Logs:Fire & Moon
| Fire & Moon | |
|---|---|
| Players | Auburn Gresham After hours, a smoldering Andi finally catches her prey in the backroom. There are ugly tears, and Panda Express. |
Closing time. Those who can't stay here are on their various ways home, and most of the staff have likely packed up to leave as well. The club is in wind-down, the pulse of life now barely a bleat, all the heat and noise and excitement dying in sleepy half-lives as the few who remain behind pick up the pieces and square things away for tomorrow. A new page awaits, a new leaf, another chance to do the same - or, perhaps, better - in the passing of a few more hours. Andreia remains behind, like she usually does, but tonight she's quickened her shutting down of Savagery and made her way into the backrooms of the upstairs. She's in a storage closet off the dressing rooms, where a few delivery crates were left on Tuesday morning. They've been... dealt with, after a fashion. Luna heard at least some of that, and perhaps Sebastian did, too - the banging, the clattering, the shattering. The loud, Portuguese cursing. It was, if not a lot, then certainly a /bit/. Scrape, scrape, scrape. Glass on exposed brickwork isn't much better than nails on a chalkboard, really, and the hard bristles of the broom currently being wielded by Andreia, and scrape-scrape-scraping the broken pieces along the rough floor, just makes for an aggravating combination of noises. The Black Wolf has, for her part, calmed down considerably from her earlier rampage, but the walls around her are still smeared in her blood, her knuckles and elbows crusted over with fresh scabs. A few cuts on her face and arms have been tended to, leaving lines of reddened skin amidst the olive tan. She's working with a casual fury, because that's how she do, her back to the doorway as she drives the glass into a neat pile. Outside the door, a stack of splintered boards have been somewhat-neatly stacked and prepared to take away. Anything they held is done, finito, past using. Someone's going to have to make a phone call or three.
Even that disappears when he is confronted by the sight before him. A quick glimpse catches the frozen expression he left Andi with the last time they were in contact but Bash is who he is and it melts quickly enough. A soft sigh emits from his lips after an assessing once over of the battered cleaner and he slowly approaches. There is less warmth in his tone, replaced by something closer to defeated acceptance, "can I take a look at you, please? I promise I won't touch you, just need to see how bad it is."
She /does/ notice as the door opens, her back stiffening and relaxing visibly, the snaking muscles below her shoulders rippling behind the skimpy material of her tank top. She forces herself to look around more slowly than she wants to, letting the broom come to rest on a gathered pile of shards, dark eyes aligning past her shoulder. "Oh." Not who she expected, apparently. The start of a smile fades to the usual, resting line - but of course, the 'usual resting line' for Andi makes her look absolutely and completely dissatisfied with this result. "Hey." Whatever line the woman draws when she causes to say 'hey' or 'sup' could be a debate for the ages, but here we are. "It's all running off and hiding until /I/ get hurt, yeah?" There it is, the spikes, driving people away rather than let them help. The dying smile returns, but it's white-hot, not warm and comfortable. With a shove, Andi hurls the broom against the blood-spattered wall and twists right into a forthright step toward Bash, reaching out like she means to grab him by the collar.
He doesn't reply right away at the barb and in the end, his response to it probably isn't what she wanted. Just a slow nod and he gives a pointed look around the room, "always easier to deal with other people's issues. Obviously don't need to remind you." It isn't meant as any sort of attempt at stinging her back, carrying far too much of a confessional tone. Whatever the sentiment, he is more distracted than usual after and even if he knew how to properly deal with someone like Andi surging forward, it's even worse now. In the moments before, his eyes go wide but his jaw sets. Other than these two tiny movements he just goes still. The corona around him flares to life, threatening to illuminate the entire backroom.
