01.11.01 - Doctor Give Me A Sign
Arriving at a much less official looking clinic. More like a office building really, Rebecca can see people go in and out in a steady trickle every twenty or so minutes, looking much richer and less just the random street rif-raff she normally services.
"This is not therapy." Rebecca muttered to herself angrily, "She's going to try to fuck me." She slips behind a crowd into the office, getting past the front door easy enough shoulder surfing into the elevator and then quickly finding the right room without calling or talking to anyone. She hadn't told Lisa she was coming, either. It would be a fun surprise.
Lisa is in a dress, some sort of toga looking thing made of sheer...silk? There's a clinical table in the room, but most of the work she's doing seems to be a pile of pharmaceuticals and more social chemicals being handed out for credit chits with five zeroes in them. She doesn't initially notice Rebecca. Lisa is done up like some image of a blue fertility goddess, with face-paint and body paint in swirling arcs that end in sharp points, purple easily visible against blue, as well as painted lips and near-nude makeup to accentuate her eyes and face in general.
After the customer, a Salarian that talks at approximately a trillion words a minute and takes something that a casual omnitool search firmly places as a downer, leaves.
Rebecca slipped right past him into the office smirking as she realized Lisa's back was turned. Her eyes were immediately drawn to the heart-shaped couch, an inviting yet peculiar choice for a therapist's office. The clinical table nearby suggested a more hands-on approach to treatment, while the steel walls provided a modern, sleek backdrop that could withstand any potential outbursts. The room was adorned with an array of pharmaceutical and social chemicals, meticulously organized and readily available for those willing to pay a substantial fee. It seemed Lisa was more than just a Doctor, and a Therapist, but some kind head-shrink as well.
Lisyris notes Rebecca's presence with a smile, looks down, and then looks back up. "Hi! What brings you here? I thought you were working with Vro?"
"Oh do you work here?" Rebecca said, irritated for some reason and sidestepping the question entirely. Her tone is again childish, the same as it was with Camlos. "Vro said I had to come over. You think I'm broken."
An omnitool audio message hits Rebecca's omnitool, from Vro. She reads the transcript and nods.
She nods, pressing play, and turning the volume up to a setting she hadn't before, as the previous ones made her ears twinge a bit.
At a volume that could shatter windows, Vro's voice yelled out, "If you're reading this, turn it to audio. AHAHAHAHA, THIS IS FOR NOVERIA, AHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAH."
Lisa still smiles, but this time looks down at the floor for a solid three seconds before looking back up, radiant and happy by all exterior accounts.
"Okay, so you definitely think I'm broken. Sick." Rebecca says, still standing in the hallway. The karambit in her hand again, having appeared sometime after the elevator ride, but before the Krogan's message. She was pissed. They both were.
"I don't think anyone's broken—" Lisa tries to assuage concerns.
"Unfixable, doesn't want to be fixed." Rebecca cut her off.
"You know I don't think th—" Lisyris tries again, keeping her voice calm.
"Too weak to be fixed." Rebecca cut her off again, "Think if I try to do the work I'll go blow up another... What the fuck ever."
"I don't think that. You're perfectly healthy, and just need some he—" The Asari is now looking down, trying to calm herself. Rebecca had already started to speak over her.
"So why do I only feel comfortable around Vro?" Rebecca knew she was going to get slapped, stabbed, yelled at, or helped. It didn't matter anymore she was going to get something, and all of those options were acceptable.
"Maybe it's because of your shared experien—" The Asari offers a reason, and is cut off again.
"Maybe it's because I'm being fucking coddled during a cry for help." Rebecca snapped at her.
A chair made of steel crumples into a ball smaller than a tennis ball in a flash of blue light and dark energy.
That worked far better to make Rebecca be quiet, and she sat down to behave. Quickly crossing her legs.
"Very well." The smoky voice is back as Lisyris doffs the vestments of a doctor and starts acting personable. "You want help? That's amazing. I'll give it to you. You don't want to be coddled during? That's fine as well." She walks over to the ball of steel, picking it up with a grimace of effort, putting it in a trash can.
