2020-06-07 Okay, NOW Welcome to the World
Okay, NOW Welcome to the World
Participants: Elle (2021) Olivia (2021)
Storyteller: Elle (2021)
Location: Griffith Park
Date and Time: 2020-06-07
Summary: Just planning murders, as you do
Elle has been visiting Olivia regularly since she moved into the woods. She is out here quite often as well, often staying the night, though she doesn't crowd wherever it is Olivia has posted herself. It's just a small bit of wild space, and so precious to both of them.
Today, Elle arrives in the early evening, her usual smile plastered across her lips. She is dressed in a blue button-up with the sleeves rolled and khaki shorts rather than her usual sports attire. "Olivia?" Even the bear can't be completely sure where Olivia is at a given moment, though she can get rather close.
"I thought we could go for a walk. Maybe visit the beach for a bit. What do you think? Or we can just climb trees... You know me. I'm not picky."
---
Olivia has had a lot to think about since meeting Elle. Basically the reptiloid conspiracy is right, except the bad guys are possessed by a devil-worm from space and the good guys are the shapeshifters trying to murder all the bad guys in the name of Mother Nature. It would be a lot to process if she hadn't recently learned how to talk to plants, and oh yeah, she can talk to plants because she's possessed by Mother Nature instead of Lucifer Spaceworm. The former is enough to deal with for now without processing the latter just yet, a fact she does her best to ignore while politely asking the park if it would please grow her some food so she doesn't need to sneak back into town to steal some on top of the clothes she's already stealing to try to hide her appearance from pursuers who might still be looking for her.
Elle's appearance is a welcome distraction from all the bullshit in Olivia's brain. She emerges from behind a particularly rough set of bushes, whose branches bend so subtly out of her way to avoid scratching her skin or tearing her clothes you'd have to be looking for it to notice it. "Hey, Elle," she greets in a mostly neutral tone, which, as anyone from the hospital could attest, is about as warm as Olivia gets. It's kind of a breakthrough that Olivia's standing up straight instead of subtly recoiling from Elle (who has not seen Jurassic Park, so she can't make any Dr. Sattler jokes). "A walk sounds better than the beach. I'm not really dressed for it. Where are we walking?"
---
"Nowhere in particular, I guess. Staying right here isn't really much fun, though." The self-proclaimed (and as yet unproven) polar bear shrugs her slender shoulders and then pointing off down the hill into the depths of the nearby trees. "We'll be skirting the ranger station but we're not going to be in view of an other people. Maybe I'll finally show you something interesting today."
The bear flashes another grin and then starts to walk into the woods, whistling softly as she goes. This time of night, the chances of anyone being near enough to hear are nearly zero. Elle, certainly, is unbothered by the possibility despite the risks entailed. The forest beckons Olivia to follow, joyous that she has chosen to emerge from the boughs.
---
Some choices have to be made in an instant, with no consideration. Either follow Elle, or hesitate and insult everything the bear has given her so far. Olivia nearly hesitates, comes so close to it, but ultimately makes what she hopes is the right decision and follows her friend? not yet. mentor? not exactly. comrade into the park.
"Guess I won't ask you to spoil the surprise, then. So spoil something about you, I guess. I'm still really--struggling with this whole bear thing."
She nearly said 'wrestling', but caught herself almost in time.
"So were you born a bear, or what?"
---
"Nope, I was born on two legs. The bear thing came later. I had dreams about it first," Elisapee relates easily as they walk, picking her way among the underbrush as if it were more known to her than the back of her own hand. "I'm a bear. It's part of why I'm so muscular, actually. Bears aren't known for being petite." Of course, Elle is under five feet tall so the 'petite' moniker is arguable at best despite the muscle on her slight frame.
"I know, I'm probably not big and hairy enough to fit what you think of when you think bear..." Elle shrugs. "But you know how it is."
---
Elle's pace is brisk enough it takes the fairly unathletic Olivia some concentration to keep up, but she does her best to spare at least one and a half ears to listening. "Sure, yeah," she agrees drily. "I know all about how human-bears aren't hairy. It was all we talked about in group therapy." Her tone is the aural equivalent of rolled eyes, but her face is fairly blank. "So when did you come out of the bear closet?"