From behind the curtain she heard more movement and she stilled, waiting for a tone of zone or sound to indicate who it was. Hearing Bash's voice she relaxed a little and continued changing behind the curtain. There was no eavesdropping of anything being said, the voices were muffled enough that there were no actual words made out, but she knew the voices anywhere. Continuing to undress, she pulls make-up remover wipes out of her back and washes off all the makeup that she'd caked on for work, undressed out of the tight-fitting clothing, and almost sighed when she stepped out of the heels she'd been in all day. Pulling on a pair of black comfortable leggings and then pink, yes, I said pink Nintendo Kirby pullover sweatshirt. It was oversized, pink, and fluffy...fight me! Flipping her hair out the back before pulling it into a messy bun. Her feet are slipped into flip flops and the stuff she was wearing is stuffed into a bag for 'laundry'. The curtain is pulled back just as Andi steps up into Bash's face and Luna freezes for a moment, watching and evaluating the situation. Then she starts to step closer, dropping the bag in her hand on the way, "Hey" she calls out softly.
--hopefully, what she knows, that she'd never just devour this one. Instead, she just stops him with her other arm across the chest, right up close, still staring levelly, the blur of motion and purpose as natural as breathing. Moreso, perhaps. "You don't get to do that," she's half-muttering, half-hissing, all the passion subdued but frothing beneath the surface, her pupils fluctuating wildly as she fights that war inside. Her mien is simply convulsing, gross and fearsome. "You can't--" Luna's soft voice interrupts her own, less soft but quieter, the beast subdued with a word. Like the dog she is. There's a word she tries to utter, but forestalls, considers shoving Bash away but then keeps him in place with a further twist of rough digits. "Let me say this, Luna." There's a profoundly uncharacteristic tremble in her voice as she catches herself in this moment, already caught by another, but she rallies with a snarl, shoving /herself/ forward now, all but nose-to-nose with her fellow Lost. Forcing herself not to care whether he submits or squirms. Her grip is iron. They both know he could get out, if he really wanted to. "If you wanna help me with my problems, let me help you with yours. Why should I let you lay a fucking finger on me when I try to reach out and you /run/? Are you scared, Bash? Me too. If you wanna help, help me with /you/ first. Are we friends? Huh?" She punctuates that with a firm shake of her arm, a singular bone-rattling judder.
On the surface, his too wide, locked in placed eyes reflect his superficial thoughts. But the Lost are survivors and Bash must have something in him that allowed for an escape from wherever he had been held. His own mien reacting alongside Andi's, the glow around him loses all traces of the soothing, welcoming light it has always carried. Pulsing in alarm and warning, it is on the verge of becoming overwhelming. Wanting to erupt from within this newfound caustic aura is a hint of something larger, even magnificent. It takes the visible exertion of willpower to suppress whatever he was ready to let loose and part of him might look a touch disappointed over that fact. A deep breath, luminous eyes close as he listens to Andi. "You shouldn't..." It doesn't seem like he entirely wants to but he manages to pry his eyes open and flicks a glance towards Luna even though he's responding to the woman holding him. "Are we friends, Andi? You know I want to be but I'm not sure we are."
Ever so slowly, Luna kept stepping forward to the pair, about to pounce, about to fight, about to battle Pink Kirby hoody and all. She let them have their interaction, they let them have their moment. There was tingling in her body and mostly in her fingers to let the claw come out of her and roar into defense, "Andi" she says softly and as soothingly as she can, "Bash" she says his name as she gets closer. Looking between the two, but not touching them. Not yet. Swallowing hard, "We're family. Right? That's what we all said when we started here? What drew us together?" Making her motions obvious to Andi so she doesn't strike, cause that's where she thinks she is right now. Luna moves her hand and places it gently around Bash's waist, sliding herself up close, putting herself in as a double stance, "We choose this family."
