protocol_03.01: checksum
The repetitive thwunk of metal against wood finally breaks Anna out of her thoughts. She stands up, fingers stiff with cold, looking around for the source of the sound. Kristoff's not too far off, out of immediate line-of-sight of the back door, with an axe and a pile of logs he's turning into firewood. His face is twisted in a mess of anger and frustration, emotion bleeding out of every downward swing, like the wood had personally insulted him.
Thwunk.
He puts a new log up on the stump.
Thwunk.
The next one.
Thwunk.
Maybe she makes a sound. Maybe it's something else. But he looks up and sees her as he reaches for the next log. "Anna? What, why are you out here?" He sounds confused, concerned, not angry. Maybe he's saving it for the dead trees.
She shrugs, trying to go for casual, because she doesn't know how else to go. "Doc kicked me out of the room. For the exam."
He lets the axe dangle at his side. "Oh," he says, rubbing the back of his neck. "Do you...are you okay?"
Anna's not the one laying half-dead on a bed in the house. "Fine," she says shortly, clutching her arms. "I just..." she shakes her head. "Nevermind." Can't break now. "What are you doing?"
Kristoff gestures to the pile of firewood that's at least up to his chest. "House needed some firewood. It's...I want to be useful."
Useful. "I know the feeling," she mutters.
He hesitates for a second, before offering the axe. "Want to give me a break?"
She takes it, feeling the heft of the worn wood grain under her palm. It's solid and heavy, and something coils inside her as she raises it above her head to swing down on the log Kristoff put on the stump before backing away.
Thwunk.
She brings the axe down with all her strength and the two halves fall away. Kristoff feeds more logs to her swings, and her mind drifts until all that exists is her and the axe, the wood just another thing she has to overcome.
Thwunk.
The blade of the axe bites into the wood, driving down deep, and gets stuck. Anna pulls on the handle, trying to retrieve the blade. The force sends her stumbling back half a step, but she raises it above her head again and brings it down. Except she can't strike the same spot, and the log splits weirdly, leaving the larger piece on the stump.
She's suddenly, irrationally, furious at it. Goddammit, how goddamn hard is it to split a shitty piece of wood? She brings the axe down again.
Stupid wood. Stupid axe. Stupid goddamn everything. The axe bites down.
She got her sister back. Except Elsa is probably three-quarters dead and Anna's out here and not in there, trying to chop goddamn wood because she's too goddamn fucking useless right now to do anything else. Thirteen years. Thirteen goddamn years, and not once did Elsa even say a word about how she was surviving. Not even living, because that sure as hell wasn't living, and Anna wonders if she hadn't gone after Prince that day, how long would Elsa have stayed there? Would she have let Anna just continue on her merry goddamn way, taking all the time in the world while Elsa payed out her pounds of flesh?
Anna snarls. Yes, yes she goddamn would.
At the moment, now that everything is out, it's blindingly obvious that her sister has a freaking martyr complex or something equally stupid. And whatever she's trying to do, she's not telling Anna, and Anna is really goddamn tired of being kept in the dark. She's not a little kid anymore. She's spent three long, quite frankly terrifying at times, years seeing some of the worst bits of society. Even if all that pales in comparison to tonight.
Scratch is still out there. And just the mere thought of him makes her throat and hands burn, and her thoughts howl. He ruined everything, he took everything, everything she ever had that was actually worth anything. All she has is broken pieces and broken dreams, and fuck him straight to hell if he's going to walk away. After everything he's done.
"Whoa! Whoa whoa whoa there!" Kristoff's voice cuts through the haze of red.
Anna blinks, axe raised over her head.
"Easy. I think that log's about dead."
She looks down. The log isn't so much a log as it is broken kindling. Oh. She lowers the axe, then lets it fall from her suddenly-numb fingers. She didn't even notice what she was doing.
Isn't that always the case, though? She didn't notice. How much of this all could have been avoided, could have been stopped earlier, if only she'd freaking noticed? Elsa's odd silences, the always-too-damn-calm voice, the goddamn glitches? How many clues were there, right in front of her face, that Anna didn't notice? Or was too wrapped up in her own shit to even try to notice?
Goddammit.
It's too damn hard to breathe. She squeezes her eyes shut. Anna feels like there's something caught in her throat, sharp and spiky, and she can't choke it down without it tearing something inside her. Her hands curl into fists, and she tries to not let herself shake apart.
