The fact that he didn't give her a straight answer didn't surprise her at this point. She was catching on to him being shady in his conversation. Partial truths. Half answers. It was mildly frustrating. "I guess I don't have a choice unless you tell me and if you don't tell me, I'll just have to wait.." She sighed softly when he mentioned the things he might ask for. Her head was starting to pound from stress, but she was trying to breathe through it. "You strike me as... someone with a lot of world knowledge. I don't know how, but I've met people who feel like old souls before and you feel that way to me. I'd be surprised if I could find new knowledge for you. Favors, I can do my best. And artifacts? I guess I could take up archeology maybe...." She gave a small shrug, until he said she'd literally died. Her eyes went a little wide and she took a deep breath. Fuck. "What kind of favors by the way? Can you elaborate?"
She gripped the edge of the table she was sitting on. Dead. Griffin had killed her. She had died. And her brother would have never known. The comment about what would have happened if she'd said all of it made her look up at him. "How would it have.... oh.... would I have belonged to you, like Gerwulf hinted at?" She didn't want to be anyones slave. Not like that anyway. She was trying to sort things out in her mind. The comment made her laugh. "Yes, that's what American's say. After market parts. That's crazy." The laugh had a strain to it, showing she was stressed, but it wasn't too bad at the moment. His voice made her sigh.
When he mentioned the sights, her eyes went to him. Indeed avoiding looking at the room. "I saw it when I woke up. I'm trying not to think about it. I feel like I'm already losing my mind a bit." She took a deep breath and took another look at the room. The pieces. The contraptions that she had no name for. The animals hooked up, breathing and possibly suffering in the tubes. "I feel like you'd be more akin to what modern fiction would call a mad scientist than doctor. I'm grateful to you either way, but... this is the stuff nightmares are made of." She lifted a bandaged arm, unable to see what lay beneath. "Am I going to have any scars or anything? I'm a bit tired like I've been through an ordeal, but I don't feel... hurt at the moment."
Cicero shook his head, as Aesa was right, she wouldn't have a choice in the matter of what she was and what he would say. All good things come to those who wait. When Aesa began to describe what she felt about him, he chuckled once more. "True enough, as for Artifacts, I meant in the mystic sense," Cicero couldn't help but burst the bubble that was forming. "Have you never heard of the trade of boons, favors, and promises? They can be anything, though they are weightless, they carry the world. Yours is quite hefty," He murmured as she gripped the table and finally seemed to wrap her mind around something.
"Not quite, but close enough. Closer to indentured servitude, though I treat my... staff, with a lot more leeway. Seventy-five percent is still nothing to sneeze at." He spoke softly; all the while, his words seemed to be lighthearted, even with the topics being so leaden. "That may be part of the change, you're fine. Some collegiates of mage-craft call it the paradox. A lot of supernaturals call it the veil; once the mind pierces it, as an average person. It forces you to stop thinking in hypotheticals, where the mind tries to brush it off as figments of your overactive imagination." Cicero began to talk more knowledgeably, like a lecturer who got caught up in a topic.
"Mad science only occurs if it is brought up against what the majority does not understand nor wishes to. Humans are the cruelest things in existence after all. What is different is cast aside. You know the world is full of pychiatrists and therapists, yet not more than a hundred years ago, they were known as Alienists because it was the study of strangeness in people. As time goes on, so will the things that are viewed as normal." Perhaps it was because it was easier, talking to her like this, would likely either put her at ease or frighten her.
"As for nightmares, I know what nightmares are made of. This is nothing at all except a foray into the unknown." Chuckling as he moved his hands toward her, he slowly grabbed her arm and untied some of the bandages on it to reveal some scabbing from minor scratches. Likely from her struggles in the material realm. "You will have a bullet wound; it missed your womb, though it tore through a good few of your other organs. It will complicate surgeries in the future due to the increase of scar tissue along the intestinal webbing."
Stopping then as he cut the doctor jargon, "You will be fine. The needle's pathways were healed by my powers; I could have removed the wound as well. However, it would be difficult to explain being shot and not having any proof of such when you return home." Smiling lightly, he continued to talk, almost as if he were giving her reassurances. "You will need rest, relaxation, and foods with high caloric value. However, with the fluids that are binding to your marrow, you will be healthier in the long ru,n and that should include healing faster. Any further medical concerns?"