That thought finishes and holds her back, stunned, her fingers beginning to release their grip. It's not enough to make escape easy, but it's enough to make the doomed reconsider their options. More stated than a simple weakening - she's not tired. She's choosing to relent. Stepping away from the plummeting edge, from the relapse she's already narrowly avoided once today. And then he's punching her straight in the gut. She visibly blanches, her mouth hanging open in wounded horror. There's only one way she knows to go from there, and she's honing in on it when Luna slides on in, like the unsummoned moon. Her name. /Her/ name. It pulls her up short again, and sets her eyes to blinking. Luna's movement is distracting, those hands placed on the Black Wolf's prey are another insult to her purpose - piercing her armor with the grace of a stiletto. Tears prickle at the corners of near-black eyes, and Andreia twists away from her own grip, releasing her fingertips a moment later. She's turning, but her gaze, welling up as it is, remains fixated upon Bash until the last possible instant. "Guess family ain't friends, where you come from," she spits bitterly, her voice trembling again, and then she's collapsing backfirst against the wall, her stare shooting to the exposed brick of the ceiling, closely inspecting a trailing wire they probably should have dealt with before the business inspector comes around again. "Get the fuck away from me."
It isn't an act or for dramatic effect. Bash's legs were already sagging as the hold on him loosened but a near stumble occurs once it is released entirely. Leaning against Luna heavily, his brows furrow as if confused at her presence. That expression and lack of awareness fades as his strength returns and while Andi collapses against the wall, he rests his forehead lightly down atop his source of support. He wants to do more and he certainly doesn't want to break away but the peripheral awareness of that much pain radiating somewhere else in the room drives him finally into motion. The first words are a near mutter of an admission, "I didn't have either one of them..." The next erupt in a full throated yell as he unburdens himself of something that likely has been stewing since he returned, "I don't know what I'm fucking doing with any of this Andi!" Once released, it seems to surprise even him and he shoots Luna a pained look riddled with embarrassment and shame. Keeping his eyes on the easier target, he remains unable to witness what he might have done to the other figure in the room. "I just know that I have to try and to keep trying. It's not working if you all have to worry about me, that's not making anything better."
"Family promises to be at your side no matter what happens. Until death rips you apart. Is that what you are ready to do, Andi?" The words were spoken sharply and with deep raw emotion. "Are you ready to rip family apart?" Feeling the loss of energy Hearing the yell from Bash, she supports him, meeting his forehead with his and she tries to take deep breaths to calm herself. "If you were family, you'd care what you just did to him" supporting Bash and seeing the pained look in her eyes. "But fine, you want us to leave you? Just remember you are breaking something that didn't need to broken."
When he voices that heartfelt roar, at complete odds with himself in much the same way she is, she actually flinches, another intake of breath suppressing what might, perhaps, be an instinct to whimper in return. Where he goes loud... She goes absolutely, painfully soft, all the Wolf dying from her voice. "I don't, either." Leaving a scared, little Brazilian girl who's trying to live again. She watches Luna with a sour, flat-eyed stare that's at odds with the tears as they start to tumble down her cheeks, scattering down her flesh, which is marked here and there by the shine of... glitter? For all the dour darkness she exudes, for all the mean melancholy, that's a curious touch. "But maybe I need people to worry about." She calls out, hastily, as Luna delivers those words to part on. "Maybe I need to /help/ to get better, because all I've done for a fucking century is hurt people like me-- like us. Kill them. Eat them. Grind them into nothing. Even before that, I was angry, and sad, and lost. It wasn't hard to make me into a monster, Bash. So what do you want from me? What do /you/ want from me? I wasn't going to kill him, vaca!" That comes out hard, and she's on her feet all at once, surging a step loser, her chin raised defiantly. Daring to be hit, rather than strike herself - her hands are down, long nails digging fiercely into her palms. "The better it gets, the more /I/ think I'm going to fuck it up!" She's yelling now, her accent thick as she does so, the passion of a nation firing through her veins. She doesn't realize how close it makes her to the mortal she's forgotten. "Hugs and sunshine? I can't." Won't? She shakes her head, to dispel the thought. "I was happy, once. I'm remembering how, but every time I take a step forward, my stomach screams and I just want to devour it all. Someone turns away, I see a back I can take, a throat I can rip out. Maybe this happened, 'Sebastian'." That comes with a bitter twist. "Because I need you to be who you're trying to be. 'cuz I'd rather bring him back through pain than /lose/ him." To Luna, she emits a snarl, her chest tensing as she throws all the air in her lungs into a quite literal /growl/. "That make sense to you, Red?"
