And she did say something. Something sharp and sudden the instant the question was asked.
"What?"
It wasn't asked with any kind of vehemence or outrage; nothing in her tone spoke of anything resembling anger, or anything of the sort. No, all Quinn's voice carried was innocent, dumb confusion. She blinked a few times, trying to parse out the question, to see if there was any way she possibly could've misinterpreted it and finding nothing. Only a few seconds later did she come to grips with what he'd actually asked, and she cocked her head. "What?" She repeated. "No, of course not. Why would she ever do that?" A beat passed and she went through things in her head again, shaking her head. "Casoban might not like her because of her association with me, but...what would she ever have to gain from that?"
And though Quinn still held on to that confident conviction--it was unshaken--a sticky black dread was slowly building up inside her, coupled with an ember of anger that sparked more than it should've. She could take people calling her awful and evil and in league with Helburke, it would be awful but it was what it was. But Dahlia had never given less than a hundred percent, and the idea that people were starting to blame her for someone else dying...Quinn just found it abhorrent.
She shook her head again, the bemused look on her face turning to a guarded concern. "I'm sorry, it just...doesn't make any sense to me. She's just not the kind of person who would ever do something like that."
Quinn gulped heavily as she sat down and stared at the blank screen, trying to calm herself down. Last time she'd been on the air had been the disastrous interview with Mona, and she had a gut feeling that a real news network would be harder to deal with than just a talk show. But she tried to swallow that fear, sit up tall, and look like she was far more confident than she was. One breath. Two breaths. Three--
"Oh!"
The last breath left her in a sharp whoosh, and taken aback, she felt that old panic rising. But somehow, miraculously, she held on to the end of the question. And by the time the newscaster got there...
The panic was gone.
Or, not gone, not exactly. It was still very much there. She could still feel it bubbling inside of her, clawing at her stomach, reaching to find a way out. But somehow it felt so much less frightening, so much weaker. Toothless.
And, looking at the camera, Quinn felt that same conviction she'd felt just before the duel, the one that had changed the name from RS-4 to Ablaze. That conviction to light up the world, to make sure everyone in it could rally under her light. And for the first time...she felt like she'd really met that conviction.
The panic and fear just couldn't make it past that wall. So this time when she spoke, her voice wasn't a charade like it had been on Mona's, but nor was it trembling and quavering like it so often seemed to. It was crackled with stress, filled with an unbreakable anxiety, and far beneath it lay hidden a deep, deep undercurrent of seething resentment. It wasn't a clean voice. It wasn't a neat voice.
But it was her voice.
"Won't deny it scares me. The way they just kind of show up, it reminds me of..." She swallowed, but took a deep breath and bulled on past the sudden flash of trepidation. "Hovvi, you know? And then after the duel, everything just happened so fast. It's terrifying." She took a long, slow breath, then set her jaw as she looked the newscaster in the digital eye. "But I've got a duty. I have a job to do. And I know that Casoban doesn't like me, but..." She shook her head slowly, and oh-so-lightly closed her eye. "Just because they don't like me doesn't mean we aren't allies, and it doesn't mean I'm not going to give it my all."
A broad smile came to her face, and her eye popped open. "I'm a pilot because I want to protect people. So that's what I'm gonna do."
Full Name - 秋山春陽 - Akiyama Haruhi Age - 20 Gender - Femme Occupation - Farmer and produce seller
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P E R S O N A L I T Y
Sun In Her Pocket Haruhi is a cheerful, bouncy young woman who still maintains the brilliant verve of childhood. Forever positive and filled with irrepressible energy, she won't let anything bring her down, no matter how much dirt she's covered, in or how sore her arms are. Raining on planting day? She'll make a game of it. Asahi feeling under the weather that day? She takes it as a challenge! Crop yield wasn't great? It'll be better next time!
Feet In The Ground That constant energy she's got running through her has put forth the impression on occasion that she's an irresponsible or flighty person, but that could not be further from the truth. In reality, Haruhi takes a great deal of pride in her work, and she's actually a rather self-reliant and dependable person; a hard worker, up before dawn and ready to put in the work until there's no more work that needs doing. Although, it does also lends her a sense of bullheaded stubbornness that's entrenched deeply within her.