---
"When I was fifteen. I was in a car accident. Turns out that bears don't die when they get hit by cars, they transform and murder the car. And the occupants." Elle's characteristic jubilance is muted now, and her smile becomes a thoughtful frown as she relates this portion of her story. "When did you find out you cold talk to the trees? Was that just a few days ago or...?"
---
Olivia feels the least pang of regret at her acerbic jokes. The regret drives her to be honest. "It had been coming for a while. At first, I figured I'd been inside so long I caught the crazy, like a cold. It was...scary, but by that point I didn't even care any more. It was fine if I went crazy if it meant not dealing with that place any more." Her shoulders jerk in a motion like a shrug but a bit to spasmodic to be natural. "I know that's not how it works, but I was willing to make it be how it worked for me. You know?"
---
"No, it makes a lot of sense. If I were trapped that long I would die. Or someone else would. Maybe a lot of someone elses. The changing breeds, all of us, are very angry people. We're so angry, like I've said before, that sometimes we can't handle it except by destroying anything near us." Elle's tone is frank, but gentle. "Bears are the least angry because we're the Healers. I am safe to be around despite all that, but put me in a cage and poke me long enough..."
They approach a small pond among the trees and Elle indicates it with a tilt of her head, walking along the edge of the water with careful strides. "It's nice and cool by the water at least. Not really a substitute for getting wet, but..."
---
So the trip ended up by water after all. Elle must have really wanted to go to the beach. Olivia makes a note of that, and to find a swimsuit she can steal from somewhere...unless she can grow one from plants? Maybe it's possible. She's gotten very good at growing food. Maybe some broad leaves and vines...
She finds herself wanting to experiment right now, and sits on that feeling. Better to save it for a surprise. Anyway, if she started experimenting now, she'd have to deal with the embarrassment if it failed due to any of the two hundred predictable reasons a plant-based swimsuit wouldn't work. Plus, it feels almost sacrilegious to use her gifts for something so damn trivial.
Olivia shakes her head briskly to clear it and returns to the conversation at hand. "Do you get hot a lot? Inside, the other women were always cold. Out here's different, but..." She trails off with a shrug, not saying aloud that she doesn't know if the temperature is the difference or if she is.
---
"This time of year, people complain about how they're boiling," Elle replies, making a face. "And my kind are from places that are cooler than this pretty much year round." She gestures vaguely to the woods around them before moving to stand along the edge of the pond. "This is a nice place for us to just... Stand around. You know." She takes a deep breath then, taking in the forest air as she contemplates the water in front of her. "Tell me more about what it's like. Being able to hear the world around you like that? I am pretty in tune with nature but it never talks back. Not unless I reach out to the spirits for guidance. Seems like you hear them everywhere?"
---
"Yeah, I'm not standing around," Olivia says archly and drops down onto her butt, ten feet from the pond's shore. Looking up at Elle, she answers the question with the air of someone being interviewed; which, at the hospital, was pretty much the only time she was ever asked questions, so it's almost the only context she knows how to answer in. "It's, I don't know. Harmonious. Most everything around here is asleep unless I try to wake it up. They're like babies, almost. They don't have names and most of them hardly even think, but they're all, like, humming or something. It's hard to describe. I'd say it's like there's a soundtrack to the forest except it's not quite like that, it..."
She notices her hands making frustrated reaping gestures above her lap like she's trying to snatch words out of the air, and forces herself to lay them back on her thighs. "I just call it a song because I can't think of a better way to describe it. Everything is as it should be, and it all works together. That's the best I can do." Olivia shakes her head, obviously annoyed at her own inability to say what she means. "What's the connection like for you?"
---
"Peace," Elle replies slowly. "The forest is silent to me but that's what feels so good about it. I know it talks to itself, and to you, but for me it is just warm and protective. Like... Like I don't *need* to talk or do anything to be understood and cared for." Elle replies carefully after studiously nodding along with everything that Olivia had to share. Elle never betrays frustration or annoyance. She seems to fit the myth of the affable bear, more Baloo from Jungle Book than a rampaging starving grizzly. Of course, everyone has more than one face depending on to whom they speak.
"I think I get what you mean though. Even though it isn't something I get to hear too."
