A Mountaintop Reflection

[ProcaPro 557]

 

 

Spoiler

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eb2zuegwcwk

 

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It was no small thing, to have lost her body. Her skin, once her own - once warm and living - was unyielding. Everything about her was carefully planned, measured, and built into something that could only truly be described as perfection. Curated, molded, a perfection she hadn’t chosen - one of hard lines, precise limits, and exhaustive maintenance. It takes steady hands and a steadier mind to uphold perfection, and she had neither. She let herself rot, let her perfect form grow dirty. Shining, strong Ferrum had grown dull and scratched in the past years. Grae’s joints creaked louder as she ignored them time and again. Her fingers bore deep gouges from a lack of caution. Her dexterity had faded. What good was it for, after all, providing maintenance to a shell she hated?

 

Yet she lived. She lived against her will and couldn’t bring herself to end it. She was stuck in a limbo both imposed on her by another and by herself. “Cowardice” she called it. She reached out for help and rejected it all the same. She clung to her personhood, yet she cast it aside. She’d become a creature of contradictions, of uncontrollable mood and emotionless calculation. Eventually, she met a mentor. She agreed to change her name in time, to start fresh.

 

When Grae’s mentor tasked her with meditation - told her to feel what she once was despite her metal body - She held back laughter. She knew that would merely earn her discipline in the moment. It wasn’t ‘til she’d set onto the road that she’d bothered to criticize the task: how absurd it felt. Her mentor didn’t deserve such, but it was still a ridiculous thing to ask of Grae in her opinion. Asking her to try and delve deep into her soul and mind to try and remember what was long lost and dredge up a reality that she couldn’t get back felt cruel, maybe even torturous. Yet all the same she went travelling North to Ailmere, then beyond.

 

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There in the North, Grae found her spot. Closer to the sea than the jagged mountain line that encompassed Ailmere. Near a crumbling Witch’s keep and a distant tower, she sat in the snow. She tied a blindfold about her unblinking eyes and crossed her legs, hands folding into her lap. Frost built slowly over the layers of furs and wools she wore, creeping into the unmaintained joints beneath. Her blood slowed. Still, she remained. She sat and imagined as instructed.

 

Every whistle of the wind, every crack and shift of snow was fuel. She imagined the sting of cold on skin, the way it numbs fingers, burns lungs, turns breath into mist. She remembered the bite of life and the warmth within her that had once resisted it. Then, her memory joined her imagination. She saw her face, or whatever she remembered her face to be. She saw herself running in her old home in Celia’nor as a child. She saw a place that’d never quite left her heart and a version of herself that lived long before her metal shell. She caught crickets and beetles, chased birds, wondered if she could fly too someday.

 

The sun rose, pulling her to reality and back to the present. She couldn’t move at first. For hours she remained frozen, joints locked. Not until midday - when the sun melted the ice crusting over her - did she rise. Gears squealed out into the mountain air.

 

But there was a peace in Grae’s soul she hadn’t felt for a long time. She’d remembered what was lost in her change from flesh to machine, and then willingly let it go. Yet she remembered it was still her, despite her situation. She owed her mentor a silent apology. After she cared for her frozen joints on the journey back home, she owed an apology to herself too.

 

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[lemonke 6014]

Seisho Ehiba smiled upon hearing that Grae's trial was completed. Whereas Grae was a being of steel, the elder geisha was utterly proud to welcome her amongst the claws of the tiger in the circle, as she was more promising than most. After all, what makes a Shinkan isn't magic but culture and wisdom.

[latte 2238]

"PUTTT A GEISHAAAA ONNNNNNNNN" SCREAMS SEIRYU HINA!!!!

[MaplTree 129]

Despite everything, Omekko'ii still saw Grae as her sister, and loved her all the same.

[WhatASithuation 210]

Athri had noticed a change in Grae as she cheerfully waltzed into the clan hall before one of her dance classes. Truthfully he was at a loss, on how to help her.  He did his best, still in any way that he knew how. A sigh of relief was given as she rushed out towards Sakuragakure. A small, exhausted smile lingered. There were others there, asking their questions, multiple conversations flowing in the tiny family get together. He spaced out as he usually did, making a future plan to meet with Yuki's new mentor to express his gratitude.