It has been something of an interesting week for Amber. Sunday she traded odd messages with the woman who is probably her best friend before going over and "hanging out." It was a night of beers, burgers, fries, and Dwayne Johnson movies. And a strange story of commands given and unnaturally followed.
Then she and her other sort of friend exchanged perfectly ordinary texts (which is strange for another reason) and agreed to meet up. More of the story unfurled, was denied, backpedaling happened and this sort of friend nearly left he was that embarrassed. Or worried he was losing his sanity. Or maybe he was afraid Amber thought he watched too many monster movies.
It's another night, and Amber has a brilliant inspiration. Talk to Lux. Find out what can be talked about with Nathan. Either the answer is nothing and she continues to lie to everyone, or the answer is at the very least something, and some of this burden of secrecy will be lifted. Maybe. It's Nathan, after all, and their friendship is still a tentative newly sprouted thing.
She has a number for Lux which she calls, and whether she gets voicemail or the voice of the vampire herself, Amber says, "Hey. It's Amber." In that smoky sultry voice that could be no one else's. "Want to, ah, hang out? I bought a bunch of new cans today and I want to try them out."
Because 'hanging out' for these two can be many things, including marking up the walls of the city, making it a little more beautiful and a little more defiant.
LuxLux does answer herself when she sees the caller ID. Amber knows by now that Lux's phone number shows up as x. dubois unless and until Amber changes the name to Lux. The ambient noise has an echoing sort of hush as if she is in some sort of tunnel. If Amber listens hard, she can perhaps hear music in the background - but distant thready music, a man's voice.
"Sounds fun," Lux says. "Just us?" And following a confirmation, she suggests a place where 'new cans' might be tried out. A bridge, maybe, or an abandoned something-or-other in Colfax, maybe even something out toward the 'burbs. Surely there's an abandoned drive-in theater somewhere in this world of darkness just waiting for a couple of artistes to make it an awesome hang-out.
Amber"Yeah," she says, just the two of them. It was one thing to get Flood out to - wait, get him out to? It was his idea to go to karaoke. But that was one thing and this is another, and while Amber has promised to stay with the Lasombra they still have their separate lives. And this is a thing for Amber and Lux, rebel women in the night.
So, Lux suggests a place. Amber says, "Okay, see you there." And some time later they arrive before tonight's canvas, Amber with a tote bag that clinks a bit with new and untried and untested cans of spray paint. All sorts of colors, at least one that's supposed to shimmer. Not long ago she painted a mural (for money, on purpose) on the side of a store, an image of a face in inhuman colors. Purples and blues rather than skin tones - olive, cream, black. The cans she has are something of the same spectrum.
There are other supplies, stencils and pieces of poster board cut into curves, and scissors in case they need to cut them a little more. Arts and crafts for grown ups.
Amber is there, her lovely car parked somewhere far away from here. She's dressed in muted colors tonight, jeans and a sweatshirt with a bandana to protect her face from fumes. When Lux arrives, the ghoul is there already, crouched at the base of the barren wall that will be their canvas tonight.
"Hey," she greets, and she smiles a crooked smile that is at once intense and happy.
LuxLux is in dark colours, too. No sweatshirt but a tunic-y-jacket-y thing that has a hood. The hood's up, but the sleeves are rolled up too, to her elbows, and one arm is encased in cold metal, jagged metal, a stacking-up of handcuffs, chains. The other arm is pale and lovely: the blue fork of her veins under translucent skin a promise. That soon her wrist and palm and fingers will be stained by paint. The tunic-y jacket-y thing is zipped up, because beneath it her shirt's nothing but very fine black lace.
And to meet-up at the place, Lux enjoys going where she shouldn't go. Around that fence. Across that yard. Cut across that roof-top, past that chain. There's a small whumpf before she comes around a corner, passes out've a fall of light and into the dark ambience of their place, when she jumps from a ledge to a dumpster lid's top, and then -
Why then! Hey. Lux is smiling at Amber like [Lux's smile is to People like Fall is to Lucifer: go ahead, baby, you know you're gonna and it's gonna be poetic] she's pleased to see her and she is pleased to see her. That sharp press-together of her lips, surprisingly sharp snick-up of one corner of her mouth: the Toreador's got a certain energy tonight.
She didn't bring any cans unless Amber asked her to, and when she looks over the spread, chin lofting in consideration, she says, "So what the Hell does this wall long to be, really, in its secret heart of hearts? What is our theme?" And she steeples her fingers together on the word 'theme,' holding them to her mouth like a prayer.
AmberAmber rises and it is not a graceful thing because she is not a graceful thing. She is lovely, but not all lovely things are delicate and graceful. A tiger is a lovely creature and has grace of a sort, definitely, but a tiger is power as Amber is power. Power and speed and stamina in equal measures, with someone else's blood in her veins to give her a little extra oomph. She rises with strength and with power, stands sturdy and strong.
Then she moves. She stands beside Lux and folds her arms as she looks up, head tilted, looking at the grain of the wall and the cracks in its surface. They are hidden from immediate things, but this place is not hidden. Cars can see it from the freeway if their passengers happen to look to the right at just the right time. Right now if a person looks over at the right time they'll see two figures staring at a wall. Later? Who knows?
Amber looks at the wall and she twists to look back over her shoulder at the freeway, cars whooshing past, headlights a blur in the darkness. She looks back.
"Depends," says Amber. "Should it be beautiful art or a big old Fuck You? Or both," she muses. It could be both, the two are not mutually exclusive.
LuxThis place isn't hidden. Perhaps they'll need to run. The thrill of it. Exhileration. Exultation. This place isn't hidden and Amber isn't delicate and neither is Lux a flower but isn't it a shame they're not the fucking painting, those two creatures standing at a wall and contemplating the transformation of it. Amber is taller than Lux is without heels but Lux is almost never without heels so they're standing at around the same height. Tonight the vampire might be a touch shorter. They met when Lux was furious over Everett's loss; when she wanted to say fuck you, fuck you, fuck you, fuck you to both the Tower and the Sword. Maybe Lux's graffitti back then makes more sense to Amber now; maybe it doesn't. Lux always wants to say fuck you to the Tower and the Sword, but tonight -
"Let's make something where beauty's the fuck you. You fucking assholes think there's no purpose in it? You think that a thing of beauty isn't a joy forever? That the only thing that matters is going back and forth and moving forward? Think paint's got no power; that it's not going to hold you down by the throat and break your heart? Think it's gotta bleed to be worth remembering? Something like that."
