FIC: Back Again & Four Days (SP)
Title: Back Again
Prompt: Time to Say Sorry
Word Count: 399
Rating: PG
Original/Fandom: Original - Streetlight People 'verse
Pairings (if any): none
Warnings (Non-Con/Dub-Con/RPF etc): none
Summary: Rika can tell something is wrong as soon as she gets back to the room.
The room was still when Rika opened the door. She had been expecting chaos, quite possibly everything thrown around and torn to bits. Instead, everything was quiet. Calm, almost. As she stepped inside, she tried to figure out what it was that felt wrong. There were dishes in the sink, still. As the only female living with three males, there were always dishes in the sink until she washed them. The fabric on the couch and chairs was still intact from the last rant Tevan had gone on.
"Hello?" she called out as she closed the door, pondering whether closing doors was something she needed to be watching out for in the future.
A scuffle of sound captured her attention and she followed it until she was standing in front of the door to her room. Pulling out the chalk again, she thought about marking out a sigil but her hand was out of the question, the flesh still singed and stinging. Instead, she let it fall back in her pocket. If there was really an intruder here, she would do better questing for some magic. It would be safer, no matter that she was already begging for a day of pain already.
It took only a small hit of magic before she realized what she was seeing on the other side of the door. This time, she didn't give a thought to the door or even her own safety as she wrenched it open with her hurting hand. In the far corner, Tevan huddled in a quivering ball. As she got further into the room, she began to hear his murmuring.
"I didn't... I didn't... No, you can't... so don't go... okay? Okay? Okay?"
She sank down beside him, afraid that physically touching him would send him into a frenzy. "Tevan? Can you talk to me? Focus on me, Tevan."
When he didn't move, she tried questing out to his mind. Be calm, boy. Be calm. What's wrong? Talk to me. Tell me what happened.
He stilled but didn't turn toward her. The push of magic met resistance so she knew he was listening to her but she wasn't getting anything back from him. Normally there was an emotion there (mostly anger, these days) but there wasn't anything there right now.
"Tevan?" she whispered. "I'm so sorry. I didn't mean for any of this to happen. Whatever happened, I'm sorry."
Title: Four Days
Prompt: With/Without
Word Count: 400
Rating: PG
Original/Fandom: Original - Streetlight People 'verse
Pairings (if any): none (sadly)
Warnings (Non-Con/Dub-Con/RPF etc): none
Summary: A person does not lose four days without a good reason.
"It's about time you got back." Stere stood in the doorway, a tray of food in his arms. "I was about ready to call the Honor Guard out to look for your body in the forest. Figured a wild animal ate you after he started screaming about your voice being gone."
"What?" She sank back on her heels, pushing the heel of a hand into her temple where the pounding was beginning. "My voice was gone?"
Stere came to kneel down beside her, pushing a bottle of water toward Tevan. Like a docile child, he took it but didn't drink from it. "Three days. Almost four. Where'd you go? Would it have killed you to leave a note?"
Her hand still hurt, the skin red and raw around where the chalk was now imbedded in her skin. Surely it wouldn't still be like this after four days. And she would be hungrier if she'd been inside the building for four days. "Four days?" she repeated when it failed to make sense in her brain. "I went to the Library. For like, a few hours. He told me to leave and I did but just to the Library."
"The what?"
"The Library. Big building in the back corner of the campus. It's surrounded by trees."
Stere was looking at her like she was the one who was crazy. "I've been over every inch of this campus doing that stupid clean-up duty that I'm always getting stuck with. There's not a random building back there. And that doesn't change the fact that you were gone for four days, Rika."
"Rika?" Tevan perked up for a moment but only because he's heard Stere say her name. Not because he noticed her. Even when she tentatively reached out to touch him with her uninjured hand, he didn't seem to notice her.
She remembered a time when she didn't have a connection with Tevan. There had been a couple of days that she'd spied on him before she'd made her presence known. He had been normal, even without her. At his worst, he had never been this bad. Now, he was well and truly broken. She didn't know what had happened to sever their connection but she knew who she needed to talk to about this. This time, she was going in prepared. There was no way she was going to be taken advantage of twice.