Head In The Clouds All that being said, she's couldn't be called a hundred percent grounded, because she's absolutely got an imaginative streak a mile wide. As a kid she imagined herself as a spirit, fashioning herself crowns of wildflowers that she found off in the fields and woods and brandishing her legendary stick. She snuck into everywhere from the blacksmith's to the shrine, got herself anywhere and everywhere she could find. And though she no longer imagines herself as a valley spirit, that imagination, creativity, and curiosity has followed her to this day.
S K I L L S E T
I've Got That Farmer's Grit! Haruhi is a daughter of farmers, and of course from birth a farmer herself. A farmer who does her own work! Consequently, she is both much tougher and much stronger than most people tend to expect from a 20 year old woman. She's won her fair share of arm wrestles against people who underestimate her, and she's able to take quite a bit of work and strain to her muscles before giving up. In addition, she has many pieces of her skillset derived from a farmer; she knows what soil is good to plant in, knows how to handle animals--she rides Asahi bareback all the time--knows what weather is coming by the color of the sky, and many other skills besides.
I Ain't Need No Signs! And she takes fierce pride in that hard-won strength! She absolutely refuses the use of any Signs, no matter what! Taught from a young age to take responsibility for herself and do her own work, she stubbornly refuses to even learn any, even those that would help her grow and harvest. She tills her own field, plants her own seed, reaps her own harvest, and lets the turn of the seasons dictate it all.
Good Ol' Fashioned Gumption! Haruhi is a tenacious girl, chock full of stick-to-it-iveness and ingenuity. Because she doesn't use Signs, she's become extremely resourceful in ways that other people typically aren't. She knows what to use as fertilizer, how to fix a head back onto an axe, what stones are useful for starting a fire and which are good for sharpening tools, and so on and so forth. After all, if she's self-reliant enough to not use magic, then she'd better actually be able to rely on herself, right?
Physical Description
As soon as you look at Haruhi, you know that she lives up to her name, spring sunshine: quite short at 157cm, blonde-haired, tan-skinned from working hard out under the hot sun, and almost always bearing a bright and chipper smile. She isn't exactly what you would typically call a cool beauty; she isn't nearly stately or demure enough for that. What she does have, though, is a strong and striking sense of exuberance about her that seems to light up whatever room she walks into, and even when she isn't smiling, it always somehow seems like her wide warm purple eyes are doing it for her.
The skin on her tough hands is hard and callused from rubbing against tools, and that of her feet is the same from hours in her heavy workboots. Completing the picture is her musculature. She's a farmer, after all, and she has been for pretty much her whole life. That tanned skin lies taut over a physique of hard muscle, bought and paid for with hours upon hours of hard farm labor.
But despite that hard-labor athleticism--or perhaps because of it--when she's not working she's a bit of a klutz, and quite spritely in the way that she moves through the world. Running barefoot, skipping down the road, or laying on long grass staring up at the cloudless blue sky, it would be fair to say that when she's not working she doesn't exactly portray a sense of gravitas, nor really even act her age. And the fact that she's constantly smudged with dirt and mud and sweat from working in the fields doesn't really help matters.
As a rule, she dresses in practical farm clothes, and she takes her beloved straw hat with her EVERYWHERE. Her hair is typically tied up in either a ponytail or a braid to keep it out of her way. Though she has a few pieces of very nice formal attire gifted to her by her best friend Yuki, she doesn't really know when she'd ever wear them, since it's not like she ever goes to formal functions. She doesn't even really know how to put on a proper kimono!
Character Conceptualization
All things considered, Haruhi has had a pretty good life. Born to a pair of successful farmers--Akiyama Akito and Hanako--she grew up with a deep love and appreciation for the outdoors, and as time went on, an equally powerful one taught be her parents: a sense of responsibility for one's actions, and the sweat of one's brow. They were hard workers, and wanted to instill into their rough-and-tumble daughter that she should do the same.
And they succeeded in spectacular fashion! It wasn't long before kiddo Haruhi began to help out in the garden, pulling weeds and snipping beans off of vines. It was looking like she was set up for a wonderful future, despite her propensity to get into everywhere she probably wasn't supposed to go.
