Adrift, hanging empty in a colorless haze. Hanging, suspended above a precipice of... something. Something important.
It was gone. Out of reach. Beyond her. Something she couldn't get back. Why?
Something was missing. Something from inside her. Something that was irrevocably lost, taken from her, pushed away beyond her grasp.
It hurt. It hurt so much, but she felt lighter for having lost it. Was that so bad? Should she be sorry that she lost it?
What is going on?
No singular moment defined when her mind started to awake. Consciousness sparked like the fire on the end of a matchhead. Incoherent thoughts morphed into muddled ones at a glacial pace.
Touch was the first thing she could recognize; the feeling of a bed beneath her, stiff and flat. The rise and fall of her own chest as she drew in each breath was an anchor, something steady and consistent for her mind to latch onto as it tried to dredge its way to the surface.
Memories, formless and indistinct, danced just beyond her grasp.
Finally, her thoughts began to coalesce into a more tangible form of awareness. She could feel the stiffness in each limb, sprawled on the the bed below her. The crick in her neck from the awkward angle she was laying at. The oddly potent soreness at the ends of her tentacles, hanging just by her head, and the tingling at the ends of her fingers and toes.
More importantly, she could hear voices. They were distant, like they were at the end of a long tunnel, but they were there. Two of them, one more quiet and gruff, the other smooth, as if it were gliding through each word. Are they the reason she was asleep? Or waking up?
A scream. I remember a scream, the way it echoed. Was it my own? Wind rushed around her engulfing her body in weightlessness, tethered only by an all-encompassing fear. A terror tight enough to seize her body, as something rapidly approached. Closer...
Closer...
Closer...
Nothing. It was blank. She couldn't remember anything else. Why?
"...ke by now. Did something go wrong? Why isn't she...?" The words faded in and out, her mind still to sluggish to focus for more than a moment, but she started to pick apart what she had all the same. That was the lower voice, the gruff rumble, with a jagged edge. She recognized that voice. She knew that voice... but from where? Her mind was only drawing blanks, but she was SURE she knew it.
He's asking after me...? No, look, I'm awake, see? She tried in vein to communicate, but her body still refused her commands.
"Patience, General. " The second voice said. There was an authority in her voice, underpinning the smooth curvature of her words. "Rushing things of this nature is never a good idea."
[Note: maybe use styling to make her initial sounds either much smaller to indicate how quiet they are, or make them much lighter gray]
What the hell are they talking about? Rushing? Who cares, get me up! Again, she tried to respond, but all she could manage was a nearly inaudible groan. Neither voice seemed to notice. Are they ignoring me? Irritation instantly simmered in her veins, driving her temper up. With a mental grunt of effort, she set about trying to wiggle, move a muscle, anything to get them to notice her.
"Mmmpp..." For good measure, she even managed to twitch her leg too. There, that should be enough to make one of them wake me up.
The conversation stopped. Almost instantly, she felt a presence looming beside her. "Are you awake? Can you hear me?" The Old Man, the one that was some kind of general, was beside her, peering down. Again, she couldn't help but try to place him. She knew that voice. It was soft, almost a mumble now, but somehow, she just knew it could be a booming echo.
There were two quick smacking sounds, and General backed up. "PATIENCE, GENERAL." The woman said through gritted teeth. There was a terse beat of silence before she spoke again, her voice more level this time. "Don't try to force yourself up, let your body wake up naturally."
Is she talking to me? I... I guess that makes sense. Only... something about those words rubbed at her wrong. Sure, it made a logical amount of sense, but... well, truthfully, she didn't want to wait anymore. This fucking blows, I'm not waiting. She immediately set about trying to wrestle control back into her own body.
"Or completely ignore me, out of spite. Why am I surprised?"
Screw you bitch! It was a slow, grueling process, getting that control she wanted. It felt like she had to wake up each individual muscle in her body and teach them how to move again, all while they screamed in soreness and protest. Tides, just how long was I asleep? A quiet stream of grunts escaped her mouth as she worked, but eventually, she was able to get her elbows beneath her, and pull herself into a sitting position. It might have been... a little propped on the wall, but that wasn't important.