But the firehaired young woman does stop in her tracks now, feeling not only that roil of palpable /heat/ roll over her--but also the impact of the flood of emotions of all kinds that come pouring out of it too, like a flash flood in a dry canyon. She stays rooted in place, observing, her expression carefully neutral, as she gets her bearings. She doesn't quake or turn away, at least not not yet. But she absorbs that figurative punch, hands still grasping the bag tightly, almost like it is a shield.
He takes all of the force of her anger and sadness, even moving to shield Luna when it turns more onto her. It isn't easy for him, his aura every so often flickering in warning as much to himself as anyone else in the room. But even without that signal, the memory of being lunged at can be easily found on his face. Yet, he fights through it and the unwelcoming Mien slamming up against his being. Everything falls away but Andi as he forces himself to speak, the only words for some time the deceptively difficult phrase of, "I'm sorry." Trying to find her gaze after, even through the blaze of his eyes she can see tears beginning to pool. "I was selfish and I'm sorry." There is so much more wanting to come out but he just leaves it at this simple sentiment, trying to convey it with every facet of his being.
Abruptly, she turns away, spotting Fi with her take-out bag frozen in place she is taken around the waist by Bash and she is stopped in her tracks. Her back to Andi and all that is happening, he's preventing her from leaving because she won't fight against him. Even as he kisses her cheek, Luna is stiff and uncompromising. As Bash apologizes to Andi, Luna can't take it and she tries to wiggle away, "let go." She tells him, but it comes out sounding like asking, even if she could break from his hold.
The Arcadian hound is practically baying as she feels the blood rise in Luna Red, taking another half-step forward, subconsciously entering a ready stance, her fingers twitch-twitching, nails and talons brandished, every string of fibrous muscle in her arms preparing to bend and squeeze. It's the easiest thing in the world, to be like this... But, beneath it all, she's aware of what stops her. What /should/ stop her. Passion doesn't have to be bad. /You/ don't have to be bad, Andi. That little girl remembers, and she seizes the reins as Sebastian adroitly intervenes in his own, visceral intervention. There's zero hesitation from the Brazilian, her reply immediate - like she'd prepared it. As if she'd seen this all, and has the script hovering around her thighs, the prompt unneeded. Because he's good at what he does, too. "Don't need you to be sorry, Bash," says Andreia Lopes, as the Summer Beast retreats apace, "I need you to be you." It's you, "It's me," that needs to be sorry, "That needs to be sorry." The tears tumble freely, and she swipes them away, her anger turning inward as she turns away herself, her own back to Luna's - the traces of glitter on her shoulders nowhere near as ridiculous as the hoodie sported by the Irraka. Just, one more thing that doesn't sit right in a scene of scary monsters duelling over the impossibility of their own emotions. There's life in the old dog yet, though, that familiar brusque teasing winding through her tone, mitigated by the self-loathing coursing through her body but none the less sardonic. "Thought you told me you could deal with this, Lun'."
There's no judgement on her fair features, though as Andrea turns away Fi crouches down, as if to be in the line of sight but still not interfering in whatever is going on between the three of them. Though both of her hands are unencumbered now.
If she makes no move to break free, he stays just like he is. While turning his head to address Andi, he sees Fi and with one glance is able to beg for help with his overly expressive eyes. The panic that was in them can't be entirely shed as he resumes trying to soothe his fellow Lost, "I know. I'm just figuring out what that is too. It's something I should have let be done with you rather than all on my own." As Bash goes on, he starts to both sound and look more natural. His glow even begins to soften at the edges once more, a welcoming presence rather than an attempt to keep people at bay. "We were...a thing, made into a role. I gave up one and just took on another and it only partially fits." A deep breath follows, accompanied soon after by the type of relieved sigh that comes from unburdening, "we don't have to be just the one thing." If Luna hasn't left his side, he peeks at her with a soft smile and adds, "someone has been helping me with that already, I just need to let the rest of you do the same..."
