[ it's funny how, even after working on the piece that won her the pulitzer, it's in a lab at the ppdc that naomi first meets the woman who made piloting jaegers possible. dr. caitlin lightcap is deceptively soft-spoken with a spine made of steel and a heart so big that naomi takes to her almost immediately. she sits with her and raleigh for awhile, lets her talk a little about why she's here ( she suspects that they all already know, but she answers the questions anyway ) - how she's been sleep-walking and having panic attacks whose triggers she can't isolate ( they were at the burger king and something caught on her ears and next she knew, raleigh had her outside, on the sidewalk, his arms wrapped around her to keep her from shattering ) and of course, the gaps. blanks in memory that don't feel right.
she cries a little, because talking is hard. necessary, but hard. and the whole time, raleigh's just there. just holding her hand and pressing his forehead against her temple and mouthing i love you right when she needs it.
she's reclined in a large cushy chair that looks like it was made for falling asleep in with a funky looking metal thing curved over her head. she squeezes his hand back, holds his gaze because, no, she's not ready, but when has something like being scared stopped her? ] Promise you'll still love me in the morning?
[ she doesn't know why she says it except that she wanted to be funny and it just comes out all wrong. but the countdown's at one and they fall--
( Push, Mimi, push she feels like she's being cut in half but the baby's coming and for a moment she just wants to curl up in bed and cry the way Alison had offered him an out, given him some cash and he holds out his thumb on the highway he's just so tired and he wants to die everything hurts the way Raleigh looks up at her the first time they make love, apprehensive and full of want and she bends down to kiss him because it's not hard to love him at all Mom look at the puppy where is my daughter I have to find them, Mako and because he won't listen to a thing she says she actually sits down on him and refuses to move the cold steel of the cuffs on her wrists the woman seated across from her with her face more reptilian than human what is wrong with these people the kaiju have taken so much bagged our fifth kill with all due respect, sir, we just took down a kaiju and saved everyone on that boat she's seventeen and he's so handsome when he smiles she'd liked his brother first but Yancy's magnetic without even trying Naomi, right? Yeah, what're you doing out here on your own my friends, they ditched me, you need a lift?
--the drift is strange and overwhelming, memories seeping into each other based on the flimsiest of associations. she wants to shy away from that last memory and the way it makes her feel to see herself so young, naive and full of dreams in awe of a cadet from the jaeger academy. she thinks no, not that, please because raleigh doesn't need to see that, not the way she can't breathe when yancy enters her, his mouth at her neck but raleigh knows how does he know you always do this! there's nothing that i want that you can't get maybe i'm sick of waiting for you to do something about it you broke my trust bro, it's not even about the girl, it's about the way she looked at me for once and not you and you took her sorry kid, i messed up, never again okay laughter at yamarashi's take-down and the way she grieved on the floor of her daughter's room mommy, mommy, what's wrong, why are you crying, he could have been anyone, anyone but how do i tell my little girl that the man who fathered her is gone i want that piece, gary, naomi focus on the pulitzer working on the wall and working out until he's tired and sometimes he hears yancy talk to him like he was still there you are naomi sokolov, yes? wh...what? bro, you ought to step back a little, or you're going to lose your footing when you weld that bit in it knows we're in here yancy why are you so calm we have heard curious things about you. about the little girl named yancy. you are involved with raleigh becket, yes? i don't underst-- raleigh, you listen to me-- knifehead tearing through gipsy's connpod a strike across her face when she answers back you people are crazy the kaiju are gone and the world is finally right again the needle sliding into her skin the rush of water overhead, his drivesuit weighing him down-- ) ]
[ raleigh gives her hand a small squeeze. ] Always, babe. [ he thinks he sees dr. lightcap smile at that. but then the countdown is finished and he's pulled down into headspace.
the drift is rough, both because first drifts are always rough and because there's a lot of awful stuff in their heads. it takes a concentrated effort not to flinch away ( or towards ) the memories of her time with the cult. they make raleigh's stomach clench and his anger spike. it's kind of cool and also really fucking weird to have the memory of girl yancy's birth. he really, really didn't need to know what it felt like to not only have a vagina but push something out of it.