Why is it when you get exactly what you want, it's the worst thing ever? Rebecca thought, watching carefully, still not saying much. She really didn't want to find out if that was a show of force, or a lack of control.
"In fact, let's get some things on the table. You are a paranoid wreck, with violent tendencies and a severe inability to control yourself without the threat of violence or punishment." Lisa is carefully laying out the facts as she cleans up metal shards, bending down with a small cloth and picking them up.
Also, you dissociate for long periods of time. "If you knew that second part, why..? Err, third." Rebecca said with a shrug.
"Because everyone can change, if given time and help. It just changes how much time and how much help they need." Lisa puts the cloth into the trash as well, and moves to sit next to Rebecca, not taking the classical position of being across from her. "However, at this current instance, we need to think of triage, not treatment. Does that make sense?" She asks.
"I mean, triage is definitely what you do to broken things. Like bones and shit, so I feel a little lied, too." Rebecca said, annoyed.
"Mhmm, you don't call yourself broken again. If you do, I'll make you regret it." Lisa smiles, not looking down this time.
Her eyes narrowed at Lisa, bitch, "Well, this time you were the one who said it so tec—" A flicker of black and blue energy makes a small cup fly across the room, missing, or perhaps intentionally slipping past Rebecca and cracking into the wall, embedding chunks of ceramic in the steel. "You were saying?" Lisa offers with a nod.
Rebecca considered her words, but Lisa still hadn't really done anything. These were still very idle threats from a nice, if strong lady. Something about that bothered her, she couldn't be helped by someone who couldn't meet her where she was at. While very insightful. That's so fucking insane, you realise. "So technically I was just repeating what you thought."
A hum escapes Lisyris at the stubborn continuance of Rebecca's behaviour. And then a pressure settled on the human, like being in a diving plane except rougher, pushing her down into the couch. "I don't like doing this sort of thing, you know?" Lisa says as the force turns horizontal, dragging Becky along to the far side of the couch, impacting it with enough force to shake the soft and comfortable seat, shaped like a heart.
"Ow Ok. Okay! I'll behave! I'll behave." Rebecca groaned as it felt like her ribs were seconds away from becoming shrapnel in her chest. "I just... Wanted to see if you would." She coughed hard, trying to catch her breath, the pain making it hard to breathe.
"I will, lets not do this again, alright?" Lisa says as the pressure and barely visible blue-black energy fades, replaced by her hand resting on Rebecca's shoulder. "I much prefer talking and being kind."
The Asari clears her throat after the exertion, a thin sheen of sweat on her skin. "I'd like to discuss some more radical interventions in your daily life, is that fine?"
"Well, I don't like talking and being kind. I need to know..." What do you need to know? You're bullying an eight hundred old woman. Look at her. "I... Fuck it, yeah. Sure."
"Your self control issues." Lisyris, carefully, says. "I think we can institute some more active ways to control your behaviour. I-"
"Like a bomb collar?" Rebecca offered nodding, "I have some plastique at the house. I could rig it up I think." There was no mockery in her tone. It for all intents and purposes seemed to be a truly earnest suggestion.
"No." Lisa slowly says. "I wasn't going to jump to negative reinforcement immediately. I was thinking instead, we reward whenever you manage something well." She says.
"Do you have any ideas on what we could do?" Lisa asks, letting Rebecca speak.
Rebecca kept accidentally cutting her off, so this time she waited, which seemed to take an excruciating amount of time. The woman was a slow speaker. "Uh... Not really, ma'am. I didn't really start getting gifts until a month ago. There's not much I want or care about enough to be like 'Yay a treat,' I didn't realise humans responded to clicker training."
A laugh escapes Lisa at that, elegant and pleasant. "Clicker, no, I was thinking praise? Are you responsive to that?" She considers, looking at Rebecca curiously.
Rebecca grit her teeth again. Therapy sucked and seemed to mostly involve admitting really shitty stupid things. "I... Wouldn't know. Ma'am."
"You're doing amazing already, don't worry." Lisa assures Rebecca with another touch at her shoulder.