Like, say, the Heiseina shrine, where she met a lonely girl who called herself Fuyuko and decided then and there that the two of them would be the best of friends. From the time she was eight and onward, she would go and visit her friend, always bringing her something fun from the outside world; whether a flower crown, or a basket of fresh vegetables and rice that she'd grown and harvested herself.
Speaking of, it would seem her parents underestimated how deep into her heart she took the sweat-of-her-own-brow lesson on self-reliance, because when they discussed her learning some Signs to till her soil and grow her crops faster, she staunchly and immovably refused, no matter how they cajoled or convinced. This was when she first showed both one of her great strengths or her greatest weakness, depending on how you looked at it; that streak of mulish stubbornness. They thought she'd grow out of it, but she never did, insisting on doing all of the work herself.
When she was thirteen, they realized that she really wasn't going to budge, and brought home a strong palomino draft horse from the stables to help plough her field in lieu of magic. Haruhi fell in love with him instantly, naming him Asahi and, with her own hands, building him a paddock outside of the barn so he could stay outside and get exercise when the weather was good.
And so her life has gone on from then, and been a good and simple one. One of earth, and water, and plants, and animals, and nature. She loves everything and wants everyone else to love it too. She loves people, and wants people to love her back. She wants to live a good, simple, peaceful life surrounded by the people and places she loves.
You don't always get what you want.
Other Information
As mentioned, Haruhi has refused to learn any labor-saving Signs, preferring to do the work herself over using magic to do it. Her parents are still alive and happily working on the farm with her, though they gave her a smaller personal plot of land, one that wouldn't be touched by any of the Signs that her parents used themselves.
Full Name - 秋山春陽 - Akiyama Haruhi Age - 20 Gender - Femme Occupation - Farmer and produce seller
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P E R S O N A L I T Y
Sun In Her Pocket Haruhi is a cheerful, bouncy young woman who still maintains the brilliant verve of childhood. Forever positive and filled with irrepressible energy, she won't let anything bring her down, no matter how much dirt she's covered, in or how sore her arms are. Raining on planting day? She'll make a game of it. Asahi feeling under the weather that day? She takes it as a challenge! Crop yield wasn't great? It'll be better next time!
Feet In The Ground That constant energy she's got running through her has put forth the impression on occasion that she's an irresponsible or flighty person, but that could not be further from the truth. In reality, Haruhi takes a great deal of pride in her work, and she's actually a rather self-reliant and dependable person if things don't go as planned. Although, it does also lends her a sense of bullheaded stubbornness that's entrenched deeply within her.
Head In The Clouds All that being said, she's couldn't be called a hundred percent grounded, because she's absolutely got an imaginative streak a mile wide. As a kid she imagined herself as a spirit, fashioning herself crowns of wildflowers that she found off in the fields and woods and brandishing her legendary stick. She snuck into everywhere from the blacksmith's to the shrine, got herself anywhere and everywhere she could find. And though she no longer imagines herself as a valley spirit, that imagination, creativity, and curiosity has followed her to this day.
S K I L L S E T
I've Got That Farmer's Grit! Haruhi is a daughter of farmers, and of course from birth a farmer herself. A farmer who does her own work! Consequently, she is both much tougher and much stronger than most people tend to expect from a 20 year old woman. She's won her fair share of arm wrestles against people who underestimate her, and she's able to take quite a bit of work and strain to her muscles before giving up.
I Ain't Need No Signs! And she takes fierce pride in that hard-won strength! She absolutely refuses the use of any Signs, no matter what! Taught from a young age to take responsibility for herself and do her own work, she stubbornly refuses to even learn any, even those that would help her grow and harvest. She tills her own field, plants her own seed, reaps her own harvest, and lets the turn of the seasons dictate it all.
Good Ol' Fashioned Gumption! Haruhi is a tenacious girl, chock full of stick-to-it-iveness and ingenuity. Because she doesn't use Signs, she's become extremely resourceful in ways that other people typically aren't. She knows what to use as fertilizer, how to fix a head back onto an axe, what stones are useful for starting a fire and which are good for sharpening tools, and so on and so forth. After all, if she's self-reliant enough to not use magic, then she'd better actually be able to rely on herself, right?
