trans_9 | Meet and Greet Part Deux: The Socialing

"Hello, Katara. I'm glad you're back alright."

Luna is smiling much less vaguely than she smiles at most people, wide eyes warm. It really has been a while.

Funny how that happens.

She hesitates before putting a hand on the other girl's shoulder, head tilting to get a good look at her face. Socially inept or not, Luna knows faces. And this one isn't happy.

"You're upset."

"Luna!" Wow, she really hadn't seen the blond in a long time, but she was unmistakable. Katara reached out and hugged her friend, glad to have someone near her age to talk to for once. "Where have you been, I haven't seen you in a long time! I'm glad to see you're okay!"

It was good, to see Luna there. Katara couldn't quite place it, but having Luna around was like have a cool breeze in a stale room, a trait she found she liked in a person, as there weren't too many who had that effect. Still, Katara preferred not talking about this in the middle of Obs, so she took Luna's arm and had them walk away from the crowd for now.

"Yeah, a little. Sorry for the look, I just came back from this holiday mission. Thing was, the place we landed was all full of ice and snow. It made me realize how much I miss home, and how I might never see it again. It kinda hot me all at once."

Returning the hug lightly, she feels her spirits lifting. Friends are so lovely.

"I've been around, studying Stacy's anatomy. I've spent a lot of time in Escherville. It's quite a fascinating place," she says, eyes going vague as her thoughts whirl her away.

She is silent, not particularly noticing the tug on her arm as she is drawn into a more secluded corner of the room by the brunette.

Blinking, she realizes that Katara is talking. Fortunately, her ears absorbed the first part and had it waiting for her perusal.

She nods.

"I don't think we'll ever stop missing it, and certain things are bound to make the loss more palpable. It's sad that you had to come across such a place now, but I suppose it's good to be exposed to the experience." Despite the logic in her words, her tone is as kind as it ever is, and she pats Katara's back gently. "I'm sorry."

Katara smiled. "I'm just glad to see you're okay! I thought you might have been grabbed by GLADOS, and made to run around looking for this cake...never mind," she said, noticing Luna's questioning look. "I don;t understand it either. One of my friends apparently was taken by the computer's AI to do stuff like that, its weird."

But at the mention of Escherville, Katara's ears perked up. "Wait, I thought Escherville was really dangerous or something. Because that's where that Nightmare King is supposed to be! Luna, please be careful! I don't know yet what that guy is capable of doing, but I don't want you to get hurt. Escherville might be the next place we have to infiltrate."

But at the mention of her home and Luna's soothing voice, the waterbender relaxed. "It's okay. It just really hit home, to see all of that and know I wouldn't see my world again. Other than that, it was actually a very nice time, and I got you a present!"

Of course, she owed a billion presents to other people too, but she would learn that soon.

"Here," she said. "I know it might be strange but this made me think of you (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v102/elpedrososama/Lolita-Dress-For-Girl.jpg)."

Indeed, Luna's look is quite quizzical at the mention of GLADoS, and AIs. Being a witch, she doesn't understand the concept of technology, and doesn't much care to - in her eyes, it tends to complicate things. Consequently, she chooses not to remark.

"Lots of places are dangerous. You just have to tread lightly," she says simply, the comment vague and typical of her. As she is quite fond of Escherville, she doesn't much enjoy the thought of avoiding it for any reason, even the Nightmare King, frightening as he is. He almost reminds her of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named in his skills at instilling horror in people. It's quite a power to have over a group, and frankly, that scares her more than anything.

She shakes it off, though, looking surprised as she accepts the present, finger the frothy, confection of a dress with fascination.

"This is a dress," she states, though it's obvious what it is. Frankly, she hasn't held one before. "Muggle women wear them, though I can't say I've seen one quite this exquisite. Are you sure you don't want to wear it yourself?" But how could Katara take it back when her eyes are glowing like that?

It was just as well to not go off talking about that stuff anyway. Even Katara didn't know all that much about GLADOS and that technology.

"It never hurts to exercise caution. It's not so much being afraid of a place, but what he could do. I don't know the powers he has yet, and what they can do. To go somewhere where an enemy is and not know his powers is just not smart. You might as well be setting yourself up to get killed."

Especially if he tried to do anything mentally damaging to Luna. If that happened, she wouldn't rest until she destroyed that thing.

She had to shake this thought off too, and was a little surprised by Luna's words. "What? No, no, its for you, Luna! I wouldn't do this dress justice anyway, its much more suited to you. I thought of you the moment I saw it."