"Um, shit. Hey."
Anna cracks her eyes open, still dry. Kristoff is standing in front of her, looking awkward and concerned and why is he looking at her like that?
"Do you, I mean, well, you look like. Um." He makes a small frustrated noise. "Do you want a hug?"
She stares at him, a little confused. But her body must not be paying attention to her brain, because she feels herself nod a little, and Kristoff is stepping forward and wrapping his arms around her shoulders.
It's awkward. He's hugging her but leaving her space, and her arms are hanging uselessly at her sides. But he's warm, and Anna suddenly realizes how cold it is and leans in a little more. She can smell the detergent on his shirt. It's a little industrial, but clean and a little bit of forest, mixed in with the smell of gunpowder and oil.
It's warm and safe and Anna bursts into tears.
It's not pretty. It's not delicate. They're huge, gulping sobs that wrack her entire frame. Everything comes crashing down, and her knees would buckle under the weight of it if Kristoff wasn't there to catch her. She buries her face into his shirt, fingers grasping the material, and he just holds her as she mixes tears and snot into his shoulder. And she cries.
She cries for her family, dead and lost years ago, the parents she never really got to mourn. She cries for her sister, lying cold and broken in a bed, barely able to talk.
And she cries for herself. For all her broken dreams and shattered futures.
Anna doesn't know how long she stands there, face buried in the fabric over his chest. But when she stops, his shirt is soaked. She sniffles. "Sorry about your shirt," she mumbles into the fabric.
"Huh? Oh," he says, looking down. She can feel him shrug lightly. "Eh, that's what washing machines are for." He makes a face. "Thank god."
Despite herself, she snorts as she rubs her face in her sleeve. "Jerk," she says, punching him lightly in the shoulder as she takes a step back. She does feel better, a least a little. Lighter at least. She bites her lip, and tucks a stray piece of hair back behind her ear. "Thanks," she says softly.
"It's just a shirt," Kristoff mumbles, looking very interested in his shoes. But she can see the tips of his ears turn a little pink, and okay. She knows what he means.
The sound of the door opening breaks the moment. Anna looks over her shoulder, wondering.
"Anna?" says Kocoum from the doorway. "Doc wants you."
She looks back to Kristoff, who just makes a shooing motion. Anna doesn't need to be told twice, and bolts across the grass to the door. "Is she...? Does she...?"
"Whoa there. Save those for Doc. Come on." She ducks under his arm and is about to head down the hall to Elsa's room when he grabs her by the back of her jacket. "This way," he says, steering her towards another part of the house.
"But— "
"This way," he repeats. He practically frog-marches her, gently though, to a dining room. Doc is sitting at the table, two glasses and a bottle of alcohol in front of her. A chill goes down Anna's spine. Shit. Shit. Shit. Something's wrong. Something's horribly wrong and she needs to see Elsa and oh god, she shouldn't have left, goddammit, why did she leave—
"Arc. Sit down."
There's something in Doc's expression that is scaring the shit of out of Anna. "Where...why are you—" The words strangle themselves in her throat.
Doc sighs. "T's with Elsa, okay? She's resting, and she, well, she asked for it this way. There are ways this conversation needs to go, and...she can't do it, in there."
Anna goes very still. Elsa told Doc her name. That's...her sister is more paranoid than she is. She closes her eyes tight and counts to ten. Okay. This isn't about her. This can't be about her. If Elsa is willing to let Anna hear the truth, in all it's probably-terrible glory, then Anna knows she needs to get over herself and listen. Meet halfway.
And now, hearing Doc say "Arc" just seems wrong. She swallows down all her objections and sits down across from her. "Anna. My name is Anna."
Doc nods slowly, and grabs the bottle. "I was born Mulan. Doc fits better these days." She pours an equal amount into both glasses, then passes one across the table. "Here."
Anna gingerly takes the glass. "Am I going to need this?"
"You might. I'm not going to lie and say this will be an easy conversation. If you need it, it's there." Doc — Anna can't think of her as anything else right now — puts her own glass off to the side and pulls out her phone and puts it on the table. "So. I have good news, and I have bad news. Which way do you want to do this?"
Yeah, okay. Anna stares down at the amber liquid, glass cool against her fingers. Take the leap. She looks up into Doc's eyes. "Bad news first." She bites her lip. "And don't sugar-coat it."
