P.S. If you'd like to know how her joints and such look right now, check out Ghost In The Shell, Stand Alone Complex movie, Innocence I think it's called. In the opening sequence they show a robot that is sorta my basic image for this doll's joints and such.
The doll stared at the ground, unspeaking and unmoving again. Narcius looked slightly annoyed with the doll's return to silence while Kirielle scooted closer to the doll, wondering if the doll would be more willing to talk to her then her brothers.
"Miss, we just want to get the relic so-"
"So you can destroy it," the doll finished, shaking her head slightly. "I won't help you. Father's relic was his-" The doll was cut off by Narcius who looked more then a little irritated. "Your father?! Don't you remember what that guy did?" He snapped, making the doll jump slightly. Maya shot a glare to the young Master which was completely ignored.
"Narcius, would you stop trying to be so charming?" Kirielle hissed, making her brother cross his arms and huff loudly. Kirielle gave Karwyn a slightly pleading look, and getting no response from him copied her brother. "You did it to Mint, why not him too?" Karwyn continued to refrain from answering her and Kirielle scowled. Maya decided to try her hand at talking with the doll.
"Miss, what's your name?" Maya asked, trying to sound as gentle and harmless as possible. The doll remained quiet for a long time before answering.
"Elita."
"Elita, that sounds like a nice name. Elita, why were you shut off?" Maya asked, trying to make the question as innocent as possible. Elita did not answer, opting to return to silent staring. Maya decided it was probably better then having the doll try to strangle her, so maybe she had made a little bit of progress.
"Mint- !!" Maya turned around, hearing Rue's startled cry, and saw him barely restraining Mint from getting up and going after the doll for information. Karwyn looked slightly irritated as the princess struggled, and his siblings quickly headed over to restrain her.
"Has she become even more bullheaded since we left?" Karwyn inquired as his siblings forced Mint to sit down again. Maya smiled apologetically and nodded a little before looking back at the doll. The doll gazed back at her and something pulled at the corner of Maya's mind. They had gathered everything to complete the doll, hadn't they? Then why did it feel like something's missing...?
"Elita, are you complete yet?" She asked, hoping the doll would at least answer her that. The doll quietly shook her head no. What else did she need then? She remembered that Prima had a necklace, was it something similar? "Elita, what do you need to be complete?"
No response. Elita seemed to have completely blocked her out now, gazing steadily at the ground with an empty expression. Passive resistance, she wouldn't hinder them but she wouldn't help them either. Maya sighed gently and sat back, looking at the doll. At the same moment, Mint broke free and ran over.
"What did she say?! Does she know where the relic is? Does she?! Huh?!" Mint cried, shaking her sister slightly in her excitement. Narcius and Kirielle watched from a distance as Rue and Maya tried to pry Mint off.
"I think she's gonna shake Maya to death," Narcius said softly to his sister. Kirielle nodded vigorously. "Or at least give her some moderate brain damage," she replied with a small giggle. Mint glared at the two and they stopped talking, for the time being. They were still throwing each other conspiratorial looks that suggested they'd be talking about Mint again soon, and they probably wouldn't be so polite next time.
"Mint! She didn't tell me where the relic is!" Maya cried, sounding both desperate and annoyed. Mint let her go, crestfallen, and seemed to deflate a little. Mint released Maya, much to her relief, and sat there with a defeated look.
"But... But," Mint pointed at Elita with renewed vigor. "WHY WON'T SHE TELL US?! I NEED THAT RELIC TO-"
"Conquer the world, blah, blah, blah. You need to get your head examined, that's what you need," Narcius quipped from behind her, making Mint lose her place in her rant and look extremely foolish. She turned around, ready to pummel Narcius, and came face to face with Kirielle. Mint's desires to destroy Narcius left soon after that, and Karwyn nodded approvingly to his sister who smiled.
