towerofanimus | it's not a cry you hear at night (backdated to the 21st)

Characters: Hallelujah (possibly Allelujah) and anyone.
Setting: Floor 39 (gymnasium) (day), Floor 75 (tower) (night)
Format: Either.
Summary: Hallelujah has grown frustrated with Allelujah's silence, and has taken to trying to beat out his frustration on anything and everything.
Warnings: Talk of Richtofen which itself is a warning, mentions of vivisection, character death, gore. Also heavy swearing and violence warnings as per usual with Hallelujah.

[Floor 39]

[Every goddamn day he comes here, and every goddamn day he trains. All the details are fuzzy, but he's still determined to get even stronger than he already is in order to kick that guy's ass. He can't explain how that horrible experience made him feel - upset, angry, afraid. The last one is an emotion he's never supposed to feel. So how does this even work? He's not a person. He's just part of one.]

[He punches the punching bag again and again, the fabric starting to split. He has some fabric wrapped around his knuckles but they're also starting to grow red.]

[Floor 75]
[A Chocobo zooms out of the darkness, making a line for Hallelujah. He doesn't care. The birdlike creature is met with a roar, Hallelujah reaching out to grab the thing by the neck and twist, breaking it. He kicks the body, over and over.]

Dammit, just answer me! Stop fucking hiding!

[A Bullfairy flies at him, interested, but he grabs it from the air and squeezes, crushing it.]

Say something!

[He carries on like this for a while, not caring if anyone comes up the stairs and hears him. He's already thought of as crazy, so who the hell cares?]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[If the older memories are like this - like this, but worse - Sheba can see why Hallelujah has warned her away from them. She steels herself against the memories as she gets a feel for them, tries not to dwell too much on the blood and the screaming and the fear -

It's hard, though. It makes her stomach clench uncomfortably and her hands clench into fists, her nails digging into the palms of her hands. But there's something else; she feels as though she's being watched. Which means he's in here, somewhere.

Allelujah, answer me! She focuses on the awareness - it's strange, to be looking for someone within their own mind. Why are you hiding?

Her consciousness brushes a few stray memories, but she only pays a brief attention to them. Hallelujah's asked her not to peer to closely, after all. But she sort of skims them rather than reads them, because she needs to come to some sort of an understanding as to what made Allelujah hole up like this if she's supposed to draw him out.]

[In answer, a memory rears up in front of her, pulling her in.]

[- the lights are flickering. She's in the Tower, but it's the hospital level, dirty and filthy. It's hard to tell what's going on, because she can't move.

The pain is intense, and there's a figure in a surgical mask over her, waving a bleeding piece of muscle tissue at her. It's hers, she can tell from the concentration of pain where it should be.

The figure places his scalpel against her body again and starts cutting, working his way to the internal organs. There's darkness, and then after a while, she can see what's going on as if it's through a window. There's pain, but it's far away. A knife comes down, and there's screaming, in Allelujah's voice.

The pain from her chest is intense, as the knife plunges into her heart. Hallelujah spits out a last "f... fuck... off..." before everything goes dark.]

... I'm the weak one. I'm the one who can't handle pain or anger. He's... starting to become his own person. Even though this body was originally mine... if he's more of a person than I am, I have no right to stand in his way. ... And this body isn't mine anymore. Not after years of experiments. It's just a 'thing'.

Ah-!

[The memory is sudden, and she doesn't think to cut off the connection as she is drawn into it. She recognizes the surroundings, at least; feels the pain that isn't actually hers but still seems all too real; and realizes that this may have been one of the last things Allelujah experienced before walling himself up and ceding control of his body to Hallelujah.

Even in his mind, even in his memory, Sheba feels winded and out of breath, like she had been screaming. She knows she wasn't, not really. It takes her a moment to move past the horrific vision and respond.

That's not true. You're a person, too - and it's the both of you together that make you strong. You're both people... maybe you're two sides of the same coin. That doesn't make either one of you any less. And he needs you. He asked me to come looking for you, you know. And you - you, Allelujah - have friends here who are worried about you, who want to see you. Nobody wants you to just vanish. You're not weak. You might think you are, but you're not.]

[There's a sound like a sigh, before Allelujah appears in front of her. He has his head down though, and there's an air of sadness around him.]

[I know I do. It's just difficult to try to think of them as friends. The last friend I had... I didn't see her for many years, and then when I met her again she was trying to kill me.]

[The image of an angry-looking young woman appears to her, who morphs into a very pale little girl in a glass case.]

[I don't want to hurt people, but with Hallelujah around I'll always have the risk. I just want to know what it's like to have a more normal life and normal connections, but I'm not normal. So they'll never be normal. And I'm a failure. I was supposed to be terminated. I'm modified and I'm tough and I'm supposed to be the perfect soldier but I can't even correctly be what I've been modified to be.]

[I'm just... very tired of trying to trust people and then it ending in failure, either from them or from me.]

[She is quiet, if relieved, when Allelujah finally appears. He seems sad, but that he's appeared at all means that some kind of progress is being made.

Sheba notes the similarities between the angry woman and the pale girl, and then she sighs. Any words of consolation she has to offer him would feel hollow - she's never been through that kind of thing. She can't really understand how it feels for something like that to happen, though she does understand loss. Just not that specific kind of it.

You don't have to be perfect. Her expression is serious. Being imperfect is part of being human, and modified or no, you are human. It doesn't mean you're a failure. It just means there's more that you're meant for than what you might think.

It's still possible for you to make the bonds you want to, Allelujah. It'll take time and there will be ups and downs, especially because of where we are right now, but it's possible. The only way it'll never happen is if you run away instead of continuing to try. Please... try again?

She holds out her hand to him.

Failure, success... the end results aren't what's important. It's the journey that is. That's how you make lasting connections. You can still do it.]

[He's quiet for a few long moments, before reaching out to take her hand. There's an audible sigh from Hallelujah, and his posture tightens a bit as Allelujah takes control.]

[There's the image of Hallelujah heading into a room and closing a door, a wall springing up in front of it. He is so done with everything right now.]

[She smiles as he takes her hand and is vaguely aware of Hallelujah retreating into his own mental room. It's the last thing she sees before she eases out of their mind. She supposes that after all this frustration he deserves a break, but if he tries to just vanish, too, she'll badger him just as she badgered Allelujah.

And speaking of that... once she's no longer actively reading their mind, she becomes more aware of their surroundings in the cafeteria. She looks around briefly before looking up to the man in front of her.]

Thank you, Allelujah.

[He rubs the back of his neck a little, before speaking up.]

I'm the one who should be thanking you. And apologizing, both for bringing you into this mess and for what you saw. Please... don't speak of what you saw to anyone. I don't want to get other people involved.

Don't apologize. You're not really the one who got me involved, anyway - [She makes a face and rubs at the back of her neck.] Hallelujah was. [Seriously, he could have just asked before grabbing her.]

I won't tell anyone, I promise. But if you ever want to talk, or if you ever need anything, let me know, okay?

[He's not going to make the argument that they're the same person. Not right now, at least.]

... Thank you. I really do appreciate it.

You're welcome! We all have to look out for each other here, right?

[To be fair, Sheba might separate them a little much. Two sides of the same coin they might be, but she wouldn't call heads tails or tails heads.]

it's not a cry you hear at night (backdated to the 21st)

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Sorry for how late this is! The infiltration ate my soul. But you knew that already. XD

No problem. /o/

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