Doc nods. "Elsa is in terrible shape. On the surface, she's suffering from extreme malnutrition, muscular atrophy, dependency on at least five different drugs, likely skiz dependency, and the effects of multiple invasive surgeries on her central and peripheral nervous system," she says bluntly. "Stemming from that, at minimum, includes delayed growth and stress on her internal organs, as well as the psychological issues of her captivity."
Each word feels like a sledgehammer to Anna's heart. Well, she asked for blunt. "Right. Psychological issues. She was...trapped in that machine. For years."
"Yes. Arc. Anna. There's no easy way to say this." And suddenly, Doc looks older and very tired. "Elsa was tortured. Almost constantly. For thirteen years."
The glass clatters to the table, slipping from her suddenly-numb fingers. It wobbles, not spilling, but Anna's barely aware of it. She's not really aware of anything but those damning words echoing through her. Someone's taken her soul and slid a knife into it, and has cast her into the void. There's nothing there, nothing but the truth that she so desperately wanted. Because Doc isn't lying. Anna knows this deep, beyond her bones and into the very fabric of herself.
Tortured. For thirteen years.
She doesn't even know where to make sense of that, if it's even possible to make sense of that. "What?" The word tumbles from her mouth, coating her tongue like the ashes of dreams and preconceptions. She should have been faster, worked harder, done something more. Shouldn't have wasted so much time.
Paid for in blood and bone.
"It was because of my powers."
Anna jolts backwards, staring at Doc's phone. She never thought she'd hear that voice again. She never wanted to hear that voice again, now that she knew the truth of it, that it was a hollow mask for her sister to be locked behind. To hear it now...
"You jacked her back in?" she hisses at Doc. "After all of that, you — "
"I know. I know." Doc rubs her face with her hands. "It sucks. But I said there was a likely skiz dependency. Considering how long she's been connected, it's wiser to taper her off it."
"But — "
"Anna. I asked her to do it." And Anna doesn't know if it's her imagination or the knowledge of reality that makes Elsa just sound tired.
"It's just feels...wrong, to hear you like this again," she admits quietly. It feels like giving up.
"It's...it's difficult," she says slowly. "Everything is...I...I'm not used to it. My...body, I guess. It doesn't feel like me. I want to be here for this, I want to talk to you. But it doesn't feel right, to do it in that room. I'm...it's hard to remember that's me."
It makes a horrible amount of sense. Even though it still feels like there's this gap between the two of them that has nothing to do with distance. This entire thing is so messed up. When did the world get so screwed up?
"All right," she breathes out, and then picks up the glass again. Debates taking a sip, because christ on a bicycle, Anna doesn't know how much more of this she can handle without liquid courage. Oh screw it. She takes a sip, and nearly coughs as the liquor burns a trail down her throat. "All right. You said because of your powers? How does that follow?"
"There's a...strong emotional component to my powers. I always knew this. It'll react if I'm anxious or stressed. Or scared." Elsa pauses, as if she's trying to find the words. Maybe she is. "Especially when I'm scared. It's an automatic thing, like adrenalin in fight-or-flight."
"The skiz jacks they surgically implanted form a network that's also wired to very specific regions of her brain," Doc says, taking over. "From what she tells me, they could induce sensory perception and memory retrieval."
"They...could make me relive the worst parts of my life, over and over. And could trick my mind into seeing a different ending. The ice would...respond."
Anna takes a sip again, because otherwise she's going to start crying again, and she's not sure she has any tears left. Because what the hell. Elsa was eight years old. What the hell kind of monsters are these people?
Kristoff shouldn't have shot that one. It was too good for him, she thinks viciously.
But that's not what she has to focus on right now. There's more here, and Elsa's talking, and Anna's not sure she wants the answers, even though she knows she does. She needs to know. Because she needs to hold these people accountable.
"All the time?" she whispers past numb lips.
"Sort of? The sensory stuff, yes. They did. The somatic response was good enough for them. The memories...yes and no." There's a pause, and Anna realizes she's not going to like the next part. "The low-level version, I eventually learned to, well, ignore. I'd bury myself elsewhere. The instinctual reaction would...happen, but I'd be...not there. The other version...they'd force me awake. And I couldn't run from that."
The implications of that hit her like a lightning bolt. "The glitches. When you glitched, you'd..."
