gonna get up out of the ground

[wishesandsmoke]

Eden spends a lot of time in her garden these days. She doesn't have the aptitude for writing scripts which Daisy and Gideon possessed, she has no skill with a camera and she's not much of a director, she's sure, and while she knows she ought to turn her attention to the project she proposed all those months ago, she's yet to get started. She isn't

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[lucked]

"It's going to take a whole lot more than a little earthquake to scare me," Claire replies with a raised brow, even though there's still a touch of nervousness that lingers underneath her flippant tone of voice, one more concerned about the island population on the whole. While Claire's accustomed to her share of accidents and quakes, the island has always felt like a place more precarious, people already holding their breath over disappearances with families so tentatively formed. Whenever any of it is put in jeopardy, Claire always feels the need to protect everyone, in spite of the fact that there's so little she can do now, without her power, and without the proper knowledge or innate sense to know the right steps to take.

She steps closer to Eden, each step a bit softer nonetheless, as though she expects just about anything to happen. Maybe the earth plans on opening up under the both of them. It seems like anything's possible.

"Maybe... it was just a fluke," she suggests hopefully when she makes it to Eden's side, unscathed, but the doubt still remains heavy in her voice.

[wishesandsmoke]

"I'm sure it's nothing," Eden says, reaching over to rub Claire's shoulder, though she's nothing of the sort. If there's one thing she knows for certain, it's that there aren't flukes on the island. Things happen, and when they do, it tends to come in packs. An earthquake could herald anything - a bigger one, plagues, other natural disasters, the power lines down. She makes a mental note to check the state of the electricity soon, but doesn't rush for it. She doesn't want to panic Claire. The last earthquake took out the generators, though, and that brought down the electric fence, and if the dinosaurs are headed out this way, they'll want to hurry for the Compound.

"You know how this place is. Weird, random things just happening. I think I'm done out here for now, though. I think maybe it's time for breakfast."

[lucked]

"Yeah, but..." Claire hesitates, watching as Eden's hands already begin clearing up the area. If there's anything to be said for Eden, Claire thinks, it's that the other woman knows how to hold herself, calm in the face of just about any hurdle or challenge. On the other hand, by comparison, Claire feels especially young, especially inexperienced, only capable of narrowing her eyes and trying to check for any details that are out of place. Finally, it hits her. Eden could probably garden and weed for hours yet, if she set her mind to it. Chewing her lip, Claire glances in the direction of the Compound.

"Time for breakfast like... time for waffles, or time for waffles and also to make sure that there isn't worse stuff happening on other parts of the island?" Claire asks, gaze direct.

[wishesandsmoke]

Eden straightens up, leaning over to kiss the top of Claire's head. "Time for both," she says. When Claire's asked outright, she isn't going to lie to her. She's done more than enough of that in their time. "Just a moment and I'll get cleaned up to go."

Leaning back down to fill in a furrow, she steps back, tensing, then slips closer again, kneeling. There's a feeling under her skin she knows, like a memory she'd half-forgotten, something coursing through her veins, unfamiliar but recognizable. She thought she saw something stirring. When, on a hunch, she focuses more closely, she knows she sees it, dirt shifting into places as if of its own accord, under her direction. It's shaky still, but impossible to ignore.

All the more reason to check what's going on, then.

[lucked]

The kiss on her head is familiar. A comfort. In times of fear, it almost becomes achingly so, reminding her of her father, of the way that he always knew what to say in times of crisis. (Except, it seemed, when he had to clear up his own lies, those that had piled over time and started to roll out of control. But that wasn't the case here, not with the soft edge of confusion that runs through Eden's voice and movements alike.) And for a few seconds, Claire lets Eden walk on ahead, forcing herself to trust the other woman to know how far to push. What would be risking too much. It's only when Eden seems to stop in her tracks, kneeling on the ground, that Claire picks up her pace at last.

"What's going on? Why'd you stop?" Claire asks, nose already wrinkling at how desperate she must sound now, waiting for any hint or fact that Eden might throw her way. Her eyes dart around, looking for the cause of Eden's sudden hesitation.

