Room 324, Tuesday Afternoon

[wwiii]

Okay. Things. There were things happening, and Warren needed to... to do something about them. Frat had been skipped last week because of the holiday, and this week, after losing his entire world, he just hadn't had it in him to coordinate anything resembling fun and games. He'd meant to go to the library to help research over the weekend, and that hadn't happened, and he couldn't really remember the last time he'd eaten, though he was vaguely aware of stumbling off to raid common room fridges at least a couple of times in there.

It was stupid. He hadn't so much as thought about going home in the past two years, and now that it was gone...

He needed to be doing things, but he had no idea where to start. So he just kind of cuddled Thor and stared at the ceiling.

When had moping in his room alone with a bunny become the status quo, anyhow?

[Open post, closed door, IDEK. Someone smack him or something.]

Comments

[glacial_queen]

"What?!"

Now Karla was jumping to her feet and it was a good thing she'd already moved Thor because he would have spilled over if he'd remained in her lap. "You can't do that!" She marched over the maybe three paces away he'd moved and thumped him hard on one of his struts. It wouldn't even be enough to bruise someone without a Healing factor, but it was the only thing she could think to do to show her displeasure with him cowering.

"No! You can't do that! You promised not to do that!" Folding her arms over her chest, Karla spat, "After I got back from Jack's world you promised--promised!--that you wouldn't do that! You wouldn't just hide away and bite back what you were thinking and feeling so you wouldn't make waves. You want to fight with me? Yell at me? Fine, then do it! You don't want to do any of those things? Then figure out a way to find us a way back to not fighting any more, but you can't just shut down on me! You can't wash your hands of responsibility and remain quiet when that's not going to fix anything! You. Promised!"

She glared up at him, angry eyes at odds with her trembling chin, but didn't back down.

"Or is that one more thing that I'm supposed to figure out by myself, too?"

Quiet. Bitter. Damning.

[wwiii]

So, so damning. It was that last statement that rocked him backwards, made his mouth hang open wordlessly and his shoulders hitch and his breath catch and his head spin like the world had dropped out from underfoot. She'd hit him, and he hadn't noticed. She'd yelled, and it was all he could do to keep from cowering away all the more.

And then she'd gone quiet.

He wished she was still yelling.

"Is that how you feel?" He wasn't certain where he found the voice to say that, because his throat was tight and he couldn't breathe, but there they were. Words. "You're on your own? I'm just... just shoving it all at you and telling you to make it better and..."

The voice that he'd apparently pulled out of thin air dried up again, left him sitting there and shaking, not quite coming out from behind his wings yet, mouth open and eyes wide and staring at nothing in particular.

[glacial_queen]

For her own part, Karla looked just as shocked. That she'd said--that she'd felt-- "I..."

No air. Where did all of the air in his room go? Right now there was nothing. Karla was gasping for oxygen and there was nothing. She took a step back and then another, eyes wide and throat constricting shut, chest being brutally compressed until it was almost flat.

Another backwards step and then she hit the bed again, sinking down onto it seconds before her knees gave way.

"Not until today." Barely a whisper. Impossible to be anything more without enough air for breath. "Not until I came up and that's what you threw at me. And then you tried to stop talking--like all those times it was up to me to try to figure out what was going on in your head because you wouldn't say."

[wwiii]

"Because it's stupid," Warren murmured, still not looking at her. Still not really looking at anything. "Because I don't want to make this... poor me my world is gone so I'm allowed to just... just stop and everyone else can make this go away even though they're losing people too. But there are people who have lost just as much as me who are doing things, who are still trying and I don't know where they keep finding the strength or the will to do it when it's all I can do to walk across the island because I want some fresh air or something."

Inhale. Exhale.

"So people are going through things in the library, and I should do that. I should be in the library, helping people study, but I can't focus, I tried looking things up on the internet and it's like the words kept slipping. And nobody's injured so I can't do first-aid, and there's nothing to fight, so it's not like I can... can get all commando-chicken and flap at anything while people call me some kind of Angel and I'm not. I'm just some big dumb kid who's all broken up over a world he never really got to be a part of in the first place. Poor fucking me while everyone else goes through the same thing I just did."

