VIVILENE
i make a mess
and you'll be there
to help me undress

Don't worry about it, said Azure.

Worry extensively about it, said a chattering voice in Vivilene's head.

And oh, worry about it she did. Vivilene wasn't one to ask for details-- though, this trait more comes from not realising she could ask --but her mind did automatically begin to envision and obsess over and fester over the small details.

She worried about a lot of things-- she worried about Azure not having a good family and how lonely she must be. Vivilene loved her sisters and her brother and her dad and everyone. She couldn't imagine how she'd feel if they did bad things and everyone got mad and attacked her for it.

And, on top of that, she worried if they would. Suddenly she didn't want to go home. She didn't want to see her dad-- what if he was bad? What if bad things would happen and Vivilene wouldn't be allowed to go into Eridanus either?

WHEEZE.

Vivilene stopped dead in her tracks with a clatter of hooves, looking around shakily. She opened her mouth and then shut it and then opened it again-- but, alas, she had not become any less mute in the last ten minutes. She let out another of the usual noises; croaking, rasping, choking on her own tongue.

The one thing that made it all worse, on top of the encroaching anxiety, was that she couldn't properly tell Azure what she was thinking. She would have to use magic, but she couldn't concentrate, couldn't bring herself to do it. She just wanted to be normal, and she wasn't, and now she was abnormal with a bad family.

How did Azure deal with it? Would she have to live alone in creepy tunnels? Never mind that Azure said she had safe places-- Vivilene didn't want to spend her life picking through places where rats lived and attacked her hand with a bad family.

She wanted to cry.

@Azure

When Vivilene stopped moving, Azure turned, and peered. She had no idea why the kid had stopped; surely her words hadn't bene that damning..? Or was it something else? Azure looked around, but couldn't spot anything else dangerous, or alarming.

She hesitated, then turned to face Vivilene.

"You okay, Viv? You need to stop, rest a bit?"

Maybe she'd just been walking too far..? The choking sounds were a little worrying, though.

@Vivilene

VIVILENE
i make a mess
and you'll be there
to help me undress

Stop? Rest? Vivilene didn't know.

Did she even know anything?

Oh dear.

There was a brief clacking of hooves as Vivilene promptly began to pace in a circle. Sometimes just moving would get her to stop panicking. It seemed like the more she moved, however, the more anxious she got.

She started to pick apart the behaviours of her family, and the things they did. Maybe hunting was bad? Maybe making clothes and satchels and stuff was bad? Maybe her dad was really really bad and now Vivilene was bad because she didn't stop him.

Maybe the fire that Asteri really liked was bad, or maybe Hunter swinging a spear around was bad. Maybe it was illegal for Volta to have four eyes!

What if she was doing something wrong, too? What if she did something bad and didn't even know about it and now everyone hated her and she was a bad person? What if she was going to get eaten in Canis by that monster because she woke him up? What if everyone wanted her dead now because she made a mistake?

Vivilene started choking again. Every step forced another miserable little noise out of her-- but thankfully, the more she paced, the less she choked and the more she began whimpering and almost crying. Eventually, finally, she slumped onto her side and curled into the side of a ruined building, covering her face with her little hands.

She would have liked to sleep, but she was unsure if she would be able to. Realistically, Vivilene just wanted to crawl back into her chrysalis and stay in there.

@Azure

Azure stared, absolutely blankly.

She'd been fine--the kid had been fine--and now she was going in circles, and choking, and--...Aaand she fell over.

The hybrid hesitated, looking around, relieved that she'd chosen to stick to cover. She couldn't imagine trying to deal with Vivilene having collapsed out in the open. But what the hell was all of this about? She felt sympathy--worry--but she felt confused, more than anything; was it something more, wrong? Was she injured, somehow?

Azure paced over, moving to nudge a beak and feathered head beneath one of the child's arms; sometimes Dip had liked the contact, maybe it'd help this kid, too-?

After a moment's confused, concerned focus, Azure popped another banana into being, briefly poking it open with a beak before nudging it to Vivilene.

"I'm not sure what to do to help you. Uh--here's a banana," she explained.

...Holy shit I'm useless.

@Vivilene

VIVILENE
i make a mess
and you'll be there
to help me undress

And then there was a banana.

Her fingers parted past her eyes to look at it-- shimmering, glittering, beautiful. The abrupt passing of a banana was enough that her mind pulled a blank for now; for a few precious seconds she forgot about the outpour of irrational thoughts.

Slowly, carefully, Vivilene lowered her hands. She nodded stiltedly, miserably, but thankfully. She picked up the banana. She knew, vaguely, how to pop it open-- half-instinct, half from watching Azure do it before. She split the peel and yanked it back to reveal the fruit.

She took a piece off, lifted it to her mouth, and... started crying.

Vivilene, if asked, could not tell you why she started crying. Perhaps she was just thankful to have a friend, or perhaps the emotions were too overwhelming for her at such a young age. Regardless, there she sat, crying so hard on a piece of banana that she was almost choking on it.

A reasonable person might have tried to take the banana back out of their mouth and try again when they stopped.

Not Vivilene.

Vivilene took another bite.

She cried so hard that her throat closed up entirely; which brought about two new problems. The first, Vivilene couldn't breathe right. The second, Vivilene had an increasing amount of banana-mush in her mouth. The consequence: she cried even harder.

It was a silent cry, but it was something that looked ultimately quite painful. Her face was glowing dark pupil and the tears went streaming down her stupid face, mingling with banana-drool dripping down her chin.

If that imagery wasn't bad enough, unfortunately, the sobbing hybrid started glowing.

Perhaps... luckily, Vivilene did not notice. It might have made her more upset, if she knew how outright ridiculous she looked. She cried, and she choked, and she tried to eat more banana, and she glowed. It lasted all of (exactly) two and a half minutes, but really, it could have been hours.

When her body began to dim down again, Vivilene began to calm. She swallowed what was in her mouth and wiped her chin and her cheeks with her hands. She shifted, with a little sniffle, and went to lean onto Azure underneath her arm, closing her eyes.

She had, at the very least after this ordeal, managed to exhaust herself enough that she fell asleep-- because what else would you do after bawling on a banana?

It might have been what she needed, at least. A moment to reset her mind and think more logically about her own situation, rather than to work herself up to a panic about, realistically, absolutely nothing.

@Azure exit vivilene

Azure did not spend those two and a half minutes idle. She was very worried that the kid was choking, and she tried to talk to her--repeatedly--but it didn't seem to get through past the sobbing and choking, and eventually, she gave up.

There was glowing, too; she wasn't quite sure how to parse that, along with the rest.

When Vivilene abruptly exhausted herself and slipped toward sleep, Azure resigned herself, confusedly, to babysitting.

She lowered her own head to the ground, but listened, and watched, for danger--wondering just how the hell her life had come to this.

exit Azure
@Vivilene