She leaned into the other woman instinctively. You didn't need to be a psychologist to tell that Becky was touch starved. "Right um... Thanks. Don't do that. I don't... You..." You needed to stop telling people to stop doing things you like them doing. "That... Whatever. Don't... Not do that."
"Would you like me to stop touching you?" Lisyris murmurs back, letting her hand rest where it's at.
Rebecca growled like a puppy with a broken leg, "Stop asking things. It's confusing. I don't like making decisions."
Lisa smiles, "You're doing fantastic," As she slowly tugs Rebecca into a hug by inches. "Just tell me when you want something to happen or not to happen." She whispers as the touch settles in with the hug.
"Why can't you all figure it out? I'm not an officer." Becky mumbled, her eyes getting heavy whilst the alien woman touches her cheek.
"I can, but I want you to say it more often." She murmurs gently, like a slow tide on a warm summer day, smelling of roses and sweetness. "So, tell me. I'll be proud of you if you can." Lisa offers in the embrace as she leans to the side of Rebecca.
Rebecca felt an innate urge to flee. It was something that had been getting harder to indulge lately. "I want…" She was trying hard to say something, but any words she'd use wouldn't mean what she was trying to say. "I need to be kept in check. I can't be trusted on my own anymore."
"Okay, I can do that. Is it fine if it's like this? Or do you need me to stop you?" She's still trying to get more admissions out of Rebecca. "More actively?" Lisa leaves the implication there as she's fully now laying besides Rebecca, sweet scent radiating off her, along with a steady warmth and adoringly soft touch.
When did we lie down? She wondered, unbothered. She curled around the Asari, but there was nothing romantic about the need for touch. There was intimacy, but her mind was miles away from that kind of contact. She needed something else more. "I need walls I can throw myself again … I need to know they won't break." It seemed giving even the smallest modicum of praise did wonders. The woman had gone from a street barbarian to a small puddle after a couple of compliments. Still, she needed more. She hadn't realised how much she just needed to hear she was doing well.
"That's excellent!" Lisyris is actually excited about the admission. "I can help there, keep you from going too far. Stop you gentler than Vro can at least." She promises with a murmur of a touch at Rebecca's hair, massaging her scalp with practiced ease.
"I don't really want gentler. I don't think you really could. I normally have to control myself because you get worn out in a few seconds." Rebecca's need for positive reinforcement had almost immediately caused her to melt. "There's not a ton of interpretation needed when someone hucks a chunk of steel at you."
"I won't be throwing anything with my arms. I'm a telekinetic." Lisa chuckles.
"You broke a sweat pushing me ten feet." Rebecca rolled her eyes. It was clear she didn't actually think the Asari could hurt her.
"I broke a sweat keeping you intact." Lisa corrects, patting Rebecca's head. "It's hard when I'm so out of practice, not pushing full force. Like … sprinting. You forget how to pace yourself, but you never forget how to do it." She's still murmuring the words, "anyways, this is about you, not me."
"I … Mean that's it?" Rebecca admitted, "I want to be violent, and kept on a leash without having to make decisions. That's … What I want, just a bunch of people telling me no and throwing things at me until I listen. Like Camlos does, where I can jam a knife in his shoulder, and know he won't be mad. That I couldn't really hurt him."
"You want people you can't push away? Because you don't think you can help yourself?" Lisa says mostly for her own benefit as she continues rubbing at the humans scalp, soothing her with precise pressure. "You're lucky, you've a man deeply in love with you, and two other people who you can't hurt." She chuckles lightly. "
Rebecca shakes her head. "I just … If things go wrong, I want it to be everyone's fault, not just mine."
That makes Lisa tilt her head, "I see!" She realises suddenly, "I'm so proud of you Rebecca! You're very strong!" Lisa leans into the hug after saying that, legitimately ecstatic at the progress.
She hadn't realised quite how much time she spent with Camlos until she did an eerie recreation of a Turian trill, without any of the requisite parts. The trill makes Lisa even happier somehow.