"Now then," Karwyn said, walking past Maya and kneeling beside Elita. He looked back at Kirielle and Narcius, who had a good hold on Mint, and then at Maya and Rue who showed no signs of interfering. Hopefully it would stay that way, this doll was trouble and he didn't want to deal with her and two worried people.
He sighed and slipped into Elita's mind, hoping he'd only have to defend himself against her.
The first attack came almost immediately. A twisting, burning pain hit and within the pain were images that changed too quickly to be examined. While he shook it off he felt Elita draw back inside of her mind, protecting herself from him. He suspected that if he tried to follow he'd be attacked again, probably with more violence then the last time, but there didn't seem to be any other choice.
He ventured further, noticing how cold is seemed to become the deeper he went into her mind. He couldn't figure out whether it was her doing it, or if that was simply how her mind was. She was not human, after all, so it was very possible that this was normal. Still, it was very unsettling. The cold was almost a living thing that seemed to be reaching back into his body, chilling it and slowly lowering its temperature. He'd have to finish this quickly.
'Get out!' There was that second attack he'd been waiting for. He used the inside of Elita's mind for protection against it, drawing the doll's own mind into the line of fire. The attack ripped through the inside of her mind, causing an internal scream that jarred his senses for a moment. It was as if whatever it had been that was holding him upright within her mind had vanished for a moment.
'Stop it! Leave me alone!' He reached out, ready to defend himself again, but she did not attack this time. He continued, and quickly made it to where she was. Her prescience was horribly icy, and he realized the cold had been another defense. If she could freeze him there, kill or injure his mind, the injury would effect his physical body as well. He imagined he already had several bruises and maybe some bleeding from the first attack.
'Elita, you're going to cooperate,' He told her calmly, ignoring the cold that bit bitterly at his lungs. He'd already gone through this before and he knew once he was out of here he would be just fine. Elita responded by ignoring him, the cold presence unrelenting. He could distantly feel someone shaking him and his mind loosened its hold for a moment before regaining its hold.
'Elita-'
'Leave, now.'
'...Very well,' he said, reaching forward and seizing Elita's consciousness and searching it. He imagined it must have been very painful because she began screaming instantly. Hopefully, she wouldn't be able to focus on driving him out while she was suffering. He could feel her thoughts scrambling, the cold slowly receding, and her defenses breaking down.
There it was. The faintest glimmer of knowledge, deep inside her psyche. He reached for it, felt his mind closing around it, and quickly withdrew. He felt her mind clawing at him as he left, leaving stripes behind where she had struck. Then he was-
-back inside himself, shockingly cold and sore. Mint was asking what was going on, Maya was hanging onto the doll which had gone limp after such a struggle, Rue looked very confused, and his siblings were alternating between helping Maya and helping him.
Karwyn brushed his siblings away, taking several breaths to warm his lungs back up. That must have been why they were shaking him, his core temperature had dropped slightly while he had been gone and was now attempting to rise back up to a healthy temperature. Narcius watched him, fists slightly clenched, and Kirielle reached over to firmly grasp his wrists. Karwyn suspected he was very close to being struck for entering the doll's mind when it so clearly did not want to part with any information about the relic.
"...What did you do to her?" Maya asked, holding Elita's limp form. She had lost most of the color the gloves and boots had returned to her skin, and there was no question as to whether or not she was unconscious now.
"She did not want to part with any information on the relic, so I took it," Karwyn answered, seemingly unconcerned with what he had done to Elita. He reached over to see if Elita was still functioning normally, and found his fingers refused to move at his command. They were cold, but surely not frozen? He'd have felt much more pain if that were the case. He forced his fingers to move, and this time felt the message get through to the digits. They uncurled, and pain bolted from the fingers into his palm. Not frozen, locked up.
"What did you find out?" Kirielle asked, releasing Narcius after he seemed to calm down. Karwyn kept a wary watch on his youngest sibling as he answered. "The doll, Elita, will not be able to help us retrieve the relic," He said, making Mint gasp aloud. He ignored her and continued. "She... does not know where the relic is, nor does she know its nature. She knows it exists within these ruins, and she knows how strong it is, but its exact location and how this power manifests itself..."
