The Denial Twist

[Super Llama†]

{{continued from Death and All His Friends (again)}}

Lyn finally showed down her pace after she was satisfied that she had put enough distance between herself and the storehouse. As she walked through the jungle, she finally got a better look at the box of ammo in the moonlight, finding that the rest of the writing on the box read "COLT PEACEMAKER: 24 BULLETS + SPEEDLOADER" She had no idea what a speedloader was, but she figured she'd find out when she opened the box again. She also stopped to remove the wire from her leg, which had become wrapped tightly around her ankle as she ran off, and was beginning to sting. As she removed it, she found that there were two hard plastic handles on the ends of it. She wondered at the purpose of it as she continued on her way, though soon she got the idea that she could strangle someone to death with it. There were even handles on the ends to keep a hold of it better. It was a pretty brutal way to kill someone, but you never know when it could come in handy. Might as well hang on to it.

Finally, she encountered another break in the trees, a large tower at the center of it. I guess this is as good a place as any to stop. She thought to herself. She had yet to take care of the injuries she incurred during the fight with Harry. Making her way towards the building, she found a body in her path, the head pulverized far beyond recognition, though the shattered pieces of a smiley face mask gave an impression as to who it was.

"Well, hello there, Blood Boy." She said to the corpse. Formerly one of the most fearsome killers on the island, now just a lifeless hunk of meat. Seeing his pack nearby, she went right to it and opened it up. "Let's see what the imfamous Blood Boy carries around with him..."

Unfortunately, she didn't find anything of any real interest, other than what she would've found in any other pack. Still, free supplies are free supplies, and thus she dragged Blood Boy's pack with her into the nearby tower to raid it for medical supplies and such.

As soon as she entered the building, she was met with a bunch of bloody and rotting chunks of what used to be a human being. "Oh...fuck..." The stench was horrible, and she decided instead to just remain outside, sitting down against the wall and digging through the new pack.

[DetectiveArcher†]

((Continued from Death and All His Friends.))

He stopped as he came to the clearing and spotted Lyn. Doubling over, Edward Sullivan caught his breath in deep gulps. The island was going to be the death of him, one way or another. Looking up he noticed that Lyn was grabbing supplies from a mangled corpse's bag. Eddie understood the necessity of such actions, but he still didn't have to approve of them. Taking things from those bags felt destinctly like graverobbing.

Dragging the pack behind her, she sluggishly marched towards the tower. Eddie wondered if he looked as exhausted as she did; he probably looked worse. The dark haired boy made his way across the clearing, nodding at the body. Sorry, whoever you are. I'm sure she doesn't mean it. You probably didn't do anything wrong. He noticed the remnants of the yellow mask and faltered in his steps. Or maybe, he reconsidered thoughtfully as he continued past the body, some people deserve what comes to them.

He shook his head, was it really ok to say Blood Boy deserved that? He may have freaked out, but he was still just a highschool kid, wasn't he? An image of Wade popped into Eddie's mind and the boy decided to abandon his current train of thought. He knew, if he kept at it, the result would only upset him. Lyn recoiled from the tower opening like she'd been slapped. Apparently, there was something unpleasant in the tower, because she decided it was a better idea to simply sit in the grass. Eddie dropped down beside her with a grunt.

Resting his head against the cold stone of the building, he waited for Lyn to say something to break the silence. She dug through the bag, taking only what seemed to be useful. Eddie squirmed uncomfortably. He thought he should say something, but wasn't quite sure what. He'd never been good at small talk. That was mostly the reason he kept away from his classmates. He was sure he'd always manage to say something stupid and give them a reason to hate him. He cleared his throat.

"S-so," he began weakly, "I d-don't sup-p-pose this was what you had in m-mind when you decided to c-come on the t-trip, huh?" He turned away and felt his face flush as the jumbled words spilled from his lips. Stupid question. Nobody expected what had happened. He was probably only making her mad. "I m-mean I am t-too, it's only...." He trailed off, his face burning hotter. "Sorry," he mumbled quietly, " j-just t-trying to make c-conversation." It was probably better just to shut up. He did.