A pause; Lux pivots toward Amber, contained laughter: "So yeah, let's just figure out what that is. I suspect not kittens in a basket. How are you doing?"
Because while they start to mess with concepts, they can also have a conversation.
AmberAmber does understand that first night better now, and it makes her happier to know. The sword and the tower. She doesn't understand them very well, doesn't understand why anyone would want to pay homage or fealty or take orders from anyone or anything for eternity but then Amber is young. She still has breath in her lungs and blood pumping through her veins of its own accord. And though she may be forever-bound to a vampire, she is still a rebel. She still prefers to fight systems than work with them.
Which is why she feels her heart beating - not faster, no, it doesn't feel like it's racing, it feels like it's slamming, hammer to an anvil. Whud! Whud! Whud! Each beat vibrating her very bones. This is what she feels when Lux speaks, because Lux has the power to move mountains and she has the power to move Amber who is a storm.
Amber nods. "I like that." Of course, it's a theme, but it's not an idea precisely. And maybe they don't need an idea precisely. Amber drops into a crouch to open up that bag and reveal the colors that she's brought, which should help.
"I'm okay," she says, head down as she pulls out one can after the other. Then there's a pause, considering. How to broach the subject, how to broach the subject. Amber's temper is cooled these days, it makes it easier for her to think, and to consider the words she says in order to get what she wants. It lets her calculate.
"I saw Nathan the other day. For a little bit." Dip a toe in, test the waters.
Lux[Hmm. Percept + Emp. Are you going to ask me if it's okay to date him? Do I get a sense of what this is going to be about?]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 3, 7, 8, 10) ( success x 3 )
Amber[how nonchalant are you not being tonight, Amber?: manip+subt this is totally cool a normal conversation about whatever man whatever]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (1, 4, 8) ( success x 1 )
AmberAmber is being cautious, because she has some apprehension about this conversation she's trying to delicately (as delicately as a monsoon, as carefully as a tidal wave) broach. But she glances at Lux often, little darts of her eyes hoping to gauge her reaction. Nathan is a person that they have in common but in what capacity? That's what she's hoping to find out, so she is not blushing/bashful looking like she's about to ask for Lux's permission to court the man. Ugh.
LuxAmber begins to take out the cans. Lux's senses are heightened, are sharp are a whettstone for the night to sharp itself against and she continues to study the wall. Her head canted: just so. The hood drapes gracefully against her cheek, against the corner of her mouth. Darkness and more shadow. Her lashes are long, even without the assistance of mascara, the colour of her eyes just now a tarnishment, an indecipherable thing. Lux isn't smiling though the contained laughter from before is still energy and vibrance in the shape of her, she is a scholar. What does the wall want to be. And then, amid the rattle-roll sound of cans touching pavement and asphalt and perhaps broken bits of micah which would gleam if the headlights reached this far, scrub and abandoned rubber, Amber mentions Nathan and Lux looks over at the beautiful thing, stolid, Earth-made, a gorgeous clay-baked golem for God to put his mark upon. It's not a sluice of a look, but it is absorbant.
Her mouth curves up. "You're not about to tell me he's somehow found himself hospitalized and I do not know it yet, are you? Because if you are, too cruel," and Lux doesn't think that's what Amber's about to tell her. She wouldn't say it like that if she did.
Lux bends to pick over the can-colors, shaking one she decides on when inspiration strikes. "Why don't we cheat and start with doorways. In the almost-center, do you see? But not quite the center, because balance... No, but look. We can make some huge Narnia-looking doorway, through that doorway another one, sort of surreal? And through that doorway -another-, and then just have things coming out of the doors all across the rest... Perhaps to frame it a kickass woman leaning against the side looking out of the fourth wall."
AmberAmber is not about to tell Lux that Nathan's been hospitalized, although the words of the Toreador give her pause and make her consider. She hadn't realized there was a connection between Nathan and Lux when he was hospitalized before. She doesn't know what it is or why it is - all Flood ever told her was that Nathan was claimed by Lux, all she saw was Lux in Nathan's hospital room, Lux, who looks like she could maybe be Nathan's cousin. Amber just knows that it's there, and now she thinks to file it away, just in case she somehow does discover Nathan-in-a-hospital first.
She shakes her head, because she wouldn't phrase it that way at all if that were the case. She wouldn't be here, wouldn't have waited to contact her, wouldn't have done a lot of things that aren't hanging around the waiting room of a hospital's Emergency Room if that were the case.
Before she can continue along that thought Lux has inspiration. And Amber, rising and taking a step back to look at their cracked canvas, sees it clearly. See's Lux's idea mingled with Amber's own hand. Glancing askance of Lux, Amber imagines working in tandem with the woman. Breathing in deep, she looks away again. She imagines something else. A beauty and a doorway that is a giant middle finger to the world.
They might not have enough paint for all of that, at least not if they want to get it done in one night. Or maybe they'll find a way to make it work. There are a lot of colors from which to choose.
"A woman," she repeats, smoky voice low. "In armor that's a little busted, because it's not safe." And because Narnia and the elves of Tolkien and fantasy. "But she's taken off her helmet." Turning her head, she looks at Lux, whose face is shadowed by her hood. "Because she doesn't need to be protected. That sort've thing."
LuxPerfectionism. Lux. A pause, and then a nod. "Armor that's a little busted because it's not safe," musing. Mused. Muse. "I like it."
"I'm going to start here," she touches the wall with her boot, claiming an initial patch. A firm touch; the sound of it has her so still, just after. The sound of façade holding strong, but behind there is a mark. They might not finish tonight, but so what? There's always the next night, or the night after that, or the night after that. Forever's a long time. The can she has plucked is some dark purple for a base. They'll probably only have time to get an idea of the thing, to paint one or two 'effects.' Lux, she's thinking clouds, she's thinking tendrils; she's thinking abyssal twists of darkness, stretching, she's thinking -
there's a bit of a wind. She pushes her hood back. "So..."
Invitational; go on. Her voice; it's like the feel of silk, lover-warmed; a fall of shadow on that silk.
"You saw Nathan the other day."
Lux can talk while she works.
AmberLux is going to start over there, then Amber will start over here. She plucks a can from the ground, looks at it, considers it and then the wall and then Lux's paint and then
pops the cap. Tugs her mask up over her face. Lux's senses are sharp, she can smell the scent of the paint, but Lux is not alive. Lux does not respond to the paint like Amber will. Amber needs protection, because art isn't safe. She isn't safe, either, but she's about as safe as she can be.