the memories of his brother carry a heavy melancholy tone to them, even the happy ones. and raleigh can't help the amusement that rushes through him when he feels naomi's embarrassment over that memory of his brother coming up. he doesn't know if they're deep enough in headspace yet for her to hear it, but he still sends the thought of it's okay, i've already seen it, babe her way. it's still kind of horrifying to see a memory of his brother having sex, but he was bracing for it. was kind of expecting it, really, since the yancys are what initially connected him with naomi after that first meeting.
the last memory is of water and drowning, that awful dream from the beach. but raleigh's got enough experience not to chase that rabbit, to let them align correctly and settle into headspace. it's different for every pair of co-pilots, and the headspace he shares with naomi is different than the ones he's shared with yancy and mako. yancy was like whitewater rapids. mako was calm serenity hiding sharp steel. rarely did they have a seemingly physical representation of themselves in the drift. it's not like that with naomi.
raleigh offers a mental hand to her ( and isn't that weird ) and smiles. let's start off simple, okay? work our way up to things.
he closes his eyes ( are they really his eyes if this is all in his head? ) and thinks. the space around them blurs until they're caught in one of his memories. him and yancy sitting on the catwalks above gipsy's dock. they're drinking and laughing about something that happened the night before. yancy grabs him in a headlock and noogies the shit out of him until raleigh cries uncle. it's a good memory.
your turn. just think of a memory and we'll follow it down into your head, okay? ]
[ she wants to ask if it's always like this, because she feels like she's in her own body, just blurred at the edges, and when he offers his hand for her to take, she takes it, laces their fingers together to feel the familiar warmth of his palm against her own.
she's never seen the inside of the hangar where they dock the jaegers during downtime. she'd never seen the becket brothers the way she sees them now, both so young, a little bit drunk and happy. she wishes she could carry a snapshot of this moment out with her and share it with her daughter.
but i don't know how-- and because the drift is all thought at the snap of a finger, the world blurs and changes again. maybe it's the sight of the boys that prompts it, but it's that night. the one she gathered the courage to pretend she was brave, egged on by friends who'd commented on the two blond boys in jaeger academy jackets sitting at the bar.
her then-bestfriend is whispering in her ear, don't be a chicken, go introduce yourself because she's been eyeing raleigh through his mirror reflection all night and god, he has the goofiest, cutest smile, he's like a puppy and she doesn't know why that is but wow, how is he so cute.
she looks over at raleigh then, offers him a sheepish smile because she can feel the way he's grinning. what. it changed before i could pick something different. ]
[ it's really interesting to feel her bashfulness. it mixes with the emotions of the memory in an odd way and he's--really kind of flattered watching this. even as he thinks, is there no one on this earth that doesn't think of me like a puppy? seriously.
if he could kiss her in the drift, he would. ( maybe if they've got the time before they finish up he'll see if they can't do that. ) the room shifts a little as he lets his own perceptions of this night leak into the memory. the way he thought she was so damn pretty and the way his heart beat against his rib cage so hard when she smiled at him and wrote her number on his hand. i may never wash this hand again, eighteen-year-old raleigh had thought.
and he never, ever told yancy about that thought because it was kind of stupid, but he was really kind of star struck by her.
you up for something more difficult? he thinks, but before he can get an answer out of her the scene changes again. maybe if he was more experienced in hopping from rabbit hole to rabbit hole it wouldn't have. but he doesn't, so they end up in an alleyway. the trashcans that line it all have kanji on them and there's a little girl in a blue peacoat that comes rushing in and hides behind a can.
he'd asked mako if he could use this memory since it's distant enough from anything he and naomi has experienced to hopefully not shake them up too much as they ease their way into naomi's more painful memories. she'd agreed and he's grateful for that. it's a little like mental whiplash to go from nice nights at bars to onibaba. he can't imagine what it would be like to go from that to what they came here to find. ]
[ she is definitely up for kissing him if that's actually allowed in here. but at the same time, she can't help but feel shy.
after raleigh had sat her down one afternoon to say babe, i have an idea about dealing with the blanks in your head she'd actually done a bit of research on the way brains worked and how people could read them. how activity here meant infatuation ( and also hints of obsessive-compulsive disorder, who knew? ) and while all the jargon had made her head ache, she gets enough of the gist to understand a fraction of how it all works.
she's trying to shrug off the embarrassment when the drift shifts and she starts seeing that same memory from his point of view. it actually makes her pause, because she looks exactly like herself but also a whole world different through his eyes.
