Y'know? There was a time, long enough ago for it to be embarrassing but not so long ago that you wouldn't recognize her if you saw the video, when Yue thought that it was very important that she learn how to dance. Haha, can you imagine? The sheer cheek! What's a little village girl need to know [i]dancing[/i] for, anyway? Was it her plan to skip on down to the big city and twirl her silks and her fans in exchange for supper? She never said. And maybe she didn't know! But she'd been reading a book about a Princess (they didn't use that word exactly, but you could tell, ok? You can always tell.) who stole hearts (and jewels!) with her dancing, and it was important! Real important that she learn! So she begged and she begged and finally Sis, who knew everything there was to know about everything you see, sighed said ok and took her outside.

If you're wondering what this has to do with anything, well, the sensations just now are [i]remarkably[/i] similar. Pull this way! No this way! Now that way! Yue squeaks with fright as her body jerks around in an awkward dance that's somehow even less graceful than she managed to be back then. Her feet don't quite trip over themselves, but if she's watching them she's got no idea how they're managing it. And she's not, because it's too important that she keep those pretty blues trained on her, erm, her 'partners' as they brandished those awful and awfully heavy looking clubs at her. Her arm lurches one way and her foot slides another and her weight shifts like meep! and then clack clack clatter clack! Wooden weapons beat their song together and she goes spinning till she's sure she's gonna hurl, till she's definitely absotively gotta smack her dainty little face right on the slime covered floor.

[i]like this! and then this! ending like this![/i]

But she doesn't. Yue flinches and yanks her arm away at the last second so that her horizontal slashing finisher turns into more of a crossways halfways whichways sort of half-boop. And that's not right at all, is it? It's like being a puppet, she supposes, or well... weird the way everything here comes back to jiangshi isn't it? But come on! If it's strings or magic it makes no difference, she hops when she's told and nobody seems to mind or notice when she winces because it's uncomfortable, and oh no oh no oh no she's gone and done it, hasn't she? She's been possessed! Or... or lower possessed or just plain cursed and oh! Oh no! Was it going to be like this forever? When she thought all that stuff about this place being pretty she didn't, y'know, um. She didn't mean she wanted to [i]be[/i] the monumeEEEp!

[i]...like this.[/i]

What is this?

[i]...[/i]

All of her muscles feel like jelly just now. If her heart beats any faster she's pretty sure it's gonna explode, and that's a mess she'd best not try to imagine unless she wants to add fainting to her list of bad things that are about to happen to her. Every time she tries to move her body on her own it feels like fighting to push through the sea, if the sea were made of sheep's wool but also somehow yanked back like a teacher dragging her idiot student out of incoming traffic. Shame and pain and a palpable sense of disappointment, of letting someone important down. She'd like to cry right now, but her eyes don't belong to her at the moment. You would think she would be thrilled, wouldn't you? 

But this doesn't feel like when Hyra held her close. It's got none of her warmth, it doesn't... um. Oh gosh, don't take this the wrong way, but it doesn't tease right. Y'know? That smirk was everything, when you got right down to it, and without it there's just pushing and pulling and nobody's letting [i]her[/i] move so it's just like getting stuck in a whirlpool while being clung to by an octopus, but also there are robot zombies with large clubs who are much better at being puppets than she is and they keep swinging bit hurty chunks of wood at her and eep! And likewise, eep! And aish! Once more with feeling, EEEEEP!

...Except. A third loop and a forth, there's a feeling of exasperation clutching at her lungs, but there's a glimmer of something else now too. And... it's just, she's not sure, but she thinks it might be hers. No, it must be hers. A thought that [i]she's[/i] having, a connection that [i]she's[/i] made, because it flows like water down a hill after a night of rain and suddenly, suddenly, suddenly!

[i]like. this.[/i]

And then... this?

[i]finishing like this![/i]

It's a miracle. One of those tiny every day sorts of miracles like when you crack open a shell and there's an extra nut inside for some reason, or a cold winter's night where you're feeling sad for no reason at all but suddenly there's a floofy little fox in your lap who won't stop kneading and purring until you finally smile. That kind of miracle. The kind that goes this way: Yue about the way she's being pulled and which thing goes next and then, aha! It's clack and clack [i]then[/i] clatter clack! She steps into her parry for once, just ahead of being yanked into it, and it's only for a moment but suddenly she feels as warm as summer, and there's a little squeeze on her shoulders. 

Yue is allowed to pose.

When she smiles, it's a shaky sort of thing. Thank goodness it's so dark down here, because it's really rather ugly. After all, she's still half-crying and half-unsure if she wants to not be crying. Her heart's still racing, but she's doing her best to stuff all those fears into some tiny pocket maybe down by her toes? Because... hahaha, it's so strange. But her curse feels... well. Not exactly. Maybe? No, gosh. She must be imagining it. But still. Doesn't it feel just the littlest bit like love?

This poor thing. This poor, poor girl. Maybe... maybe she doesn't have any other way to show love anymore. Maybe this is how she does it. Maybe this is how she laughs. Maybe this is how she cries. Maybe this. And then this. Now that. Ending like this. Yue is yanked back to start, and her increasingly dented opponents stand and brandish their weapons with renewed vigor at her equally increasingly bruised arms. 

She gulps. But she closes her eyes, and tries to imagine herself, but a heroine worthy of a song. Or maybe just a verse or two. A rhyming couplet, maybe? Her hair drawn up into a ponytail instead of left to frizz and floof wherever it felt like. Soft boots, and a pleated skirt, a bit of leather armor maybe, like Hyra wore, but... she giggles. It's hard to imagine that working without also having Hyra's, erm, physique. But it helps enough, at any rate, to let her trust her, oh gosh! She almost said 'mistress', didn't she? Oh gosh gosh gosh, no no it's not, um. Focus!

She lets each move flow into the next, just letting go, just trusting, not needing to move herself at all because there's someone here who can do that for her. She surrenders her control, and it's strange how much that feels like power. But that's a thought to unpack later, by a campfire under a blanket, when everybody else around her has gone to sleep. Right now, her mind is on the feeling of it all. She's got no idea how to speak to this ghost. None at all. In fact if she was brave enough to try speaking at all right now it wouldn't surprise her to find out that she couldn't. Which is why she isn't. Because she's not. Brave enough, that is. So what she's got left to speak with are the feelings in her heart, and that floaty little trust sense that comes from surrender, and... hope, she guesses. Hope that it's enough. Hope that it helps. 

Hope that, maybe there's a Level Two?