[Day: Saturday, April 12th. Time: 11:00 a.m.] [Three days later, Rose is at home! Where does she live? I'm sure she'll tell us. Also, she's recovered enough so that her injuries are now pretty much superficial.] [Go!] * Roseli is at home, as it happens, which is a fairly nice but bare bones apartment in Berlin; it's about as well decorated as her office and somehow looks less lived in. Regardless, she's gotten up, gotten dressed, fixed herself a cup of coffee, and is drinking it while dialing a phone number with her other hand. * Roseli puts the receiver to her ear and waits, still sipping coffee. [All that and it's only 11:00! ] (Yeah, she's actually usually up way earlier.) (Like, WAY earlier.) (But she's been waking up late recently.) [The phone is answered by Stein Seidel. Seems he does more than provide food. "Children's Welfare Agency."] * Roseli makes no comment as to that. "Roseli Tavares. Checking on the status of Osmar Santos Amaral." ["Just a second...." .... and Rose is put on hold.] [But not for long. "Hello, Rose," says Dr. Pasche.] * Roseli listens to the insipid music and paces. Oh, does she pace. But at the doctor's words, she stops. "Dr. Pasche," she says in return. "How's Osmar? Is he open for visitation?" ["He's been slipping in an out of consciousness since last night, sometimes screaming in Porteguese. We have no idea what he's saying..." He pauses, then adds, "He'll recover fine, but there's going to be some scarring from the burns he suffered. I'm sorry."] * Roseli is silent for a long moment, then asks, "Can I see him?" ["If you're up to it."] I'll be down soon. ["All right."] * Roseli hangs up, grabs her coat and gun, and leaves immediately, locking the door behind her. [Rose's apartment doesn't explode behind her!] (Sweet, a red herring!) (Does it explode in front of her?) [On the other hand, she does bump into a dark-skinned guy in a vinyl jacket outside her apartment building. ""] * Roseli blinks. "" But she keeps hurrying to her car. "" [He follows along, giving the impression that he's walking since there's people around. He probably doesn't have to, though. "" ( For all intents and purposes, he's speaking Portugese. I don't wanna have to keep typing (Sure. PORTUGUESE FROM NOW ON.) (Carry on. ^^) [He shrugs. "Won't talk long. I can't be here too long anyway. Davi will kill me if he finds out I'm talking to you. Or he would, if, y'know... "] * Roseli reaches her car but doesn't open the door yet. Instead, she looks to him. "I don't really know. You died?" [He grins. "Yep, deader than a doornail." As if to prove his point, he walks around Rose as he says it, passing through her car in the process.] * Roseli stares. "A ghost," she whispers. Then, "I'm sorry, Estefani." ["Ehh... it's not so bad. I mean, I could have ended up Frankensteined, like Davi. Compared to that... I can live with being a ghost. Or not, but..."] ( Uhh ) (?) (I thought he's continuing?) ( Wasn't going to :X ) (Oh, okay. ;P) * Roseli waits for him to continue, and when he doesn't, asks, "But what?" [He frowns. "But what are you doing here, anyway, Rose? How'd you end up in Germany working for the government?"] * Roseli sighs. "What-" She stops, then she continues, as if compelled. "You know what happened... with my son?" [He nods. "Just about everyone does."] It's- * Roseli is looking at the ground now, hugging herself. Even when they were friends, Estefani's probably never seen her like this. "There's more to it than that, but- but I- I don't remember. After. I don't remember for months." [He frowns. "I'm not surprised."] ["Do you know why?"] * Roseli doesn't look up, murmuring, "Don't know. Just needed to get away." She starts crying, silently. "And I needed it, so badly." [He fr--- keeps frowning. "I can tell you. If you really want to know."] What? * Roseli snaps her head up to look at Estefani, suddenly wild-eyed. "What do I need to know?" [He glances to the side. "I can tell you what happened. The truth. Though you might not make you feel better. It might help you to understand us, though. Davi, me, Osmar, the others... and why we did what we did in Ulm."] What! Do you- * Roseli stops, and in a remarkable moment of clarity, asks, "Do you want to come upstairs?" ["Is your appartment safe to talk in?"] Not bugged. Check it every day. (This is Rose. You know she does.) (Hey, Heinrick does it too.) [He nods. "Alright."] (Hooray paranoia!) (We're not paranoid. We're sane. They really *are* out to get us.) * Roseli jerks away from the car, then walks hurriedly up the stairs to her apartment door. She fiddles with her keys