dizzyspells | She tied you to a kitchen chair...

[Locke wouldn't have to look around long before a pair of familiar boots came into sight. A lantern sat nearby, illuminating the two. Celes stood before him, dirty and battered from the cave-in, and with a painful looking gash on her forehead. She'd cleaned it up the best she could, but there was only so much she could do with no magic, and dried blood colored her hair red where she hadn't managed to clean it out yet.]

You're awake.

[There was a cold indifference to her voice as it echoed in the caverns around them.]

[Locke hisses a little as his headache protests to the light from the lantern.]

Unfortunately. Remind me not to do that again.

[Ow. He ignores the pounding behind his eyes long enough to manage to focus on the red in her hair. Immediately, he starts up, concerned--]

Hey, are you al-[--and he yelps and falls forward again when he tries to stand. No wonder it had been so hard to move. His wrists were bound together at his back.]

[She started forward, instinctively, when he fell, but stopped herself short of catching him. Frowning, she leaned over to help him back up to a seated position, before checking to make sure the bandana she had liberated from his hair was still holding his wrists together soundly.]

Don't struggle. [She commanded, and Locke might notice that any weapons or dangerous looking trinkets he had been carrying were now laying by the lantern.] If you're cooperative, I'll untie you.

Edited 2013-01-03 10:33 (UTC)

[A few muffled curses later and he's back upright, at least. He shakes his head to try to clear it. None of this is making sense.]

Time and a place, don't you think?

[Muttered in kneejerk and unhappy response, but his head does start to clear and he finally starts to piece together the coolness of her tone, the meaning of her words, and he backtracks, confused.]

What am I cooperating about?

[He's not hurt enough to need immobilizing. (And if he was, she was going about it in a terribly inefficient way.)]

[Once he was upright and settled again, she took a few steps back so she was standing in front of him, watching him carefully and with an expression that, while it wasn't uninterested, it seemed horribly withdrawn, like he was someone to be studied rather than a friend.]

I have questions, and I suggest you be honest with me. First thing though,

[Finally, she crouched down, more on eye-level with him.]

What's your name?

[She draws level with him and looks him in the eye as she asks. And it's just as well that Locke's already on his knees, because the floor seems to fall out from underneath him. His face quickly loses whatever color he'd regained after waking up, and he speaks without thinking, fighting a growing wave of dread.]

What?

[She's watching him carefully, for his reaction. Whatever she had been expecting, her face gave nothing away other than a troubled frown.]

I believe I spoke clearly enough. Surely you remember your own name.

[Remember. There were more than a few holes in Celes' memory. She knew her name, her profession: an Imperial General, but outside of that... vague images of caves and ribbons and bandanas and she really couldn't tell what memory came before another.]

Is something wrong?

[Something is very, very wrong. She'd have to be blind to miss it in his face. Pale, eyes wide with shock or fear, shoulders slack. He barely even seems to hear her.]

No, no, please this can't- Don't tell me-

[It was in his voice as well, hoarse and pleading as he trips over his denials. He doesn't want to accept it, but he can see in her eyes that she doesn't know him. It's not a look he'd ever forget. How could something like that happen again?]

Celes?

[Her name, not his. As if calling out to her would snap her out of it. In his shock, he's neglected to answer either of her questions.]

[His denial was easy enough to read, but it just added to the jumble of questions in place of where Celes' memories once were. Him calling out her name did little more than make her furrow her eyebrows in concentration, trying to remember how he came to know her name. It wouldn't be too hard to learn it, after all, she was an infamous general. But were they friends? He certainly didn't look like an Imperial soldier.]

You didn't answer my question.

[Her face softened slightly.]

I'm not sure what happened but I'm only holding you until I know whether or not you can be trusted. The sooner you start helping me, the sooner we can find a way back to the surface.

[She watched him carefully in the dim light.]

Unless there's a reason you're reluctant to speak.

[Not so reluctant to speak, it didn't really occur to him that he ought to be. At least, not yet. Just flustered and upset and probably babbling (and maybe a little concussed.) She stops him short for a few seconds. Silent, he opened his mouth, but then thought better of it and shut it again. At least she seems to remember herself, if not him, and that manages to be a small comfort, but that would mean she couldn't remember anything that happened after they met in South Figaro and...]

[Well, no wonder she'd taken his weapons. Chest tight, he twists his wrists in his bonds, trying to loosen them enough to slip out.]

Look, the cave collapsed, and...I'll explain just let me- Celes you're hurt.

[She made an annoyed sound in the back of her throat. Locke, you are not very good at listening.

Stop struggling.

[She rose to her feet, stepping forward to grab his hair, forcing him to look up at her.]

