A MEMORY CALLED PRINCESS
The Heir
"Hello! I'm your family! My name is Eva! What's yours?"
Bea watches as Eva regales the young child with mostly exaggerated tales about her father, the little girl's eyes wide as saucers as she clings to every word her Princess says. She half listens to what Eva is saying, instead turning her attention towards the rather nervous looking guard watching all of them.
Bea stares at the guard, making sure not to blink to unsettle him further. Eventually it's him that cracks first, looking away as an understanding passes between them. Gloria need not know.
She returns her attention to Eva and the girl, Angelica the dossier said. Old memories of a mother long gone tickling the back of her mind
It's Angelica's first Sol Invictus as a Princess and she can already see why Auntie Eva was always so tired.
The D'Oro Palace was filled with guests from all over the country, and even some from outside of it. Those ones are mostly from CanMexico and ZOLON though. The palace's hall was filled with people chatting, eating and drinking; while she herself sat on the throne as a Princess should.
The noise hurt her head and the smell made her hungry but some of the maids were nice enough to pass her snacks as Momma and Mister Villa talked to all the adults for her.
It's her first Sol Invictus and Angelica doesn't wanna ruin it by complaining that everything is too bright, people are too mean to Auntie Eva now that she's gone or by saying anything about how Momma and Mister Villa keep glaring at each other when they think Angelica isn't looking.
"Are you alright, Your Grace?" Miss Cece asks next to her. She's one of her new friends after she became Princess, even if Angelica knows she's only her friend because Uncle Ion and Miss Laevateinn ordered her to be.
Angelica puts on her Princess-like smile before responding.
"We're merely happy to see our subjects enjoying the fruits of peace. The strain of our responsibilities on this holy day is merely unfamiliar to us." There, polite and disarming enough for a Princess. Just like Auntie Eva taught her in the rare times she visited the manor.
"If you're certain, your Grace." Miss Cece says with a shallow bow, Angelica tries her best not to pout with how clearly she isn't believing her words.
"I am!" She nearly raises her voice, before remembering where she is.
Even still a number of the guests turn to look at her, hearing her outburst. Angelica shrinks into herself at people's unwanted attention. She's being a bad Princess, what is she going to do….
"Would you wish to have Lord Ion's gift returned to you?" Angelica perks up at Cece's words. She nods as excitedly as she could, ignoring the stares people were now giving her.
Banana's her new cat, he's bright yellow and warm despite being made of metal. Uncle Ion gave him to her for Christmas, which is apparently a celebration that the Catholics have. Idly she wonders if Auntie Eva celebrated Christmas.
Sighing, Cece leaves her side to retrieve the mechanical ZOLON feline, the cat having been separated from Angelica earlier due to Momma being all worried.
Banana struts up to the throne with Cece in tow. The cat, despite obviously being a robot like a lot of the other ZOLON knights, is still a cat.
The metal parts only make him look cooler.
The feline leaps up to her throne's armrest, before prancing down to rest on Angelica's lap. He turns his gaze at all the guests that had been staring at her, who've suddenly decided that their meals are more interesting than their Princess.
Despite herself, Angelica lets out a pretty un Princess-like giggle.
Maybe this Sol Invictus isn't so bad.
Angelica didn't understand what was happening.
The day had been going great! Everyone was complimenting her dress, and she got to see Momma again even if she looked tired and stressed.
She was gonna be Auntie Eva's ring bearer! Why is everyone suddenly whispering and arguing all scared?
"Your Highness, we have to leave." One of Auntie Bea's guards had whispered to her ear as they grabbed her and led her away from the Wedding Hall, leaving the important guests and her new Uncle behind.
She was already in the safehouse when the leaflets and papers started falling.
The Mirror
"You've lost family too haven't you? You must be so alone."
Bea can almost believe that Eva is being sincere as she says those words. Maybe she actually is. Nevertheless, Eva weaves the young Gertrude's sorrow into a web to ensnare the young pilot, something that's increasingly becoming her Princess' modus operandi with all of her knights.
To, admittedly, impressive effect.
Still, she makes a mental note to begin clearing out any evidence of the truth regarding the garrison. No matter how close or how much Eva flirts or leads her Knights on, none of them are trusted enough to know what she knows. And, as Bea looks at Eva, to see what she sees.
But…that treacherous part of her always whispers. As she sees Gerturde so desperately cling to Eva's touch, even through her glove, like someone clinging to flotsam in the middle of the ocean; Bea can't help but wonder.
The South of Jaburo, the border with Amazonia specifically, had always been the most rebellious part of the country following the Civil War. It had only been the near omni present surveillance and repression of Condor that had kept it restive.
It was where the most insidious policies of Condor were refined and practiced. Infiltration, subversion, and division. It was through those methods that Condor kept the Republicans that had stayed behind and Socialists at each other's throats.
