Judith
Amelie stands outside at 1 am avoiding sleep like it's a plague. She developed this horrific little habit that does nothing to improve her health but, it does make her feel safe. She exhausts herself to the point of blacking out just so her body has so energy to plunge bones outward at her expense. But, it happens anyway. Amelie has just gotten used to it at this point. Here she was still doing it. She stared at the darkened sky with a pensive look to her brow. She felt like something was slightly off this weary night. 

Her skeletal hands tighted on the crutches which held her. She took one shaky step forward careful to put her crutch in front first. Gods, she hated these things but she's forced to live with them. Nothing you can do with a broken body. She sees nothing, her almost milky eye moving right over everything. Amelie sighs her hands flexing a little on their handles. 

You can't fault a poor girl for being too cautious. She was alone in that house for months. And, girls with disabilities were easy targets for murder and other things. She was still young and she was still scared. But, she's here now. Nothing to be afraid of, right? 

There's a little breeze that hits Amelie with a cold shiver. Yeah. This was going to be a long. Long night.
Dawn
This was probably among the worst of the bad ideas Owen had had lately, and that was *Really saying something.* It could be worse though, couldn't it? He wasn't that far from the dorm buildings, his earbuds weren't in, and he was only about three metres above the nearest lamp! Plenty of precautions. Yeah. 

The copper-haired certainly-not-an-idiot hoisted himself up through another tangle of branches, hoping to wear out tonight's nervous coil by tiring himself out in the cool darkness. A chilly breeze cooled the back of his neck; he envisioned the droplets of sweat freezing into little gems of ice, glittering in the downy wisps on the base of his neck beneath his low ponytail. 
...In reality, he probably just smelled funny. 

A sound- breath? What was that? Bears weren't nocturnal, right? *Right?*

"**Whozzat?**"

In a motion of comical exaggeration, he whipped his head around nearly the full 180° and shouted something dumb. It occurred to him mid-slip that he probably should have been watching where his feet were. 

Going down like a Looney Tune, his arm held fast to the nearest branch for dear life- anyone looking at the tree he was failing at would see a red high top flailing out of the wildly dancing foliage, and hear a pitiful yelp as the foot attached to it was rapidly yanked back. More crashing noises, ceasing when his descent was paused in an oh-so-perfectly-clear spot on the trunk; one white-knuckled arm stretched above his head kept the boy from plummeting the rest of the way down.

And so there he was, ripe for the mauling! The view onto the path was surprisingly clear from the branch he dangled from, the light casting an eerie off-white glow onto whoever had just scared him shitless. 

*Gulp.* 

Maybe, if he hung there perfectly still, who or whatever he had heard wouldn't notice him.
Judith
There was a movement in the trees. Something her eye could actually pick up on. A figure of sorts moving up into trees. Her breathing froze, which was an easy enough feat considering it was hard to breathe anyway. Gods it's just been a few days since she passed out in Margo's room, what now. 

Branches moving a groaning under heavy weight, some snapping like thin threads. That was no beast. That was a man, panic set in. Gods she only hoped that was not what she thought she was. 
Maybe it was just an idiot boy climbing tree! Oh she hoped she was right. Her eye widened and she took that prideful step back. 

The hair on the back of her neck stood up straight and whatever comfort she came to find was long gone. That ugly sound came straight out of a horror flick Tejal had shown her when she was younger. Amelie wanted to die immediately but she currently couldn't do that. So bones protruded from Amelie like she was a sort of hedgehog. Except with more bones then there was bodies. It furled around her like that damn magnetic liquid. 


"***SCHEISSE. KINDERMÖRDER.***"

She yelled in her native tongue. Which actually sounded more gutteral then the sound whatever in the trees made. Then whatever from the trees fell, like a ripe apple that couldn't quite pull itself away. 

It was that boy the one who had a shirt rather violently got put on him. She had a lovely view of that woman's back but it didn't quite catch her attention like rabid flailing of the boy. Now hanging by a mere branch like a stuck pig. She would laugh but then again it was just one of her prison mates and she had just gotten scared prior.

There was that eerie glow makes Amelie look more like a horror show than anything. It takes a moment of painful silence before Amelie takes a moment to cough, before talking. 

 "Oh! Du bist!"
She wheezes. 
"You're that boy. Shirt boy?"
Dawn
Well, that was.. A lot of oddly strung-together reactions from the person (thankfully) who had witnessed his half-downfall. Was that German? It was loud-

Ah, jeez. So the spectacle of him being violently re-shirted hadn't been banished from the minds of the people; still, though, not the worst thing to be known for. Despite his precarious grip on his lifeline branch, Owen couldn't help but let loose a flurry of giggles. Choppy, jolted, and wheezing uncontrollably, his laugh bounced off of the still and silent trees (who found it unbearably awkward).

"Shh-shirt boy?! Yeah, that's- that's me, fully clothed and everything," He managed to wheeze. Every shake of his shoulders reminded his arm of how it did *Not* Like carrying his whole weight. "You're the baker girl, with the-" *A pause as he reached his left arm up to give his right a break* "-with the bones," He spluttered. Damn, that didn't have the same ring to it that 'shirt boy' did. He hoped he'd think of something better. 

"Speaking of, uh, that looked like it hurt." 

His tone remained light enough, but noticeably coloured with concern. His accent, clearer now that he wasn't shouting, stressed the vowels in a nervous singsong sort of a way. She didn't.. Seem all too concerned about the bones ripping up through her back. Was it impolite to bring it up? Was she pain-proof somehow? She had this under control, right? He found a branch to brace his foot against; wasn't a good look to be flailing about while trying to be genuine, now, was it. 

Another strange stretch of silence as Owen blinked at his fellow lurker in the woods. This was.. This was going somewhere. He had better pay attention.
Judith
Amelie's eye twitched and furrowed when the child started giggling. It's what she knew for a fact he was. That rabid child that flung himself around like a drunkard looking for a woman. His giggles were slightly irritating as her mouth twisted into a frown. 