"You want a group of people who are … equal to you? In responsibility and in task? You want a sisterhood?" She considers Rebecca, "
Rebecca shakes her head, "I just want … Orders. A way forward that I don't have to decide. Betters, people need to be better, or they need to be way worse."
That clarifies even more, "I keep saying it, but you're doing amazing." Lisa continues to praise reliably and often. "Have you considered mercenary work?"
"No, because I'd have to leave on a ship. Hitman work sounded really cool, though." At some point Becky had closed her eyes, and now became a permanent clasp despite being a foot taller. She hadn't said but, if the Asari pulled away at any point she might go on a rampage now. She needed this. She realised she'd kill anyone or anything to keep these brief moments.
"Have you considered purchasing a ship?" The Asari asks, rubbing Becky's back now that the hug is reciprocated entirely. "A floating home to call your own. You could keep anyone on it. Might help with any worries of distance. A Corvette isn't expensive.
Rebecca let go, and snapped immediately, "Oh yeah, fuck it, I'll just buy a ship and fuck off then." She pushed off the couch angrily. "God forbid I have five fucking pleasant minutes. Fuck you." Before the woman could do anything, she was already trying to kick the door open and stomp out. The mass accelerator had found it's way to her hand. She was clearly going to do something stupid.
"A ship is not a ticket out. It's a home." Lisyris tries to explain as she watches Rebecca leave.
With a growl Rebecca was looking for something to hurt in the hallway. She wasn't listening anymore, regressing to two weeks ago in an instant. Oh yeah, just get on a fucking ship and leave. Fuck her, fuck them, they just want me better so I'm gone.
"Rebecca, listen to me," Lisyris says, one last warning almost self-evident in the words. She'll be heard today. That's not in question.
The woman had found someone. "Give me your money." She jammed the gun in some poor human's mouth, the barrel lodged between their teeth as the gun pointed upwards into the brain pan. She didn't care Lisyris was watching. "Fine, I'm getting a ship. This is what you want, right?!"
"Enough." Her voice warbles in the gravitational shift as she reaches out and wrenches at the air, the force translating into hundreds of newtons of force pulling Rebecca towards her. It's rough, it hurts, joints pulled at awkwardly until she's at the foot of the couch, being glared down at by glimmering blue eyes.
"Fuck you." Rebecca chews out immediately around the pain. "Couldn't even wait a day to tell me to fuck off? You plan this with Vro and Camlos? You all just waiting for me to … Just fucking kill me then. You have to see how this is worse.
"Change of plans, I think." Lisa murmurs, "I see your concerns, and I believe the issue is that you feel alienated. I'll solve this." The Asari pulls her up, even as sweat beads down her forehead.
It was ironic, the Asari was doing everything in her power to stop Rebecca's bones from breaking, as the newtons climbed towards the thousands. While it seemed all Rebecca wanted to do was struggle to a point where she could fire into the surrounding rooms. The gun going off occasionally into the floor and ceiling, punching holes in expensive tiles in both directions.
"I am going to help you." She grits her teeth at the violence. "Stop fighting me. Now." Lisa demands again, reaching out and trying to get the gun out.
There was a crunch as Rebecca's arm had a weird bump pushed up into the skin, and the gun crumpled in her hands, nearly taking her fingers with it. God that feels so much better. She realised it, and hated the truth of it. The minute her arm was broken, and the gun was destroyed she couldn't leave. That felt safer. It felt better.
Wait. No. It fucking hurt. It hurt so badly. Holy shit, did it hurt. She let out a sharp yelp, a nearly strangled scream.
There's a mild panic in the Asari's eyes as she realises the gravity of the injury, letting the biotic force fade with a gasp of release.
"No, no, it's fine." Rebecca said through tears, holding the limp limb. "It's … No it's fine. It's better that way." She hissed angrily at the pain while trying to explain something.
"No, it's not fine. I promise this is not fine." Lisa says with a grit to her voice.
Rebecca growled, "You asked me to say what I wanted. I said this is fine. It means I have to stay, or it won't heal right."
"You'll stay either way. I am not going to drive you away." Lisa grimaces after looking at the injury again.
