2378/I'm Sorry...

I'm Sorry...
Date of Scene:	21 January 2017
Location:	Mitakihara - Mitakihara General
Synopsis:	Lacrima goes to visit Sachiko in the hospital for the first time since she's been in there the past months- under threat that Kukai and Momo would probably kill her if they found out. Something seems to happen.
Cast of Characters:	Norie Okana, Sachiko Hayakawa

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Norie Okana has posed:
Lacrima sometimes watches Sachiko's room from afar. Everyday she wants to go over there. But she's afraid. What if she just gets overtaken by some craving and finishes the job? What if Kukai or Momo see her enter and there's a misunderstanding and another fight? No. No. It'd be better to not have that happen.

She feels guilty on many levels. Recent events haven't helped, with Alexis and all. She keeps screwing up, always things beyond her control, always things where she needs to 'a make a choice' where there isn't much of one to be made to begin with.

She's noticed something though. Kukai and Momo aren't seen visiting Sachiko a lot. This bothers a little- once again on many levels- but that also means she can attempt a safe visit. Right?

Afterall. All she needs to do is throw herself through the window or something if she senses a craving. She can do that. She even has a plan.

Pooling in the shadows in the corner of the room, Lacrima appears from a short teleport and gently looks around, before stepping outwards.

She looks down to her braclet, the control RIventon made for her. She isn't experincing any flare ups. That's good.

"Hello?" she says quietly. Just making sure no one else is in the room at first.

Sachiko Hayakawa has posed:
The room Sachiko has been assigned is small, and definitely part of the children's ward. Cute little characters dance across the sheets layed over the girl. There's bright colors everywhere, and a few books on a shelf near her bed. Of co urse, there are wires coming from her--so many wires. Fluids in, and fluids out, and monitors and sensors and alarms. The sound of the machinery is the only response Lacrima receives: the steady, quiet beat of her heart monitor. Beep. A long pause, and then another. Beep.

Someone's been here recently: the sheets aren't perfectly made, and there's a chair pulled up beside Sachiko's bed, as if someone were sitting there. An open book on the counter. Maybe someone was reading? Regardless, there's no-one here now, but there is a faint odor in the air: something out of place in the sterile environment. A stick of incense, still burning in the corner. It smells vaguely of cinnamon.

Norie Okana has posed:
No one is here. It looks like someone was here. But there isn't right now. Her eyes scan across the room. This looks like the standard kind of child's ward. She'd been in one before. When she was little. She'd also been in a more standard hospital room. Not that she remembers much through the searing pain of the week before she became this thing.

She can smell cinnamon. This puts her on edge immediatly. It's for obvious reasons. When she realizes that it is very not Sachiko's own scent she's smelling but actually an incense stick she calms down as she looks down the burning stick as it turns to fragrant ash.

She walks over to the bed finally and sits down in that seat. She grabs the book and looks at it a moment to see what it's about before placing it back down where she found it.

Sachiko is there. She's quiet. This is expected. She's in a coma.

She wraps her arms around herself. Does... she talk? Is she supposed to talk?

"Hi Sachi-chan..." she says quietly.

There's probably no response. "I'm sorry. I'm an idiot." she says silently.

Sachiko Hayakawa has posed:
The book is a Disney retelling of the story of Snow White. Whether by intention or happenstance, someone is comparing gLacrima to the bearer of an apple. But there are no Prince Charmings here to kiss Sachiko back awake.

Momo already tried.

There is, notedly, no visible response from the comatose child. meone's been taking good care of her. Her cinnamon hair is laid out around her carefully, and there's a pink ribbon in her hair. Momo's influence, maybe? Except she hasn't been here in some time.

Beep, goes Sachiko's heart monitor--is it a little out of time with the last beep? No, surely just a product of Lacrima's imagination. Or maybe just didn't remember the regular timing that well.

Norie Okana has posed:
Lacrima does not trust beeping medical devices. Beeping medical devices will tell you she has a pulse when she's 'Norie'. Which is entirely false. She doesn't have a pulse. Or a Heart. or Blood. Or anything she'd appear to have. It's just disguise. For the world's sake. She might notice it, but she doesn't give it too much berth. For all she knows her prescene will kill Sachiko and that's what that means.

So maybe she will pay attention to it, a little.

The book is Snow White. She purses her lips a little at this. She places the book back down in the way she found it.