"And, thank ze gods for that." 
She said with a sigh. She never wanted to see this boy shirtless again, once was enough. He was a short boy, with this odd little scar that looked like it was pulsing through his skin. She didn't get a close enough look. But, who was she to talk about scars. She has enough to share around the table like food. 

"Yes I'm ze girl with... Ze violent bones." She said with a frown. Blood ran down her nose and soaked into fresh bandages. What an ugly thing to see constantly. She was prideful that shirt boy sounded better than whatever amalgamation this boy came up with. 

"Of course it did! But zince I'm on ze equivalent of verdammte Pferdeberuhigungsmittel! I'm not screaming in agony."

She said. She was still frightened but, she at least realized she needed to reiterate what she said. 

"Horse tranquilizers basically." The bandaged girl sighed, rubbing her temples. 
"I'm on opioids, a lot of them. I'm not pain proof. It hurt, a lot."
She growled. 
"Try not to scare me of all people. Verdammter Gnom."
She grumbles. 

Oh she was going to feel everything later, like she got hit with 50 trains and still lived. She is going to regret this immensely. She couldn't take this boy seriously, not when he was acting like one of those orange monkeys.
Dawn
"Got it, got it!" 

Owen squeaked out a hasty reassurance. *Captain Obvious here, stating what this girl already knew about nightmare bones ripping through her back. Nice.*

Wuh oh. 

Reacting to his sixth sense, Owen felt the familiar ether wriggle its way through his layers of muscle and flesh. As he had gotten better at this, so had *It*.

"Fair warning, then, that this branch isgoingtobreak-"
*Crk*
*SNAP*

And down the rest of the way he went, somehow hitting
Every
Branch
On the
Way
Down.
Was he doing that on *Purpose*? Blurs of faintly glowing red passed through the tree, his arms outstretched, infernal crystal casing no damn good for grabbing branches. Eight solid seconds of muffled crashing and cursing gave way to an anticlimactic *Thud*. 

"Wughhhhhh."

And there he was, in all his awkwardly-sprawled glory, sinking slightly into the cool earth. A *Black Sabbath* Shirt with the sleeves lovingly sheared off revealed bare arms, still half-covered in the strange substance that wasn't quite blood. It was red, yes, but it seemed to glow from the inside; it moved in layers, dim rivers beneath an inconsistent glassy exterior. Beat-up cargo pants were sewn up in a couple places with neat red Xs, matching his scuffed red sneakers. It felt off to still be dressed for the sunny day when it was this dark out.

It hit him then how tired he was (or, was supposed to be). Flat on his back in the pitch-dark woods wasn't the *Weirdest* Place he had ever conked out, but it wasn't the safest. Propping himself up on his hands, he sat upright and got a better look at the strange girl. He could take a guess as to why she was so displeased with being awake. Something sympathetic moved around in his back and arms, almost trying to imitate her plight; he could feel it murmuring uncomfortably beneath his skin, guessing at what it *He?* Saw. Just out of sight, a crystalline hand dug slightly deeper into the soil; *Knock it off.*

"Lovely night for a walk," He wheezed.
Judith
"Uh." 

Amelie watches this boy panic while on a breaking tree. Amelie beginning to wince at every fiber she hears groan in protest. 

Amelie's eye widens cartoonishly as Owen hits every single branch. Every hit had Amelie looking like she was watching somebody die, again. The bones under her skin scream and move restlessly causing painful discomfort. 

At least the boy looked like a proper glow stick on the way down. With all the cracking that was happening it was only good that it happened. 

Amelie was quick to walk her way over to where the boy landed. Her crutches severely inhibiting her speed but at least she made it over to where the boy landed. The bones on her arms worming their way outside to Amelie's protest. Creating a kind of gauntlet look to her thin arms that could only be seen at the cuffs of the leather jacket.

There was a very clear frown to Amelie's face. It was cold and this boy was dressed like he was about to swim in a damn lake. It was 1 am why was this boy climbing a *Tree* Of all things. But, to be honest Amelie would do much the same if she still had movement in her legs. Much the hypocrite she was. At least the boy was comfortable. 

"It was lovely untill you fell from ze tree like an illness struck bird, Tollpatschiges Kind." 

Amelie blatantly worried for the boy but, upon closer inspection the boy was unharmed leaving Amelie wondering. Just what did the boy have? Was it a disease that made you look like a half-baked teletubbie? Or was it something else. Why does she have to think this much during this night, she was just trying to go for a walk.
Dawn
Owen fought back another unsettling giggle. Somehow, being called an "Illness struck bird" Was even more devastating through a deadpan German accent. He didn't even need to know what the second part meant to know that it was a brutal blow as well. A voice in the back of his head made some quip about asking Uriel to patch up this mortal wound later; that did not help with containing the giggling.

For his own sake, though, he toned it down; it occurred to him that he was staring, and that staring at someone and holding back giggles was commonly interpreted as *Very rude.* He didn't think anything bad of her- if anything, she reminded him of something he would see printed across the front of a record back home, Lady Death or something like that snarling and tearing some poor bastard's heart out. That would make a sick album cover. *Whoops, his eyes were glazed over.*

A deep breath in, and he rose from the dirt.

"You got me there," He attempted. "I'm certainly not capable of flight, as we've seen, and as for ill, well.. Probably."

A grin, childish and uneven, dared to crack across his face.

Slightly sad though it was, he tucked away every teasing swipe taken at him from a person here; it meant some sort of lightheartedness, camaraderie, *Anything*, didn't it? Or maybe it was just an insult. As first impressions (at least, first one-on-one) went, he certainly could have done better. 

Faint clinking and melting sounds flickered through the air as he played with his fingers absentmindedly; he winced as one of his fingers made a horrible popping noise. The murmurs were still rustling quietly beneath his back. His heart was going fast, but his thoughts sure weren't. He wanted to say something intelligent to Metal-As-Hell Baker Girl with the Accent and No Fucks Left to Give, but, poor boy, it was devastatingly 1 in the damn morning. *Speaking of, was it too late in the interaction to ask for her name?*

"Is it, ehm, too late to catch your name?"
Judith
Amelie quickly was one to make a noise, it wasn't something akin to pure disgust. The pure giggling was straight from a puppet box and only Tejal knew how much she didn't need that. He looked like he packed away whatever in his head for safe keeping and his head became utterly transparent, empty. Which she could feel was happening with her own head. For her braincells we're exiting a mile a minute. 

