[closed] we were young enough to sign along the dotted line

[adamance]

CHARACTERS: Lexa and Angel
WHERE: The Bearings
WHEN: The day after the rally, evening time.
SUMMARY: Talking about Lexa's technological problem.
WARNINGS: Definite spoilers based on retroactively applied information about Lexa's chip from the last two weeks of The 100. Anything else will be updated if needed!

[When Lexa first Ascended, it had been painful. Though her body had been prepared from birth, complete with black blood, for what lied ahead, she hadn't been completely prepared for those moments after swallowing the chip to ensure that it became her own. Feeling it become one with her body had brought her to her knees, and after the wave of calm came over her, she remained there, waiting for the Polis artist to complete the tattoo she had designed days prior. She felt her connection to all of the previous commanders, even those who had been seemingly lost to history. When she closed her eyes, she could connect with them, and sink into that experience.

There was no way for her people to know the truth. What had once been known about the Flame had long been lost before it made its way to Titus' hands. He had helped several commanders ascend, though his care for Lexa had been nurturing. He viewed her as the wisest and best among all the others, and the information granted to her by the Flame made her even wiser. She could capitalize on that information like no others. No one spoke of the only real challenge to Lexa after that day, relieved that the pacifistic Nightblood had abandoned her people to take up elsewhere.

(This was Luna. To this day, Lexa will still not speak of her.)

Now, she's come to question the Flame, the Spirit of the Commander that lies within her. The technology of this world recognizes it both as technology and something that's merged with her body biologically. It confuses her, and no amount of meditation for the last day has helped her find her answer. She knows that the Flame helps her, and she knows that it gives her what she needs to help her people. These are undeniable truths, things that she can't overcome in her mind. But she doesn't know its origins, and finds herself wondering if it's a relic of a lost age, a time when the holy symbol of her people had come into use for the first time.

What Lexa doesn't know is this: the chip is a silicon-based biologically adapting super computer that interfaces with the person's mind and helps them be more advanced. Their mind is always in control, but they have more, and know more, and it's as simple as that. Only the one in control of the chip can control the chip. Even those connected by the link of the Nest would be unable to enter Lexa's mind beyond the memories it holds to access the chip: they are not biologically one with her body. The symbiote is the same: it cannot access the chip. It's only Lexa who can do this, and she has done it many times before: both in sinking within herself and sleeping. She felt like she was going to another world. There are ways to remove the chip without causing harm to Lexa, but while that knowledge is available on it, she would not seek it. It's out of the question. Cutting it out after her death will be the only way. As for accessing it externally: it's all but impossible. It must be done by the keeper of the chip, as it's currently processing their mind, their body, and their everything.

But the knowledge is there, just as the knowledge of the chip's creator is there: buried, waiting for someone aware enough to reach in. Lexa is so close that she can see a new face, and she knows who she is, but she doesn't know the right questions. She still lacks the connective knowledge. But she needs it. Some part of her recognizes how significant this is to their mission. They need it, no matter what answers may arise in her mind. She is the living embodiment of the ideals of this world, and she's only beginning to understand that.

Though she's spent a great deal of time inside of her head, she's done it away from The Bearings during the day. The idea of purchasing clothing is foreign to her, but she became accustomed to it quickly, acquiring things she needed with the credits available. ("Needed" might be loosely used by others, but she's worn much of the same clothes since she arrived, and she's due.) Aside from some decent (and always dark-colored, if beautiful) day clothes, she wears an elegant nightgown that falls to her feet now, bearing her shoulders and back. Those who might see Lexa as she heads to Angel's room will undoubtedly see the variety of tattoos, and she's unashamed about that. She is attempting to find some comfort within this mission, especially with the revelations. She knows it makes her look human, or perhaps lesser to the unimaginative mind, but she knows what each marking means. To her, it's the exact opposite.

Her eyes are solemn and half-lidded as she knocks on Angel's door. They're urgent but not too hard, and as always, there's a sense of it being nobody but Lexa on the outside. After announcing herself that way, she does all she can to pull her mind away.

She doesn't want her meeting her to catch too much other attention, as she isn't interested in alerting them just yet as to her predicament.]

