Short one-shot alert! ;) I've been re-watching the show (again), and the line that always sticks with me is, "I want her with everything I have." So, I wanted to dig into that and explore how admitting it to Asriel may have emotionally affected Marisa Coulter.
Happy reading!
Marisa sat in the dimly lit cabin of the airship, the hum of the engines a distant murmur beneath her feet. Luggage was strewn around her, a chaotic reminder of her hurried departure, but she paid it no mind. Her golden monkey daemon sat silently by her side, his eyes mirroring the turmoil that brewed within her.
As her fingers traced the edges of a weathered notebook, the one she'd hastily grabbed from Asriel's study, her thoughts were still on his words, the raw emotion in his voice as he pleaded with her. She had refused him, yet the weight of that decision felt like a leaden anchor in her chest.
She flipped open the notebook, her breath catching as she recognized the meticulous handwriting. Asriel's notes, the very heart of his research. She scanned the pages, her eyes skimming over complex equations and sketches until something caught her eye. A stack of photograms, tucked neatly between the pages, as if Asriel had hidden them away for safekeeping.
The first showed Lyra, a young girl with a mischievous smile, the curve of her lips so familiar that it sent a pang of longing through Marisa. The second photogram, Lyra a bit older, her eyes wide with curiosity, made Marisa's heart clench. But it was the third photogram that made her pause.
Lyra, no more than two years old, stood in a field of wildflowers, clutching a small bloom in her tiny hand. Her dark, curly hair framed her face, her expression one of innocent joy. Marisa's hand trembled as she held the image, her mind replaying her words to Asriel: "I want her with everything I have."
But now, in the solitude of the airship, the weight of those words pressed down on her, unraveling the fragile composure she had maintained. She wasn't sure how they made her feel. The certainty she had felt when speaking them was now a tangled mess of confusion. Had she meant it? Or was it just another lie she told herself to mask the truth?
Going to find Asriel had been hard, not because of the physical journey, but because of the emotional one. It had always been difficult for her to lie to him, to hide from him what she truly felt. Asriel had a way of seeing through her, unearthing the parts of her she had long buried. But this time, she had managed to keep something hidden, even from herself… until now.
The echo of her own voice whispered in her mind, wanting Lyra. Why? Why did she now want her? The question gnawed at her, unsettling in its simplicity yet profound in its implications. Had it been a mother's instinct, long suppressed, now bubbling to the surface? Or was it something more, something she wasn't ready to confront? Was she really capable of the love she claimed to feel, or was it just another mask, another role she played to survive?
Her thoughts drifted back to her earlier encounter with Hugh MacPhail, when he had asked her what Asriel had done to her. She had melted in front of him, denied that Asriel had affected her so deeply. But maybe she had melted. Melted into something unrecognizable. When they took Lyra away, when Lyra was born looking so much like Asriel, Marisa had turned to stone. She denied responsibility for Lyra, pretended she had never existed. Pretending. She was good at that… had been her whole life.
But now something was changing. Was it because Lyra was in danger? Marisa had tried to protect her by taking her to London, keeping her safe from the very technology Marisa herself had created. Was it in Bolvangar, when Lyra was about to be severed from her daemon? Was it in that moment, when Lyra screamed for her mother? That primal scream had cut through her, shattering the cold facade she had so carefully constructed.
Why did she want Lyra now? She had tried to see her at Jordan College when Lyra was just five years old, but the Master had refused to let her in. That had made Marisa think that Lyra was better off never knowing her. Better off without a mother who was more monster than human. But now... now, she wasn't so sure. The walls she had built around her heart were crumbling, and with them, the certainty of who she was—or who she wanted to be.
Marisa's gaze drifted back to the photogram, the image of Lyra's innocent joy a stark contrast to the darkness that had consumed her own life. I want her with everything I have. The words haunted her, an admission of a truth she had tried so hard to deny. But was it enough? Could she truly be the mother Lyra needed, or was she destined to destroy everything she touched?
The airship continued its steady course, but within Marisa, a storm was raging, one that threatened to tear her apart. She had always been a woman of ambition, of power, of control. But now, as she sat alone with her thoughts, she wondered if she had lost the most important battle of all—the battle for her own soul.