He was like a lower pitched chipmunk. And, the fact he was laughing at Amelie? Oh there was a pure scowl on her features, if you looked close though you could see moving beneath bandages and blood beginning to pool beneath it, as if it didn't look red enough. He looked like a complete lunatic! That's what made it worse! A LUNATIC LAUGHING AT AMELIE OF ALL PEOPLE?

Christ this day could not get any worse. There was nothing to make it worse besides that nasty boy who wore clothes as bland as his personality, Ares? She guesses that's what his name was, she forgets on purpose. 

The boy rises from the dirt, and unsurprisingly he looks less like he saw Satan in his toilet. 

She made a scoffing noise to the boy. 
"Course you wouldn't ve able to fly. You look more like a hyperactive wet dog."
Amelie looked at Owen with that scowl only a person that has been through.Much could do. 
"Ill??? Probably???? You just came from a tree! At 1 am! Du bist ein. Verrücktes Kind. Von seiner Leine!"

And the insufferable red marker looking child has the gal to pull a smile on her. But, she saw that smile slightly waver before growing brighter, odd. She didn't know what she was saying, she wanted to fling her arms with how mad she was but! *Oopsie* She was crippled! She can only stare like she wants him dead.

.

The awful sounds didn't help the way she looked either. She also winced at the disgusting popping noise. While her body her body made a awful noise of protest at her anger. An odd noise of muscles moving and the sound of blood pushing itself away for creaking bone slithering underneath battered flesh. Amelie hisses at the pain her face warping. 

Tejal wouldn't want this now would she? Gods only know she wouldn't. Amelie took a loaded moment to collect herself. Which was mostly just her looking to the ground like it had murdered the only thing that could never be repeated, much like birth and death. Amelie just continues to stare at the floor. 

"Amelie. Amelie Valentina."
She said in a tone which was welcoming but threaded together with guilt and pain. 
"Yours?"
Dawn
A pained sort of a wheeze escaped the dishevelled boy at the 'hyperactive wet dog' comment as he combed the pine needles from his hair. This girl was something downright terrifying, what with her ability to both send him into hysterics and scare him shitless in the same motions. 

Ooh, that's a lovely name.

...

Shit, she *Definitely* Thought he was laughing at her. *Quick, trip over yourself to clarify! Move, move, move, blasted tongue!*

"Owen! Edris? Yeah," He squeaked, his voice running up and down wildly like the little cartoon characters in his skull sprinting around in a panic rather than manning the controls. His tone wavered, but rang as distinctly genuine nonetheless.

"I! I, eh, wasn't laughing at you! If that's what you thought! It's just- it's an odd hour, and uh- you have a way with nicknnn-"

A break as he tugged the elastic out of his hair, his movements exaggerated ever so slightly to try to defuse her *Very* Potent fury. Dark, unruly waves spilled out over his shoulders, free at last from their captivity. Like one of those slo-mo intro shots in the movies, if the beauty being showcased spat out pine needles and wiped dirt from his cheek rather than blink seductively.

"You're funny, is all," He blurted apologetically. That ought to do it. People generally liked hearing nice things about themselves, didn't they? Hell if he knew at this point.

Amelie was staring at the ground. Stellar idea! It was cold and dark and very not overwhelming. Another cool breeze passed by them, carrying the smell of copper, dry trees and hair conditioner. It cooled Owen down a little more this time- that was good. Goodgood. 

A faint, oddly pleasant *Clink*Ing noise came from his hands when his fingertips tapped together, the bloody shield still refusing to go back to sleep. A spark flickered across his knuckle, as if to say *You're doing a shit job at convincing me that you aren't in mortal danger, mate.* Rude.
Judith
Amelie's faces shot back up and contorted into a mix between a growl and scowl, both looking threatening for a girl like her. Maybe it was because she was German. A bulging vein splits across Amelie's neck like there was a giant spider under her skin. *This boy*.

"VERDAMMTE HYÄNE." 

Amelie spat. Bloody spikes bursting Fourth from her forgone eye. She looks like she's bristling even though the most she can do is fall forward and hope it impales Owen. 

Owens name went straight through one ear and out the other, Amelie looked like a straight up paralysis demon waiting to drag you to hell. Amelie could care less if she was going to make a friend, this boy was about as empty as a fucking lays chip bag! All air and no fucking chip!

"Sure you fucking weren't!" 

Amelie again, spat at the poor boy. It wasn't her fault that he was trying to be like a damn ken doll. Why the hell did he have his hair pull back that tightly???? His hair is going to get pulled and it's going to take the whole scalp. 

"Oh? I have a way with ficken nicknames? You have a certain vey of meeting people."

This boy looked like he wanted to cry. But, Amelie could care less. Tejal take her now because she's about to take her crutches and make sure this boy dosent know how to walk two feet without crying. Dirty child that looked like the inside of a child's colouring book! What a way to meet somebody. They fall from a tree like a wet stuffed animal and indirectly insult you! FUN!

Blood spurt from the holes the bones pulses violently from. 

"*Funny?*"

.

God this boy was a mosquito! A messed up one too. This boy would get bullied at senior bingo. That cold breeze sent a violent shiver up Amelie spine, I mean how couldn't she? There were giant gashes in Amelie because of bones! 

Another bone erupted from her bandages like a bubble of puss being exploded. A faint smell off iron introduced itself to the conversation. She was going to need to go to the hospital after this, and good riddance for that. This was a horrible night! Screw everything! Amelie's heart was going to make itself exit from her body from how stressed she was!
Dawn
The red around his arms shifted in plates, the ends melting and re-forming in stilted bursts before freezing again; they overlapped in strange ways, jagged edges roiling nervously with his guts. Faint yet insistent and *Hot* Waves of ether pushed against his neck from the inside.

