As he senses Anna looking his way, Daniel keeps looking forward. She'd only look away if he looked back.

"Not a bad plan. By 'they' you mean the Neverborn? Was this plan made directly by them or through Yama or Cygnus?"

He lowers his gaze to the floor.

"One heart or two, Neverborn or Yozi. Whatever's binding you I'll shatter."

"Yes,"  She says, "Yama gave the idea, Cygnus made the plan, the Neverborn made it possible.  All branches, working together towards one goal for once."

She sighs.

"I appreciate it, Daniel.  But ease up on the melodrama.  Ghosts and abyssals practically live on it.  Did you know there are mandatory poetry slams?  Just to break up the monotony?  Most of them have probably never cracked open a book on poetry, and if I hear one more plagiarized Robert Frost poem I'll summon his angry ghost myself.  None of them have even heard of William Ernest Henley."

Daniel arches a brow in surprise at Anna's quip, meeting her eyes for a moment.

Then he aims his eyes straight ahead again, chuckling as his features soften with relief.

"Glad to see you're still there. I'd have thought the average ghost would copy Poe or Byron, though."

"Think about who the average ghost is, Daniel,"  She points out- reluctant to meet his eyes.  "They molded me- a librarian!- into one of their killing machines.  The best and brightest fought hard, and many escaped in your big egg.  Those that didn't were purified on the battlefield."

She buries her forehead in her knees, less out of sadness, more like someone who's massively hung over.

"The leader of my group?  He was waiting tables at a seafood restaurant when he died.  You think a guy whose singular goal in life was to buy a Jaguar would know any Byron off the cuff?"

"Not all of them", Daniel replies with a tinge of sadness in his voice when the best and brightest are brought up. "All too many were captured or died beyond my reach."

He tilts his head left and right,neck cracking faintly as he finally starts slipping out of combat mode.

"They might due to the wonders of the internet. Another thing is if they could properly attribute it."

"The internet's dead too, Daniel, the Neverborn prefer books.  Dead words," She explains.  "So imagine all those ghosts, stuck together in a room, trying to remember the last vestiges of poetry from the dregs of their memory."

She shakes her head.

The pain starts to flood in.  His hand throbs.  He's aware that even small, involuntary movements of his hand cause stabs of pain and small clicking sounds.  So, his hand is probably very, very badly broken.

This doesn't escape Anna's notice.

"You realize you're not supposed to stop bullets with your fingers?"

Daniel winces as the adrenaline wears off and the real damage starts revealing itself. He lets the hand lie over his knee so as to hold it as still as possible, which is admittedly like throwing a bucket of water into a forest fire. Luckily he shouldn't have to go far for a doctor.

His voice becomes more strained and littered with grunts of pain, but as a whole the devastated hand doesn't seem to bother him too much. At least this time it was just his non-dominant hand rather than everything below the neck.

"Not true for me with most bullets. Pretty sure those rounds were meant for armored vehicles, though. Still better than it would've been to let them hit their intended target."

He draws air through his teeth and throws another glance at the ghost.

"So. Any ideas on how to set you free? I'm thinking the first thing would be reverting you from an Imperator to the ghost you were before. Maybe there's a way to use the process to sever the strings of the Neverborn as part of it."

"We call them angelkiller rounds.  Think how many vehicles you guys have and that we face, I'm sure you can count them on one hand." Anna tells him dryly. "Luckily for you, they don't live up to their name."

She looks down at her chest, where the pulsing green glow of the Malfeas-hearts are barely hidden by her armor.

"Removing both is a start, and this room helps.  They're just... loud voices right now, no control, just suggestion.  If an Abyssal was in the room, though, I'd be in thrall again.  Daniel... I don't think it's possible to ever be free of them.  If you're dead, you're theirs.  Period."

"Clearly there's degrees of ownership, though. Anything's an improvement from where you were half an hour ago. Maybe we can build you an office of sorts inside a set-up like this."

Daniel shifts slightly, causing a stab of pain to shoot up his arm. It was clear Anna was tired... And it's not like she was going anywhere for a while.

"I should get this looked at. Any pointers I should pass to the doctors on these angelkiller rounds?" He asks as he leans forward and gets up with a grimace.

As he nears the exit he leans on the wall with his healthy hand and turns to look back at her.

"Network access is obviously a no-go but we've got a pretty good selection of books backed up. I could get you a datapad with whatever you'd like to read. Anything else you need?"

"They're solid tungsten-soulsteel alloy, designed for maximum penetration.  We decided that adding anything extra would diminish the strength of the round." Anna explains to him. "And nothing electronic.  It's... too easy for them to influence," She shivers.  "You know how superconductors work, after all.  Books.  Dumas.  Count of Monte Cristo."

"Fair enough. I'll have them sent over."

Daniel takes a deep breath, regarding Anna as if to affirm she wouldn't just be whisked away the moment he turned his back on her.

Finally, he crosses the threshold of the cell.

"Good to have you back in some way, Anna. It'll get better."

"I'm not so sure." Anna says, keeping her eyes low as Daniel leaves.

Sanctuary's a bit of a walking distance, fitting as Smoker definitely didn't want any potential infection near a bunch of dead and dying.  Lucifer's hand throbs mercilessly, and a quick glance shows blood pooling under all of the fingernails.  Fortunately he's not experiencing any signs of infection.  No dizziness, hallucinations, stigmata...

Halfway to Sanctuary he finds he's been flanked by an honor guard of Dragon-Blooded.  Most of them look recently battle-scarred, soaked in blood and with fierce smiles on their faces.