Are you a member of the resistance? You don't look like you're from Vector. I may not remember how I got here, but I wasn't born yesterday. Tell me what's going on. What did you do to my magic?

[The calm tone of her voice broke at the last part, and she sounded worried, confused and maybe a little scared. Even if she wasn't born with magic, it's been a part of her for as long as she could remember and it was just... gone. She'd been silenced before, or run out of magical energy but this was different.]

[There are a lot of reasons Locke would make a lousy soldier, and being bad at taking orders isn't the least of them. But he does stop struggling when she orders him to, if only because she grabs him by the hair and forces his head up to look at her. And he cannot bring himself to look away. Now he does hesitate to speak. Claps his jaw shut in what is probably damning silence. He'd seen shades of Celes-the-general before, she wore it as a habit, especially back in the early days. And they'd had plenty times when they'd failed to see eye to eye. But never had she ever looked at him like an enemy.]

[His jaw works, pushing back heartache and simply at a loss as to how to talk himself out of this particular corner. She deserves to hear the truth. That there is no resistance, not anymore. That her Empire is gone and it's partly her own doing. Unfortunately, he's not all that sure how he's supposed to make her take his word for it. And then, she asks about her magic, and he can't help a sharp intake of breath. Somehow, it had slipped his mind completely.]

[Tension clear in the air, he locks eyes with her for what feels like a very long time. Searching desperately for a hint of renegotiation and finding none. Finally:]

Celes. I'm sorry, it's- [His voice breaks. His mouth is dry.] I swear, it's not what you think. But it's a damn long story and we don't have time to be sitting around while I tell it.

[They need to try to get out of here as soon as possible. Before the ground shifts again and they're buried for good in the next collapse, before they suffocate, before they find themselves trapped and lost for too long because the paths they had followed are gone. He pulls at the bandana wound around his wrists a little harder. His voice and his expression remain earnest.]

I'm not going to hurt you. I wouldn't. I promise.

[Celes watched the man for a long time, trying to read any hint of betrayal, but either he was a very good actor, or he wasn't lying. Celes wasn't sure which, but she almost wanted to believe him, and the word "promise" makes something in her heart ache in a way that confused her.]

[After a minute of contemplation, she released his hair, walking over to the pile of weapons and carefully placing them on her person before moving around behind him, crouching down to untie the bandana.]

Fine, but if you try to trick me. I won't need my magic to take care of you.

[It's a long minute, as she weighs her options. When she releases him, he slumps a bit in relief. (Or something else. Relieved, but only because he's too dazed and too heartsick and too stubborn to allow himself despair.) He lets his head hang for a while as she frees him, hair hanging too long without the bandana she's liberated from him, obscuring his expression. Eyes closed against the dull pounding behind them.]

...Yeah, I know.

[It's almost fond, despite it all. Celes is a match for him at the best of times, and he knows it. He doesn't try to stand right away when she allows it. Just shakes out his freed wrists and reaches up to gingerly examine the wound at his temple. There's dried blood tracing all the way down his jawline. He winces.]

How long was I out?

[She stands again, holding the bandana out for him.]

I'm not sure, awhile longer than I was out.

[And she had no idea how long she was out. It felt like a long time, but she wasn't sure if the loss of memories made it feel longer.]

Do you know the way out of here?

I did.

[Once. Things might be a bit different, now. It was hard to know for sure. He shakes his head and looks back up at Celes. Looks very much like he'd like to say something, but instead he just takes his bandana back and ties it back over his hair to keep it away from his face.]

If we're lucky it was an isolated collapse and we can follow the same path out once we dig ourselves out of here.

[If they aren't lucky, they'll have to do a whole lot more digging. And that's the best case scenario. He pulls himself to his feet and carefully approaches the wall of rubble that hadn't been there before the collapse. After a moment of quiet, interrupted only by the shifting of the rubble:]

Where should I start?

[With the explaining, not the digging, though he doesn't clarify.]

Edited 2013-01-07 08:20 (UTC)

[She trailed behind him, finding herself watching him more than looking for a way out, but would almost always avert her eyes when he would look at her. It was hard to look him in the eyes, they looked so sad, and she didn't know why.]

You could tell me how we got down here. Where are we?

[She'd like to ask him his name again, but maybe a different approach would be better.]

[He seems to find it just as hard to look at her in turn. And yet he can't seem to stop. There's no shortage of quick, furtive glances thrown back at her, but he shifts his eyes back to his work just as quickly as they come. Forces his hands to be steady as he canvasses the rock walls for cracks. There's a part of his own foundation that is very quickly crumbling underneath him. Right now it's overshadowed by the fundamental fact that he needs to get them out in order to save her, and that is enough to keep him going.]