Comments

[adamance]

I'm not worrying. [She takes a step back. The fact that Angel's life has led to this is the unfortunate part. It's not fair for her to have to experience this in this way, with the others around and aware of it. Not all of them are kind, or understanding. Then again, if Lexa hadn't grown fond of her, she would see this as just another burden to have to deal with. She wouldn't be as understanding as she's become.]

But the point still remains. If now is a bad time, I can return later. Or I can speak to Rhys first, and you can combine your efforts. [As if Rhys might be some kind of antidote to this problem. She hadn't considered it that way, but Lexa has the sense that he's the type of man who could turn just about anyone away from those feelings.

(Which is, likely, just another unkind thought. But it's not like she's ever shown interest in men.)

She considers adding more to try to sate Angel's feelings, but she has the sense that it would only embarrass her further. Yes, it's perfectly normal, and honestly, they likely aren't the first to think this way or deal with this issue among the Hosts. They won't be the last. But it's clear that where Angel's developed in other ways, forming a strong belief system, she's stunted in ones where it's almost unfair.

Unfortunately, Lexa's really not the best at helping her along. She can be sensitive to Angel's feeling, but her people are too brusque in their handlings of others to really know how to approach this with any level of softness.]

[circumspector]

[ Which is a fine idea except that -- Handsome Jack had been in Rhys's head and that makes him literally the most unappealing thing in the world to her right now. ]

No, no not - okay, no. [ Deeeeeeep breath. ] Honestly this is something... everyone else just deals with. I am adjusting, and I need to learn to adjust to this too. It's not going to get better any time soon and you need to know about this sooner rather than later.

[ and then a little firmly ( she doesn't know what Rhys's symbiote ability is, but she's a siren, and what she isn't normal ) so all that she can say this bit a little more confidently. ] Besides, Rhys wouldn't really be able to help me.

[ she lets go of the air she's holding in a heavy exhale. ] So just, stay there, give me a second? I'll be alright. Just need to focus.

[ swallows, it's a little more determined than she feels, but she is determined. ]

[adamance]

[Hadn't she suggested Rhys before? Angel's deviation from her original suggestion leaves Lexa puzzled, and she gives her a sharp look that suggests that she knows Angel is hiding something. She stops short of actually asking what she's hiding, as she believes that the information that Angel has to provide is far more important to her.

After a moment, she relaxes, tilting her head forward.

(It occurs to her that she could suggest drawing at least an article of clothing on to conceal her bare back, but she doesn't want to muddle Angel's thoughts any further.)]

If you need me to do anything, let me know.

[circumspector]

[ She's so very glad Lexa doesn't, it's not something she particularly to explain - if only because there is ... too much there. A hundred things to understand, and she doesn't feel like adding that on top of it.

So she swallows, shutting her eyes again, and this is a process of centring that is at least familiar. Straightens her back, relaxes her shoulders and tilts her face up slightly as she breathes in deep. In a building ebb, she glows again. The lightness of that familiar feeling is a relief to the embarrassment and worry about everything else. Lets it slip and curl through her into her fingers and toes and opens her eyes with the light behind them as she steps forward to where Lexa is. Addressing her front on, shifts her tone, the directing way she had before. Easier to become removed, aloof, than deal with any of the issues of proximity. Leave humanity for a better time and place. This at least, she knows what she's doing, what to me.

Mostly. ]

I've never reached into someone else's enhancements before, they're deeply personal, obviously. But it shouldn't hurt you in any way when I do so. If it does, let me know immediately, my abilities can be lethal if I use them incorrectly and in accessing foreign technology that double applies, and I'd prefer to be careful.

[ Explains it all with the impression of distance to the situation, she effects that all knowing, all seeing tone. Removed from here and now. As easy for her to flick in and out of, like changing clothes. The nervousness of an inexperienced teenager gone. ]

When I tell you, I want you to try and access the... chip. [ wets her lip, as she readies herself, building knot of tension that curls deep in her chest, like drawing on a strength that tastes ancient. ] I won't touch its abilities, it'll help me see how it responds to.