The colors definitely wouldn't work with her skin tone, that was certain.

Though she rather hates to admit it to herself, Katara is right - no matter how much she dislikes the collective terror the Nightmare King instills in the crew, it remains that wandering into his territory unprepared is a rather reckless thing to do. Still, Luna is a fairly stubborn individual, so she gives the brunette what could almost be a smug smile, and says "I've fought worse." It might actually be true. Maybe.

'Scept not.

A grin alights on her face, growing as she looks at the dress. She hasn't been given clothing as a present since her mother died, and never anything this exquisite.

"Thank you, Katara. It's lovely," she says genuinely, fingers tracing one of the sleeves. She couldn't wait to show it to Ginny.

Katara narrowed her eyes, and for a moment looked like a certain bossy Griffyndor girl, minus the bushy hair. "Luna, I'm not going to tell you what to do, but that place is going to get dangerous very soon. Whatever is in Escherville is going to try breaking out, and it will start attacking people on the ship. I don't know how strong it is, or if it can even touch you...but if it can, I would rather you didn't get hurt, okay? As far as I'm concerned, better safe than sorry."

No, Katara wasn't going to take any chances with this Nightmare King, not when there was a possibility that it could start moving on her friends and family on the ship. She'd find out everything she needed to.

Here though, she smile. "I'm really glad you like it," Katara said. "I wanted something that fitted you."

The sudden resemblance to Hermione is rather disconcerting, in Luna's opinion. It sends a pang through her heart, making something deeper and darker than her usual intelligent gleam sparkle in her eyes. Her eyebrows pinch together, eyes shifting to focus on the floor for a minute as she reminds herself that there is still hope. After all, Stacy would be completely insane if she chose Luna over Hermione, in the blonde's opinion, and she knows - she just knows that all of her friends are in the Caverns somewhere. Harry and Ron and Hermione and Neville and Ginny... all of them.

They had to be.

Meeting Katara's gaze again, she exhales silently, eyes somber as she nods vaguely. "I suppose you're right. I'm just... rather loathe to let an entity of fear get the best of me." Too familiar.

Katara had never seen Luna look quite so...pensive, and it actually warranted some concern from the younger girl. But it wasn't as if she hadn't seen that kind of look before...heck, she was fairly certain that she given that look herself. It was that dawning realization that everything was different, more permanent when you realized people and situations that were once familiar was gone, and there was nothing to be done about it.

Katara sighed. "I agree with that, I do, but a little while ago, we had to try and take the Bridge from pirates. We lost B5, and Paco got his arm ripped off. I don't want to see anything like that happen to you."

If pensiveness is a surprise to Katara, she'll be even more shocked by the violent wince and shudder that Luna gives at the mention of that last mission, though she's most definitely not thinking about the bridge. Yes, B5 dying is horrible, and yes, she feels terrible for Paco, but she just can't. get. past. the Inferi.

Hiding her face in her hands, she sucks in a breath, fighting back the waves of chilling terror rolling through her.

Katara is a little surprised, but more than that, she had concern for her friend. She knew that what happened on the Bridge had been pretty rough, but she was betting that Luna's reaction had nothing to do with the Bridge.

"Luna," Katara said softly. "What are you thinking about?"

She shudders again, shaking her head at Katara, an obvious refusal to talk about it. Visions of dead hands breaking through windows fill her mind, tortured faces contorted in grimaces of death, slow, shambling walks, shattering bodies. Blood and screaming and the walking dead, and Luna has had it.

What had seemed to be a firm grasp on her emotions cracks down the middle, loosing an ocean of horror that the blonde has somehow managed to keep at bay since she regained her lucidity. Pulling her knees into her chest, wand knocked from behind her ear, she dissolves into choking, terrified sobs, and honestly, it's the most genuine thing she's done since her podpop.

She's been holding this back for a while, so bare with her, Katara.

Katara, for her part, was starting to realize that even with Luna, there were certain secret terrors, things too overwhelming to even talk about. Since it was Luna, who was usually quite frank about the things she'd seen, what Luna must have been imagining must have been quite horrifying.

And knowing this, Katara was filled with a quiet dread. The Nightmare King was going to start trying to break out of his prison soon, and to do that, he had to access the memories and fears of the people on the ship.

And that made Katara worry.

