crossing_lostrp | [Ami] Day 11: Tending Open Wounds (tag Mara,open)

OOC: Bumping from [Lucy] Day 11: Making Her Escape due to maximum comment/replies reached.

Edited 16 May 06 to add: Maximum Posting Limit of 75 has been suspended for this thread.

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Ami ducked into Mara's shelter as Tommy and Jon made their way to the cookfire area. As they departed, her stomach grumbled a bit, reminding her that she hadn't eaten yet this morning. Tommy and Jon were too far away without shouting for them, and shouting might disturb Mara and she wasn't willing to leave the young woman alone. She figured she'd suffer through for a while longer; it wasn't like she would die of starvation in a few hours time.

Kneeling by Mara's bed, she hesitantly reached out and placed her hand lightly on the woman's forehead. Dropping her shields just a bit, she focused solely on Mara, wincing again at the rents and tears in the woman's shields. Beneath that, she was disturbed, and mentally and psychically exhausted. Ami wasn't connected to Mara the way she was to Megabyte, Mara not being a Tomorrow Person, but she thought she would try to reinforce the woman's shielding a bit anyway. The worse that would happen was nothing and the best was that Mara might sleep a bit easier, even if Ami couldn't take away the horrors she'd already experienced.

It took a few minutes of concentration, and Ami felt a wee bit more tired herself when it was done, but she'd managed to connect with Mara on the very surface and reinforce her shielding – filling in some of the gaps. It wouldn't hold for long, a day at the most, but hopefully it would give the other woman some comfort.

Done with what she could do, Ami leaned against Mara's bed and waited for Tommy and Jon to return.

Current Mood: determined

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From:

sophiedb.livejournal.com

Claire decided that she liked having Damon's arm round her shoulder and leaned into the warmth, feeling decidedly better than she had done a minute ago. There was still that chill from.. *shudder*.. but if she still had a decent friend on this pile of sand, despite everything she'd said and done, things were looking up.

"How some people can get away with an instant tan while we poor sods have to make do with infinite peeling doesn't make sense either," she joked quietly, then chewed her lip as she remembered Lucy's death. "I'd really like to know where all this fits in the great plan though, if there is one. Sometimes it feels like I got a raw deal in life, then along comes something else that makes me think I must have it easy after all.

"I don't want to sound ungrateful or anything, but how come I get to have a good mate like you despite everything while poor Lucy gets.." Claire waved her free arm vaguely in the direction of the reef, then leaned her head on Damon's shoulder as the inner shivering returned. Never mind the fact that Lucy'd been stand-offish at best, it just seemed like such a waste. "She survived the crash for what? This? Because it was 'her time'? It's not right. It's not fair."

She shrugged as best she could, sniffing a little. "Don't worry 'bout answering that. I know there isn't one. It's just.. crap. All crap."

From:

fikgirl.livejournal.com

If he lowered his shields, he could feel the emotional tide of the camp, a clear demonstration that emotions were running high all around. He narrowed his concentration, focusing just on Claire, noting her sadness and confusion, although he didn't need to call upon any kind of empathy to pick up on that. Claire cared a lot more than a lot of people, which meant that she would hurt a lot more and feel a great deal more sympathy at a time like this.

Not that he didn't as well. His eyes were drawn again to the reef and he suppressed a shudder as he forced his attention elsewhere. That was a waste, as much as Eric's death. Surviving a plane crash to die in a raid by the feral Neanderthals, or surviving a plane crash to end up killing yourself? Which was worse? Did it make that much difference? Things weren't so bad here that a person should want to take their own life, so what would cause Lucy to have made such a decision?

(Stop analyzing,) Megabyte chided himself. (Lucy's gone, it's the fallout that has to be dealt with now.)

"When I was at MIT, there was guy, Jack, who had everything," Megabyte started talking quietly, absently rubbing Claire's shoulder. "We thought he had everything. He was the smartest one, always had a girlfriend or a date, rich parents, Pentagon, Department of Defense, NASA, all of them were begging for him and he was only a sophomore. In his second year," Megabyte clarified.

He didn't go on to describe how a few late night partiers had found Jack dangling from a tree by a necktie; Claire didn't need that bit of description. She was bright, she would make the connection and know where his story was going.

"After he was gone, we kept trying to figure out why, because it didn't make sense. It didn't seem fair that someone like Jack was unhappy or dissatisfied with his life. It didn't change the fact that it happened." Megabyte rested his head against hers. "I don't think that it's ever fair or that it ever makes sense. It is all crap. I agree with you there."

