1x1 for Lady Ligea and Red

[Lady Ligeia]

(That's fine. Take your time, college is much more important. ^^)

[Princess Porcelain]

Light could still hear Anya through his trance, though it was as if she were whispering through a terrible, static-filled audio system. Her abilities had no effect on him in this state; he couldn't move or speak as the grisly images flowed through his thoughts. He realized, if subconsciously, that while in this state he could try to make an effort to see a way to make an alternate ending. He searched the future for a way to change things for the better, reaching only a void. Perhaps he would have to find the way himself, or perhaps it wasn't possible to change it, in which case everyone would probably die. Gee, that's pleasant to know, he thought morbidly in the back of his mind. How pleasant. As the images rolled by, he began feeling a chill as if he'd suddenly been thrust into a blizzard. He was glad for the blanket Anya draped around his shoulders as he sat shivering, unable to move as grisly images of painful, excruciating deaths went through his mind.

Finally, they stopped, and Light was so shocked he fell off the couch in a daze, hitting his head on the coffee table and not even feeling it because of the intense throbbing behind his eyes, now clouded over with darkness. When the darkness cleared and the throbbing stopped, he felt it -- it felt like someone had stuck a white-hot nail through the back of his skull. He reached back to feel the wound and drew his hand back, filled with a pool of fresh, red, warm blood. His blood. He got up quickly and found himself a towel and an ice pack to hold against his head. He then sat on the couch and looked at Anya, confused as he stared out the window at the sun going down. "How long have I been out?" he inquired. "The sun was still up when the trance started."

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Moka sighed as she turned off the Wii, staring out the window at the sky, barely lit with the orange glow of the sun sinking below the horizon. She remembered the blood red sunrise that morning and knew what it meant. "Rain tomorrow," she stated as she took in the wispy clouds that still hung up in the sky. Mares' tails, her father would call them. He was a sailor, and he had all kinds of weather proverbs, most which were true. For example, "Red sky in the morning, sailors' fair warning. Red sky at night, sailors' delight." The sky was red this morning, which was a sign that a storm was on its way. "Mares' tails and mackerel scales make ships take in their sails." Clearly female horses these days had an excess of tails; plenty were in the sky now. She'd seen mackerel scales -- tiny, puffy white clouds about the same height as the wispy cirrus clouds -- just yesterday as she was walking around town. A storm would be here very soon, and that wasn't the least of their problems. Over the past few months, Moka had noticed a drop in the population of their courtyard, which was unnatural. Once placed in a courtyard, an experiment was to be left alone until the end of his or her life unless the courtyard became overcrowded, which had never happened.

She wondered briefly if Dallas had noticed, then rolled her eyes. Of course he hadn't. He didn't notice anything that was worth noticing. She was positive that even if a giant tarantula walked into their apartment and attempted to devour him, he wouldn't notice. He'd just stay seated on the couch, reading until the poison killed him. He didn't bother to notice all those times he made her cry when they were together. After awhile, she'd gotten over it, decided she wasn't having it, and changed completely. One might say she was the polar opposite of the girl she had been when she first met Dallas. Bubbly, pink-haired, green-eyed Moka was gone, replaced with a newer, better version, one that wouldn't get hurt, wouldn't cry, and would beat the crap out of anyone who angered her instead of sitting in a corner pouting about it. Moka stopped her train of thought and sighed. "Guess I better get up and make dinner." With that she got up and made tomato soup, enough for both herself and Dallas to have at least two servings and still have leftovers. She didn't invite Dallas to come to the table, though; she simply sat and ate, waiting to see if he would notice that dinner was made. Probably not, she thought, giving a humorless snort. I suppose we'll see about this, Mr. Bennet.

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Ed shifted into a human, grabbing Lady's hand and running toward the elevator with her. "I have no idea. But we need to get back to the apartment as soon as possible. I'll get Light and his mate from next door and then we'll discuss it." He half-led, half-dragged Lady to the elevator in his rush to get to the apartment, impatiently pressing the UP button several times in quick succession until a ding was finally heard and the elevator opened, upon which he rushed inside quickly.

