savetheearth | don't you know, in the end?

Entry tags:

don't you know, in the end?

Who: Kallie Raydan + Randall Lyall ~~Wow their names are kind of similar.~~
What: Echoes suck. A day after some rough stuff goes down for both, Kallie decides to make a visit. Unannounced, of course.
Where: Lyall's hooouuuse.
When: July 23rd!

The forecast has been promising rain, but it's only after noon that any sort of actual precipitation makes an appearance.

By that time, naturally, it was also past the point where Kallie had already dragged her motorcycle out from its shelter, left her house, and made it quite a ways from both home and school. She was never really one who was into checking the weather, which today made for something that was definitely not the wisest of decisions- not only did she find herself restless and unhappy, short of sleep since the day before, but now thoroughly soaked and on the road too, with a hardly-appropriate form of transportation. Of course, her parents would have never allowed her a license if she couldn't handle herself, but it was still without a doubt... unpleasant.

She hadn't had a destination in mind, but her mind was busy. It was half by coincidence that she ended up outside a particular house, frowning uncomfortably as a realization over what day it was hit her. It was only after some considerable deliberation, however, that she finally made her way to the front door, her pale pink hair more or less the only thing that wasn't totally soaked through - thanks to the helmet tucked under her arm as she hesitantly tried the doorbell.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Lyall had finally convinced Hajime to turn in, he'd be fine for a few hours on his own, most of the bones were mostly healed anyway, and Hajime was obviously exhausted. Well, as obviously exhausted as a giant bug-person could be. So he was in bed, and Lyall was sitting on the couch, scrolling through the network without having fingers able to type and listening blankly to the tv while he tried not to strain anything.

The doorbell startled him, and he leapt to his feet-- and regretted it, wincing and sagging aside against the arm of the couch. Still, he hurried as fast as he could limp to the door so whoever it was didn't ring it a second time and potentially bring Hajime running out. Then again, Hajime probably knew better than that.

He opened the door, one arm wrapped around his aching ribs, and dredged up a surprised smile for the pink-haired girl there. "Kallie. Hi. Everything all right?" Because why else would she be at his door?

She was half-expecting to have to ring a second time already- or not, considering she was still considering the option of turning right back around and leaving, perhaps for the shelter of a coffee shop or similar instead. Her eyes widened as footsteps approached and the door swung open, but then immediately dropped to take in her former teacher's state, frown tugging the edges of her mouth down even further.

"Hey. Just... making sure you were alright," she managed after a moment, shifting in place. Unfortunately, it came off a lot more awkwardly than she'd been intending, and she kicked herself internally for not thinking further ahead. The fact that she just showed up at his door in the rain probably brought up the obligation of inviting her in, which was more likely than not rude without prior warning.

"...Should have called first," came the admission a moment or two later. "Sorry."

"It's all right." And she was quite right about the inviting in part. He shuffled back a step or two so he could open the door the rest of the way. "Come in, I'll... get you a towel, maybe, or at least something warm to drink?" Because being soaking wet was never pleasant, in his experience. He thought he could manage tea-- he no longer had cocoa in the house, to avoid temptation since he couldn't drink it anymore-- without his fingers being fully functional.

Fortunately she was just wet and not muddy as well, though it was obvious she was still at least somewhat concerned about dripping on the floor as she first hesitated slightly but then obliged in slowly crossing over the threshold.

Turns out this was just sort of weird in general, considering how, even if she knew the address and where the place was, she'd never actually been inside. No reason. There was something inherently odd about entering the living space or otherwise encountering someone you knew from only a school or work environment outside of it.

"Not if it's trouble," she replied, busying herself with tugging off her gloves, one at a time. She was silently hoping for coffee rather than tea, though, in true American young adult fashion.

"Well, most things are trouble at the moment, but I don't mind doing them anyway," Lyall pointed out, shutting the door behind her. "Hang on, let me get the towel first. Go ahead and take off your shoes there by the door."