She has a hunch, but somehow... after all these months, it's the last thing she wants to hear.

[wishesandsmoke]

"I just wanted to..." Eden glances up over shoulder, hastily brushing her fingers against her knee. There's a part of her which, even now, instinctively feels it's better not to tell Claire. It doesn't make sense, that she might suddenly develop an ability she never had before after years without, but if there's something she understands, it's that current of power twisting through her. If she's back to being specially abled, there's every chance Claire is, too, and she doesn't want her running off to see if she's invulnerable again and getting hurt in the process.

She can't lie to her either, though. For one thing, she's too confused and uncertain to frame a coherent one she'll remember to stick to just yet.

"I wanted to cover it up," she explains. "The hole I dug. And I did. Just... not the usual way."

[lucked]

She doesn't know how to feel, as soon as Eden's explanation sinks in. It's not that the words themselves are unclear. Far from it. Eden's always been able to distill an idea down to its essence, driving a message across far more quickly than Claire ever could with her rambles and tendency to run off on tangents. It's not the right power, Claire knows that; it's not even in the same ballpark as persuasion, but it's still something achingly familiar, the longer Claire's mind lingers on it. She has to fight down the taste on her tongue, bitter, tempted to prick herself with a pin just to check if the same's happened to her. For all that she's wanted to push her ability aside, even the faintest hint of home leaves her lurching.

"Okay," Claire nods, quickly hurrying over, some buried part of her wondering if she should be hoping that it was just a fluke, a trick of the light. "Maybe you should... try it again. I mean, if something's changed about the island, we should. We should know, right? It'd be good to know."

[wishesandsmoke]

"If something's changed," Eden says, "we've been given our abilities back. Just... switched for something else. Which means we'll know very soon." There are too many people here who once had powers or magic, and too much damage that can be caused with such things. Given back to their owners and switched around, they're liable to cause intensive chaos all across the island within a matter of hours.

There's no use jumping the gun, though. Pushing some dirt around isn't that far a cry from an earthquake, but it's a different scale of power, and she really shouldn't be so hasty as to assume it's been her, whatever she's felt. It could be a trick of the island or her imagination.

Turning her attention back to the ground, hands up before her, Eden focuses, shoulders rolling back, reaching for that current of instinct she knows perfectly after years without. With a faint push, she sends a surge through the earth, digging a wide furrow in the grass, then glances to Claire. "Do you feel any different today?"

[lucked]

There's an emotion that washes anew in her chest. She's not sure what it is, though it leaves her breath thin, it seems to encourage her heart to beat faster, stronger, impossibly so. Gradually, Claire tries to pick all of it apart. Anticipation is a thread tangled with the rest, the longing to have some kind of power in her hands again, perhaps one that affords her more control (even though she knows, she knows that she wouldn't have it at home, and what does it really mean if it won't last, anyway). Fear is there too, the reminder of blood's scent in the air, acrid, metallic, the taste of it on the back of her tongue. She stretches her hands, not sure how it's supposed to feel, or if indeed she should be feeling anything at all.

"I don't know, I... I don't think so," she blurts out, and with those words, envy rises too as she bites down on her lower lip.

"I mean, I never... felt any different with my first ability, so I don't know. I don't know what I'm supposed to be looking out for." Her eyes linger on the furrow in the earth, lips quirking a touch. "That was really cool though. You have to admit."

[wishesandsmoke]

It makes sense, Eden thinks. Though hers was as much instinctive as anything else, she knew, after a while, how to feel it out, what to do to use it to its utmost. Claire's is different, not a choice, automatic. She doesn't need to control it or figure it out; it was always just there.

"It was," she says with a smile. It's not her she worries about, not yet anyway (that will come later). There's just no telling who has a hold on what, and how dangerous that could be. At least what she can do stands a chance of being useful in a time of trouble. "It's... certainly different. And don't go testing anything. If you have something, you'll find it." Claire knows that, she's sure, but it bears repeating at a time like this.