Hefty. That felt very much like an underestimation. She almost wished he could give her the amount it weighed so she could keep track of it being whittled away. "I've only heard of boons in stories. Fairy tales. Things like that. This is all new to me except what I've read in fantasy or science fiction novels. She let him explain about the veil and his thoughts on it. "I do feel slightly like I am losing my mind. The thought that I'm still dead and this is some kind of situation where my mind is slowly shutting down and creating all of this." She looked up at him. "That would be too easy for me." She didn't argue with anything he said after, just taking it in and trying to file it away to think through when she wasn't in something close to shock.
Though she came back to being active in the conversation when he began to unwrap her arm. She watched in fascination as her skin was revealed. She wasn't sure what she expected, but normal and scratched up wasn't it. The way that her mind had built up that he'd changed her, she almost expected scales or feathers or something weird. Her other hand went to her stomach when he told her what had happened. So she was still whole in respect to any kind of future she wanted to have. How long was that future now? Her brow furrowed not sure she wanted to ask. What he told her about being healthier and heal faster was a relief.
"How does what you did to me affect my life span? If the supernatural is real, and I do believe you both, then will I still be human if whatever you did doesn't change me in anyway? Live eighty or ninety years and gone? Or will I live longer?" It sounded selfish as she said it, but if she was going to go through all this, she wanted something good to come from it. "What will you make Gerwulf do for the other twenty-five percent? Can I... discuss you being kind to him? He saved me. I owe him as much as I owe you."
Fairytales, Cicero nodded, listening to her words. It made sense, and yet, he didn't clarify anything related to her understanding of favors. Aesa had the basics, and that was enough to fulfill one of the agreements he had with Gerwulf. The woman was in shock, in the presence of a strange man and surrounded by things of unspeakable natures. Near a table that was covered in her blood. All while having been told that they were changed irrevocably through some procedure. "Your lifespan will be increased, though, as far as I know, you're not immortal," Cicero told the truth, though it was a modified version of it. As he really didn't know how long she would live, he had not created one of her before, as it was based on samples of a long-dead creature.
"You will be mostly humanoid at the very least, a sub-category like Shifters," He said as he straightened up slightly. He could smell the changes in the mortal and yet kept it all to himself. Cicero did look back at her then, eyes staring into hers as Aesa asked about Gerwulf's twenty-five percent. "I cannot say..." was the only answer he could really give. Because it wasn't her place, and even if Cicero wanted to bend the rules, he couldn't guide her toward the words due to the agreement. "We could discuss it, but what would I gain from such an agreement?" Whispering softly as he waited for a response.
Aesa seemed a little addled, perhaps, because she had even mentioned the types of creatures that traded in boons and favors. Yet, she was easily speaking with Cicero on such free terms. He had said he would provide her with information about most of her condition; medically, he owed her that much for what he had done. However, if she started talking about particulars, then it would be a trade, and like how she wanted good things to come from her procedure, he would do nothing if it did not benefit him.
Aesa's mind felt like mush. There was so much and it kept slipping through her fingers like water through a sieve. He said he was human, so the idea of a fae boon or something like what she'd read about being an issue never crossed her mind. She thought she was talking to something more akin to a mutant of a sort than anything. A deep sigh left her when he asked what he would get out of what she wanted to talk about. Why was it all about gain? Why couldn't it be about kindness? Why was everyone out to get something from someone else. "Sometimes I hate this world." She said it more to herself than she did to him, not even thinking about him questioning it.
She rubbed her forehead, looking back at him. "Nothing. You'd gain nothing at all, except being a good person and doing something nice. I've found that to be a reward in and of itself." She shook her head. "I don't think that's got any value for you after what you've said since I woke up." She looked around the room and back at him. "Why do you do this? What do you get out of it?" She let out a deep breath, looking back down at her arm, touching the scabbed over spots. She replayed the last bit of time before the door had called her down to her doom. She was trying to make sure her memories were in tact. Just moments before she had realized she hadn't taken her birth control before they left for the lake.
"I do have one question to stay between us. There's no way a pregnancy could have survived what I went through is there?" It wasn't that she minded if things had failed, but she doubted that Gerwulf wanted kids with the life he lived and she only had bad examples to raise one by. If he asked, she'd explain she missed a pill before she and Gerwulf spent time together but no details beyond that.