for a while before inserting the correct one and throwing the door open. With an impatient wave, she invites Estefani in. [Estefani steps in, hands in his jacket pockets. He glances around. "Nice, so you're into interrior design, then?"] (Some of us don't get an option. >:D) ( Oh man, she invited him in fast. He's so going to get laid toni... wait. Ghost. Crap. ) (Yeah, he's really bummed about that. Estefani always had the hots for Nuria. ;P) * Roseli walks in, shutting the door behind her. "No time." She paces around him - sure, he's a ghost, but habits - and goes to pick up her coffee, also out of habit. [He takes a seat. In the center of the room. In mid air. Then he breaths into his hands. "Not sure where to start."] * Roseli nods, taking a sip of coffee, looking at it, putting it down, and pacing some more. Now she's twisting at her bracelet, never mind that it won't twist. [Estefani watches her do that. "Guess that's as good a spot as any. Okay... Let me tell you how I died."] * Roseli stops abruptly, looks at Estefani, nods, and goes back to pacing. * Roseli puts her pacing to good use, now, checking for bugs. Again. Just in case. ["You know our country doesn't have many..." he pauses, looking for the right words, "... 'special' people."] [Rose finds a bug!] * Roseli continues checking. "Yes." She squishes it. (;P) [Squish.] * Roseli wipes up the bug with a paper towel, tosses it, and goes back to her nervous compulsive checking. [He nods. "Not really sure why that is, but anyhow.... They were trying to cover that weakness. Ventrimulin was one way, but there were other things. Darker."] The werewolves. [He nods. "I guess Sofia probably told you about that."] * Roseli looks at Estefani. "Before I shot her in the head." Pause. "We don't get along." ["She's not all that bad. Just... desperate. Like the rest of us."] * Roseli is sounding more together by the minute. "Blowing up a city of innocents is pretty desperate." ["Yeah, well... This country isn't entirely innocent either."] No, but most of the people in it are. ["So were most of our people. Even Sofia was, originally."] * Roseli wipes off what tears are left on her cheeks. "I know. We all were. But you know that what you were going to do to Ulm was wrong." [He nods. "Not saying it wasn't. But the world isn't so clear cut sometimes, and you only know part of the story."] Then keep going. * Roseli keeps going, too, returning to her bug checking. [He nods. "One night Davi O.D.'d on Ventrimulin. I found him dead in the bathroom."] * Roseli nods to Estefani, since she's finished with the bug check. ["They told his family it was a suicide. Guess I can buy that, them not wanting to reveal that one of their country's soldiers died on a drug his own government provided. But it was pretty obvious something was up when they returned his body in a jar. They said there wasn't enough left for a coffin, so they just creamated it."] * Roseli is silent at that, looking at her own bracelet. ["I knew something was up. I had to find out what. So one night I snuck into the medical facilities."] * Roseli asks, quietly, "You found Davi?" ["Yeah. And they found me. They took me outside and executed me. Didn't say a word as to why, didn't respond to anything I said. Dead, just like that." He snaps his fingers.] * Roseli shakes her head. ["But guess nobody counted on me coming back as a ghost. I just got right back up and walked through the facility."] ["That's when I watched them do what they did to Davi. Sewing pieces of other people into him. And do you know why? Do you know why they did that to him?"] I wouldn'tve. (Swap those.) * Roseli looks at Estefani now. "To see if they could." [He shakes his head. "Maybe. Maybe that's part of it. But the real reason is Ventrimulin."] * Roseli blinks. "What?" ["It's something about the way his circulatory system works. The drug dilutes faster in his body, but the side effects aren't nearly as bad."] ["I heard it all... watching those scientists."] So... they wanted to keep him? ["Yeah. They would have, too, if I hadn't freed him when they weren't looking."] Good. I know he hates me now, but... good. * Roseli looks down at her bracelet again, twisting her fingers around it. "We've given so much for our country. They shouldn't take more than that." ["More than you think. Do you know what Ventrimulin does?"] * Roseli shakes her head, still looking at the bracelet. ["I'm sure you know about the physical side effects. But it can also cause extreme mental instability and hallucinations."] * Roseli stops twisting her bracelet, freezing in place. "You're