Back in Quito, the Countess just had them thrown and forgotten in a jail cell.
The valley her group was currently operating out of was as far from home as CanMex was for Gertrude. She'd spent most of her childhood in a farm in the countryside of Quito, her father had been a tenant farmer for one of the many plantations in the region eking out a living to support her and his brother.
It was only the generosity of the Cult and her brother's pay after he'd joined the army that kept both of them fed in those days.
Her father was a proud loyal Sun-fearing servant of the Crown. Sometimes Gertrude wonders what he'd think of her now.
"Again!" She barks as she pushes her B-Sharp forward; her training partner's stance was exploitable and painfully so. Their stance was all wrong, their inexperience and hesitance at piloting somehow visible through tons of steel.
The remaining Knights of the Round would not hesitate to gore that cockpit, and kill the rookie inside. She knows she never did.
She casually backhands her enemy's efforts to shield themselves with her suit's empty arm. With the opponent wide open, she slams the blunt edge of her B-Sharps Heat Axe right where the cockpit should be. Dead.
"That's enough. Next batch in an hour!" Despite her defection, the military discipline instilled in her remains, despite her best wishes. She's simply too proud to let it go. The Algerian ticket burning a hole in her wallet is a testament to that.
As the small crowd of rebels and guerillas watching her fight begins to disperse, a sizable chunk of them defectors like her. Gertrude exhales and leans back into her chair, exhausted from training and sparring with the new recruits for an entire day.
It's her job as the best pilot in the cell, likely the best pilot of the Republicans in Jaburo.
"Hey, boss! Why don't you take five yourself! You've been cooped up there the whole day." Glancing at one of her B-Sharps monitors, she can see a small group of pilots, defectors one and all, calling out to invite her to drinks.
For a second the exhaustion seeping into her bones almost makes her consider it.
Gertrude feels the touch of her Princess' glove on her hand and—
"No!"
She jerks up at attention, all but shouting the adrenaline rushing through her body. Her sudden movement sends the console flying, slamming it onto the side of her cockpit causing all of her personal touches and mementos to fall from where they'd been kept.
"Jeez, you sound strung up. Just take care of yourself—" She doesn't bother hearing the rest as she mutes the outside sensors, granting her sweet silence.
In that cockpit Gertrude sinks even deeper into herself. What is fucking wrong with her.
There on the floor, she sees it. Her locket. Her little outburst caused it to fall from the glove compartments she'd put it in.
With hesitant hands, Gertrude picks it up. Inside was a picture of her brother, one he'd taken and left with her while she was studying at military academy, having been scouted for talent by the Cult. He was assigned to a fort near the Amazonian brother.
The other side of the locket is empty, only scraps of the picture that had once been there remain.
Anger begins to roil inside Gertrude's chest, that same impotent worthless futile anger that had gotten her ensnared by
her in the first place. Her grip on her locket tightening.
Her brother had served as a loyal soldier of Jaburo for years. His reward was getting murdered by the one he swore an oath to and being used as an excuse to forward one woman's ambitions. He was a fool.
Just like her.
She snaps it shut and returns to the isolation of her cockpit.
Gertrude stares ahead, her mind unable—refusing to process what it had heard.
She's been in the camp for a few days now, one of many captured after Marshal Artemi surrendered the Army. She'd heard rumors of what was happening back in Jaburo, tales of a coup, assassination, a plot; all of which she had given no mind. Far too focused on managing the dragoons and other Mobile Knights caught in the pocket.
If she had listened then would it hurt less?
All around, the other prisoners were reacting to the recordings, the confessions, in their own way. The Amazonians had the pilots co-mingling with the common infantry man in the camps, so it was more varied than expected. Shock, anger, denial, some even laughed.
Gertrude heard none of it. Unable to hear, unable to breath, unable to think. She felt like puking but nothing would come out of her throat. Her skin felt dirty, even though she'd just taken a bath.
No. She would've denied it. Nothing could make it not hurt.
The Knight
"I entrust my well-being to you. Though I know you won't disappoint."
The saccharine sweetness of Eva's words hurts Bea's teeth, like she'd bit directly into a sugar cane. Although, of the Jaburian entourage welcoming Old Walder's replacement, only she can tell Eva's words are a little faked.
Bea looks over Gregorius, Eva's new personal knight generously chosen by the cult, as he and his retinue are welcomed to the Margraviate properly. She finds herself less than impressed by the lack of a certain light that motioned to higher thought. She can feel the edge of her lip droop down as she notices him staring at Eva in a way that she's even less impressed by. Surely the Cult can scrounge up another replacement before the New Years—
She's interrupted by that line of thought by the sound of Eva snapping her fingers, signalling the beginnings of the planned feast. As the Knight and his Cult delegation head off to the palace's dining hall, Bea sees a contemplative look crossing Eva's face. The one she always has when she's scheming something.