[ When she steps forward, she brings her left hand up. The ball of light amassing bright in her hands, shining out of her skin and from all the corners of her, where the scribbling lines wrapped around the arch of her foot, tickled up and around her back of her knee and slid up the inside of her leg, catching and bending as she moved. It has been years since she had first gotten them, and there is a distortion to the air that she took as accepted power that she strides with, like the others had before her. All Maya, all Lilith and their confidence even if it is not her own. Keeps it slow though, as she steps forward to Lexa's side, waiting there patiently as the light shines out of her. ] Ready?

[adamance]

[Due to the proximity between them, there is a strong sense of trepidation that surges forward when Angel explains that her abilities can be lethal. Lexa has no desire to die here, and perhaps more importantly, she doesn't want the chip to be destroyed because of this mission. This knowledge may help her in the future, but—still. There is a sense of anxiety.

But beyond it, she still trusts Angel. Her mind has fully removed itself from the matter of their previous discussion, which is easier due to the fact that she had never considered it with her before. (Easier, too, is the part where Lexa cares for another.)

She draws in a breath that's far from exaggerated and exhales slowly, bit by bit. And then:] Yes, I'm ready.

[The good news (for Angel, incidentally) is that the chip is already readily activated inside of Lexa. Were it not, it actually could kill Angel ... but that's only if it were out of Lexa's body. What she will sense almost immediately is that the chip is an evolutionary miracle to some degree, as it's evolved and adapted to Lexa's body, just as it's evolved and adapted to other people's bodies. While a mind can be saved to it, the mind is not taken over: it is independent, moving and thinking and drawing upon the chip where it's needed. It provides information when the right questions are asked of it, even if its origins are hidden, currently lost.

If anything, it's Lexa's awareness of the chip that needs to change more than the process of accessing it.

But that's undoubtedly where Angel comes in.]

[circumspector]

[ It's a process of broadening, if she were ever to set it down for someone else, as she shifts closer with the light forming as an almost solid thing in her hand. ( It is not, for she is not, shifting and bending and morphing and stars die before their light ever reaches the planets they eventually brush against and she is - )

her eyes close as she leans over Lexa, tilting her forehead against Lexa's as her hand comes up the back of her neck and she has not fought the connection so much as learned to filter herself, but more she needs to see -- how Lexa works with it. So she opens herself up, rather, fair was fair was fair and when she shifts to being a - girl unsure in her own skin - to siren, in absolute control and in this light hurts as much as darkness might, she is proof of that, her voice echoing oddly inside her own head. Like she is far away, like a thousand things speak with her. Her own private multitude.

Of which is absolute. A control of herself and of them that is like a force more than a person. The empty echoes from far off buildings. ]

( Just stay with me. Don't fight me. )

[ How many times now has Lexa helped her find a way forward, helped her train her body now? It is right to help her now in return, a sound that is so, so soft, sweet as if all was so utterly right in the world. Her body glowing until she feels numb, her face tilting that little bit up as she sought with fingers and mind inside of Lexa herself. Opens herself wide, as an all-encompassing presence, that she folds around light could be tangibly touched and moulded, and to Angel - it is, oh it is.

Her hands draw up against her neck, pressing the light so meticulously against her, fingertips gentle as one can only be when they've had no life to mar them, tangling against her hair. Searching, searching, not like digging in the dirt. For her, it is like looking for signs of life, an ear the ground and waiting to hear the rumble of a heartbeat, machines were lively, singing things. She makes another sound as she keeps scanning, curious almost until - ah, there she stops. ]

( Got you. ) [ graps tightly against thought and feeling. a pause then, - ] ( Speak with it. )

[ Skims over the surface, once, liking pressing hands to glass as she waits for Lexa to do as promptly. Before she surges forward in a rush. Machines work quickly, as fast as thought, and she moves with the echo of Lexa's own thoughts, measuring the chips response to her, measuring herself by her own heart beats to feel it's response. Not meddling, not delving any further, just observing like she is so used to doing. ]

[adamance]

[The mental link allows Lexa to connect to Angel, but it doesn't allow the voices on the chip, the various past commanders and their vehement presences, to respond as well. Lexa can tell that there's a startling, that they're erupting in response to this outside, foreign voice. But it's not Angel's mind that they respond to: it's Angel's power, the thing that is Other about her, the thing that Lexa herself can barely understand.