Luna's eyes still hold some spark as the smolder comes out of her, she watches Fiametta approach Andreia and she says nothing else, letting her do what she wants. But you better be sure, she is watching every movement Andi is making right now. Ready to spring into action if she needs to defend. Bash steals a look at her, but her jaw is set tight and she won't look at him, her eyes fixed on Andi and her next reaction. For this moment, whatever walls Luna has have gone up and she is a stone wall.
Whatever her stance on hugging may be, in this moment the Brazilian has no problem with embracing herself, her arms sliding across her chest, pushing past softness and into the convulsing muscles lining her shoulder blades, nails digging deep in tan flesh. Her voice has softened again, the dichotomous souls within battling for supremacy - and finding they both hold sway. "None of us is just one thing. We're in this together, no matter what shit you try and pull. People pull away from me, I pursue 'em. That's how it's been for me. They run, I chase. I eat, they don't run no more. I didn't want this-- any of it, to be about me. Figured all I had left was that, or what I can do for other people. Maybe if I could help build something, even on the backs of an ill-conceived dream by an actual giant and his literal witch, I'd get back what I had, before." She clears her throat with a rumble, and turns around, her arms falling away, palms open at her sides as if she's expecting resistance - emotional, physical, verbal - her /instincts/ tell her to be wide-open, and narrow-calm. Luna is the one to confirm that suspicion, and her ire is absorbed with a slow, thoughtful nod. Exercising control, Andi breathes out, and looks at the pair before her, then finally settles those near-black eyes on Fiametta. Her expression shifts, the brush of a frown across her brow, and then a twitch of her lips as she continues, accounting for the elemental, "Love. Respect. Reason. Ain't no reason to instinct, sure as hell not in war. You were a thing, she was a thing, we were all just /things/ for one sacana or another. You, too, right?" Back to the werewolf on that, deadly serious, deadly /caring/. She's not trying to fight any more. "Way I figure, we need each other. You can't have it be about you, I can't have it be about me, 'cuz neither one of us knows who that person is. If they're even a person." Her gaze has crept back to Bash, but it finds the copper-haired dancer again, then returns to Luna. "Then there's someone comes along you love with a fierceness no /thing/ could ever know. Who loves you back so much it burns them, and you're still pulling this?" She's teasing, but she's also not joking in the least, the lingering warmth of a smile holding a sharpness as dark eyes flit between Bash and Luna. "Whatever you're tryin' to find, find it, Bash. Do it for Red if not for you. Only thing that's worth anything in this /stupid/ mortal world is love, longing, and the family you share it with. Everything else is just a distraction, and then you're dead in the ground and it's just those left behind, crying for you. We all know what it's like to lose, well as be Lost. Pick yourself up, try again. Better'n that." Her shoulder is eased into a one-sided shrug, her neck cracking to one side. "Meantime, I'll /push/ all of you motherfuckers, because I want you to win. Think you don't know me? Me telling you all this means you know enough. Anything else, /ask/. I got no secrets here. From any of you. Only reason I don't pour my heart out to each of you right now is I'm still strugglin' to see past the monster in me. Who wants to know /her/? She doesn't want you to, 'cuz she's scared you'll see how weak she really is. Then, she stops existing. That's why they-- we, run."