Physical Description
As soon as you look at Haruhi, you know that she lives up to her name, spring sunshine: blonde-haired, tan-skinned from working hard out under the hot sun, and almost always bearing a bright and chipper smile. She isn't exactly what you would typically call a cool beauty; she isn't nearly stately or demure enough for that. What she does have, though, is a strong and striking sense of exuberance about her that seems to light up whatever room she walks into, and even when she isn't smiling, it always somehow seems like her wide warm purple eyes are doing it for her.
The skin on her tough hands is hard and callused from rubbing against tools, and that of her feet is the same from hours in her heavy workboots. Completing the picture is her musculature. She's a farmer, after all, and she has been for pretty much her whole life. That tanned skin lies taut over a physique of hard muscle, bought and paid for with hours upon hours of hard farm labor.
But despite that hard-labor athleticism--or perhaps because of it--when she's not working she's a bit of a klutz, and quite spritely in the way that she moves through the world. Running barefoot, skipping down the road, or laying on long grass staring up at the cloudless blue sky, it would be fair to say that when she's not working she doesn't exactly portray a sense of gravitas, nor really even act her age. And the fact that she's constantly smudged with dirt and mud and sweat from working in the fields doesn't really help matters.
As a rule, she dresses in practical farm clothes, and her hair is typically tied up in either a ponytail or a braid to keep it out of her way. Though she has a few pieces of very nice formal attire, she doesn't really know when she'd ever wear them, since it's not like she ever goes to formal functions. She doesn't even really know how to put on a proper kimono!
Character Conceptualization
All things considered, Haruhi has had a pretty good life. Born to a pair of successful farmers--Akiyama Akito and Hanako--she grew up with a deep love and appreciation for the outdoors, and as time went on, an equally powerful one taught be her parents: a sense of responsibility for one's actions, and the sweat of one's brow. They were hard workers, and wanted to instill into their rough-and-tumble daughter that she should do the same.
And they succeeded in spectacular fashion! It wasn't long before kiddo Haruhi began to help out in the garden, pulling weeds and snipping beans off of vines. It was looking like she was set up for a wonderful future, despite her propensity to get into everywhere she probably wasn't supposed to go.
Like, say, the Heiseina shrine, where she met a lonely girl who called herself Fuyuko and decided then and there that the two of them would be the best of friends. From the time she was eight and onward, she would go and visit her friend, always bringing her something fun from the outside world; whether a flower crown, or a basket of fresh vegetables and rice that she'd grown and harvested herself.
Speaking of, it would seem her parents underestimated how deep into her heart she took the sweat-of-her-own-brow lesson on self-reliance, because when they discussed her learning some Signs to till her soil and grow her crops faster, she staunchly and immovably refused, no matter how they cajoled or convinced. This was when she first showed both one of her great strengths or her greatest weakness, depending on how you looked at it; that streak of mulish stubbornness. They thought she'd grow out of it, but she never did, insisting on doing all of the work herself.
When she was thirteen, they realized that she really wasn't going to budge, and brought home a strong bay draft horse from the stables to help plough her field in lieu of magic. Haruhi fell in love with him instantly, naming him Asahi and, with her own hands, building him a paddock outside of the barn so he could stay outside and get exercise when the weather was good.
And so her life has gone on from then, and been a good and simple one. One of earth, and water, and plants, and animals, and nature. She loves everything and wants everyone else to love it too. She loves people, and wants people to love her back. She wants to live a good, simple, peaceful life surrounded by the people and places she loves.
You don't always get what you want.
Other Information
As mentioned, Haruhi has refused to learn any labor-saving Signs, preferring to do the work herself over using magic to do it. Her parents are still alive and happily working on the farm with her, though they gave her a smaller personal plot of land, one that wouldn't be touched by any of the Signs that her parents used themselves.
Full Name - Quinn Aldis Age - 26 Place of Origin - Portland, Maine Occupation - Police Academy Instructor, formerly a Marine
A V A T A R
Character's Name - Quinnlash Pathos Affiliation - Drox Role - DPS (split between physical and magical) Profession - Bounty Hunter Weapon of Choice - Clockwork Rifle Domains - Fire; Manifestation, Enhancement -
P E R S O N A L I T Y
Grump Owing to what happened to her, Quinn generally exists in a state of perpetual grouchiness. she's frustrated with herself and for not being able to serve like she used to, and she channels and focuses it outwards, catching everyone around her in the impatient crossfire.
