pc: maomao

[sacredpath]

Comments

im sorry been babysitting and brainded

[apoisoncary]

[ She is momentarily distracted by the party because Karlach reminds her a little of Charlie. However, she re-focuses on the child and the events that play out. The twisted versions of a doctor and nurses, their experimentations all in the name of their believe system... There is so much to react to, but curiosity is winning over. She will take the path down the hallway wanting to know more. ]

[sacredpath]

[the memory that follows down this path is what happens after they return to camp for the night, accepting that arabella didn't want to be found. and, well, some members of this particular traveling group are fairly soft. wyll, karlach, gale - none of them are going to give up on a lost child easily. but they didn't go to the shadow cursed lands to rescue children or go on errands for them. they have a purpose here. and yet, in that moment, the failure hurt, and she didn't fully understand why. arabella was a child it was hard not to get attached to, with her defiance and independence, but even so...

sometimes in moments like this, there are things on the edge of her memory. the feelings stronger than the events themselves.

a memory of a child, crying herself to sleep after another nightmare. wondering why no one had come to save her, besides the people who found her. wondering if there ever had been anyone looking for her, waiting for her to make it home. but if there had been, she'd never remember their faces. she'd never see them again.

a memory of a child, who knew she should be grateful to the people who did come for her, the people who took her in. they are the only family she has, even if they show her no kindness. she never seems to do anything the way they want her to. mother superior, and her book, writing disapproving notes of her progress, never finding her good enough. she wonders if it's because of the hopes that she clings to, the desire to remember the faces of people she once knew, and if she tries, perhaps she can let that go and be good enough. to hold onto these desires, to want, to desire to have something of her own is to reject shar.

this is how she learns to wield the knife, to make her incisions perfect, to steady her hand. she practices on strangers, learns how to cut and how to hurt without doing lasting damage. practices for hours upon hours, how to say her prayers, how to praise shar, and she practices this on strangers, too. it's brief, though, just brief impressions, forgotten memories.

but then one of the patients, an older woman, calls out to her. uses a different name than the one she knows. and it shatters her, right in the careful practice, and suddenly there is a presence there in the room with her instead of an absence, a familiar face where a cadaver's should be.

and shadowheart's hand catches maomao's sleeve. she looks angry, but it's partially to cover up fear.]

This isn't yours. Stop prying. Let's go.

[i am not actually going to punish you icly for engaging with my memories though, she's just mad at this moment but will get over it after they talk.]