paradisa | Changes

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winifred burkle

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[Someone's standing on her bed again, navigating a mattress and piled blankets to chose a book from the shelf that lines the length of her ceiling.

...then suddenly the book is chosen for her. And it isn't string theory.

Fred scrambles back down to sit on the edge of the bed, fingers tracing over the pages of a journal. Page after page after page. Every last one of them blank. Something presses against her, from the inside out. She moves to the window, briefly glancing outside of it. Everything seems just the same, but she can't seem to fully push back memories of Libet and the auditorium at the heart of it]

Is everybody alright?

[The words seems impossibly dark and large against the blank expanse of the page]

Is everybody...there?

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Looks that way. [She sounds annoyed. It's both genuine and a cover. She was worried something big was happening.]

Of all the pointless things for this place to do...

I just...[There's a ramble there, somewhere. What if something happens and they forget? There's very little actually written about the castle in the library. Is this its way of absorbing its history? Assuring itself nothing gets left behind?

Finally --]

I just can't like it.

[Silence. She doesn't want to get into how this makes her feel. She's had enough "feelings" from Abel's sudden reappearance and regaining memories. It does stir up something in her. The journal had Matt and Ukitake's voices in it. Elektra can't go back to them whenever she's feeling nostalgic or rather when she admits to missing them.]

I don't like it either but, nothing else seems to be going on yet. Small favors.

[She's still going out to make sure of it soon enough.]

It's been quiet lately.

[It's an explanation, and it isn't. Or maybe her head -- and her heart -- is just especially loud of late. Maybe it just feels like she has more to lose]

You think this is the start of something even if nothing else has happened yet.

[A beat.] I do too.

I decided a long time ago it never really stops.

[She's unquestionably serious]

You probably right about that. I meant nothing violent or outright cruel has happened.

If I had serious concerns those would be it.

I just keep thinking about all those people in Libet. What happened to them. There's nothing to say this isn't how it started.

No, there isn't. We're going to drive ourselves crazy looking for how it started with them so let's not.

I already know we're not going to have the same fate as them. [Simply because she won't allow it. She is going to see Matt and Abby again. This place is not going to take that away from her.]

[Fred knows what is waiting for her outside of Paradisa. That's been made perfectly clear. But there's still a need to understand and navigate what will happen there as well. The last few months have done a lot to put Pylea more firmly behind her.

But that doesn't mean she's forgotten what it felt like to be enslaved with that demon dimension. They're already manipulated here far more than she's alright with. But to toy with their memories?]

You don't know that, Elektra. There's no way any of us can know that.

I know that we fight. I know we usually win even if it isn't as absolute as we'd like it to be.

[One of the few things Elektra believes in here is the people. With the exception of how long things took with Riful they haven't disappointed her.]

If that day ever comes for us, we'll find a way out of it. It won't be pretty or easy. We may not even manage to save all of us but, we'll still win when everything is said and done. It's what we do.

[There's a flicker, a ghost of the smile she usually wore. But with it came that tug. The reminder that no, nothing is inevitable]

We do all tend to be a bit stubborn.

[Some more than others]

Sometimes that's more important than actual power. I really think we want it more.

I'm definitely used to wanting it more.

[That makes her smile.] Well that's part of your charm.

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