[Super Llama†]

Lyn pulled out the first aid kit from Blood Boy's pack, only to find as she opened it up that most of the supplies inside were already exhausted. Breathing a deep sigh, she nonetheless took out what little there was left, along with her own kit, and, barely reacting to Eddie's arrival at all, got to work.

The cut on her cheek wasn't really that bad. All it needed after the hydrogen peroxide was a large band-aid slapped over it. The cut on her leg wasn't much worse, though it managed to hurt worse than it looked. The one on her shoulder, however, was rather inconveniently placed; too high up for her to reach it simply by rolling up her sleeve. There was only one real option.

Pulling off her hoodie and setting it aside, she carefully pulled her right arm back through the sleeve, wincing a bit as the fabric brushed against the wound. Once it was free, she reached down and pulled the bottom of her shirt up all the way, throwing the loose sleeve over her shoulder to get it out of the way. The shy and introverted Eddie would have a pretty embarassing sight if he were to look his way, made even worse by the fact that during her last change of clothing on the island, she decided to stop wearing a bra (what would be the point? She was about as flat as they come,) but it didn't really seem to faze her at all.

Of course, nobody really expected to get kidnapped and thrown onto an island to kill people. Okay, probably the more paranoid people who had believed that SOTF was real, but the question was obviously just to break the silence. But she supposed she might as well say something to at least adknowledge his existence.

"No, not at all." She said as she reached for the hydrogine peroxide again, emitting a sharp hiss as she poured it over the wound. This one was definitely the worst of the three, but it shouldn't hold her back too much.

Why HAD she gone on the trip, anyway? To try and get away from her problems for a while? Yeah, right. Going on a SCHOOL trip, most of her problems just went along with her. She supposed she wasn't really thinking when the time came, she was just doing what everyone else was doing. Finding a suffucient bandage to cover the wound, the carefully applied it, waiting to see if Eddie would say anything else.

[DetectiveArcher†]

Eddie almost jumped when Lyn responded. He honestly hadn't expected her to say anything at all. Usually, when he spoke, people just gave him a cold glare to discourage him from saying anything further. So, when the girl at his side spoke in her calm, even voice the adolescent found himself caught off guard. A quick smile spreading across his lips, he felt glad that Lyn was easy to get along with. At least she was nice enough to try and make conversation.

A sharp hiss caught his ear, calling his attention back to the girl at his side. Eddie felt the warmth in his face flare intensely, as he found his companion stripped to the waist, not caring who might see her. Squeaking out a few syllables that might have been words, Eddie quickly turned away, attempting to preserve any sense of privacy Lyn might still have. "S-sorry," he mumbled, mostly to himself, as he pulled his legs close and tried to ignore the sudden tightness in his pants. He was silently glad that he'd worn jeans on the trip.

It dawned on Eddie that this was the first time he'd seen a real woman topless. His face burned brighter, as his heart thumped in his chest and a strange warmth filled his body. Lyn might have been less than amply proportioned, but it was the principle of the matter. He wondered if his body's actions made him a pervert. He mentally admonished himself, commanding his body to be more reserved. It didn't help.

Casting a glance back at the thin girl, Eddie watched as she carefully applied a bandage to a large wound on her shoulder. It was a decent dressing, but there was a limit to what she could accomplish without assistance. Clearing his throat and trying to compose himself, the flustered boy tried to get his companion's attention. "Uhm," he began, trying to keep his voice steady, "I-if you n-need help, I'll g-give you a hand. N-not that you can't do it yours-self!"

