fandomhigh | Detention, Depths of the Castle, Monday

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detention

Detention, Depths of the Castle, Monday

Morning had broken in Fandom, and another day in detention was about to begin, the same as every other day.

For the moment, things were as quiet as they probably ever got, while everyone was still resting on their cots, women on one side of the magical black cloth barrier, men on the other. Soon, those who had managed to sleep would be woken by the ever-cheerful voice of Dolores Umbridge coming from the loudspeakers, ordering them to rise. The barrier would disappear, and whatever bland, tasteless substance they were calling breakfast today would appear instead. After that, those in detention were free to do whatever they wanted ... if they could find anything to do that didn't break one of the island's rules, or that could be done while trapped away from everyone else.

But really, the days of those in detention weren't that slow. Soon enough, visiting hours would start, and there wouldn't be nearly as much boredom then.

[OCD is up, have at it!]

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Rinoa drifted towards Sookie, almost without realizing it. She didn't know if she was offering comfort, or taking it, but some of the horrible itch under her skin eased when the other girl was near.

But Sookie had too many thoughts, so she shouldn't get close. Her thoughts were going to eat Sookie's brain and not just hers. So she found a spot near-but-far where she could curl around herself and watch, looking for some sign of invitation that her presence might be welcome.

Sookie was pretty hard to sneak up on, these days. << Don't be scared, sweetie, >> she offered, holding out an arm. << It's a good day, so far. I'm here. >>

Bad days, she wasn't.

Rinoa didn't smile much these days. Sookie was one of the few who could pull them out.

"Hi," Rinoa said, crawling over eagerly. "My head's in circles and I didn't want to make your head bad, too."

Sometimes it got loud in her head. That couldn't be good for anybody else who could hear it.

"My head can't get any worse," Sookie offered softly, carefully draping an arm around her friend's shoulders. "How's your head in circles?"

This was why mornings were important. The afternoons, she fell apart. The mornings, she put people back together.

"I can feel it," she said, shuddering as she leaned into Sookie's embrace. "It wants out. It doesn't like being shut off from me. But I can't get to it. There's this ... wall. If I push on it too much my head starts to throb, but if I don't it ... it itches. It almost burns."

It was hard to think, hard to focus, and she wasn't sure she was making sense. Something was Wrong, on a deep fundamental level, and there weren't words to describe the limb she was missing.

"Your head wants to stay with you," Sookie soothed, rubbing Rinoa's back in tiny circles. "Shhh."

It was the opposite of her problem. Sookie's mind wanted to take everyone else's and retreat on itself, just a constant news feed of her peers' thoughts and her own echoes.

"Don't push it. Don't hurt yourself. They want us to hurt ourselves, honey, because then they don't have to," Sookie murmured. "Don't."

"If I ... if I could reach," Rinoa said, shivering without even realizing. "I could end this but I ... I can't."

She could rend Umbridge into separate molecules. But trying to reach through the block in her mind was enough to give her headaches, sharp spiked ones that made her nose bleed and her vision go gray.

If she were stronger, if she were more powerful, if she didn't have to stop herself from trying whenever the pain overwhelmed her ......... or maybe there was no way around it. Or maybe there was and she was just failing.

"Do you think they're still ... out there?" she asked.

The Resistance. Maybe they were all dead. No. Umbridge would have shown off the bodies.

"Raven would have told us if they were gone," Sookie said softly. "To taunt us. They're still out there."

She gently locked her mind with Rinoa's, mostly out of her own tiredness, and sent a soft wave of calm through the link. "Don't reach. You'll hurt yourself again, honey. We need you strong, Rinoa."

"So ... Squall's alive," she said, tasting the words. The little flicker of hope they gave her. Hope was so scary, in a place like this. Hope could be what broke her. "A-and we're gonna get out of here. That's why I need to be strong, right?"

The calm soothed her nerves. She closed her eyes and breathed it in.

"A-and Angelo's alive, too," she decided. She had to be. Umbridge wouldn't kill a dog, for no reason than to just kill it.

She knew that wasn't true, that Umbridge would stoop to anything, but she chose not to believe it.

"Squall's alive," Sookie agreed, tilting her head to rest her temple against her friend's. In Rinoa's mind, she was slowly crafting a field. It was one of the more familiar landscapes -- she almost never messed this one up. The flowers that floated through the air were pink, just as Rinoa would remember them, and the meadow expanded before them in an endless sea of growth.

It was nice to remember that things still grew. They came here a lot.

"You'd know if he wasn't."

She would know. She would. He was her Knight and -- and Rinoa gasped, again, as she found herself inside the field. Her field.

Their field. Squall had made a promise to her. They would wait there and meet up again. No matter what. She had promises to keep.

The air was crisp and bright, and the petals flew through the air. She caught one in her palm, and it turned into a white feather. Her feathers.

Her wings.

She would go there, again, and be free.

There were tears streaming down her face, now. It was okay. They were good tears, and the wind was kissing them away.

<< Gonna be okay? >> Sookie's voice was far away -- she'd closed her eyes, in the physical world, and would just sit here, drifting, until Rinoa didn't need the vision anymore.

It would tire her out, but that was okay. This was the only thing worth anything anymore.

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Detention, Depths of the Castle, Monday

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