Shaking the can, she starts, leaving behind streaks of turquoise. The sky through a door maybe, or a door made out of the sky. It'll take shape eventually.
So...
Amber keeps working. She hasn't forgotten that opener, that she saw Nathan the other day. She has been thinking about it, thinking how to expound about it, thinking about the trail of conversation she would like to follow but most importantly the destination.
"Yeah," she says, voice only a little muffled by the fall of cloth over nose and mouth. She decides that, rather than going the roundabout way, she will cut straight to where she wants to go. For god or for bad, Amber has had just about enough of playing games of misdirection and telling half-truths, for this week at least.
"How much does he know about like, you, and what you are?"
Lux"How much do you know about me and what I am?" Lux asks in return. Because: she doesn't actually know. The question isn't shot back quick enough to cut; it isn't sharp at all. It's musing, and she would like to know.
Amber"I know you're a," she pauses, and the hiss of her can pauses with her as she looks over at Lux. Lux who she considers a comrade in the fight against most things, a friend. If she wants to have people in her life that she can talk to about any of this, then there isn't any better place to start than here.
"Toreador. And you're mostly outside the two sides. Daniel said I should be careful around you, you might add me to your collection." Her mouth quirks in a sharp grin. Amber is a rebel. He might as well have given her a map to Lux's location and a push to get out the door.
Amber[empathy: YOU ASKED but hey uh, should i have said that?]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (1, 7, 8, 10) ( success x 3 )
Lux[I DON'T KNOW. Not that she's hiding anything, but COULD she if she wanted to?]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 3, 4, 9) ( success x 1 )
Lux[Nope.]
LuxAmber gives Lux a careful look just after she speaks; or perhaps it's just intuition suddenly sharpening up, and why not look at Lux? Lux is a compelling thing; the loveliness of her is evocative, makes people think, kindles a want, would certainly enslave. Why not look at Lux? Even if beauty's not the thing, there's that magnetism: it animates her, livens her shape and makes it - well. The point is: Lux's mouth compresses, surprisingly sharp at first, but it's a smirking sort of amusement, a distant consideration, and curiousity. Amber in her 'collection,' huh?
"My collection! I wonder what he means when he says that," Lux replies. "I suspect it isn't what I would mean were I to say the same thing!"
Lux pauses in her spray-painting; looking at the metallic poison line she made, then canting toward the wall to angle her body toward Amber. "He didn't say anything about a secret longing to shuck the bloody shackles of his current side, did he? I exist in hope."
A beat: "What did he say a Toreador was?"
Luxooc: Actually no, make that, "How did he describe what a Toreador is?"
AmberAmber shrugs. "I don't know, you've never seemed like you wanted to put me in a jar." Or behind glass, or on display. So far (as she knows), no one's tried anything like that with her. She knows she's pretty, gorgeous, her beauty nearly worthy of deification. But when she thinks of collections she thinks of museums and she can't imagine being put in a museum.
Maybe one of her paintings. Maybe. She can hope. She will always hope.
And she shakes her head, she has never heard him say anything of the sort about breaking free of the Sabbat. It's something Amber ponders from time to time. When he talked about the sects before the two sides sounded so definitive. At least his side seemed a little freer than the other, but it still sounds limited. Limiting. Then he brought "Anarch" to the table. Maybe Amber can shape it into something. Maybe.
How did he describe Toreador?
Amber's eyes narrow with thought, color arching up over her head to stain the wall. "He said they're obsessed with art. And they're enchanting." Both things she thinks, judging by her association with the woman standing just a few feet away, must be true.
LuxHow still Lux can be. Lux does not often cease movement completely. Because why? That's for the daytime. That's for slumber. Lux likes being able to move. There's point to it. Amber says Lux has never seemed like she wanted to put Amber in a jar, and the creature makes a little sound. Mm. Hmm. Acceptance or acknowledgment or thoughtfulness. Lux, why, Lux doesn't want to enslave anybody, does she?
"What a boring description," Lux says, with a rill of laughter just contained. If there's a lick of darkness there, why, Lux loves her Clan, thinks it is the best (or second best), but Lux hates a lot too. Hate's always sharper than love, isn't it? "But I suppose it will do for accuracy."
Spray, spray, spray the paint...
"If a shadow hadn't fallen on you, perhaps you'd make a Toreador one night. You wear so many accomplishments they look for; but gosh, I don't think you'd like it very much."
"So he told you about the two sides, and what I am, and to be careful," here, the kissing curl of a grin: her eyes glitter; the fall of her lashes is sweet when she blinks, the touch of her chin imperious. "And I suppose he told you all about the war he plays with and - and what did he say about the kine?"
This is a slow circle back to the topic of Nathan and what he knows.
AmberAmber frowns. Flood has told her a lot, but it's only been recently that he's started to really tell her anything at all. There is so much more out there, so much more going on. He informs her in bits and pieces as those bits and pieces come up.
Sounds like a few haven't come up yet.
"War," she mutters, thinking, but not for too long before she shakes her head. "The kine?" she asks, pausing again to give Lux her attention.
LuxConsidering; consideration. Lux studies Amber for a second. Her thumb and forefinger have been purpled; she puts that can down, picks another. Shake, shake, shake, the metallic rattling, fine spray-mist hanging in the gloomy air - "'Kine' is a word for humans."
Amber"Ah." The sound gets tangled up, nearly becomes lost as it tries to work its way free of Amber's fabric protection. Maybe a memory has been knocked loose in her mind, a vocabulary lesson perhaps?
"He hasn't really talked about them." Them.
Lux"Them?"
Amber"Humans."
Lux"Are you no longer human?"
Amber"I don't think so." Amber is something more than human now, something better. She was always something better, though, because she was worthy of receiving Caine's blood. Which...she doesn't care about much, actually, but the name means something to Daniel, and so she is pleased.
But she looks over at Lux. It's the first time Amber's told anyone that she's not-really-human anymore. Was she not supposed to? Was this supposed to be a secret even from Lux?
[EMPATHEEEEE]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 5, 10) ( success x 1 )
Lux[Lux doesn't hide things! Or does she?]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 3, 4, 5) ( fail )
Lux[Still nope.]