"Yes. That's what those were." Elsa just sounds exhausted, there's no denying that now, but she keeps going. "The thing is, they gave me skiz jacks. Those are always two-way. They tried firewalling me in, but they knew I could get past at least one of them. I didn't know to be careful the first time, when I was...little. So the method to induce one of the...other versions, which would also reel me back in, it was something I couldn't hack."
Was that...Kristoff turned a key on the console. And Elsa glitched right when Scratch turned it. That key wasn't to open the chamber; it must have been how they...forced her back. Maybe something as simple as completing a circuit. Did Elsa know? Did she know that it was so damn close, and so outside her reach? Anna hopes that she didn't, but knows that she did.
But there's more to what her sister just said. "'The first time'?"
"I figured out how to hide myself away fairly early on. I was just trying to get away as best I could. I ended up flinging my, well, consciousness into the local network. They caught me and built better firewalls. So I figured out how to get past them, without getting caught."
"And then out into the wider net," Anna says softly. "That's why you're so good. You had to be."
"I'm sorry I didn't tell you sooner. I...I didn't know how."
"It's..." It's not okay. But it is. "I understand." She takes another sip; maybe she'll get used to the taste at this rate. That's a terrifying thought. She shudders. "Did it, did it hurt?"
"That's...complicated."
Doc joins back in, apparently able to translate that non-answer. "Some of the drugs they had her on were painkillers and sedatives. They might not have thought she was in pain, and it might be hard for Elsa to tell what was...physical and what was psychosomatic."
"Basically that. It didn't always hurt, and not always in the way that slamming your hand in a door would. It's hard to explain."
Anna nods, then realizes again that Elsa can't see that, dammit, and winces. "Right. Okay." She rubs her forehead and looks at the ceiling, trying not to cry again. Even though it's just Doc here, and she's pretty sure Doc is the last person who would judge her for that. "God, how did you...I don't know how you survived like that."
Doc makes a small noise, and Anna shifts her gaze to her. "That is a very good question." She sighs. "Elsa is sane. By all rights, she shouldn't be."
Something grips her heart again in icy claws. If Elsa can't think of her body as hers, then that's the only thing left. "What do you mean?"
"I mean that I've seen skiz cases. I've seen bad skiz cases, where their brains are long fried and no one's home. And of the worst I've seen, not one of them was jacked in as long as Elsa has been. By length alone, not even counting the torture, your sister should be a goddamn vegetable." Doc breathes out sharply. "But she's not. She's brilliant and lightning fast and it's amazing."
"But...how?" It feels like a betrayal to even ask that.
"You saved me, Anna." Elsa's voice is soft. "All I had to do was hang on, because I knew you were out there."
"She needed an anchor," Doc says quietly as Anna reels. "She got something better, long before tonight."
Oh. She bites her lip and rubs her face against her sleeve. Oh. What in the world is she supposed to even say to that?
Nothing, really. So she doesn't. "So what's the good news?" And if her voice feels a little scratchy and thick, neither Doc nor Elsa say a word about it.
"Well, that, for one," says Doc, leaning back in her chair. "And she's alive pretty much goes without saying. I can treat most of the problems. And then there are the nanomachines."
"Nanomachines? I know there were some in the...chamber when we got her out but...they..." Anna blinks, then feels the blood drain out of her face. "You mean they went inside her?"
"Yes. They're...threaded pretty extensively throughout all of her nervous system, as well as other organs. From what Elsa tells me, Eden originally put them in to help keep her alive and to better manipulate stimuli from the skiz jacks." A slightly-lopsided grin crosses Doc's face. "They didn't expect her to reprogram them with her brain and take all of them out of their control."
"Forgive me for not wanting a kill-switch in my brain."
Despite herself, Anna snorts a laugh. That comment was pure Elsa, and until this moment, she thought she'd never hear that kind of dry wit again. "Would that be the glowing eyes?"
Doc nods. "Yes. But, more importantly, we might be able to use them elsewhere." She leans forward. "We might, and I want to stress this, might be able to use the nanomachines to jump-start and help Elsa's muscular and skeletal regeneration."
For the first time all night, wild hope sparks to life in her chest. "You mean..."
"I don't know if she'll ever walk again. But Elsa and I discussed it, and, well, we're going to try."
"I need to try reprogramming them first," she cautions, but it's not enough to stop Anna from smiling. "It might take some time."
"Which is why you should really rest, Elsa, now that I think we're done here," Doc says as she picks up the phone. "Disconnect and sleep. Or I'll send your sister in to make you."