It took a similar amount of effort to finally pry her eyes open. Everything was blurry at first, but as she mustered the strength for a few blinks, it started to clear up. The room was dim, and pretty barren. A few cabinets hung in the corner next to a empty chair. Those, plus the bed she way sitting on, was every piece of furniture in the room.
[Lilac's appearance is open to ur suggestion! Idk if you want her to just look like Lilac in your story, or just share a name]
The real focus was on the other octolings in the room with her. The first one she saw was the woman. She was tall, slim, and quite young, maybe only a few years older than her. An unbuttoned white lab coat tried its best to hide the plain black underclothes she had. A large green sleeve wrapped around her right shoulder, but beyond that, there wasn't any accessories or other decorations. Even her tentacles were plain, being held in a simple magenta ponytail. It actually gave her pause when she saw this woman's eyes. There was a coldness to them, a calculating, meticulous edge that seemed to pick apart every single detail they could see. One of her eyes had a nasty looking bruise around it, most likely from someone getting sick of her looking at them like that.
Much more interesting, was the old man, General Whatever-The-Hell. Similar to the woman, he had a very intense gaze, though his eyes were less 'see everything you do' crazy and more 'seen some horrible shit' crazy. Their green coloration, and oversized eyebags underneath didn't make any effort to diminish the effects either. Beyond the psycho eyes, the first thing one would notice is just how much magenta this man had on him. Full body robes with an intricate pattern, covered entirely in magenta. The massive mustache on his upper lip, big enough to hide his mouth partially, also magenta. The top of his head... wasn't. He was bald, though magenta tentacles wrapped around the sides of his head, and trailed a short ways down his back still. Moreover, the General was not a small man. He was incredibly tall, with shoulders that felt nearly as broad. Even his hands looked huge by comparison to her own.
The wall behind her head was the only thing that kept the world spinning out of control. The absolute deluge of information was nearly to much for her lagging brain to handle so far. The feeling was slowly abating, as her body and mind pondered the idea of waking up. "Whazzz...?"
"This is why I told you not to rush it." The woman gave her a scowl as her calculating gaze swept across her. "You're only going to disorient yourself further."
Her first instinct was to shy away from the admonishment, lay back down and apologize. In fact she almost did, until a thought struck her. You know what? No. She didn't have a good reason why she suddenly felt so resistant to what were obviously instructions to help ease her pain, but something about being ordered like that pissed her off like nothing else. Even through her atrophy, she still managed to send a nasty little sneer back at the woman, which made her back off.
"Ah, perfect. You're awake now." The General quickly butted in. Even when trying to be quiet and subdued, his voice grabbed for authority. "How are you feeling, is everything alright? Can--"
Another smack, this one much less quiet, shut him up. It was the woman, smacking him in the shoulder, a very annoyed look on her face. "Do NOT overwhelm her. She is in a particularly delicate state right now."
Delicate? What is this bitch's problem? Half a dozen burning words rested on her tongue, but the lingering fatigue meant she could only force out a pathetic "Shut up..."
That was enough to raise an eyebrow. "You're recovering quickly..."
"Bitch." Every word she spoke felt heavy, and clunky, like she couldn't get her mouth in the right shape to say them. She spoke anyway. "What... happened?"
Interestingly, the woman hesitated, instead of speaking, looking back at the General instead. He cleared his throat. "You were injured."
Silence hung heavy in the room. A scowl quickly crawled over her face. "...And?"
"And, nothing." The woman interjected. "You are in recovery. No more questions, the stress could cause a relapse of some kind. We will explain more when you're in a better state.
What. "Oh HELL no." The retort slipped from her lips automatically, faster than she could catch it. Letting her thought loose like that felt electric, the attention it commanded, the way it made both of her attendants stiffen, it was what she wanted. "Tell me what happened." She demanded.
You could hear a pin drop in the silence.
"You--"
SMACK! "GENERAL."
"[Title]. [Lilac Last Name], something isn't right. She's... unaware?"
The woman, [Name], narrowed her eyes. "We can test later. Right now, the risk of added stress is not worth the-- guh!" She cut off as a pillow hit her in the shoulder.
Shit, I missed her head. Oh well. With a determined grunt, she shoved her way towards the edge of the bed. [Name] rushed forward to catch her, but she batted the [Title]'s arms away before they could touch her.