After all, the Flame is meant to do more than offer Lexa wisdom and knowledge to protect her people: it's meant to protect her as well. And just as her people have been critical and violent toward outsiders, the chip acts in the same way.

Lexa does her best to balance it, interacting with the chip because she can tell somehow rather quickly that a fight of power is about to take place (and she fears what it will mean for the chip, which she doubts has any of the power that Angel has). Her hands rise up to curl tightly over the edge of the table, an absent action as her mind asserts itself over the chip.

For a moment, flickering through the memories of the chip, there are images as Lexa grounds herself, and they're transmitted through Lexa's mind rather than the technology itself:

a burnt battlefield—no, a nuclear wasteland, with people just barely surviving—and then, the inside of a space station, white walls surrounding the figure at the center of it, walls that are almost suffocating before she looks down at the Earth below to see it begin to burn—and then the slow revitalization of humanity, of the discovery of Polis, a tall, tall skyscraper, where the people find themselves and make a name for themselves—

and finally, a girl who sits on a throne. that girl is Lexa. this is her audience room. she is in control. she is the commander.

While Angel is not allowed to access the chip itself—the data is kept away from her, kept protected like it's walled away permanently (likely inside of the body where it's currently contained), it's obvious that it's adapting, that even if it's degraded (and that much is clear, like aspects of it are beginning to find its wheels to work again), it's beginning to respond just as it might have. Just as it should be.

The image that Lexa openly projects to Angel is clear: the audience room adapts. There are children at her feet, a glimmer of a memory that then fades. There is a girl with dark hair that has been in past memories, and then a girl with blonde hair, just the same, like she's waiting, like she belongs there. (But neither are saved to the chip itself. They are merely adapting: a part of Lexa when she seems so distant, so removed from her humanity almost forcibly. But she can never remove herself entirely, no matter how much she tries.

Angel's presence just behind her outside of her mind and outside of the chip is proof of that.)

But more than that, the room shifts, showing bookcases upon bookcases, presenting a haven in an unusual place. Knowledge. The thirst for it. Control. She knows what she has.

Lexa's eyes reopen, and she can tell that if her nails were knives, she might have left marks in the table.]

Angel? [she speaks out, using her voice. She hopes (hopes) that she's all right, that something hasn't happened to her in reverse.]

[circumspector]

[ In the way she does best, she lets it wash over her - and she admires so much the control, the authority that Lexa is, so much, not just in how she moves, but what she is. For a second she loses herself, self-eradication is easier for her - just accepts being on the edge of that great throne room, watching it from the distance she is more comfortable in. Rock at the bottom of a great river that is rushing over her. She becomes smooth, no edges, and there is the basis of so much of her, to accept with no resistance, to let it just happen to her with comment or judgement. No use fighting, she knows, that taste of inevitable things. An itch just to wonder the libraries, and maybe despite all the warnings she would just delve into that chip if it were left to her.

But politeness saves them both, she doesn't stray further into it. But it does take time for her withdraw herself to be a singular present again. Sighs soft and longing and at first there is no response, there's just static noise. The noise of someone speaking two rooms away, she is distracted, separated, not here and whole at all. More like she's laying there, and the response comes more like the reassuring thud of a pulse than a strict word but it is aimed to be just that: reassuring. ]

( Here. )

[ The soft of a harmony of those multitude voices. Takes time, or rather time passes differently for her in that state, but eventually a good minute after Lexa speaks, she begins to disentangle enough to respond her properly, glowing brightly still. A looseness to her limbs, a smooth extension. Drawing herself up and out. A lot of things she can say, but she's easy, right now, a peacefulness. ]

That's a remarkable piece of technology, Lexa, and so is your control over it.

[adamance]

[Her body angles, turning toward Angel so that she can sweep her eyes over her in concern. It's a look that she will offer no one else here. Lexa lets so few in, and what she gives and receives is all so purposeful. She knows she is far more exposed to Angel (and by proxy, Ilde, though matters are still different there) than she is to anyone else. It offers Lexa comfort to have that control over how she is perceived by others, and she does feel powerful because of it.