[Super Llama†]

As Lyn stuck the bandage over the shoulder wound, she heard Eddie speak up again, looking over to see an understandably embarrassed reaction to her state of partial undress. Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on how one would see it), she pulled her shirt back down, sticking her arm back through the sleeve. "No, I got it." She answered, reaching up for the bandage covering the deep cut over her eye, deciding that she was overdue to replace it. Taking the towel and a bottle of water from her pack, she removed the bandage, only to realize that she'd probably need some help with this one, since she couldn't see it at all.

"Huh. I guess I do need help." She said simply, turning to look at Eddie again. The two day-old cut was pretty bad, and definitely in need of stitches. Fortunately it didn't look infected, but it was sure to leave a nasty scar. "I can't see to take care of this one."

[DetectiveArcher†]

Eddie was glad to see Lyn pull her shirt back down. It was hard enough talking to her at all, let alone when she was half naked. Peeling the bandage from above her eye, she calmly turned down his offer for help. The dark haired boy nodded at her response. She'd taken care of herself just fine before he'd met her. Why wouldn't she be able to take care of those things herself?

"Huh." she said suddenly, "I guess I do need help." Turning to face him, Eddie got a better look at the deep gash over her left eye. He hissed quietly at the wound. "Jeez, that's p-pretty bad. Are you ok-kay?" he asked. He didn't bother to say anything about the fading bruise on her right cheek. It took him a few seconds to realize that he should probably stop staring and get to work. Shaking his head, he took hold of the peroxide and applied a small amount to one of the swabs. "Th-this might st-sting a little," he warned before pressing against the cut.

"S-so," he mumbled, as much out of curiosity as to clear the uncomfortable silence that stretched between the boy and his companion, "h-how...I mean, who d-did this to you?" Eddie remembered Jimmy had introduced Lyn as a player. She probably got her wounds trying to kill someone. The thought didn't seem very fair. She could have been defending herself, right? Keep telling yourself that, a voice in the back of his mind grunted. People will do a lot of evil things if they're backed into a corner. She's probably got blood all over her hands.

Eddie contemplated the matter and found it left a bad taste in his mouth. Lyn didn't seem like a bad person. And even if she had done wrong, Eddie had just as much blood on his hands as she did. Hers was through action, his through inaction. Two sides of the same coin, really. He tried to keep his hands from shaking as he applied the new bandage.

[Super Llama†]

Lyn winced as Eddie applied the hydrogen peroxide to her cut, breathing in sharply. Though she looked in Eddie's direction, she didn't really seem to be looking AT him, or at anything, for that matter. Sort of like she was just spacing out at the moment

"Hmm?" She uttered, her eyes focusing again as Eddie asked who did this to her. "It was Melina." She said, assuming that Eddie knew who she was. After all, who at Southridge DIDN'T know about it's queen bitch. "But after what I did to her face, it was worth it." She found herself smiling in some sense of twisted satisfaction as she remembered Melina's face lighting up like a summer bonfire, or some other equivilant simile.

As Eddie applied the new bandage, though, her face turned serious again. "Listen." She started. "You're going after Wade? Well, I'm going after Melina. If I find her, I won't hesitate to kill her. In fact, for me, that takes priority over everything, and nobody kills her but me. Understand?"

She let a few awkward moments go by before she spoke up again. "Why are you going after Wade, anyway?"

[DetectiveArcher†]

Eddie nodded as Lyn mentioned the redhead's name. When he caught Lyn's smile of grim satisfaction, he decided he wasn't going to ask about what she meant by what she'd done to Melina's face. He wasn't sure he wanted to know.

Eddie knew Melina, much in the same way he knew about his other classmates. She was the type of person to have made enemies with just about everyone, including him. People on the whole didn't notice or talk to Eddie, but Melina had been one of the few to go out of her way to deliver a few scathing insults to him on occassion. Eddie had contemplated the matter at the time, and came to the conclusion that the jabs were just the girl's way of keeping up appearances.