---
Olivia noodles that over for a second, and settles on, "So you feel cared for? Not like you have to hunt what you need to live or whatever?"
---
"Or at least, that there's a place to hunt and sleep peacefully instead of being afraid for my cubs," Elle replies with a slow nod. "It's like having a home. You don't need walls or anything... Except room to belong."
---
Olivia raises one eyebrow as she looks up at Elle. "Your cubs?" she echoes, with a look that clearly expresses a contemplative surprise at the idea Elle is old enough to have kids. Which of course Elle is (and probably older than necessary by shifter standards, a fact which Olivia would not be grateful to learn), but Olivia just didn't think of her as a breeder.
---
"I'm a Den-Mother," Elle explains. "I raise the kinfolk. All of them are my cubs." So not a breeder in the literal sense, then. "There are kind of a lot of them actually, even though there's just me with the fur."
---
"Den Mother? Okay. I thought that was a Girl Scouts term." Olivia hears the reflexive snark rising up in her, and bites it down. Shitting on a person's culture is bound to earn some blowback eventually even if they're not a supernaturally angry murderbear. "Or are you telling me something about the Girl Scouts? Is there something in the cookies I need to watch out for?"
---
"It is," Elle replies with a laugh. "When I changed I was still a Scout, you know." She shrugs her shoulders at that, tilting her head slightly as she studies Olivia's expression. "But it gets the point across. Sometimes I feel like I'm a Girl Scout troop leader." She's grumbling along rather than reacting angrily. The sarcasm is somehow proving safe enough.
---
Olivia says, "Aw, bummer. I was hoping you were gonna tell me the Scouts are a front for bears who're trying to heal the world with magical cookies." She stops as a thought occurs to her, eyes flicking back and forth as she considers it. "Actually, I wonder if I could make friends with a pot plant and talk to it about enchanting cookies with...TLC?" She frowns as she searches her memory for a term she's only seen on a TV show she wasn't supposed to watch but nevertheless was playing on night shift because the bored aides turned it on. "No. Whatever the real thing is."
---
"CBC. Anyway... I'm not sure you can do that but if you wake up a pot plant and then bake it into some food I'm told the effect is pretty... Intense." Another of those smiles follows, and Elle takes up a seat beside Olivia on the grass. "Be careful what you awaken before you use it. Sometimes it will be a lot more than you bargain for, you know? But I hear pot is a fun one to try, so knock yourself out."
---
Olivia nods seriously. "I'll think about it. I spent long enough on drugs that mess with my head, I don't know if I want to be on them ever again." Her voice is oddly reluctant, reflecting her feelings: she's still on high alert as part of her escape, but she's slowly permitting herself to believe she might actually be free of the inside.
But it's more than that. Olivia knows she has a purpose, but not yet what it is. Whatever it is, she's pretty sure it doesn't involve healing the world by baking batches of Kumbaya brownies. Her goal feels...angrier? No, not quite. Merciless? That's closer, at least.
She doesn't want to think about it, so she barrels ahead as Elle sits. "Hey. You don't have to change the way you act to suit me. I...know I have my walls up, but I think I'd feel better if I knew the real you than the one behind a mirror of me. I think."
---
Olivia starts to feel slightly on edge as the conversation continues. It isn't immediately clear why. Nothing seems to have changed. The late evening is peaceful, the clearing largely empty save for the clear water and the birds in trees overhead-
Aha. That is the problem. The birds have left. One of the trees is vibrating agitatedly to get Olivia's attention, and this has scared away their passengers. Presently, they are speaking more loudly to get the Kami's attention.
"...Del. Burned?" It's a pained whisper, turgid with confusion and fear.
"Who would burn Del? And at a park?"
---
Olivia's head whips toward the speaking tree and she shoots to her feet so fast she almost totters off-balance. Her eyes blaze as she stalks over to the tree and lays both hands on it in a gesture that oddly evokes images of Al Pacino grabbing someone by the face to demand they look at him while they repeat bad news. "What? Say that again. Tell me everything."
It's rude to ignore Elle like that, but for Olivia, Elle has temporarily ceased to exist. When she thinks on this later, she will wonder what it means.
