Alexandra & Nancy
"The World is a Stage"
All I can say is, be careful what you
wish for. It just might come true.
- Oliver Stone
Location: The Swamp (Ville au Camp) β’ Northampton State Hospital, 1947
Skills: The Cards, History, Torture, Psychosis, Russian
Nancy was quite excited that morning. She was wearing a black dress and matching hat. Both of them looked new and just slightly out of place for 1943 - it'd be Alexandra's first visual clue that they wouldn't be traveling too far. The 'young' Emendator was hopping from foot to foot, waiting for Alexandra to show up. She had enjoyed her time with Sophia, but she had concocted a beautiful plan for Alexandra. It'd be a trying mental test for her.
As Alexandra made her way down to the swamp, she was filled with conflicting emotions, which was strange considering the fact that she had been mostly excited the last times she had gotten a new trainer. Perhaps she was just weary after training under Gilbert for four months. He always seemed to be two steps ahead of her, which honestly had left her feeling a tad paranoid on more than one occasion. You know, wondering when he was going to pull out his next arsehole move out of his hat. Nevertheless, she had learned a lot of valuable, lifesaving skills from the man, and for that, she was grateful.
Surely, Nancy couldn't be any vorse than him, right? Yeah, just my luck, I vill probably rue the day I ever thought that, she thought to herself as Nancy came into view.
She looked the woman, who was all decked out in black, over, before arching a brow quizzically.
"Vho died?" she commented sarcastically.
"You," Nancy said plainly, pulling out her camera and taking a picture of Alexandra. She'd develop the film for it later. She enjoyed taking pictures of the Paradoxes, as something by which to mark the passage of time but also to have some sort of record. Sometimes she'd give them to the Paradoxes. Sometimes they'd go to one of the Emendators. In other occasions, Nancy just tucked them underneath her bed.
"Get out all of your sarcasm now. This is your only chance - so be thorough. You'll have to bite your tongue soon." "Thank you, Captain Obvious," Alexandra retorted with a snicker. She then blinked and shook her head lightly when Nancy took a picture of her. She followed that up by arching a brow at her last statement.
"Oh, vhat vas that? I am avesome? Yes, yes I am," she retorted, leaning towards her and cupping a hand over her ear for added effect. A playful twinkle came to her eyes as she straightened back up.
"Vhat do I look like, sarcasm on demand? If I give avay too much, I may have to start charging," she quipped with a wink, before continuing in a more serious manner.
"As tantalizing as that offer is, vhy don't ve just get this shov on the road, before one of us is the first person inside a loop to grov a grey hair?" Nancy was playing with her camera throughout Alex's sarcasm rant, just waiting for her to get it out of her system. She then raised an eyebrow as Alex told her that they should leave. Nancy normally wasn't one for rules and decorum, but being told be a chatty Paradox to get a move on?
That irked her and she stared at Alex, before she decided on the best way to deal with her.
"You don't make the rules and whatever sense of humor you think you're displaying, you don't have it," Nancy said a bit coldly. While it was normally easy to mistake her for a young girl, her demeanor hinted at her true age in this moment.
"You are learning from me for the conceivable future, until it's time for you to switch trainers. So try not to get on my nerves on the first reset." Alexandra's eyes widened in surprise, and her mouth opened and closed as if trying to form words.
"But you said--" she began in protest before quickly stopping herself.
"You knov, never mind. I'll just shut my big mouth nov. Sorry." She looked away sheepishly and scratched the back of her head, feeling all kinds of awkward now. Apparently, the woman didn't take her brand of sarcasm well.
Crap, I'm dead meat. Nancy nodded, about to say something before she got the tell tale tingle on her fingers meaning that it was time to do a card reading. She held up a finger to Alexandra, pulling out her deck of cards and shuffling them. Everything else could wait. And the longer she put this off, the more unbearable it would become. She first drew the Three of Cups, then the Devil, and lastly the Two of Swords. Her eyes flickered up at Alexandra as she considered their meaning. The first card dealt with friendship, revealing Alexandra's past. The Devil - she usually saw this card with addicts of some sorts - and then the Two of Swords alluded to compromise.
"I have a policy that I will only do one personal reading per Paradox, generally at their request," Nancy began, putting her cards away.
"This reading is about you, as it turns out," her eyes flickered over towards her.