Lyn spoke up again, as Eddie began to finish with the bandage. Looking very serious, very dangerous, Lyn calmly told him of her priorities. Melina was to die by her hand and that was that. Eddie nodded and quickly averted his eyes. Sometimes Lyn could be absolutely terrifying. But, you're going after Wade, so it's really not that different from you, right? The thought made Eddie squirm uncomfortably.

For a few moments neither of them said anything. The silence felt awkward, heavy with unasked questions on both sides. Lyn broke the quiet first. Eddie knew it was coming, but it still made him feel tired. "Wade. That's because....You re-remember what we saw at the lagoon, r-right? All those...b-bodies." He paused a long moment, trying to keep himself composed.

"You hear about how Wade k-killed five people all at once? W-well, there...was a girl there. A girl named Jodene." he forced down the ball of guilt growing in his throat. "She was...special, you know?" He shook his head, looking at the ground to avoid having to look at Lyn. "We weren't dating or anything. Probably didn't even know who I was. And, I never told her how I felt. I tried a few times, but I always ended up putting it off. Running away. I just sort of...always thought I'd have a chance later. Shows how fuckin' smart I am, right?"

He expected tears, but none came. He didn't even feel the soul crushing sorrow that he once had. He just felt empty. "I was there, you know. I watched him do it. I hid as he killed her. It wasn't quick. It was slow and terrible. She died screaming." Eddie realized that the others Wade killed were unimportant to him. A small part of his mind felt that unfair. The rest of his mind didn't care in the slightest. "So, now, I'm going after Wade. Killing him won't bring back Jodene, but I'm sure it'll make me feel a little better."

Another stretch of silence passed before Eddie realized he'd monopolized the conversation. Feeling his cheeks flush pink, he quickly put the focus back on Lyn. "S-so, that's m-my st-story. What about y-you? Why are you trying to k-kill Melina?"

[Super Llama†]

Lyn listened quietly as Eddie explained his reasons for hunting Wade. He was a victim of sentimentality, and if there was one thing that would not go unpunished in this game, it was sentimentality. She knew that firsthand, having gotten too sentimental during her travelling with Jimmy, and look what it had gotten her.

Jimmy...she should've thrown that molotov earlier. He was obviously trying to do a sneak attack on that guy with the shotgun. If she had thrown the molotov at him earlier, that asshole would've been too preoccupied with putting out the flames to deal with hi-

ARGH! There she went again. She had to stay on guard from here on out. She definitely wouldn't have minded having friends back in civilization, but here they were only detrimental. There are no friends in SOTF, only competition.

So why hadn't she tried to ditch Eddie yet? He probably wouldn't approve of the way she played the game thus far, which could be a problem later down the road. Plus the main reasons she had agreed to go after Wade was to repay the debt to Jimmy and to get her hands on a weapon to match Melina's shotgun. Jimmy was dead, and she had already gotten the weapon she needed. She tried to think of some kind of logical explanation. Unless she'd ditched or killed them by now, Melina would still be surrounded by that fucking goon squad. She'd have a much easier time taking her on if there was someone to keep the others at bay. Yeah, that sounded reasonable.

As Eddie finished replacing the bandage, Lyn pulled out her revolver, popping the chamber open. Reaching for the box of ammo, she opened it up, and a metal cylindrical...thing fell into her hand. There were six holes around the bottom of it, with a knob on the other end, and it looked very similar to the chamber of her revolver. Come to think of it, the box did read "24 BULLETS + SPEEDLOADER."

Then something clicked. Taking one of the bullets, she stuck it into one of the holes. "Why am I hunting Melina? Well, I've got to do something here other than just survive, right?" She said as she added another bullet. And another. "...no, that's not quite true. Back at Southridge, when I was as low as I could possibly get, she managed to drag me down even lower. Granted, there were others, but she was one of the worst."

Another bullet.

"Her and Anthony, and I've already taken care of him."

"Oh, really now?"

Another bullet.

"I...I HAVE to do it. It has to be me. There might be others out there who had it worse than me, who deserve to do it more than me, but I don't care. It HAS to be me."