"Right. Okay. I'll...see you in a bit, right Anna?" She sounds small, hesitant for a moment, and despite Anna's moment of happiness, she feels her heart clench again.
"Yeah. I'll, I'll be there, when you wake up," she says as Doc turns her phone off.
She slips the phone back into her pocket, and Anna watches Doc grab her glass and slam the liquor back. Before her eyes, Doc falls away. leaving something darker and more worn behind. Mulan pours herself another drink, downs it, and pours a third before rubbing her forehead tiredly. "I fucking hate Eden," she mutters.
Anna blinks rapidly. That is...unexpected. There's certainly enough reason right here to hate them, but this sounds, well, older. "You've run into them before?"
Mulan looks out from behind dark hair, her expression carefully blank. "Once upon a time. They've gotten no better, and a hell of a lot more degenerate."
"How?"
"I wasn't always a doctor in the undercity." Mulan shakes her head and drains her glass before getting up from the table. "But that is a story for another day. Go see your sister, Anna."
Anna doesn't need to be told twice.
T looks up when she enters the room, standing from the chair. "She just fell asleep, honey." She leans over Elsa's sleeping form, fussing momentarily with the quilt before stepping away. She shakes her head. "Never in a million years..."
"Yeah. I know," Anna says as she brushes her fingertips against the back of Elsa's hand. Her sister's fingers are long and thin, cold to the touch. Now that she knows why, the icy skin is strangely comforting.
T clears her throat, making Anna look up. "Food in the kitchen should almost be ready. I'll bring you something, Arc."
"Anna." She meets T's eyes steadily. "My name. It's Anna."
T's eyes soften further. How in the world did she luck out enough to fall in with such people? "Anna then. And you're allowed to call me Tiana if you want, but you already know T's just as good. And I'll have food for Elsa, when she wakes up."
So that's how it goes. The hours bleed into each other in that room. Anna sits by Elsa's bed. Sometimes she reads a book either Kristoff or Kocoum leave behind. Sometimes, she just sits there. Sven stays with her, silently watching her sister breathe on the bed. She's gotten better at helping Elsa eat whenever she wakes up, despite how awkward it is.
And it's still weird, awkward, to talk to her when she's jacked in. It's hard to talk to the voice she's known for the last three years, and see her sister's body and glowing blue irises beneath the half-closed eyelids right in front of her. But she doesn't know how to make things better. All she can do is hope things will get better and be there as Elsa tries and Doc treats and Kristoff, T, and Kocoum care.
The care is nearly her undoing, but she can't cry again, not like that first time. Even when the gentleness and thought, the care they show her and her sister, as if they're precious, makes her eyes burn and her heart clench. Not when Doc's patience and care steers Elsa through even minor withdrawal symptoms and bad hours where she shakes and gasps and freezes the room. Because she can't cry in this room, not over her sister trapped in a body she doesn't even think of as hers, and Anna can't be anywhere else.
The first time she falls asleep in the chair, half-flopped onto the bed and using Sven as a pillow, someone was nice enough to cover her with a blanket. The second time, Kristoff hauls her up to sleep in an actual bed, despite her protests. At least it's just down the hall, and honestly, she's out the second her head hits the pillow. So maybe he had a point.
It's sometime on the second or third day that Doc brings it up. She's in the room with her and Kristoff, checking on Elsa's responses. For her part, Elsa seems to have managed to start looking annoyed at things, which Anna supposes is progress. "So what's your next move?"
"Huh?" Anna quickly glances at Kristoff, but he looks as confused as she is.
Doc stands up straight and rolls her shoulders before looking at them. "Your next move. You really can't stay here." She frowns. "Eden isn't really the type to give up. They'll try to get what they want, even if you don't always know what that is."
Anna pulls a face. "I was afraid you'd say that." She sighs and tugs on a braid, debating on whether she actually wants to give the terrible thought that's been lurking in the back of her mind a voice. "Part of me thinks this was too easy."
"Didn't you say you've been searching for three years?" Kristoff scowls. "And the stuff we pulled isn't exactly what I'd call 'easy'."
"I know. And we had Elsa here working on...god knows what."
"Thanks...for that," Elsa rasps. Anna shrugs sheepishly at her, getting an eyeroll in response.
"In any case, it's just a feeling. Kinda like I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop."