"Listen, both of you. I don't know who the fuck you are, or where the hell I am." With another piercing glare towards [Name], she slid off the bed, grunting loudly as her feet hit the floor. Instantly, her legs started to shake under her weight, but she didn't fall. After a few moments to gather herself, and an arm subtly placed on the bed to brace herself, she took a bold step towards the General. He towered over her, yet she stared up more defiantly than she had ever before in her life, a nasty sneer playing over her features. "TELL. ME. WHAT. HAPPENED." She jammed a finger into his chest with each word.
He stared back at her, expression unreadable. "You... don't remember?"
"Remember what?" She bit back. Her balance buckled for a moment, but she recovered, meeting his eyes defiantly.
The General hesitated for a moment, confident facade cracking as he weighed his words. "What do you remember?"
"I--" She stopped. What did she remember?
Did she... remember anything?
Anything at all?
The scream, the wind, the terror. Is there anything else? ANYTHING else? She searched her mind, desperate to answer the question, but she couldn't find anything beyond faint wisps of emotion. Anger, regret, hopelessness, she could still feel them swirling around her head.
Her legs actually gave out this time, sending her careening towards the ground. The general lurched forward with a grunt, catching her before she face planted. Despite his old age, there was a surprising strength in his arms she found herself clinging to as she started shaking.
"What the fuck is going on?" She mumbled as the General helped push her back onto the bed. "Why the fuck can't I remember anything?"
"This is what I was trying to prevent." [Name] casually remarked, pulling thick clipboard from somewhere and making a note.
"Shut up, bitch." The reply flew out of her unbidden as her hands grasped her forehead. She sucked in frantic gasps of breath, faster and faster.
"I was just trying to prepare you." [Name] replied almost too politely.
"BITE ME," She growled as she squeezed her eyes shut. "Why can't-- I don't--"
[Name] stepped forward and pressed a stethoscope again her back. "It's quite unfortunate what happened. However, for the sake of limiting stress, you will have to wait for your answers. Now, please hold still."
Oh, no. Hell no. She jerked her body, and slapped the stethoscope away. Before [Name] had any chance to react, she grabbed the woman by the front of her jacket, and pulled. Her grip was incredibly weak, surprise was almost exclusively the only reason she was able to knock [Name] of balance, but now that she was here...
She pulled until [Name]'s eyes were practically touching her own. "Tell me, now.
[Name] staggered away as she shoved her back, looking perturbed. Good. She should be.
"It's not--"
"[Title], I'm afraid she won't relent. I will tell her."
For a heavy few seconds, she just stated at the General, face blank. "As you command, sir."
With the opposition defeated, she turned back to the General with a sneer on her face. "Alright then grandpa, let's hear it."
The General sighed, a heavy, somber sound. Something about it made her look closer at him. He was big and powerful, yes, but he was also old. There was a frailty to him, a deep, piercing exhaustion that seemed to color every thought that passed through his head. She recoiled slightly in shock when she realized that he was also in a wheelchair; he backed up slightly, squaring himself with the bed she was on.
"Cantra, do you remember anything?"
Cantra. He said it like a name, her name? She felt cold.
I... I don't remember my name. I--I don't... The realization hung over her, stalling everything in the world. She didn't... how couldn't she... why... oh Tides, she didn't remember anything.
"Is that my name?" She-- Cantra-- She asked, her voice barely audible.
"Cantra Takowasa. You are... my ward, so you are under my name."
Is that why he feels so familiar? "Ok, cool." She tried her best to keep her voice level. "You're Takowasa then? General Takowasa?"
"General Octavio, but you are one of the few permitted to drop the title."
"Alright then, Octavio, what the fuck happened?" Cantra eyed him intensely.
"It..." Octavio trailed off. He tried to start again, but whatever made him hesitate didn't let a sound escape.
"Well? What's the fucking story?"
Octavio regarded her, weary, before his gaze hardened. One of his hands gently fell on her shoulder, but his eyes were turned away. "It was a suicide attempt."
"What?" It was more of a gasp than a question.
"Suicide by height, fatal if specific organs or the brain are severely damaged by the impact." He explained things like her was reading a clinical report. There was no sway in his voice. "There is no shortage of opportunities for such a thing in the unviable domes."
