multiversallogs | CLOSED. don't ask what happens when the curtains draw.

Who: Megan Gwynn & Sonja Garin.
What: Sonja brings Megan the antidote, and later, an explanation.
Where: Megan's place.
Warnings: Discussion of sexual assault, suicidal ideation, Sonja's very existence, at least narrative thoughts of violence.

There are probably many, many people in Baedal better-suited to going to speak to a young woman who has been violated by magic in a terrible way, to explain to her what has been done. Unfortunately, the only person in the city with the necessary knowledge to create an antidote is one of the least qualified counselors around, and she knows it, too; she doesn't let herself become awkward because that's not her way, but when she turns up on Megan's doorstep (in her leather pants, crop top, and leather jacket), she's got a tension in her shoulders. Admittedly, some of this tension is to do with wanting to beat Hilmi with a sack of hammers, but she's trying to quell that until later.

She knocks at the front door. While she's aware that Megan might well be too far gone to answer (she doesn't know what the time frame is like, that's the problem--none of them know as much as they should), she figures she ought to do this before trying to break in like a total maniac. That's restraint, right?

Fuck it. She wonders if she should just castrate the guy after this.

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Sonja withdraws to the doorway again, not leaving, but giving her a healthy amount of space--she doesn't know if that's wanted, she just knows that's what she would want here. It's not pleasant to watch, but it doesn't really faze her terribly; she's more ticking, mentally, over what she has to do next, which is educate Hilmi. She stays slouched where she is, lean and knife-sharp from hipbones to shoulders, jacket falling open and loose.

"Hilmi happened." Her voice is resigned. "He's a fucking idiot, and he's in my enclave, so I'll have to discipline him later."

She makes that sound a little bit like he belongs to her, like she's responsible for him and he's an errant pet. It's not entirely true, and it's not even wholly intentional, she's just accustomed to seeing the people in her army a touch like emotive weapons that are hers to utilize.

"His kind of fae have an addictive property when it comes to the women they sleep with. Feels like love, acts like meth." She's dispassionate, now, to conceal her thoughts. "It's eventually fatal without an antidote."

It takes her too long to process this. Addictive property. Eventually fatal. The words all make sense, but the visible struggle on her face to form them into some kind of series of events that make sense to her looks like it's hurting her.

Her cat comes up and lies down in her lap, batting at her wings, their constant slow motion, like a butterfly's, catching the light that filters in from her window.

"He didn't know," she says, and that is, yes, hope in her voice. Hope that he did not know he would do this to her, because she would understand that, it would be easy to accept -- she's known so many mutants with similar out-of-control gifts, many of which involve that kind of pseudo-mind control, and as long as they don't intend to, it's... not all right, exactly, but it's forgivable. Megan has to assume that that's what happened here because it is completely inconceivable to her that anyone could know, and do nothing to stop it, and not care.

That he didn't come to tell her. That he didn't tell her before, so she could weigh that in with her decision to sleep with him. She's not in love with him, not with her head finally clear, and she doesn't even want to be; he was supposed to be her friend.

"No." It's not abrasive, but it's cutting through that idea Hilmi was acting out of ignorance. "No, he knows what he can do."

He said that he was drunk, but she does not find that to be any excuse. This is what she weaponizes him to do at home, but it's against Lucas's entourage, to extract information and then leave only a suicide in its wake. Not against random young women who were simply there and attracted to him.

"He said that he'd been drinking and he lost control, and from there on, he wanted it to be someone else's problem." And Sonja is not too happy about cleaning up the mess he made, but that's not really her most pressing concern in this clusterfuck. "You had someone here, staying with you. I suggest you call them back to stay with you for a while. You shouldn't be alone."

She can hear her say that, but she can't quite believe it, not yet. It's easier to block it out and keep pretending, at least for a little while, but the idea's in her head now and she won't be able to hold on to it forever. It is too soon and requires too much investment to be angry, or hurt, or anything other than feeling like something inside her has cracked slightly.