*What in the hell?!*

One misunderstanding after another- Owen winced at every spat syllable, eyes scanning desperately for somewhere polite to look. Every word he said was coming out sideways and registering backwards, and this Amelie looked like she was just about ready to sneeze her skeleton out at one more push. *Shiiiittt.* He rocked back on his heels.

"I mean no harm, really- *AIE-* Gah, I'm bad at this," He yelped, utterly befuddled at how she had *Bones sticking out of her face* And still found the energy to be mad at *Him*. If he wasn't scared shitless before, he certainly was now. 

"I swear, I'm not taking a dig at you, I'm just- *Shitty at talking* So- **Cachu hwch, do you need medical attention?!**"

Ffyc.

Well, that had certainly blurted itself out, hadn't it. Too late to cram it back down his traitorous windpipe. He was totally serious, but looked downright comical- his stance had widened and so had his eyes, frozen awkwardly in place. He was beginning to wonder if this was some sort of fever dream. That, too, was written all over his face. *Quick, say something to cover that up!*

"Man, both of our powers are really sucking tonight."

*Gulp.*
Judith
The red that swirled around his arms, gently overlapping themselves like leather made Amelie's head burst in confusion. Was he a power ranger? Damn she doesn't know a word of what is happening at this place. Her head was getting dizzy and painful. 

If this was a misunderstanding she was going to the hospital. Amelie watched his frantic eyes flickering every which way like he was trying to find a way to leave. She must look like his damn best nightmare if he's looking like he's about to head straight for the bathroom.

"You *Are* Bad at this." 
He looked like a scared dog with its tail between it's legs and maybe that made her scowl falter. Maybe she pulled the stick from his brain out too far. 

"So it seems-" 
Amelie was effectively cut off by Owens burst. 

"Not yet." 

She breathes, her scroll removed by pure surprise like the boy suddenly pulled out the unmatched power of the sun from nowhere. What the hell was with this boy, he was like fifty confetti canons put into one area. He made Amelie feel like she was on more drugs than just opioids. Amelie just has a neutral stare now, how she switched was pure whiplash. Though it seems she has a slight grimace flickering from time to time. 

"Yes but, it seems mine sucks more then yours."

**She is so envious.**
Dawn
"Yeah. Yeah, it does," Quoth the scruffy boy knocking his fingers together, his tone strangely shifting to be more even. Of course it did. He hadn't met anyone whose powers sucked harder, he thought. He could scream and shred and sprint and get it out of his system; she couldn't. The *Stuck*Ness.. That had to be brutal.

They were more alike than they would initially seem; her anger, though coming from a misunderstanding, was a similar flame to his own, latently burning in its own stubborn, choking smoke and just *Waiting* For the next scuff of gunpowder to be kicked into it. Which was what he had been doing. By accident, but. Still.

"I can't imagine."

He couldn't. But he could sympathize. *How to communicate that, though...* He knew from his own experience that the last thing she would want is his pity.

A spark in his eye.

"Wanna make a terrible racket about it?" The *Clink*Ing sound coming from his hands grew more rapid. "It's night- people will think it's all just a dream." An earnest look in his eyes, permeating through the childlike twinkle. "I.. Suspect you're out here for similar reasons to me, is all."

There went nothing. 

Owen was starting to get antsy; he wasn't trying incredibly hard to calm his power, but the fact that his efforts hadn't been working was unsettling him more and more. The slightest surge of adrenaline on a bad day, and he was radioactive rock candy- the conscious mind argued futilely with the primal, and (especially at this hour) it made him want to scream until all the hot air and needless nerves unwound into steam in the cold darkness. 

So, why not?
Judith
Amelie teeters on her crutches slightly, rocking herself back and fourth. She made a noise of affirmation in the back of her throat at what Owen said, although it was weak it was still the equivalent to a nod. 

Amelie was a weird uncontrollable fire, one moment she was burning so brightly she could engulf the world and, the next she was meager and terrified to show herself. Gods she just wanted to curl into herself and let whatever omen struck her ill body take her. She was nothing more than a rock to be stepped on in others stairs to life, nothing more than something odd to look at and move on. And, that's all she saw herself as now, No will to fight. *Nothing.* 

"Course you can't but, I do not need your pity, ***Boy.***"

Amelie let out with a hiss. The last thing she needs was pity, gods if she could push her thumbs into the eyes of everyone who looked at her with that Stare of fake condolence, by all means she would. She wasn't some sad circus clown and damn everyone who thought she was.

.

Amelie's frustration was building again and the veins in her hands seemed to look like they were stretching and moving, every finger twitching and crying out to snap themselves in odd positions to bring it's owner pain, the agony to forget. 

Amelie looked at the boy with a frustrated eye that quickly settled at his proposition. 

The clinking filling her eardrums with an odd static that washed through her ears, it at least one of them, the other was covered by gauze. There was this stare in his damn eyes that made her want to go along with his little plan, as odd as it was, she just met him after all. 
"I was here to pass ze time. Have a moment for myself, which I suspect that yes, you vere doing that also."
Amelie lets a breath whistle through her teeth. 
"Before you... Fell from ze tree." 

Amelie lets the moment sink before she answers, letting his words roll around in her head like a marble that hit nothing. 

This boy seemed a little hyper as if he'd been cradling this energy for *Years*. Amelie looked at his face seemingly searching for something, a checkmate to a lie, that in a moments notice he'd flip on a dime and laugh at her. But, there was nothing. Maybe she could trust his word despite how his actions earlier made her doubt heavy upon her boney shoulders. 

There was a neutral looks as she answered. 

"And how do you suspect I do zat? I am basically half dead."
Dawn
Okay, this seemed to be working a little. Just a little. But, a little was a little more, wasn't it?

"Well- ehm, demonic shrieks in the dead of night practically make themselves," He tried. *Don't mansplain screaming, pric pwdin*, spat a voice in his head. *This pastime already sounds weird as hell out loud.* It really did. "The quiet's even nicer afterward."

His original plan of turning his lungs inside out from the top of that tree had been thwarted by his own clumsiness. But he was still here, still crackling at the seams, and the night was so blissfully cold and clear; it seemed a shame to waste it.

