The New Face Of Lior, Holy Mothers and Civil War

Ahava bin-Abdul had never been as happy as when she became human again, but had it really been such a wise decision? She knew that her beloved homeland of Ishbal was nothing more than scattered ruins now, and she was feign to leave Amestris. After all, she had lived there since she had forsaken the unholy name of Lust. Still, her religious calling and the strings that tied her to an almost godless country had landed her right in the midst of civil war.

Ahava watched in reverence as the Holy Mother made her rounds through the city of Lior, and she said a prayer to Ishbala for guidance. She sighed as she watched the brother of her dead lover--who now fashioned himself a religious militant called Scar--guide the Holy Mother through her duties. Ahava offered another prayer for Scar; Ishbala hated war.

((Sorry to say but I'm no longer Scar. Gave it up to Orobrus. But if he doesn't show up, I'll take him up again for this topic))
While Ishballa hated war, a Fallen was a different story. Null, who was watching the ruins of Lior smoulder as he walked past him couldn't help but smile. The 'Rabid' side of him enjoyed seeing pain. He lived for it once. But that seemed like ages ago.

Walking past a church, Null looked up and saw a very familiar face. Smiling he jumped up to the window sill and smiled "Well well well...the former Lust. It's good to see your alive and well."

((OOC: Sorry, Omega. I hate to hear that you're not playing Scar...you made a good one. I'm just not too great with keeping up with who plays who. Thanks for responding though.))

"Rabid!" Ahava exclaimed, surprised that she had been found in this desert metropolis, and especially by whom, "Or is it Null now?" She relaxed, suppressing a loud yawn with a wave of her dusky hand, "Anything I can do for you, or are you just stopping by to see me?"

Scar walked alongside the poor woman whom the people of Lior had proclaimed Holy Mother. She could no longer speak after the things the soldiers had done to her so he had no idea what her voice sounded like. More often than not her eyes were blank, flickering to life only when her baby laughed or cried. Seeing still another crime committed by the military only hardened his heart and strenghened his resolve to complete The Stone.

((OOC: Arigato Oroborus! I guess I need to track down whoever plays Roze now.))

Ahava stood, and offered her seat to her Fallen visitor. She had not seen him in a long time but--being a homunculus no longer--she was reasonably wary around him. Still, she tried not to make her discomfort obvious.

"What is it you want here, Null?" she questioned, her voice distant as her maroon eyes followed the solemn movements of Lior's religious rites. She felt that she knew, or at least had a basic understanding of, the Fallen's purpose here, but she wanted confirmation. She had always wanted confirmation.

OOC: Is Dante lurking around here somewhere too?

((OOC: I think Cocytus plays her. I'll go check, and if so I'll ask him to send her over.))

Scar spoke to Rose.

"We will need to gather the citizens of Lior together, and then I shall tell them our plan for luring the military into the city - and their doom."

He looked about for the young woman who called herself Lira. Once again she had seemingly vanished. He found her just a tad creepy. There was a dullness to her eyes, a jadedness, that seemed out of place with one so young. And the way she spoke was like every word was preplanned and calculated. On top of which was the perfume she wore, was never without, which seemed to him a slap to people so poor and desperate. He had meant to point this out to her, but he had much more important things on his mind.

((OOC: Okay, I've sent a few PM's out, but I haven't gotten any responses.))

Ahava looked out onto the street from the shaded apartment window. She had a vague idea of what Scar was up to, but where this Lira person was was anyone's guess. Somehow, Ahava did not trust her. The musky perfume trail that followed her like a ghost was eerie, and in a way unsettling. Yet there was something familiar in Lira, and it was more than just the fact that she had once been Dante's maid and student. In a sense, the practices of the master had rubbed off on the student; Lira was more confident now, and she had the alchemic dexterity to back it up.

OOC: Back from vacation. Not sure where you want to take this - do you want Scar and Ahava/Lust to encounter each other? Does he know she's had her wish granted?

IC: Scar put his hand on Rose's shoulder.

"You should rest, I will speak to the citizens of Lior," he said. He didn't want her to hear all of the things he was planning. While he did not wish any of them ill, there was no hiding the fact that they were, in their own way, tools to enable him to create The Stone.

Once Rose had retired he motioned for the various leaders of Lior to him, to explain his plan for luring in the military, and defeating them.

((OOC: Scar and Ahava have met before. Sorry for not mentioning that--I forgot Omega was playing Scar then. Ahava is simply here to help Scar, and he knows about her condition. She is trying to warn him against making the stone, knowing what happened to his brother.))