"You drew the Devil card - if you don't change your ways in the future, it'll stick around. Your mouth and attitude needs to change." Alexandra hesitantly glanced back over Nancy, as if doing so could possibly cause her to burst into flames. She ended up doing a doubletake when she caught Nancy's gesture followed by the Emendator pulling out The Cards. A look of curiosity now crossed her features unbidden, and she started to take a step over to the woman to take a peek at The Cards but quickly stopped herself.
Yeah, she probably vouldn't like that. She arched a brow when she was told that the reading was about her, and her brows then shot up at the woman's next statement.
Me? Stop being sarcastic? She does realize that that is just vho I am? Asking me to stop being sarcastic is like asking a fish to breathe on dry land. It just doesn't happen, she thought to herself, brows furrowing slightly.
Granted, I could tone it dovn a bit. Maybe that's vhat she meant, surely? "I can try to tone it dovn," she finally proclaimed with an affirmative nod of her head.
"Follow me," Nancy then said, not giving Alexandra a choice in the matter as she stepped through a portal, emerging in a dingy room. The lights were flickering and Alexandra would be able to hear the sound of screams echoing through the halls.
With long strides, Alexandra quickly followed after Nancy through the portal. She immediately glanced around, taking everything in once she stepped through to the other side. Her head snapped to the side, eyes widening when she heard the screams, before she eventually grimaced.
Great. Another one of those adventures that only lead to mental trauma, no doubt. "Something not to your liking?" Nancy asked, noticing the grimace. She pulled out something small and numerous from her pocket, clicking them through her fingers as she exited the small room and went into a hallway. Somehow, the stench only became worse out here. The hallway was lined with cells - most of them occupied, all with an individual out of their mind. As they passed, they shrunk away from Nancy and Alex, fearful of human contact.
"The nuns run a strict operation here," Nancy explained.
"Fortunately for us, they'll be busy performing electroshock therapy...Or any other form of torture that they deem reparative." "Π’Ρ ΡΠΌΡΠ΅ΡΡ Π·Π΄Π΅ΡΡ!" a voice screamed.
"Π, Π½Π΅ ΡΠ»ΡΡΠ°ΠΉ Π΅Π³ΠΎ, ΠΎΠ½ Π·Π΄Π΅ΡΡ ΡΠ»ΠΈΡΠΊΠΎΠΌ Π΄ΠΎΠ»Π³ΠΎ...ΠΡ ΠΏΡΠΎΡΡΠΎ Ρ
ΠΎΡΠΈΠΌ Π²ΡΠΉΡΠΈ..." Nancy didn't turn to react. Though given their surroundings and the fact that Russian was one of the few languages the Emendator did not speak, it was not altogether surprising.
Alexandra glanced over at Nancy, biting back a snarky reply. Her lips thinned as she then cautiously followed after the Emendator. This place already had a bad vibe going for it, and Nancy's words mostly certainly didn't ease her mind either. Her breath came in and out a bit sharply as she took in the caged people with wide eyes. Her heart went out to them, and yet she knew that she could not intervene as it could have unforeseen cataclysmic effects. And that was it's own form of torture all in itself. She flinched as a scream pierced through the air, and her eyes squeezed shut for a moment at the poor soul's words. While Nancy didn't seem to understand the person's words, Alexandra very much did. As she forced her eyes open again, she uncomfortably rubbed her arms.
Nancy rounded a corner, stepping to the side to make way for a girl with black braids. The girl locked eyes with Alexandra for a moment.
"It's not your time yet. Shame," she told Alexandra, a sharp knife in her hand as she went the other direction. The brief moment's distraction had been a moment too long, as Nancy seemed to have vanished from sight. Alexandra could either go back the way they had come, continue heading down the hallway forward, or take either corridor heading to the left or the right.
Alexandra followed after Nancy with brisk steps. However, as a girl wielding a knife came around the corner at the same time as them, she found herself coming to an abrupt stop, her eyes widening. She nervously eyed the knife as she tried to gauge the girl's intentions, while her muscles tensed with a flight or fight reaction that was brought to the forefront.
"Good to knov," she replied, more as a question than a statement at the girl's proclamation. She then hurriedly rushed around the girl after Nancy, just to find out that she had lost sight of the Emendator altogether!
"ΠΠ΅ΡΡΠΌΠΎ!" she exclaimed as her gaze looked around wildly for Nancy.
"ΠΠ΅Ρ Π½Π΅Ρ Π½Π΅Ρ!" After a relatively short deliberation, she chose to head right down the corridor, thinking that that was the general direction they were headed. As she walked down the hallway, it became more and more crowded as patients, nuns, nurses, and doctors seemed to pour in from all directions. The sounds of people walking and talking slightly muffled the sounds of screaming voices. She tried to keep her head down, but nevertheless, she felt more and more out of place. Not to mention the fact that the room was quickly becoming exceedingly claustrophobic for her.
