch the woman who had been as good as a sister to her...

She did not. That part was long, long buried. Perhaps it had been first buried in the rubble of her parents house and then only sank deeper with time. Ororo's chin set. She had never been one to cling to sentimentality--Yuki (Yuriko) was here. She was obviously alive.

Move on.

"Then I am not the only one. What are you doing here in a camp full of mutants?" There was power in her low voice, an assurance that had never been there before Africa.

[sixinchnails]

An elegant eyebrow arched again, and Yuriko smirked just slightly. "Working." She answered shortly. It would be unusual for her to be among them, had there not been other humans within the ranks.

However, Yuriko was no longer merely human.

Unlike most, she agreed to be made into a mutant, something she had never regretted. Despite the stance of mutants. "I do not choose where I am sent, I simply complete my assignments." Her hands clasped behind her back.

"You have not answered my question, Ororo."

[whenheavenfalls]

Yuriko had never been what Ororo would have called highly emotional, but this coolness was nothing that she remembered. Her boots shifted in the snow. Now that the edge of shock had worn off, Ororo felt winded, exhausted but ramped up.

"What question was that?" she snapped.

As if she had a right to snap at the woman in front of her. The woman she should have been hugging. Clinging to. But Yuki...

Yuriko.

Something had changed.

[sixinchnails]

Technically, she hadn't asked a question, but she had alluded to one and as such, Ororo avoided it. Yuriko tilted her head again, assessing things.

"You should not be here." 'Ro shouldn't, the girl Yuriko remembered -blamed- the one that Yuki tried to protect, the one that she wanted to protect.

But here Ororo was, and Yuriko wondered if it was a test. "You should leave." If she could. Yuriko was not the type to sanction the disobeying of orders. But 'Ro didn't belong here.

[whenheavenfalls]

"Stryker recruited me." Ororo repeated the words she'd tripped over earlier in her shock. She stacked her hands on her hips and looked for all the world like a taller, better fed version of the slim stubborn girl she'd been at 16. "I've got just as much right as you." Her white hair whipped around her face as a gust of wind came up from behind her.

She was sorry for what had happened. She'd nearly died herself, neglecting to even eat as she mourned the death she thought she'd caused. But Ororo would not let Yuriko run her out. Not again.

"Is this your turf?"

The question was haughty, almost. A sharp reminder of that incident so long ago. Yuriko knew that the best way to get Ororo to sit was to tell her to run.