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 Posted: Sat Dec 30, 2017 5:22 pm
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Posted: Sat Dec 30, 2017 5:23 pm
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Masoal had never ridden a train on his own before. Paying, making it to the platform, and resisting altercations with anyone who looked at him sideways was an exercise in patience the likes of which he'd never experienced. For Emiola, though, he did. That alone should've been proof he cared.
It had been some time since they'd last seen each other and it wasn't because they'd been busy. No, last they met had been the night Fossamom left, the night she made her point loud and clear against her arrogant son and his closest friend before disappearing entirely. It had been one of the worst nights of Masoal's life. That he had to drag himself back to his hive, manage to somehow climb the tree without falling and hurting himself more, and tend to his own wounds all alone while worrying over Emiola's fate had been actual torture.
All the nights after hadn't been much better, honestly. It hurt when he finally understood his lusus really, really wasn't coming back. It hurt when he knew he was too injured and vulnerable to seek out Emiola. Even if he had, he knew her lusus would've only pushed him away.
By now, though, Masoal's wounds had fully healed. Only a few had scarred, most notably the incredible gash across his torso. Surely Emiola had healed, too. Surely he'd be able to see her without interference.
As he stepped off the train and stepped over a particularly nasty crack in the concrete, Masoal looked around at the imposing structure of New Hemisect. This wasn't the city proper, he'd ridden further into the suburbs where she lived, but everything here still felt larger than life and it was intimidating (even if he wouldn't admit it).
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Posted: Sat Dec 30, 2017 6:40 pm
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Everything had been a blur. The wake of the entire incident had easily been the worse part.
The sensation of losing her arm was understandable gruesome. The pain was unlike anything she'd ever felt... and yet, somehow this hurt more. Staring at her drumset with two sticks and one hand hurt way more than losing the arm did. She was frowning. Maccue had tucked himself down in the overly-spacious living room, his eye trained on his charge. He seemed to be growing antsy with her silence.
She didn't remember it well, but he'd been following her that night (of course). Swooped in a moment too late, brought her back to her hive. She adjusted the bandages around the now nub of her shoulder. Back to the couch to mope around some more. Maccue, you see, was adamant that she couldn't leave, let alone go back to the woods. Emi didn't have a whole lot of strength and pep to fight him on the matter where she would have normally.
At least, until she glanced out the window to watch the going-ons and caught the eye of a very, very familiar looking friend. She didn't really react though, much past the dumbfounded gawk on her face.
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Posted: Sat Dec 30, 2017 6:55 pm
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It was with some effort and a lot of backtracking that Masoal finally found Emiola's hive. This was the first time he'd been here, after all, because she was always the one to seek him out. It let him stay in his comfort zone, but in a way it limited him, too. He'd always needed more outings like this, things to force him to start adapting to society when he'd so long resisted it. Too bad that something had to be so traumatic. If he didn't venture out, he feared he'd never see Emiola again.
With a small grunt of vague self-satisfaction, Masoal approached, eyes catching every inch of the expansive hive. It was much larger than his own, but that was to be expected of something built on solid ground. Hopefully when he knocked—that's what trolls did, right, they knocked to summon their hosts—it wouldn't be Maccue answering the door.
Emiola always was a fool, he thought, for letting birds into her hive, lusus or not. It was bad, bad luck.
It was only when he finally did knock that he also noticed a mop of messy hair in the window he'd missed before. He stared.
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Posted: Sat Dec 30, 2017 7:07 pm
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Mop of messy hair was an understatement. In the time that she'd been cooped up in her hive, it had gotten long, and it hung over her shoulders in unruly curls. Maccue stirred behind her from the knock, but Emi continued to stare, and stare, and stare.
With more energy that she'd exhibited in a pathetically long time, she made for the door.
Maccue, by this point, was starting to twitter anxiously from all the movement, "Outta the way dad! N-No! I'm answering the door, I got it, I got it--stop! Oh my god STOP!" And the door swung open rather unceremoniously. Emiola--one arm and all--was putting all of her weight on her lusus' head to shove him back inside, because she knew if he saw, she knew if he realized--
The shriek was shrill and unnecessarily deafening. It seemed someone wasn't very happy to have a visitor.