Mulan — and she's definitely Mulan now — crosses her arms. "Good instinct," she says, catching their attention again. "You got Elsa out, which they're not going to like. It's probably luck that they haven't found us yet." Her smile is slightly lop-sided. "Probably don't expect the people who broke in to be crazy enough to hide out less than 50 kilometers away."
Wow, put it that way...
"Hid from...helicopters."
Anna takes over for her sister, saving her from talking more than she has to. "Yeah, before you came. They sent out a couple to do sweeps, I guess. I don't know how far they went."
"Far enough that I saw them," Kristoff says with a frown. "Just a flyby of the highway."
"Like I said, luck." Mulan sighs. "You're going to need a plan. Elsa can probably be moved, but that might be tricky. Honestly, I'd feel better if I could keep an eye on you."
Which, honestly? Makes sense. Except Anna will admit her apartment is a minor disaster area at the best of times, and probably no place for someone with, uh, mobility issues. And while T would probably be more than willing to give them a room at Sanctuary, they'd be tiny and cramped and probably not weather one of Elsa's icy little problems that well. She tugs on a braid. The problem is that she's basically going back blind, and this time, she can't count on Elsa to help her out with intel.
Well, she could, but at the moment, Doc was trying to keep her presence online down as much as possible, in case Eden had some kind of tracker on her. Or were waiting to see if she reappeared or something. Anna would make a joke about paranoia, but all of this sounds way too reasonable right now. But that means that they need some other way of getting information.
She sighs and pulls out her phone. It's about time she called the Contessa anyway and thanked her for her help in getting the information they needed to find Eden in the first place.
Anna really isn't expecting for Contessa herself to pick up after the second ring.
"Arc, what the hell did you do?"
She pulls the phone away for half a second and stares at it, surprised by the vehemence. "What do you mean, what did I do?"
"Arc, I give Rime some intel, and then you both drop off the fucking grid. Rime drops off the grid. And then I get reports of the fucking Men in Black crawling all over Jeorling and Harborpointe. Forgive me for trying to put two and two together."
"The Docks? Why would they..."
"So you did do something!" Aw hell. Anna winces at Contessa's tone, choosing to ignore the look of concern Kristoff shoots her. She's in for it now. "Goddammit, Arc."
She takes a deep breath. Well, she wanted information. Time to try to get it. "Okay. What exactly is going on over there? We've been...out of contact."
Contessa sighs. "You mean what's been giving me a giant headache? Try everything. Your mystery man's gotten a hold of a press release. Says blacksiders stole something 'very important' from Helios and not only are they going to prosecute, but now the talking heads are making noises about how it's time to clean out the undercity once and for all."
Anna stills. "They can't do that," she says, suddenly numb. "They can't. What about all the people? That's...that's thousands of people, what are they going to do?"
"I know that. You know that. And I'm pretty sure they know that and don't give a damn. We're scum to them. And this is just an excuse to get them talking. They've done it before and nothing ever comes of it."
She stares at Elsa on the bed, feeling like she's about to fall. Her sister stares back, blue eyes wide and full of guilt. Somehow, Anna isn't surprised that Elsa knows what she's probably hearing, what she's thinking about. Twenty steps ahead of everyone else. "Maybe not this time."
"Arc..."
"It's, they have the arcology now. We never figured out where they were going to put it. What if..."
"Fucking hell. You mean this time might not actually be just bluffing." She hears something crash in the background. "What the fuck did you steal?"
Anna tries not to bristle too much at the 'what'. Contessa doesn't know. And so she stares at Elsa as she answers, because this is just as much her as it is Anna. "I can't answer that. Not right now. I need...I need some time. I'm sorry. I'll get back to you."
"Arc. Arc!"
She hangs up, then looks down at the phone in her hand. She can feel the combined stares of Elsa, Kristoff, and Mulan burning holes into her.
Kristoff finds his voice first. "Anna, what's going on?"
"Well, I know where Eden went to find us."
"Where they went...you mean they're in the city?"
She lets out a deep breath and looks up. "Yeah. They're looking for Elsa. For us. And Scratch already got the media talking about cleaning out the undercity."
Mulan's glare is sharp enough to slice her to the bone. "And this time, they've got a reason. Oh shit." She rubs her forehead. "Shit. This is bad."
"Anna...if they want..." Elsa seems to struggle with the words.
Anna points at her, suddenly furious. "If the next words out of your mouth are anything along the lines of giving you up, I will...do something."
