Saturday Night, Room 308

[the_merriest]

Rikku was bouncing on her toes, and singing little snippets of Christmas carols. Only bits, because really, she didn't know most of the words. But hey! The bits she did know were pretty snifty.

She was also packing. Packing, woohoo! She'd be back in time for this whole New Year's thing, and - whoa, she'd been at Fandom almost a whole year.

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[tatooine_doofus]

Luke had spent most of the afternoon with a tool chest putting his hand back together.

He needed something to make him laugh before his father lectured him all the way to Connecticut.

Thus, popping his head into Rikku's room. "Hi!"

[tatooine_doofus]

"He called me a brat!" Luke said. "It didn't really bother me."

[the_merriest]

"Is that why he messed up your hand?" Rikku frowned. "Oh, wait, we were gonna change the subject. Uh. Sorry?"

[tatooine_doofus]

"No, he messed up my hand because I let it get too close to his cage," Luke said. "He called me a brat because slapping him made him let it go and I think he wanted to keep it as a creepy souvenir."

[the_merriest]

Rikku stared for a minute. "Okay. Uh. No more going to taunt the freaky vampire? Please? He sounds kinda sick and messed up and that's ... bad. Yeah?"

[tatooine_doofus]

"I wasn't taunting him," Luke said. "That's tacky."

[the_merriest]

Rikku raised an eyebrow. "You weren't? Then why'd you go? To yell and scream or lecture or ... did you just wanna be all HEY, WHY DID YOU DO THIS?"

[tatooine_doofus]

"I wanted to make sure he wasn't being mistreated," Luke admitted. "And to see if maybe I could figure out a way to change him back."

His mouth set in a stubborn line. "I've done it before."

[the_merriest]

"With your dad, right?" She nodded, then hesitated. "Uh. He was a vampire?"

[tatooine_doofus]

"So's Angel," Luke said. "I didn't know souls could just be, you know, lost."

[the_merriest]

Rikku shook her head. "Mel and I fought her brother once. He was a vampire, too. He kinda smashed my head open with my own Godhand. It was scary. He ... liked it. He was saying things like 'I can't wait to see what your insides look like' and okay, people say that in fights, but most of them don't mean it. He did."

[tatooine_doofus]

"Ewww," Luke said, then frowned at her. "And why didn't I know about this earlier? Maybe I wouldn't have spent my day fixing my hand if I had more than my father's word to go on."

Because clearly Anakin couldn't be believed.

[the_merriest]

Rikku shook her head. "It was ... right after Jude left. I've kinda ... been, y'know. Since. And I didn't want to just depress the crap out of people all 'Hi, how've you been, I'm still crappy' so I've kinda been ... y'know. Hanging out and not really telling you guys stuff that I should've?" She managed to look sheepish, at that.

[tatooine_doofus]

Luke reached out to thwap her on the arm. "That's what friends are for, silly. You don't have to be happy all the time around us."

[the_merriest]

Rikku laughed. "Hey! I said it was dumb, didn't I? Uh. If I didn't, it was totally dumb and I won't do that again, honest. I just kinda ... I dunno. I'm supposed to be all cheery, and when I'm not, I just ... deal with it? That's ... not healthy, is it."

She shivered. "So what happens to the vampire guy? Now, I mean. If he's ... you know."

[tatooine_doofus]

"Hopefully I can convince my father not to kill him in a fit of ridiculous overprotectiveness," Luke said, "and then I guess someone tries to figure out where his soul disappeared off to."