"I uh...brought Panda Express," she says, finally. Because obviously junky American food is the balm to all wounds. Did she know there was still a bunch of people back here? Her haul looks like it's enough for about eight of her. "Andi, are you seriously wearing a /Kirby/ getup?!" She folds her arms over her chest, as if she were trying to contain herself as well. But then she looks down, digging a bare toe into the floor. "Fighting's fine. It's going to happen, now and then. We're going to get pissed. Scared. Jealous. Bitchy." She seems to include Bash in that, congrats Bash, you're an honorary. "Maybe someone need to run to get some breathing space, yeah? Shit happens. But if you don't come back, tough shit, we're going to come looking. I don't know what the fuck is going on, I've been in a bad mood all night thanks to Doctor Asshole. And I'm not the best at being a nice human either. But if anyone needs a hug or a hard fuck or some food or anything, I'll do my best," she offers. A little grumpily.
When Andreia turns, she likely finds him this way, looking at her with none of the confrontation the woman next to him might bear. Back to soft eyes, gentle smiles and an empathetic, engaged focus, he nods along with what is said. Any mention of love earns a glance back to Luna but even he realizes that now isn't the time to start voicing it, struggling instead to just stick to almost sickeningly sweet looks of longing. There is enough overlap between Andi and Fi's words that he just listens for a time, only speaking after he weighs everything. "We do need each other. None of it is going to work without support. Otherwise it's just nights like this until, at best, somebody leaves for good." The next portion is seemingly more reserved for the two wolves, splitting most of his focus between them. He doesn't neglect Fi, it just appears that he has a more positive idea of where she is emotionally when compared to the three others in the room. "It is ok to focus on ourselves though, at least to the extent that we get to a point where we feel like all the good we are getting from this place, from each other is deserved. We are all amazing at telling each other that fact but if it isn't internalized, we will hit a wall eventually every time."
Standing in her pink Kirby sweatshirt, with her quivering jaw of steel a tear falls from Luna's eyes and it streaks her cheek. Swallowing hard, she says nothing, unwilling to lift a hand to wipe that tear away. A tremble rolled through her and rage soared once more as emotions starts to rise inside her. Not wanting to feel this. Angry at herself for what she was feeling and trying desperately to push it back down. Everything emotion was telling Luna to run right now, to leave and just run away from all the feels But her mind and her heart told her something else and she sighs, "Fuck you, Andi." That was said with complete love and compassion, in a way she knew only Adi would get, "I'm not running because I don't know you or want to know you. I want to run for other reasons." Finally, she wipes the tear from her face and sniffs, rubbing at her nose, "We want to know. /I/ want to know. And if she doesn't want us to know her, she can go fuck herself." The interruption about food has her shifting her eyes to the fiery redhead, and then she makes a comment about her sweatshirt and she looks down at it, "Yeah, it's adorable. He's cute and fluffy and just eats whoever pisses him off. I thought it was fitting." Though that seems to break some of the tension and just a little, Luna relaxes. A fisted hand releases from its ball and comes out of the pink sleeve of her Kirby sweatshirt and it slips into Bash's hand.
Luna's words strike deep, though, and she /honestly/ laughs, her usual brusque bark but softened by the tears she's already cried, the emotion she's prodded back into the gloomy caverns of her lost soul. "It's hard," she offers, feeling useless in so doing, "Fucking yourself. Means looking at yourself, real close." She doesn't finish the self-effacing thought, instead she looks at someone she does want to look at, for all the dissonant chill that the autumnal flame can crystallize into being when she wills it. The tension is easing already, and the hound lets a quiver run through her as her gaze drinks in Fiametta. Shaking off the tears. Getting them the fuck out of her fur. "What's going on," heaves the shudder-dried Black Wolf, sighing as she slips over to inspect the haul, "Is loverboy here's been bunking in the dressing room." Dark eyes fire off toward Bash, to curtail any protest. "Yeah, we're still gonna deal with that. You two can't bunk up? Last I checked, Lun's in the same situation as I am, and /I/ was gonna demand you come over and check out the--" She stops herself, clamping her mouth shut, her jawline tensing. What's a normal thing to call a room? "Spare room. Too much space in that place anyway. Only need somewhere to sleep, got all this posh shit around me instead." It may be a little apparent from the way she says that, that by 'posh shit' she means, completely normal things people have. Like showers and ovens and doormats. Maybe a plate and mug. You know, fancy stuff. "But if this is a thing, make it a thing. Or come over anyway, just to appease the person who wanted to rip you apart ten minutes ago. Speakin' of." With a heave of her frame, as if she both weighed three times as much as she does, and has complete control over it, she sinks down opposite Fiametta, looking up at her now, finding those stormy blues with a dark-hearted little smile. That might normally be a bad thing, that callousness beneath the empathy for the person in front of her. But with these two... "Want me to kill him?" She asks, arching a brow and shrugging her wiry shoulders. There's nobody else here for her right now, her focus absolutely shifted to the dancer. "I think he's a nice guy, wants to help, but that shit..." She trails off with a faint snarl, shaking her head, dark hair tumbling across her shoulders. It's remarkably unclear if she's joking or not, as she finishes, in a heartfelt murmur, "World can stand to be a little less helpful if it makes you smile again. Did that fucker even apologize?" Her anger shifts, revealing the more playful work of a crooked grin, "Did I fuck up, holding back?"