lying." And then the gun is in her hand, and she's pointing it at Estefani, screaming, "YOU'RE LYING!" [He shakes his head. "I'm sorry, Nuria. I really am."] ( Also, if he said Rose at some point, that was an error :X ) (Sokay, we're all used to calling her Rose!) * Roseli keeps screaming, now crying, "He was my boy! My baby boy! Don't you fucking LIE! TO! ME!" Every one of those last words is punctuated by a gunshot, right on target, but the bullets fly through Estefani and into her television and wall. [Estefani just sits there, looking at Rose sadly. He doesn't comment about how she just broke her TV, or how the cops will probably be there soon.] [He doesn't comment at all, in fact.] * Roseli keeps firing and firing and firing, and eventually she's out of bullets. She sobs and reaches into her coat, withdrawing another clip and putting it shakily in her gun. "My baby. I killed- I killed my baby..." [Estefani gets up, walks over to Rose, and embraces her. Or tries to. His hands go right through, so he just looks at her uselessly.] * Roseli sinks to her knees as she keeps trying to slam the clip in and missing. "I killed my baby, Estefani," she says, almost laughing. "It wasn't a demon. It was me." ["I'm sorry. I didn't want to be the one who told you."] * Roseli finally manages to get the clip in her gun, still crying. "I thought- I thought I saved him." And she raises it so she's pointing it at herself. [Estefani nearly panicks! "Hey! Nuria, stop!"] * Roseli sobs, and her hands are shaking, but she is so totally pointing that gun at herself. "I thought I saved him." [Estefani pushes for the gun! The gun, not Rose. 'Cause that wouldn't work.] [He could comment on how he doesn't want her to wind up like Davi, but he doesn't!] * Roseli 's gun is shoved, and she pulls the trigger, but she shoots the wall/ceiling (maybe through Estefani) and then loses her weapon. * Roseli stares at the gun, now out of her hands, and breaks down even more. She falls the rest of the way to the floor, sobbing and screaming incoherently. [Estefani takes a deep breath. It looks odd; there's no sound because he's not actually breathing.] ["There's something else I need to say. About Ventrimulin."] * Roseli continues trembling violently, but she barely (just barely) manages to stop screaming, and she looks at Estefani from the floor. [He glances to one side, maybe wondering if he should really say this now or not, but then he says, "Our country didn't make the drug. They bought the recipe. From Zukunft."] * Roseli makes a mmmn sound, then sobs. "No." She shakes her head, violently. "No no no..." ["I don't know all the details. If Zukunft knew what it would do, or if they told our government... But now do you see? Why we're willing to attack this country in order to strike at our own?"] But I need it. I *need* it, Estefani, but I killed my baby, they killed my baby, WHAT DO I DO? ["Why don't you join us?"] [Sirens can be heard in the distance! And growning. Estefani glances at the window, and frowns. "Look... you don't have to decide right away. We'd like to have you, but think it over for a while. I can contact you again."] * Roseli reaches for her bracelet, pressing buttons in a rush. There's the faint sound of the bracelet being undone, and she yanks it off, blood flying from the braclet and where the needles sunk in. * Roseli stares at her wrist, as if not believing the thing even came off, and then she looks at Estefani. "Please don't go." ["I have to, Nuria. I'm a terrorist in this country. Even dead, I'm not invincible."] * Roseli sobs. "Come back? You're the only one who believes me." [He nods. "I can do that. I know where you live, after all. And it's easy to get around and avoid notice when you can walk through walls and the ground."] Okay. * Roseli looks down at the bracelet dangling from one hand. "Okay." [There's a knock on the door, followed by German: "Open up! This is the police!"] * Roseli doesn't get up to open the door. [Estefani glances at the door. "Shit. I have to go, now. I'm sorry, Nuria. Stay safe, and please don't do anything rash."] * Roseli almost smiles and says, softly, "Never rash. Go." [He floats downward, though the floor. "I'll come again. And think about my offer. We could use you." Then he disappears. Shortly, there's some screaming from downstairs. Then the police knock again. "Open the door! This is the police!"] * Roseli stands slowly, shakily. She drops her bracelet to the floor and walks to the door, opening it. ( And unless you really wanna RP through this, I suggest we call it here. ) (Done!) [End!]