LuxAmber looks over at Lux; Lux is looking at the wall when Amber answers her. Amber can see, perhaps, a whisper of tension lick through Lux's shoulders, read a touch of resigned acceptance; contained, just so, and something pensive. She doesn't get a sense of dismay or anger; nor of crossing a line she shouldn't have, of secrets breached.
Lux's bare forearm is now paint-splattered, snow; the air has a promise of snow in it, doesn't it?
"Nathan is," she tells Amber. "You wanted to know how much he knew about me and what I am, yes? He knows - " she steps back from the wall, looks upward; at the sky. " - what I am. He does not know my allegiance; only what I do not ally myself to. He knows a couple clan-names; those I'd like him to do his level best avoid; he knows about the masks we wear - "
"He knows - oh. He knows more than I'd like him to know, but I could not keep him ignorant any longer. Why do you ask? Do you wonder how much it is safe to say around him? Or did he say a thing to cause you worry?"
Luxooc: change 'worry' to 'concern'
AmberShe wonders about that resigned acceptance, what it means, what it's for (who it's for, is it her?), but she doesn't ask. She doesn't know how. Amber, blinded by her fury and her upset at the unfairness of the world, never paid much attention to the feelings of other people. Her understanding is limited. No longer quite so blinded, she doesn't understand what she sees when she looks at other people and sees...well, whatever it is that she sees.
Nathan is still human, should that be surprising? Or should it be unsurprising? Flood changed Amber the third night he knew her, claimed her for his line and bound her with his blood. He cast his shadow immediately. Nathan is still human, though, and that just...For Amber it means...
She lowers her arm, looking at her work but not really seeing it. She already considers Nathan to be a rare thing, someone to be protected. He's a decent guy, she told Laurel. Decent guys do stupid shit like try to be the knight in armor when they can't even throw a punch.
Or in Nathan's case they go down into darkened basements where horrors await them armed with absolutely nothing whatsoever. They grab hold of unbalanced women who are likely to give him a black eye for his trouble (if he's lucky). And he's still human. Amber isn't long enough in her life as a ghoul to find that terribly endearing. It doesn't add to her desire to keep the man safe. It doesn't take away from it, either.
Drawing her attention back, she looks at Lux while she talks, listening, her mind scrabbling to hold onto those words and find meaning in them. And then there is a question.
"Both," she answers. "A friend of ou- a friend of mine, you remember Laurel?" she asks, pausing for confirmation or denial. Laurel only vaguely recalls Lux, she wouldn't be surprised if it went the other way, too. "I think she ran into another vampire. After, she ran into Nathan and his friend, and everything got really fucking tangled. When I saw him he asked me about it. I didn't know what I could tell him about what I thought so I lied to him like I lied to Laurel. Told 'em what was done to her sounded like some kind've hypnotism, and they bought it."
LuxThe creature listens, intent. The pause to seek confirmation; why, Lux seems to remember Laurel, Lux who rests her shoulder against unpainted wall now, can still held loosely in her hand. Dark still, so there's no real colour to her eyes; just the suggestion of tarnished-up green, of crystalline clarity that could be, smoke-stained - oh, so intent. Her lips are parted, slightly pursed, because words're going to come, and her head's a-slant toward the wall too. Nods, slightly, understanding when the name is dropped. A line etched between her eyebrows appears around 'fucking tangled,' because doesn't it sound fucking tangled?
A moment's silence. And then, "You needn't lie to Nathan about that kind of thing." That's what Amber wanted to know, isn't it? "Though you weren't really lying, were you?" A pause, and then such a smile, more than a suggestion. Go ahead and dream that kind've smile then write about Troy, the pride of it in flames. "It is a kind of hypnotism."
One Lux never wanted to learn before she began to interact with Nathan. [Some people Fall slowly--]
"What happened to Laurel?" Bemused, not accusatory. "How the heck did it become a clusterfuck of a thing for Nate to ask you about?"
AmberA sigh. Not just a sigh, and exasperated sigh. "Ugh," she says, drawing out that hhh sound a bit too long. Her head dips to the side and her body swings around so that her spine strikes the wall. There will be a splotch on the back of her jacket, a swath of turquoise along the front of her hood and in a large patch between her shoulders. Amber doesn't care, ask her how many clothes she owns that are covered in paint, go on. Easier to tell you how many aren't.
Her head tips back and she crosses her arms over her chest, can of paint still held in one hand, her fingers stained with color. After a beat, Amber rolls her head to look at Lux. It was fucking tangled, she said.
"This was like high school levels of bullshit," she says, not wondering until after she's said it if Lux knows what high school levels of bullshit are like firsthand. She seems rather in-the-know about things in the present, which only strikes Amber as odd because the vampire she spends the most of her time with woke up out of history.
"I don't wanna talk about what happened to Laurel," she says. "Not 'cause I think it was bad-bad, he didn't make her hurt anyone, just socked her in the pride. But that's her business." And she's Amber's friend, and it was embarrassing for her, so Amber's not going to be the one who spreads that news all over town. "Nathan and his friend got involved because they happened to wind up in the same place as Laurel a couple days later. She said it sounded like they knew something about the guy that did it but they wouldn't tell her. I don't blame them for that, Laurel gets word on where to find this guy she's gonna hunt him down and she's going to get her ass handed to her if she's lucky." Because the difference between a vampire and a human - a kine - is vast. "Then the other chick that was involved in the incident showed up and Nathan stopped Laurel from going over to confront her."
Which was kind of insane and a clusterfuck. And then, "That's what Laurel told me after. I found out about it because she texted me to tell Nathan she was sorry, which I did. And when he told me to message her back I told him to do it himself and gave him her number." So at least they're all connected now, maybe.
She sighs again and this is less annoyed, less aggravated. "After I talked to her about it, I did thank Nathan for trying to help. That other girl," Amber doesn't know if the woman was a girl, doesn't even realize that she's seen the woman often, what a small place Denver is, "was probably just another victim, and she'd've been a victim twice-over if Laurel got her hands on her. I met Nathan after, which is when he tried to talk to me about it. There's no secret handshake, is there?" she asks, mostly joking but partly serious. "So people who know about this stuff know they can talk about it? Because jesus fucking christ."
LuxLux is either accepting of Laurel's business being Laurel's business even if it involves another vampire or she isn't invested enough in the blonde woman's fate to push that line of inquiry. Is that so different from acceptance? There's a suggestion of a smirk when Amber mentions high school levels of bullshit, so she does seem to understand. A stillness to her gaze on Amber as the clay-shaped thing, Virago-thing, spins out the still utterly confounding to Lux series of events. There's a soft: Heh. 'Round about when Amber says the girl would've been a victim twice-over if Laurel got her hands on her.