Another bullet.

"It's what I live for, now. I can't really explain it much better than that."

She stuck the speedloader into the chamber, the bullets matching up with the holes, and turned the knob on the other end, the bullets falling right in. Moving the chamber back into place, she aimed the gun off into the distance.

Guns: The great equalizer. She had everything she needed now. No more sentamentality. No more fucking around. Melina wasn't getting away a third time. Laeil would find her, and put a bullet right between her eyes.

[DetectiveArcher†]

Applying peroxide to another swab, Eddie quickly dabbed at the cut above his own eye. The small wound stung briefly. Lyn carefully examined Jimmy's old revolver. The tips of her fingers ran along the cylinder, before placing it to one side. Taking a small metal disk, she went to work sliding a bullet into the small indentation. She went over her reasons for hunting, using that same quiet, supremely calm voice. If she held any qualms about killing anyone, she hid them well.

Her calm voice droned on as her fingers did their work, filling the empty spaces on the disk. The whole thing struck Eddie as slightly ritualistic, but he couldn't say why. Symbolism was always lost on him. It probably had something to do with his less than classical choice in literature.

Pressing the now full disk, Lyn load the gun in one smooth motion. Slipping the cylinder back into place, she leveled the pistol and glared down the sight. Eddie nodded as she finished her explanation. "I think I understand what you m-mean. B-but, what happends after she's...after she's d-dead?"

The question didn't sit well with Eddie. It seemed too much like a question he'd asked himself. If he killed Wade, what then? He hadn't bothered to think that far ahead. Now that he had, he couldn't, for the life of him, imagine what he might do after that. The voice in the back of his head spoke again.

Holding a bandage in his hand, Eddie looked up at Lyn. "Hey," he began, his voice barely audible, "do you think....Do you plan on dying out here?"

[Super Llama†]

Laeil paused as Eddie asked if she planned on dying on the island, a vision of her breakdown at the storehouse flashing through her head. For a brief moment, her demeanor changed completely. She seemed more vulnerable, more...human.

"...no." She said after a while, reverting to the old, more stoic Laeil as she added more bullets to the speedloader and then pocketed it, sticking the gun into the back of her jeans and putting everything else (except her sword) back into her pack.

"I need to get some sleep." She said. It wouldn't do her much good to go after Melina right now. The moon was making its way towards the horizon, so they'd lose their light in a little while. Besides, she had to make sure she got some rest once in a while to avoid a repeat of what happened back at the storehouse. Leaning back against the building, she closed her eyes and allowed herself to give in to the mercy of sleep.

[DetectiveArcher†]

For a moment, Lyn faltered. Her hand trembled slightly, the bullet meant for the loading disk nearly falling from her loose fingers. The detached look in her eyes fell away as something else took its place. The lean killer's eyes looked tired and vulnerable. For a heartbeat, Lyn looked like a beaten dog. The moment passed, taking the flash of weakness from her eyes as quickly as it came. Eddie pretended not to notice.

A quiet "no" was all she had to say on the matter as she finished filling the disk, her cold manner restored. Putting the medical supplies away, she informed Eddie that she was going to sleep. He nodded, realizing she probably needed a rest. The dark haired boy watched as Lyn, hands still clutched around the hilt of her sword, slowly nodded off to sleep with her back against the building. Eddie waited until he was certain she'd fallen asleep before allowing himself a weary yawn.

He rapped himself briskly on the cheek, blinking quickly. He needed to keep sleep at bay for a while yet. After the second fiasco at the lagoon, the boy had promised himself he'd keep a better look out. If he'd been paying attention, maybe Jimmy.... He shook his head. He couldn't allow himself to wallow. Lyn was still alive and he was going to keep her that was as long as he could. It was the only way he could keep himself focused. Keep himself from going off the deep end. There was the hope of killing Wade, but that manner of staying focused could hardly count as sane.

