SCM Writer of 2814 Wrote:Lindy/Precia?Oh man...this has such potential for crack, but come to think of it....
***
The voices were somewhere beyond the spotlights, but she didn't look up at them. Even if she could have seen them, there was no point.
"Precia Testarossa, it is the decision of this court that your experiments were in gross violation of the Dimensional Boundary Act, the TSAB Founding Accords, Lost Logia Regulation Acts 2 through 14, and guilty of gross parental misconduct and abuse. However, in spite of your crimes, your main surviving victim has refrained from pressing additional punitive charges, and you are hereby sentenced to 30 years imprisonment at a high security facility to be determined by a separate evaluation panel. This court is adjourned."
She didn't look up as others began filing out. Even if she'd cared to acknowledge that her case was hopeless, and that the public defender assigned to her had done the best he could to get her sentence mitigated to something she could conceivably serve in her lifetime, she wouldn't have looked at him. None of this mattered. She'd failed. Everything else was dust and ashes in the ruins of her unaccomplished goal, and she would never be able to attempt it again.
Nothing ever returned from beyond the boundary. Instinctually and intellectually she knew this. Knew that the last sight of seeing Alicia's stasis tube tumble out of control as...that girl....had prevented her from following was the last time she would see her daughter. That any hope of reviving her was now gone, the very molecules that had comprised her torn apart by the forces that lay between the dimensional riptides.
Not even Al Hazred could bring that back.
If she'd looked up, she might have seen a familiar blonde girl looking at her as she was led out of the courtroom, crimson eyes hoping for some spark of recognition or acknowledgement. Or possibly the teal haired woman standing beside her, her own eyes filled with faint hint of pity.
***
Looking across at the woman on the other side of the barrier spell, Precia gave one Admiral Harlaown a flat stare.
"You're asking me...what, again?" she said, trying to grasp what the woman had just asked.
"Fate is too young to be legally emancipated, and so I volunteered to be her legal guardian. However, as you're her mother, it's required to inform you and ask if you approve of the choice," Lindy said again, clearly.
Precia looked at her again, the confusion clear. "I imagine so, not that I particularly care. She's not my daughter, after all. If you want to keep her, be my guest."
Lindy frowned slightly at that. "You know that she still considers you her mother..."
"My daughter is dead," Precia hissed. "Your overzealous TSAB saw to that. If you think you can hurt me further with Fate, you are sadly mistaken and more cruel than I thought to try such a thing. I have nothing left, so threatening to take away something that worthless from me is hardly a threat. Good day."
With that, she stood up, striding away from the barrier. Lindy sat there for a moment, then sighed, standing up and leaving the room.
***
"Why do you keep coming back?" Precia asked, looking up as the other woman sat down across from her. “She’s your daughter. She has been for years. Why would I care? Why do you care about my being here?”
“If I try to explain, will you listen?” Lindy asked after a moment, getting a puzzled look from Precia, before the other woman nodded faintly.
Lindy sat back, her eyes closing in thought. “When I got married, it was the happiest day of my life. My husband, Clyde, was everything anyone could want in a husband. Caring. Sensitive. Strong. And he was stubborn, hard-headed, and loyal to a fault because of it,” she said. “I never had to worry about him cheating on me or leaving with another woman. The concept of being without him was some far off thing, like a dream. Eventually we’d grow old and die, but it wasn’t real to me. It felt like we’d be happy together forever.”
Precia blinked at the recitation as Lindy opened her eyes, looking at her. “The day I lost him, it felt like my heart had stopped. I wasn’t even there at the time. I got a letter brought by a pair of men in suits. They read it off, almost as if hoping I wouldn’t break down at the fact that the love of my life was gone due to some...cosmic accident. I disappointed them, I’m afraid. I wailed. I raged. I cursed the TSAB and everything it stood for. I hated Gil Graham for not trying to save him. I almost hated him for his stubborn devotion to duty that’d gotten him killed. At the time, it felt like my world....was just gone. Empty. Without him, there wasn’t any reason to carry on. There wasn’t any hope he’d come back somehow. Nothing survives a l’Arc en Ciel blast. And....I almost did. I almost considered it worth it to just...stop...and go find him, wherever he was, beyond. But I didn’t,” she said softly.
“...why?” Precia asked, despite herself. The emotions felt....too similar to ignore entirely. She knew that kind of pain. If it weren’t for the fact that she had no way to do so herself, she’d had nights she would’ve given anything to do exactly what Lindy had admitted considering.
“Because there was something left. It wasn’t Clyde. Nothing could bring him back or replace him. But there was something he’d left behind. Something that I knew he’d want me to take care of....our son, Chrono,” Lindy said. “He was barely three when Clyde died. Despite how much it hurt, I had to consider, could I face him, in the end, admitting that I’d abandoned the child we’d vowed to raise together just because it hurt too much to be without him? Could I force Chrono to deal with that loss twice over because his mother felt the need to die as well? No....I had to carry on. Because that’s what he would’ve wanted me to do.”