And then she is silent, considering Amber's last mostly joking but partly serious remark. She rests her temple against the wall; closes her eyes, briefly. She can hear so much; it still bothers her, occasionally - it is still so new, too new.
There are secret handshakes after all. The Sabbat use them, don't they. To see whether or not they're among fellows, or vampires they look upon as less than vampires; as prey and traitors. The Sabbat, a machine Amber is part of now.
"Mm. Really, you just tend to pick it up. Remember faces you saw at this watering hole or that, learn who's all right by whatever your patron tells you." Patron; it's a deliberate word, though she doesn't say it deliberately. "Truly, Amber, for the most part, we -- oh, it's just stupid and difficult, a snarl. We're suspicious, you know? We don't want our friends who breathe to be fingered by the other party; not unless they're our friends, and even then it's not always nice. And if you're hanging out at one watering hole, there's a lot of fucking bullshit watering hole pride that goes on. Leads to rumbles, you know?"
AmberPatron. It's not a word that Amber would use, though it is fairly accurate. When Flood scooped her out of the gutter he set her down in a place with easy money and a comfortable home so that all she need do with her time is create. Paint. Color the world, color the house, make it feel like a home and do whatever she wanted. Her feelings for him aren't for him a patron, though, but that's not really her fault, is it? His blood is in her veins, twisting her heart and pointing it in his direction. How would she feel about him if that blood were allowed to run out of her system? Completely, though, not the couple months dry she managed when she ran away.
They're not dwelling on patrons, though, they're talking about secret handshakes. How to know who knows what you know about what the rest of the world isn't supposed to know. Truthfully, Amber doesn't want a whole sprawling support network. She's not going to tell Laurel anything because Laurel will think she's crazy and she wouldn't want Laurel to think she's crazy. Even knowing Nathan knows isn't terribly helpful to her, she will still need to be careful. At least she thinks she'll need to keep being careful. She vowed that if anyone found out Flood's secrets it wouldn't be because of her, and she intends to keep that vow even though she only ever made it to herself. And Nathan used to be (is, is right this very moment, is still) looking into her Lasombra, which means Amber needs to be doubly careful.
But maybe Nathan won't ask her how she knows about vampires. Maybe they can talk about this strange attack on Laurel and she can tell him that she's more or less (hoping to) have it covered.
She nods, though, listening, because she knows that they're suspicious. She lives with Flood and she keeps his secrets and she's learning to be suspicious, because of him and for him.
"That makes sense," she says, pushing herself off the wall. Flood was the one who told her about Lux, after all. And Jack.
"It seems kinda nice between you and Daniel," she comments. "The other night was more fun than I thought it'd be."
LuxThere are theories about alternate universes. Different timestreams. Possibilities that never happened so became impossible becoming elsewhere possible. Humanity doesn't like to let go of What Ifs and What Might've Beens. What if Lux and Flood had run directly across one another at the August Siege of Richthofen? Would it have been so nice? What's going to happen the day Lux and Flood run into one another and Flood's with his pack or his sister-by-blood or - ?
Lux yet stays slung against the wall, head canted, a curl of hair licking against the façade light as a kiss. But her mouth curves, one corner carving up; needle-sharp, compass-quick, and it is all impulse - impulse that makes her, poised, precise, straighten, lean on her other foot, drag her fingers through her hair because it began to fall into her face. The movement necessitated a look down; it was that kind've swing-of-a-straightening, gravity-dance.
"Yes, well... I like to have fun and know everybody and Daniel's a doll when he wants to be; a doll when he doesn't, too, the rake-hell whole of him. But doesn't that always depend on the company?" Lux: she laughs. "'The karaoke show.' Dance, Dance Revolution next, I do hope."
Lux shakes her spray can again, and sprays the wall. Kshh, kshhhh.
AmberSomeday maybe Amber will ask if she can paint Lux. Someday, but not a soon day. She thinks it's nice hanging out with Lux and Flood at the same time, the three of them a trio of not-exactly-friends, but she also knows that Lux can't come to the house unless Flood invites her. And if he hasn't invited her yet - or she's declined an invitation - she's smart enough to know there must be a reason.
She has an idea niggling in her mind. Maybe based off of something Flood told her or maybe something she came up with for herself, sparked by his shared caution. So maybe sometime soon she'll be able to ask for that honor and that pleasure. Because look at her, shouldn't she be put on a canvas? Was painting not begun on cave walls in the earliest days of man but to capture such beauty in still-life forever?
Amber is bent to find a new can, to change the hue of that turquoise and make it dark and darker when Lux suggests their next outing. The ghoul can't help it, she laughs, and what a laugh. Has Lux ever heard Amber try to laugh before? It is not a pleasant sound, but a grating, scraping sound. Smoker's lungs, perhaps, but to a romantic maybe something more. It sounds like Amber's laughter has been kept locked up in her chest so long the bars have rusted shut. And that bark, that fresh release, it is the sound of rust scraping and grinding off as the humor is set free.
Whatever a listener thinks, it leads into a cough that nearly disguises the chime or buzzing of an electronic device. Lux gets hers first, but not much long after, Amber's phone goes off. Shifting her weight she pulls her phone from a pocket of her sweatshirt, sees she's got a message, sees who it's from, starts to smile.
The smile dies on her lips when she sees Nathan's face, pale and tired and scared looking, staring up at her from her phone's screen. Amber's blood turns to ice in her veins and she shoots up, stands up so fast she might faint, but one hand slams against the wall's surface, saving her from a fall. A second later and her other hand joins it, quick and hard and with the crunch. "Fucking Nathan!" Anger, yes. Fury, yes. Betrayal, too, and hurt. Her mangled phone drops to the ground to shatter a little more and Amber punches the wall again, this time with a very different crack and she cries out sharply. Pain. Pain spreads up from her knuckles and into the back of her hand and her fingers go numb. Grimacing, she finds she can't bend her fingers without white-hot pain lancing through her hand with each twitch of her muscles. The skin of her knuckles has split. Turning away from Lux, she uses her other hand to tug her bandanna free to wrap around her injured hand.