And the heat pooling beneath his skin had become unbearable, rushing in his ears and filling his senses with muggy static. He needed it *Out* Or he was certain he would never think a coherent thought again.

"I just. I need to- *Hrrghfsjflhmm.*"

Owen cut himself off by turning around and stepping away from Amelie, inconsistently aware of how little sense he was making. He shut his eyes and flexed and clenched his hands at his sides, breathing deep of the chill in the air. *Like the Mariana Trench.* Pitch-black, utterly frigid, waiting to swallow up his flares and crush the smouldering remains. Just one exhaustion, and then the pressure would blissfully cool him to sleep.

The sound tore out of him almost too fast, materializing in his chest and gaining force in his throat, cutting through the air in an arc jagged and graceless.

Beautiful.

The nervously welded plates covering the boy's arms and back finally relented, releasing their density and melting back through his skin with a cracking and a hissing. A breath sucked through gritted teeth, and there was once again cold dripping down his spine.

.

And then the woods were quiet, like he hadn't made a sound. With the shield gone, midnight engulfed the two of them once again; the younger of the two looked more like an exhausted child now, head still tilted back and hands finding each other again to worry themselves silently.

It was a relief to feel small and cold again- he wouldn't call it *Pleasant*, but a concern had been soothed.

"S-sick, right?"

The now-small and still-awkward Owen quickly turned to look over his shoulder at his odd company. The static had been cleared from his head, but it had given way for a *Lot* More self awareness than before. *What in the hell was he doing?!*

"Your turn!
*Thatis, ifyou- uh- wantto.*"

A slightly sheepish look coloured what was visible of his face. Worst came to worst, no terrible moment would last forever, right? Mam had said that. Her voice coming back to him helped some.
Judith
Amelie looks at Owen with a comically raised brow. The last time she let out a demonic Shriek was... Nevermind we won't get into that. It truly sounds strange to suddenly say out loud, maybe it was better kept in his head when his best friend there is himself. 

Amelie pieced it all together in her head that he was going to scream at the top of that tree like he was a Disney prince, this boy confused her to no end. The air was nice, it was truly a peaceful night, it was a shame that they were here disrupting it. 

It deserves to be disrupted, what was she thinking. 

Though she hadn't said anything she nodded her head in a most sagely manner as if he was speaking the words of the gods. The glow of the boy had become almost unbearable, she was squinting at him as if he was a object an old woman found. This boy was like popping wrapper! It was annoying! She announced joyously in her head. 

The boy was sounding like he was either going to have a stroke or a seizure, for Amelie's comfort she hoped for the former. The air was cold, almost uncomfortably so but, she assumes, it was better like this. Why was this so crucial to him? Also it's been ages since Amelie was outside comfortably. Amelie watched him like he was about to do some big stunt, and quite possibly he was!

Though the sound was less than she thought.

.

Amelie snorted, the bones in her faces contorting into curving lines instead of jagged spikes. Blood covering the left side of her face like a loving blanket. Gods he sounded like a prepubescent cat! It was God awful. 

Amelie let out a peal of laughter, she snorted heavily which devolved into coughing. That little show left Amelie looking like she was doubled over. Is she laughed anymore she'd be giving up blood instead of laughter. Catching he breathe she stared at Owen like he grew two heads. 

The woods were silent to Amelie's self-made peril. It's uncaring eyes turning away to them both, if silencer is what they want, it is silence they will get. Owen looked small and worried and well, he is. 

But, the looked rather well, that was something good. 

"Uh! Killer!"

She chirped. They're both odd little people but, maybe they could be better. Amelie watched his eyes widen as he looked more sheepish than ever. This was good company at least. 

"I! Maybe!" 

It was her turn to look spooked. Amelie didn't think this would turn out too bad. Maybe they could even be friends.

She stared at her feet for a second. She looked to Owen and asked him to turn away. She looked like a dumb little penguin. Too scared to do anything. 

The spikes within her head turning jagged once more. Bones violently curled and snapped in her body, her body twitching. Her jaw tensed, everything seemed like it's own type of pain. Bones seemed to curl and beg to be let out from torn skin under her collar. 

Her tensed her jaw and looked at the sky, it was a second. 
Then she let out a scream, it was actually quite melodic really. It was laced with tones of sorrow and pain, much like a howl of a grieving animal, something beyond the boy perhaps. 
 
Bones burst from her collar in tribal looking spikes, she breaths heavily, wheezes let out periodically. 

She looks to Owen, Amelie looks utterly bewildered with a small open smile. Next, Amelie is letting out a breathless laugh.
Dawn
*She's laughing!*

Even the weakest, roughest laughs were incredibly contagious to Owen- a lopsided grin broke out across his face, his eyes crinkling half shut as the corners of his mouth were drawn up. Amelie's laugh, as far as he could tell, was genuine- it was heavy and pained and scratched in strange ways but it was *Hers*, and it was real. 

..So what if it was because he was being just a little bit ridiculous. He could roll with that. Neither could claim to be the least strange person in the woods that night- what a curious little comfort.

"Okay, okay," He giggled, turning around and planting his hands on his hips. Boy, his shoulders were getting cold. Whew.

*Whoa.*

Amelie's scream was a primal wave of fury, one that rattled something deep in his bones. It bounced around in its skull after it had finished erupting, his ears reeling from being blasted by a volley of fire straight from some miserably smouldering circle of hell. 

"**SIIIIICK.**"

Owen bounced jubilantly on the front pads of his feet, fists blurring in the low light as they rammed excitedly against his hipbones. Not only was that epic, but he had *Not* Been expecting the energy to be reciprocated- against the perpetual tittering of the voice in his head telling him to slow down, Owen's thoughts were flooded with sparks, lighting torches along what he hoped were long and happy halls. A faint squeal eked it's way out of his throat. Couldn't be helped.

His energy hiccuped, however, when he spun on his heel to face her again. *Was that normal?!* Lady Death seemed to be closer to ripping out her own heart here than some painted soul- the sight jarred him for a moment, the reality that *This girl's bones were ripping through her skin and bleeding their horror all over her* Finally registering properly in his head. For all his virtues, this sweet boy was really slow to catch up sometimes.

