Canaan can't trust her senses (fortheliving) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2013-09-21 20:24:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, canaan, motoko kusanagi |
Who: Catoko (motoko and canaan)
What: Canaan's eyes are stuck 'on', Motoko is supportive.
When: 09/16
Where: Canaan's place.
Ratings/Warnings: PG-13 just in case.
Status: Complete!
It felt like whatever was wrong with her was on overload. Unlike other times, when things had just started going bad for Canaan, this time it all made sense. Everything came together like an entire puzzle. Just like in the dreams.
It’d been doing that on and off lately, but she hadn’t been able to count on it. Now, everything was clear, and she felt like she had an unlimited amount of sensory range. Planes flew overhead, helicopters - she didn’t just hear them, if she raised her eyes to her ceiling she could see them - bright blobs of color, close or far away. Numbers and letters raised up off her calendar, changing color until the important ones took on one river of similar color. Almost everything else was grey.
She understood with great clarity now, why she liked it when things were grey. It made it easier to pick out the colors that really mattered. One of those colors was heading right for her.
Motoko’s color trailed in through her door, a small cloud of iridescent specks of light. Even when her eyes were closed, Canaan could feel it floating on the edges of her body. If it wasn’t so very painful, she’d probably be a little happier about it.
Motoko pushed the door open, unsure of what she'd see when she'd get there. Her emotions swirled about, uncontained in her heart and in her head. She didn't let her face betray her, though even with her inorganic muscles she struggled. Motoko was worried and this was a foe she could not face head on.
She wondered what she looked like to Canaan right now. She wished she'd had her eyes modified to switch to IR and ultraviolet, and made a mental note to talk to Mayuri about that. It might bring her closer to Canaan and would be useful in combat.
She sat next to her lover friend and took her hand.
The other woman's hair had drained in color - the brown it had been before coming off more like an ash blonde. The change had been so subtle over the last week that she hadn't even noticed it, and right now she was too out of it to check herself in the mirror.
She squeezed Motoko's hand, "You're going to be too bright to see without making my nose bleed. You're always so bright."
The cop looked at Canaan's hair, and lifted her other hand to brush at it. It was somehow a lot softer, and it made her stomach flutter. She reached into her front pocket and pulled out some sunglasses. "Want to see if these help?"
Canaan cracked one eye open. Whatever had kicked her eyes into overkill mode was still going on, and even just opening her eye a crack made the headache that much worse.
Motoko's outstretched hand scintillated like it was covered in a million glowing diamonds, the glasses she was offering a stark grey in comparison. She reached her hand out and took them, then put them over her eyes and opened them both fully.
It only dimmed the glow down slightly. Blood began to trickle out of her nose, and she casually wiped it away, "It helps a little."
“Canaan, you’re bleeding.” She wondered if a blindfold would somehow be better. Canaan would probably see through it anyway. She didn’t offer to wipe Canaan’s face, though her fingers brushed against Canaan’s cheek.
"Yes. I know. This... whatever it is has been giving me nosebleeds sometimes. Usually when it goes into this... mode." Canaan had no better way to describe it, but she tried to, anyway.
She leaned against Motoko a bit while she spoke, wishing that the other woman's presence would somehow magically return her to normal, "It all comes together. Everything comes together into this way of seeing with perfect clarity. Nothing that matters has color. Everything that does, glows. I could turn that off, in my dreams. It was doing this on and off during our raid on those labs, but it turned itself off. It won't turn off, now."
“I’m hoping some day you’ll be able to control it without hurting.” She pulled the woman against her, squeezing her gently as she did so. “I’ll talk to Mayuri. Just let him know it’s full...strength. We need to learn how to turn it off. I know it isn’t like shutting out pain.”
"It might be connected to my dream."
Canaan curled up in a ball against Motoko, allowing herself to give in to the need to be comforted, at least for the moment. She recounted the events in her dream as concisely as she could - the viral threat at the convention center, Maria's kidnapping, staging the rescue, and the bomb the USA had sent. How she'd managed to divert its course by hacking the bomb itself at the last minute, using her abilities.