Amber[rolls to determine shout volume: punch the first]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (4, 7, 7) ( success x 2 )
Amber[let's say +2 for unyielding wall surface?]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (2, 4, 6, 6, 7, 8, 9) ( success x 5 )
Amber[soak]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 3, 7) ( success x 1 )
Amber[actually gonna give her +2 soak because that first punch mostly the phone took the damage]
Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (2, 9) ( success x 1 )
Amber[punch the second, all hand, baby]
Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (3, 7) ( success x 1 )
AmberDice: 6 d10 TN6 (3, 6, 6, 7, 8, 10) ( success x 5 )
AmberDice: 4 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 6, 8) ( success x 2 )
Amber[i would gauge that yell to be "Pretty Loud"]
Lux[WITS]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 8) ( success x 1 )
LuxLux gets a message from Daniel Flood. Amber is laughing, and that distracts Lux from looking at the message. Lux is a suggestion [a compelling, an I-am-compelled, a what wouldn't I do for - ] of a half-smile, the expression a knife's point gleam in her eyes.
Then Amber stands so swift. Lux narrows her eyes at her. Lux's phone is unlocked now, but still she has yet to look at it. Amber shouts. The shout's loud loud loud and a shrill of pain (a stab) for the Toreador. The Toreador whose eyes go black and dark and wide and whose expression goes still and sharp and pained. That sharp line. That troubled curve to her mouth. Lux stares at Amber.
Doesn't connect 'Fucking Nathan' (if it wasn't so loud she didn't quite absorb what the sound meant [it's only because Amber is so close; because she was so unprepared]), but does drop her gaze to her own phone while Amber beats her fist against the wall. Smell of blood. Lux is a social shark, but isn't she also a shark and a monster? Suggestion of blood, left behind on the wall, and
oh, it doesn't matter. Lux has checked her messages, and do you know what happens then? The beast surges up against her breast-bone: it wakes, and wants to run - wakes, wants to seize her bones, and muscles, lick away her mind and - it surges up, the Beast, and Lux wills it calm. Barely so, hang nail of control. Her voice therefore is taut when she says:
"Amber."
---
roll from ooc room PMs:
Tithe @ 12:22PMPrivate Message to niko[Self Control, yo. WP. Do not frenzy, Lux.] Roll: 4 d10 TN7 (2, 2, 4, 8) ( success x 2 ) [WP] VALID
AmberIt happens so fast. She doesn't know that her shout, loud with lancing pain, hurts the woman she considers a friend. If she did maybe she'd try to muffle it. If she finds out later she'll feel terrible, a sick feeling in her gut that she won't fully grasp. Because Amber may not be full of tender, delicate feelings or an understanding of them, but she has a conscience. She has regret.
And she will regret later. She regrets now. It's awkward, trying to tie off her hand, trying to close off that scent. Blood. Lux is a creature not like Flood but so like Flood. Lux is poised and collected and cool but Amber knows, because Flood can be those things too and sometimes Flood verges on a loss of control. Amber needs to clean that blood up or at least keep the smell of it from seeping out so strongly.
Little does she know it does no good. Lux would smell a droplet of her blood from a ways away and they are so close. Too close.
Amber turns her head, looks back over her shoulder at Lux when she hears her name spoken in a voice that is tight. So unlike Lux but then, maybe she got the same message. Flood knows Nathan's connection to the Toreador, of course he would have told her. Right?
She has no words, only question in her eyes, dark and colorless in the dark and colorless night.
LuxThe phone is in Lux's hand. Does Amber try to look at whatever is on the screen? If Amber does, perhaps she'd see (if the angle was just right [smart phones, privacy]) a familiar picture. Then again, Lux's grip on the phone is tight. Her knuckles are sharp. It's not blood that's inducing the pale-skinned cold-hearted (no, never [but]) creature toward Fury, toward being the monster instead of the woman but the scent of blood doesn't help. It's like a clarion call. Lux is staring at Amber without blinking, and it is still Lux staring at Amber. Still Lux's will in her eyes.
Still poised, too. But oh, oh just. Less so this time. Lux does not jerk or gasp. Lux just stays very very still.
Because Lux is looking at Amber and she is thinking, oh, darling Daniel, you put terror into my mortal's eyes? Should I not do the same to yours? Because Lux is looking at Amber and she is thinking, oh, but I don't wish to do such things. Because Lux is looking at Amber and she is not really thinking in words: so neat, like that. All she's thinking is: do not. No matter how satisfying, that impulse to devastate. Not Amber, specifically: but it's the natural response to fear-so-strong.
Lux. She tries to be will.
Her tone is conversational but there is no humour in it: "I need you to get on the other side of the wall so I do not see you. Slowly, please."
Does that answer Amber's wordless question? Lux cannot see the question; she is too concerned with self-mastery.
AmberThe possibility of Lux is so far from Amber's pain-wracked mind. Hadn't they just mentioned how nice it was, the three of them together? Going out to karaoke, getting Flood out to some other modern past-time?
She sees the look on Lux's face and she is uncomprehending of it. Is everything different now? Is everything ruined? Because Flood and because Nathan? Because boys? And here is Amber, who has already spent her anger only to bring harm to herself. She struck without thinking, destroyed her phone (help, call for help), destroyed her hand (hurts, hurts so much), and now she's stuck here in this moment with Lux.
Who is speaking. Who is holding perfectly still and looking at Amber in a way that she cannot possibly understand as tears of pain spring into her storm green eyes, adding a little salt water to the illusion of a stormy sea.
Some words make sense. do not see are some. Slowly another. For Amber there is no speed, there is no quickness. The pain in her hand is destroying her senses, distorting her perceptions. There is a part of her that still wants to sit down at someone's feet and cry, but she won't. Not Amber. She will move, she wills herself to move, and so. Slowly. She does. Her bandanna-d hand cradled close to her body, her spine curled to protect it. Her head remains turned. She does not want to let Lux out of her sight. She does not actually wish to show her back to her.
And then there is the wall's edge, away from the faint light of their little painting spot. It's darker there but not unbearable. Amber slips around the side finally, stumble stumble stumbles her way down the wall. Maybe she should go? Can she drive herself to the hospital? Can she find someone to help her? Maybe. Her car is that way, she remembers. Lux said only that she needed her out of her sight and Amber, she wants to keep going. She wants to get to him, to them.
She wants to know why. Why? WHY? Why the fuck was nate "following" Flood "home?" At least he didn't seem to make it. That wasn't any living room that Amber's seen before. At least that secret is still safe.