She can't possibly be—
It is one of the most holy days of the Apollo-Mithran faith, where the righteous all across Jaburo spend it in celebration. The rats however, scheme and plot against their betters, Catholic and Republican alike.
Gregorius stretches his cybernetic arm out towards the fleeing rat, a maid from the Palace that had been seen carrying papers and items to some unknown nest of dissidents. Two fingers fire off, connected to the rest of his fist by a metal wire, they impale themselves onto the maids back, electrocuting the rat until she's nothing more than a drooling twitching thing on the floor of the winding alleyways of the city.
"Pick her up, interrogate her when she wakes." His Royal Guard escort hurriedly goes to grab the maid and sling a bag over her head, carrying the rat to a dungeon underneath the city's fort for interrogation.
Such drudgery is typically beneath Gregorius and his knights, but since the cowards of Condor are nowhere to be found following His Princess' disappearance, such tasks have fallen to him and his.
Even still, such grunt work is beneath his station. But very few people can be trusted these days, so many in his Margraviate in the pocket of those machines who call themselves people. While Villa's worms are too soft to dirty their hands with the necessary work. Not even counting the cowards who had called themselves His Princess' Knights who had fled abroad.
Though it has given him an excuse to not be in the presence of Gloria's brat, not that he'd ever call her that in her mother's presence, so the night hasn't been too bad.
Clenching his new mechanical fist, Gregorius can hear the screeching of metal against metal and the light but noticeable whirring of gears underneath it. There are a number of capabilities he's curious about with regards to his arms that he's yet to explore, a part of him almost the rats he'll encounter tonight. Almost.
The Knight looks up to see the silhouette of the Palace in the distance, new pockmarks from when the rabble had tried to attack during that day. The Faith had nearly lost Jaburo in those weeks, betrayed within and forced into an ignoble peace.
His Princess' disappearance had nearly denied Gregorius of nearly everything he had been owed, all that is left for him to claim is the Margraviate. He is truly thankful that the brat is young and malleable, one that could be raised properly. His Princess—for all her quirks that made her so lovely—was always too stubborn and independent, especially with that maid of hers.
Thoughts for later, he has work to do.
"Continue your patrols, have fun with it though. It's Sol Invictus." Gregorius is unable to suppress the smile that breaks into his face as he says those words. One mirrored by his men, as they split up and take to the streets to the city, like wolves on the hunt.
The sounds of their laughter echoing through the night, a lovely chorus for the most holy day of them all.
"Send these ingrates running!" Gregorius yells at the top of his lungs, as he pulls the reins on his horse. He's long since abandoned most of his dress uniform, but shining saber and his sidearm are still in hand as he attempts to restore some semblance of order to this mess.
He hasn't the faintest idea what's happening, save that His Princess is in danger and the brainless mob had been whipped up by whatever propaganda the Seraphim were dropping on the city.
Damn them! If he only had his Mobile Suit - no, even better, if he'd only had his E-Major, then he could leave this disaster and go take His Princess away from whatever attack the space witches must've surely subjected her to. The repairs had faced delays, saboteurs amongst the crews he is sure. There would be a reckoning when—
Further grumbling is interrupted as the police line at the front buckles from the weight of the rabble pressing down on it. The men and women of His Princess' Military Police, equipped with what fancy riot shields and suppression equipment the treasury could buy are forcing the mob away, bit by bit.
Proud of himself, Gregorius pulls the reins on his horse as it tramples upon the Amazonian drivel the Seraphim had dropped into the city. The mob is being pushed away from the center of the city and thus the palace, if those Condor mooks and ZOLON halfwits have a brain cell between them they should've evacuated the guests by now.
As he continues to bark orders and the odd encouragement to the police forces, Gregorius half wonders on what reward he should ask of His Princess. He has been a leal knight, the very model of a loyal servant; perhaps it is time to request from His Princess what he is rightfully owed—
His mind registers the flaming bottle a second too late. For agonizing moments, pain becomes the entirety of his existence as the right side of his body is burned and cooked by the flames. He gurgles orders to kill the mob even as his subordinates drag him away.
The Marshal
"It's been so long since I've told this to anyone, so your guidance in this is most appreciated."
Bea had known that Eva was a Catholic since they were merely two dragoons in the Royalist Armies, but now's the first time Bea's ever seen her step foot in a Church proper.
So in and out of the church in the middle of Quito, Eva pretends she isn't a Princess, that Bea is merely her close friend looking out for a young Catholic girl, and both of them have to pretend that the nun across the confession booth with Eva is not General Isabella of the Margravial Armies.