"I wish I could make you better." she says quietly. "I wish I wasn't so irrational around purification magic." she says.

"I got a chance to help someone recently. A friend. He was going to die."

"But I just ended up making his life worse even though he survived it."

"...and people still want to hurt me for it." she says quietly. "...but people said they'd also been upset if I let him die."

"It's like people are going to hate me no matter what I do." she says.

"I bet you'll hate me too. When you wake up...." a pause.

"If you wake up."

Sachiko Hayakawa has posed:
Beep. Beep.

Two heartbeats in a row, much faster than the previous. Outside the door, a cart rolls past, and the hushed voices of a nurse and doctor talking echoes into the small room. But they don't matter; they're not talking about Sachiko, Lacrima, or anything related.

But something else is different: a single solitary bead of wetness, formed on Sachiko's cheek. This tear grows larger after a moment, until its weight prevents it being suspected any longer. Then, it begins to roll down her cheek.

Norie Okana has posed:
Lacrima can hear the beep beep. She looks to the heart monitor and then to the right as she hears a cart roll past. She isn't afraid of dealing with a surprise doctor or nurse. A stare, a little wisp of dark energy--- and they'll think she's a visiting cousin named Maria or something. No, she isn't afraid of that. Mundanes are easily manipulated- But they aren't talking about Sachiko or herself. Which is good.

She looks back to Sachiko and she can see that little bead roll down her cheek as her head turns back. She blinks a bit. Is that a common occurance? Or is it new?

She doesn't know. If she'd said screw it and visited earlier wether or not Kukai or Momo were okay with it or not she'd had known.

"I'm sorry. I don't mean to make you sad." she says quietly.

She tries to think of something else to say. Nothing pointed comes to mind. "I'm sorry." is all she can say for a moment.

She wishes her voice would carry emotion better sometimes.

Sachiko Hayakawa has posed:
"Anshi."

It's a soft-voiced word. Did Sachiko's lips move? Lacrima wasn't watching them quite close enough to tell. It's not quite Sachiko's voice, though. Or was it?

Beep.

The heart monitor plays out its tune, yet again on the original rhythm. Nothing special. Nothing new. Maybe the double-beep was just a mistake. But the teardrop is still there, staiing the pillow.

Norie Okana has posed:
Lacrima is sorry. This is a fact. But you can be sorry all you want and it doesn't change anything. The thought of using her power to try to jumpstart Sachiko had been a thought that occured to her but she refused to even think of it past the one time she did in idle contemplation. Sachiko would come back wrong just as Alexis did if that worked and she couldn't bear to deal with that.

Not to mention she was already on thin ice with Amu forming some sort of vampire killing posse.

She does look up and looks towards the machine which has gone back to acting as normal.

She does look around for a tissue. When she doesn't find one immediatly, she uses the hem of her shirt to try to wipe that tear away. It's all she can do to help at the moment.

She sits back down and places her hands to her lap.

"Anshi was your sister. Wasn't it?" she asks quietly. She isn't expecting an answer.

Sachiko Hayakawa has posed:
It's funny how the simplest things can have the most dramatic effect on the world. Toss a pebble in a river, and you may change its course. Allow a breeze over the mountain, and your mountain may wear thin. These subtle actions have consequecnes which can still be seen an noticed centuries later.

So it is with affectionate touchh.

As Lacrima's cool fingers touch Sachiko's dampo cheek, the girl takes a sudden sharp breath. Her eyes open just barely for one brief moment, before squinting shut just once again.

Beep. Beep.'

The medical monitors beat out their rhythm, agreeing with Sachiko's sudden sharp breath. Real or feigned, though. That is the question.

Norie Okana has posed:
The sudden eyes opening. The sharp breath. They cause her to act with a recoil of surprise- as much as she can, a short gasp of her own that has her purple eyes blinking in confusion for a moment.

"...Sachi-chan?" she asks. Waiting as if she might say something.

She gently places a hand to her arm a moment, and gently gives just a touch, to see what will happen. She isn't... feeling a reaction to her magic. It isn't sparking out or anything. Usually she feels that when she has reactions. So it isn't anything she's making happen.

Right?

She doesn't know.

"Sachi-chan... wake up." she says quietly.

Sachiko Hayakawa has posed:
A faint whimper emerges from the girl, and she shifts in the bed.

Beep. Beep.

With her next intake of breath, a cold wind blows through the room, ruffling Lacrima's clothes and the sheets, and sending the book to the ground, where it lands with a harsh slap.