They sat in silence for a few moments, and it was certainly more comfortable, if infinitely more sad, than the last silence between them. Somehow, in the face of this morning's tragedy, yesterday's tension between them seemed far away. Megabyte realized that Claire was doing her best to avoid looking out towards the reef, just as he was.

"I think we need a change of venue," Megabyte suggested quietly. "Let's take a walk or something. I promise, no strolls through the jungle today, just . . ." His gaze drifted towards the reef, and he looked away hurriedly. He gave her a close, platonic hug, then stood up and offered her his hands. "Come on, let's walk over to the stream. Or something. Maybe get you some breakfast.

"No arguments. I know you probably don't have an appetite, and I don't have one either, but you need to eat. Just a little something."

"Going through the motions, then?" Claire asked softly.

"Sometimes it's all we can do."

From:

sophiedb.livejournal.com

Resigned to reality, Claire let Damon help her up and dusted off all the sand before giving him a quick hug back. The thanks in that squeeze should be clear enough to anyone with half a brain, she decided, psychic or not, and she wouldn't have taken the well-meaning hint about looking after herself so well from anyone else here - not even the doctors.

"Breakfast sounds good," she replied quietly. "I've got some fruit in the tent, and the others should be awake by now."

Claire sniffed a little more when she saw how many other people were up and about now, mostly in groups of two or three and headed over to the cookfire - or 'town square' as Charlie had jokingly called it the other day. Sure enough, Rose was sat outside looking very philosophical as she darned while Sue had run out to get them both some water. Her ladyship, the elderly woman informed them dryly, was still resting her eyes.

"I guess they're having a meeting up by the fire then?" Claire commented when she'd retrieved a couple of bananas and an apple from her bedside.

"Uh-huh," Rose nodded. "I'm sure the news will trickle down though. Such a shame though, she was a sweet child."

I wouldn't know, Claire realised. They'd met fairly often, even had the odd chat about footy, Vegemite and other things they missed from home, but it was all superficial stuff. It was just like Damon said - shy or not, there'd been more going on in Lucy's head than she'd let on.

"You want to go to this meeting thing?" she asked Damon, not sure whether she did or not. "I guess this does put a few more things on the day's to-do list than simply 'find food'. Maybe we should take a raincheck on that walk for now."

From:

fikgirl.livejournal.com

Moving away from the shoreline and closer into camp had seemed like a good idea at the time, however surrounded by the air of sadness that permeated the main camp, Megabyte was questioning the wisdom of that particular move. But Claire did need to eat, and she hadn't needed to continue sitting in the sand staring out at the reef.

He considered Claire's question about the meeting and his answer carefully. Truthfully, he really didn't know if he wanted to be surrounded by people in shock, filled with sadness, or - and the one he was really worried about - people who just plain didn't care. Megabyte had a good idea of what the meeting would entail: an announcement of Lucy's death, probably whether or not there would be a funeral or memorial and lastly, a reminder that life went on. Suicide, cancer, death by natural causes, the words that came after were typically the same.

Unfortunately in this situation, life going on was particularly important. There would still be food to forage for, and the general surivival of everyone else would have to be considered.

"Honestly, I don't know," he told Claire. "If you want to go and feel like you need some company, I'll go with you, though."

"I'm not sure if I'm going myself," Rose spoke up. "Nothing's going to be said up there that hasn't been said before. There'll be talk of retrieving the body of course and probably a burial. I'll say a few words if that's the case, don't think anyone knew the child all that well."

Megabyte felt a twinge of guilt at that. It was certainly true that he hadn't known her very well at all. She was just a face in the crowd to him, as were many of the other survivors. If he didn't need to get close to them, then he didn't. He wondered if that was a good thing or a bad thing.

"It's up to you," Megabyte continued. "If not, we can keep Rose company, I'm sure she won't mind."

"I'm always up to good company, especially at a time like this," the older woman agreed solemnly. She looked pointedly at both of them, "There's no rule saying that you have to go. Nothing about etiquette and politeness now. Just do whatever it is that feels best and most comfortable for you."

From:

sophiedb.livejournal.com

Claire nodded slowly. It wasn't like they were going to hear anything new at this meeting, and.. well.. moping around was something she'd been doing way too much of recently. That's what it felt like anyway. She needed something to do.

"Back to Plan A then: walk," she decided, shooting an apologetic glance in Rose's direction. "Not that it wouldn't be great to sit and chat for a while, but doing something useful rather than dwelling, that's what feels best and most comfortable. So.. walking, maybe get some some more breadfruit, mangoes.."

"I'm doing something useful!" Rose protested mildly, holding up her needle and thread. Her eyes were twinkling though. "The sooner you younger folk realize that the better."