In the silence of that Church, where she can't even hear the mumbled words of her Princess, Bea can do nothing but think.
So she can't help but wonder, is this just another act of hers? Another mask to wear to secure power? If it is, she can't help but think, treacherously, what else is a lie.
Is what the two of them have a lie?
Would she care if it is?
Far away from the hustle and bustle of the Capital, in a small countryside estate, a different Holy Day is being held.
Because for the Catholics in Jaburo, who make up almost a fourth of the nation's population, it is Christmas.
Marshal Isabella's new Pallasi car is sleek and silent, nothing like those noisy and smoky CanMexican Anneheym's from earlier last year. A little indulgence for the Countess of Arauca, while she still has that title at least.
As they leave Santa Marta, past the Algerian Checkpoints who flash lights into their cargo for any weapons, they begin to enter the countryside. Vast fields giving way to forest and jungle, Algerian peacekeepers becoming fewer and fewer in number until they're replaced entirely by her militias.
As they finally pass the last checkpoint, Isabella decides to speak.
"Do come inside later, greet the young ones. They'll fawn all over your new… arms." Isabella's efforts to reach out to her bodyguard, assigned to her by the Cardinal, elicits only a grumble, the best she could muster as of late. She's never been blessed with the near effortless charisma that Her Grace had.
Only necessity serves to hold this disparate alliance together, neither goals nor loyalty to any one person. The centre could not hold. The woman who could have filled the void is gone.
"His Eminence had specifically tasked you to take your mind off of work, did he not?" Her bodyguard, who only responds to the name Hospitalier, scolds her. Isabella clicks her tongue in irritation, easy for him and that old man to say, he's not the one becoming the public face of the entire revolt once it starts.
They continue to drive in silence, through the somewhat rough roads of the North Jaburian countryside and past the thick canopies of forests and jungle. In any other circumstance, they would've been ambushed by Republicans by now; the situation in the hinterlands is far less secure than what the already grim forecasts High Command is predicting.
But this land is Catholic land, run and secured by the Daughters of St. Eva, the new Church's paramilitary arm. Run and controlled by Isabella herself. She feels a bit of pride in it and in her work. Though how they perform in combat is yet to be seen. For now, they keep the peace in the north alongside the Algerians, making sure none of the Royal Guard thugs are able to force her people from their homes or worse.
Finally, they arrive at their destination. One of the large manors and estates owned by the predominantly Catholic provincial elite.
As Isabella steps out of the vehicle, she makes sure to grab the gifts and presents she'd promised Don Simon and his grandchildren. She looks around at the gathered vehicles outside, spotting many old Anneheyms. Those had been gifts from Her Grace to local Catholic community leaders during her visits to the region; through them Jaburo and Condor had managed to secure the loyalty of the long-restive interior. It's amazing what treating them as people could achieve.
Organizing and meeting up like this in the old days was impossible—only when Her Grace had ascended that could they be so bold and brazen now.
"What took you so long? And stop brooding, will you? It's Christmas!" Isabella's thoughts are interrupted as the grumpy and hoarse voice of Don Simon del Antonio welcomes her into his home. She gives a curt and polite nod to the various waiting staff before heading in.
From the entrance, she can already hear the laughter and arguing of young children, the familiar smell of Donya Lisa's cooking and the nostalgic feel of the entire celebration. She runs her hands over the aged wood of the manor, finding it well taken care of, as if it hadn't aged a day.
In an instant, she feels the weight of the past two decades go away. She's not a Marshal here, not a commander of the holy warriors. Just Isabella.
"You were close to her, weren't you? It's a shame; the business with Her Grace. God rest her soul." Don Simon suddenly speaks up next to her, the old man scratching at his balding head before doing the sign of the cross. A gesture she mimics in return.
"Yes, I was close to Her Grace." Isabella says, ignoring any lingering whispers and doubts. Only she knew that part of Her Grace's life. Her and no one else.
There was utter chaos in the command centre in Acre—in actuality a seized hotel used to manage the front. Reports of uprisings and revolts across occupied territory. Dispatches that suggest Artemi was planning to surrender Army Group Azul. And most worrying of them all were the rumors that Her Grace was missing.
Isabella rubs her eyes, her staff running around like chickens with their heads cut off, going to and fro, taking calls and messages as if it mattered. She doesn't need an actual accurate reading of the situation to know things have gone south, all she has to do is look over her shoulder.
Looking around, the ever familiar sight of Cult attaches and her Condor handlers are nowhere to be seen. Isabella brings a hand up to caress the center of her necklace, a small cross Her Grace had given her, and mutters a prayer.
Fears and worries on what Her Grace's disappearance could mean slip into Isabella's mind. With their protector gone, the Cult will surely use this opportunity to fully cleanse Jaburo of the faithful. Everything is proceeding as Eva had feared and confessed to her on that day.
