exsiliumlogs | (open) celebrating everything it took to free us from the land of the broken and betrayed

Entry tags:

(open) celebrating everything it took to free us from the land of the broken and betrayed

Date & Time: February 12th - February 14th
Location: Throughout Exsilium
Characters: ANY & ALL
Summary: Separation Awareness Day is a festival and time of celebration for the hard won and retained freedoms of those who live on the island of Exsilium. Separate from the United Earth, they continue to exist, and thrive in their own way. As those identified as teenagers and children are showered with gifts of sweets, foods, and toys from the adult population, merchants are selling on the streets and color had invaded the often grey atmosphere. Feasting is practically a law, singing can be heard in the streets, and instruments that may stay safely indoors most the year are brought out to encourage dancing and such other frivolities as are rarely seen.

The night of the 14th there are fireworks shows throughout the city, with the most impressive display being launched from the remains of Buckingham Palace.

Warnings: Festivities!

Date your threads as you will, and feel free to use this as a Valentine's exploration as well for those more inclined to appreciate a holiday from home amidst the celebrations of a whole different sort of world!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Exactly," Steph's used to unfair, and she stopped railing against it long ago, she just took a deep breath and dealt with it anyway, because what else was there to do? She hates it when it's other people, she hates how Cass had to grow up, everything Damian's been through to make him the way he is, but she knows there's still no point in saying it's unfair.

Life is unfair, complaining about it doesn't change it.

"I still don't know which is the right course, but we're here now, and you're right, we've just gotta deal with it," This is a lot heavier a conversation than she planned to have on Valentine's Day, but for all that it's been a bit emotional, she feels better to have had a chance to put her thoughts into words, and to know that she isn't alone in those thoughts.

And well, Ellie's right about adults, "They'll never get their shit together, it's better if we rely on ourselves."

On each other, and she's starting to think Ellie really is someone she can trust.

"Sometimes having a tantrum and getting it all out can be kind of cathartic, though." She offers Steph a very small smile. "It's nice having someone be on the same page. Most people here just..." Probably have no idea where she's coming from, the logical part of her recognises. "I don't know if they're liars or out of touch, or maybe the wires just went wrong somewhere. They're confusing." Steph makes sense. Even if she wears a costume and calls herself Batgirl, she's trying to make a difference and understands fighting and futility and that painful weight in your gut when the floor gets knocked out from under you. And she doesn't blame Ellie or hate her guts, which she swears the others do, half of the time. They can't stand each other, even as they harbour that need.

Despite herself, she curls up against Steph a bit. Not leaning too much against her, not after the way she tensed up with the hug, but just wrapping her arms around her own knees, which are propping up her chin. "We need a game plan. I don't like making things up as you go along." More windows for things to go wrong, and it was dangerous enough with the best laid out plans.

"I try to do that in private," Or around someone she trusts enough to let them see her breakdown, which doesn't happen a lot, she even kept Tim and Cass at a distance. Her therapist in Africa saw an awful lot, but her PTSD is at managable levels.

The fact Ellie feels the same way she does about having someone who understands, is one more reassurance that she's made the right decision to trust her. She gives Ellie's hands a final squeeze, then lets go, "I think there's a line, between never having fought before and having fought too much."

They either don't treat the situation with the respect it deserves, because they don't understand the gravity of the situation, or they're so desensitized they don't realize why others would struggle with it. Steph doesn't think she'd ever be desensitized, and Ellie is new to battle.

She smiles to herself when Ellie curls up against her, leaning into it a little, "I've kinda got a reputation for leaping before I look, but I guess I can make an exception for you."

Or more that she's grown up enough to know a game plan is a good idea.

Steph is getting pretty good at wrangling smiles out of Ellie. "Nah. Better when you can see someone else's face when they think you've totally lost it. 'Oh, geez, there she goes. We knew it had to happen sometime.'" If only that weren't so very true. At least they were all human trainwrecks together. That was a really comforting thought.

"You're a real smooth talker today. You could get me in all kinds of trouble." If there's any innuendo there it is one hundred per cent accidental and unrealised by Miss Linton. "Definitely know how to make a girl feel special."

She was pretty sure she used to have funny banter with Lee, but that had disappeared somewhere along the way. Banter got replaced by jumping between paranoia, homicidal rage, debilitating fear and some things she can't find names for. Banter was making a little less room for those things by sneaking back in.