"I, uh, I--" Truth be told, Emiola rarely had guests to her hive. What was she supposed to do, invite them in? Probably. But this was Masoal and she didn't even know what to say, considering the last time they talked--
"Dad! I said stop!" Maccue was still pushing insistently, but Emi smacked him on his beak. He finally receded back just a bit, but enough to watch with his piercing gaze. Emiola, finally freed, turned to Masoal looking uncharacteristically ragged. "Sorry about that... Wasn't expectin' anyone! Y'know, that sort of stuff." She made a weak heh sound that wanted to be a laugh, but didn't quite make the cut.
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Posted: Sat Dec 30, 2017 7:17 pm
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What Masoal wanted to do was look at Emiola, to give her a once over, to make sure she looked alright. What he ended up doing was staring dead-eyed at her lusus. The shriek had him gritting his sharp teeth, his expression already distorting in displeasure. Maccue had never been Masoal's favorite, not by a long shot, but when his reaction's were so violent it ruffled the tealblood to his core worse than ever. All he'd wanted was to see Emi. Cut him some ******** slack.
He shut his eyes, tightly and angrily, to get them off of Maccue. When they opened, he was looking at Emiola.
She wasn't the same as he remembered and it wasn't because she was missing an arm. No, Emiola had always been full of energy, full of life. It irritated Masoal sometimes, but in its absence everything felt off.
"I didn't know what else do to," he told her. Honestly, Masoal was at a loss for how to go about all this, but he rarely hesitated when he spoke and didn't now, either. "I had to come or I wouldn't see you."
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Posted: Sat Dec 30, 2017 7:46 pm
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Emiola blinked very slowly, "Wouldn't... see me?" Emiola sounded out every syllable like it was weird for Masoal to be standing there, this troll she considered an incredibly good friend, a troll she lost her entire arm over. It should be ordinary really, that someone she held in such high esteem was on her doorstep. "I-I mean! Dude! You know I was gonna come back and see you! Can't get rid of me that easy." She threw her arm up the air in a over-dramatic motion, but it just looked weird and lopsided instead.
"Maccue won't do nothin'. You uh--come inside! I mean, if you want." She moved off to the side. The inside of her hive was surprisingly clean, if not for the occasional junk. Most of the trash was limited to food wrappers and aluminum cans, but there were some expensive looking instruments laying around the floor too. They led an train to an open room further into the hive.
"This is so exciting! You've never been to the city, right? We can do so much stuff!" Her voice sounded... hoarse. Maccue watched the duo closely, "I can show you all the good places to eat at! I just gotta get dressed and we can--"
There went Maccue again, adamant about her leaving the house. He spoke a language only Emiola could understand, but the way he stomped his foot and chattered was pretty universal with displeasure. Emi only stared at him forlornly for a moment before making an aggravated sounding sigh. "Well! I guess I can show you around my hive first."
There was clearly a lot of tension between the two.
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Posted: Sat Dec 30, 2017 8:04 pm
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That sounded like something Emiola would say. It was enough that Masoal felt something in his gut, a short moment of reassurance that his friend was still in there despite her appearance. Couldn't get rid of her, huh? Well, she'd be happy to know that even if he'd wanted to in the beginning, he didn't anymore. Not at all.
"Alright," he agreed, stepping inside without even looking at Maccue. It was so much easier and less stressful to pretend the lusus didn't exist whenever he wasn't in Masoal's directly line of sight. Even Emiola mentioning him didn't sway his attention. What did capture him, though, was her hive. It wasn't exactly what he'd been expecting, but then again he didn't know what he'd been expecting. Maybe nothing at all. He'd been thinking about her, not her lodging.
"I don't wanna go out yet." Yet meant he'd humor her if that's what she really wanted, but that wasn't what he'd come here for. Then again, like his expectations, maybe there was no reason other than seeing her and making sure she'd healed. In that case-
"Are you okay?" he asked her, cutting right to the chase. The tension between lusus and charge was palpable even as Masoal tried to ignore Maccue, but he was definitely asking about her and not him.
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Posted: Sun Dec 31, 2017 9:23 am
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Emiola had taken the time to lead Masoal through her hive. The first stop was her music room--her pride and joy--a room that honestly looked just as disheveled as she did. All of the instruments were percussion-based in nature, but they all paled under the shadow of her rather imposing drum set, which had so many odds and ends tacked onto it that one could hardly see any troll sitting behind it (or rather, within it). The hardest part probably wasn't even playing the damn thing, it was getting to the seat without knocking s**t over.