But she learned not too long ago that it isn't wrong to care. Sometimes, caring is difficult. Sometimes it hurts. But that doesn't make it wrong.

When she looks at peace, she finds her voice again, seeking out what seems to be the right thing to say.]

Do you believe I've been in control for far longer than I realized? [she asks, because it's an impersonal question. Leaning on that seems wise right now.]

[circumspector]

[ Her hand comes up to her forehead as she begins to let go of her abilities and there's a shake in her hands to it, a sheen of sweat on her brow and chest as she steps away. Used her abilities too long again, and she steps away to sink down into the chair opposite to Lexa. Slumping back as the light dims and then dies.

A smile, weak as it is, but there as she nods to what she says. ]

For that level of integration? I wouldn't be surprised... even if you didn't know what it is.

[ She's seen all sorts of cybernetics and they're -- advanced, where she comes from. Different to here, granted. Different to what Lexa has either. ] But how long have you had it? How did you come by it?

[adamance]

It passes from commander to commander, [she says, considering how to explain it.] When one commander dies, their novitiates fight to see who will be chosen by the Commander's spirit. The survivor of these rounds is the one who receives the Flame and ascends. [To call it "The Flame" seems like a misnomer now, but it feels natural.

Even if it is technology and nothing more, it has still helped her people survive for the last hundred years. Lexa will not deny it the reality that her people have provided it.]

It has passed down from the first Commander, Becca Pramheda. She was the one who first passed on the Nightblood, and created the first round of novitiates.

[circumspector]

[ It's a genius way of passing it down where complex understanding might otherwise fail. That they would be pass along something like that. Once upon a time she knows, science and religion hadn't been that separated. Swung back around, she was proof that the universe wasn't completely understood. ]

It's a clever way of ensuring it's passed along. But that's... definitely not a spirit. That's a very advanced piece of technology. [ This is all too familiar, somehow, people using ancient technology to further their own societies, and something pulls there. ]

What I can tell of it is it's pretty wired into you. I don't think I could access it completely if I wanted to. It works like you said it seems to commune with your fairly directly. [ presses her lips together. ] It feels old though. If it's been implanted as many time as you say, then I would be surprised if there wasn't some degradation of it. That happens with cybernetics, especially something as sensitive as this.

[adamance]

I think it's good that you can't access it. My people have tried to give it to people without blood like mine in the past, but they failed. The people died almost immediately, tortured by the Flame. [She accepts that it's something different, but she still raises it up in her mind, believing it to be important. It may be a piece of technology, but those lives do continue in some way.]

Do you believe there is some way we can replicate this technology for this world? [She imagines that she may need to speak to Becca to attempt it, but if the degradation that Angel refers to is too great, they might have to take a different approach.]

[circumspector]

[ She looks up then, and there's a lot to explain, and her fingers drum. Something older there, more calculating, a knot in her brow like she's thinking and it's not a terrible idea. Stands up then, less to do with agitation, more to do with thought taking movement in and out of herself. ]

It's not about blood for me - I'm something different to you or another human. But either way, you're right. [ a flick of her fingers, dismissive. A hum through the connection: thought received, contemplated, discarded. Another in the same fashion.

What would imparting their technology do for them? A great deal, but also nothing. She was made for technology, and yet it was strange and different enough that it was for the first time in her life, frustrating to her. They had developed in their own way, particular to them and that meant -

She shakes her head. ] No. Our mission is to gently guide, unseen, not lead them. Not do anything they wouldn't do themselves without our help. They are on their way to this kind of technology it's true. But... they are meant to do it themselves, I think. This is their revolution. Not ours.

[ Taps her fingers against her side, lips pressed together. ] Besides, they would notice... differences. Just like they do with me and Anders. This could give it all up.

[adamance]

[It is hard for Lexa to do anything less than lead with a heavy hand. Strength comes naturally to her, and her mind immediately rebels against Angel's way of approaching the situation. It's not that Lexa doesn't understand nuance, but she believes it can be achieved while strongly leading.]

And if we could find a way to apply the tech of my world to this one? To use it to advance this world's technology? Adapting it may be a way, and I don't like the idea of them believing that a memory is enough to pass on. It has to be their full consciousness.

[Anything less could be disastrous, or so she assumes.]