[Princess Porcelain]

Bump.

[Lady Ligeia]

Anya stared at the television until her eyes were bleary, but nothing that she watched was processed in her mind. She had only the vaguest idea of what was going on. She was thinking, worrying, rather, of what would happen if both she and Light ever went into trances. It was idle, pointless thoughts that lead her no to conclusions other than a minor headache. She didn't turn around until after she heard the awful crash of Light falling into the coffee table directly in front of the couch. She froze for just a moment before Light got up and took care of his own wound.

She was silent until Light asked how long he had been out. She glanced out the window at the orange sunset. "I'm not sure exactly,"Anya replied, glancing around in search of a clock. "At least an hour and a half, maybe two." She debated over whether or not she should ask him about what he had seen. Not once had she ever told anyone about one of her own trances, but she had also never been with someone that she would remain with for the rest of her life. She considered asking a relatively safe, "Do you want to talk about it?", but curiosity overcame tact, and the question she actually asked him was far closer to "Well, what was it? Was it bad?"

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Dallas set the book on the arm of the couch, still a little angry at the ending of the novel, which had still somehow managed to shock him even a second time. It wasn't until he rose that he noticed Moka at their kitchen table, and smelled the tomato soup. He was surprised to see that she had made enough for both of them. He fixed himself a goo sized bowl, the soup sprinkled with melting mozzarella and a few pinches of thyme. He sat in the chair diagonal from Moka, instead of the one furthest from her. "Thanks," he muttered, then added, "for the soup. It's good." Dallas scowled at himself. Why can't you ever say something intelligent? You come off like a fool.

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Lady wordlessly nodded, too nervous to speak clearly. She always kept a calm, level head in emergencies, or when she was nervous. Her aunt had always told her that she would make a good nurse because of that. I hope that Light or his mate- what's her name? Anna? Anita? Oh, it doesn't matter! I just hope that they have some idea of what to do about all of this! Her strength was in carrying out careful plans, and going through them with a fine-toothed comb to ensure that they were sound, not creating those plans. And the fact rang true, whether the problem at hand was involved something insignificant, like laundry, or if it was a matter of life and death, like the one at hand.

[Princess Porcelain]

[Sorry it took so long. I have had no muse lately and I've been so busy you wouldn't believe it.]

Light merely sat on the couch, processing what he'd just seen. Depressing thoughts floated around in his head like ghosts on the fabled Flying Dutchman, scaring the living daylights out of him. Morbidly, he thought to himself, No, Davy Jones is probably a lot less scary than those visions. He disliked the thought of anyone dying without a cause; in his opinion murder was worse than death itself. He didn't understand how serial killers could live with themselves knowing they'd done those horrible things to innocent people. When Anya answered his question, he was extremely shocked. Two hours? Really? The longest trance he'd been in to date -- not including the one he'd escaped just now -- had been about twenty minutes long. He shook his head slowly, stopping soon after as it made him dizzy. He'd probably lost too much blood. Not that it mattered. At this point, nothing really mattered except finding a way to make things right so that no one would die. The sheer injustice of it all made his blood boil, but what really made him seethe with rage was the fact that he couldn't seem to find a way to fix things. Either everyone would die, or...Well, there didn't really seem to be an alternative, unless he could induce a trance and force himself to see events leading up to all the deaths so that he could possibly stop them from happening. Then again, he'd heard about other experiments who had tried to play with fate...In the end, the fact that they had tried to stop what happened from happening was what had made it happen. So maybe not intervening would work? He mentally shrugged and outwardly sighed in frustration.