[glacial_queen]

"I am just so tired," Karla said, staring at her hands again. They looked like such small, delicate hands. So why did she always feel like she was trying to stop the world from crumbling with them? They were meant for stirring brews and soothing fevers and setting bones and even sewing torn flesh, but for the last...however long...it felt like all she'd been doing with them was fighting and killing and clinging to a world that trickled through her fingers like sand.

She wasn't ignoring what he said. She was just trying to get out what she was feeling, too. Maybe they could confront those feelings. Stop gouging at one another with words. Something. "I've been trying to be strong and mature and adult. Trying to find ways to stop it, trying to keep in contact with all my friends, trying not to feel lost and hurt and abandoned as they one by one blink off the maps. And I'm just so tired. Nothing I do feels like it's worth it. I've been going through the days feeling so old and worn and today I just feel so fucking young. I feel like a little girl trying to do a woman's job and I just can't. I'm failing everyone and all I want to do is hide away and I can't."

[wwiii]

That got Warren to look at her. It got his gaze to focus, first on those same hands, and then up to her face, so tired and scared and trying like hell not to be either. And he nearly laughed.

"But we are still kids, aren't we?" There wasn't any mirth in those words, even though his face seemed hell-bent on smiling, something dark and strained and terrified. "We're just terrified teenagers trying to make sense of this, trying to figure out how to make something better and even the grown-ups are terrified and struggling. We keep... growing up, and saving worlds, and fighting and healing and do you know how many times I've seen nightmares in New York since coming here, and each and every time, I'm just thankful that it's not my New York. I can keep doing it because it's not my New York and even if it was, I wouldn't be able to just... just sit back and watch people get hurt. But with Trigon and the Church of Humanity and Kyknos, at least we knew what was going on. And now we don't and New York is gone and people are gone and we're still just kids."

... Some of that made sense, probably.

[glacial_queen]

"But we can't be kids," Karla protested. There was too much to do! Books to be read and graphs to chart and records to be kept and pictures to be pinned and messages to send and and and

The responsibilities never stopped. They just kept piling up and getting higher and deeper and they were drowning and it was unfair!

"...Can we?"

Karla wasn't sure she knew how.

[wwiii]

Warren's shoulders hitched upwards slightly.

That was... it was a good question.

"Maybe we can be kids today," he offered, quietly reaching for her hands. "Because we're not very good at being adults right now anyhow. And we can work on growing up tomorrow."

[glacial_queen]

Karla clutched at his hands, leaning forward to rest her forehead against them. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "I was hurting and upset and I yelled and I shouldn't have. I'm sorry."

She was still turning the idea of being a kid over in her mind. She wasn't sure if it were possible without Fandom's influence to help that along. But that didn't mean she couldn't try, right?

But before she did, there had to be one last moment of maturity and let Warren know how sorry she was for using her words to hurt.

[wwiii]

"I yelled too," he pointed out, leaning forward to press a kiss against the top of her head. "And I gave you a reason to yell."

Things were... still inside-out. Still upside-down and roiling around in the pit of his guts. And he'd yelled as well.

"And then I broke my promise, and I'm sorry for that too."

[glacial_queen]

"Sit with me again?" Karla pleaded softly. "Everything else is going wrong. I couldn't stand it if we went wrong, too. Maybe we could...try again? Just start this whole conversation back over."

Fighting with Warren hurt. It was so weird. Picking a fight with Morton to make herself feel better had always been a thing. But now, even fighting with Warren unintentionally made her heart ache and her stomach twist.

"Or, not, even. We don't have to. I just--I don't want to fight with you. I don't want to yell. I'm sorry."

[wwiii]

Warren bit his lip, looking up at her, watching her face for seconds that felt like long, tired hours, before nodding and shifting his weight around a little, freeing up one hand so that he could relocate Thor down to the floor.

"We... could. I don't think I'm doing any good at getting the right words out today, though."

He inched a little closer, bumping his hip against hers and folding a wing over her shoulder again.

[glacial_queen]

Karla immediately buried her face in his wing, letting soft feathers and the scent of cornchips help alleviate some of her tension. Not all of it, no. Not even the greater part. But some. Being wrapped in his wings eased something deep inside of her.

"We don't have to talk about anything at all," she said, turning slightly so that her cheek was still resting on his feathers, but so her voice wouldn't be muffled. "I just want to make sure everything is okay between us first. We're just scared and miserable and out of sorts, but that doesn't mean we should be taking it out on one another."