When Masoal asked if she was okay, she sort of offered the tealblood one of her trademark smiles, only it seemed less genuine and more 'that's just the expression she normally has'. In fact, she seemed to gloss over the question all together, "See! This is the stuff I'm always telling you about," She motioned to the instruments, "Uh, y'know, when I would always say: 'you should come over and we can jam!' and now... you're finally here!"
You know, when she was mostly incapable of 'jamming'.
"Oh here! Here, you'll like these." She made her way over to the right of her drum set to reveal some hanging wind chimes, "Always can add more... ambiance. But they sound like bells! See--" She gently brushed the back of her hand against them. They rang out in a quiet, but harmonious chime.
Maccue had squeezed himself into the narrow hallway to peek in through the door. The special acoustic walls and size of the room meant Maccue couldn't fit inside, but he still seemed adamant about lingering outside to watch Masoal very closely.
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Posted: Sun Dec 31, 2017 9:54 am
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Any relief was gone the next moment in the face of her fake smile. Masoal wasn't the soft, emotional type, nor the type good at reading subtleties in expression, but with Emiola it was different. In this case, it was as obvious as a slap. He frowned.
There was a callout balancing precariously on the tip of Masoal's tongue as he followed her where she led. Any other night he would've been smitten with her wind chimes and their gentle, clear twinkle. He loved bells and, despite himself, he liked the way she talked about them. Emiola had this way of making even minor details sound larger than life. Still, this wasn't what he wanted.
Just like Masoal wasn't the soft, emotional type, he also wasn't the type to let himself be so easily derailed, even if it would've spared her feelings.
"They're nice," he said. Okay, maybe he could spare the tiniest kindness. "But you're avoiding my question. I don't like it."
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Posted: Sun Dec 31, 2017 11:31 am
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Emiola was chewing absentmindedly on her lip when Masoal spoke. "No? Doesn't it?" She laughed again as she gave Masoal a playful punch in the shoulder. It was weak. "C'mon man, I..."
At least her resolve was starting to waver. Sort of.
"I don't... want to talk about it, you know?" At least the fake smile finally melted off of her face. She didn't frown, but she still looked unnaturally neutral. "Maybe I'm not okay, but I will be, alright?" She knew Masoal wouldn't stop pressing through, like pressure to an overbearing abscess, it hurt. "Like? How would you feel if you lost your leg and couldn't hunt anymore? Pretty useless, right?"
She was looking at the drum set again.
"Things are... different now dude." There was that defeated, aimless shrug again.
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Posted: Sun Dec 31, 2017 12:26 pm
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Now that he'd gotten a taste of what he asked for, Masoal realized he wasn't the best troll for this sort of job. He couldn't totally wrap his mind around comforting someone or going much more in depth than you don't know how to protect yourself, so you need to be more careful. Maybe it would've been better to play her instruments with her and go out to eat and pal around like they used to.
Except no, that didn't feel right and if there was one thing Masoal could do, it was rely on his instincts. They'd gotten him this far, after all. Sometimes the outcome was good, sometimes bad, but this was how he knew to handle things.
"You're doing the same thing as before," he told her, but then relented a bit. She wasn't wrong. "It wouldn't be good. If I lost my leg I'd feel useless. You're right. And it was my... my lusus that did it." It was the most guilt Masoal had felt over anything. Fossamom, his guardian, had been the one to take this away from Emiola because he'd resisted her so selfishly.
Did he have a right to lecture her? Well, it didn't really matter, he'd do it anyway.
"You won't talk about it. You'll do like you did before and pretend it's not a big deal. How can you be okay later if you just pretend?"
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Posted: Sun Dec 31, 2017 1:07 pm
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"Well..." Emiola was wavering, "It's... I mean, eventually, it's--"
She sucked in a deep breath.
"I'm trying, okay?!" She huffed, "Geeze! You can be real ********' pushy sometimes, y'know?" She ran a hand through her hair to try and settle herself down. "I can't do anything here, and Maccue won't let me leave, and I haven't seen you in like, weeks!" She grabbed his shoulder, "Weeks! Wondering if you're dead, or, or--"
Emi sighed. "Or--I... I don't know. I don't regret nothin', you know? I just wanted to make sure you're okay, I panicked, and you were right, I wasn't..." Her shoulder slumped as her hand fell from Masoal, "I wasn't ready. I was stupid. I just wanted to give you the dumb bracelet."
"This is sad." She almost sounded flippant, "I'm sad. s**t sucks."
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