He heard, if only barely, Anya's question. Any deeper in thought and her words would have missed his ears completely. His brain went into panic mode and he tried not to show it outwardly. Should he tell her? He wasn't entirely positive that they could use their abilities to intervene and if they couldn't then he saw no reason to make her live in fear, knowing that at some point in the future they were all going to die. Still, she could read his mind, so if she was really curious she could just find out what he was thinking and then she'd realize what he'd been hiding. Then again, he also hated to lie, so maybe he could just evade the question. Technically speaking, if he did that, he wouldn't be lying. Plus, he wouldn't be scaring the living daylights out of anyone but himself. He took a deep breath before answering her query, putting together in his mind what he wanted to say. "I'd rather not say," he finally stated. He cussed himself out again mentally, hoping that his statement hadn't made it painfully obvious that he'd seen something that boded ill for everyone they knew. Then she'd just keep asking questions until she got the answer she desired, or worse yet, read his mind and see everything for herself. That in itself would probably be enough to give her nightmares for months on end. I any case, he knew he wouldn't be going to bed before midnight for a while.

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Moka shrugged as she listened to what Dallas had said, not really desiring to say much. Still, she figured it would be polite to say something. What, though? I've got nothing to say, she thought to herself. Maybe she ought to tell him about her recent investigations? Lately, she'd noticed the drop in the population and wondered if Dallas had too. Most likely he hadn't, though, as he rarely left the house anymore. Moka, on the other hand, was nearly always out, whether she was at the gym, shopping, on a date, or searching for answers. As well as the sudden drop in experiments, she had noticed that there were considerably more scientists hanging about above ground, which she thought rather odd as they mainly worked in the cells with their little "lab rats" -- that was the slang term for the un-mated experiments down below among her and her friends. She didn't pity them -- really, she envied them. Love was cruel and in a place like this impossible to keep alive. Sometimes, she wasn't entirely positive it actually existed, though at one point she had thought of Dallas as her Prince Charming and her "true love", even though she was old enough to know that she shouldn't believe in fairy tales. Nowadays, Moka didn't see love as a real thing -- it was merely an idea that people had made up to describe a feeling that never lasted and always hurt. It wasn't a good thing, either. It was a cruel, evil thing and should have been considered a form of torture.

Moka pulled herself from that train of thought just in time to keep her eyes from watering. She would never allow Dallas to see her crying, not ever. Ever since they'd called it off she had tried to forget that anything had ever happened between them, trying to ignore the pain and just force herself to get over it. Sometimes she still felt it anyway, and at that point she'd go off by herself somewhere and find something -- or someone to strangle. There was just too much anger and hate built up inside her, and sometimes it just exploded -- most of the time on Dallas, but sometimes on other people as well. Maybe that was the reason she didn't have many friends. Then again, she wasn't really the social type anymore, so that might be a reason. Whatever her problem was, she had to deal with it herself. It was no one else's problem and therefore no one else should be required to give her a solution. She would do it herself and the point at which she decided she couldn't was the point at which she would quit trying. She hadn't reached that point yet and would thus continue on in silence and pain. After nearly ten minutes without speaking, Moka finally looked over at Dallas, trying not to appear too friendly so she wouldn't give him the wrong idea. "So, have you noticed all the disappearances lately?"

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As soon as Ed made sure Lady was in the apartment, he went to retrieve Light from the apartment next door. He knocked on the door, waiting for a response.

[Princess Porcelain]

Bump?

[Lady Ligeia]

((Sorry for my extremely long absence, I've been excessively busy lately between having to write my term paper, guitar lessons, and play rehearsals. I should be more active now that I've turned my paper in, though ^^.))

Anya stared at Light as he answered, her eyes full of both curiosity and scepticism. He was hiding something from her, and, whatever it was that he had seen, clearly involved her, probably directly. She would find out what he had seen, the only question was how. She could state directly that she would find out, whatever means she had to use, but that could easily backfire, and just serve to put him on edge. She could feign that she had accepted Light's answer, but he would more than likely see through that. There was also the possibility of trying to guilt him into telling her. It would be easy enough, with fewer drawbacks than her other potential plans. And even if guilt didn't work, she could more than likely use one or more of her abilities to find out the answer.

"Fine then," Anya turned away from him, her thin arms crossed against her chest. "You don't have to tell the woman you'll be spending the rest of your life with anything, especially not something that clearly involves her life and future." She was striding back to her bedroom, refusing to glance back in Light's direction even after she heard the rapping at their front door.