"I think I'm too stubborn for that, too," She's been close to it twice, both with Tim, and even then she managed to keep herself mostly together. She can trust people to have her back in a fight, to keep her safe and keep her secrets, but it's hard to let anyone see her being so vulnerable.

But she smiles, almost a smirk, "I'm just being honest, sweetheart," Steph doesn't miss the innuendo, but she knows it's just the same sort of easy, teasing banter that they had before. That nothing's really meant by it.

Except Steph kind of does mean it, at least - she means that she's being honest. She's not trying to smooth talk Ellie, or win her over with words, she's just telling the truth of how she feels about this situation, and hoping that Ellie will understand it.

"Human minds are so bizarre. How we twist ourselves around to do things and all those different limits. Some people can do one thing and others just fall to pieces-- our minds can make us the strongest forces to reckon with, or we just turn into something useless. Or maybe it's a head and heart thing, again, I don't know."

Knowing more would be nice, but then again, not knowing had been like a victory of innocence. When you did't know, didn't need to know, things were so much simpler. "Hey. Don't get ahead of yourself. Flowers are good, but you get nothing until there's chocolate on the table." At least in terms of diet Ellie's had a bit of a chance to recover this last little while, looking a little more healthy, though the demand for chocolate might still seem a little odd from someone who's prepared to eat just about anything. Whatever. "Fried stuff on a stick doesn't count."

A few moments pass before she lets the banter settle. "It's good. Trying to figure out what people are really saying and wanting gets tiring."

"I've seen a lot of things, and I'm still not sure I'll ever have an answer for stuff like that," Whether it's a head or a heart thing, how people can go through the same things and cope with it completely differently. She doesn't think she's strong, she really is just too damn stubborn to let anyone else get the better of her. Her father, Batman, Sionis.

Her smile widens a little, and she raps her knuckles lightly on Ellie's knee, "I'll find you some chocolates before the day is out," And she will, even if she has to steal it.

For all that Steph talks a lot, she's comfortable in the silence, too, looking over at Ellie when she speaks, "I won't lie to you." It's a big promise to make, but she thinks she'll be able to keep it.

Ellie just smiles. Stuff like that she doesn't except there'll ever be an answer for. "Maybe the fun is trying to figure it out. Like a brainteaser that you'll get different answers for every hour, and none of them will be real answers."

Hah. Good. "I'm glad to hear it. I'm holding you to that as your first definitely-not-a-lie. This is crucial stuff." Super crucial, obviously.

Somehow, Ellie can't quite curb her desire to try and be cool after all that emotion. Damn pride, again. She pinches the shirt she is wearing at the shoulder (just a simple thing, Ellie indulging the opportunity to get new clothes for the first time in ages, even if she can't break the easily camoflaged habit). "Do I look fat in this?"

So dry. So so dry.

"I'm not sure fun is the word you're looking for," But her tone is light, and she shakes her head, like she'd laugh if she wasn't still so wrung out emotionally. They'll never gonna get real answers to questions like that.

She can definitely understand the desire to keep the conversation a little more flippant after all that, so she just smiles and nods for confirmation that she'll get Ellie her chocolate.

So Ellie also gets a light jab in the ribs, as if Steph is testing how fat she is, "I think we could feed you nothing but chocolate for a month and you'd still be too skinny." Underfed, probably malnourished, it's not surprising, but it worries Steph.

A huffed out attempt at a laugh, though the ups and downs of this conversation have been a little draining. "There's no pleasing some people." Those people are probably Ellie, if we're being honest. "First my idea of fun is wrong, then you tell me I need to eat more chocolate."

Retaliatory, she prods Steph's abdomen, then her ribs, and the poke war might continue without mercy. "Maybe you should eat more chocolate, too."

"Maybe I just wanna show you how to have fun my way," There's a smirky little grin on her face, sticking with the light, meaningless flirting because it's easy. The smile doens't exactly reach her eyes, but she thinks Ellie can probably forgive her for that.

Steph doesn't even flinch, just gentle bats Ellie's hands away with a feigned look of annoyance, "My calorie intake is pretty much perfect considering how active I am."

There's something in her tone that suggests she's just teasing, although since training as Robin, she's gotten into the habit of monitoring calorie intake. Thanks, Bruce.

"And what do you do for fun? Polish your armour and alphabetise your weapons?" That lack of spark in her gaze when she smiles, that's familiar. It's not far off how Ellie has turned to jagged edges and how sometimes it feels like Fi just slips away into another world. Smiles like that, the jokes that ring hollow are Robyn all over. It's painful, but that longing for familiarity is enough that she'll gladly keep bashing the bruise. "Or do you need to go deep fry something?"