"You mean she doesn't know anything beyond what we already know, right?" Rue stated. Karwyn nodded and Mint let out a groan of frustration. Narcius looked briefly over at the doll, and Karwyn nodded imperceptibly.
Yes, she knew where the relic was.
Yes, she could be used to obtain the relic.
Yes, they were taking Elita with them to retrieve the relic.
Mint, in a foul mood, took to accusing the Master's of lying about the information obtained from Elita, and for once Maya couldn't help but feel that her sister was right. Why else would they want to keep an incomplete doll with them as they continued their search? Why else would they go back to their own campsite when the doll had already attacked them once? Yes, Karwyn needed rest. He'd fallen into a dead sleep almost before they'd left and probably wouldn't be waking back up until tomorrow. Still...
"Eh? Maya? What're you thinking of?" Mint asked, taking a break from her ranting to look at her sister. Rue looked over, concern in his eyes.
"...Do you think that they're hiding something too?" Rue asked quietly, hoping a little she would say no and deny his own fears. Instead she nodded, face lined with sadness. Mint bit her lip and looked away. She hated them, but they had seemed so different that she had almost hoped she was wrong.
"I think we had better follow them tomorrow to where ever they decide to search..."
"He sleeps like a dead man, huh?" Narcius said, making yet another odd face at his sleeping brother. It had been around an hour since he had started doing this and it had yet to lose its appeal. Maybe it was because he knew he would never get away with it if his brother were wide awake.
"Narcius, knock it off," Kirielle said, tossing another piece of wood on the fire she had made. Narcius looked at her as though she were nuts. "Screw that, I'm gonna keep doing it until he wakes up and strangle me himself," Narcius said, pulling at his eye lids and sticking out his tongue.
Kirielle sighed and looked over at Elita, who remained in her own deep sleep. Her color was returning quickly and she suspected the doll would awaken soon, but how soon exactly? She looked away and continued tending to the fire. Kirielle had always known that some people, particularly children it sometimes seemed, were capable of producing their own mental defenses that were very different from simple barriers and walls. Depending on the person the defense could be passive, such as things which were meant to slow the intruder down or stop them completely, aggressive, such as things which attacked in ways that affected the body, or both. The doll seemed to have defenses that fit into the third category, attacks that hindered and injured.
'Troublesome,' Kirielle thought, looking up to see her younger brother make a particularly grotesque face. She clenched her fist, feeling herself growing angry.
"NARCIUS! KNOCK IT OFF ALREADY!" Narcius nearly fell over, shocked by the force of her voice. He recovered quickly, and turned to face her, angry. "What the heck?! It's not like he's awake-" Ah, but he was. In under a second Narcius was lying on the ground favoring the back of his head while Karwyn sat behind him favoring his hand.
"Oww..."
"How many times have I told you not to turn your back on someone just because they look like they're no dangerous?" Karwyn asked, rubbing the pain out of his hand. It was a little easier to move now that he had been able to rest his mind. It would soon become normal after a little use. Narcius got up, rubbing his head and heading towards the other side of the fire. "Good morning to you too..."
"Feeling any better now?" Kirielle asked as her younger brother collapsed beside her. Karwyn removed the blankets from himself and gave Narcius and Kirielle back their belongings. Narcius curled up in his blanket, ready for sleep, and Kirielle covered her legs up with the blanket. Karwyn nodded and stood up with his own blanket. The younger Master's watched curiously as he covered the doll up and then went back to his spot.
"You're weird," Narcius commented sleepily, already putting his head down to sleep. Kirielle gave him a little shove which went ignored. "Oh hush up, Narcius. We can't let her die, she's the only tool we have to get the relic. Besides," Kirielle said, looking over at the still doll. "We've been tools too, haven't we?"
Note: Hm... Time for the next writing block :)