and our broken virgin realities

[allmydiredreams]

For the past couple of days, Babel has been MIA. She's actually been holed up in her room, trying to figure out, dispute, come to terms with certain painting given to her at the Carnival. The only conclusion she came to was the one she'd suspected, but hoped wasn't true. She's learned that hope is a futile, frail thing at best, over the

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[savesomelight]

Piper can sense Unhappy Drums from a mile away (okay, not literally, but you get the picture) and she usually recognizes specific emotional wavelengths if she knows the person well enough, so when, while wandering around the courtyard, she senses lots of unhappiness from what feels like Babel, she comes running.

"Babel! What's happened?"

...She cuts right to the point when she's scared. Babel's always been so happy, so exuberant- what could have her so upset?

[allmydiredreams]

Babel doesn't so much see 'Piper' as sense 'empath: unhappy, conflicted, worried', and she doesn't turn to look at Piper, just closes her eyes and falters for half a second before continuing to walk to the gates. "Small error," she says, "just fixing. He'll be right as rain in no time."

A few more steps, then another pause, this time an automatic bodily shake, like someone with a deep, deep chill. Something in Babel is trying to shake off the dissociation, the ache everywhere from the vibrations through her, though it's not going to work. "They take and then they disappear and the shift comes back around

[savesomelight]

Piper is getting so tired of bad things happening to her friends. It's stressing her out something fierce. "What?" She asks and then shakes her head. It's not important and, anyway, Tay promised that they'd get Mattie out, if that's what Babel's talking about and... Yeah, anyway.

"I don't understand," she says, trotting after her. "Did something happen?"

She pauses, her steps faltering. "Was it the carnival?"

[allmydiredreams]

"It's going to," Babel replies, though she shows no other sign of knowing Piper's still there. "All of it, down in flames." She doesn't really know how it will end, but it's not as if she's coherent enough to say so.

She mutters for a moment, under her breath, though eventually the muttering rises into audibility. "...half-seen mystics and hidden fingers reaching in to pry open the heart--show the real--want the flesh in the mind..." She trails off, pressing her hands to the gates for a moment, letting them wander over the barrier. Then she opens the gates and walks out. She's going to keep walking until something stops her, and that is all she consciously knows. Walking and recording. There is so much of this city to remember before it's gone.

[coolestscythe]

Soul has seen Babel around. She has always seemed nice. Maka has mentioned her; apparently they met when Maka first arrived, and Babel was helpful then.

Soul is really just minding his own business in the courtyard, pacing and frowning to himself, stewing over what happened at the carnival and over his and Maka's mutual avoidance of each other. He spots Babel out of the corner of his eye and turns to watch her, his eyes widening a little. He is suddenly, vividly, reminded of everything that happened down in the ruins, when the Kishin woke up. There's the same sort of sense of madness, without the malice.

"Hey." He starts trotting over to Babel, coming close enough to make sure he's seen. "Hey. It's Babel, right? Are you okay?"

[allmydiredreams]

Babel takes a moment to respond, as it takes a moment to register that anyone's speaking to her -- he's just an interesting entity, one that needs to go down in the books, the bones. She turns around to look at him, and while it's clear she sees him, it's definitely not clear that she recognizes him as a sentient, thinking anything. Or that she recognizes that this should matter.

"Weapons shouldn't look for eggs here," she tells him. "Nothing inside but beats and bones." And then she continues walking to the gates. She doesn't consciously know why she needs to be out there, she just knows that maybe she should go that way.

[coolestscythe]

He does not like that look, not at all. It's the kind of look he has gotten while in weapon form here. 'Nice scythe, girl.' People talk as if he can't hear them, look at him as if he's not looking back. It's almost as bad as the looks he get when he's in human form. One of these days he's going to snap and yell at someone.

He stares at her, a little wide-eyed. "How did you..." But she's already walking off. "Hey! How did you know what I am? I've never met you before...and how do you know about Kishin Eggs?"

He trots after her, trying to keep up.

[allmydiredreams]

Were she coherent and not on auto-record, she might think differently. At this point, if she meets anyone she'll give them the same blank, half-unfocused look, and then continue on. Nothing against you personally, Soul.

"She feels it all," Babel replies simply, now not looking at him. She's stopped, staring upwards at the moving form of a demon through their open balcony door. "Just killed, satisfied," she mutters more to herself than anything, then closes her eyes for longer than a blink, making sure to remember that one's bodybeat, before starting toward the gates again.