The Beach, Monday Morning

[on-her-korhal.livejournal.com]

Wings folded back and away; Kerrigan pulled the coat a little tighter around her as she felt the wind tug on it. She was trying to focus on something else, some strange sliver of an instinct telling her that if she just-- pulled together.

Under the coat, torn as it was, armor pulled back and in, and the tough, hard shell of the tentacles on her head softened, framing her face more as hair should.

Her next breath should've been choked, wasn't-- preternatural strength that had started to fill the self-conscious spots. And yet, all the focus broke her concentration in other areas, filling her mind with a nigh-endless supply of annoying interference.

Sarah Kerrigan took a breath. It was just a damn beach.

[ open like a beach, y0 ]

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[idontlooktired.livejournal.com]

Harriet had woken when the world blinked. Somehow, it wasn't too much of a surprise. Now that it was morning, she made her way down to the beach to discover what new view awaited them.

"Oh, my," she said under her breath when she spotted the person who was there before her. If it was a person. "We might be further away than I thought."

[on-her-korhal.livejournal.com]

Again, she found the weird sense of disconnect between memory-reflex and actual-reflex-- one told her she should freeze, deny freezing, put up a brave front; the other compelled her simply to turn around, regarding Harriet with familiar-but-not features, and speak.

"I'm fairly certain we're still on Earth," she said.

[idontlooktired.livejournal.com]

Harriet froze and stared, rude as it was. The features were sort-of almost familiar, even amongst everything that was most definitely not, but it was the voice that pushed her into certainity.

No matter how impossible that certainty might be. "Sarah?"

It was a measure of how shaken Harriet was that she used her first name.

[on-her-korhal.livejournal.com]

"Hello, Harriet," she replied, almost-unblinking, and then she smiled-- a little small, a little sorrowful, but mostly just resigned in self-mockery. "I'm afraid they got me."

[idontlooktired.livejournal.com]

Harriet blinked and shook her head, shaking away and putting aside everything that wasn't important in favour of the only thing that was. "But you're alive," she said, crossing quickly to stand near Kerrigan. Not quite so near as she once would have, but close enough to reach out and touch. Not that she was going to. "Aren't you?" With everything she'd seen, it wasn't something she was prepared to assume.

[on-her-korhal.livejournal.com]

"Alive, but--" More. "Different than I once was," she said, her eyes fixing neatly on the figure beside her. Kerrigan felt that curious disconnect settling in again, and it put part of her, hidden under the skin, ill at ease. "It's--"

A long story.

[idontlooktired.livejournal.com]

The corner of her mouth quirked up. "Let me guess. A long story?" she asked, glancing around, then settling to sit on a driftwood log. "I've got time. I'm guessing your different means more than what's apparent."

The calm interest she was radiating was a mask, sliding neatly over the relief mixed with fear mixed with worry, about Kerrigan, for Kerrigan, with a hefty dose of confusion and sheer amazement tossed in for good measure. "I did say you'd always have a place here."

[on-her-korhal.livejournal.com]

"You did. And I'm grateful." Her neck craned sideways for a full-on look, and her eyes glowed a little, even in the morning light. "I didn't survive New Gettysburg," Kerrigan spoke, after a moment, and there was not a tremor in her voice. "And then I barely survived my rebirth at the hands of the Zerg."

[idontlooktired.livejournal.com]

Harriet didn't flinch. She'd seen things far more frightening, though she wasn't sure she'd ever seen anything so disturbing. "What did they do to you?" she asked, voice barely audible, staring up at her. "Are you safe here?"

[on-her-korhal.livejournal.com]

"For the forseeable future--" she started to reply, and then the interference kicked it up a notch. One green hand shot for her forehead and she doubled over, hair thickening back into its old-new form. "Dammit," Kerrigan muttered, and the steady note fell from her voice.

[moonbrain-tam.livejournal.com]

River had headed for the beach this morning to watch the sea, feeling a little more melancholy than she had as a pony. Still, when she saw Kerrigan she smiled.

[on-her-korhal.livejournal.com]

She felt a familiar set of thoughtpatterns approaching. "River," Kerrigan said, nodding at the thin air.

[moonbrain-tam.livejournal.com]

"Morning." River walked up to stand next to her.

[on-her-korhal.livejournal.com]

"It seems to be," Kerrigan replied, aprising the horizon. "And somewhere else, at that."

[moonbrain-tam.livejournal.com]

River nodded. "Does it bother you?" It didn't bother her. It wasn't important.

[on-her-korhal.livejournal.com]

"No," she said, and her tone was entirely emotionless, "It's just another place." Kerrigan turned away from the water, focus back on the island.

[moonbrain-tam.livejournal.com]

River imitated her motions, then smiled and reached up a hand, trying to touch the tentacles that replaced her hair.

[on-her-korhal.livejournal.com]

She tilted her head only a little at the touch, the steady base in her gut that came and went with the buzzing calling the shots. Impassive eyes fixed on River. She tried somewhat of a smile.

[moonbrain-tam.livejournal.com]

River let her fingers run over Kerrigan's cheek, tilting her own head, looking up into her eyes.

[inthereflexes.livejournal.com]

Jack went out for a mosey along the beach, looking for the occasional rock to skip into the waves.

It was so much better to NOT be a lizard.

[on-her-korhal.livejournal.com]

If she noticed him at all, Kerrigan made no movement into his direction, her wings curved inwards along with her thoughts.

[inthereflexes.livejournal.com]

Jack, being the clueful sort, would not notice unless she moved, so clueless intent was he on the waves.

"It's just peaceful out here," he said out loud.

[on-her-korhal.livejournal.com]

Noise.

One of her wings shivered a little, moving for defense without her say so. Kerrigan's head spun with it, and her eyes found Jack and fixed on him.

She tried to force her reflexes down to a calm level. There was no threat, here. "Find your peace somewhere else."

[inthereflexes.livejournal.com]

"Oh. Sorry. Didn;t see anyone here," he said, glancing briefly to flash a smile, not really registering the presence. He continued to walk, occasionally scratching the back of his head because something wasn;t right.

[on-her-korhal.livejournal.com]

Right.

She offered his back a passing glare, then settled her attention back on the sand.