Even [Name] looked away as he spoke.
Cantra felt cold.
"You survived, but not without injury." Octavio continued. "When you... slipped away, no one knew where you went, or that you'd left at all. It took several hours to find you, and when we did..."
"You hit your head as you fell." [Name] explained bluntly. "The impact slowed your momentum enough that hitting the ground wasn't fatal, but it is most likely the cause of your amnesia."
Cantra slowly lifted a hand to her head. She couldn't feel any immediate wound, but her entire body was sore, and the inside of her head was pounding like a drum, there was a good chance she legitimately just couldn't feel it currently. "D-did I really jump?" her voice was barely more than a whisper.
For a second, Octavio's stoic facade faltered. "We haven't officially ruled out foul play, but it's... unlikely to have been the cause."
.
.
.
The world felt numb. How was she supposed to react to that? Her usual snark was entirely absent, leaving her with nothing but the pure horror of reality, and a mocking, dethatched sickly sense of self pity. Ha, I really tried to-- I really-- ha. I couldn't even do that right. Haha. How funny is that?
.
.
.
.
.
It's not.
"How long have I been out for?" Her voice found a fraction of its strength, and she bolstered it as best she could in a bid to focus on something else.
"It's been a little over three weeks." [Name] stepped closer to her, before reaching forward. "In addition to the blows to your head, your lower body also suffered a significant hit from the impact." She gently traced a place on lower side that was incredibly sore. "It is only because you landed on your tentacles that your organs didn't rupture."
"M-my tentacles?" Cantra's hands flew behind her, instinctively trying to grab at tentacles that weren't there. Instead, she found them dangling just below her shoulders, significantly shorter than she knew they should be. Touching one of them sent a sharp jolt of pain through her entire head, strong enough to make her flinch and force a pathetic wimpier from her.
"They absorbed the impact, but in doing so, ruptured and left you with significant nerve damage. We had no choice but to cut them short." [Name] thankfully didn't touch her tentacles.
She'd need to see a mirror to figure out just how badly they screwed her up. The fucking nerve of them to haphazardly cut her tentacles left her simmering. "Is there anything else you did to me without permission?"
"I cut down on your claws significantly. Two of them splintered in a way that would have easily lead to infection, and frankly I think you would be more mad at me if only cut the two and left the others." [Name] gave her a stern look, one that was almost a sneer in its own right.
Cantra didn't hesitate to send one back, three times as viscous. "Thanks." There was an awkward pause where [Name] wouldn't quite catch her eye. "And?"
"And..." [Name] actually hesitated for a moment, like she was nervous about something."
"And?"
"...You're much more sensitive to light now, likely debilitatingly so."
"What the fuck does that mean? I'm gonna have a seizure if I see a bunch of flashing lights?" She tried to push herself off of the wall she was slumped onto, but the moment she stopped pushing her shoulder fell right back into it.
[Name] visibly braced herself. "Not exactly. It's... all light."
The look Cantra gave her would have melted steel. "Is that why it's so damn dark in here?"
Finally, Octavio spoke up again. "We made you special glasses, ones that reduce the intensity of any light hitting your eyes."
"Oh?" Cantra reached up, feeling around the side of her head. There were in fact glasses of some kind poised there. She paused for just a moment, hand lingering on the frame, before she clicked her lips and pushed them off her eyes.
"AAUGH!!" Immediately, her vision went completely white, as an indescribably searing pain tore through her entire head. Her hands flew up to cover here eyes, as she instinctively tried to curl into a ball, trying in vein to do anything to make the pain stop.
Someone's hands were in her face. Suddenly. Cantra batted them away, as an agonized scream tore itself from her throat. No coherent thought could form in her mind. She thrashed and pushed, trying something-- anything to make the pain stop.
When she was able to lodge another thought in her mind, she was panting heavily and someone had her arms firmly pinned down above her head. She could feel every single pulse of her hearts behind her eyes, and more stars than vision danced through her eyes. Between desperate, greedy gasps for air, she managed to squeak out a "...What...?"
"The glasses should stay on at all times." Octavio said from above her. He was the one holding her arms down.
Despite the pain, her mind was spinning. Cantra tried to form another question, but all she could muster was a few pained whimpers.