Overwatch Speaking of crossfire...
Quinn was a member of the military. And not just the military, but a member of the United States Marine Corps. And because of that experience, she is long used to punching through hell to keep both her squadmates and her country safe. Consequently, in a surprise for those that only see the gun-toting grump, she is rather protective of people that she views as under her care, though she wouldn't die in place of you, because that would mean she couldn't protect any more people after that.
Unless you're a kid. Quinn is ungodly protective of kids and would throw her life away for one in a heartbeat.
Quick Thinking As you might have gleaned from the way she thinks about the people in her squad, Quinn thinks heavily in risk vs. reward assessments as a side effect of years of military service. This can sound dehumanizing sometimes; but she really doesn't mean it that way. And on the flip side, that quick plus-or-minus thinking lets her make decisions very quickly. Because she doesn't consider every nuance of a situation before she jumps in--another, perhaps less charitable interpretation would call her 'exceptionally reckless'--she doesn't get bogged down in the ideology, so she can jump in far faster than she otherwise would've let herself be able to.
B E N C H M A R K S
Deadshot Quinn's weapon of choice is a clockwork longrifle. It's nowhere near what she's used to; she's used to something much more technologically advanced. But her skill as a sharpshooter, the one that earned her a place in the Marine Corps, the one that had her brought on to teach marksmanship in a police academy, that brilliant talent for calling her shots and landing them on target--there's nothing that stops that from carrying over. Consequently she is excellent at dealing crit damage, because if she sees where the weak spot is, she can probably hit it.
Keep The Flame Alive Quinn has always been a fiery person, and as it turns out, when she gains access to magic, well, it becomes strikingly literal. She is quiet a skillful pyromancer, dealing a pretty fair deal of damage with her primordial spells. But that's not where the real trick she uses lies. Leveraging not manifestation but enhancement, and enhancing not her, but her gun. She has the ability to channel a vast amount of pyromantic force straight into the chamber of her rifle, storing it and charging it up. She can release the stored power at any moment, and the unleashed bullet blasts off with the force of a meteor. It takes a fair deal of time to charge to that point, and she obviously can't use her gun until it's done; but oh man, if she can get that charge off, she is packing some serious heat.
True Grit Quinn is--or, well, was--a member of the United States Marine Corps. As you can probably imagine, this came with a host of interesting side effects. But the first and foremost is a matter of mindset: Quinn is used to near-death situations. This kind of life-and-death edge is where she made her career for several years. Consequently, she might be the single least bothered by the glitch (at least, bothered in that fashion) in the entire game. The other major benefit is physique. She might not be in the military anymore, but it hasn't been that long, and there's no way she gave up her exercise regimen. She is extremely strong and fit, much moreso than she looks at first glance.
Can't Run, Can't Hide Quinn's profession in the game, chosen after careful consideration, is that of a bounty hunter, and she is quite good at what she does; as a former sniper, she is capable of sitting motionless in one place for hours at a time, observing the world, and on the flip side, moving quickly and quietly from place to place. It is very hard to get away from her once she's on your tail. The caveat is that she has a strict set of morals for targets that she takes. Monsters of course are always fair game, but if you want her to track down an NPC or other player, you had better have a damn good reason for wanting them dead, or Quinn will laugh in your face and walk away. And maybe kick you in the shin.
Physical Description
Quinn Aldis is a woman of fairly average height, all told; perhaps a little above, maybe in the neighborhood of 5'5". Her pale, watery blue eye is framed by her sharp bangs, the dark gray hair falling a little ways down her back, usually tied in either a braid or a ponytail. Her right eye, the one she lost on her final tour of duty, is replaced with a plain black eyepatch; she refuses to get a glass eye of any kind, insisting that she prefers this, as looking in the mirror and seeing two eyes but only seeing from one seems extremely disturbing. While she's working at the police academy, she's gotten special permission to wear her old military fatigues, attached as she is to them. When not teaching, she tends towards long pants and trim jackets. Her favorite color is yellow, and she has a brown leather coat with bright yellow trimmings that she's very fond of. She always wished she could streak her hair yellow, but the professionalism standards of the military and the academy have rendered that dream impossible. As a result of all that she's dealt with, her face is set in a permanent scowl.