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Dallas did not answer for a few long seconds after Moka had broken the uncomfortable silence. He hadn't noticed it on his own, but, if he thought about it, there were considerably fewer experiments out lately, and more scientists than he had ever seen before. Rising to refill his empty soup bowl, he finally replied. "I have noticed; it's very odd. Where do you suppose everyone is?" He asked, careful to keep his tone as brisk and nonchalant as he could, despite the waves of conflicting emotions rolling over him.

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Lady paced in front of the locked and bolted apartment door, feeling more like a bundle of nerves than a human. She did not even bother trying to reassure herself with repeated phrases about how everything would be alright, or vainly scrambling to find a harmless explanation for what the scientists had been doing. Her pacing grew quicker and more frenzied the longer Edward was gone.

[Princess Porcelain]

[I can understand that. Between trying to finish up final papers for college, piano lessons, Civil Air Patrol and now trying to start up a show rabbit breeding business I've been so busy I've barely had any time to even glance at my CS stuff.]

Light rolled his eyes as he watched Anya walk away. "Don't overreact, dear," he said sarcastically in a tone that clearly stated his inability to understand most women. He got up when he heard knocking at the door and almost jumped out of his skin when he saw a face from the past in front of him. "Ed? What brings you here?" He'd seen his old friend around town once or twice over the past couple of days, but by the way he noticed his buddy swooning over his new mate, he assumed they wouldn't be seeing each other much even though they lived next door to each other. The expression on Ed's face told him that something was wrong, very wrong indeed. "You look terrible. What's wrong with you?"
Ed sighed. "Something's up with the scientists. Lady and I wanted you and your mate to come over so we can discuss it."
Light nodded. "I'll see what I can do. Anya's in a bad mood right now, but I'll try to talk to her. Meanwhile, I think you should probably go back to your house and hang out with Lady for awhile."
Ed nodded in return and left to go back to his apartment and Light shut the door behind him, sighing as he sauntered over to the bedroom door. "Anya, you should come out now. Ed says he wants us to meet him at his place to talk about something. He says it's important."

Well, if she didn't want to listen to him, that wasn't necessarily his fault. After all, it seemed to him that she was overreacting. After all, no matter what he'd seen, was it all that bad for him not to tell her? It was his own mind, anyway. He should be entitled to share his thoughts with or keep them from whoever he wanted to. If she didn't want to come with him to see Ed, he'd just go by himself. It would be her fault and hers only and she still wouldn't know any more or any less than what she started out knowing.

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Moka shrugged, staring grimly into her bowl. Her reflection, red-tinted from the liquid, stared back up at her with a murderous glare that she hadn't intentionally been trying to display. "Maybe they're taking them someplace else. You know, building another lab somewhere." She doubted that was the case; there was still plenty of room here for experiments, so why build another lab and waste all of the space that was still available here? It was a ridiculous idea, at least in her opinion. Then again, who knew? Maybe the scientists liked to waste space and time by building a new lab to ship the experiments off to. How ridiculous, she thought. Surely they have more sense than that. She sighed, though it sounded more like an annoyed growl. In truth, she was kind of annoyed, but for once not at Dallas. It was at herself. She prided herself in having all the answers all the time, but this time there was a question she simply couldn't answer. Where was everyone going? How would she find out? At that point, a completely crazy idea struck her and she grinned like a maniac, looking up at Dallas. "We should break into the lab to find out."

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Ed walked into the apartment that he shared with Lady, closing the door and looking up at her, trying unsuccessfully to hide his disappointment with the whole situation. "Light said he and Anya would try to be here as soon as possible. They're having, um, issues at the moment." He remembered when he and Lady had first met and recalled that he had not liked her at all. In fact, he had loathed her. All he had wanted was to be paired with Winry, his childhood friend and first love. His wish was not granted, though, as when he was dragged unceremoniously out of the darkness of the cells -- all of the lightbulbs he'd had to light the place up had since exploded -- he had met Lady, who he had wished at that point would just drop off the face of the earth. Now, of course, if that happened, he would probably go insane. Now, he just stared at her, wondering in the back of his mind if they would ever have kids, and if so, what would become of them. He didn't want them to become lab rats for the scientists to run tests on -- if need be, he'd hide them from the scientists.