The true nature of the garrison attack being a Cult plot to drag Jaburo into war. How that Pagan King wanted to use Jaburo to bleed the Atheists dry and with it conquer both Americas.
Her Grace had confided in her such truths and such fears, and told Isabella of her own plan to turn their trap against them. To reveal the truth at the hour of victory and break the stranglehold the Pagans in Vancouver and Toronto had over Jaburo.
She'd been trusted with that truth, with that holy mission, to serve as Her Grace's most able general, so that when time came, the Army would remain loyal.
Her Grace is gone but the cause can still be carried on. And the only one who can do so is her. No one else has known Her Grace like she has. The work is good, but remains unfinished.
The work is not yet done. The work is yet to be done. The work is yet to be done.
With that mantra assuaging any doubts and fears in her mind, Isabella stands and with her most practiced officerial glare, restores order to chaos.
The Shadow
She really does look like her.
It isn't completely one to one, the Princess is lithe where she's lanky. The Princess' hair flows down behind her back; so long that it reminds her of her mother's hair. Hers only goes up to her shoulders. There were also a number of minute details that she could hours trying to discern, but for all intents and purposes, they were identical.
Intellectually she knows that's exactly the reason she was chosen for this mission, to keep an eye on and safeguard His Grace's younger sister and heir. The so-called White Princess, one of the Margravial Armies' best aces.
The Prince had thought it prudent to have his sister's shadow be a capable fighter, both in and out of a Mobile Suit. She didn't disagree.
"So, Eva. Didn't I tell you? Like a mirror!" The brash and loud-mouthed commanding officer of the Dragoons Regiment has the voice of a smoker, even if he—somehow, Bea thought— managed to refrain at that moment. She does her best to subtly distance herself from his touch, her natural dislike of it warring with the professionalism expected of an agent in a mission.
The Princess looks at her with a curious expression, one deep in thought. The Princess' eyes flicker between her and the officer, hints of disdain slipping into the latter. Interesting. Maybe this mission won't be a drag after all.
"So you're to be my double? My wingwoman?" The Princess says with a mischievous and teasing expression. It's only her training that prevents the neutral and respectful expression she's wearing from slipping. Has her cover already been blown?
"Well, a knight is always in need of squires, and my would-be Marshal of a brother is always pestering me to find a new one. Let's see if you can catch up…" The Princess has to be doing it on purpose now. But despite the fact that the incognito portion of her mission was blown before the moment it began, she really couldn't find it in herself to care.
There's something in the excited, mischievous smile on Eva's face, her round face with its sharp angular features, that's convincing her to go along with whatever angle the Princess is planning.
Fine. She'll humor her. Though as she thinks that, she's having trouble keeping a smirk out of her own expression. And as the Princess' grin grew wider, she's sure that she noticed it.
"Introduction's are in order then. I already know who you are." As she says those words, her eyes flicker to their commanding office, who'd already begun to leave. Eva rolls her eyes in response, pointing at the man with her thumb. Oh yes, they're going to get along nicely.
"Yes, but do refer to me as Eva. The full name is too much of a mouthful in battle."
"Well, Eva, you can call me Bea. Bea—"
"Bradamante! Wake up! We're near." Bea snaps out of the memory, her skull pounding from the near constant hallucinations and flashbacks. She'd been warned her cybernetic augments would interface oddly with the psychic remnants of the battle site. But—
Bea grips her head as another memory forces its way into the surface of her thoughts, any concentration she might've had vanished in an instant.
"Sheesh, if you're this crippled over something like this, remind me to take you to Oakland. You'll have a
real fun time." Bea glares at her handler, Doran Triangle, a descendant of some old Federation politician.
On the outside he seems a blonde man around her age, but at closer inspection it's obvious how his skin and flesh is pulled taut over his cyborg augments, unconvincingly hiding the machine underneath. At least ZOLON made no illusions of their mechanical nature.
Bea sighs as she takes and swallows another pill from the bottle provided to her, something meant to help with her headaches. She looks down at a puddle on the jungle floor, her haggard
changed reflection looking back at her, the edges of scales peeking out from under her hair, fangs at the edges of her lips. Augments resembling those of the vampires making their way topside, a little to blend in and muddy the waters on who precisely she's working with.
The Conductor of Condor reduced to this, like one of the rabid agents they used to keep around. Still, the surface may be different, but the contours and shape of a shadow organization is familiar. She'll use them for her own ends, find Eva and then save her. It's the only way.
From how Doran smiles at her, accentuating the cyborg features underneath his flesh, he no doubt suspects what she's planning.
Doesn't matter. She just has to focus on Eva.