She laughs though, and it's not wholly bad natured at least. "No, he apologized to you, /at me/. I wasn't anything but an object to him. It's all right though. I've met a dime a dozen like him. Always have, even before. Kind of sucks to see it in one of our own, but whatever." But she shakes her head at the wolf, reassuringly. "Nah. He still wouldn't've /seen/ me even if you beat him into a piss stain on the ground. But like I said, I'm kinda used to it." She flashes a grin, but it's hollow.
That lightness drops suddenly as the conversation shifts back towards him. Alternating between surprise, bashfulness, and still enough traces of panic, he struggles to reply right away. "It isn't...just my martyr complex at work with that. The clothes and whatever else getting taken care of is one thing but a place to live? It makes me feel close to being...kept." A dismissive shrug and he banishes it for now, trying to stay present in all the progress they made. "Conversation for another time..." Before moving on entirely, he does give Luna's hand a reassuring squeeze, knowing that part of Andi's offer of ideas is sure to foster some anxiety. After one last assessing look over her, he peeks at the other couple, "I have a guess who Doctor Asshole might be but we can all help kill him. Might be a good bonding event after everything tonight. Some catharsis."
Forcing a smile, "Speaking of home" she steps away from the group to retrieve the duffle bag she'd dropped earlier when investing what was going, "I should get to bed." Flinging the bag over her shoulder she starts for the door, offering a little wave to the others, "See you all tomorrow." And then she pushes through into the empty Satin club to make her walk home.
It's just a way to keep busy. Sebastian's dismissal of the conversation isn't unexpected, and it doesn't restart the fight; her worries have been eased, and she looks at him as peacefully as someone like her can. "Gonna be tossing you around again, 'member," she mutters, tossing him a slow wink, her resting scowl still in place. "Think of it like a warm-up." Her peripherals take in Luna's discomfort, and she shoots her fellow moon-howler a concerned glance. Sometimes, when you're this savage, you catch someone without meaning to. 'Fuck', she mouths, silently, before forcing a smile herself. It feels weird. "Rest good, Red," she manages to say in what's essentially a civil manner, but before she's halfway out the door, she sniffs at Bash, "Should... probably go after her? Bad idea?" A sigh, and she's back on Fiametta, leaning over the emptied table full of food as her stomach gives another insistent moan. "Hey," with no more warning than that, Andreia reaches out and grabs Fiametta's chin, her thumb lifting one side of the jaw as the index finger settles lightly against the other. It's almost as if she's inspecting the nature of that grin, but her gaze remains on the dancer's own. "You don't have to /be/ used to it. You're out on the floor, you keep up an act, you don't need to act with me. Got enough of that shit when I was still..." Alive. "Young." "Hard to be yourself in Brazil in 1920. Know what it's like to have people, 'specially men, look past you, past what and who you are. Pissed me off in every way. Don't need me to be angry for you, or fix your problems. But I'm /here/. I'm /real/. I think you are, too, I just... don't know how to deal with whatever we have. He made it sound like I fucking owned you."
