On the first day, they'd talked for hours. Beautiful wanted every detail about the mission, and always pushed for more whenever the conversation started to die down. She preempted every question of logistics, and shut down every deflection of praise with clipped and random bursts of observations and a wave of her hand. What she wanted was [i]stories[/i]. She kept asking how XIII felt with the wind in her hair, or if it felt good to fly so high under her own power. Was it different from riding on the train? What kind of sounds did the guard make? Debriefings weren't normally like this. Nobody laughed this much, and definitely nobody ever used the phrase "Shut up!" when they meant "tell me more!" Praise was always reserved for the officer in charge, and even though the girl named Bella had played at sitting in that chair she'd never managed to find out what it was like to bask in the glow of her work until Beautiful showed her how. Hours drifted into each other one after the other as the details grew bolder, fuller, and brighter, until XIII was startled from a long thought admiring the construction of Azura train systems and the sorts of things their gravity technology did that made life here different from living on Tellus by a call to dinner. The plan accounted for every last detail, it turned out. XIII cooked a sweet potato and eggplant salad with her best approximation of the the bread she'd eaten on the roofs. For another twenty minutes, they tossed ideas back and forth about how to change it, interspersed with distant mutterings about things too big and far away for XIII's brain to catch up to. And things were never quite this nice again. ***** Her reflection in the mirror looks back at her with the expression of a woman who expects to be punished. Her eyes dart to the back of the room again and again, seeking the hiding spot of one of the Masters, either of Assassins or the Kennels, ready with the whip and a harsh lesson. Silence greets her. She closes her eyes, and gently slides her hand across her head to feel the hair rapidly grow back where she directs it to. Beautiful's vision is absolute. Her plan casts a net too wide to see, woven with details too small to seem important. Of course the ball requires a dress. Of course the dress requires a hairstyle. So of course XIII's hands are the only ones that can be trusted to bring it into being. Her blue-black hair greets her in the mirror when she opens her eyes again, longer and silkier than it had been even before the [i]Yakanov[/i] ruined it. She reaches for a box on the counter and plucks several large diamonds between the knuckles of each finger, and brings them carefully up to the glossy curtain on top of her head. She gathers, and she weaves her hair into a complicated chain of braids. Some are tight and full of many tiny loops, while others are so loose they're only held together by a series of small bands. They all wind together into a chaotic tail, and where they cross each other she inserts a diamond. Brilliant white on the surface, every slight turn of her head rips them into prisms that throw different colors of light across her back and the floor, never quite repeating the same pattern twice. She reaches grabs a small gun and put it to her ears. Through gritted teeth, she shoots three large emerald studs apiece into her sensitive triangles, falling down a row starting from the tips. ***** One the second day, Beautiful wanted to talk philosophy. It turned out she had no special insights into the nature of the universe, or of love, or of the gods or how to worship them. Mostly she didn't say anything, except to prod XIII for further comment. But she had an endless fascination with XIII's journey. She wanted the story of Big Bone Lick told over and over again, the fall of the Kaeri and the rise of the Lanterns and the way that Hera blessed its coming. Even though it hadn't lasted long, there was a... no, not a hope. A hope would imply Beautiful hadn't understood everything properly, and it was impossible to believe that could be true. Maybe it was a flash or insight, or inspiration. XIII had no ability to read those wide, violet eyes. And it didn't matter. If it was Beautiful asking, she didn't mind talking about anything. She wanted to hear about life aboard the empty [i]Yakanov[/i]. She didn't press for details, but when it came to sensations she was a bottomless pit of hunger. What did this feel like? And this? Was it empty, was it sad? Did she cry? How did the fish taste? Tell me about the movie again, chan-barra-chan. What was Apollo like? And he watched you? All that time? Every time XIII stopped and frowned when her words failed her, Beautiful lit up and nodded with even greater interest. It felt like she was drinking in the space where thoughts faltered as they poured off of XIII's head or something. Maybe she could see the shape of these memories by staring into the Auspex or something? She asked for the feeling of the spiral and the void skiff five separate times. Each time the story came out differently. It twists from a story about panic and desperation into an indescribably peace and the feeling that everything would work out fine, and when the lid lifted off of that coffin the world rushed back in, but there would never be any return to a time before she'd become the golden corkscrew and carved her way into the Reaches. Beautiful watched her without comment after she finished her final failed attempt to explain it all, her face getting that glassy, distant look that meant she was taking in new ideas and applying them at a scale maybe even the Empress couldn't comprehend. But then her eyes turned wet, and she smiled. Their embrace left a scent on her neck XIII didn't think she could ever be rid of. ***** She stands in front of Beautiful with her robe tossed carelessly onto the floor behind her. No secrets between friends, right? The Ikarani takes her awkwardly by the shoulders and turns her around to face a wall, instead. XIII's tail lashes with frustration and tension, and she's forced to tuck it around her leg to keep it out of the way. This is a sign of trust. Beautiful is too far away to be able to explain anymore why this must be done. But it must be done. She hugs her arms tight around her stomach, and gasps when she feels the first touch of paint against her back. Beautiful moves like she's trying to paint an entire galaxy at once, but somehow the effect is