7 continues to sit and comfort Rinoa while Reeve offers distraction introducing Steph. If they just had a few more moments, everything would be alright, she felt-
-but that wasn't about to happen. Their invironment shifts, and suddenly they're surrounded by book - open books, stacked books, old and musty. It's nighttime, but there's a faint glow from moonlight sifting in through broken windows and holes in the ceiling.
The focus is that these books and the surrounding library are Very Big; the perspective is narrowed in to a collection of burlap and canvas dolls - and a pair made of from gardening gloves - all only a few inches tall. Some are are adorned; one has a fancy hat decorated with wire and a coin, another wears a birdskull, her white canvas back is covered with a faded red patch, nearly obscuring the '7' that had onetime been inked there.
A burlap doll with one eye and '5' on his back helps '7' stand to her feet. She tests the weight on her leg, where a tear has recently been stitched up, then the two go to join four others; the two smaller dolls made out of gardening gloves, a black and white striped doll covered in inksplotches and the number '6' (who is gripping a small piece of paper with pen-nib fingers), and another burlap doll wearing the number '9'. The gardening gloves - 3 and 4 on their chests - scamper over to pull open book. It's illustrated with simple lineart plates; something about alchemy.
9 and 5 peer at it, 5 holding his light-bulb staff closer.
6 holds his sketch up over an illustration in the book; it's a perfect match.
"What? What is it?" 9 steps over to take a closer look.
"The source!" 6 is confident in his assessment, nodding.
It strikes a chord in 9, who presses closer with urgency, "The thing that woke the machine -"
6 recoils slightly, clutching his picture close again. "Go back. Go back,"
"Back to where?" 9's insistence is frightening to 6, and he struggles to find words to answer.
They're interrupted by an old, raspy voice. "Dark Science." The canvas doll with the fancy hat has joined them, the number 'one' drawn down his back, walking in an gesturing eloquently. "What good is this useless rubbish do us? Forget it!"
9 turns towards 1. "You know something ..."
1 doesn't respond, scowling in response.
9 pushes again, "What do you know?"
1 brushes past him, "I know enough to leave their ancient evils to molder. Look what they've left us with - Leave it be, I say! But you! Always asking questions, so many pointless questions! Probing, pushing, like 2! He always had to know -" 1 reaches up to the book and tears off a handful from the page, gripping it in metal fingers and shaking it as if to make a point. "- too much!"
"I was right!" 9 challenged; "You did send him out to die."
"He was old. He was weak."
There's an audible gasp from 5, behind him 6 clutched his drawing closer to his chest.
7, but 1 continues, hand to his chest and the other in the air as if he spoke a singular, irrefutable truth.
"'Sometimes one must be sacrificed for the good of many.'"
"You coward!" Rage in her voice, 7 leaps and swings her spear towards 1 in a single, fluid motion. She attacks the other, her spearhead sliding in just under his chin, against his neck-
"7!" She's interrupted by 9, and though she doesn't immediately back off, she doesn't push further. It's a moment, though, as she's watching 1 who's fear finally gives way to a smug hmph.
She casts a look over her shoulder a 9, then turns and runs off into the night.
As the vision fades, 7 - again back in her human form the village had put her in - is wearing an expression of confusion and fear, she'd only just been starting to open up about not being human to her closest friends, but to have this scene played, this moment where she almost killed one of their own - she turns to run.
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