---
Elle, to her credit, doesn't react poorly to this at all. She straightens where she is seated and her blue eyes track Olivia's movements. Small hands rest on the woman's knees as she watches intently for any information that might be conveyed to her.
"It's awful," the cedar replies. Del was a cedar too, Olivia recalls. "My Del was burned at the park. Someone chopped a hole in their trunk and threw in lots of smelly paper that burned with black smoke and torched him to the ground. Humans are vile. Mae, the birch across the way, told the birds and the birds told Eric, and Eric let Cindy know, and Cindy sent more birds and these birds are telling me!"
The flora of Los Angeles do have quite prolific family trees.
---
Olivia strokes the tree's bark carefully, trying to offer it comfort in this painful moment. "If I asked Mae, do you think she could tell me who did it?" Her gentle touch is at odds with the anger shaking her voice.
---
"Mae will know," the cedar agrees immediately. "Will you make them go away?" The tree stops shuddering after a few gentle caresses and instead returns to hanging its branches in what only Olivia can interpret as a despondent manner. "Who knows who they might burn next?"
---
"I know who they'll burn next," Olivia says darkly. "Themselves." Okay technically that doesn't make any sense unless she plans to control their minds or something, which she can't do, but--
Olivia rests her forehead against the tree's trunk. "I'm so sorry. They did this because of me. I'm going to make sure they never do it again, to protect all of you and avenge Del, okay? I just need to figure out how I can do it without involving any of you more than I have."
From someone else, asking for time would be an excuse. For Olivia, it's literally just her desire to do this right, to figure out a way to stalk and kill people in a way that will both send a message and be accomplished without her getting caught so she can't protect the trees again in the future. The murders she means to commit cast no shadow over her thoughts; to her soul, they are not crimes, but facts. The consideration she gives them carries as much moral weight as strategizing where to put pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.
She has it in her to do this. What she lacks is the experience to do it well.
Slowly, Olivia turns to Elle, her chin tucked down toward her throat, her eyes flicking rapidly as she thinks. "Elle. Someone just killed the tree you found me in. Either they were trying to interrogate it to find out where I am or it's a trap to lure me in. The Wyrm. Would it know enough about me to know I'd go into this trap to get revenge? If it wouldn't know that, then they killed Del as a hunting expedition rather than as bait."
---
Elle peels open one eye, turning slightly to settle her gaze on Olivia. "They know," she will say without a second's thought. "If Gaia's spirits could tell me then the Wyrm's minions could learn the same way. Your kind, Kami, are precious and rare. They would do much to capture you and corrupt or kill you. So..."
Elle climbs to her feet slowly, moving as if her weight were more ponderous than her all of one hundred and fifteen pounds. A deep breath is taken and then held for a few seconds as the bear rouses herself. "They won't know me yet," she relates. "I have never revealed myself in Los Angeles. Never had a need..." She shrugs slowly. "So... When you go spring this trap I'll come with.
"I did say I'd protect you. I don't think they'll be prepared for me to be involved. Back to the park then?"
---
Olivia almost says yes. It's so close her throat bulges with the effort it takes to swallow the word. "No," she chokes out, and is able to say more steadily, "I need to grow some things to prepare, and I need more information." She looks around, trying to spot the ranger's tower Elle mentioned at the start of the walk. She doesn't see it, but she suddenly doesn't feel safe here either. "Let's get deeper into the park. The people who did this. Would they be people, or possessed? If it's a demon, I'll probably need to ask the green how to kill it." Poison. Probably some kind of poison, but no, don't go making assumptions before you've checked, Liv.
---
"If they know as much as that then they are possessed by a spirit or perhaps one of the shifting kind." Elle's tone turns gently grim. "If the latter then you would not be able to handle this alone. The shifting folk are built and bred for war. Without the help of others of the Changing Breed..." She shakes her head slowly.
"Either way... Kill the host and the spirit will be banished, so we are settled there. Every possessed is different, but few can match the might of a shifter." Elle pauses for a second before adding significantly, "And few shifters can approach the might of a bear. If it comes to blow I'll take care of it, one way or another."