It took him a minute to do so, of course, since he was limping on the way across the living room, and him busily trying not to show how much it hurt. But he did it, and pulled a fresh one from the linen cupboard just inside the hall, draping it over his arm so he didn't have to hold it. "Here we go... it won't help a lot, but it'll help a little. What did you do, walk all the way here?"

Kallie wanted to object, yet managed to hold her tongue, simply bending to start loosening her shoes as asked- boots, actually, though of course it wasn't obvious with her jeans over them. She left her helmet on the floor too, even as trying to free her feet proved pretty much just as difficult as one could imagine. Needless to say, it took considerable pulling and grunting to finally accomplish the task.

"Motorcycle," she answered neutrally as she straightened, and frowned again as she found herself having to take the draped towel. Not that she wasn't appreciative, but the obvious pain he was in was apparently intrusive to her ability to focus on much else at the moment.

Forgive him, Kallie, he wasn't at his best at the moment. "Ah. That does sound awfully wet, just now. Have a seat?" He was going to have one, himself, before he braved the kitchen. If he braved the kitchen. He eased himself down into the armchair, doing his best to smother a wince, leaving the couch for Kallie should she want it. "On the towel, would probably be best. How are you doing?"

She mostly used the towel to swipe rain off her arms and collar, silently wishing that she could pull off her shirt entirely without flashing a former authority figure her current choice in undergarments. Another sigh was issued for her own stupidity, even as she told herself that at least this was a valuable lesson learned with a relatively low payment of misery to compensate for it.

The abruptly-tightened look that crossed her face at the question betrayed her ultimate answer long before she could even piece it together.

"Oh, you know," she answered, her lightened tone utterly unbelievable- it only took an instant before her frown returned in full-force, her gaze dropping to her hands. Her intentions were quick to unravel, and she swallowed both the assertion that she was fine... and pointing out that every day was tinged with the concern she'd be brutally killed for something she had no choice in.

"For a little while there," she said slowly, "I thought the pulses were going to stop."

"Ah," Lyall said, understanding the feeling and sympathetic to it, even if he didn't share it. His had calmed down somewhat, as well, but things had changed too much and there were too many hints of what else was to come for him to think they were done. "Had another one?"

He could only assume she wanted to talk about it, or she wouldn't have brought it up. And driving out here in the rain, for that matter.

"A couple."

For better or worse, it was clear she was getting more agitated as she thought about it, her face slowly flushing, gaze restless and mouth setting in a firm line following her reply. Never mind her initial excuse being that she wanted to check up on him- whatever had happened recently, it obviously still strongly bothered her even now.

Yeah, he didn't believe that excuse to begin with. She didn't need to come all the way here to check on him, after all. So there had to be another reason, and it seemed like they'd hit on it.

After a pause, watching her expression, he asked gently, "Want to talk about it?"

Kallie would have objected had she known Lyall's thought processes, claiming that no, really, the fact that she stopped here was only because it happened to be close to where she was when the rain caught up with her.

In the end though, she was definitely agitated... and had no idea who else she'd talk to about this kind of thing, anyway. Her pool of people that she knew both on the network and off was small, lacking in people who also overlapped with those she trusted at least a little bit.

"I don't know," she started after a moment or two, eyes finally fixing downward towards her hands. "It's not like I'm changing, warping into a monster or anything, but..."

Not like Lyall and Hajime and some of the others were, right. Despite it making him want to wince-- he didn't, managing to keep that to himself-- Lyall didn't grace it with a comment, and just addressed her own concerns. "I think this is changing all of us, even if it isn't in ways that are so obvious. So there's nothing wrong it still bothering you. What happened?"

As contradictory as it seemed, it wasn't them she really had in mind when she spoke of changing into monsteres. All things considered, stubbornly-pink hair was difficult to deal with when you were mostly so honest to a painful degree, but at least it wasn't something she couldn't just pretend she'd chosen to do herself. That obviousness was more her line of thinking, fueling the idea she shouldn't be complaining- how many people wouldn't want to be able to shoot purple lightning bolts and create fancy weapons out of thin air?

Her, that's who. At least when she has no idea what's going on to cause it.