Claire smiled shyly. "Yeah, but been there, tried that, remember? You know what you're doing and the best I can do is buttons. Child of the throwaway society, that's me. I'm still holding out hope that we'll be rescued before the wardrobe runs out."

She grinned at Rose's amused look, then turned towards Damon and realised that he was looking a bit tense. Was that a leftover from yesterday, or this morning? With the weirdness of daily life here, either was a possibili..ty.

Claire's eyes widened briefly. Oh shit.

In the midst of everything - including being glad that he was still talking to her - she'd forgotten all about the previous day's revelations. Well not all about them, but she hadn't been bearing them in mind or anything and going by what he'd said about picking up on emotions..

A wave of concern and self-recrimination washed over her. Oh god, how could I have been so selfish?

Sticking out her hand, Claire repeated herself a little too hurriedly. "Um, yeah. Walk?"

Heh. Subtle, Littleton, she cringed. I am so crap at dealing with this island.

From:

fikgirl.livejournal.com

With his shields held loosely to hold off most of the gloom that blanketed the beach, Megabyte almost missed Claire's feelings of guilt and concern. He couldn’t quite figure out what brought on those feelings though, until she extended her hand and let her words tumble out in a rush. "Um, yeah. Walk?"

For only a microsecond, the offered hand gave him a moment's pause, reminding him of the days of awkwardness when the very prospect of holding the hand of a girl he liked would send him into a deeply scarlet blush and have sweat pooling in his palms. That was what it felt like at any rate.

(Don’t be ridiculous, you're a grown man, and you know it doesn’t mean a damn thing.) Megabyte chided himself and took Claire's hand in the spirit of friendship that it was offered.

He thought to tell her that she didn't have to worry about him, but decided against it; in some ways it was nice that he could be a bit more of himself around Claire now, but he didn't want his abilities to become the center focus and he wasn't going to draw attention to them.

Deciding where to walk was another matter. But Claire clearly wanted to do something to distract her from the goings on, and he thought distraction was a good idea. "What do you say we head down by the stream and the jungle there? There's still plenty of foraging in that direction."

Also, it was in the completely opposite direction of the patch of jungle that had caused yesterday's insanity as well as moving away from the reef.

"If you're planning on going foraging, you'll likely want to take a bag," Rose suggested. She then pushed an empty one towards them across the sand with her foot. "Like that one."

Megabyte bent down and gathered up the bag with his free hand. "Thank you, Rose." He gave Claire a boyish, playful grin, "So, upstream or downstream? Although really, there's not a whole lot downstream unless you want to play tag with Vincent."

From:

sophiedb.livejournal.com

"Yeah, cos I really like being slobbered to death in the morning," Claire chuckled dryly.

A loud voice interrupted them from inside the tent. "You people just don't know when to shut the fuck up, do you?"

"Language, Shannon," Rose scolded their grumpy - bitchy - tentmate half-heartedly. Claire sympathised - it was practically a morning ritual, these days. At least Sue wasn't around to hear it this time.

The mutterings continued until the blonde girl deigned to acknowledge the rest of the world by sticking her head out the flap and locating Claire with narrowed eyes. "So what's the big deal? And where's that stash of fruit gone?"

Claire scowled, clenching her jaw so hard it hurt. She'd only just gotten to grips with 'life goes on', bugger it. Damon's soft squeeze of her hand definitely helped though.

"Lucy.. k.. she.. She committed suicide." Hard part over. Deep breath. "And we ate the fruit."

"Jesus, so fucking selfish.." Shannon practically spat, moving most of the way back into the tent before spinning back incredulously. "Lucy's what - dead?"

Rose answered this time, putting down her darning and patting the sand beside her. "I'm afraid so sweetheart. Here, take a seat - it's a shock to all of us."

Shannon simply shrugged, that "like I give a rat's arse" back on her face as she pushed past the three of them just a little too harshly, swooping down to pick up a banana from Rose's side. "Screw that. She had a red top that matches my pumps perfectly."

Claire didn't know what to say, but the elderly woman clearly did, following the retreating back with her careful gaze as Shannon vanished towards the cookfire gathering.

"We all deal with these things in our own way, child. Let her be."

"But that was so fu-" she bit her tongue at the sight of Rose's raised eyebrows. "Callous. Shannon was way too callous."

"Maybe she knew Lucy better than we thought."

"Maybe she's just a bitch." Claire scowled, then realised that Damon was still standing with them - probably wondering which part of the oestrogen zone he'd landed in this time. She sighed, rubbing her face with her free hand and definitely not encountering any tears. "Ok, ok, we're all on edge and we really need to go for that walk. Upstream. I vote upstream."