816/How Many Times Can I Break

How Many Times Can I Break
Date of Scene:	28 November 2023
Location:	Mitakihara General Hospital
Synopsis:	In the aftermath of scene 798, Magda Faust checks in on Lulu Adelstein at the hospital.
Cast of Characters:	Lulu Adelstein, Magda Faust

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Lulu Adelstein has posed:
    Ironically, now that Lulu is ostensibly fully recovered (according to Magda), now the doctors and nurses are allowed to come in and examine her. Racing pulse, high blood pressure, anemic, dehydrated, sudden insomnia, and wild mood swings, among other symptoms have given the medical staff plenty to chew on. Magda also left enough surface damage to justify bringing her here to begin with. By this point it's just bruising around her ribs. Lulu could heal that too, if she was willing to spend magic, but she isn't.

    She keeps getting up from her hospital bed, pacing up and down the room, going over to the window to look out of it for a while, flopping back onto her bed, lying there for seconds to a minute, then getting up and pacing again.

    She looks unwell, and her behavior, while not necessarily cause for concern in itself, is certainly odd.

    She also refuses to be separated from a ring with a red jewel on it that she idly toys with for hours on end.

    A red jewel, with a streak of yellow crookedly embedded in it. Almost like someone filled in a crack with liquefied crystal of a different sort.

Magda Faust has posed:
    Magda has visited whenever she can, of course. But she isn't sure what else she can do. There isn't really anything to heal other than the superficial damage she left to help explain Lulu's presence here... She could heal the damage from not sleeping for several days, and has, and replace the lost blood, and has, but... The psychological and emotional problems are the ones she's concerned about.
    And she can't do anything about them.
    The green-haired girl knock-knocks on Lulu's door before coming inside. She has her clipboard, and a meek smile, as she asks quietly, "Hey, how are you doing?"

Lulu Adelstein has posed:
    Lulu is by the window when Magda enters, just looking outside as she leans against the window sill with her arms folded, idly turning her ring this way and that on her finger. "What do you mean?" she asks Magda in a monotone. "Since I found out that this very fragile gem is my entire being and I've been playing with my own life, and those of my closest friends, without even knowing about it, for two years? How well have I been doing since that?"

    The redhead has her hair down, not in the puppy-ears she normally does. She turns to look at Magda, expressionlessly, and waits expectantly for an answer.

Magda Faust has posed:
    Magda stands where she is, just inside the room, while Lulu speaks. She shifts awkwardly from foot to foot, and then eventually answers, "...Yeah. Pretty much."

Lulu Adelstein has posed:
    Lulu stares into Magda's green eyes for several seconds with no change of expression. Then she bursts out laughing, and keeps on laughing, until she has to lean on the wall to stay upright because her remaining strength is leaving her as it is spent on cackling hysterically.

Magda Faust has posed:
    Magda grins at Lulu's sudden burst of mirth, and can't help getting caught up in it too. It starts with just giggling, but then she's full-on belly-laughing, walking around with her clipboard and trying to find something to hold onto. She keeps laughing until tears are streaming down her cheeks. Tears she stopped shedding after Lulu came back, to not worry her friend even more. But now they are healing tears. Letting out the grief and sorrow for her friend, and laughing like a lunatic.
    Just two teenage girls in a hospital room, laughing like they just heard funniest joke in the world, until Magda is slumped over Lulu's bed, giggling and crying into the sheets.

Lulu Adelstein has posed:
    Lulu is heaving in a mix of stress-laughter and pain from her bruised ribs. Eventually she winds up sinking to the floor, and wiping the tears from her own eyes as she starts to get ahold of herself. Then she's just sitting there. On the floor. Arms around herself, legs stretched out to the side, staring at the wall she's leaning against, as her lingering smile fades to nothing.

    "Oh, in that case... I've been... You know." She shrugs. Then she looks back to Magda. "What about you?"

Magda Faust has posed:
    Magda eventually manages to gather the wits and strength in her limbs to limply get up off the bed, and turn around to sit on the edge. Sideways, so she can still look over at Lulu. Her face is still wet, and she makes no motion to clean herself up. "Trying to figure out a way to get a second Wish, so I can fix us all? That's the only way, isn't it? I can't... I don't think I can fix... This. Our souls ripped out of our bodies and manifested as a gemstone. That can't be fixed with healing. It's not an injury, it's... It's something worse."
    It's not until that last word that her smile full drops away to show guilt, worry, fatigue, and desperation engraved in her face. "We should ask Kyubey-san. Maybe he knows a way to undo it."

Lulu Adelstein has posed:
    Lulu's lip begins to curl the moment she hears Kyubey's name. "I don't think there's a way to fix this," she says simply. "It was our decision. Now we have to live, and die, with it."