Ahava pulled a moth-eaten cloak around her shoulders as she sat up. She slipped on some shoes, and decided to join the villagers in the street. Scar was being foolish in his desire to create that sanguine incarnation of alchemy's most stringent taboo: The Philosopher's Stone. She was already involved, and so was Lira, but dragging poor Roze into this mess was more than she could bear. Later, when the girl came to her senses and realized that she had helped murder so many people (even if they were the Amestrian military), she would be hysterical. No, she had sat silently by for too long. If she was ever going to stop him from this idiocy, now was the time to do it.

"Well...interesting." said Null as he peered over. "I'm surprised that you of all people are here. You once such a...love seeking spirit and now your in a place full of wreckage." He smiled and continued "Who would have thought you...Lust would be like this?"

Ahava clutched at the cloak a bit more--not due to coldness for Lior was scorching--but out of modesty and suspicion. She averted her dark brown eyes down and to the right, her cheeks burning with indignation at the allusion to her former wretchedness. The very mention of the name "Lust" had a sort of ripple effect on her. It began with an unsure churning in her stomach, and left her with her head pounding, and her heart racing so fast she felt like the homunculus itself was trying to escape.

Her return to life as Ahava bin-Abdul had been difficult, and far from what she had imagined when she had been nothing but a piece of meat with only a fragment of herself nestled deep within. She had dreamed of the day she would become human again, acted on it relentlessly, fought for a cause she thought she knew. Now she realized how glorified her vision of humanity had been--a being who lives and loves, with everything to lose and everything to gain. She had thought that becoming mortal again would infuse her life with meaning and make it too important to lose. Instead she was harrassed with the constant threat of death around each and every corner. Now, she was weighed down with the all-too-human burdens of compassion and responsibility--things she had dreamt of when she could not have fathomed them. Ahava realized, with a nausiating sickness, that some small part of her wanted to be Lust again, wanted the chance to start anew in an invincible body with a mind completely unburdened by human morals and virtues. She longed for the freedom of hopelessness, and the ironic upliftingness of despair. When you cease to hope, you cease to care; when you abandon yourself to damnation, you live without fear.

Null was right. Ahava bore little resemblance to the undead seductress she had once been. Who would have thought that she--Lust--would be loyal, modest, selfless, and God-fearing? With the ray of hope known as salvation, had come the sunburn of responsibility. She had spent too much time admiring her new opportunity, and before she knew it, she was in too deep.

"I'm like this, Null," she began, grasping for words. Lust would not have done this. Lust would have known what to say...but Lust did not have to worry about Ishbala and responsibility and...

"I...I..."

She could not finish. Somehow, she felt like she was lying. Ahava could feel the penetration of the homunculus's spearlike fingernails in her mind and throughout her body, scratching at her soul like they were peeling paint off a wall. The paint was starting to flake, little pieces of religion and indoctrination peeling away and crumbling into dust. But there was something beneath the paint with lifeless eyes...something alien and yet too familiar...something dark...something dangerous...

"...I'm going to stop Scar!" she finally yelled. The eyes behind the paint faded into darkness, but the paint still fell away in tiny shards too miniscule to notice.

"Scar's here?" he said, not in surprise but rather as if this was a mild awareness of the man. "Oh...well what do you know." He chuckled and said "Look...Ahava...it's pretty simple to see what's going on in that pretty little head of yours...why go back?" Popping a few of his knuckles, he said "You chose...it was your dream. But no one said dreams had fairy tale endings you know. You chose it, now you have to live with it. I suggest you stick with it. If you don't well...a few people won't be so happy about that." Turning to finally look at Ahava he said "One of those just so happens to be me."

Looking back down he said "You still going to catch Scar or not?"

Ahava was petrified. She had never taken Null so seriously before. He was dangerous--that was for sure--but she had always known herself to be immortal. If he killed her, she would be resurrected to kill him back. Now, though, death would be the end. Life did seem all-important now, but it was also slippery and getting more and more difficult to hang on to.

"I...I..." she was doing it again. She was trying to make an excuse, but none would come. Of course Null would want the stone to be made; everyone wanted that damned stone. But all the people that would have to die...

Her life may have felt like it was slipping through her fingers, but if she did nothing to stop Scar, many more would be lost, and there would be no resurrection for them. But she had fought so hard to get her own life back! Would sacrificing it be a waste? Ishbala loves those who love others, and laying her life on the line to save the Amestrian military was the most compassionate action she could think of. But Ishbala also rejected the suicides. If she chose this path, then she was certain Null would kill her. If she knowingly and willingly went to death, would it be a suicide? She could lie about her intentions, but lying was a sin...

"I...I..."

The paint was peeling again, the carefully and artfully applied layers of social do's and don't's disintegrating into dust to reveal that wicked devil-may-care freedom that Ahava both feared and longed for.

"Null, I...What can I...What do you want from me?"