Well, Pariah has no professionalism standards, and upon signing into the game for the first time Quinn was delighted to find that her hair had indeed become streaked with bright yellow, and had grown into a long braid. Less fantastic was the fact that her eyepatch was still present; sometime in the past year or two she'd grown so used to it that it was just kind of a part of her subconscious now, which she's not super happy about, hoping she'd get the use of both eyes again. Her clockwork rifle is carried in a long case on her back that can serve as a bludgeoning weapon all its own. When it's borne in her hands, it looks for all the world like it belongs there, like Quinnlash is the person fated to use it. Her clothing is...similar...ish? Her general attire is a somewhat shredded up coat-cloak, worn over a gray linen shirt. She keeps armor to a minimum for obvious reasons; it would just slow her down. And though she still looks just as grumpy, she is smiling more.
Character Conceptualization
The story of Master Gunnery Sergeant Quinn Aldis, U.S.M.C., begins in a small house outside of Portland, Maine, where a husband and wife lived: Luke and Shannon Louvain.
Quinn's first memories are of smothering attention. Constant, assiduous lovey-dovey-ness layered over and over on her by Shannon; saccharine nigh-obsession. It was so all-encompassing that she didn't even realize that she was being abused. It took a teacher--and CPS worker--noticing some telltale signs of emotional and psychological abuse for things to come to a head. To make a long story short, Shannon and Luke were arrested for child abuse, and Quinn went into the foster system when she was eight years old. She bounced around foster homes for a little while, about a year and a half, before she was fostered for an extended period by an up-and-coming politician named Elizabeth Aldis. And after that extended period...neither of them wanted to let go. Liz applied for official adoption, and Quinn Louvain became Quinn Aldis.
For a moment, Quinn didn't move. Couldn't move. Stood poleaxed, because Besca was hugging her, hugging her tight and pulling her in close, and Quinn closed her eye and just let it wash over her. After the day she'd just had, she let herself go almost limp and burrowed her face into the crook of her neck. When just moments later Besca pulled away at Dahlia's wince, Quinn unconsciously reached out her arms just slightly, trying to stay in that warm embrace instead of letting the cold of the world grip her again.
But then Besca leaned in and cupped her cheeks, leaning in. Quinn leaned back.
"I am so proud of you, hun."
It was like hearing that flipped a switch inside of Quinn and she lunged forward, wrapping Besca in a crushing viselock of a hug and starting to ugly cry. She didn't say anything, couldn't say anything, as much as she wanted to.
She had waded through fire, and damnation, and horror, in the span of a few minutes just prior. She'd thought she was going to die. The level of distress that she'd felt, and up until now had still felt to some extent, was something that was difficult to explain to someone that wasn't either a pilot or someone that worked with them. Like a living nightmare.
But in that precise moment, all that she could do was stand there unmoving and let all the stress pour out of her through her eye.
At some point--she wasn't sure when, she'd started talking, rambling. Simple words, simple ideas: thank you, and I love you, and I'm home. It took some minutes for her to calm down and settle to a sniffling, and even longer for her to let go of her death grip on Besca, but even then she stood right next to her, like she could still hug her through proximity. She coughed the tears out of her voice, but it was still kind of reedy; it always took a bit of time for it to recover.
"So--ahem--I think I was supposed to...to give a statement?"
"You might hear some noise in your head for a moment."
She took a deep breath and concentrated on his hand in hers as he peeled back the eyepatch. As usual, whenever it was touched there was a jolt of discomfort and concern, but she battered through it. Just because she was too much of a coward to look underneath it didn't mean nobody could look; and the two of them had both seen underneath it anyway. There was no reason to be worried, she thought, trying to convince herself it was true.
Ah, and there it was, Doctor Follen was right. A little sound in her head. A clinking sound, of metal against...
Against metal?
Quinn frowned for a moment at that. Doctor Follen had put a solid metal probe into her eye socket. At least, she thought it was solid. It wasn't like she'd seen any kind of machinery on it. So then, if that was the case, if it was just a simple piece of metal...then what had made that sound?