LuxLux continues to be a poised (on the verge of [before you snap]). Unmoving, a statue. Poor Amber. Phoneless. They'd been laughing, they'd been amused. Poor Amber of the blood-beaded, mangled hand. Not the hands, anything but. Had Lux been paying closer attention, she might've quicksilvered her way between the wall and Amber's fist. After all: what's a flesh and blood blow to such as Lux? Amber's got potent blood wicking through her too, but not so much. A ghoul. They're hardy, yet still. Lux can be impulsive.
This is not an impulsive moment. This moment when Amber, eyes tearful, looks at the creature who is watching her without moving, and then slowly backs away to the wall's edge. Darker there, but not unbearable. The creature standing by all those paint cans and stencil-making stuffs is still not moving. Her eyes are wide; how lovely she looks even now. La belle dame sans merci. Vampire. There is still mistaking her: she looks like a young woman, all moonlight and gloom. But for how fucking still she is.
Amber at the edge of the wall. Lux looks down; her eyelashes drop like a curtain fall. Down at her phone. She can hear Amber stumbling on the other side of that wall. Her hearing's settling, though it still hurts. Can hear Amber coming nearer or going further. Can hear her and part of her knows, instinctually, just where she'd leap up, where she'd try to pounce from, where -
But it isn't the hunt that's trying to unlock that Other Thing inside her. It's fear. It's worry. Eyes closed now, she waits. She does not take steadying breaths and she does not count her heartbeats. Who knows what Lux considers, when she is trying to control herself? Who knows what mental rosary she counts?
Not long after, she is freed from the would-be compulsion to ravage and she opens her eyes.
She looks at the phone again; then at the spraypaint cans; then at the place where Amber punched the wall, because she can still smell it.
" - Amber?"
If there is no answer, Lux circles the wall, looking for her.
---
More rolls from the OOC!
Tithe @ 12:22PMPrivate Message to niko[Again.]Roll: 4 d10 TN7 (1, 2, 6, 10) ( success x 1 ) VALID
Tithe @ 12:23PMPrivate Message to niko[Keep on, yo.]Roll: 4 d10 TN7 (1, 6, 7, 10) ( success x 2 ) VALIDTithe @ 12:23PMPrivate Message to niko[Barely. Sheesh.]niko @ 12:24PMPrivate Message to Tithe[Good job Lux!]
Amber[because i don't always like arbitrarily deciding these things but it IS dark and they ARE in an abandoned-ish area: odds = Amber stopped by darkness, evens = she gets a little further]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (6) ( success x 1 )
Amber[don't cry for me, Argentina, +1 because ow ow ow ow ow ;_; ]
Dice: 3 d10 TN7 (3, 6, 8) ( success x 1 )
AmberThere is no answer. Amber is gone, but she's not gone-gone. She can't be gone. The pain is terrible and every movement she makes seems like it jars her. How is it her tibialis anterior is connected to her lumbrical muscles? Why does a step shake her hand? Why does the body work?
Why why why? Amber's head is full of whys, most of them she can't think clearly enough to dismiss.
She goes, but in the time it takes for Lux to hold tight the reigns of her Beast she doesn't make it very far. Around the corner of the building is emptiness, but with her acute hearing Lux can hear each grunt of pain that escapes her lips, every groan, every raking, rasping breath.
And Amber thinks, Where is this? Where am I? I've been walking for years I should see the ocean by now. Want. Want to see an ocean. Want to- want- where?
It takes a long time for her to make it a few feet, and it takes even longer as she weaves her way around patches and pools of darkness, places where who-knows-what lies in wait. Is this even the way to her car? Is this even the way home?
Her eyes hurt like she wants to cry but it's nothing compared to the pain in her hand. Every muscle in her body is tight with effort. The effort to keep her eyes from watering any further, to keep her feet moving one before the other, to keep going, keep pushing on to wherever.
Lux[Conscience.]
Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (5, 7) ( success x 1 )
LuxFlood's message and replying to it is very important to Lux. There is no answer from Amber; but Lux follows her anyway. The sounds she's making: groan, grunt, effort. The human body makes an effort in the way that the vampire's body does not. The vampire's body is an eternal thing, depending on one thing or another. The vampire's body still reacts to pain and effort and pleasure: but there's always an undercurrent of hunger, then - and it has nothing to do with physical systems - so there's no real effort. Pain-noises, certainly, pleasure-noises, surely, but not that scraped out've wounded that Lux is hearing from Amber.
Flood's message and replying to it -
Lux considers. Then she quickens her pace to overtake Amber. Not to grab her arm or to throw her down or beat her up, and Lux is very quick, isn't she?
"Amber," she says, once she's near. "Fucking Nathan indeed. How hurt is your hand; you need the ER?"
Her tone of voice is not a casual oh whatever happened there that just happened; her voice is still a lick of tension, darkness under smoke. Restraint. But Amber's in pain; she might be a ghoul, but how quickly do ghouls heal? Like Lux pays attention to that. Doesn't it change from ghoul to ghoul? Eh.
AmberIf Amber hears Lux's quick steps coming closer she makes no sign of it. Doesn't stop or slow, doesn't try to speed up. She doesn't waste any extra energy than she needs to in order to move, move, move. It's not hard to catch her up, anyway.
Then Lux is with her, not grabbing her or shoving her, but speaking her, voice still tense. Can she see? Is it light enough here in this patch of semi-dark that she can see how pale Amber is? The ashen pallor of her desert-dusk skin? She doesn't want to answer because answering means talking and talking means redirecting her breaths, and right now she needs every breath to fuel her lungs and power her forward.
"I'm," she starts, because really, she has to say something. It's Lux, and she's never found it easy to deny Lux a word, a sentence, a painting. She starts and she stops because she considers lying, but Amber is a terrible liar in the best of circumstances and these? These are not the best of circumstances.
She pauses finally, looks down at the colorful cloth wrapped around her hand. She wills her fingers to move but they ignore her, because Amber is a rebel to her core, even her body refuses to obey her. The breath she takes would be a sob if she'd let it, but she doesn't let it. She keeps that shit under control. And she looks at Lux and her face is tight. There are lines that mar that earthen, fired-clay beauty. She swallows hard.
"I think so," she says, lie, she knows she does. Amber looks at Lux, and it is the look of a stone wall breaking, trying to keep all its rocks from falling down and not doing the best job of it. "I want to see him. I want to see Danny, I want to know what happened, but my phone." She broke it, stupid thing. Stupid girl. Thought she had that temper under control but then one thing happens and that control unravels.