[Lady Ligeia]

Anya listened with interest to the conversation between Light and Ed (whoever Ed was, probably just some friend of Light's). Even with her ear pressed up to door, it was difficult to understand most of what was being said between the two. The door was thick and excellent at muffling sounds. But from their tones alone, it was obvious that whatever it was that they were discussing was important. Her mind raced with possibilities as Light headed down the hall in her direction.Quickly and as silently as she could, Anya crept from her position by the door to beside the bed. It would be better for all involved parties if Light was ignorant of her eavesdropping.

"Anya, you should come out now. Ed says he wants us to meet him at his place to talk about something. He says it's important," Light called from the other side of the door.
Anya's response was instant. "Oh, it must be very important to bother telling me about, isn't it?" Despite her words, she opened the door and joined him in the hall, taking care to glare at him with cold loathing in her eyes. Her curiosity didn't allow her to miss an opportunity to find out something that few knew about.

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Dallas sipped at a spoonful of soup, considering Moka's suggestion that another centre similar to the one that they were in now. The idea was far-fetched, though. The centre never filled to capacity, and, at this point, was far closer to empty (not that the scientists ever acted in a rational manner, but that would have been extreme, even for them). He was about to state so, but Moka spoke first.
"We should break into the lab to find out."
If he hadn't already swallowed his soup, Dallas was sure he would've done one of those spit-takes from vaudeville. His response was slow, but confidant. "Breaking into the lab is reckless, stupidly dangerous, and probably impossible. But I, for one, have nothing left to lose. Let's do it." He looked up from his soup, his grin as manic as Moka's.

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Lady listened with silent sympathy as Ed made his short report back to her. She could relate, and it wasn't just her Empathy; she remembered when she had first been paired with Ed. She hadn't been in the cells for long before being paired. Her first impression of him was of a coarse, dull stranger. It had taken them weeks to warm up to each other.

As soon as Ed finished speaking, Lady rushed from her feet to embrace him, fighting back tears. She hated how she always seemed to break under stress. She didn't speak.

[Princess Porcelain]

"Oh no, not at all," Light mumbled sarcastically. He now remembered why he had put off getting a girlfriend for so long before he had been brought here. Women were too confusing, emotional, and dramatic to think rationally and that didn't sit well with him. He wanted to at least be with someone who could think straight no matter what they were bothered by. At least if he was pissed off, he would not make a scene and start spouting emotional crap. Truthfully, he wanted to tell someone about what he'd seen, but it seemed like if someone else had known, they might try to stop it and in doing so either cause it or make something even worse happen. He had heard of it before -- those who knew the future were both privileged and cursed, being able to see what may be and not knowing whether or not it could be prevented. It could both hurt and help. It only depended on what would happen. Light thought of Tokyo, where he had been raised. He remembered when he and his girlfriend Misa had met. She was a beautiful, famous model and he was just a school kid trying hard to pass college entrance exams so he could become a detective for the NPA like his father, Soichiro Yagami. From the first day they had met, Misa had had a crush on him, though it took much longer for him to warm up to her. When they had first met, she had been surprised and a little amused to discover that his name was spelled with the kanji for "moon" but was pronounced "light". They were so happy together...

Those days would never return though, so it would be best just to move on and forget about it. Misa was just a distant memory and that was what she would remain. He was stuck here...He would have to accept that and move on with his life. Maybe he'd try to become friends with Anya, and then who knew? They might be happier together than he ever was with Misa...That possibility seemed unlikely, though, as he had been in almost perpetual bliss the entire time he had dated her. She had been everything to him...He couldn't forget about her that easily. He shook himself out of his thoughts and opened the door that led outside. "Come on," he said to Anya. "Ed lives next door. It's not that far." He gestured with his hand in the direction of the apartment Ed shared with his new wife. He wondered how they had made it in this place. It made him happy to know that they had found love, but at the same time he was jealous and somewhat curious. He didn't think he would have another chance at that kind of love unless by some miracle Misa was here too. That seemed to him the only way to find love in this God-forsaken place. But maybe his luck would change...After all, nothing is final until you die, so anything could happen. Anya was attractive, too...It was possible.