But she looks at Bash, thoughtfully. "You talk to Mari about that, Bash? I mean I know she says you don't have to pay. But if you wanted to, and explained that? I bet she'd let you, until you felt more comfortable and it wasn't quite so much of a rub." She puts her hands on top of the counter now, and hops up on it, swinging her legs a little, and perched right next to the pile of fortune cookies, hooking one ankle behind the other. She watches Luna, though once more she respects the space, instead offering a quiet, "'Night Luna, see you tomorrow." She doesn't object to the turning of her face, but her smile softens a little, as if to show that she really is okay, if still a little annoyed. "I cried all the tears I have over people putting their own visions about who I was or why even before I got taken," she says, gently. "It's gross and annoying, but I don't know. It doesn't make me feel less of myself. Just them. Or him."
But then the roller coaster of his expressions begins again as he suddenly finds both of his hands empty. Unable to hold onto lightness for very long, he manages a smile that doesn't quite reach his eyes, those glowing spheres betraying him every time. Watching Luna go, he only barely gets a "goodnight..." out in time. The door she passes through gets watched after like she might come back through at any moment but when that fails to happen, he shoots Andi a pointed look that lacks any real venom, "early days and you bring up moving in together?" Shaking his head in playful disbelief, the attempt at humor once again fails to cover all of his features. Voice matching the more somber thoughtfulness he's really feeling, "better to let it go for now. We'll talk later after she has some time to process. It's all just very new." Rubbing at his face and the nonexistent scruff to be found there, Bash tries to distract himself with replying to Fi, "I haven't. Maybe a conversation with all of you first. I don't want to look ungrateful for any of this or suspicious." The attempt doesn't even come close to working and his eyes move over to the door off and on the entire time he speaks.
There's a little audacity and exasperation in that, again - the tease is not a joke. There's a snort from the Black Wolf, though, her amusement still shining through even if it's profoundly self-effacing this time. She elaborates on the point with a shrug. "World'd be easier if people just said what they thought, and did what they wanted. Me included. Risk it all, or burn it up. We're all fuckin' cowards, in the end. Sorry for--" She stops herself, breath caught in her throat, glancing between both Fiametta and Bash. Not sure which to choose, but it's the moony boy who's most pressing right now. "Being this. Being me." They're moving on, so she does too. Best not to linger on /that/ anyway. Practical shit. "Just do what I do," Andi offers to Bash, with an upflick of her chin, "Boss bitch won't let you pay, give the money she gives you to someone else, spread the love. Funny enough, was 'Doctor Asshat'," her lips curl as she joins in on that, though her heart doesn't seem entirely in it. Like it's worse to call someone names - when they're not right in front of you - than it is to offer to end their existence. "And his boy who gave me that idea. Don't got time to volunteer, can still chuck what I got somewhere there's a good cause. It's like you're donatin' her money for her. S'what rich people should do anyway." With a shrug, she starts tearing at some of the food, though there's a momentary hesitation before she actually /eats/, recalling an earlier conversation as her gaze lingers on Fiametta. Almost like she's asking for permission. Thankfully, she doesn't, just starts ramming stuff into her mouth before it gets any colder. She eats exactly as one might imagine, like she's on the edge of starving, and the food's going to up and run away if she doesn't pack it down. There's a good bit of mess, too. Table manners, zero; perpetual hunger, four million, two thousand, six hundred and forty five. "Nobody treats me like anything," she manages with her mouth still full, "'cuz if I can't bully them into going along with /my way/ I just don't bother. Boring people, annoying people, stupid people, who cares. Walk away, deal with the ones you like." Maybe they'll even like you, she adds mentally, the self-doubt none too plain in dark eyes. She eats even harder.
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