A hand shot out and grabbed Alexandra, yanking her into the nearest room. There was what looked like a surgical bed and on the side was a variety of instruments.
"Do you want to learn how to torture someone, Alex?" Nancy asked, but her voice would sound strangely distorted. She pulled out the very things she had been fiddling with earlier - and although her image would begin to drift out of focus, they'd appear to be Eve's dice.
"If I roll even, I poisoned you. If I roll odd, you're fine," Nancy explained, rolling the dice. Nancy rolled a natural 20 and she smiled at Alexandra.
"Here - antidote," she said, pulling out a vial and handing it to Alex.
Alexandra let out a startled yelp as she was suddenly grabbed and forcibly pulled into a room. She turned in the person's grasp, preparing to defend herself but stopped short when she saw that it was only Nancy.
"Don't scare me like that," she exclaimed in a high pitched voice. She then shook her head in disbelief at the woman's words.
"Excuse me?" she questioned. Had she heard the woman correctly? The distorted quality to the sound of her voice would beg to differ. Looking over the Emendator's shoulders to see the surgical bed only served to unnerve her further.
"Not particularly," she stated, but even the sound of her own voice seemed a bit off now. Her vision was blurring, and she was seeing double. However, she was able to just make out what looked like dice in Nancy's hands. The woman's next words would have freaked her out even more if it weren't for the fact that she was having a hard time focusing, mentally and visually. Her heart beat wildly in her chest as just then she could hear the sound of heavy breathing behind her.
Nancy shrugged, setting the antidote on the table and sliding it on the table towards Alexandra. In one moment, it looked like the Emendator was smirking and in the next, Nancy had an expressionless face.
"It's up to you if you take the antidote - you could just let the effects happen," she mused. There was a large banging on the door, as if someone was trying to get inside and more screams vibrated throughout the place, the lights flickering.
"What are you afraid of, Alexandra? That's the first step - figuring out a person's fears..." Alexandra fumbled for the antidote, as she tried to calm her rapidly increasing nerves. The blurry, double vision. The heavy breathing down her neck. The screams outside. The flickering lights. The Emendator trying to freaking kill her! It was like a total sensory overload right then.
"Dying again" she retorted sharply, before hurriedly taking the antidote.
The door shrieked as it was thrust open, as if someone dragged their nails down a chalkboard.
"Mother sends her regrets that she couldn't be here, Ailith," the same girl from before said. She set her knife down on the table, the blade gleaming amongst the flickering lights.
"But even I know that's not what you're truly afraid of," she finished curtly, shutting the door behind her with a resounding clang. She had heard Alex's declaration of her fear - dying again. Nancy just chuckled slightly, picking up the dice and letting them fall on the table, over and over again.
"Tetradyi, play nice," Nancy chided.
"I can just keep on rolling for you, Alex, if you'd like...Eve won't know the dice are gone for another hour. After living in the loop with her long enough, you memorize the schedule." Alexandra gagged as the vile taste of the so-called antidote filled her mouth and went down her throat. She sputtered and coughed before clamping a hand over her mouth as she tried not to vomit it back up.
Vhat the hell vas that? Piss?! she thought. She spun around as the door was suddenly thrown open to reveal the knife wielding girl from earlier. She backed up a few steps, nearly running into Nancy. She looked sharply between the two. At this point, she wasn't sure who to trust or if she was even safe anymore. She looked wide-eyed at Nancy, gulping slightly.
"Vhat do you want from me? Vhat kind of sick training is this?" she questioned, shaking her head.
Nancy cackled, looking at Alex's attempt to not regurgitate the liquid. She let the dice fall one last time and the twenty sider showed a one, which Nancy picked up and looked at with amusement.
"What do you think, Alexandra?" she asked at first, using her full name. The knife wielding girl seemingly vanished amongst the flickering lights. Whether she had left the room or was merely lurking in the shadows, it was hard to say. She was as quiet as a corpse.
"I mean surely, you are quite the expert when it comes to training?" Nancy added, picking up the dice and letting them fall again. The lights finally gave out, sparking a bit as the bulbs blew, plunging them into darkness.