Daniel notes the blood pooling under his nails and sighs. That wasn't a good sign. Still, simple - if severe - physical damage was a small price to pay for thwarting something the Neverborn had clearly pooled resources for - not to mention the return of Anna.

Her lack of enthusiasm was unsurprising given her condition, yet her newfound inkling of freedom was something she would likely grow to realize as she recovered from the separation from the Neverborn. He didn't know how yet, but he was damn sure he'd do what he could to make her existence bearable.

The honor guard is a slight surprise but glancing at their faces gave reason to expect a positive outcome.

"I gather the hunt was successful", he half-asks the closest Dragon-Blooded as he keeps walking.

"Very, sir." She responds, "The ghost ended some kilometers from the Underforge and linked up with some demon sympathizers and flesh cultists."

"We lost one of ours,"  Another says after her.

"Yes, but we lanced a festering boil.  I'm calling it a win."

"So you got two birds with one stone", Daniel notes with a pleased tone. It was good to see the Refuge's security working effectively.

He nods seriously at the mention of losing one of the Dragon-Blooded. "Sorry for your loss. At least falling in the line of duty accomplishing a significant victory for the Living is a good way to go. What was his name? Has the body been recovered?"

"More like three sir,"  She smirks a bit, "Or one bird and a really really fat one."

"Your metaphors are breaking down, Sally."

"Bite me."

"Lord Lucifer, the one we lost was Hideaki Daigo.  Water Aspect, son of Hideaki Makoto from Tokyo."

Daniel remembers Hideaki Makoto- a Water Aspect as well, she was one of his support fighters during the Battle of Tokyo.  She'd died in the process, but no doubt she'd have been quite proud of her boy.

"Hideaki?"

Daniel wasn't the type to go out of his way to study or get personally acquainted with most of the Living - a natural defense mechanism after losing so many, perhaps - but he did remember Hideaki Makoto. The woman had demonstrated such valor fighting for her home and family; he felt humbled and inspired by her ultimate sacrifice.

A moment of wistful remembrance turns into a nod of recognition and a proud, if melancholy, smile.

"I remember Makoto. I would lament the loss of another Hideaki in furtherance of our cause, but until the Exodus is complete there is no greater way to go. May Daigo rest easy knowing he's done his mother and the Living Fleet proud carving the Hideaki bloodline into history."

He frowns slightly, thinking as he walks. "Has his body been recovered? Are there any next of kin? I would send him off as I did his mother if possible."

"Yeah, the body's been quarantined as usual.  But, no next of kin, most of his family was already dead and he was too young to be allowed to start his own."  The male Dragon-Blooded answers him.

"That means we'll be filling in for them.  There's no difference between Hideakis and Finnegans or what-have-you, when he died he became our kin."  Sally seems to be quoting something, very incorrectly, from distant memory.

Daniel nods. "Then I don't think there's anyone opposed to me sending him off. Do you know where his body's being kept? It might be a while till the doctors let me go so I'd rather give him his last rites before checking in."

Sally's mis-quote elicits a smile out of him - not a smug or amused one, but one of discreet pride.

"It's true. For all the tragedy and loss that Ragnarök wrought upon mankind, at least it gave us unity. For all our differences we can now find common ground in the cause of the Living."

"Yes, we can bring him to you in Sanctuary if you prefer," The male answers him seriously, "We have our own rites, but they usually end with the corpse ceremoniously burned anyway, so if you wouldn't mind us having our go first?"

"Spoken like a man who doesn't play in a sports team,"  One of the other, quieter Dragon-Blooded murmur.

Sally laughs, "Yeah, looks like you haven't visited one of the stadiums, Lord Lucifer."

"Of course. Bringing him to me is fine if you can arrange it with the staff in Sanctuary. I just need to be there to touch the corpse in the end so I can ensure the proper passage of his soul."

The sports reference makes him give a slight chuckle. "Guilty as charged. Of course having something in common doesn't remove all the things that divide us, but at least it helps work around them."

He takes a few steps before remembering an addendum. "Wait, I actually did visit a stadium once, on business. I'm pretty sure it wasn't your usual event though."

Sanctuary's first checkpoint is up ahead, manned by armed guards.  Most of them are heavily armed mortals, so the look of 'oh crap' when they see the group approaching is understandable.  Though they're certainly Living, part of Sanctuary's dedicated defenders, if they had to try to keep Lucifer's group out they'd be wiped out to a man.

"What was the business?"  Sally asks, "Tell me it was to deal with an Abyssal baseball team."

Daniel, apparently unarmed already, relaxedly raises his healthy hand as he walks to signify the group meant no harm. Of course this was less than likely to put the guard of Sanctuary completely at ease, but at least they'd avoid an embarrassing firefight.

"No Abyssal baseball team. An undead one, though, along with half of the audience."

"Well, that's just not the same, is it?  Less Field of Dreams and more like a normal zombie movie."  Sally looks disappointed!

The Sanctuary guards relax a bit and welcome them in.  In Lucifer's experience, they're always pretty jumpy.

Signing into Sanctuary is difficult due to his messed-up hand; what the hell, who remembers their insurance number?!  Who would insure him?!!?

Eventually he's led to a bed, given some most excellent pain killers, and set up with a datapad and communications channel.

((If Lucifer has anything he wants to get done, we'll continue; if not, we'll end thread here.))

Despite his incredible resilience, the elephant-grade painkillers are a welcome relief to Daniel. As he lies down, he makes sure to put forth the request for Anna's books before he gets too groggy to remember.

Another mission accomplished. For at least one night he could rest without the weight of humanity's future on his shoulders, knowing he'd done what he could.