No Bel Canto

[MurderWeasel]

"Thanks."

The relief in Mandy's voice sounded pathetic even to herself, but it also was lower priority than the nervousness that gripped her as she slowly and carefully stood, made her way gingerly to the bag—long since stripped of anything potentially dangerous or valuable, and barely hanging together with all the charring—and looked to Ashanti again. But she wasn't shot or ordered away from the stuff, and so she scooped it up and then made her way into the bathroom, pulling the door closed behind her.

It was an immediate relief to have something between her and Ashanti, even if it was just a door and there was no way out of here besides going right back through it and straight past her captor. But for this brief moment, Mandy was alone with herself and her thoughts and her fears, and that was better than sharing all that space with a crazy girl silently pointing a gun at her.

It helped that the bathroom was super fancy. It took a few seconds, but Mandy's parents had a steam shower in their bathroom, and she figured out how to get the one here going, and after a few moments of gurgling in pipes hidden from view, steam started pouring out and filling the room.

Under normal circumstances, proper operation would've entailed closing the door, but Mandy was a little apprehensive about, well, taking a shower live on TV, and letting the haze of steam spread through the whole area would hopefully buy her a little modesty by messing with the cameras' ability to get a good view, unless they had special cameras that got around that somehow, which they probably did, but the uncertainty was enough to get Mandy to risk it and start the water flowing properly.

---

Mandy put the swimsuit on as her bottom layer again, because it was working well enough and hadn't been destroyed in the blaze, unlike some of her other effects. The track pants and tank top were a write-off, both soaked through with the rank liquid from the fire suppression system and the latter sporting holes from the burning besides. Her sundress had also been seriously messed up by the burning, but the loose, bulky panda onesie had worked its way far enough towards the bottom of the bag to escape unscathed, so that was her new look. It was probably really goofy-looking, but it was super comfy actually, and its being loose helped it not press on the spots where she was hurt, so really it was a net win, right?

She'd applied the burn cream and some bandages and really, all things considered, she was pretty lucky. It wasn't that bad—some raw patches of flesh, a few blisters, lots of stinging, but she wasn't oozing pus or dripping blood everywhere. She had to wipe a circle in the mirror because of all the steam, but there was a mirror, and that helped her get the bandages all settled nice and snug and well-centered.

Her hair was a different story, though; the right half had curled and blackened to maybe half its original length, less in places. She didn't like looking at it or thinking about it. Mandy had started growing her hair out intentionally when she was thirteen, and had kept up with the trimming and care religiously ever since. She pulled the hood of her onesie up so she wouldn't have to be seen like that, and while it flopped into her eyes a little, it did the trick.

The costume really was a morale boost. It was a few notches more direct than she usually went, but having a special style was nice. It felt like a new start, and Mandy was fresh and invigorated and ready to go back out there and maybe make things better with Ashanti, or else figure out a way to distract the girl long enough to sneak away and get back to Seo-yun. How hard could it be to outwit someone who wasn't even willing to talk?

Mandy walked over to the bathroom door, turned the knob, and pushed.

The door didn't budge an inch.

((Mandy Gross continued in Calenture))

[Brackie]

Well, that went better than she thought it would.

She was genuinely not thinking about the possibilities when she let Mandy go to the bathroom. Sure, there was a possibility that she could bolt for it at some point before, during or after, but that was fine. In the end, it probably would have worked out better for her if she'd just let Mandy go and stayed alone with her thoughts and just hoped and prayed that Mandy didn't come back for the revenge she knew other people wanted against her friend.

But that thought popped into her head, and without mulling, she walked up to the door and began tying things together. The full brunt of it was from the cord of the lamp beside the bed, but the dresser she'd moved across the carpet and in front of the door didn't hurt either.

Then, when Mandy began trying to open, banging, yelling, she just sort of sat there, waiting for it to die down. Worst case, someone found them. But Ashanti had a gun for that. Best case? It happened, because eventually she quietened down.

And Ashanti fell backwards to the bed and finally got to sleep.

((Ashanti Baker continued elsewhere))