Magda Faust has posed:
    "W-well..." Magda stammers, not expecting such a fatalistic outlook from Lulu of all people. "We don't know that for sure yet, right? There might still be a way for Kyubey-san to--"

Lulu Adelstein has posed:
    Lulu is up and kicking a chair so hard it flies through the air, and smashes into a wall-mounted mirror over a sink all the way on the other side of the room. "KYUBEY DID THIS TO US! WHY WOULD I EVER TRUST HIS WORD ON ANYTHING, EVER AGAIN!?" she screams at Magda, eyes wide, hands with fingers splayed rigid like she wants to strangle the little white creature.

Magda Faust has posed:
    Magda jumps at the sudden explosion from Lulu. Her own eyes go wide and she flinches when the chair breaks the mirror and clatters to the ground noisily. Ears ringing, she starts to open her mouth to say something, but thinks better of it, and just stays quiet for now.

Lulu Adelstein has posed:
    Lulu practically steams as she starts pacing up and down at the foot of her bed, not caring when she walks on broken glass with her bare feet. Maybe not even noticing. "We made the choice, but it wasn't an informed choice. If he had just told us in advance, explained why he did it, you know what? I probably would have been okay with it! But having it sprung on me like that, knowing I could have lost any of you, or died from a goddamn elephant crushing a little gem on my belt, I would have done things differently! I would have been more careful to protect you all, and myself!"

    She continues marching up and down angrily, tracking blood all over the floor. There will be medical staff coming in soon, no doubt. She doesn't care. What can they do for her? She's already dead. A walking corpse, manipulated from a small, easily broken piece of jewelry.

    "Little bastard knew exactly what he was doing. I don't care that much about where my soul is kept, or in what format, but if breaking a Christmas ornament on my belt is the difference between falling over dead or still getting to live alongside all of my friends, being able to go home to family and tell them I love them, being able to go to school and learn new things..." She finally comes to a stop, shaking her head, and looking out the window again.

Magda Faust has posed:
    Unsure how to respond to all that, the multi-braided girl just watches with increasing anxiety as Lulu walks through crunching broken glass, tracks blood over half the room, and doesn't even appear to notice. Adrenaline, maybe? She only barely attempts to distract herself with figuring out the biological processes behind the capacity to ignore those kinds of injuries. She is also trying to find something to say. Anything useful to this situation at all.
    "...But you're still with us." she says finally. "And so am I." She gives a very small, very faint smile. "We still have a chance to do those things, so that we don't miss out on them. We know how to protect ourselves now. And... And Teresia was able to fix the crack in your Soul Gem. Maybe that means she knows some way to keep us alive even if our Soul Gem is damaged or breaks. Teresia-senpai can do anything, you know."
    Her eyes go back to the floor. "Also, um... You might be turning off your sense of touch, but--"

Lulu Adelstein has posed:
    The red-head just keeps looking out the window. "And how many times can she do that?" is her muttered reply, regarding Teresia. Certainly, she can do anything. She's amazing. A larger-than life hero. The kind of talent that must appear only once in a hundred years... Or even longer than that. If their lives were a manga or an anime, then Teresia would be the main character probably. If it weren't for her... Lulu thinks about all the times they could have died without Teresia, and that just gets her thoughts on the very real possibility of death that was always there, but not death as they knew it. Death from not protecting something they never thought they'd need to pay special attention to.

    Shouldn't a henshin item be indestructible?? she thinks furiously. "I'm not blocking the pain." she says curtly. "I can feel all of it. Some of my toes are broken too."

Magda Faust has posed:
    Magda is even more lost now. What can she say or do in this situation? "...Well, there are probably medical staff on the way if they heard that. Did you want me to do anything about your injuries before they show up?" She is sensing that the time for her visit with Lulu is drawing to a close, and isn't going to press things. A little bit at a time. She'll do everything she can to help others, and then she'll worry about fixing herself. Just a little bit at a time.

Lulu Adelstein has posed:
    "Why would I want you to do that?" she asks dully, not being sarcastic or edgy or whatever. She seems to literally just not care about the issue of treating her injuries at all. Like it truly does not matter to her how much pain she is in or what damage she is suffering. She pays no further attention after that, just looking out the window as the sound of rushed footsteps in the hall draw closer. She may have already forgotten that Magda was in the room with her.

Magda Faust has posed:
    For the third time left at a loss for words, Magda sits quietly for a moment, then gets up from the bed, and leaves the room so hospital staff can deal with it. She would have at least cleaned up the floor, but... Not right now. Lulu isn't in a place right know where she can help her. Besides...
    The Medical Magi has to go make sure her other friends are okay too.