In fact, the determined boy thought to himself as we went to work reloading his own gun, that's probably making you really fucked up. Bloody revenge isn't exactly the life goal of someone that's right in the head. Eddie contemplated the idea a moment and found that it didn't bother him much. The fact that it didn't bothered him greatly. Was he becoming a monster? A killer like the others?

A shiver wound its way up his back. Pushing the distressing ideas away, Eddie focused on the task at hand. Letting go of the mental distractions, he scanned the jungle's edge, his grip on the rifle tight. His eyes jerked at each ruffle of leaves. His body jumped nervously at noises that might very well have been his imagination playing cruel tricks. All the while, he never once loosened the grip on the Remington.

[Super Llama†]

SCREEEEEEEEECH!

Laeil was awakened by that familiar yet obnoxious sound that heralded the morning announcements. Yawning rather loudly and stretching her arms over her head, she got to her feet, taking a look over at Eddie seated at his post.

"We should leave as soon as the announcements are over."

"Good morning, children! Well, without further ado..."

Laeil picked up her pack and sword as she listened to Danya list off the newly deceased with half an ear. Now that she had a gun, she'd have to find something that could work as a sheath for her sword, or make one herself, so she could pull the gun out easily without having the drop the sword. She checked to make sure everything was in place, so once the announcements were over she could just take of-

"...and everyone's favourite femme fatale, Melina Frost!"

*thud*

Laeil's sword hit the ground right at that moment. After a moment's pause, she just shook her head. She didn't hear that. It was just her mind playing tricks on her. That was all. Melina couldn't be dead. Because...well, she just couldn't. Nevermind that were other people out for her blood; she couldn't die until Laeil killed her. That was all there was too it. So that's it, it didn't happen, she's not dead, period, she's not dead, she didn't go off and get her dumb ass killed by someone else it didn't happen god dammit, god dammit, god dammit, GOD

FUCKING

DAMMIT ALL TO HELL!!

Laeil felt like she was going to explode, her fists clenching tightly until her nails dug into her palms and drew blood. Danya continued on with the rest of the dead, but she didn't hear it. Her pack slipped off her shoulder and hit the ground, and Laeil soon found herself walking. She didn't even realize she was doing it, her mind was such a swirling maelstrom of rage she couldn't even think straight. Finally, her foot bumped into a corpse on the ground; the corpse of Nathanial Harris. And as soon as she looked down to see it, she reacted, redirecting all her anger onto this dead body.

She pulled back her foot, and kicked it as hard as she could.

Then she did it again.

And again.

And again.

And again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again.

She couldn't stop herself even if she wanted to. Not even when her leg began to hurt, and she began to feel out of breath. And when the rage subsided just enough for her to think, only one thing went through her head.

It should've been her.

It should've been her.

It should've been ME!

Finally, she took a step back. At least, she tried to, but the incline made her misstep and she fell hard right onto her back. She stared up at the sky, breathing heavily from her outburst. There she lay for a minute or two before...

She began to laugh.

Once again, she couldn't stop herself, and to Eddie, it wouldn probably seem like a ridiculous reaction. She continued to laugh; a laugh completely devoid of humor. Because just then she finally realized.

Melina won.

She said before that she always wins, and she was right. Even in death, Melina had won, and all of Laeil's efforts, all the hell that she had put herself through, it was all for nothing.

As far as she was concerned, Melina Frost had won. Completely and utterly.

[DetectiveArcher†]

Eddie sneezed, sniffling as his dew damp clothes stuck to his body. Keeping watch hadn't been so bad. The night had passed without any trouble. As far as he could tell, nobody had come near the tower at all and there was no immediate danger to be worried about. Not that such a thing stopped him from worrying. As the sun rose quietly over the eastern treeline, Eddie was glad for its warmth.

Resting against the tower, the meek student became acutely aware of the weight in his extremities. His arms and legs felt like lead weights, growing harder to move with every passing second. His grip on the rifle loosened as dark eyes fluttered in a desperate attempt to remain awake. Losing the battle for consciousness, Eddie felt his body giving into sleep. The screech of the announcement system shocked him back to his senses.