delicate and precise. It takes all of four or five brushstrokes before the pattern becomes obvious. One line, and then another, and then another after that. The gentle curves of petals, and the sharp stab of thorns. The lacquered, crimson paint is being used to bring out her scars: the ones Her Imperial Majesty ordered put on her back to punish her for disgracing the Olympic Games. Beautiful paints each silvery line of the unfolding flower into an unmissable and bold expression of Imperial power and pride. But in bringing it to the foreground, she twists the meaning. Shame becomes pride. Submission becomes strength. The more of it she draws out, the more pride creeps into her chest until it's threatening to burst free and ruin her makeup in a sudden stream of tears. The rose unfurls across her very own back in colors that only a Praetor would be permitted to wear, and then only as an accent. In fact, to paint them this boldly is almost an act of declaring her to be an imperial princess. She watches Beautiful work in the reflections of the mirrors all around her. XIII's tail uncurls, and flicks comfortable back and forth underneath her canvas. ***** On the third day, they had a slumber party of sorts. This time XIII did all of the listening. The pair of them ate junk food and wrapped blankets around themselves for no reason beyond the feeling of it, trying to squeeze a lifetime's worth of memories into a single half-hour allotment. Beautiful was a natural gossip, if one let her be. She knew, or half-remembered at least, a thousand different stupid little details about several lifetime's worth of people and all of the people those people knew too. Most of it came tumbling out in an incoherent stream of disconnected facts shot rapidfire without pausing for more than obligatory giggle. It was like listening to a waterfall with unpleasant coworkers and a grudge against her environment. If any of it was about anybody XIII knew, she couldn't tell. But something about the ease in the other girl's voice compelled her to stay. Compelled her to listen, and nod, and slip little "mhm?"s in where she could so that Beautiful could feel like she was participating in something normal. As if XIII knew what that was, either. Maybe 'mortal' was a better word. So she let a torrent of stories about broken walls and bratty, flirtatious Toxicrenes and the garden party where the King of such and such a planet split her pants in front of three hundred other delegates and literally died of embarrassment all wash over her without comment and without wishing for it to stop. She forced herself to laugh where it seemed appropriate, or perhaps necessary, to continue the moment. But she watched Beautiful talk herself very nearly to death, and it was her turn to wear the blank expression of someone seeing more than was being presented. Her claws dug into her palms despite all the promises she'd made to herself that they never would again. And on the fourth day, the Master of Assassins informed her that to delay the Rampancy, she would be permitted no more than one word's worth of exchange per day from then on. ***** Putting this dress on is in itself an act of artistry. To call it form fitting would be like calling Aphrodite's Rift an inconvenience. It is a second skin, and such a delicate one at that only somebody with a perfect understanding of XIII's body could help her step into it without tearing it in half. The black lace is sheer enough that it might as well not be covering anything in between the snowflake patterns of less diaphanous fabric that dots bits of her like a dark storm seemingly at random. It clings to her soft, inviting tummy and her perfect hips. It holds her breasts with the delicacy and tenderness of a lover's hands, and the plunging line between them bares her smooth skin completely from her collarbone down to her belly button in a slowly narrowing V. The sleeves just kiss the tops of her shoulders and extend down to her wrists in clinging sheer fabric that veils her white fur to celebrate it, rather than covering it up. From the edges of her shoulders the back of the dress settles into a wider V than the front, exposing even more of her back, from her shoulder blades to her painted scars all the way down to the point underneath her tail. It feels like wearing a whisper. But if that's true, it's a celebration of her body. Nothing is covered where it could be highlighted instead, and what [i]is[/i] hidden is done so precisely that it's only done for the sake of making those small bits even more alluring. Today, she is not a Servitor. She is not being sent to make someone else look better. She is not to be hidden behind the trappings of a maid. She is not there to be touched or fondled, or sent to lurk in the shadows and keep a more important target safe. Her dress clings to her thighs down to her knees, where the sheer and swirling lace finally opens up like a pool of water and spills out onto the floor behind her for a full meter in a fan. This is her. This is meant for her. It's a dress so specific it could only be worn [i]by[/i] her; something designed with no thought in mind beyond the fact that she was born to be watched. She is nothing more or less than the most beautiful creature in the universe. Except that somebody else in that room is using that name. She's permitted one word. Just one. XIII glances down at the vial she's been given, and the swirling contents meant to wipe all of this away. Something that will save Beautiful. By taking her name away from her again. By taking this week and these memories and this plan and turning them into new vague phantoms for her to chase in another five years when someone needs a perfect plan again. She gently closes her fingers around the vial. She lifts her skirt up enough to find the loop of fabric sewn into her garter, and hides it there. Beautiful's plans take everything into consideration. Absolutely everything. This is friendship. This? Is trust. Her heartbeat quickens as she takes her friend's wrists in her hands and squeezes for all she's worth. "Beautiful..." she spends her one word on a compliment and a reminder rolled in one. She stares into those glassy, violet eyes like she's trying to see the place her friend is looking right now. Beautiful cranes her neck. Her hazy, stunning eyes fill with XIII's face. "...Bel[i]la.[/i]" she answers in a slur. Something somewhere slips and shatters, broken forever.