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Moka was in agreement wit Dallas for the first time in awhile...It felt surprising and yet normal at the same time. They used to talk about crazy stuff like this all the time when they were dating. Okay, maybe they had not talked about breaking into the laboratory before, but other stuff, like taking over the facility, and then the world? Absolutely. She remembered how she had felt back then. Twenty-one and reckless, she had felt like she could take on the world -- and win the fight. She could have done anything in those days, or at least she had thought so. It was unlikely that she could do anything that popped into her mind, for example, gather an army of mythical creatures and robots and take over an alternate dimension -- that would be nuts to consider. Then again, breaking into the lab was a reckless, crazy thing to do and she felt like she could do it. Maybe she should. The days when she and Dallas had been this way all the time beckoned to her like sirens from a far shore, trying to drag her back in again. She would try to ignore it, though; it was likely Dallas did not regret their breakup as much as she had. He didn't seem to really care about much; like her, he ignored a lot of the things that normal people would react to, but unlike her it seemed that he didn't even really feel an emotion connected to them -- at least if she ignored someone jumping out and surprising her, she felt a little shaken on the inside, but on the outside she was perfectly fine.

Still, she could not risk letting Dallas know what she was really thinking. She didn't want to start over with him again only to get hurt like that again. That would be much too stupid and reckless to even try. Instead, she replied to him, still grinning conspiratorially, "All right. Let's start planning." Perhaps they would even find a way to escape this place -- they could get everyone else out of here, too. They would solve this little puzzle and get all the glory that comes with uncovering a crazy conspiracy like the one that was clearly brewing among the scientists. Their first problem would be getting into the catacombs below ground -- they couldn't exactly take the elevator down to the cells. The scientists had somehow rigged it so that only they could get to the underground part of the lab via the elevator from above ground. The ground in the plaza was quite thick -- even in dragon form, she doubted she could get through it. Maybe they could find a secret way down through a hidden door or empty apartment? They would really have to do some thinking on this one. But she liked that idea -- using her brain was the best thing for her at this point. Besides, she had always loved a challenge -- it would be fun to sneak into a maximum-security lab. If need be, she could shift into a microorganism and make her way in through little cracks in the structure of the lab undetected. Or she could pretend to be a rat -- those little rodents weren't exactly uncommon in the cells. She could sneak into the cell of someone who was scheduled to be "evaluated" in the lab and hitch a ride to the lab as some kind of parasite. Once in the lab, she could hop away and then wait until the scientists left to go find someone else to torture and look through the files. She wondered if Dallas was reading her mind -- if so, did he think this was a good idea?

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Ed just stood there as Lady hugged him, wrapping his arms around her. He thought for a moment, trying to find something to say to fill the silence. "It's fine, Lady. We're going to make it. We'll find the answers and then I'll get you and Light and Anya out of here and we'll all live happily ever after." He knew what he said probably would not come true -- when was the last time anyone heard of a "happily ever after" in real life? Still, he would try his hardest to make it happen -- they would get out of here. They had to. There was just no other way to explain it -- if they didn't get out, how could they make things work? He had seen what this place had done to others and heard about it, too. People had gone crazy from living here too long -- they had turned on everyone they loved as if their entire heart and soul had been ripped out and replaced with stone. Maybe it was the stress or the insanity of this place -- or maybe it was the powers. Maybe some people just couldn't handle them and drove themselves crazy. Either way, it was clear that no one in this place was even remotely safe. There were essentially no rules -- you could kill to have the person you wanted and you could cause others as much pain as you wanted. There was nothing pleasant about it -- this was no place to start a family or raise kids. This was some kind of whacked-out mental hospital or research facility. It could never be home. Never. He wanted a better future for Lady and for any children they might have, so he had to get out. That was his only choice. He would get out and take her with him. Light was pretty smart. Maybe when he got here, they'd have some ideas.