But those thoughts were derailed as Dahlia resumed her position by Quinn's side. Consternation forgotten, Quinn gave a tiny, contended smile and snuggled up next to her, enjoying that warmth of closeness. Especially after the day she'd had. The day they'd both had. "Yeah, lucky me."
Then Doctor Follen went on, and in the end, asked Quinn what she wanted to do. She opened her mouth to say that she would go and rest...
...And then she paused a moment, and thought.
"I think...I'll go give statements and stuff now. If I go lie down now I'm not gonna be able to get up again for a while, and with the whole Casoban thing, I think I'd better talk. I mean, it's my fault--" For once, those words weren't accompanied by guilt digging into her voice; rather, it was very matter-of-fact, "--so what's it gonna look like if I don't?" She pulled away from her sister regretfully, looked up into her eyes. "Are you gonna come too, Deelie?"
Quinn wasn't exactly sure how long she and Dahlia stood there, wrapped around each other. It could've--was probably--only a few minutes, but time felt like it had come unbuttoned from the rest of the world. Like everything was on pause, and she and her sister were the only things left moving in the whole universe; everything else just faded away, and the entire world hinged around the two of them.
"I love you too," she sobbed, clutching tighter, clinging on for dear life. "I'll always come back."
What Dahlia said might not have been as powerful--though of course, anything Dahlia did was powerful for Quinn--but not that powerful, if Quinn hadn't also thought that she was going to die. Right around the time that the rifle Modir blasted her fingers off, she became convinced that she wasn't going to make it out of there. It was only the intervention of Axan Dane--
Though she was loathe to pull away from Dahlia, she did, just a little. She kept in contact, but pulled her head back enough that she could look her sister in her equally tearful eyes. She wanted to ask about the ESC pilot, the woman that had dropped from the sky like a meteorite to save her life. But looking her in her eyes, she realized that she didn't want to talk about her. She didn't want to pull Dahlia's attention everywhere. All she wanted to do, all she cared even the slightest whit about at that moment, was getting checked up by Doctor Follen and then spending as much time with her family as was physically possible.
But that was something that could come in a bit, and she could take when it came. Because at this exact moment, the only thing she cared about in the world was hugging Dahlia.
So, only a moment after she pulled back to see the worry and relief in her eyes...that's what she did.
Quinn blinked owlishly as she overlooked the hangar. Half from the sudden brilliant light with her pupil the size of a dinner plate, half from exhaustion, it was all a little...surreal. Not the least of which, well, the applause. The cheering. The people in hazmat suits surrounding her, bringing the cheering even closer--she couldn't help but grin when she recognized Tillie. It reminded her of that time she went down for the interview and all the fans were there waiting with signs of Ablaze. Except these weren't fans--or, at least that kind of fan. These were people she worked with, people hat she talked to on a semi-regular basis since she started her daily visits. It brought a sudden surge of warmth to her chest. She took a few unsteady-ish steps over to the railing and waved out at the people down below, and the cheering redoubled.
And then, of course--
"Quinn!"
Quinn's exhausted eye sprang open as she spied her sister, and the fear that she'd felt down there--that she'd never see her again--once again was at the forefront of her mind. But there she was. A little rough, but there she was!
Tired as she was, she still whirled on her heel in a more coordinated feat than she usually would've been capable of, then bulled straight through the technicians and onto the lift. She hopped from foot to foot, suddenly filled with nervous energy that had previously eluded her after the adrenaline had dropped. She needed to be on the ground, now!
After what felt like eons, she finally, finally stepped down on the hangar floor again. It had barely been a few minutes since she'd been here last, really; yet it felt like hours, days, in large part because of who was waiting for her. Largely ignoring the cheering onlookers, she jammed right through them as well until she eventually arrived at her destination.
Walking up in front of the injured Dahlia, Quinn felt an absurdly powerful urge to throw her arms around her and tackle her to the ground and never ever let go. But, again, she was injured, so that was right out. Instead, she walked slowly up to her and wrapped her arms tightly around her, weaving around and avoiding the shoulder and arm and burying her head in the opposite crook of her neck the same way she always did, if significantly more gentle.
"I'm home."
She was so happy she didn't even realize she was sobbing.
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