With a violent sneer, Rebecca said, "If I would stay either way, you wouldn't have had to do that. Would you?" Now lashing out, the pain and anger mixing with the sense of rejection.
"This is not therapy." Rebecca muttered to herself angrily, "She's going to try to fuck me." She slips behind a crowd into the office, getting past the front door easy enough shoulder surfing into the elevator and then quickly finding the right room without calling or talking to anyone. She hadn't told Lisa she was coming, either. It would be a fun surprise.
Lisa is in a dress, some sort of toga looking thing made of sheer...silk? There's a clinical table in the room, but most of the work she's doing seems to be a pile of pharmaceuticals and more social chemicals being handed out for credit chits with five zeroes in them. She doesn't initially notice Rebecca. Lisa is done up like some image of a blue fertility goddess, with face-paint and body paint in swirling arcs that end in sharp points, purple easily visible against blue, as well as painted lips and near-nude makeup to accentuate her eyes and face in general.
After the customer, a Salarian that talks at approximately a trillion words a minute and takes something that a casual omnitool search firmly places as a downer, leaves.
Rebecca slipped right past him into the office smirking as she realized Lisa's back was turned. Her eyes were immediately drawn to the heart-shaped couch, an inviting yet peculiar choice for a therapist's office. The clinical table nearby suggested a more hands-on approach to treatment, while the steel walls provided a modern, sleek backdrop that could withstand any potential outbursts. The room was adorned with an array of pharmaceutical and social chemicals, meticulously organized and readily available for those willing to pay a substantial fee. It seemed Lisa was more than just a Doctor, and a Therapist, but some kind head-shrink as well.
Lisyris notes Rebecca's presence with a smile, looks down, and then looks back up. "Hi! What brings you here? I thought you were working with Vro?"
"Oh do you work here?" Rebecca said, irritated for some reason and sidestepping the question entirely. Her tone is again childish, the same as it was with Camlos. "Vro said I had to come over. You think I'm broken."
An omnitool audio message hits Rebecca's omnitool, from Vro. She reads the transcript and nods.
She nods, pressing play, and turning the volume up to a setting she hadn't before, as the previous ones made her ears twinge a bit.
At a volume that could shatter windows, Vro's voice yelled out, "If you're reading this, turn it to audio. AHAHAHAHA, THIS IS FOR NOVERIA, AHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAH."
Lisa still smiles, but this time looks down at the floor for a solid three seconds before looking back up, radiant and happy by all exterior accounts.
"Okay, so you definitely think I'm broken. Sick." Rebecca says, still standing in the hallway. The karambit in her hand again, having appeared sometime after the elevator ride, but before the Krogan's message. She was pissed. They both were.
"I don't think anyone's broken—" Lisa tries to assuage concerns.
"Unfixable, doesn't want to be fixed." Rebecca cut her off.
"You know I don't think th—" Lisyris tries again, keeping her voice calm.
"Too weak to be fixed." Rebecca cut her off again, "Think if I try to do the work I'll go blow up another... What the fuck ever."
"I don't think that. You're perfectly healthy, and just need some he—" The Asari is now looking down, trying to calm herself. Rebecca had already started to speak over her.
"So why do I only feel comfortable around Vro?" Rebecca knew she was going to get slapped, stabbed, yelled at, or helped. It didn't matter anymore she was going to get something, and all of those options were acceptable.
"Maybe it's because of your shared experien—" The Asari offers a reason, and is cut off again.
"Maybe it's because I'm being fucking coddled during a cry for help." Rebecca snapped at her.
A chair made of steel crumples into a ball smaller than a tennis ball in a flash of blue light and dark energy.
That worked far better to make Rebecca be quiet, and she sat down to behave. Quickly crossing her legs.
"Very well." The smoky voice is back as Lisyris doffs the vestments of a doctor and starts acting personable. "You want help? That's amazing. I'll give it to you. You don't want to be coddled during? That's fine as well." She walks over to the ball of steel, picking it up with a grimace of effort, putting it in a trash can.
Why is it when you get exactly what you want, it's the worst thing ever? Rebecca thought, watching carefully, still not saying much. She really didn't want to find out if that was a show of force, or a lack of control.