( she distinctly remembers agonizing over how unsophisticated her choice of eye-shadow had looked a purple cardigan with pink piping, naomi? really? and thank god, i got rid of that scarf geek palettes for the win, but never am i using that again, not if i am trying to impress people. )
she looks... perfect ( raleigh, stop ) like there's something in her smile and the way she'd bitten her lower lip as she scrawled her number on his palm and how yancy had been watching all of this with a smirk on his face before he shook his head and told raleigh that the had class in the morning.
( i may never wash this hand again and the way her friends had all squealed when they headed out to the parking lot, god, naomi, i am so jealous the older brother was totally scoping you out did you give him your number did you did you did you and the disappointment days later when he didn't call. )
i was such a kid. she thinks, and she remembers what it was like to cry over a stupid boy on her sister's shoulder, the way kara had done her make-up that friday night because the girls wanted to go out and to cheer her up, they were bringing out the big guns but that's your Urban Decay palette, yeah, my sister deserves to be gorgeous, come here, Mimi, let me work my magic on you and everything it led to when yancy becket called her name.
raleigh pulls her back before her memories can pull her across ( the rabbit a tempting thing, because that night changed everything for her ) asks if she wants to try something higher up the difficulty ladder but before she can say a thing the world just changes over and the first thing that catches her attention is the smell of the alleyway, the damp and sharp that one associates to snow. there's a little girl in blue, a lone red shoe bright against the gloom nd the ground shakes and a roar pierces the air.
she doubles over, unexpectedly. each footfall a blunt strike to her middle and her hand falls sharply away from raleigh as she drops to her knees. there's blood on her mouth when she looks up at him babe, i'm scared ( raleigh, you listen to me-- ) and for half a heartbeat the world hazes over before everything goes dark.
---
( you are naomi sokolov, yes? we have heard curious things about you. ) please. the unmistakable puncture of the needle on her skin. please, just leave my daughter alone. ( we are curious about the little girl named yancy. you are involved with raleigh becket, yes? ) please, i don't know what you want from us. please, don't hurt my little girl. ]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
/gently tldr's at you
she cries a little, because talking is hard. necessary, but hard. and the whole time, raleigh's just there. just holding her hand and pressing his forehead against her temple and mouthing i love you right when she needs it.
she's reclined in a large cushy chair that looks like it was made for falling asleep in with a funky looking metal thing curved over her head. she squeezes his hand back, holds his gaze because, no, she's not ready, but when has something like being scared stopped her? ] Promise you'll still love me in the morning?
[ she doesn't know why she says it except that she wanted to be funny and it just comes out all wrong. but the countdown's at one and they fall--
( Push, Mimi, push she feels like she's being cut in half but the baby's coming and for a moment she just wants to curl up in bed and cry the way Alison had offered him an out, given him some cash and he holds out his thumb on the highway he's just so tired and he wants to die everything hurts the way Raleigh looks up at her the first time they make love, apprehensive and full of want and she bends down to kiss him because it's not hard to love him at all Mom look at the puppy where is my daughter I have to find them, Mako and because he won't listen to a thing she says she actually sits down on him and refuses to move the cold steel of the cuffs on her wrists the woman seated across from her with her face more reptilian than human what is wrong with these people the kaiju have taken so much bagged our fifth kill with all due respect, sir, we just took down a kaiju and saved everyone on that boat she's seventeen and he's so handsome when he smiles she'd liked his brother first but Yancy's magnetic without even trying Naomi, right? Yeah, what're you doing out here on your own my friends, they ditched me, you need a lift?