.

But.. She seemed just as befuddled as him? The inky darkness pooled deeply under her eyes as it dripped down her face and ran down her collar, and she was looking at *Him* For some reason. 

That same strange, sorrowful laugh. 

He was both hopelessly confused and understanding completely, the sounds of twisting bones and anguished howls and precious laughter burning into his mind as he filed them away to pore over later, when he was certain that this encounter wasn't a dream. They were very different people, but something stupid and angry and *Really* Fucking funny sang itself in the same key.

"*Agh*, that was mad," He marvelled, stepping a little closer to see her face clearer. The gore barely struck him as real in the low light, fear simply made into strange curiosity in the low lamplight.

"Are you, ah, alright? Well, more not-alright than is generally accepted?"

*Nice sentence. 10/10 for being a thing people say. Too nosy? Reading invisible ink that wasn't there like he thought it was?*

*Esgob annwyl*, somebody please come and shut his brain off for five minutes.
Judith
Gods it was a blurred moment for Amelie, she didn't know what was going on. All she could hear was faint giggles and noises from the rather odd and faintly dimwitted boy. She hasn't felt like this in a while. Such an odd mix of dulled pain and wonder. 

That scream took a lot from the girl, perhaps it even took her train of thought as well. 

Blood splattered and mixed with the floor beneath her. It all but swirled in her eyes in a disgusting mess of ichor. She was going to be sick, her brain messed with her so badly that her room upon that day was sinking into her vision. Oh how she pulled herself to beg and to grab at anything to help her but, there was nothing. Nothing to help her nothing to be there. 

Owens cry of jubilation made her stare blankly at Owen. It was one of those 1000 yard stares, so utterly disconnected from the world that no amount of running would get her back from the hell hole she dug herself into. 

His squeal stopped perhaps when he finally laid his innocent dopey eyes upon her battered and disgusting form. 

Blood leaked down her features and ichor slowly drew past her one eye. The light perhaps behind her casting her form in an odd glow. The whites of her eye bright while the inky void of her iris sinking further into the emotionless confines of her damaged mind.

.

A shaky smile hit her features, a garbled laugh hitting her form. She was a mess but, she hasn't been this delighted since Tejal had taken the poor corpse-like girl into her arms. 

She was genuinely overwhelmed with *Something*. By everything above she didn't know what but, she was going to take it while it lasted. 

Everything just seemed dark about her, the girl seemed too far gone in her own eyes. Her laugh broken and scattered, perhaps she wasn't as happy as she thought. 

Something hot dripped down the girls face, tears but she didn't want to try and find out for herself. Her body shook as she took one heaving, laughing breath after another. 

"Oh truly?" 
Her voice came out raspy and almost sad. The gore seemed to only get worse, flesh tearing and mending with every second. Yet Amelie seemed blissfully ignorant. 

"I have no idea. I have no idea and I'm alright with that for now."

Her voice echoed in a broken mantra, her mind was scattered. What was this? Oh she was going to pass out. 

Blood dripped onto the floor or onto her shirt which was soaking in blood like a sponge, everything about her seemed either void or red. The blood that didn't land onto her shirt pooled into a forming puddle beneath the poor girl, she was going to pass out soon.

The poor girl was heaving her own lungs. Blood dripped onto the the eye's whites as she stared at the boy, bones shifting and tearing, it's reddish white contesting against the almost sea of blood that was now the girl.

Tw: for body horror!
Dawn
*Ffyc, ffyc, ffuc,*
"**Ffyc.**"

Yeah, from what Owen was getting, Amelie was not as ok as she would like him to think. 

Without a further thought to how good of an idea it was, he lunged forward to steady her. His hands landed on her shoulders at first, palms hitting sturdy leather (damn, this was a nice jacket) that *Definitely* Had something moving beneath it. That something was not muscle. Something tingled in his own ruined shoulder; gah, it probably hurt to put pressure..

Shortened, panicked breaths as the boy tried to piece helpful thoughts together.

Another bone moved beneath his hand, the motion jagged and undoubtedly agonizing, and he shifted his body closer; he attempted to lean her against his good shoulder, a surprisingly strong arm gently snaking around her back. 
*Around*, shit, this girl was *Frail*. 

"Ca-can you breathe? Ah, need to sit you down somewhere.. Bench..." He murmured frantically as he tried to situate them in a way that allowed them to get anywhere. "Courtyard has those." The green space did indeed have places to sit, and it was close. They could figure this out from there.

"Forgive me," He squeaked, making a harebrained decision if there had ever been one.

Lowering the arm supporting Amelie's back, Owen somehow manoeuvred her crutches into his other hand and gingerly slipped it behind her knees, hoisting her up with (likely adrenaline-assisted) ease. The sound of bones shifting and cracking burrowed into his ears in the damnably quiet forest, the wind in the trees now eerily silent as if to say *"Welp, looks like you're on your own here."*

.

All right. All right, bloodbath secured, now what? Right. Green space. Curling his arms a little closer just for good measure, Owen sped from lamp to lamp, his stocky frame taking long, straight strides across the forest floor. The night-shrouded grounds flew through the edges of his vision, his sights growing narrower as he got closer to his destination; low, quick, unintelligible muttering in his mother tongue rumbled from his chest.

Every stone beneath his shoes, every pained breath his friend(?) took, every shift of bone in the form curled up against his was as loud as rolling thunder; something hot and coppery pooled in the crook of his arm, nervously ignored as it dripped to the ground in his wake.

His heart, if she was in a state to notice, beat unnaturally hard against its cage. 

There- the closest bench, beneath a cherry tree, blossoms floating with an eerie stillness in the dark. Cutting through the knee-high grass, the boy hesitantly released the injured girl onto it, the wood creaking too quietly beneath the rushing in his ears- the muttering devolved into a low, stretched note as he dug the heels of his hands into his cheeks, pressing upward.

He was a bit of a mess. Loose pine needles still stuck in his hair, smudges of dirt still graced his pants, and smears of blood now cut across his arms and shirt, sticky and warm and unnerving as hell. 