"In fact, let's get some things on the table. You are a paranoid wreck, with violent tendencies and a severe inability to control yourself without the threat of violence or punishment." Lisa is carefully laying out the facts as she cleans up metal shards, bending down with a small cloth and picking them up.
Also, you dissociate for long periods of time. "If you knew that second part, why..? Err, third." Rebecca said with a shrug.
"Because everyone can change, if given time and help. It just changes how much time and how much help they need." Lisa puts the cloth into the trash as well, and moves to sit next to Rebecca, not taking the classical position of being across from her. "However, at this current instance, we need to think of triage, not treatment. Does that make sense?" She asks.
"I mean, triage is definitely what you do to broken things. Like bones and shit, so I feel a little lied, too." Rebecca said, annoyed.
"Mhmm, you don't call yourself broken again. If you do, I'll make you regret it." Lisa smiles, not looking down this time.
Her eyes narrowed at Lisa, bitch, "Well, this time you were the one who said it so tec—" A flicker of black and blue energy makes a small cup fly across the room, missing, or perhaps intentionally slipping past Rebecca and cracking into the wall, embedding chunks of ceramic in the steel. "You were saying?" Lisa offers with a nod.
Rebecca considered her words, but Lisa still hadn't really done anything. These were still very idle threats from a nice, if strong lady. Something about that bothered her, she couldn't be helped by someone who couldn't meet her where she was at. While very insightful. That's so fucking insane, you realise. "So technically I was just repeating what you thought."
A hum escapes Lisyris at the stubborn continuance of Rebecca's behaviour. And then a pressure settled on the human, like being in a diving plane except rougher, pushing her down into the couch. "I don't like doing this sort of thing, you know?" Lisa says as the force turns horizontal, dragging Becky along to the far side of the couch, impacting it with enough force to shake the soft and comfortable seat, shaped like a heart.
"Ow Ok. Okay! I'll behave! I'll behave." Rebecca groaned as it felt like her ribs were seconds away from becoming shrapnel in her chest. "I just... Wanted to see if you would." She coughed hard, trying to catch her breath, the pain making it hard to breathe.
"I will, lets not do this again, alright?" Lisa says as the pressure and barely visible blue-black energy fades, replaced by her hand resting on Rebecca's shoulder. "I much prefer talking and being kind."
The Asari clears her throat after the exertion, a thin sheen of sweat on her skin. "I'd like to discuss some more radical interventions in your daily life, is that fine?"
"Well, I don't like talking and being kind. I need to know..." What do you need to know? You're bullying an eight hundred old woman. Look at her. "I... Fuck it, yeah. Sure."
"Your self control issues." Lisyris, carefully, says. "I think we can institute some more active ways to control your behaviour. I-"
"Like a bomb collar?" Rebecca offered nodding, "I have some plastique at the house. I could rig it up I think." There was no mockery in her tone. It for all intents and purposes seemed to be a truly earnest suggestion.
"No." Lisa slowly says. "I wasn't going to jump to negative reinforcement immediately. I was thinking instead, we reward whenever you manage something well." She says.
"Do you have any ideas on what we could do?" Lisa asks, letting Rebecca speak.
Rebecca kept accidentally cutting her off, so this time she waited, which seemed to take an excruciating amount of time. The woman was a slow speaker. "Uh... Not really, ma'am. I didn't really start getting gifts until a month ago. There's not much I want or care about enough to be like 'Yay a treat,' I didn't realise humans responded to clicker training."
A laugh escapes Lisa at that, elegant and pleasant. "Clicker, no, I was thinking praise? Are you responsive to that?" She considers, looking at Rebecca curiously.
Rebecca grit her teeth again. Therapy sucked and seemed to mostly involve admitting really shitty stupid things. "I... Wouldn't know. Ma'am."
"You're doing amazing already, don't worry." Lisa assures Rebecca with another touch at her shoulder.
She leaned into the other woman instinctively. You didn't need to be a psychologist to tell that Becky was touch starved. "Right um... Thanks. Don't do that. I don't... You..." You needed to stop telling people to stop doing things you like them doing. "That... Whatever. Don't... Not do that."