This entry was cross posted at dreamwidth - where the cool kids hang out.
Prompt: Time to Say Sorry
Word Count: 399
Rating: PG
Original/Fandom: Original - Streetlight People 'verse
Pairings (if any): none
Warnings (Non-Con/Dub-Con/RPF etc): none
Summary: Rika can tell something is wrong as soon as she gets back to the room.
The room was still when Rika opened the door. She had been expecting chaos, quite possibly everything thrown around and torn to bits. Instead, everything was quiet. Calm, almost. As she stepped inside, she tried to figure out what it was that felt wrong. There were dishes in the sink, still. As the only female living with three males, there were always dishes in the sink until she washed them. The fabric on the couch and chairs was still intact from the last rant Tevan had gone on.
"Hello?" she called out as she closed the door, pondering whether closing doors was something she needed to be watching out for in the future.
A scuffle of sound captured her attention and she followed it until she was standing in front of the door to her room. Pulling out the chalk again, she thought about marking out a sigil but her hand was out of the question, the flesh still singed and stinging. Instead, she let it fall back in her pocket. If there was really an intruder here, she would do better questing for some magic. It would be safer, no matter that she was already begging for a day of pain already.
It took only a small hit of magic before she realized what she was seeing on the other side of the door. This time, she didn't give a thought to the door or even her own safety as she wrenched it open with her hurting hand. In the far corner, Tevan huddled in a quivering ball. As she got further into the room, she began to hear his murmuring.
"I didn't... I didn't... No, you can't... so don't go... okay? Okay? Okay?"
She sank down beside him, afraid that physically touching him would send him into a frenzy. "Tevan? Can you talk to me? Focus on me, Tevan."
When he didn't move, she tried questing out to his mind. Be calm, boy. Be calm. What's wrong? Talk to me. Tell me what happened.
He stilled but didn't turn toward her. The push of magic met resistance so she knew he was listening to her but she wasn't getting anything back from him. Normally there was an emotion there (mostly anger, these days) but there wasn't anything there right now.
"Tevan?" she whispered. "I'm so sorry. I didn't mean for any of this to happen. Whatever happened, I'm sorry."
Title: Four Days
Prompt: With/Without
Word Count: 400
Rating: PG
Original/Fandom: Original - Streetlight People 'verse
Pairings (if any): none (sadly)
Warnings (Non-Con/Dub-Con/RPF etc): none
Summary: A person does not lose four days without a good reason.
"It's about time you got back." Stere stood in the doorway, a tray of food in his arms. "I was about ready to call the Honor Guard out to look for your body in the forest. Figured a wild animal ate you after he started screaming about your voice being gone."
"What?" She sank back on her heels, pushing the heel of a hand into her temple where the pounding was beginning. "My voice was gone?"
Stere came to kneel down beside her, pushing a bottle of water toward Tevan. Like a docile child, he took it but didn't drink from it. "Three days. Almost four. Where'd you go? Would it have killed you to leave a note?"
Her hand still hurt, the skin red and raw around where the chalk was now imbedded in her skin. Surely it wouldn't still be like this after four days. And she would be hungrier if she'd been inside the building for four days. "Four days?" she repeated when it failed to make sense in her brain. "I went to the Library. For like, a few hours. He told me to leave and I did but just to the Library."
"The what?"
"The Library. Big building in the back corner of the campus. It's surrounded by trees."
Stere was looking at her like she was the one who was crazy. "I've been over every inch of this campus doing that stupid clean-up duty that I'm always getting stuck with. There's not a random building back there. And that doesn't change the fact that you were gone for four days, Rika."
"Rika?" Tevan perked up for a moment but only because he's heard Stere say her name. Not because he noticed her. Even when she tentatively reached out to touch him with her uninjured hand, he didn't seem to notice her.
She remembered a time when she didn't have a connection with Tevan. There had been a couple of days that she'd spied on him before she'd made her presence known. He had been normal, even without her. At his worst, he had never been this bad. Now, he was well and truly broken. She didn't know what had happened to sever their connection but she knew who she needed to talk to about this. This time, she was going in prepared. There was no way she was going to be taken advantage of twice.
This entry was cross posted at dreamwidth - where the cool kids hang out.