Out in the hallway, the sound of approaching feet. A nurse, perhaps, coming to check what her monitors are telling her?

Norie Okana has posed:
Lacrima can hear the whimper. "Sachi-chan... wake up. There's others that want you back..." she says. She gently gives Sachi just a gentle shake. Not much. Not even a wiggle. Just... trying. She's sorry and there's nothing she can do and she wants to do something.

A cold wind whips through the room and the book clatters to the ground, which snaps her out of her attempt to wake Sachiko. She can hear footsteps.

It's late at night. There's supposed to be no visitors, even if she were to sort of convience the nurse answer. If it even is a nurse.

She instead, slides into a dark shadow puddle, and makes for the shadows of the room she appeared from to watch and wait to see what happens. She doesn't leave.

Sachiko Hayakawa has posed:
It's only moments later that an alert-looking nurse comes into the room. Sachiko's eyes are closed and her breathing has normalized, but there's something more to it. She's moved, and there's a faint glow to her like wasn't there before. The nurse runs over and checks the equipment, then checks Sachiko's pulse, then her eyes widen and she runs back out of the room.

A moment later, she returns again with someone looking far more doctorly, in a long white coat with stethoscope. The two of them talk in hushed voices that the girl's condition might have just changed.

"But don't get your hopes up," the Doctor warns the Nurse. "Nor anyone else's. It could just be nothing. Give her twenty-four hours and we'll see."

The nurse nods her head agreeably, and then both leave the room again, though not before the nurse picks up the book, smiles, and sets it on the table again. With a backwards glance, she whispers, "Time to wake up, Snow White."

Norie Okana has posed:
Lacrima watches from her shadow pool, in the corner. She slides across the shadowed edges of the room. Paying attention. It's a nurse. Who reacts oddly. Runs out and gets a Doctor. The doctors and nurse chat. Something about getting hopes up. She watches the nurse pick the book up, and say that.

She waits till the room is empty again and she reforms and tip toes back to the bedside to that chair, looking down at the book.

Part of her is worried. Part of her is... something. That confused feeling. Like something positive trying to manifest and utterly failing because of what she is. So it isn't really helping her current mental state.

She doesn't know what she can do. She knows she doesn't want to leave. She hadn't visited at all and now she doesn't want to leave right away.

At least that reaction confirmed that it wasn't a common happening.

She gently leans down and she... tries to give a hug. It's something like one. She isn't really used to being the one hugging. But it's about all she can offer right now.

She doesn't say 'I'm sorry' again because she's said it more than a few times already.

She is definitly thinking it though.

"I...hope you wake up Sachi-chan." she says quietly. Hope isn't really a thing she's conducive too.

She is trying her best.

Sachiko Hayakawa has posed:
Any signs that Sachiko was waking have mostly fled, for the moment. The room is still, with that scent of cinnamon incense still hanging in the air. It's cold and quiet, there's no breeze and only the quiet Beep of the heart monitor still recording its patient's care.

But it's a little more frequent, now, and even the note the monitor hits is just a little more strident. It's as if the machine itself has gained some newfound hope, where the vampire cannot.

Lacrima's words fall on probably deaf ears. At least they seem to evoke no response. But there, as she hugs her, Lacrima can smell it: that delicious scent of power that is Sachiko's lifeforce. It hasn't been truly present since she entered the girl's room. There's been no real indication of life in this place at all; as if she couldn't drain it. But now it's there, that steady thrum of delicious life that teased and taunted Lacrima so many months ago.

The taste of cinnamon and sugar.

Norie Okana has posed:
Lacrima just wants Sachi-chan to wake up. There are selfish reasons for this. Sachi-chan was the only one who wanted to dance with her. She wants to dance again. That incese burns and she can smell the cinnamon still. It's quiet. There's no answer.

--and then that taste. It takes her a moment to realize that- that isn't the incense and rather it's coming from Sachiko directly- and for a moment there's a flash, but then there's an immediate recoil from her. She steps back.

She isn't going to drain her. She isn't going to let the temptation get to her.

But at the back of her head she also knows what that means. Recovery. Of some sort.

"Sachi-chan. I'm sorry. I'll be back. Tommrow night. Okay?" she says softly.

And with that she makes out the window. A wisp of black.

She doesn't want to endanger anyone tonight. She's done enough of that recently.