--the drift is strange and overwhelming, memories seeping into each other based on the flimsiest of associations. she wants to shy away from that last memory and the way it makes her feel to see herself so young, naive and full of dreams in awe of a cadet from the jaeger academy. she thinks no, not that, please because raleigh doesn't need to see that, not the way she can't breathe when yancy enters her, his mouth at her neck but raleigh knows how does he know you always do this! there's nothing that i want that you can't get maybe i'm sick of waiting for you to do something about it you broke my trust bro, it's not even about the girl, it's about the way she looked at me for once and not you and you took her sorry kid, i messed up, never again okay laughter at yamarashi's take-down and the way she grieved on the floor of her daughter's room mommy, mommy, what's wrong, why are you crying, he could have been anyone, anyone but how do i tell my little girl that the man who fathered her is gone i want that piece, gary, naomi focus on the pulitzer working on the wall and working out until he's tired and sometimes he hears yancy talk to him like he was still there you are naomi sokolov, yes? wh...what? bro, you ought to step back a little, or you're going to lose your footing when you weld that bit in it knows we're in here yancy why are you so calm we have heard curious things about you. about the little girl named yancy. you are involved with raleigh becket, yes? i don't underst-- raleigh, you listen to me-- knifehead tearing through gipsy's connpod a strike across her face when she answers back you people are crazy the kaiju are gone and the world is finally right again the needle sliding into her skin the rush of water overhead, his drivesuit weighing him down-- ) ]
eeee!!! also let me know if this doesn't work
the drift is rough, both because first drifts are always rough and because there's a lot of awful stuff in their heads. it takes a concentrated effort not to flinch away ( or towards ) the memories of her time with the cult. they make raleigh's stomach clench and his anger spike. it's kind of cool and also really fucking weird to have the memory of girl yancy's birth. he really, really didn't need to know what it felt like to not only have a vagina but push something out of it.
the memories of his brother carry a heavy melancholy tone to them, even the happy ones. and raleigh can't help the amusement that rushes through him when he feels naomi's embarrassment over that memory of his brother coming up. he doesn't know if they're deep enough in headspace yet for her to hear it, but he still sends the thought of it's okay, i've already seen it, babe her way. it's still kind of horrifying to see a memory of his brother having sex, but he was bracing for it. was kind of expecting it, really, since the yancys are what initially connected him with naomi after that first meeting.
the last memory is of water and drowning, that awful dream from the beach. but raleigh's got enough experience not to chase that rabbit, to let them align correctly and settle into headspace. it's different for every pair of co-pilots, and the headspace he shares with naomi is different than the ones he's shared with yancy and mako. yancy was like whitewater rapids. mako was calm serenity hiding sharp steel. rarely did they have a seemingly physical representation of themselves in the drift. it's not like that with naomi.
raleigh offers a mental hand to her ( and isn't that weird ) and smiles. let's start off simple, okay? work our way up to things.
he closes his eyes ( are they really his eyes if this is all in his head? ) and thinks. the space around them blurs until they're caught in one of his memories. him and yancy sitting on the catwalks above gipsy's dock. they're drinking and laughing about something that happened the night before. yancy grabs him in a headlock and noogies the shit out of him until raleigh cries uncle. it's a good memory.
your turn. just think of a memory and we'll follow it down into your head, okay? ]
slfkjhasdlfkjhsdfkh i LOVE it
she's never seen the inside of the hangar where they dock the jaegers during downtime. she'd never seen the becket brothers the way she sees them now, both so young, a little bit drunk and happy. she wishes she could carry a snapshot of this moment out with her and share it with her daughter.
but i don't know how-- and because the drift is all thought at the snap of a finger, the world blurs and changes again. maybe it's the sight of the boys that prompts it, but it's that night. the one she gathered the courage to pretend she was brave, egged on by friends who'd commented on the two blond boys in jaeger academy jackets sitting at the bar.
