OOS: Traveling
What is she doing here?
She's well into Missouri now, still plodding along, mostly human. Morphing means traveling faster, means seeing more, means getting through a town almost as soon as she got there.
Means realizing she has no idea what she's supposed to be doing a lot faster than if she's just moseyin' on through.
Even if it bores her out of her skull.
There's a diner in one town and she feels like human food, sick of getting her kills from the forest. And since she has no idea how to make a fire, or cook for that matter, that means eating in morph, too. Which... makes her uneasy. It just does.
With a few pelts from her pack (kills from the last town, she'd given them the meat if they'd cut the skins for her), Rachel trades her way to lunch. Some chicken, a few vegetables... but the important part is the fresh bread.
[So I'm guessing you're hungry?]
She turned her icy blue eyes toward him. "Like a loaf of bread. That's how you sliced me up. Like a loaf of bread you get fresh from the bakery, all crusty and crispy and golden on the outside and soft and white and still warm inside. And raspberry preserves. Has to be raspberry. I like Smuckers. A big jar of raspberry preserves with the seeds. I mean, what kind of baby has to have seedless preserves?"
It's really good bread. And the jam is raspberry. Raspberry with seeds.
She can only take a bite of it before her throat starts to burn though-- along with her eyes.
What is she doing here?
She's in St. Louis, which is pretty demolished. She'd come here before once with her dad for a gymnastics meet, they'd gone up in the Arch, looked down on the city. It wouldn't have been all that cool except that her dad was there with her, except that the building itself was pretty awesome, except that they were up so high and looking down at everything like ants. And Rachel gets the strangest urge, standing at the foot of it now, surrounded by debris in her morphing suit, with flip-flops on, ten years older than she was when her father saw her last... the urge to morph, go eagle, fly up and sit on the arch and look down again.
But with the eagle's vision, nothing would look like ants. Not even the ants, really. And when she went eagle, it was... lonely.
Someone was missing.
What is she doing here?
A new town, a small population, all scared out of their minds. Raiders come here, steal from the farms, steal from the families. Some of the girls try to tell her stories, share confidences, like she would know what they're talking about. Rachel winces and backs away, avoids it, doesn't want to hear it. She knows about torture, she knows about war, she knows about pain.
She doesn't know about the kind of pain, the kind of torture they're talking about, that goes on behind closed doors, violates you beyond anything imaginable.
There is one thing she gets out of it, though. An old soldier, a warrior of sorts, sees her practicing with her gun in a clearing deep in the woods. He runs through some exercises with her, asks her about her physical defense, insists on teaching her a few moves.
It's something. It's a starting point. It's something she didn't know yesterday.
When some more raiders come through, Rachel morphs bear and makes short work of them. It's like candy from a baby, a ten-foot tall grizzly bear taking on a handful of humans with handguns. Please.
It isn't war.
There is no war.
What is she doing here?
She's lying in the grass, a clearing far off the road, one where she wouldn't be bumped into. Lying on the grass and staring up at the stars, wondering... wondering.
Was it worth it?
Did they win?
Did it mean anything?
Why is she here?
"Ellimist."
No answer. Of course there's no answer, he never answers when it doesn't suit him. He wouldn't.
Rachel scowls.
"Ellimist. I deserve answers!"
Maybe she should have asked the questions before. Maybe she should start looking ahead, planning, strategizing. That's not her job, that's Marco's job, she's the warrior, not the brilliant mind behind the operation.
...but Marco isn't here.
Neither is Cassie. So who would keep her in check?
Neither is Jake. So who will issue the order?
Neither is Ax. So who will provide the necessary background information?
Neither is Tobias. So who will remind her, at the end of the day, that this isn't all she is, that she is human despite it all?
"Ellimist... please."
What is she doing here?