Climbed, mostly. We're just a few days to Mobliz, if we can get topside.

[Traveling down the serpent's trench to meet up with Terra and her kids for the first time in months.]

Stopped to do a little treasure hunting.

Mobliz? [Her eyebrows furrowed in confusion,] We're on the Veldt?

[That was... a long way from anywhere she had any right to be. The Empire hadn't reached any farther east than Doma, and as far as she could remember, Celes wasn't stationed anywhere near there.]

I'm a general, not some adventurer. How did I get all the way out here.

[Concentrating the faint breeze he could feel coming through a crevice in the wall, he answers without thinking.]

No, we were tracing down the trench until-

[The familiar phrase (I'm a general, not some--) throws him right back into the present. Catching himself, he stutters off. Of course, she wouldn't know you couldn't walk to Mobliz from the Veldt anymore. Well, she'd find out sooner or later. He keeps his back to her and his eyes firmly on his work.]

Believe me, you're not going to have to worry about your duties anymore, General.

[And as much as it might come off as one, it isn't a threat.]

[She had just been about to ask about the trench but his next words stopped her short, making her arch her eyebrows sharply. Even if it wasn't a threat, it was definitely alarming, and she once again considered the idea that she had been kidnapped.]

What do you mean?

[There was a certain sick feeling of dread that wormed it's way into her stomach. She remembered having questioned the purpose of the war, and she certainly hadn't turned out to be the perfect soldier the Emperor was hoping for, but... she didn't have to worry about her duties? Was she demoted or...?]

[He tells himself he can't find it in him to believe that Celes would hurt him. Not anymore. And yet he takes a while to figure out how to continue. What sort of answer would earn him a foothold instead of a sword at his back. He works the tips of his fingers into the cracks in the stone and opts for the simplest version of the truth.]

Gesthal's done for. Has been for months.

[Years, even.]

[Celes was good at masking her emotions at the worst of times, but this took her entirely by surprise, and she couldn't help but gawk. It took her several seconds to find words, and when she did, it wasn't the calm, emotionless general speaking,]

That's impossible! I can't have forgotten that much.

[She gritted her teeth, taking a moment to get her voice under control.]

Besides, even if he had, there's still an army, still a nation to fight for.

[He flinches at the rare, strident tone of her voice, and some of the wall he's working on shifts dangerously. Celes, you have no idea how much you've forgotten.]

[Can't much blame her for it. The Empire had raised her, created her, had taught her to defend and protect it. (At least, until its methods had become too much for her to accept.) And here he was, taking all that away in the blink of an eye.]

[Carefully, he shakes his head.]

There isn't. War's over. The Empire's gone.

[And even after all this time, there's still a note in his voice that says "good riddance."]

You're lying. [Her voice was assertive, but there was a hint of doubt there,]

Or maybe you got hit in the head as hard as I did. An Empire can't just disappear in a night.

I'm not a liar.

[Defensive, all of a sudden. Sorry Celes, but it turns out an Empire can disappear overnight. And it's been a hell of a lot longer than one night since then. He stops what he's doing to look at her, seriously.]

I'm not. Why would I lie to you?

[What would he gain? If he'd wanted her on his side, he'd claim to be a part of the Empire, not claim to have seen it fall.]

[She seems to falter, all of that bravado lost as she tries to regain her footing, metaphorically.]

I don't know. I don't even know who you are, or how I got to the Veldt, so how am I supposed to know what to believe?

[They're still not on the Veldt. It's not all that important. He lets it pass.]

Celes, please, if you-

[His voice breaks, and he stops talking. Stands before the crumbled face of the cave and stares at her in the dim light of the lantern and tries to keep himself together long enough to get them both to safety.]

[He's self aware enough to know that little he's said since he woke would have sounded very coherent or comforting. She's better at hiding it than Rachel had been, back when she'd woken confused and scared after her accident. But while Celes was still a mystery to Locke in a lot of ways, he knew her well enough to see that she wasn't able to fool him completely.]

I know how all this must sound. But you and I, we- We've been friends for a long time, now.

[Hesitated, there. Just a little.]

What can I do to help you trust me?

[Most of what he's said sounded like something you might hear from a crackpot roaming the streets, claiming about the end of days coming, but he looked so serious, so earnest.

She tore her eyes away from him, chewing on her lower lip. It was a small gesture, but a break in her cool, controlled demeanor.]

Just get us out of here. I need to see the truth with my own eyes.

[He almost looks like he wants to insist on proving himself. Instead, he sighs, shoulders hanging low, and turns back to where he was trying to dig them out of the cavern. He works in rigid silence for a while. But eventually, he begins to hum a tune under his breath. Low and steady and mostly on key, if not entirely cheery. And he only breaks it when he breaks through the rockslide.]