[lucked]

Even though she knows that Eden's the one with more experience in the area by far, still Claire finds herself questioning the direction, chewing on her lower lip as she carefully flexes a hand barely hidden behind her back. She's not sure how powers are called out. Never had the luxury of being able to control hers, how to direct it, how to do something useful with what she has. A soft tinge rises to her cheeks as Claire fights the feeling of shame that settles on her skin.

She shouldn't want this as badly as she does. It shouldn't rend her heart to be bereft of something she never wanted, never asked for in the first place.

And yet.

"So you could like... feel your power? I, I saw Peter struggle with his a few times, and he could see it coming before the rest of us could, but I never really got around to asking him how it felt," she muses quietly, glancing up at Eden, wondering if the other woman will judge her for asking at all.

[wishesandsmoke]

Eden draws in a slow breath, starting toward the house with a glance at Claire, her hands dusting against each other and then her hips. "Not at first," she says. "Not this and not before either." The night she got her power is one she thinks of often but speaks of rarely. This one secret she keeps from Claire not to keep the girl safe, but to protect herself; she needs to hold it on her own, to keep it hers and no one else's. She doesn't want to explain it to anyone. Besides, that life is over now.

"It's mostly instinct. But with time and practice or if you know what you're looking for, it's..." She bites her lip. "It's just there. You kind of know it when you feel it." She doesn't know what to compare it to exactly. Pushing a button, pulling a rope. Pulling a trigger. None of it's right exactly.

[lucked]

"It would've been neat to have it... like that," Claire nods, although the words themselves aren't given in an entirely positive tone, sobered by the knowledge of where it all took Eden. The burdens that were necessarily laid on the young woman's shoulders quickly becoming targets which drew the attention of dangerous people to her. She can't say that she envies Eden, any more than she envied Peter, or her mother, or anyone else. Everyone's got their own burdens, and Claire's none too eager to step into others' shoes just to try it all out.

But the mind doesn't always wander along the same lines of practicality.

"I couldn't ever really sense mine, unless we mean like, the actual healing itself. That I could feel, but I never really knew that I was, you know, capable of anything until whenever I got hurt." Pausing, she steps forward again. "Are you okay, though? With this. I mean, I doubt it'll last forever but I just... don't want you to be uncomfortable."

[wishesandsmoke]

Eden smiles, waving that off as she steps into the house. "Don't worry, I'm fine," she says. Although the truth is that she isn't yet certain how she feels, hasn't yet let herself really think about what this means, her instinct is always not to worry Claire. Even if she is uncomfortable, there's nothing the girl can do to change what's happened. All Eden can do is ride it out and cope the best she can. She may not have survived the last one, but she's learned from her mistakes, and besides, this is only going to last a few days. It's what happens if it sticks around longer than that which worries her, so she just refuses to think about it until she has to plan for it.

"You know how this place is. It'll be gone before I can so much as blink." Until then, she just has to control both the ability and herself.

[lucked]

"Probably," Claire agrees, even with it's a bit of hesitation. The thoughts come faster than she can cut them off, wondering what it might be like to actually do something meaningful with that power, sculpting the island or moving mountains, causing people to tread carefully as the ground underneath them shakes nonstop. "Or well, it'll be gone in a few days, anyway. But maybe there's still stuff you can do with it until it's actually gone for good? I don't know, it just seems like kind of a shame to waste it. Something like what you can do now would be pretty useful, anyway. Especially with construction or modeling or any of those things that we don't really have a better group to turn to for."

[wishesandsmoke]

Eden's trying not to think about how much she can do with an ability like this, so the suggestion catches her by surprise, instantly appealing, stirring a longing she doesn't know what to do with. Claire's right in that this is something powerful, something with a great deal of potential, but the idea she could possibly change the face of the island permanently sends up a wave of desire met by a wall of fear at how strong that is. She's let herself abuse her ability before, and though this is something different, it's easy, too, to worry she could do so again. With something like this, the possibilities could be disastrous.

"I'll have to see," she says lightly, then smiles. "Maybe put a flier on the bulletin board and see who needs the help." She's being flippant, but it's not a terrible idea. It's a start anyway, the question being to what.