"I woke up just as we were heading outside. Everything hurt, my eyes ached, and the sun was the wrong color..." It's all she remembered before waking up.
Motoko felt herself get unreasonably jealous of this Maria person. She squashed the emotion, and thought it might be better for Canaan if the woman was around. She seemed to be a kind of influence on the assassin that someone like Motoko could never be, and that was more important than her own personal feelings. Feelings she shouldn’t have anyway.
“What color is it now?”
"Blue," Canaan answered, without even looking out her window, "They're all blue. I hate the sun, because it's blue, like them. The color of my enemies..."
She trailed off, and rubbed at the side of her head, "The other me hates them. When they bombed her village. Siam pulled her out of the wreckage, and they were in the distance. She could see them even though Siam said they weren't in sight."
“Why is the sun the same color as your enemies?” Motoko wondered aloud. The sun was the giver of life, but it could also represent death and fire and burning.
Canaan shook her head, "I don't know. I've never understood."
But she thought she understood better from the outside of her dreams than she did from the inside. She held her own hand up in front of her eyes. It registered as a sort of pale green, "I'm... scared. Your body can check vitals?"
“Yes. Your pulse is elevated.” She rubbed her hand up and down Canaan’s back, and pulled her closer. She pressed her lips against the other woman’s forehead. It wasn’t necessary, but it was comforting. “You’re sweating.”
"I believe my abilities when combined also take in some parts of the infrared spectrum, or combine empathy. I pick up heat and emotions off of people, the sound of their breathing, their smells, and translate those things into colors."
Whatever her body was doing, it was taking its toll on the rest of her. Canaan was exhausted. She closed her eyes again and rested against Motoko, "Mayuri would delight in testing it. I wish you could... hook into me. See what I see."
It wasn't an easy thing to admit.
“There seems to be an emotional aspect to it. You associate blue with negative things.” She kissed Canaan’s cheekbone, lightly. “I wish I could too. It would be possible, but it would require a surgical implant.” She paused. “It would make sex even more intense.” Like bribery.
"... what else about me would it change?"
Canaan was considering it now, not just because of Motoko's bribery, but also for its more practical applications. If having some kind of implant could also restore normal vision to her and leave it so her abilities were only active when she summoned them...
It would mean less episodes like this, hopefully. Which was good, because she was a little afraid she might throw up on Motoko's shoes.
Motoko shifted out of Canaan’s grasp, and made her lie down so she could massage her scalp, shoulders and back. “I don’t know. Ideally nothing. It would just be an implant that would let you communicate over a secure radio frequency, and over wiring with a connection. The other effect I’d hope would be to help you with control.”
"That was my hope, too," Canaan groaned. The massaging felt fantastic. Motoko had such excellent control over her fingers that they applied just the right amount of pressure where needed. It was helping her relax even more than just the sounds of Motoko's voice did.
"Worth considering," She added, after a long pause. Her eyes were beginning to get baggy. She suddenly realised how tired she was. Would Motoko stay if she passed out? Canaan hoped so.
She didn't want to wake up alone.
There was no intention on Motoko’s part to leave, at least not yet. She didn’t think there would be anything short of an order from her superior that would get her to leave Canaan’s side right now. “Worth considering.”
Maybe she could move in. Or Canaan move into her place. Whichever place was larger.
The world started shrinking around her, and then her vision snapped back to 'normal' with such suddenness that it actually made Canaan feel like she was going to lurch off to one side or the other. Even though all she was doing was laying there, it felt like her body was falling downwards.
She squinted through the sunglasses, searching for Motoko's face like she was suddenly going blind. Her eyes no longer glowed, and seemed to be almost a pale amber color instead of brown, "...over... falling, but the colors... please don't go."
The last bit was really the only part of it that made much sense, even to her. She barely hung onto consciousness long enough to hear Motoko's reply before everything went black.
Motoko considered if she should take Canaan somewhere. But she decided against it. She stood, lifting the woman into her arms and cradling her against her chest, then carried her to bed.