And there we are.

[Triumphantly, and a little muffled. If Celes looks, she'll see him leaning through the narrow passage he'd cleared.]

There's light up there. We might be in luck.

[She didn't say anything as he worked, just waited and listened to the song. It was familiar somehow, she didn't know what it was from, but it felt like she could hum the tune along with him, though she never joined in.

When he finally called back for her, she leaned in. It was a tight squeeze, but sure enough there was a cool breeze coming from where Locke was waiting.]

...So are you going to tell me your name?

[Here's her attempt at light conversation as she worked to follow him through the path he'd cleared.]

[It's narrow, but Celes would fit through with no problem, especially once she'd handed their things over to Locke before squeezing through herself. He takes the supplies in one hand, and offers the other to her to take to keep herself from falling. Now they're getting somewhere.]

[His good cheer takes a blow, though. It runs through him at her question, fingers twitching together, brows knitted. ...Oh. Right.]

[A heartbeat of silence, then:]

...It's Locke.

Locke.

[Did the name sound familiar? If there was any hint of recognition, it was lost in her voice. She eyed the outstretched hand, and all but ignored it to pull herself up on her own.]

How long have we known each other?

[She didn't know how much of his word she could trust, but for now, it was the only thing she had.]

[He withdraws his hand only after she's safely through. Doesn't hand his bag back to her, just slings it over a shoulder (though she still has his weapons.)]

Uh-

[But he stumbles over that, because the calender got a little fuzzy after the world ended and they'd spent a lot of time separated and the very situation that had him answering questions like these was enough to shake him to the core.]

Two years? Almost three, maybe.

[She simply raises an eyebrow at that, but doesn't speak up to call him a liar. If he was lying, he'd have to be pretty gutsy to claim that long, especially since it meant that she was missing several years worth of memories.]

That's a long time. Do we often go traipsing around caves like this?

I did say we stopped to do some treasure hunting.

[He gives her a weak imitation of his usual smile before he turns toward the dim light and the fresh air and starts to lead them out of the cave.]

Sometimes we go traipsing around other places as well.

Seems like I've turned into quite the adventurer.

[She doesn't say much more as he leads her out, and, indeed is stopped speechless the moment she steps from the cave. She wasn't an expert on the Veldt, but she was fairly sure it was supposed to be a vast grassland not... this rocky terrain they were stepping out on. In the distance, she could see the water which... she wasn't sure, but it didn't look as blue as she remembered it. And behind her, over the peeks of the caves that had just come out of, an impossibly tall tower loomed over the peeks of the mountains. She knew for sure there was no building like that on the Veldt... or anywhere else in the world. She's never seen a structure so tall, it made the Emperor's palace look like a toy house in comparison.

When she spoke up again, most of the confident general was gone, and her voice was a mix of awe, and concern.]

...Where did you say we were again?

I like to think you always had it in you.

[Mildly teasing, if subdued by circumstance. When they reach daylight, he hangs by the mouth of the cave to watch her reaction. Carefully. As if seeing the state of the world might knock something in her memory loose.]

Serpent's Trench. A few days out from Mobliz.

But... the Serpent's Trench-

[She didn't need to finish her sentence, anyone with half a brain would know that the Serpent's Trench was under water. There was no way they could be standing on it. Yet, Locke's words sounded honest, and with the large tower behind them, and the loss of her magic...

Suddenly she felt a little lightheaded, and the look she gave Locke was a wary one.]

Maybe you should tell me what's going on.

[Anyone with half a brain would know that. It's just...not all that accurate anymore. He pushes himself off the mouth of the cave and gives her a small, sad, sympathetic sort of smile.]

Yes, but while I do- [As he speaks, he shrugs off his bag again and drops it to the ground. There isn't a lot of daylight left, and here is as good a place to stay as any, as long as they stayed clear of anything that might collapse again. And both of them could probably stand to sit still for a while.]

D'you mind if I have a look at that?

[With an abbreviated gesture toward the cut on her temple. It was hard to tell how deep it was through the blood in her hair.]

[She reached up, touching the wound on her head tenderly before nodding and walking over to take a seat on a grassy spot not too far from where Locke had dropped the bag. The blood loss or just the confusion of what was going on was setting in and sitting down sounded like a good idea right now.]

I tried to patch it up but without my magic... and there wasn't much to work with down there.

[He drops down in front of her, close and crosslegged. Hesitates a moment, then reaches up carefully to pull her blood-stiffened hair away from the wound.]

I would have helped if you didn't tie me up.

[There isn't any real heat in it, but the humor is weak as well.]

She tied you to a kitchen chair...

:'D

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randomly, two months later