---
Olivia pauses in her march through the trees, startled. "It didn't even occur to me it might be like you," she nearly whispers, almost to herself. The realization itself is embarrassing, but the implications that come with it, the implications about how little she knows of the world she's now entered and how she's so new to it that even the things she's been told haven't really integrated themselves into her way of thinking? Those are scary. It means she's compelled to act in a world she's ignorant of.
But she IS compelled to act.
She resumes walking. "It's just important to me that I kill whoever did this. If it's a spirit, it can't get away. Whoever does this needs to know they're trading their lives for the lives they take." Oh yeah, just talking about murder like it's no big thing. "So I need to get some weapons ready, because I want to go to the park and do my recon, but I can't assume the trap will give me a chance to retreat and come back prepared. I have to assume I get one shot at this." She's mostly talking to herself, working things out in her mind. "And I can't assume the ones who did it will be there. It would be so much simpler to just have the police waiting for me. No one has to explain any demonic miracles or anything that way...
"If it's the police waiting for me, they'll try to secure the area to make sure there are no bystanders. They might cordon off the roads in case I have an escape vehicle ready. Maybe we need to steal a car so we can see if anyone tries to divert traffic from the area. If it's not police, what do you think they'd do, Elle?" Olivia asks, surrendering control without hesitation. Even her compulsive need to protect herself is second to doing this job right.
---
"I don't think they would use the police unless they have an officer under their thumb to lead the way. It's too easy for it to go wrong otherwise," Elle replies seriously. "If they don't use the police then if I were them, looking for a freshly made Kami who probably has no idea how to defend herself from what is coming? I would probably watch the park and jump you the moment you get close."
Elle's brows furrow slightly and she wrings her hands reflexively as she's laying this out. Like she's stretching for upcoming physical activity. "I wouldn't want to confront you directly since you might have any number of powers... But jump out suddenly, shove a bag over your head, and drag you to a dark basement? That would be easiest. And the cops would stop them from outright kidnapping you, so... I am willing to bet it will be simpler and a lot more brutal since they went through all the effort of trying to draw you there."
---
Olivia nods thoughtfully, sparing Elle the occasional sidelong glance but mostly focus on where she's walking. "So they don't have conspiracy theory levels of reach, where they quietly arrest me, then disappear me in prison. That's good, at least. It also means they don't have the power to block witnesses, so they need to pick a place to trap me. Which means vehicles, right? A couple of cars to fence me in whether I'm walking or driving, and to throw me in once they've black bagged me?" No fear as she lays this out, just more jigsaw pieces to put into place.
A thought occurs to Olivia. "Except I keep forgetting, magic could be part of this. They can't just teleport me places or they'd have done that already, but could they create a trap that moves me to the spirit world?"
---
"They could, yes," Elle replies slowly. "But if they do I will reach through and pull you back." The confidence seems to be unshakable. Since this started, Elle has never considered the possibility of danger or conflict, judging by her behavior. Everything is framed in how they get to the moment in which Elle unleashes the fearsome power she keeps describing and never showing to Olivia. "Penning you in with vehicles, snatching you out of the park, and then taking off into the slums seems like the most likely way of getting you to of here unless they try the spirit world," Elle agrees after a moment. "They probably won't factor my presence in at all. Unless I've been outed somehow I'm just a random girl. The easiest way to deal with the problem may be to just go spring their trap."
---
Olivia pauses. "I know I'm treating you like you're a resource in this, but there's just so much I don't understand that I need to get right before I show up there." Her hands, curled into claws, raise to chest level as if to snatch the understanding from the air; but when she notices her fingers trembling, she quickly drops her hands to her sides again and forces her fingers to hang down. "Like, you're part of this secret society of whatever. If I get out of this, I'm going to need to start making friends. Can I trust them? Should you introduce me to them?"
---
"That's the plan. A bit at a time. Everyone is different. Some are going to be afraid of you and your power. Others are going to want to protect you no matter what, like me. So it's just a matter of introducing you to the right ones. And we'll definitely do that. Soon. But some of it you may just have to try on your own and hope for the best." She pauses. "I know that's not what you want to hear right now.
"And I am a resource. Go ahead and treat me like it."
---
Olivia shakes her head. "No, it's fine. And you're not a resource, you're a--"
The word 'friend' sticks in her throat.
"--A person, who's in this too. I don't--I can't tell if I'll be able to watch your back in this, but I want to try.