Precia started to ask what this had to do with her, before the cursedly logical part of her mind latched onto the similarities. What she’d done to Fate....would she have done that in front of Alicia? What would Alicia have said? They were...genetically, at least...sisters. If she’d succeeded, would Alicia have run up to hug the woman that had done that sort of thing?
Lindy nodded. “They’re different shades, but you and Fate have that same look in your eyes, occasionally. It’s impossible to hide. That hint of pain in the background that you’re trying so stoically to hide. You don’t want to feel it. It hurts so bad that you think feeling nothing at all has to be better....but it’s there every time you turn around.”
Precia looked away. She didn’t want to see what she saw in the other woman’s eyes. This woman had taken in Fate. She had to have known of what Precia had done. Of the scars that she’d likely left. Of the things she’d said. Lindy had adopted Fate as her daughter. Yet how could she look at Precia, who’d done such things, and not hate her? How could she not hate what Precia represented?
“I know, when I lost Clyde, that it felt like I was all alone. Like the people that said they understood how bad I must feel were just saying words. That they couldn’t possibly understand. How I’d wished so much for someone who really could understand. Who knew what I felt. How I wished that somehow, someone could come in and, if not make the pain go away, at least help carry it,” Lindy continued, standing up to put her hand on her shoulders. “And then I met you. And I knew that, if I had any chance at all, I had to try. Because I could be there when no one was there for me. Because like Nanoha did for your daughter, I couldn’t stand by while someone was so obviously in pain. And because it’d help Fate as well.”Precia blinked, looking up at Lindy with watering eyes. “...Fate? How?”
Lindy smiled faintly. “She keeps your picture around. She’s shown it to her daughter, when she explained to her that she has two mommies just like Vivio does. Vivio wants to know why her other grandmommy doesn’t come visit her. And Fate always says that she will when she’s ready....that something very bad happened a long time ago, and Grandmommy’s still feeling bad about it.”
Precia blinked back tears again at that. She had a granddaughter? And Fate still...still told her about her. It had been ten years since that day, yet Fate hadn’t cut her out of her life. She still cared about Precia, despite it all. Still wanted her back.
Lindy held out a hand to her. “You haven’t caused a problem since the day you came in here. Your sentence was commuted for good behavior months ago....and it’s over this weekend. Do you think you’re ready to meet your daughter again?”
Precia looked at her. “I....I was never a mother to her. I don’t deserve to be her mother. She’s yours more than that. Far more than from anything I ever did.”
Lindy smiled softly. “If you like, we could fix that as well,” she said.
Precia, standing up with Lindy’s help, looked at her again. Lindy smiled faintly, brushing some of the tear tracks from her face. “Even if she had stopped being your daughter, which she hasn’t, there would possibly be a way you could be her mother again. A way I could help with.”Precia frowned at her. “I don’t quite understand what you mean.”
Lindy’s smile widened a touch, warming. “When I lost my husband, I thought I wouldn’t ever meet anyone that could come close to bringing the feelings I felt back. I felt I’d be alone forever....but I know now that I could possibly have been wrong. I’m willing to start looking again....starting with a woman that I’ve come, over the years, to respect and understand. I think that I could possibly love her as well, and have her be the mother of my children. But in the end, whether she feels willing to try as well...is up to her.”
Precia stared at her as the pieces finally fell into place. It didn’t make any sense. Even if they’d talked regularly over the years, whether Precia had truly wanted to or not in the beginning. Even if they’d shared feelings that Precia had thought herself the lone owner of....this was completely unexpected. It couldn’t be. After what she’d done, she couldn’t deserve anything like this.
And yet...
And yet...
***
“So Grandmommy Lindy is getting married?” Vivio said. “Is it to Grandmomma Precia?”
“Yes, Vivio,” Fate said with a smile, tousling her hair. “Now you have two mommas and two grandmomma’s.”
“Momma, I already had two grandmomma’s,” Vivio pointed out, the fourteen year old saying it with a tone that suggested this was obvious.
“....yes, I suppose you did,” Fate said, smiling warmly. “But I think now your grandmomma Precia finally thinks that too.”
“Well, it’s about time,” Vivio said firmly. “I thought they were gonna be dating forever!”
“Like you and Einhart?” Fate teased, laughing gently as her daughter went bright red.
“Th-that’s different, Momma! Einhart’s um...um...she’s...she’s got pretty eyes! ...what?! Why are you laughing so hard, Momma?! It’s not funny!”
---
"Oh, silver blade, forged in the depths of the beyond. Heed my summons and purge those who stand in my way. Lay
waste."