"I wasn't even doing anything. Just talking to people on the network." A touch of indignant anger creeping into her voice, she once again shifted in place restlessly. "And then... I don't know how to explain it. My chest started hurting and then my entire room lit up in pink; there were symbols everywhere..."

It was fucking frightening, is what it was.

"I've had random conversations turn up strange visions and things, too, but-- that sounds like it would be a particularly alarming one," Lyall admitted. Just having a vision inside your own head was one thing, but having the outside of your head suddenly change like that was a new one, and it would definitely be a little frightening. Especially if it came with pain, which worried him a little. "What do you mean by your chest hurting? Are you all right?"

She frowned instead of replying, her socks scuffing slowly across the floor; at the prompting, one of her hands rose to touch her chest, at the top of and just left of her sternum. That little detail wasn't one she really intended to slip, but regardless, there it was anyway. Now that it had been mentioned-

"It wasn't the first time," she allowed finally, oddly resigned. "But..."

At that moment, that area of her chest appeared to light up in rich pink, entirely unimpeded through her clothes as it shone through her fingers. All the same, however, she didn't seem alarmed, her expression steady as she blinked down at it.

Lyall wasn't alarmed, precisely, but he did gape a little at the sight for a minute before he managed to pull himself together, close his mouth, and come up with something to say. "Well. That's... definitely something that would startle a person...." Which was a kind of inane comment, and he realized it, so he added: "It doesn't hurt, I take it? Does it do anything besides, well... glow?"

Kallie glanced up, her aqua-colored eyes looking strange in the pink light despite the rest of the room's illumination. She wouldn't say anything for a moment, because... in fact, she was in the process of demonstrating another effect here. For now, it wasn't that easy, taking about as much concentration as the summoning her weird weapon did at first.

A second later, there materialized a fist-sized object that the glow transferred itself to- a rose-shaped crystal that Kallie captured before it could fall, though immediately afterward her grip seemed a little awkward. Again she kept her mouth shut, her expression dubious, but simply allowing the sudden inexplicable presence of the item speak for itself.

All right, that was even less expected than the glow, but after the moment of further surprise, he held out his hand. He wanted a closer look-- and closer sniff-- unless it was painful for her to part from it or have it handled. He kind of doubted that it would be, as that would be a pretty new phenomenon compared to every other appearing item so far. "May I?"

She nodded, but her eyes remained steadfastly fixed on the crystal as she handed it over, as if she were half-afraid he might pocket it if her attention happened to waver. He might have been onto something at least in part- it didn't hurt her, but that look on her face suggested it was mostly willpower that allowed her to overcome the urge to deny the request- one that she hadn't even been aware of until that moment.

If the feathers from before had possessed a hint of unusual scent to them, this thing positively reeked of it. Little did either of them know just how powerful a source of magic and spirit they were handling at the moment.

Lyall took a moment to examine it from various angles and to give it a less-obvious sniff-- he'd gotten the hang of getting a thing's scent without actually holding it to his nose and being blatant about it, by now, after all. "This... well." He hmmed, looking down at it with a frown. "It's definitely connected somehow to that weapon you almost summoned, or the feathers it comes with, anyhow. It smells almost exactly the same, except-- more. Otherwise, I don't have any idea what to make of it."

Glancing back up at her, noting the tension, he offered the crystal back to her.

In addition to that tension, there was an odd sort of blankness to Kallie as well, the silence stretched a little much even for her typically quiet demeanor. She didn't really seem to react to his words, until after she had the crystal back in her hand, the relief at having it returned finally replacing that unshakable staring look.

"I don't know what to make of it, either... obviously," she admitted after a few moments, looking down at the crystal. She wrapped both of her hands around it, leaning forward so that her elbows rested on her legs, eyes narrowing in thought. She couldn't deny she had theories, but it was hard when most of them only sounded crazier than the last.

Still...

"I've gotten memories, I guess you could call them, out of just normal stuff," she started, taking the time to feel out her words, "But mostly, especially with the things like this, it's when I'm upset. Or in danger."

Barring things like feeling up mysterious statues in the dead district or other casual contact with the enemies' resources, of course, but that was probably a given.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

don't you know, in the end?

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject