Outreach 6.10
Glory Girl shrieked in surprise, turning to face me, not even leading with a strike, which was just
sad. I
really needed to work on this girl's combat style when I had some time. "Who?
Vejovis? What are
you doing here?" she almost shouted, before glancing back down to Panacea, looking relieved that the healer continued as if she hadn't heard us.
I floated away from her, keeping pace with Amy as she walked towards my base. "I asked you first."
Glory Girl pouted in what I'm
sure she thought was a cute manner as she followed, and I gave her an unimpressed look. "After you left, Mom and Aunt Sarah
really got into it," she explained. "Like, I could get that maybe she might not like you, 'cause you're a guy and you're hanging out with Ames and she didn't like Dean at first either, but that totes
wasn't what her problem with you! She was sayin' things that weren't even
close to true, and even tried to say that
you attacked
her, but Aunt Sarah saw the beginning of the fight and called major BS on that."
She winced, looking at me gratefully, "Thanks for not fighting back bee-tea-dubs. I get that you would've
so been in the right if you did, but she's my
Mom, you know?" I nodded in understanding. "And after, like, the
fifth lie mom got caught telling, Aunt Sarah told her to get her life together, which was
savage but is
so true because that was
not like adulting at
all! But then after she left Mom grounded
both of us and said that we weren't allowed to talk to you, or see you, or do anything with you at all! She even told Ames that she wasn't allowed to heal anymore, which is so not cool. Healing is like what she
does!"
"She could do
more than that, but I get you," I agreed. Glancing down, Panacea had reached the base and had a hand raised to knock, but was hesitating as she looked for a spot that
didn't look like it'd give her Tetanus. Waving Glory Girl over, I started to descend, dropping the sound bubble as I turned off my Power Sight, the flames of their power dissipating into nothingness.
"Vejovis. Unlock." I called, causing Amelia to jump. Looking at her I realized that she was carrying a small suitcase in addition to her backpack, my Power Sight having obscured them when it was active. I had a sinking feeling about what this could be about, and I
really hoped I was wrong.
She was looking between her adopted sister and I, confused. "Hello, Panacea," I started, getting the ball rolling on what I'm sure would be a
delightful conversation. "Isn't it a bit early for house calls?"
Amy looked at me, steeling herself, "Can I stay with you for a few days?"
Usually I like it when I'm right, I noted. "I'm not saying no, but why?"
She sighed. "My m-...Carol said a lot of things after you left. About...about my father." Staring me in the eye she didn't so much as ask as confirm, "You know who he was, don't you?"
"Yeah I do. Come on in, this is gonna take a while." I walked into the base, calling over my shoulder, "And I know Herb took you right here, but this is supposed to be a
secret base, so please don't lead anyone else here. Glory Girl I'm sort-of okay with, but I'm quickly accruing a list of people that have tried to, or will try to, kill me and I'd rather they didn't know where I lived."
"Who?" Glory Girl asked, floating inside following her sister.
I counted off on my fingers "Kaiser, Lung, Coil, your mother, Oni L-"
"Hey!" she objected. "Mom didn't try to
kill you!"
"Tea or Coffee?" I responded.
She looked confused. "What?"
"It's like three in the morning. I took a nap," I shot Amy a look, who gave me a slight smile, "But I doubt either of you have. We don't have soda, so for caffeine it's either tea or coffee."
"Coffee, two cream, five sugar," Glory Girl replied, shaking her head. "Don't change the subject."
"So coffee candy for you, Amy?" I asked. I felt a creeping sense of unnatural guilt quickly followed by hatred, and my head snapped back to Glory Girl, who flinched from my expression as the feeling disappeared. "Glory Girl," I informed her coldly, reigning in the unnatural rage. "I do not mind you being here but while you are you
will not Master me. Do I make myself clear?"
She had the good grace to look ashamed. "Sorry, just don't ignore me."
"I'm
not," I started, talking over her objection, "I'm getting us something to drink before we talk, and I'm focusing on doing that first before I get distracted." I sighed, turning back to my co-healer, "Coffee or Tea?"
"Coffee, just cream," she said, not getting involved.
I motioned for them to sit down at the kitchen table, and a few minutes later we all had our drinks. Sipping my black coffee, not needing the caffeine but having long ago gotten used to the taste, I started, "Glory Girl, did your mother know my power set?"
"What? Maybe? She knew you healed. And flew I guess. But she didn't try to kill you!" she asserted.
"Let's assume she knew what I told the PRT," I continued. "That means healing, bug control, and a general Alexandria package like you. Nowhere in there was the
degree of cut resistance, or
anything about heat resistance. She attacked me with a
plasma sword. For all she knew, her first attack, an attack on someone who
had not ever threatened her, would've done anything from cut off my arm to the bone, to cut me in
half. I only blocked because she was try to slice open my
head, and even Panacea couldn't have saved me if I hadn't had hidden defenses."
"She knew you would dodge," Victoria replied dismissively.
I blinked at her. "Have you received
any combat training Glory Girl?"
She
shrugged! "My uncle showed me some stuff, and Dean has too, what's
that got to do with anything?"
Sighing, I put my face in my free hand. "That's a no. Glory Girl, the expectations and responsibilities you have when wielding a deadly weapon are much different than what is normally considered when punching someone. Would you punch an E88 thug as hard as you could?"
Looking at me like I was crazy, she physically recoiled, "What?
No! That'd
kill him!"
"And if you did, but the person dodged it would be the same as if I took a gun and shot Gallant, but he dodged, or it bounced off his armor. You're saying that your boyfriend
shouldn't be mad if I tried to shoot him in the head because I knew he'd dodge, or his armor would take care of it? Right? Or if I were to shoot you, but only once, then you'd just shrug and be all smiles?" I questioned, sour expression on my face.
God I hate moral myopia.
"That's
different!" she immediately shot back, stiffening as she realized what she said.
I gave her a moment to realize she just echoed her mother, before asking, "How?"
"It...You...She's my
mom!" she finally admitted.
I nodded, "Which is why I didn't return her
murder attempt in kind, which is what it was by the end Victoria. I had assumed that she was counting on using Panacea to keep me from
dying if she hit me, but those last blows? The ones for my
head? Those would've been instantly
fatal if I didn't have
hidden defenses."
"Glory Girl," I sighed, "I'm as strong as
you are, if not more so. You've seen how fast I am. Imagine what would've happened if I decided to do something simple like kick your mother's knee at full strength." Panacea looked down at her coffee as Glory Girl paled. "I
wouldn't do that, Brandish isn't enough of a threat to me to require that kind of response, but she was calling me
evil and suggesting I was some sort of
sexual predator. Would that kind of person, the person she was
claiming me to be, hold back?" I shook my head, reaching behind me and taking out my pistol, both girls stiffening as I placed it on the table, pointed away from them. "And I wouldn't even need to do that. All I'd have to do is back up, wait for her to come out of that sphere, and shoot her in the leg."
"But you
wouldn't!" Victoria reasoned.
I nodded, my voice cold, "No,
I wouldn't, but
she didn't know that. Hell, I could've swarmed her with a couple hundred wasps; it would've been even easier, and she'd be
just as dead as if I'd shot her in the head. My point is that she came out looking for a fight and got increasingly nasty when I didn't
give her what she wanted, which she escalated to trying to maim me, then
kill me." Glory Girl looked like she wanted to object but couldn't find the words to do so with. "She was trying to manipulate me, and
you in doing so. She was trying to provoke me into offensive actions, so she could fight me."
Holding up a hand, palm raised, in an explaining gesture, I explained, "If I lost, as I assume she thought I would, assuming she didn't
kill me, she likely would have claimed I attacked
her and tried to get me railroaded in court. If she lost, she could use
that to try to turn you against me for 'attacking her unprovoked and trying to kill your mother' or something. Either way, she wins, I lose, and
you stay under her control, Amelia
. You being there, Glory Girl, complicated things, which is probably why she kept insisting you leave and why she waited so long before attempting to
kill me."
I looked the blonde dead in the eyes. "If she was
anyone other than family of one of my friends, I would've taken her down, as well as
anyone else that attacked me unprovoked, before dumping the lot of them off at the PRT to press charges, because that's what a
Hero would do."
I leaned back, opening my hands, voice controlled. "Not that they've probably mentioned it, but New Wave has attacked people they didn't like in their own homes before, and I'd rather not open myself up to that, as if they corner me in my own home, I
may not hold back."
"NO!" Glory girl shouted, spiking Awe without meaning to. "They'd
never do that!"
I quirked an eyebrow as she pulled back her power, not mentioning it, but if she did it again I
was going to kick her ass
out. A flash of motion caught my eye and I saw Herb launch horizontally out from the hall towards Glory Girl, fist swinging forward to hit the sitting girl in the back of the head while he screamed
"Fuck!"
As my conscious mind stuttered in shock at this complete non-sequitur, Glory Girl had already pushed me enough that my combat instincts were up and running. I couldn't get up and block him in time, which meant I had to stop him from a distance. Almost unbidden my Aerokinesis sprung to the front of my mind, forming a rapidly expanding disk of air an inch behind her head, solidifying an instant before he hit.
His fist impacted the surface at speed, his arm breaking almost apart on impact, grotesquely folding in on itself as flesh pulped and bones snapped, one piercing the flesh to stick out like white arrow shaft. Herb hit the ground with a meaty thud, eyes wide as the two girls started to realize something had happened, jumping up in almost slow motion. I noted distantly that Glory Girl had tossed her mug to the side, porcelain shattering on the hardwood and spilling sugary coffee everywhere.
As quick as the moment came, it passed. "Fuuuck!" Herb yelled in pain, holding what was left of his arm.
"Dude, what the
fuck!" I yelled, overriding the girl's own reactions.
"She, here,
fuuuck!" he cried inarticulately.
I took a deep breath, putting my coffee down and walking around the table over to him, Panacea staring at him with wide eyes while her sister tried not to vomit as she stared at the mutilated limb. "Why in the ever-loving
fuck did you try to sucker punch Glory Girl, when she was sitting in our base, drinking
fucking coffee? The fuck man!?" I tried not to shout, and failed.
He was looking at his arm, having gone partially into shock,
which he deserved. "She. Base. Invading?"
That I understood, he thought the sisters were somehow invading and he was taking out the heavy hitter first. The sheer
hypocrisy of that statement pissed me off. "Oh that's ripe coming from
you. You're the one who brought
Amelia here in the first place, but now she's back you think that's grounds to attack
? Fuck you."
He shook his head, "No. Sister. Angry? All I heard was no! And then I felt a sharp thing in my head...
There was yelling man!" he finally said, Peak Condition pushing him back out of shock like it had for me when I was Boardwalk. He blinked, then looked at the hardened air shield he'd punched, which still had some blood smeared on it highlighting the impact crater directly in the center of it. "What'd ya use?"
I gave a significant glance to where Vicky was standing behind me without moving my head. "Force fields."
He cocked his head, confused. "When did ya get forcefields?" I just looked at him, shocked that Mr. 'I'm so great at reading subtleties' missed that.
I swear to god Herb, I will hurt you if you blab my secrets. As I glared at him I swear I could see the thought click in as he went, "Sorry, so sorry, sorry."
I sighed, trying to find a good explanation. "Just because I'm finding new uses for my power, doesn't mean it's a new power," I 'reminded' him.
"Right, that's why I'm apologizing," he agreed, getting up. "
Sorry." He looked down at his ruined arm, moving it slightly and wincing as the flesh shifted and jiggled like an arm shouldn't, blood slowly pooling below it as it dripped down his arm to fall from his twisted fingers. "This is kinda weird."
I sighed,
harder. "Okay, take a fucking seat. Panacea can you heal him so he can put on some clothes and talk
like a fuckin' adult." Panacea looked back at me, before looking back at Herb and realizing that all he was wearing were boxers, having probably jumped straight out of bed when her sister had spiked her emotional manipulation field. "He's not gonna fight, he thought she was here to attack one of us, and he was woken up when she spiked her 'not-a-Master' power."
Herb turned to her, shrugging and wincing, "Yeah, it's not like you have a
massively overprotective sister that my friend has been hanging out with."
"I'm not overprotective!" the overprotective sister in question objected, still looking green.
All three of us looked at her in disbelief. "Yeah, ya are,"; "You are
very protective, but that's not bad,"; "Sometimes," we responded at once.
The Brute took a seat, pouting, while Amy repaired Herb's arm. I grabbed some paper towels and cleaned up the blood, gore, and coffee as the healer frowned. "Your powers...are helping mine?" the redhead questioned, confused. "Where is it getting the biomass?"
"Same place any creation power gets mass," I absently responded while I cleaned up my friend's spattered flesh and blood and reminded myself that Herb was fine. "They convert energy stores into matter, E equals M C squared and all of that fun stuff in reverse." I looked up from the blood I was cleaning off of the three-foot-wide air disk and saw the sisters staring. "What? It makes sense and the powers can't truly violate basic thermodynamics, they just use a ton of power to manipulate things on a small scale."
Panacea shook her head as she turned back to healing as Victoria frowned at me, "How do you
know that?"
I shrugged as I realized I'd over-explained
again. In my defense I might've been a bit off-balance from the near-fatal misunderstanding. "Can't tell you right now without bad things happening."
She pouted again, which if I was into teenage valley girls
might've worked, but I preferred dark, smart, and snark-... Not looking at Panacea I made Glory Girl another coffee after I finished cleaning. As I put it down she was poking the now near invisible disk. "What is this?"
I shrugged, "Forcefield?" which was true, in a sense.
"But it's invisible."
Sighing I took a seat, sipping on my room temperature caffeine. As Herb left to get changed "The best one's are," I quipped, before snapping my fingers and dismissing it in a gust of air that I directed away from the girls and down the hall without touching anything. A deep breath later I continued. "Okay, where were we? .. .Oh right, your family's habits of attacking people in their own homes."
"They wouldn't!" Glory Girl objected, though not nearly as strenuously as she had last time.
"Well, they'd hardly have told you about it if they had." I turned to Amy, "Now, you had a question about your lineage?"
Panacea glanced at her fuming sister, who looked like she wanted to continue, but was holding back for her sibling. "Yes. Who were my parents?"
"I only know one, but you should be able to figure their identity out on your own," I deflected. "Riddle me this:
Why did Brandish adopt you?"
Amy looked pained, and I repressed a passing urge to give her a hug. "I don't know why, but she had to," the healer told me. "Her and aunt Sarah talked about it tonight."
I glanced over to Glory Girl, who wouldn't meet my eyes.
Things must've gotten bad after I left. I hate domestic disputes. "Okay, do you know
when you were adopted?"
"When I was six."
"And what happened around that time in or near Brockton Bay?" I asked. "This would've been back when New Wave was The Brockton Bay Brigade."
She shrugged, and I turned to Herb who was walking back in the room, clothed this time, "Since you're up, can you grab me a laptop?"
He shrugged, "Yeah, sure." After he'd walked behind them to go get it, he gave me a double thumbs up with something that looked like a tentative smile crossed with a grimace.
We waited, and I got myself another coffee, nixing my idea to try warming my old one with a hidden tiny star. Herb returned with the laptop and a bottle of Wild Turkey. I took the computer and shot him a questioning look for the booze, but he shook his head. "Here," I told them, handing them the device, "look up what happened in two-thousand and two-thousand-one around here."
I sat at one end of the table as Amelia typed into the computer, her sister
literally hovering over her shoulder. Herb grabbed four glasses and sat down, waiting, while I opened the base manual on my phone, starting to work through the newly discovered first chapter. I
really wished I'd found this glossary of terms a while ago and found myself flipping back to understand what was said, which only confused me
even more as the things it was listing how to use we
didn't have!
I was halfway through the my confusing research when I heard Amelia give a soft
"no."
Glancing over at her, I saw her looking at the screen, face pale. Glory Girl looked sickly horrified.
Having Marquis as a dad should be that bad. Walking over to her and exchanging confused looks with Herb, I peered over Amy's shoulder, opposite of Victoria. I saw she had a news report open about
Nilbog of all people. "Why are you looking up that asshole?" I asked, even more confused.
Amy looked sharply, up at me, "Isn't
he my father!?" I blinked at her, before laughing at the ridiculousness of it.
"It's not funny!" she said, on the verge of tears.
"Nilbog isn't your father," I told her, putting a hand on her shoulder as I dragged the computer over, typing in 'Marquis captured' with one hand, hitting enter. The first result was a news story detailing the Brockton Bay Brigade's win against the villain Marquis. "
He's your father."
I looked over her shoulder as she and her sister read the new story. As it detailed the 'valiant battle' against Marquis the group that would become New Wave waged, 'Storming his base' a picture of a mansion with a destroyed front door and spikes of bone protruding from the wall in a few places putting that to lie. There was a picture of him, in cuffs, being put into an ambulance.
"What is he
wearing?" Vicky demanded, squinting at the picture.
Squinting, I tried to remember the interlude that described this event. "I believe it's a silk bathrobe. They kept your sister out of the story, but they beat Marquis by noticing he was protecting a closet, and Brandish used
that fact to pin him down and stab him in the chest with her plasma sword. It's a favored tactic of hers, apparently. After they found Amy Marquis gave himself up so they wouldn't hurt her, willing to go to the Birdcage if they promised to take care of her."
Whether or not they did is up to debate.
I sighed, "So, letting New Wave know where
I live? I'd rather not.
You wouldn't do anything Glory Girl, and neither would your sister, but your parents? You can't tell me they wouldn't." I took a seat next to Amy, as they both gazed at me in shock, obviously looking like they wanted to say
something in their family's defense but not sure what it would be. "New Wave tried something well, new, by eschewing their secret identities. Unfortunately, they, like a lot of other people who
claim to be honorable, only followed the rules when it served their own needs."
"I'm sure they excused what was their greatest victory by
later saying that since
they didn't have secret identities, they shouldn't have needed to respect those of their foes. It's why when that E88 thug killed Fleur when she wasn't in costume, which
was murder, well if you've looked into it you've seen that there wasn't the outcry one would've expected from someone
blatantly breaking the unwritten rules." I sighed, shaking my head, "That was because the Brigade became
famous for taking down their arch-nemesis by doing
exactly that, only
worse. Fleur was attacked walking down the street, Marquis was attacked at
night, in his own
home, when he
wasn't expecting it, when they expected him to be
unable to defend himself. The only reason he wasn't was that he'd just finished reading his daughter a bed-time story because she was having trouble going to sleep. Not only that, they played off Marquis' refusal to hurt women by having their front-line fighters belong to the class of people he refused to injure."
I leaned back. "Amy, I trust.
You, I'll give a chance because of what I've seen of your character. Your mother? I would've been hesitant to, but after tonight?
No." I wanted to add 'sorry' but I really
wasn't. I sat there, giving the girls a chance to formulate her response.
"So, my father is Marquis," Amelia sighed. "That, that explains a lot."
"What do ya mean Ames?" her sister asked, looking down at her. "That doesn't explain, like,
anything!"
"You know how much Mo- how much
Carol hates Marquis. He's been in the Birdcage for a decade and she
still got upset when dad brought him up after the first time Lee helped me heal!" she objected, and I blinked, not realizing that my actions had sparked strife in her family
that quickly and feeling a bit bad about it. "If I'm
his daughter, was she just expecting me to turn out just like him? Is that
really what she meant by mali principii malus finis?"
Harmful start harmful end? The hell? Did Brandish think saying 'bad blood' in latin somehow made it true? "Just because Marquis is my father? That's not how it works! That's not how
any of that works! I can
literally see brains, that's not how that works!" she nearly screamed, almost shrill in disbelief.
"Mom's smarter than that, she's a
lawyer!" Glory Girl tried to reason, but her words lacked the weight of conviction. I wanted to say that smart people could believe
stupid things, but I could practically hear Herb going 'Not the time man, stay out of this', so I glanced over at him, and he was indeed giving me a look which said
exactly that. "Besides, you know she loves us!" Victoria added, sounding desperate.
Amy shook her head, crying, "No Vics, she loves
you! She's been
clear about that. She
tolerated me until I started 'turning evil' like my
father!"
Victoria, now crying as well, hugged her sister, "I'm so
sorry Ames! This is like,
the worst!"
I sat there, feeling
so awkward.
Should I give words of encouragement? Leave? Give them a hug? Anger, arrogance, or apathy I could handle pretty easily, but anguish? Not a ton of knowledge on how to help someone
else with that, mostly because I wasn't used to people being
this vulnerable around me, and I knew that I was weird enough what helped me probably wouldn't help them. It was made worse by the fact that I actually
gave a shit about Amelia, and surprisingly about Victoria as well, so I didn't really know what to do, but wished I did.
I silenced myself as I repressed a groan. I didn't know what I was going to do, but I knew what I
wasn't going to do. There was
no way I could kick them out now. If only I'd not talked like I normally did, explaining things that people didn't want to be explained,
even if they really needed to be, I could've convinced them to let me rent a hotel room for them or something until this all blew over.
However, I knew I couldn't as they cried and held onto each other as if they were each other's only lifeline in stormy seas. They shared the pain of a terribly but undeniable truth that reshaped how they understood reality, a pain I was
far too familiar with. One I also knew from experience that was going to leave them vulnerable and crash them
hard. While I'm sure I could still convince them to leave if I needed to, I could no longer do so without hurting them.
Me and my stupid mouth.
<AB>
After about half an hour they were pretty much done. I wanted to offer words of understanding and comfort, but still really didn't know what to say. Cleaning up the kitchen as Herb produced a bottle of whiskey and poured it into the glasses he'd gotten earlier, three fingers worth in two, almost filling the others, I sat down across the table from them.
"So," I sighed, getting tired, tear-bright looks from both of them as they sniffled. "I never
actually said you could stay here, so I am saying it right now. We've got a few open rooms and you can stay here as long as you need Amy. Glory Gi-"
"Call my Vicky," she interrupted.
I nodded. "Okay Vicky, stay here tonight, and if you really want to you can stay longer, just know that if you do so, Brandish will probably try to kill me. Again. She..." I trailed off, trying to figure out how to phrase it.
"She what?" Victoria asked tiredly.
I sighed. "Do you want me to be nice, or be blunt?"
Herb passed me one of the half-filled glasses, pushing the two full ones to the sisters, as well as the bottle.
Vicky looked at the glass in front of her, before taking it in one motion and downing the entire thing, breaking off into coughs as her sister took a swig before grimacing. After Victoria stopped coughing, she gave me a teary smile, "I could use some nice right now... and some water?"
"Okay," I nodded, getting her some. I took a sip of my whiskey and waited until after she took a drink of water to look her in the eye. "Brandish cares a great deal about
you, your wellbeing, and your safety. As such if you spend time around someone that she has declared a Villain she'll both take it badly
and assume that you are only doing so because
I did something to you, not by your own choice. After all, you're a good daughter and good daughters
listen to their mothers. There's
nothing you can do to convince her otherwise because anything you do to prove her wrong is
obviously something I told you to do."
She tried to object that that made no sense, and I held up a hand. "Yes, it's not rational, but a large portion of adults believe that anyone more than twenty years younger than them
isn't capable of making logical decisions, especially ones that counter what said adults, with their age and experience, have chosen to do. They feel that,
as adults, they don't
need to justify themselves, their positions of power and respect being enough that they shouldn't be questioned, especially when attempting to do so would just prove the younger person
right, which would hurt the adult's pride, though they don't consciously realize
why they feel so offended. They just lash out at it, like the children they call their opposition, ironically enough. The same adults
also usually dismiss what people who have twenty plus
more years of experience than
they do think, because those old people are
obviously out of touch, or senile, or something. It's really just an 'I'm right, and I'll make up whatever excuse it takes to get you to accept it' mindset. It was used against them, and they hated it, but now that they have the power they're going to use it against everyone
else."
Glancing over at Panacea I continued, "I had asked Amy to ask
you if you could hang out with her while she heals as protection, now that the ABB is desperate for healers, but she obviously didn't get the chance, so I'm asking now that I have the opportunity. However, if you stay with her
all the time, it's a when,
not an if, that Brandish will come to, um,
claim you and drag you back home. If that doesn't work I would not be surprised if she tries to tail you back here, to try to force a confrontation, and maybe attack me for daring to steal her daughter or something similar."
I sighed. "If you're staying at home, and just meeting your sister for her hospital shifts, she
might pitch a fit, hell, she'll probably ground you and tell you not to, but, well, you
do have an Alexendria package. It's not like she can stop you without hurting you, and I doubt she's
that far gone. It's not pleasant, but it's an option. If you can't watch her back I'd ask her to not go healing now that we have the added threat of Brandish trying something, but if you sister decided to do so anyways I wouldn't stop her, and just ask that she wears a tracker." I looked at Panacea. "There's a decent chance they'll try to take you again, and once I hear about it I would go
kill the people that took you, but I'm worried about what they'd try to do to you in that interval. It's something the two of you need to decide soon."
Speech done, I leaned back as the sisters whispered to each other. I wanted to eavesdrop, but this was a decision
they had to make. Herb stood up, walking over to them and giving them both a hug, which neither of them knew how to respond to. "I'm sorry girls," he told them, nodding to the bottle, "That's yours, I don't want to see it tomorrow." With that he went to bed.
The two of them looked to me. "I don't' think you're going anywhere else tonight, and Brandish already thinks I'm evil incarnate, what's a bit of underage drinking on top of that?"
Vicky nodded, refilling her glass and topping off her sister's, before the two of them started to quietly debate again. They went back and forth, from the body language Amelia was telling her sister she was fine, and Vicky disagreed. After almost an hour, and several more drinks, they came to a decision, Amy seeming to have lost. Victoria turned to me and smiled as she swayed slightly in her seat,
"I'm staying!"