His eyes, though, were fixed on her, clear as day. Dim torches, scleras lit ever so slightly, searched for a hint or a reassurance or a *"Why in the bloody hell did you just pick me up?! I'll send you right back to that detention pit with the scary science teacher!"*

*Please.*
Judith
*Everyone has something they want to keep, but few people can actually achieve that.* 

Amelie seemed like a completely dead weight within the boy's arms. Light and all too fragile. Amelie sucked in a heavy breath with practice when his hands held her shoulders to steady her. Bones moving like crashing waves under sturdy and thick leather. 

Amelie tried her best holding in a pained intake of breath at what Owen was doing, bones ruptured flesh and red ichor moved it's way to the now freshly watered ground. She wasn't *Frail*, she never hoped to be, she was strong! But, she truly wasn't, everything about her was broken and so close to shattering and crumbling at every second, more so than Amelie liked to admit. 

Amelie's breathing was harsh if anything, her breathing coming out in whispy laughter that seemed more painful than actual breathing. His frantic pleas hitting blood filled ears, her head lulled to the side, almost drunkenly. 
*Drunkenly*. She thought, awful words, those awful men that awful everything. She weakly tried to move, her arms betraying her as they shook. She'd rather be dead than labeled as, drunk of all things. 

The gore that leaked into her eyes did nothing to try and help her from what the boy did in a haphazard way to help. 

She let out a pained hiss at how she was lifted into her arms, she curled into his body though. Bones snapping and seeming to violently snap under pressure, Amelie grabbed Owens shirt, staining the poor thing with her disgusting lowley blood. Her form was oh so cold, everything felt too hard to move. 
She was cold, so so cold. She shivers.

.

All she could think about was warm nights filled with small laughs and longing smiles. Tejal... Her everything... Her **Everything**.
She remembers having her and then having nothing. When did it get this awful? This cold? When did she have nothing but an inky void instead of everything? Her fingers loosen some, her hold becoming weak as a weak shaky smile warped her bloody features. 

Amelie was curled into Owen like a lifeline, the cold hitting her fast, her form growing more faint. She wasn't registering anything at all. Amelie's eye flickered to Owen's panicked face, it was a look she was all too familiar with. All too familiar with that scared stare of lost humanity. 
Muttering hitting her like prayers that were never answered, they were never answered. 

Every snap made Amelie's body violently twitch in wretched agony in the poor boy's arms. Blood swirled into everything Owen had on like an awful waterfall. It was enough to make anybody sick. Copper and iron filled everything Amelie knew, the smell making her nauseous. 

A pulsing beat hammered against her head, causing more pain than comfort. 

The sudden wood caused the bones in her back to violently snap. Blood seeping through its nice carved structure. It was already creating a small pond under her. The boys panic, known to Amelie as she stares with a wide unblinking eye, it was still so clouded.

.

Amelie thought he looked awful. She reached out to him with a Shaky, twitching, bloody hand. 
"It's so cold." 
She said, but it was small and weak, nothing like the shouting before. 

Amelie's eye watered, shining tears blurring her already grey vision. 
"What have I done?" She questioned sorrowfully. 
Her hand clenched within the cold air. 
"I'm so sorry I put you through this." 

"There's a hospital nearby." She says with a slurred drawl. 
"Please..." She pleas with a weak cry. 

"Bring me there, she wouldn't want me like this."

She? Why did she say that? Oh how her mind was clouded with her guilty seas, Tejal would never want this. Her sea was drowning her, she was never touching the surface, *Maybe she never was in the first place.*

Her eyes grew a little heavy.
Dawn
Owen's ears strained to hear Amelie's words through her heavy accent and haze from the blood loss. *Gah, that's a lot of blood.* The cooling mess stuck his shirt to his stomach, the smell of iron cutting through the weaker presence of the dewy cherry blossoms overhead. 

Something in his stomach twisted at the sight of her; the human fear of injury, of course, but a worry wriggled through him that questioned if he could even help her- she was losing more blood than he'd ever seen come out of a person, and that scared him for many reasons. 

Her hand, though, curling in the cold, brought him back to where she was sitting. 

Gently, gently, almost painfully so, he sat down next to her where less blood was pooling, resting her head on his shoulder, ever cautious of the cool freckled cheek pressed up against his scarred shoulder. The nerve endings were still fried in the worse parts of the scar, twisted and burned flesh still undoubtedly warm against her face. 

"It's- it's alright," He murmured, quiet now, like her. She didn't do this on purpose. It was him who had pushed her, made her go too far- the storm in his gut raged harder, shaking his hands as he tried to look up the emergency number. *What in the hell was it?* He didn't have the time to worry about blood drying in the cracks of his phone's screen.

*112.*

*She?* Never mind that. Not his place to ask, he figured. 

"Wait- no- don't close your eyes.."

The phone call with the emergency services went.. Well, it *Went*. So did the ambulance ride. He answered their questions as best he could, and refused to stay behind. With how her cold hand had gripped his shirt, he guessed that she wouldn't want to be alone. Not like he was, when the sky split him and his world warped, cracked and twisted along with his body. He... Also guessed that she knew what that felt like.

.

After being checked twice over to make sure that none of that blood was his, time shifted again and he was sitting in the ambulance. They had been left for a moment, just a minute or two, Amelie curled up on a stretcher and Owen fidgeting madly with his hands as he watched her chest rise and fall. 

He leaned a little closer, just to make extra sure. 

"Amelie?"
Judith
There was little bones peaking through the gums in her mouth, blood silently pooling below her tongue. She looks at Owen with a solemn stare that just about looks through him. They both looked like they've either committed a murder or survived one. 

He looked off. Amelie let out a wheeze and spat whatever blood pooled in her mouth onto the cobbled floor. She was losing all too much, this wasn't a part of her damn power. It never will be. Unless part of her power was constantly living in agony for amend for sins she didn't commit. 

*Why was she a monument to humanities wrongdoings? Why was she an omen of wretched death? Why wasn't she dead? Oh lord? Why?*

Amelie takes a breath but halfway through shes racked with wet, painful coughs. Her body too cold for what it needs to be. Amelie looked at Owen with a silent eye, he looked worried.
It wasn't his fault. She should've known better. 

Amelie smiled, it looked more like a grimace to those who bore gaze to her dying form. The girl leaned further into the boy, he was warm where she was not. He was everything where she was nothing. How it would drive her insane if she wasn't bleeding out. 

Owen's words seemed but a backdrop to Amelie as her eye slowly surrendered to black. She felt cold, and tired. But, this reminded Amelie of... Her. Amelie wants to be best friends with him. 

Amelie was in the ambulance, her too cold hand holding onto Owens shirt ever so tight. But, *It loosened*. Amelie's hand fell and promptly landed into his hand. It was weak but her hand tried to squeeze his. Her eye shining with unshed tears.

"Stay. Please... We're best friends forever... Right?"

It was soft and weak and losing all familiarity with her voice. Her mind broke her mind thinking this was Tejal, her one and only. It was too blurry, she couldn't see it was choking. 

Bones shifted and burst from that hand violently.

*Then Amelie's hand went cold, her hand dropping as the doctors panicked.*
Dawn
At the slightest sign of Amelie moving, *Saying something*, Owen's exhaustion-dulled senses focused. A hot, muggy pressure built behind his eyes, something tight and blinding gripping his sinuses and tugging insistently at the corners of his mouth. If he cried now, Owen was near-certain that the tears would curl off of his face as steam, leaving trails of salt to streak his cheeks. 

It wouldn't, but it sure felt that way when she reached for his hand again, blind eye seeing.. What *Was* She seeing? Surely, it wasn't him anymore. Still, his slippery, blood-stained hands curled around hers, cold and skeletal, offered to whatever she though she saw. 

*Selfish..*

*Selfish, reprehensible, unworthy*, cried the harpies flapping around the melting expanse of his mind. Was he really so low as to lurch for any and all hands that stretched in his direction? Gah, who was he, to loosely lace their fingers together anyway, to take this gesture for himself that was intended for another, no doubt far, *Far* From here. Many a scared little boy has done the same. 

Regardless.. He recalled doing the same, in an ambulance not all that different from this one, his hand reaching for the same comfort and landing on nothing. 

He hoped for both of their sake that that eased her pain, just a little. 

When she spoke, everything happened at once- his power leapt from his hands as hers lurched from her own, and a strangled sound jumped from his throat as hot tears streamed down his blood-and-dirt-smudged face. Hands were on him and hands were on her and then-

.

Time had shifted again, and Owen was folded up on an uncomfortable chair next to a bed and a mess of machines, staring at the form taking pained but steady breaths in the middle.

In a plastic bag gripped to his chest was his shirt, the blood long dried and crying out for the bottle of stain remover sitting back in his room. A few strands of dishevelled auburn hair stuck to his face, damp from either sweat or his shaky attempt to clean himself off; likely both. Dark smudges sat beneath his eyes, which were bloodshot and heavily lidded.

He had dug a suitably soft jumper from the lost and found, though even then it was dubious at best- he hunched over a little further to keep the cold zipper from his chest, which felt like it was being torn through by a thousand frayed nerve endings puncturing his skin like needles from the inside. Hunger gnawed at his stomach, but he didn't feel like hospital food; keeping himself awake still took a lot, though, and the furnace usually raging in his torso had cooled to steady embers from the lack of fuel and rest. 

In one of his ears, an earbud played an old song that he had selected in a haze. The title escaped him at the moment, but the sounds were familiar and grounding. His phone would likely die soon, but this was more important. His other ear, though it complained about all the jarring and unpleasantly overlapping hospital noises, listened vigilantly for any signs of life from Amelie. 

It had been a while. A more well-rested Owen would have been tapping and humming up a storm, but the dog- tired boy simply sat, breathed, and listened.
Judith
Amelie laid motionless in the sterile room, her breathing so light it almost seemed she was not. But, her monitor betrayed her barely. Even its beat was faint. The girl looked so shrunken and deathly looking. But, she looked peaceful. Nothing is what it seems at least. 

The sterile white blinding and undoing of all that stand against its colours. But, it was Amelie who blended in too well, as if she was meant to die. 
And she was at birth yet it seems life was a sick bastard. 

Amelie covered in bandages from head to toe, masking wounds of the girl's own design. Her eye closed in a possible endless sleep. To once think this girl was full of life was jarring. Something so joyous reduced to a pathetic shell. 

It was almost too silent. Almost as if Amelie was alone, and truly? The girl was, and that is all she will be. Cast aside for a sin she never committed, hated for something she never asked for. 

Curses that Amelie was nothing but a worthless Omen to everything and everyone, all carelessly thrown at the very object of her hatred. Her drunken mother said and Amelie knew it was what her mother truly thought. Amelie tried to walk away but, bottle met head and Amelie ran out from her house.

Just into the waiting arms of somebody. A warped face that Amelie knew and begged for. Lost and reduced to blood on the floor that Amelie curled up to many a night, waiting on a cold floor hoping that just by some what Tejal would magically come back. It was all Amelie's fault.
.

.

Yet after everything Amelie still made songs, she danced, she tried to make everyone happy. She was a people pleaser or at least tried to be. Yet the poor girl always ended up alone. 

But, it was all Amelie's fault, she was an omen. A worthless child made to be fodder. That's that she was meant to be, and she took everyone away from everyone instead. If only she had died at birth... Everything seemed dark already. Where was she? 

Was she sleeping? Was she simply comatose? The air suddenly felt choking. The noise of the monitor is so loud. It hurt her ears and made everything warp into fantastical red.

*Was there something here? Somebody, someone please.*

There was a nurse by Amelie's side, checking her.
When Amelie's heart rate began to spike the nurse told Owen to leave immediately and go back to where he came from. 

Maybe the girl will be okay another time. Or perhaps she never will be. 

Here's to hope.

——————————-(ended)————
THANK YEW WWW FOR DA ROLEPLAY SHAWTY
Dawn
AAAAAARRGZGDNFGMGJHH THANK *YOU* <333