Lux"Where's your car?" if Amber brought one here. Lux doesn't know. The question's automatic. Lux did not come by car. Lux came by rooftop.
Hard on the heels of that question: "If it's too far, I'll have my," your what, Lux, "friend come get us."
The Toreador holds up her hand; she still has her phone. Did not destroy it. "And I'm going to make a call."
AmberYes, Amber, where is your car? Does she remember? "Couple blocks..." think of the freeway, away from the freeway is, "east?"
Too far, probably, unless Lux wants to carry Amber, or go with her and take forever to go a couple blocks east.
LuxLux seems to assume she and Amber are going to be sticking together.
"Do you want your car or to sit tight while Gary gets here? He can help with the cans."
Luxooc: er, make that "Do you want your own car" or etc etc
AmberAmber's car. Amber's car is a sweet sweet ride, a lovely red muscle car for a lovely, muscle-y woman. There is a part of her that doesn't really want to let it go again, she just got back to it. But the rest of her, the parts of her that are nerve-endings on fire with pain, those parts of her couldn't give less of a fuck.
She shakes her head, but even she couldn't say if she means No or Not Right Now or No You Deal With It Look At Me. She grits her teeth, though, and she forces out an answer. "I don't think. I can get that. Far." But she doesn't want to 'sit' tight, if she sits she won't be able to get up again under her own power.
Lux"Then he will come." Lux taps out a quick text for Gareth Miller. "And we will wait. He'll come quickly; taught a bat how to get out've Hell once." Lux doesn't have ice handily in her pocket or anything, so that's really all she can offer. And even did she, her main concern lies elsewhere. Her voice is intent. Less insouciant than usual. No insouciance at all. Nothing casual. Then she scrolls through her contacts and puts the phone to her ear. Her gaze is on Amber this whole time. Amber who is in pain. Lux's gaze is still on Amber when her attention goes elsewhere.
The person she is calling on the phone. Ten minutes have passed since that photograph was sent. Ten minutes and here they are, Amber and Lux.
Amber is in no state to notice another person's emotions - is she?
Even Lux's, who is so possessed by them (becomes a possession [compelling]), who becomes the center (gravity [magnetic]). Even Lux's, right? When they're not sheathed, knife in silk. Lux's eyes are not bright. They're dark, but limned in a dark radiance that has all to do with force of concern. Her jaw tightens.
Glass-creature, darling-thing.
The person on the other line picked up, right? And said a thing. A pause. A measure.
"Why, if you want to know I'll tell you; but why the Hell start that conversation over the phone? So easy to listen in. Why don't we meet up? I'm at your complete disposal."
[Lux would like to not sound furious & stressed & at totally at Flood's mercy in this. Does she manage? Find out! Manipulation + Subterfuge.]Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (3, 3, 5, 7, 9) ( success x 2 )
Luxooc: Hmm, I should be clear. I think she walked a little ways away to make the call, but not out of Amber's line of sight or so she can't hear.
AmberThe only things Amber is aware of for the time being are pain, the cold, pain, pain, a breeze, and pain. Her mind wants to get used to it, wants to tune it out but it can't. It's too much. If she weren't what she is would she even be able to tolerate it? She's never hurt her hand like this before, usually the walls she punches are the flesh of someone's body or drywall that crumbles at a tap. She needs her hands.
Lux says that they will wait and then she steps away to make a phone call. Amber, cradling her hand miserably, holds herself still. Does she hear the conversation? Can she tell who's on the other end? She is trying not to listen but what else does she have to keep her mind off her pain?
LuxLux isn't saying anything now so the person on the other line must be speaking instead. Must be saying something, something that makes the creature look how it is she's looking right now.
And then Lux pivots: it's a sluice of a movement - fluid and unnatural. Lux isn't human. Lux's grace is more-than-human. She'd cut water from the air like those swords in old legends, wouldn't she? Movement that sharp, that fucking poised. Lifts her chin at Amber once, absent-minded but indicative of a return.
Lux. Doesn't want Amber to see her right now.
Back around the wall, underneath a portion that hangs and keeps noise out. A protected little ledge full of darkness, out of sight and out of mind, where she can be whatever it is Lux is in dark places like that. Amber can perhaps still hear the sound of Lux's voice - but it's pitched low, intimate.
And a conversation is had; doesn't take very long. Three minutes. Five, maybe, with the weight of the occasional silence.
And then the Toreador's coming back, and Amber can definitely hear
"...with a face I still long to see, some soon time, huh? Good night, Daniel."
Is Amber where Lux left her? Has she taken a seat? Leaned against the other side of the wall? Lux goes over to her right away, and she looks - what does she look? Leashed. Intent.
"Apparently," she says, "there is no underestimating the foolish fucking stupidity of a no account young reporter. They used to call them ticks."
AmberHas it really only been ten minutes since she got that message? It feels like an eternity, like she left that spot a year ago and everything should be different but it's not. It's only been ten minutes. And even earth crumbling, ground shattering ten minutes is still just ten minutes.
Lux on her call. It's quiet and then Lux gives her that look, turns, leaves. Mostly Amber is relieved. This place isn't dark enough for that darkness to seep into her core, coil around the bit of her stomach, lay her low. She will be alright. Amber is an adult, she can be alone for a little while.
Except alone means no distractions from the pain, which is burning now. Her hand throbs with every beat of her heart and it aches. With nothing to take her mind off it the tears return. This is not the sad, woe-is-me crying of the desolate. This is a human girl's reaction to intense, crippling pain. The tears do not fall, they leak in a thin little trickle over her cheeks and down her throat while her body remains tense, taut, tight.
Another eternity passes - five minutes is a long time when one is left without the ability to think straight - and then Lux is returning. Amber swipes at her cheeks with the palm of her free hand. Did Lux say Daniel? Too late, the phone is gone, conversation over.
Amber is where she was left, standing still and yet somehow diminished. With her body curling in on itself she resembles a wounded animal protected her injured paw. Maybe that description isn't so far off the mark.
She frowns, trying to make sense of Lux's words. She nods. Does she understand? Maybe. "Is he here?" she asks, and she must mean Lux's friend who can help with the paints. Hopefully he can help with Amber, too, guide her to a car and into the back seat, tuck her in, keep her safe. When he gets there. They still have some time yet, a few more minutes before someone comes to take Amber to the hospital for her hand. If Lux talks, Amber is quiet and tries to focus, to listen, but really, later all she'll remember is the pain.