"Would you like me to stop touching you?" Lisyris murmurs back, letting her hand rest where it's at.
Rebecca growled like a puppy with a broken leg, "Stop asking things. It's confusing. I don't like making decisions."
Lisa smiles, "You're doing fantastic," As she slowly tugs Rebecca into a hug by inches. "Just tell me when you want something to happen or not to happen." She whispers as the touch settles in with the hug.
"Why can't you all figure it out? I'm not an officer." Becky mumbled, her eyes getting heavy whilst the alien woman touches her cheek.
"I can, but I want you to say it more often." She murmurs gently, like a slow tide on a warm summer day, smelling of roses and sweetness. "So, tell me. I'll be proud of you if you can." Lisa offers in the embrace as she leans to the side of Rebecca.
Rebecca felt an innate urge to flee. It was something that had been getting harder to indulge lately. "I want…" She was trying hard to say something, but any words she'd use wouldn't mean what she was trying to say. "I need to be kept in check. I can't be trusted on my own anymore."
"Okay, I can do that. Is it fine if it's like this? Or do you need me to stop you?" She's still trying to get more admissions out of Rebecca. "More actively?" Lisa leaves the implication there as she's fully now laying besides Rebecca, sweet scent radiating off her, along with a steady warmth and adoringly soft touch.
When did we lie down? She wondered, unbothered. She curled around the Asari, but there was nothing romantic about the need for touch. There was intimacy, but her mind was miles away from that kind of contact. She needed something else more. "I need walls I can throw myself again … I need to know they won't break." It seemed giving even the smallest modicum of praise did wonders. The woman had gone from a street barbarian to a small puddle after a couple of compliments. Still, she needed more. She hadn't realised how much she just needed to hear she was doing well.
"That's excellent!" Lisyris is actually excited about the admission. "I can help there, keep you from going too far. Stop you gentler than Vro can at least." She promises with a murmur of a touch at Rebecca's hair, massaging her scalp with practiced ease.
"I don't really want gentler. I don't think you really could. I normally have to control myself because you get worn out in a few seconds." Rebecca's need for positive reinforcement had almost immediately caused her to melt. "There's not a ton of interpretation needed when someone hucks a chunk of steel at you."
"I won't be throwing anything with my arms. I'm a telekinetic." Lisa chuckles.
"You broke a sweat pushing me ten feet." Rebecca rolled her eyes. It was clear she didn't actually think the Asari could hurt her.
"I broke a sweat keeping you intact." Lisa corrects, patting Rebecca's head. "It's hard when I'm so out of practice, not pushing full force. Like … sprinting. You forget how to pace yourself, but you never forget how to do it." She's still murmuring the words, "anyways, this is about you, not me."
"I … Mean that's it?" Rebecca admitted, "I want to be violent, and kept on a leash without having to make decisions. That's … What I want, just a bunch of people telling me no and throwing things at me until I listen. Like Camlos does, where I can jam a knife in his shoulder, and know he won't be mad. That I couldn't really hurt him."
"You want people you can't push away? Because you don't think you can help yourself?" Lisa says mostly for her own benefit as she continues rubbing at the humans scalp, soothing her with precise pressure. "You're lucky, you've a man deeply in love with you, and two other people who you can't hurt." She chuckles lightly. "
Rebecca shakes her head. "I just … If things go wrong, I want it to be everyone's fault, not just mine."
That makes Lisa tilt her head, "I see!" She realises suddenly, "I'm so proud of you Rebecca! You're very strong!" Lisa leans into the hug after saying that, legitimately ecstatic at the progress.
She hadn't realised quite how much time she spent with Camlos until she did an eerie recreation of a Turian trill, without any of the requisite parts. The trill makes Lisa even happier somehow.
"You want a group of people who are … equal to you? In responsibility and in task? You want a sisterhood?" She considers Rebecca, "
Rebecca shakes her head, "I just want … Orders. A way forward that I don't have to decide. Betters, people need to be better, or they need to be way worse."
