[text]

[a_shadow]

who do I need to threaten to find out the truth about this place

'gods'? you expect me to believe that shit?

Comments

[a_shadow]

Ah, well. Maybe we'll go in on it together, then.

[ Considering the status quo when Carolina had gone over that cliff, though? It's not likely. ]

[uptightness]

[There is a pregnant pause, before yes, a snort follows.]

If I thought it might actually accomplish something... I don't think it would.

[a_shadow]

From what I'm hearing about it now, I'm guessing you're right.

I'm glad you're willing to joke about it, at least, though.

[ The latter is said quietly. ]

[uptightness]

A lot has changed.

[To put it very simply.]

[a_shadow]

I get that feeling.

Tell me...that day on the cliff...

[ She trails off. How do you ask someone if they're dead? ]

[uptightness]

[She doesn't need to finish it. She might be gone. Epsilon might be gone. Yet Carolina still remembers. She told me once she would have given anything to save you. Not that it makes any of this any less awkward or easier. Carolina hadn't been able to let it go, not for a long time, and even now, she can't say that she's let it all go.]

Grappling hook.

[a_shadow]

Mm. You did a pretty good job becoming invisible after that, then.

[ Tex was looking for her, and she knows York was too. And he had Delta to help him. ]

[uptightness]

[She had been number one, until Tex had come around. People thought she was dead, for a while, she thought she might end up there anyway. She'd left no trace though.]

I didn't want to be found.

[Not for a long time. For a variety of reasons. Everything had been so confusing, so muddled. So much anger and too much hurt.]

[a_shadow]

Understandable.

I should have tried harder to explain what was going on, or something. Maybe it would have made a difference.

[uptightness]

I wouldn't have listened.

[Not to her- especially not to her.

Hadn't to York, when he had tried.]

[a_shadow]

I suppose not.

Do you know, now? What was going on?

[uptightness]

[A breath exhaled.

How she'd missed it- but she knows exactly how she had. She'd been too caught up, too driven, too obsessed...]

Project Freelancer is done. The Director is done.

[a_shadow]

[ Tex's sigh matches Carolina's. ]

All of it?

[uptightness]

There's still some messes we're cleaning up.

[Events that keep popping up... Tech. She might spend the rest of her life trying to fix it all.

It's the least she can do, and it's not like it's going to wash away her sins.]

[a_shadow]

There were a lot of messes made.

I wasn't trying to get at the root of it, I was just trying to—

[ She makes an inarticulate sound, interrupting herself. ]

Well... Doesn't really matter.

[uptightness]

I know.

[She might not know it all. Might never come close to all the secrets. But, she does know more than she had then. About the Project, about what the Director had been doing. The horrors that had been undertaken.]