"Your brain reacts very poorly to any light-based stimuli." [Name] said with an edge in her voice. A quick look revealed two places that were already beginning to bruise, and several shallow scratches along her arms and face. "Even through your eyelids. We caught you convulsing several times while you were unconscious."
Slowly, her breathing began to return to normal, though the throbbing in her head refused to let up. Seeing this, Octavio finally released her hands. He hovered for a moment, strangely silent, before gracelessly dropping back into the wheelchair with a grunt.
"It's likely some form of photosensitive epilepsy, but I'm no neurologist."
"Why--nngh." Cantra flinched involuntarily as she shifted. Even the slightest touch of her head made her headache flare like nothing else. "Why the hell aren't I spazzing out now then?"
"The glasses." [Name] tapped her claw against the frame, each touch making the inside of Cantra's skull bang like a drum.
This fucking bitch is doing it on purpose. A sound not unlike a growl escaped Cantra's mouth while she stared [Name] dead in the eyes.
She didn't react. "They're based off the blueprints of a... former engineer. Save for locking you in a pitch black room, there's no way to stop you from encountering light. Instead, these shades are one of our several attempts to adapt her technology."
"Save me the fucking backstory, or I'll give you a few more bruises to match your new ones."
[note: potentially make [Name] a tetro reference? could be fun.]
"Right." [Name] gave her a grave look. "They suppress your brain's reaction to the light. Essentially, your brain is having that fit perpetually, but the shades prevent your brain from realizing that it's even happening."
"That's really fucking comforting." Cantra deadpanned.
"It's that, or locking yourself in a dark room for however long your recovery takes, if it happens at all." [Name] shrugged. "General, I believe I have done all I can here. If you'd excuse me, I have a few other experiments to check up on."
It was notable that [Name] was staring not at Cantra, but at the glasses on her face as she said that last part.
"Of course, [Title].[Name]. Thank you for being here."
[Name] gave a sharp salute, a shout of "Sir!" loud enough to make Cantra's head throb, and promptly walked out the door.
Cantra felt too week to do anything beyond push herself upright, and even that was proving to be a strain. "So what's your story grandpa?" She spit towards Octavio.
He hesitated for several long seconds. "I believe I played a large role in your... motivation. I wish to rectify that."
"What do you mean by that?" She sneered. It was a leading question, she knew exactly what he actually meant. All she had to work from were the vague, but potent memories of emotion stained to the back of her mind, but it wasn't a leap of logic to determine he was a large part of that source.
"We'll discuss things more when you're feeling better, but I will be removing most of the restrictions that I had placed on you. You will be allowed to freely traverse the domes, provided you don't interrupt procedure, or instigate issues."
Cantra could immediately sense some wavering in his convictions. He wasn't entirely firm on that choice, which meant there was a chance she could work him, to try and get more out of it. "So, I'm just free to go then?"
"We'll discuss more after you have had some time to recover."
"I'm--"
"Barely holding yourself up." Octavio met her gaze with a stony look in his eye. "Rest now, you will have plenty of time in the future." With that given, he turned his wheelchair, and rolled towards the door.
A part of Cantra wanted to stop him, to say... something. What specifically, she couldn't quite figure out. As he rolled out, he flipped a switch, which turned off one of the two overhead lights, darkening the room further. Words danced on the tip of her tongue, but she held it as he wheeled his way outside and shut the door behind him.
Now, she lay here, alone in the dark. It was impossible not to think of the story she'd been told. Did I really do that? It felt ludicrous to even think about it. That was the kind of thing you made jokes about, or rarely used as a threat if someone had a weak enough spine to exploit; it wasn't something you actually did.
And yet, as that foreign yet familiar bundle of emotions weighed on the back of her mind, it wasn't exactly hard to believe that she tried.
Oh Tides. Did she still want to? To-- to do it? Was she still su-- still that weak?
No, no I can't be, right? I can't even bring myself to think the word for Tide's sake! Like I can't even associate the concept with myself! That's it then, right? I'm better now? Above... whatever it was?
She had to be. She had to be. Otherwise, what good even was being alive now? It was with that conviction, that she slowly drifted into the shallow, dull sea of unconsciousness.