Infiltrating past the Army and ZOLON patrols was a simple matter, her new benefactors were capable of using their psychic abilities to achieve a sort of invisibility field. Though it's an ability Bea herself has yet to master, whenever the scientists of the organization speak of her 'psychic potential' they say it with no small amount of disappointment. She's not blind to the fact that they'd been hoping to recruit Eva instead of her. It simply doesn't matter.
At last, through an increasingly scarred and devastated jungle, they finally arrive at the… site.
Approaching it had given Bea a headache, now that she's at the epicenter, she can feel her heartbeat in her ears. Her palms are clammy with sweat inside of her gloves, which she'd worn to hide the changes the augments were forcing her to go through. Her mind
hurts, in a way that made her want to cry, what to puke, want to smash her head open on a stone to make it stop. Like it's trying to picture something that's refusing to let itself be imagined.
The pain is unbearable, she stumbles forward bit by bit as Bea's legs crumble beneath her. It's enough to force her to her knees, down to the muck and mud of the jungle floor. Tears welling up in her eyes.
"Well, we're here." Doran turns to look down at her. The condescending grin is gone from his face—all that remains is…pity? Sympathy? Whatever it is, it's ill-fitting on something like him.
"I hope you find what you're looking for."
And with that, Beatrice sinks.
She sinks and
falls.
She falls through the gaps in reality, left behind psychic scarring of a dissection month's past. She falls deep into the psychic wound of the world, images of battles and events long past flowing through her mind.
She grits her teeth. None of them matter
She sees Ling A-Bao connect with the first of them—She sees Paglia's mind shatter—She sees a miracle occur, an Asteroid sent towards the planet diverted by a people's will to live—-She sees Harry Nimitz's execution—-She sees any hope of peace die, and the march towards Cataclysm begin.
None of this matters.
Past the images, past the memories embedded onto the world, she focuses only on one thing. A singular light in the kaleidoscope that has swallowed her whole. October 5th, 1001.
Bea blinks.
"COME THEN, SERAPHIM! YOU'LL HAVE TO DRAG ME FROM THE NEMESIS LIMP AND BROKEN!" She sees it now. She sees her now.
In the Nemesis' cockpit, Bea sees Eva for the first time in months. The longest they've been separated.
Even in a memory she's beautiful beyond comparison, just seeing her smile has banished all of her exhaustion since Eva's disappearance. Her heart aches just looking at her.
Dressed in a wedding gown of Bea's choosing, they'd spent so long picking it out and fitting just for her. They'd been planning a wedding like this for years. Always in the guise of what if Eva had to marry for politics or some other. But they both knew. They were just scared.
Fear. It was in Eva's every nerve, every muscle and every twitch. She's utterly terrified. Bea tries to reach out to her, to touch her, but her hand passes through Eva's, grip tight around the Nemesis' controls.
Foolish. This is a memory. Bea can't interact. She can't cry and beg Eva to retreat and flee.
She can only watch.
"GET OUT OF MY HEAD!"
Bea watches as old traumas are pulled to the surface, like corpses in the water. Eva had only told Bea about her mother once. A moment of utmost vulnerability between the two of them. It was…after the both of them nearly died during one of the last battles of the Civil War.
Bea watches as Eva's last desperate stand amounts to nothing. If she could scream, her throat would've given out by now.
She can only watch.
"P-please, STOP!"
Bea watches as the love of her life is torn apart, secrets ripped out like guts from carrion. Eva's brother never deserved her. Never deserved someone like her. Bea had always hoped that she'd hidden it well. But you can't hide things from your shadow.
Bea watches as Eva pleads and begs to hide one last truth. If her hand could hold Eva's, their grip would've been inseparable. She'd always suspected. You can't hide things from your shadow. They could've confronted it. They were just scared.
She can only watch.
"......."
Bea watches as Eva ceases screaming and crying and begging. Not even a whimper remains. A woman so lively, so filled with energy and power and whose mere presence could invigorate Bea, now lies at the cockpit of her Mobile Suit like a puppet with its strings cut. Bea wraps her arms around Eva, a futile gesture of comfort. She wasn't there.
She so desperately wanted to close her eyes, to not see Eva reduced down to this humiliating heap. But what right does she have to avert her eyes? She failed Eva.
Then light. It peers into the cockpit like the blinding sun, and Bea glares at the intruder, hate and fear warring in her heart. She's only seen the woman in pictures, recordings and posters that the Seraphim oh so loved to proliferate. The Witch of Belem. Domina Gunn.
Every step the Seraph takes closer and closer is a thunderclap, already Bea can feel the edges of the memory begin to fade away. The end is nearing. But it isn't over yet.
Bea can only watch as Domina steps closer and closer to Eva, passing through her as Bea puts herself between the two of them to little use. Futile.