Elsa's lips press together in a mulish line, and she looks highly annoyed. "But...you..." She makes a noise of utter frustration. "Need...jack."
Kristoff glances over. "Hey, you just got off that. Are you sure..."
"Need...jack. Talk."
Doc pokes him in the head. "Let her go." She grabs the connector and leans over the bed to gently lift Elsa up. "Just the local network," she murmurs as she slides the network plug into the skiz jack on her neck.
Elsa's irises immediately glow blue, and her face takes on that half-slack stare as Doc slowly lowers her back down to the pillow. It's so goddamn creepy and wrong to see, and it's all the weirder because Anna's standing right here and watching this happen and it still doesn't feel right. It probably never will.
"Right, okay. Much better." Elsa's voice cracks over a speaker they set up just for this. "Anyway, what I was trying to say, Anna, is that if they want me back and they want the undercity cleared, there's little reason for them to stop if they've only got one of those."
"Right. So how about we don't give you up?" Anna grits out.
"Great, we're on the same page. Because that plan sucks. A lot."
Oh. Well...okay then, that's less infuriating. "So what do you suggest instead?"
"I don't know. Like I said, I don't want to go back. But keeping me out puts you, and everyone else apparently, in danger." Before Anna can jump in on that, Elsa continues. "I spent too long keeping you safe. They don't know who you are, they can't. I hid you too well. But I don't want them to get their hands on you."
"We could run," she whispers. As soon as she says it, she sees it laid out in front of her. They could run. Run from this place, run from Eden, from Helios, from everyone. Anna carrying Elsa on her back, running forever. Because they would. They wouldn't be able to stop, not really. Helios would find them. Someone would find them, would talk, would see, and then what?
And Anna looks at the broken form of her sister in the bed and bites her lip. She doesn't know how long Elsa could run. Part of her believes she could run forever. The more realistic side, the side ground into her over the last three years, the side that watched Elsa shake and cry out soundlessly as she painted the room in ice mere hours ago, that side knows the answer, in all its damning sorrow.
Running is a liability.
She looks at Doc, crouched by the bed, watching her sister breathe with a practiced eye. They really could not have asked for better than Doc, who dropped everything and came running, who's been known to work miracles. She didn't have to do that. But she did, and Anna knows she's hiding her own secrets and has her own reasons, but she's grateful for the care just the same. And T and Kocoum too, who gave care when they didn't have to. When they're pretty much strangers, T for how long and Kocoum let them into his house, and she just knows he's as prickly as Kristoff is.
And she looks at Kristoff, standing with Sven by his side. He's given so much, helped them when he didn't have to. Anyone would have run for the hills after hearing her story. Deciding to go after a megacorp? To steal back someone from the clutches of an organization most blacksiders think of as the boogeymen? Dropping them and running would have been the smart thing. But he didn't. He wouldn't let them go alone. And Anna knows she couldn't have gotten Elsa out fast enough on her own.
She doesn't think she could leave him. Any of them.
She looks again at Elsa, and sees her sister's head has shifted. It looks like she's almost looking back, those glowing blue eyes burning straight into the core of herself. She remembers looking at them, once, when they didn't glow and were in a younger face. They were sitting on their parents' laps, and Anna had asked her Papa why they gave money to the hospital.
And Anna feels like she knows what their answer is, without even having to speak. "We have to go back."
"Anna, are you crazy?" Kristoff half-yells. "That's where they are!"
They probably are crazy. But they are their parents' daughters.
"Kristoff, where else would we go? Elsa can't, she needs Doc and other things that she can't get if we're always running." She folds in on herself, just a little, feeling the weight of everything settle on her shoulders again. "And we'd always be running. And Eden will tear the undercity apart."
"It's not your job to fix everything," he says, fierce and painfully earnest.
"No. But we can't walk away either."
"And we don't have to walk in blind," Anna says, and his shoulders fall, conceding the point. Mulan looks on, and Anna swears she looks faintly approving. So she takes a deep breath, reaches for the phone again, and dials.
"Arc. What the actual fuck."
"Contessa, we're outside the city and need some help getting back in. Quietly."
"That is a tall order, considering the state of the undercity and that you hung up on me."
"Remember how our deal was that you'd help us if someday I'd tell you what was really going on?" Anna takes a deep breath, and jumps. "Do you want to hear a story?"