That clarifies even more, "I keep saying it, but you're doing amazing." Lisa continues to praise reliably and often. "Have you considered mercenary work?"
"No, because I'd have to leave on a ship. Hitman work sounded really cool, though." At some point Becky had closed her eyes, and now became a permanent clasp despite being a foot taller. She hadn't said but, if the Asari pulled away at any point she might go on a rampage now. She needed this. She realised she'd kill anyone or anything to keep these brief moments.
"Have you considered purchasing a ship?" The Asari asks, rubbing Becky's back now that the hug is reciprocated entirely. "A floating home to call your own. You could keep anyone on it. Might help with any worries of distance. A Corvette isn't expensive.
Rebecca let go, and snapped immediately, "Oh yeah, fuck it, I'll just buy a ship and fuck off then." She pushed off the couch angrily. "God forbid I have five fucking pleasant minutes. Fuck you." Before the woman could do anything, she was already trying to kick the door open and stomp out. The mass accelerator had found it's way to her hand. She was clearly going to do something stupid.
"A ship is not a ticket out. It's a home." Lisyris tries to explain as she watches Rebecca leave.
With a growl Rebecca was looking for something to hurt in the hallway. She wasn't listening anymore, regressing to two weeks ago in an instant. Oh yeah, just get on a fucking ship and leave. Fuck her, fuck them, they just want me better so I'm gone.
"Rebecca, listen to me," Lisyris says, one last warning almost self-evident in the words. She'll be heard today. That's not in question.
The woman had found someone. "Give me your money." She jammed the gun in some poor human's mouth, the barrel lodged between their teeth as the gun pointed upwards into the brain pan. She didn't care Lisyris was watching. "Fine, I'm getting a ship. This is what you want, right?!"
"Enough." Her voice warbles in the gravitational shift as she reaches out and wrenches at the air, the force translating into hundreds of newtons of force pulling Rebecca towards her. It's rough, it hurts, joints pulled at awkwardly until she's at the foot of the couch, being glared down at by glimmering blue eyes.
"Fuck you." Rebecca chews out immediately around the pain. "Couldn't even wait a day to tell me to fuck off? You plan this with Vro and Camlos? You all just waiting for me to … Just fucking kill me then. You have to see how this is worse.
"Change of plans, I think." Lisa murmurs, "I see your concerns, and I believe the issue is that you feel alienated. I'll solve this." The Asari pulls her up, even as sweat beads down her forehead.
It was ironic, the Asari was doing everything in her power to stop Rebecca's bones from breaking, as the newtons climbed towards the thousands. While it seemed all Rebecca wanted to do was struggle to a point where she could fire into the surrounding rooms. The gun going off occasionally into the floor and ceiling, punching holes in expensive tiles in both directions.
"I am going to help you." She grits her teeth at the violence. "Stop fighting me. Now." Lisa demands again, reaching out and trying to get the gun out.
There was a crunch as Rebecca's arm had a weird bump pushed up into the skin, and the gun crumpled in her hands, nearly taking her fingers with it. God that feels so much better. She realised it, and hated the truth of it. The minute her arm was broken, and the gun was destroyed she couldn't leave. That felt safer. It felt better.
Wait. No. It fucking hurt. It hurt so badly. Holy shit, did it hurt. She let out a sharp yelp, a nearly strangled scream.
There's a mild panic in the Asari's eyes as she realises the gravity of the injury, letting the biotic force fade with a gasp of release.
"No, no, it's fine." Rebecca said through tears, holding the limp limb. "It's … No it's fine. It's better that way." She hissed angrily at the pain while trying to explain something.
"No, it's not fine. I promise this is not fine." Lisa says with a grit to her voice.
Rebecca growled, "You asked me to say what I wanted. I said this is fine. It means I have to stay, or it won't heal right."
"You'll stay either way. I am not going to drive you away." Lisa grimaces after looking at the injury again.
With a violent sneer, Rebecca said, "If I would stay either way, you wouldn't have had to do that. Would you?" Now lashing out, the pain and anger mixing with the sense of rejection.