her then-bestfriend is whispering in her ear, don't be a chicken, go introduce yourself because she's been eyeing raleigh through his mirror reflection all night and god, he has the goofiest, cutest smile, he's like a puppy and she doesn't know why that is but wow, how is he so cute.
she looks over at raleigh then, offers him a sheepish smile because she can feel the way he's grinning. what. it changed before i could pick something different. ]
no subject
if he could kiss her in the drift, he would. ( maybe if they've got the time before they finish up he'll see if they can't do that. ) the room shifts a little as he lets his own perceptions of this night leak into the memory. the way he thought she was so damn pretty and the way his heart beat against his rib cage so hard when she smiled at him and wrote her number on his hand. i may never wash this hand again, eighteen-year-old raleigh had thought.
and he never, ever told yancy about that thought because it was kind of stupid, but he was really kind of star struck by her.
you up for something more difficult? he thinks, but before he can get an answer out of her the scene changes again. maybe if he was more experienced in hopping from rabbit hole to rabbit hole it wouldn't have. but he doesn't, so they end up in an alleyway. the trashcans that line it all have kanji on them and there's a little girl in a blue peacoat that comes rushing in and hides behind a can.
he'd asked mako if he could use this memory since it's distant enough from anything he and naomi has experienced to hopefully not shake them up too much as they ease their way into naomi's more painful memories. she'd agreed and he's grateful for that. it's a little like mental whiplash to go from nice nights at bars to onibaba. he can't imagine what it would be like to go from that to what they came here to find. ]
no subject
after raleigh had sat her down one afternoon to say babe, i have an idea about dealing with the blanks in your head she'd actually done a bit of research on the way brains worked and how people could read them. how activity here meant infatuation ( and also hints of obsessive-compulsive disorder, who knew? ) and while all the jargon had made her head ache, she gets enough of the gist to understand a fraction of how it all works.
she's trying to shrug off the embarrassment when the drift shifts and she starts seeing that same memory from his point of view. it actually makes her pause, because she looks exactly like herself but also a whole world different through his eyes.
( she distinctly remembers agonizing over how unsophisticated her choice of eye-shadow had looked a purple cardigan with pink piping, naomi? really? and thank god, i got rid of that scarf geek palettes for the win, but never am i using that again, not if i am trying to impress people. )
she looks... perfect ( raleigh, stop ) like there's something in her smile and the way she'd bitten her lower lip as she scrawled her number on his palm and how yancy had been watching all of this with a smirk on his face before he shook his head and told raleigh that the had class in the morning.
( i may never wash this hand again and the way her friends had all squealed when they headed out to the parking lot, god, naomi, i am so jealous the older brother was totally scoping you out did you give him your number did you did you did you and the disappointment days later when he didn't call. )
i was such a kid. she thinks, and she remembers what it was like to cry over a stupid boy on her sister's shoulder, the way kara had done her make-up that friday night because the girls wanted to go out and to cheer her up, they were bringing out the big guns but that's your Urban Decay palette, yeah, my sister deserves to be gorgeous, come here, Mimi, let me work my magic on you and everything it led to when yancy becket called her name.
raleigh pulls her back before her memories can pull her across ( the rabbit a tempting thing, because that night changed everything for her ) asks if she wants to try something higher up the difficulty ladder but before she can say a thing the world just changes over and the first thing that catches her attention is the smell of the alleyway, the damp and sharp that one associates to snow. there's a little girl in blue, a lone red shoe bright against the gloom nd the ground shakes and a roar pierces the air.
she doubles over, unexpectedly. each footfall a blunt strike to her middle and her hand falls sharply away from raleigh as she drops to her knees. there's blood on her mouth when she looks up at him babe, i'm scared ( raleigh, you listen to me-- ) and for half a heartbeat the world hazes over before everything goes dark.
---
( you are naomi sokolov, yes? we have heard curious things about you. ) please. the unmistakable puncture of the needle on her skin. please, just leave my daughter alone. ( we are curious about the little girl named yancy. you are involved with raleigh becket, yes? ) please, i don't know what you want from us. please, don't hurt my little girl. ]