Nate doesn't stop to consider that the woman lying on the floor might not be his wife. The outfit isn't precisely normal, but he's seen it before (And, well, taken it off before, if you want to get technical about it), is pretty sure it's been hanging in the back of Remy's closet since Halloween. There's enough familiarity to it that he doesn't stop to think how misplaced it is, worn in the middle of a festive Whoville living room.
He just sees his wife, lying pale and unmoving in the middle of the floor.
The newspaper he'd been carrying with him flutters to the floor and Nate all but launches himself in Remy's direction, heart in his throat, but she abruptly comes to before he even gets there, her black-rimmed eyes wide and curious. And it's only then, hovering in a half-crouch before the figure on the floor, that it occurs to him this may not be who he thinks it is.
"It's okay," he says, kneeling at her side, a hand against her back to help her sit up. She's so fucking pale, luminescent like a china doll, and he can't help but stare. She looks unfathomably fragile, but if she's anything like Remy, Nate's sure the opposite must be true.
"Okay?" Quorra looked around, wondering if that word even still meant what she thought it did, since nothing else made sense. So many questions crowded in on each other all at once, and she was a little bit worried about experiencing some kind of overload.
The stranger did seem to be trying to help her, and she let him. She knew well enough that kindness should not be taken for granted.
"I'm sorry," Nate begins, genuinely apologetic and looking it. "I don't know Flynn or Sam. This may sound a little strange, but wherever you just were, you're not there anymore." There really isn't any nicer way to put it, in his experience; people either accept the information or they don't, and reactions to it vary as much as individual personalities do. "I'm Nate," he adds, before he gets wrapped up in explanations and forgets.
"I can see that." She was still getting her bearings, but she was clearly no longer in the middle of a fight at the End of Line. "I'm Quorra, and I need to find them. They might not be okay. How did I come here? I need to reverse that."
She had somehow arrived in this place, after all. Leaving should be just as easy, once she understood how it worked.
"No, I don't think you understand," Nate replies, trying another tack. He fucking hates this part, having to make it clear to new arrivals that there really is no way back home. "You're not even in the same reality anymore. If I knew how you got here, I'd be more than happy to tell you, but no one knows how it works. There's no reversing it that anyone here is aware of."
Her arm seemed to have been returned to good order, but Quorra wondered if maybe something that happened to her cortical processing unit. She certainly didn't seem to making sense of any verbal input at all.
To his credit, Nate doesn't laugh at that, instead firmly biting his tongue as his expression becomes unmistakably wry. "I can definitely agree with you there," he replies with a cant of his head. "But as far as I know, there's no changing it. You're stuck here, I'm sorry."
Quorra frowned. She didn't like being stuck anywhere. It was especially upsetting now, because she didn't like not being able to help Flynn or Sam, either.
Not that she was probably going to have been much help to them for long, considering how the fight she'd been had not been going in her favor.
"Did I die?" she asked. It wasn't like anyone really knew what followed deresolution. For all she knew, it was exactly this.
"It's possible." Nate pushes himself to his feet and offers Quorra a hand to help her up. "Some people arrive here after they've died. There are a lot of theories as to why or how we get here. Morbid as it sounds, it could be we're all dead."
Upon consideration, that's probably not the best explanation to offer to someone fresh to the island. This woman looking so much like Remy has him off his game.
"The good news is that it's not a bad place to live," he offers in consolation.
"If we're living here, we can't really be dead, can we?" It was the sort of question that Flynn would have pondered for many, many cycles, but Quorra would have preferred an immediate answer.
She stood, and made a mental evaluation of all of her systems.
"I don't feel dead. I'm not sure what that's supposed to feel like, though, so maybe I do, and I don't even know it."
He just sees his wife, lying pale and unmoving in the middle of the floor.
The newspaper he'd been carrying with him flutters to the floor and Nate all but launches himself in Remy's direction, heart in his throat, but she abruptly comes to before he even gets there, her black-rimmed eyes wide and curious. And it's only then, hovering in a half-crouch before the figure on the floor, that it occurs to him this may not be who he thinks it is.
"It's okay," he says, kneeling at her side, a hand against her back to help her sit up. She's so fucking pale, luminescent like a china doll, and he can't help but stare. She looks unfathomably fragile, but if she's anything like Remy, Nate's sure the opposite must be true.
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The stranger did seem to be trying to help her, and she let him. She knew well enough that kindness should not be taken for granted.
"What did they do to Flynn? And Sam?"
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She had somehow arrived in this place, after all. Leaving should be just as easy, once she understood how it worked.
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"I can't go back? That seems like poor design."
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Not that she was probably going to have been much help to them for long, considering how the fight she'd been had not been going in her favor.
"Did I die?" she asked. It wasn't like anyone really knew what followed deresolution. For all she knew, it was exactly this.
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Upon consideration, that's probably not the best explanation to offer to someone fresh to the island. This woman looking so much like Remy has him off his game.
"The good news is that it's not a bad place to live," he offers in consolation.
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She stood, and made a mental evaluation of all of her systems.
"I don't feel dead. I'm not sure what that's supposed to feel like, though, so maybe I do, and I don't even know it."
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