I'm not crazy, I'm just a little unwell

[songbird9.livejournal.com]

Who: Song and Chase
Where: Radiant Garden castle
When: Saturday night (technically Sunday morning)
What: An emotionally unstable ex-Nobody with a delusion-inducing fever... yeah, this ain't gonna be pretty.
Luckily there's a Chase to the rescue.



The clock on her laptop read 3:48 AM. She wasn't using the laptop, but she hadn't turned it off. iTunes still shuffled through random songs, the volume so low that no words could be distinguished, only faint, ghostly melodies. But the owner of the computer wasn't there to read its time or hear its quiet song. The room was empty. Cold wind blew through a half-open window to billow the curtains and lift the feathers tied to her dreamcatcher.

It was far too cold for the end of May in Radiant Garden. The wind had picked up shortly after dusk and had not let up. It was the reason she'd gone, having woken in the middle of the night tangled in sweat-soaked sheets, afire with fever and dazed out of her normally sharp common sense. She was too hot, the wind outside was cold, so she'd gone to it, clothed only in a sleeveless faux-silk nightgown the color of the sky before dawn. The wind dried her sweat and chilled her, but she didn't retreat form it. she'd wanted cool and it had given that to her, then she'd seen something pale and tall against the star-strewn sky and her muddled thoughts had drifted elsewhere. She seemed not to notice the unnatural winds even as her body shivered under their unceasing barrage. Step by barefoot step, she made her way to the castle.

Her body was moving automatically, following a specific path with no bidding from conscious thought. Her mind was elsewhere. Even a minor fall on the stairs induced no response beyond a mindless stagger to regain her footing before she continued. She remained virtually oblivious to her surroundings until her body reached its goal; a seemingly inconsequential room in one of the twisting towers high above the radiant city.

It was someone's bedchamber, though it looked to have gone unused for some time, everything impeccably neat and covered in a fine layer of dust. It was a nice room, not overly large or extravagant, yet still managing to impart a sense of nobility. It did not, however, look like the room of a prince, but then, the royalty of Radiant Garden had long been rather informal compared to those of more old-fashioned kingdoms. After all, the king and his adopted son were scientists before they were royalty. Such was the way of this forward-thinking city.

Of course, Ansem was no longer the king, and his son was certainly not the person he'd been in the past, but in this timeless section of the castle, none of that made much of a difference.

It was in the open doorway of that room, standing with her hand braced on the wall, that Song suddenly became fully aware of her surroundings, waking wide-eyed as if she'd been pulled violently out of a dream. she stood for a long moment, simply staring into the room and swaying ever so slightly on weakened legs. Then her expression became a harsh grimace and she moved stormily towards the bed, slamming her hands down on the edge of it and digging her fingers into the covers in a display of rage.

"You!" she shouted at thin air. "You, you, you. Always you! Why won't you leave me alone?!" Her voice wavered between anger and despair, thick as if with unshed tears. Her aqua colored eyes were glazed and confused by the same fever that addled her mind. "I said I was sorry! I said I was wrong! Why won't you talk to me? Why won't you forgive me? I forgave you for everything. Everything!" With unexpected force, she shifted her grip on the blankets and yanked them clean away from the bed, swinging them in a wide arc across the room to let them scatter chaotically over the floor. It was the greatest show of fury she could commit here. Even as delusional as she was, it simply wasn't in her nature to do any real damage.

"I forgave you. And you left me." She stared down at the array of blankets, and then sunk slowly to her knees, raising a hand to her aching head. "...Left me behind to burn. Oh gods, I'm on fire...." Her eyes welled with tears which refused to fall. Whether they were of physical pain or of sorrow was impossible to tell.

"Please..." the huddled figure begged of the empty room. "Please say something... Please forgive me... Please, I need... need to know... Please forgive me."

And the rest was black.

If someone were to enter that room before too late the next day - perhaps to investigate an out-of-place noise, or follow a path of doors left ajar - they would find the ill young lady passed out across the splayed bedcovers, dreaming fitful dreams.

Comments

[apollo-chase.livejournal.com]

Chase was up late again.

She was worried and fretting over things that were beyond her control. She felt guilty for not being able to help her friends, for being one of the tiny few of the Refugees' allies who weren't affected by the illness that was spreading like wildfire. She didn't know what to do, other than offer words of support and encouragement and optimism. All she knew was that this wasn't supposed to be happening - hadn't the worlds granted them wishes of peaceful futures? Hadn't they promised good health and happiness?

So why...?

And then there was Josiah. Her neighbor and friend. The person who was the reason she was here in the first place. Not knowing what she could do to help him was frustating her to no end, knowing that he was suffering and everyone was suffering and she...was useless.

She was walking aimlessly around Radiant Garden, a thermos of steaming coffee held in her hands and her sweatshirt hood pulled up. How had things become so dire, so quickly? She didn't even want to think what the others back on Earth were going- her line of thought stopped as she saw a faintly familiar figure up ahead.

"Song...?" she breathed quietly. It was late, the former Nobody was sick, and she was wandering off to the castle...? What in the world was going on? She set her jaw into a determine expression, and quietly fell in step some distance behind the dark-haired young woman. She wasn't sure how strong the affects of this strange flu was, but if it caused sleepwalking...she remembered reading somewhere that waking a sleepwalker was a bad idea.

She followed Song into the castle, not even paying attention to her surroundings, only worried about the young woman who she had only met a handful of times in the past. Somewhere along the way, she tripped over her shoelaces, and cursed herself as she quickly bent down to retie the wayward strings. Her fingers nearly stumbled over themselves in her hurry, and by the time she got to herself set, Song had already disappeared around a corner.

It took her another good ten minutes to find her. But by then, whatever had happened...Chase stopped, looking into the room, and the girl sprawled out on the floor. Sentimentality wasn't Chase's fortitude - she tried to portray the tough girl attitude as best she could. But something about the scene in the room...something about it broke her heart.

She walked over to Song, placing the back of her hand against her forehead, and hissed at the heat. The same feeling of complete uselessness swept over her, but she swallowed it. She wanted to help. She was one of the few people who could do it now, and she wanted to...no, she needed to make sure her friends were okay.

"Song...?" she murmured quietly, gently shaking the other woman's shoulder. I wonder if I could find Rainbow's End from here..., she thought belatedly if she had to take Song back on her own.