Bea can only watch as Domina grabs Eva's face, pulling her like a rag doll. The stained and soiled wedding dress all but ruined, Bea had hoped to have been the one to ruin with Eva together, to create and ruin. Their love in miniscule. Futile.
Bea can only watch as Domina gently parts Eva's veil, the tenderness insulting, it drives spikes of hate deep into her heart.
Bea can only watch as Domina closes in and—-
An eternity. An instant
What happens between Domina and Eva is beyond the memory, beyond even the capacity of the psychic strands connecting everything to witness. What happened, what was said, what more was pried from Eva is beyond here. Beyond Bea.
She couldn't even watch.
Defeat sinks into every fiber of her soul. If she had physical mass, Bea would've sunk to her knees. She glares up at Domina as with that same mocking tenderness, Eva is lifted away. A bridal carry like Eva tried to pester her into doing.
Eva! Bea screams to the void. Futile.
"...Bea…"
Eva giggles, lost in some sort of haze, a dream-like state as the Seraph carries her away from the cockpit, away from Bea.
Here Bea knows that she is witnessing Eva's last moments. She can't help but scream.
Eva!
EVA!
"EVA!"
"What!? Christ, I was almost falling asleep!"
Bea blinks.
The first thing that invades Bea's senses is the sound and smell of the crackling fireplace. As her eyes register more and more, scanning her surroundings, her mind fills in the blanks. The Palace, Sol Invictus decor, seated at the floor surrounded by pillows and blankets. She refuses to look down at the weight on her lap. Refusing to—
"So are you just going to scream and—did you have a nightmare?"
It's the concern that gets to her, Bea forces her eyes down and—
There, head upon Bea's lap, with her hair sprawled out without a care in the world, is her. From her hair, Bea's eyes trail south, to two piercing lilac eyes, arranged in worry and amusement in harmony, to a sharp nose she's longed to pinch and bite everytime her irritation and libido get the better of her. From there was a long and slender neck, one she's praised and kissed so many many times, its taste of sweat and skin marked on her tongue and lips. It's always shocking how lithe she is, a childhood of ballet she claims. It has given her slender arms, but unlike Bea's own lanky limbs, there was a hint of slight muscle from regular exercise. She breathes in to remember the scents of foreign soaps she loved to use. She memorize all of that and more, every single minute detail.
As beautiful and perfect she last saw her in flesh. Eva.
Bea couldn't resist herself. She pulls Eva in for a crushing hug, refusing to let go. As if even letting up for a moment would cause to slip from her grasp and disappear forever. There's a momentary shock in Eva's frame, then she returns it with as much force.
Bea doesn't even notice herself shaking, tears welling up in her eyes.
"I'm here. I'm not leav—I'm here with you. That's all that matters." Bea pretends to not notice that slip of words, too caught up in the moment, in Eva's comforting presence.
Bea doesn't know how long they spend in that embrace, basking in each other's presence. An instant? An eternity? Even as her tears end, Bea just closes her eyes, letting Eva's weight press down on her, feeling her heartbeat, memorizing it as best she could.
Eventually, it is Bea that pries apart, mind racing with questions. She doesn't speak them yet, instead gathering her thoughts as she focuses on her surroundings, and finding that she can't. Purposely haze-like and incomplete, as if—
"A dream? Or a memory? Not quite." Eva speaks, a familiar teasing edge to her voice. But it also contains something more, the edge of something beyond her, beyond the two of them.
Eva, facing her, holds out a hand. Hesitatingly, Bea matches her, interlocking their fingers together. There she feels every contour, every detail of Eva's palms. But more than that she feels it. That same psychic presence, the one her own then immature and latent abilities could only feel at.
It's Eva.
"You're not a hallucination…" Has she really been reduced to this?
"According to you, when you hallucinate about me, I'm wearing much less—Ack, you bitch!" Eva complains as Bea rubs her knuckles on her head, the only sort of discipline she's willing to listen to.
Despite the roughhousing, her heart soars. It's her. It's Eva.
Eventually Bea lets her go, Eva plopping her head down back into Bea's lap. Her hair once more sprawled out all over. Idly, she runs a hand through it, feeling the same silky smoothness that Eva lovingly cares for and cherishes.
In that instant. In that eternity. They bask in each other. There was no more use for words.
They've always understood one another. They've loved each other. They've hurt each other. But they always understood one another. They were just too scared.
No barriers remain between them. The shadow and the original were now indistinguishable. In that instant. In that eternity. The only thing that existed was one another.
"You're not dead are you?"
"If I was, I'd be telling you to leave and live."
"Forcing your knight to chase for her princess?"
"What can I say? I'm a selfish girl and it's Christmas."
"Where are you?"