That makes her quirk an eyebrow. "You don't actually worry about that stuff, do you?" Accusatory, her tone not exactly full of warmth and empathy, but it comes from a place where worry so often crashes into exhaustion.

"Kevlar doesn't need polishing," She decides to ignore the comment about deep frying things, not letting Ellie use American steroetypes against her, regardless of whether or not Steph is actually fond of fried food, "It's a shame they don't have trains here, I'd teach you how to surf."

It's an old Robin tradition, train surfing, and Steph had taken to it like a fish to water. She's always been a bit of an adrenalin junkie.

Ellie's tone softens her expression, "I do, but it's not 'oh god I'm gonna get fat', more like 'oh god I do five hours of intensive training a day am I eating enough so I don't pass out?' which is a little healthier."

She's seen how Tim looks when he frequently skips meals, or Bruce when he exists on protein shakes alone, and it's not pretty.

"Never seen it," she says by way of excuse. But, wait. If she were a dog, her ears would've pricked right up. "Surf? On train?" Steph's just hit the gold mine. Ellie's been feeling a little lacking in excitement since she got here, at least in the "traditional" sense. "There's gotta be something else."

Admittedly, that's not what Ellie had been expected, and looks a bit bashful, almost. "That's more familiar. I dunno how we kept moving, really."

"You probably have, actually, it's in stuff like bike tires," Sometimes Steph is a smartypants, and she can't helping giving Ellie a smug look, though it turns into a genuine smile - reaching her eyes this time - at her response to train surfing, "Something else we can surf on, or something else I do for fun?"

She can probably answer the latter.

"Probably a combination of sheer force of will and adrenalin," It's been a long time since Steph has been starving, but she remembers what it felt like.

"No one likes a smartarse, you know." It's why she has so many friends. "And either. Both! Keeping an insomniac company can't be the best thing you can come up with." Self mockery, but there's a painful honesty in it. Ellie knows full well the others can barely stand her, anymore.

Nodding a bit, she releases a bit of a sigh of relief. "There wasn't a lot of choice. Move or die." Then, she glanced at Steph with a kind of renewed appreciation. "It's nice talking to someone who gets it but who wasn't there." There's a silent thank you hanging on the end of that.

"You seem to like me," Which is a joke, but there's something genuine in it, too, maybe a little hopeful, maybe enough to ease some of Ellie's town, "And I dunno, it's not like I keep normal hours myself. Maybe I could teach you how to use a zip line."

There's a couple of things there, an attempt at reassuring Ellie that Steph does like her without having to be blunt about it, and an actual answer to that 'fun' question. Even if using grapples is technically work, Steph doesn't - get out a lot.

What Ellie says reminds Steph of the first time she really talked to Cass, about their fathers, and it was the first time she felt like someone had really understood, so she can understand why it matters so much, "I'm glad I could help."

"I have awful taste." Immediate, though she's got a little grin. "I've met worse, definitely. Bonus points to anyone who doesn't try to shoot me, y'know?" And hello. "That sounds awesome. You definitely should. And those throwing things. I'll teach you... how to make a kookaburra sound, or something." She feels a bit useless around Steph, who seems to know everything and have a lot of stuff together. At the same time, it's a relief. And it makes her jealous. And ten other things.

Is Ellie embarrassed? She might be. She isn't too sure why, but Steph is really cool and it makes her feel a bit awkward. "I'll have to figure out how to help you, sometime."

"Well, that's only 'cause I'm not allowed to use guns," That's clearly a joke, Ellie isn't annoying enough to warrant shooting, even when she steals Steph's bed.

That embarrassment doesn't escape her, she knows what it's like to feel a bit useless in the face of someone who can do everything, it's how she felt when she first met Cass. It had been easier to deal with when she'd realized Cass couldn't read; not in that she could hold something over her, but that they had a skill they could trade. Steph would teach Cass to read, Cass would teach Steph to fight.

"You help. I don't exactly have many friends here," There's wry self-deprecation in her tone, to ease the fact she's trying to reassure Ellie. She doesn't want to come across as patronizing, "And hey, I'm sure there are plenty of things you can teach a city kid."

Which is true, they might be in a city right now, and Steph does have wilderness survival training, but it sounds like Ellie has done the real thing, and if they get sent on a mission somewhere out in the wild, her experience could save lives.

