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Post by Arihant on Apr 22, 2008 16:05:55 GMT
"No... it's fine, really. Thank you." His heart was beating in his throat. This was ridiculous. It was over. He'd set her down. She was only holding onto his shirt now. She was hardly going to touch him. Even if she tried to, he could probably move fast enough to stop her. But... Still. Reckless endangerment like that - Arihant wasn't the sort of person to put other people in risk of losing their lives without a lot of careful deliberation first. Or, at least, he'd thought he wasn't. But now he was realising that... Oh, God. What had his first instinct been? When she'd asked to get out, what had he done? Sure, he'd been careful, but not enough. Nowhere near enough. Did that mean that... that... his first instinct was still to touch people? That he hadn't learnt a single bloody thing after four whole yearsAnd now all the fraught anxiety that he would have felt a second ago had he remembered to was coming back with a vengeance. "Oh dear..." He turned his head to look at her, alarmed. Oh. Oh God, no. Had she touched him? Had she- Was she going to- No. No, Arihant, don't be stupid. If she'd touched him, she would have lost consciousness long ago. "What is it? Did - did you bang into something, or-" He let his question hang. Christ, he was a wreck. A panicky wreck.
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Post by misa on Apr 22, 2008 17:41:04 GMT
It was strange, Misa thought as she meet Arihant's gaze, he looked worried. More than worried, he looked down right panicked. "What is it? Did - did you bang into something, or-" Had she remembered how to Misa would have laughed. There was something she couldn't remember doing in a long time. He was worried for her. He didn't even know her, but he was concerned for her. Slowly she shook her head. "It's this," she fractionally raised a hand to the room, which was completely beyond recognition as Madeleine's training facility. It was going to take more than she had with regards to energy and strength to put things right again. A fair bit more. But she couldn't not sort this out, Madeleine would have her guts for garters, and rightly so... If she did it, she was going to suffer; if she didn't, even more so. "Arihant, I think I may need help back after all," Misa admited slowly.
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Post by Arihant on Apr 24, 2008 16:44:31 GMT
OK, so he had no idea what she was talking about. Right. He could... deal with that? Probably, yeah. He didn't know what she meant in waving at the room. Or... or maybe it was her hand - maybe it was sore, or... God. He was clueless in this place. But that didn't matter. It didn't. He'd go see the Gornray woman tomorrow, and she'd fix him, and then he could go, and he wouldn't have to think about this weird night ever again - this whole place. It really didn't make much difference what he did now. So he might as well do the right thing. "I- Of course, that's fine..." He'd take her back. He knew where to go, at least. He'd passed the girls' dorms on the way to Room 11 earlier that night- Yesterday, actually, by now.
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Post by misa on May 6, 2008 18:49:25 GMT
"Thank you, and, um, sorry about all this," Misa mumbled, looking at the ground. She felt slightly ill.
What if- what if she really wasn't strong enough to do this. What if it did take all she had and more. What if she passed out and didn't - didn't wake up again.
A person had the right to be sickened or terrified by that thought, Misa felt, but that wasn't why she felt ill. The fact that to not wake up didn't sound so bad - didn't so bad at all - made her feel sick with herself. She didn't deserve to get out of the atrocious mess her life had become that easily and she knew it. But it wasn't like that was her aim...was it? That was not the reason she'd come here. She'd come here to exercise herself into oblivion, into numbness...even though she knew she didn't have the strength for it right now. "...let the feet lead the way and they will show you where you honestly want to go."[/b] Was that not what she'd been thinking? Maybe this was where they'd been taking her all along; the training room was just the transport to this destination. Stop it! She shouted internally. She was thinking way too hard on this with way too little oxygen getting to her brain; that was all.
She just had to do it; do it and be done with it.
Muster all her strength Misa closed her eyes and pushed all the cold, raw, energy she possessed out into the stone floor, making it contract and shrink allowing the raised stone to drop back into place and simultaneously dragging up the bottom on the maze to level with the rest of the floor.
It was over in a matter of twenty seconds. Even so, Misa wasn't conscious long enough to see the room return back to normal. Not that she was counting, but after five she found herself sitting on the floor, completely unsure as to how that had happened. By ten she could hear her pulse in her ears, anticlimactically dropping from a roaring crescendo to a flutter that would have been drowned out by a butterfly's wings.
Subsequent to thirteen at the very most she felt the last of her energy going and it wasn't gentle or gradual as it had been every time she'd overexerted herself before now. It was violent, like a seam being torn. Her very last thought went to Arihant, the poor thing; she hoped this wouldn't cause too many problems for him, after all, if she died it was completely her own fault. Poor Arihant... Then everything was black.
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Post by Arihant on May 11, 2008 8:15:52 GMT
A deafening crack resounded throughout the cavernous hall, but he wasn't paying any attention to the rest of the room. Arihant swore violently in Hindi as Misa Matsuyama began to topple towards the floor, her eyes fluttering and her body becoming entirely limp, and swung her around to grasp her with his other arm. Then he set her gently on the ground, crouching beside her, and looked up at the room. And cursed again. For once, he was completely speechless. He had just... no idea of what to make of this. The maze had been - the wall - they had been there mere seconds ago and now - now they were gone, and Misa had... Had she done this? "Oh my God," he muttered softly, as he realised the true implication of what had just happened. This was what it was like here. This was what proper magic was like. And this, he thought, was at least one more reason for them to want to get rid of him. If they had people who could do things like this - manipulate stone, cause entire assault courses to disappear in a matter of seconds - if they had people with that amount of power... Well. Why would they want people like him? The thought assuaged his fears a little. Just a little. They wouldn't want him to stay. They'd just cure him and he could go. No fuss. No hassle. He turned back to Misa, noting now the dark circles under her eyes, her shallow breathing. How had he not noticed this? How had he been so self-absorbed as to not see how ill she evidently was, to stop her from pushing herself so hard- No. They were strangers. He couldn't have stopped her. Really, he shouldn't even care at all. He knew most people wouldn't. But Arihant was good at being guilty. However, this was most certainly no time to be wallowing in guilt. He picked up Misa carefully. She felt a little heavier now - it was always harder to carry a limp person than a conscious one - but it was easier for him. There was no way she was touching him. He hoped he wouldn't run into anyone in the corridors. That might be... more than a little suspicious. He'd leave her in the common room, he decided. He realised now that, yes, while he did know where the girls' dorms were, he neither knew what dorm Misa was in or how to find out. He thought for a moment of going to the hospital, but once more his lack of knowledge stopped him. He'd have no idea where to go, and it would probably be best for Misa to be warm and lying down as soon as possible - Hah. Look at him pretending to know what he was talking about. He adjusted Misa in his arms, trying to make it as comfortable as possible for her - sure, she wasn't conscious, but it could still hurt later - and left the battle arena.
Twenty minutes later she was safely placed on one of the sofas in the common room, a throw stolen from one of the other chairs wrapped around her, and Arihant was sitting down in front of the fireplace. He'd go up in about half an hour or so. He still wasn't... all that tired... No. That was a lie. He was exhausted. But he just wanted to make sure she'd be okay. At least, she looked like she was just sleeping now. Just half an hour. He'd feel better about leaving her down here in half an hour. He glanced at the clock. 2.50. It seemed they had been down there for... quite some time... Ah well. He wouldn't feel tired tomorrow. He never did, no matter how little sleep he got. And he was fairly sure that this whole feeling-tired-at-night thing was psychosomatic. He leant back in his chair and sighed. Well, it had been a pretty eventful first night.
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