"Oh you know. A prison of flesh. A prison of the mind. We'll see each other one day, I'm sure of it."
"One last secret between us?" Bea says exasperated.
"One last dance if you can call it." Eva, head on Bea's lap, turns her eyes to Bea's hands. What—
Claws. The aftereffects of Black Cradle's procedure to unlock her psychic potential. She hides it away from Eva's eyes, her ugliness begins to morph their surroundings. The fireplace crackles and warps, the room and blankets turning slowly to dust. Eternity is ending.
"Stop that. There is nothing to hide. I will always love you, though you might need to clip your nails a bit. Maybe just the two middle ones." Beneath her signature teasing smug grin, Eva looks at her with utter sincerity, so much so that Bea can almost believe it.
She returns her hand to where it was, running it through Eva' long hair over and over. Like a spoiled cat, Eva purrs in delight.
She missed this. She loves this.
"You've no need to tether yourself to fossils like them." Eva says, lifting her own hands up to caress Bea's face, feeling the scales beginning to poke out beneath her locks.
"For you, I'll do anything." Bea replies.
"I know." With that, Eva pulls her in for a kiss, their lips touch and for an instant, for all eternity, everything feels right.
"Have you found what you were looking for?" With a clearer head, Bea can now notice the rather obvious concern her Black Cradle handler has for condition. Do they really not know what it's like to be under the effects of their own procedures?
Bea turns around to look at the site. Vast damaged jungle, trees torn and ruined, pockmarks of craters and gouges on the earth meters wide and deep. She wishes she could've seen the battle. She wishes she had fought in it. With her.
Despite her newfound serenity, her head clearer than it has ever been since Eva's disappearance, an anger still roils deep inside her. Insults and violations must be paid back. Bea removes one of her gloves, her claws glistening in the noon sun. She flexes her hands and exhales.
Bea turns to Doran with a confident smile on her face, it's one she has whenever presenting a plot or a scheme to a superior back in the old days.
First they'll need to gather up all her old condor contacts, they must've followed protocol and gone to ground, hiding in the rat holes as best they can, away from the Seraphim. Their combined intel will let her and Black Cradle operate much more smoothly in the Americas. The ancient conspiracy's web is vast and extensive, but nothing can compare to ol' reliable human networks.
But first, she needs to be courteous and return Doran's concern.
"Yes, I have."
"Stop squirming, this has to be perfect."
"I'm merely impatient, you have the dress, I have…whatever this is you wanted me to wear."
Bea adjusted the strange black uniform she's been forced by Eva to wear. Black and dark purples and a cravat of all fucking things. Though she has to admit, it stands in nice contrast with the stark white dress Eva's wearing. That's likely why Eva picked this out.
If one were to witness them, you could mistake that it was the two of them getting married. If only.
"It is Condor's colors. Black, purple with gold trimmings. You are my Conductor and my Knight of Zero. I will not have my wedding day be ruined by anyone, not even you." There's a petulant childishness to Eva's tone. Merely one of many quirks Bea' learned to accept and even love.
That doesn't stop her from pinching Eva's nose.
"If anyone ruins your day, it's going to be you by obsessing over every detail. And by you fussing so much that you ruin your own dress. Save that privilege for me during your wedding night, I'll utterly ruin it—-" Bea is unable to finish that sentence as Eva wraps her arms around her chest and squeezes tight, pushing all the air out of her lungs.
"I already agreed to do it behind Ion's back! Stop bragging!" Despite her advantage in the situation, Eva's voice was shrill and embarrassed. In that moment one could almost forget that they'd been discussing where to shuffle Applegate and Republican prisoners of war mere hours ago.
They awkwardly try to wrestle before detaching from one another, giggles flowing between the two of them. With it out of their systems, Eva puts the finishing touches on her dress uniform. Bea almost feels embarrassed looking at the mirror, but she also feels a strange hint of pride.
"Well my knight, I believe it is time for us to finish our business here. Prepare Jaburo for its Princess!" Eva says with a dramatic Princess-like flourish, one she only usually reserves for the Round.
Playing along, Bea gracefully bows while grabbing her Princess' hand, bringing it up to her lips.
"I shall see you upon a white horse, my Princess. As beautiful and glorious as you." Bea could not wait for the other A-Minor to be repaired. To once more fly alongside Eva in the battlefield. White Princess and Black Knight, reunited at last.
As she's dismissed, sent ahead to ensure the weddings preparations had gone smoothly; Bea turns to look at Eva one last time. Past all the theatrics and the drama, Beatrice Bradamante loves Evangelista Qasvah Jaburo.
With that she closes the door to her Princess' dressing room, heading down the hall to prepare for transit on a ZOLON purchased VTOL to Jaburo, away from her Princess.
That is the last time she ever sees Eva again.