That she wasn't expecting. "How come? I thought that'd be a vigilante staple." It almost her feel uncomfortable, thinking about the damage her gun had done, that she'd seen them do. Made her feel that shade more criminal, even when Homer insisted that nothing they did could be stealing, or wrong. It was bad enough the looks she got when she carried her gun around, which was almost all time. This was the first time she'd gone out without it, and going out was achievement enough with the uncomfortable density of the crowd.

"Maybe. I dunno. If you figure out how to fix fences then you won't need me around." It's sad, really, how horrified she is by the prospect of being without the others, without people with whom they shared such a desperate mutual reliance. "Or bog a tractor, then I'm your girl, I am a total professional. Building chicken coups? None of that seems that relevant, here."

"That Batman I mentioned, he has a thing against guns, and we're not allowed to use lethal force," There's something cautious in her tone there, not wanting Ellie to interpret the rules Steph follows as a judgement on what she's had to do. Sometimes Steph struggles with that no killing rule, but usually she can find a reason to follow it.

"Ellie," Her tone is a little firm, and she puts a hand on Ellie's arm as if to stop her from talking about herself like this. She's still worried about coming across as patronizing, but she's more concerned right now with making sure Ellie doesn't think she's useless, "You've survived a war for god knows how long, and I'm sure it isn't just 'cause you know how to build a chicken coop."

She doesn't know exactly what skills Ellie must have picked up, but she can imagine there's a lot of them.

Despite herself, she flinches. She catches the caution, of course she does, but these vigilantes who take down criminals and deal out justice inadvertently work in line with that idea of what they do as wrong, lethal. "You guys really are super heroes." Valiantly trying to grin it off, and not fully successful.

"Yeah. No, I know. Just stuff that--" The words aren't there, that frustration simmering at the back of her throat. "I don't know. It's just stupid. I'm a country kid in the city, I'm a guerilla who's meant to just start falling into ranks, and now I'm just--" The words fail again, and she lashes out at the wall. "And every time other people came in, people not just our group, they just treat us like kids that know nothing."

"No, we're vigilantes, we have to leave those decisions for the courts, otherwise no one would tolerate us," That's often the way Steph explains it to herself, when she needs a reminder why she can't just slit the throats of people like Zsasz, or the Joker. What they do is already illegal, but as long as they don't cross that line, the public, and the government, will let them operate.

Her expression falls a little as Ellie talks, and she reaches out again, her hand on Ellie's knee, "I don't care what the Initiative expect, you're not going to fall into ranks and neither am I, okay?" It's solidarity, an offer to stand by Ellie against the Initiative, no matter what.

"The city is our base, it's not where the fights are gonna take us, and we're-- I'm gonna need you out there," She wants to have someone she can rely on, because god knows she can't rely on the Initiative.

"Yeah." Places where the law still operates, the people have a say seem bizarre to her, almost, like some surreal and far off dream. "We're operating because the courts don't and our pollies all buggered off nice and safe to Washington." She's almost deaf to her own bitterness, now. "They'll probably charge us with vandalism or something stupid if things ever get back to normal." When has become a fairy tale.

With a frustrated little groan, she rests her head against Steph's shoulder. "Mm." Grumpy. Sulky, almost, which feels far too teenage to be appropriate. "Right."

She hopes not. Especially not Steph. Her becoming an Initiative crony, that'd be awful, even if she already has it figured that Steph is hardly likely to do that. Questioning and stubborn and in denial about being a super hero. The laugh Steph wins for her vote of confidence is not especially nice. "Think you're scraping the barrel. Maybe some of your bat... bird... people will turn up."

"Funny how politicians do that," It puts her in mind of Gotham after the quake, when everyone with enough money just fled the city, including the politicans. Especially the politicians.

She shifts slightly to better accommodate Ellie, wrapping an arm around her. The laugh just makes her sad, "There are some, actually, but they're not--" There's a pause, as she tries to work out what to say about the subject of Dick and Jason, of the girl Robin. They should be allies, but they're so young. Even back home, Dick or Jason weren't people she trusted.

"They aren't my friends, they're--" Another pause, a sigh, "I dunno. It's complicated. But I can't rely on them."

If anything, she feels like she should be look after them, which might not be fair to the boys, but... Ellie is an equal.

so basically the entire Tomorrow Series

And the "how much can we ruin Ellie's life" sequel trilogy

the answer is "a lot"

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