"I've been pumping you for information. Tell me what you need from me to support you too. My best idea right now is to see what the green can give me to work with. I figure if it can grow me food when I ask, then it can grow me poisons or maybe, I don't know, enchanted clubs to use as weapons, or...I don't know, I've never been a wizard before."
---
"I can be a person and a resource," Elle replies patiently. "From my perspective, you're a cub. I am here to protect and support you. You don't need to give back anything at all. That's not the point."
Elle's voice takes on a soothing, rhythmic cadence from deep in her throat, seeming to drop an octave in the process as she speaks. "You can and will support me as best you can, but it's your first time. As you grow stronger you'll support me more. What I get out of it is an ally and a friend. It just might take a little bit of time. And that's okay." For Elle, the situation is as simple as that and there's no change in her expression to suggest vexation or even concern. Just another moment to share, another piece of information to divulge. Nothing really seems to get the bear's hackles up. Not yet, at least. "I don't know what kind of weapons you can make but pick the best and then hide up in a tree where you can support me without being a target. If you're a target then I will have to put myself in harm's way to protect you. So we should do our best to skip that part. Just like wizards in a video game, right?"
---
Olivia doesn't know video games, but she gets the gist, and nods. "Okay. So, we're talking about at least two cars, probably three. That means at least five people, maybe a lot more, especially if they have a van or a moving truck or something. And not everyone who tries to jump me will be the ones who did it." She thinks as fast as she can. "If it becomes a fight, then things will get flashy, right? We'll attract witnesses?"
---
"Well," Elle begins. "Probably not. People tend to run away screaming and forget what happened once the changing breeds get involved. It's complicated but Delirium should cover the worst of it, and the park has all those trees to hide it from the street..." She seems to be pondering this a moment. "We should be okay, and I would expect three to five of them, yeah. I doubt they will bring enough that it will be a serious problem. Just don't try getting close yourself. I don't know if you are any tougher than a normal human but I wouldn't bet on it."
---
Olivia nods decisively. "Okay, this is my plan. Tell me what you think. We spring the trap, we fight our way out of it. I want to leave one of them alive and get into their car to drive them off and get information out of them. That would be easier to do if we don't draw attention, but it's not worth risking either of us for that. I could probably get the same information from the trees later, after the heat has died down. I'm going to see what the park and I can work with, and once I know, I'll tell you what I can bring to the table. Does that sound good? Am I overlooking something?"
Olivia apparently just assumes she should be the one to plan the assault rather than the experienced soldier in the war.
---
"That sounds straightforward. We'll walk in together and you head straight for the tree and up as soon as they close on us," Elle replies, nodding. She seems to be fine with Olivia taking point on planning out their excursion. "I will try to leave someone alive for you so long as none of them leaves alive," Elle adds. "I won't be unknown to the spirits after this but eyewitnesses tend to be better at describing things, so all the same..." It might be a trick of the light but the smile Elle bears at Olivia seems like it might have a hint of fang to it. "Just give me the word and I'll be there."
---
Olivia's hand is on Elle's upper arm. When did that happen? She doesn't remember. She just knows she's blushing and pulling her hand back like Elle's skin is on fire. Never mind. Focus on the mission. "Okay. I'm going to commune and ask for some advice," she says, looking down at the plants because they're the ones she'll need to talk to next. Not for any other reason. "It will probably take a while, if you have anything you want to do. It's not like I can start without you, after all."
That's almost a compliment, that is.
---
"I'll go see what I can find out, talk to some people... Eat a cart load of salmon." Elle cracks a newfound grin at that. "But I'll be back here in the morning, like always. This will happen. And soon. Since you're busy, I'm going to go ahead and get started on that, though." Elle glances down a ther stomach, though definitely not because of the rumbling that follows her statement. "Just be careful. Okay? Don't go anywhere near that park without me."
---
Olivia shakes her head. "I won't. I wasn't kidding. I can't do it without you."
Then:
"Thanks, Elle. I don't know what I'd do without you."
---
"Of course not. Nobody can deal with this much bullshit alone." Elle turns to wink at Olivia. "We'll catch up in the morning. Promise." And then she is walking away into the swiftly approaching night.