"Luna, listen to me," Katara said softly. "The thing in Escherville, it will try to make your worse fears come true. I know whatever you're thinking about is too horrible to talk about, but the Nightmare King WILL try to use it against you. Is there...any way we can somehow keep it secret from him?"

Luna's shattered consciousness struggles to point out that one of her only friends at this point (you know, the ones that are still alive - that elicits an abrupt, loud sob from her) is trying to speak sense to her, but the part of her brain that's somewhat lucid is highly insistent on completing its catharsis. After all, Luna Lovegood rarely acknowledges her own emotions long enough to realize that she's upset about something, so this is a very rare opportunity.

Sniffling, she shrugs. It appears that this is the only answer Katara will be receiving for a few more minutes.

There was a bit of fear in Katara's gaze now. It was one thing for Luna to be upset, but right now she was remembering something pretty bad, and it was silencing her. Katara had seen that reaction before: the Firenation had hurt enough people and done enough horrible things that she'd seen that reaction before.

She seized the girl's hands. "Luna, please listen to me! I know whatever happened to you must be scary, but I'm really concerned! If the Nightmare King gets to you, he'll show you what you're seeing now and worse! Please listen to me, I want to make sure you have help!"

Luna's eyes are dark, weighed down with fear and anguish as she blinks up at Katara.

"How can anything he imagines be worse? Nothing is worse than Inferi, because if someone can raise the dead, how can there be any rest for any mortal? It's the darkest concept in existence, and I've seen them. No more infantile nightmares about nebulous, shadowy corpses - I've seen them, and my mind hasn't gotten a wink of sleep since." She gasps, trying to pull her hands from Katara's grasp, failing, squeezing her eyes shut. "And it's not as if he can show me my friends dead, because I've already had that nightmare, Katara. What else is there to fear?"

Her posture is defensive, voice distinctly cutting, expression entirely clear of dreaminess.

Katara could understand the outburst, and since it was Luna, who hardly ever showed anything concretely related to fear if she could help it, this was definitely rare. For the reason, Katara listened to her friend, gathering all of the information she could about the things she was saying. After all, she was definitely no expert of the magical world.

"He's the Nightmare God Luna, and the scary thing is, I don't know how far he can go. He has the ability to take the worse fears you have and twist them even farther. He's strong enough that only someone very powerful can keep him at bay, and even that person is starting to fail at that. I don't want anymore people hurt because we weren't prepared Luna, not like last time. If there's anything I can do, I'll do it. I don;t want him to do anything to you."

Katara turned away a moment. She didn't like that Luna was so full of fear, it bothered her a little. It didn't mean she wouldn't keep trying, she just had to adjust a moment.

And Luna can understand Katara's concern. She has already admitted, multiple time, that Katara might have more common sense than Hermione when it comes to dire situations, and the small bit of her brain that was clear was fairly certain that this qualified as dire. Still, her terrified mind doesn't want to admit the possibility of something more horrifying than Inferi and dead friends.

Sniffling, she tries to blink away her tears, and inevitably fails. Still, her effort is obvious as she fixes red eyes on the floor, arms going lax as she tries to jumpstart her brain.

"I'm not sure how he can make them worse, but..." A deep breath provides a pause, eyebrows knitting together with the effort of gathering her wits. "But I'm being ridiculous." She glances up, expression an odd mixture of contrition and melancholy, making her look about three years younger. "I'm sorry, Katara."

"I'm not one for apologies," Katara said. "All I care about is making sure that you don't get hurt. If you think you can defend yourself and you have nothing to worry about, I can't do anything about it. I just wanted you to take care of yourself, okay?"

She took her hand. "Please?"

She sighed. She really hoped things would be okay for her. "If you ever change your mind Luna, you know where I am."

She rubs at her eyes a few times, ridding her lashes of their last droplets, though her eyes are still puffy. She gives Katara a faint, watery smile.

"Thank you. Really. There aren't many people in the world who care what happens to me, so it's nice to have someone nearby." Her voice is crackly, filled with the remnants of crying. She squeezes Katara's hand, nodding, eyes still distant, though it's more out of worry than genuine anguish now.

"Of course I care what happens to you!" Katara protested. "You're one of the first friends I ever made. If something happened to you I'd..." Katara stammered. She wasn't quite sure what she'd do, but she'd make sure that someone would pay, that was sure.

"I'll always care," Katara said, squeezing her hand back. "If you need anything, let me know. Things in this place...don't stay quiet for long."

Meet and Greet Part Deux: The Socialing

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