Jae. Jae was here -- she barely noticed his presence before but now she remembers. He sat with her sometimes. Her cat likes him. (Her cat likes everyone.) "Okay," she says, again, and her voice is so unsteady, she's walking a high wire right now between falling back into that pit of despair and trying to keep her head up where she can breathe. This isn't supposed to happen to her. She's not supposed to get sad, not in a way that she can't just pretend isn't there. "Okay," she repeats again, lamely. Her CiD's somewhere around her; she had it within arm's reach, just.

In case he called.

She is going to break his fucking pretty-boy face, Sonja decides. "One second," she says, rather than extolling the virtues of revenge.

She disappears from the room, but she doesn't leave the house. It takes a little poking around Megan's cupboards to figure out everything's location, but kitchens are relatively predictable, and she doesn't really know what the hell to say; this is not her skill set, and furthermore, there's really nothing to say. A few minutes later, she's got a plate, a sandwich on top of it, and has returned to the doorway.

Sonja sets the plate down by Megan.

"Eat something." She probably doesn't mean to sound so bossy, it's just force of habit. "If you want to confront him at some point, I'll bring him to you; you can find me on the Network."

In the meantime, Megan has managed to sit up fully, so that's good -- she's tucked up against her window, her knees drawn to her chest and her wings tucked tightly behind her. It's a little uncomfortable to have them pinned to her back like that, but the world isn't built for people with wings and it's a kind of discomfort she's used to.

She stares at the plate without really seeing it; she knows she should eat something, she can't remember the last time she did, but the thought of it -- she just can't. It would feel right now like another failure on top of the already lengthy list of this week's failures, all of them her fault. She can feel this impending tidal wave of blame, its presence is too much. She would really rather get drunk immediately. "I don't," she says, after a pause. Want to confront him, she means. Definitely not now, but probably not ever, the idea of it is laughably alien. What would she even say to him? It's not like he cares what she could possibly have to say to him -- plainly, or he would have done something before now. Like never let this happen to begin with.

After a moment: "He asked you to come?"

She pauses.

"Yeah." That sounds too favorable to Hilmi, so she decides to elaborate. "Somebody gave him a little bit of a reality check before I got back, seemed like. He was a wreck."

And Sonja appreciates that headfuck Hilmi received prior to her return, even if she sort of sees it as softening up the meat before she cuts into it--if that sounds like an unnecessarily vicious turn of phrase, it's still perfectly accurate in terms how Sonja's mind works. She's not really looking forward to disciplining him, but she won't be satisfied until she's certain he's learned the lesson she wants him to understand: don't ever do this again.

That someone has already done something about it has completely escaped her notice -- to be fair, that's probably not something Jae is dying to share with her -- and, yeah, it upsets her. This isn't the first time some guy has beat up another guy over her, and it doesn't make her feel any better. Maybe it should. She should feel better that he's hurting, too. "Oh," is all she can manage.

She has the strong desire to find her purse with her cigarettes (among other things), but that's downstairs, and she isn't going anywhere except maybe to crawl to the opposite end of the room, to the proper bed there. Eventually. She does pick up her CiD, she'll call someone... eventually, after she's sure that she can hold herself together, she's not going to let anyone watch her cry. "Um," she adds, after a moment-- "Thanks." It's completely inadequate (eventually fatal still rattling around in her head as it is) but what the hell else do you say in a situation like this? That she's talking at all is a lot of effort, right now.

The thanks is a little surprising, though she supposes it shouldn't be--when you run out of words, you revert to those formalities, the structure of how social interaction is supposed to go. There's another lingering pause, and then Sonja nods, in acknowledgment.

"I'll be around." Not that she really expects Megan to contact her, but she leaves the possibility open. (Did she even give her name? Oh, well.)

She leaves.

CLOSED. don't ask what happens when the curtains draw.

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