Alexandra eyed Nancy and those damned dice she kept rolling. Sweat beaded on her brows as her gaze nervously flitted between Nancy, the dice, and then at her surroundings upon realizing that the knife wielding girl had up and vanished. Her gaze eventually gravitated back to Nancy, her mouth opening and closing but ultimately unable to form words apparently. What was there to say anyways? Don't kill me? Or maim me? Or do whatever it is you planned to accomplish with this nightmare worthy training session? However, she wasn't able to think much on the matter of word formation as the lights suddenly went out. One could hear an audible gasp leaving Alexandra's lips as everything went dark.
As the lights flickered back on, the dice were sitting on the table. Alexandra could reach out and grab them if she wanted to. Nancy was just smirking at her, before she nodded behind her. The knife wielding girl from before was there, but her eyes looked like they had been gouged out and her skin was stained with blood.
"You'd be prettier if you smiled," the girl said simply, holding up a bloody knife as she walked towards Alexandra. Nancy didn't make a move to stop her. There was a reason she was doing this - and she hadn't even showed off her final surprise just yet. Alexandra's only hope of defense would be those dice.
"Oh, how rude of me to forget to introduce Tetradyi to you," Nancy said, shaking her head slightly.
"You know her mother." Alexandra's eyes blinked as they readjusted to the light. The hairs on the back of her neck rose up as she had that odd sensation that someone was behind her, or at least watching her. At Nancy's gesture, she spun around, letting out a strangled cry when her gaze landed on the
sight that had been behind her.
"I think you better get that checked out," she managed to rasp. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see the dice sitting on the table conveniently within reach. She really didn't want to play with the fates, but what choice did she have?
"Forgive me, Evelina," she muttered under her breath before she quickly dove for the dice. She glanced sharply in Nancy's direction at her comment, but it gave her little pause, as at the moment, it seemed rather inconsequential given the fight or flight response that was warring inside her.
"In order to be forgiven, you need to apologize first," Nancy said sharply.
"Namely, to Gilbert. Who do you think you are, Alexandra? To behave like that to an Emendator. We've walked the Earth long before you were born and we will continue to walk it long after you have died. Whatever talent or fantasy that you've deluded yourself with, it doesn't exist. It's time that you learn," Nancy said, patting Alexandra's cheek,
"that I'm the only Emendator you ought to have nightmares about." Alexandra blinked, her face going slack as her mind worked furiously to process what Nancy was saying. Recognition seemed to dawn in her eyes as she put two and two together. She began shaking her head.
"You mean the flirting? I vas joking. I didn't actually mean any of it. I vas just fishing for a reaction, foolishly so apparently. Besides, I vasn't even quite myself at the time. I'm still not, being infected by a Soulless and all. Please believe me," she pleaded with the Emendator.
"In fact, I'll let you in on a secret, though I doubt you'll keep it to yourself. Each of us has a secondary ability. I'm about to show you mine," Nancy said, as the other girl opened up the door and stepped out, enough to let Nancy by yet not enough to let Alexandra have room to escape. Nancy raised her hand, pointing at Alexandra.
"Don't worry, I'll come back for you...eventually. You need to spend some time to think about your behavior - and know that if you ever make comments like that about Gilbert again, I'll kill you." A tingling sensation spread throughout her finger tips as Nancy used her secondary ability:
Psychosis.
She attempted to follow after the woman, dropping the dice on the ground as she rushed forward.
"No no no, please don't leave me here," she cried out. But it was too late as the door shut in her face.
"Don't worry, I'll be here," Tetradyi called through the door. Throughout the next month from Alexandra's perspective, she was confined to the single room in the asylum. Tetradyi ensured that food was sent to her and limited Alexandra from human contact, just in case the psychosis Nancy had caused in her would cause her to harm someone. Nancy didn't particularly care when it would wear off nor did she feel a great swell of pity for Alex. Instead, the Emendator went on 'vacation' of sorts.
Eventually, the door opened and Nancy looked at Alexandra.
"You look terrible," Nancy observed. There was a portal waiting for them down the hallway.
"Come on, it's time to get home. You seriously need to bathe." While Nancy enjoyed her "vacation," Alexandra was in a pit of hell all on her own. She didn't know where and when she was or truly have any concept on the passage of time that occurred. All she knew was this anger that the psychosis dredged up and the strange sights and sounds of her own mind's creation. By the time, it had worn off she was a mere shell of herself, whether that was due to pure exhaustion, mental damage, or all of the above was to be determined. She just sort of stared blankly at Nancy when the Emendator
finally returned. She didn't even make a sarcastic retort to the other woman's remarks, which to everyone else was probably an improvement but for a person like Alexandra that meant
everything.
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