Jumping at the sudden crackle of speakers, the young Sullivan cast a quick glance at Lyn, wondering if she noticed he'd almost fallen asleep. Embarassment burned in the boy's cheeks as Danya giddily informed the remaining students as to which of their contemporaries met their end over the past 24 hours. Eddie felt a rush of guilt as the children were listed off, one after the other.

Every name brought on a face. Vikki Valentine had been a cute girl who seemed almost supernaturally optimistic. Eddie wondered how optimistic she'd been before she died. Michael Anders was listed. Eddie managed a short sigh. Apparently he was dead when they'd found him on the trail. Hannah Rose was dead too, her beret not being quite as lucky as she needed it to be.

All those people. Did they expect to go home? To see their families? Did they accept that they were going to die in the middle of nowhere, for no reason at all? A new wave of guilt washed over the dark haired boy as Danya droned on, the depraved fuck barely mentioning Jimmy's death. Lost in the despair of the situation, Eddie couldn't help but wonder. What had he done right? What had the others done wrong? What made him so goddamned special that he was still up and walking while the others were worm food? The unanswered question gnawed away at his gut. As the next came up, the introspection came to a violent end.

Eddie froze and slowly turned to Lyn as Melina Frost's death was happily announced. A chill crawled up his spine as Lyn's far off eyes danced wildly in their sockets. She dropped her sword, wandering forward like a ghost. With each step her back exuded a stronger aura of rage and unspent frustration. She came to a halt at the mangled body they'd passed on their way in. Her fists shook, white knuckles showing through the skin.

Drawing back, Lyn drove her foot into the dead body with a loud thud. Apparently, it made her feel better, because she did it again. And again. And again. At one point, Eddie was certain he heard a loud snap as a rib broke, but didn't say anything. Heaving with the effort, Lyn stepped back, her shoulders rising in falling with each deep gulp of air. When the girl begin to shake, he thought she might be crying, until he picked out the short chuckles drifting from her lips.

"Uh...L-L-Lyn? Are you...?" The quiet laughing exploded into full throated cackles that made Eddie's blood run cold. That's it. She's gone. Completely, fuck all insane. He swallowed hard, walking forward. He had to consciously force his legs to take each step, to prevent them from locking up. Hovering a short distance from her, he waited a moment, for the laughter to die down. Fighting to keep his hand steady, he slowly put his hand on the thin girl's bony shoulder. He wasn't sure how she'd react, but he wanted her to know he was still there. That, no matter what she might think, he wanted to help her.

[Super Llama†]

As well intentioned as Eddie's gesture was, it probably wasn't the best of ideas. Laeil's eyes snapped back into focus, and as rage begin to build again, she focused it on the first thing she saw.

She got up slowly and eeriely calmly, standing still for a moment before wheeling around and throwing a punch right at Eddie's face. "Don't touch me." She hissed "This is your fault. Your fault and Jimmy's. And my fault for going along with this shit. If I hadn't gotten caught up in your little revenge plot, I could've had mine!" Logic and reason would've told her how flawed her statement was, but logic and reason were no longer with her. "It could've been me! Three days, three straight days with little sleep and food, obsessing over it, torturing myself over every defeat, all so I could have that one moment when I spill her blood with my own hands, and get back at her for the hell that she put me through, and now it's all GONE!"

"Heheh, careful now, you don't want to choke on the scenery, do you?"

Suddenly, she pulled the revolver from the back of her jeans, pointing it right at Eddie, a wild look in her eyes as her hands trembling slightly, though she was close enough that if she fired, she was bound to hit something. Her actions were no longer under her control, and her mind screamed at her to off this little fucker right here and now.

"Now, how are you going to make it up to me?" She said, in as calm a voice as she could manage, though the attempt was broken soon afterwards "TELL ME!"