The Nature of Good and Evil ||Open||

Aveira kept her stern face on for a few more seconds before relaxing. "Good. Family should love and accept each other." She felt a sharp pang as she thought of her own family. "It isn't good for brothers to fight. Especially twin brothers. You are each other's closest family." She smiled slightly.

"You both look awful. Come back to the school with me. You should get cleaned up. Maybe the nurse should see you." She walked closer and tilted Angelo's face up, touching his chin lightly. "You're eye is swelling. It's going to start hurting very badly unless we find some ice for it."

She turned to Damon to check his wounds and laughed as she saw the feathers in his hair. She plucked them out and handed them to Angelo. "I think you may have lost something," she said with a grin on her face.

She felt very relaxed. She was glad to have met these boys. They'd allowed her to open up and act like she normally did. Back at the asylum, she was one of the saner patients. She often acted as the go between for her ward mates, despite them being much older than her. She remembered plenty of times she had to intervene in an argument between a young patient and her room mate Kelly, a forty-year-old paranoid schizophrenic.

Angelo shrugged at her words and said in a bored tone, "It's nothing you should worry about."

Damon added, "We fight a lot. I have to make sure Angelo knows I won't let him bully me."

Angelo nodded, "And I have to make sure Damon won't take everything somebody will dish out at him, the wimp."

They finished together, "It's nothing to worry about."

Angelo rolled his non-swelling eye at her inspection of his face. "I can handle it, lady."

Damon grinned red at the feathers Aveira pulled out of his hair. They must have been really visible against his black locks. "Angelo wants to be able to show off his 'battle-scar'. He'll probably make up some really exaggerated story about it."

Angelo replied quickly, "That's not true!" However, his grin belied his statement. He amended, "It will only be slightly exaggerated. And we don't need to see a nurse."

Damon nodded. "We can find a bag of frozen peas or something for Angelo's eye."

Angelo added, "Damon will be all right. I didn't punch him at full strength so he shouldn't be missing any teeth."

Aveira faltered, weighing her options. "All right," she said slowly. "But if it hurts later, don't say I didn't warn you." She smiled a little. Angelo seemed to dislike her, but Damon has become a fast friend. They may have been younger than her, but she was used to older people who acted like they were children. Who was she to judge?

"At least come out of the alley. It can't be sanitary." She looked around and grimaced. Trash bags and dirt lined the walls and there were spider webs in almost every nook and cranny. She shook her head. "It's really quite gross, actually."

A thought struck her as she looked at Angelo. "If I'm bothering you, you can tell me. I know your brother must affect your attitude with his powers, but that's no reason for me to brush off your concerns. If you want me to leave, I will."

They looked around and seemed to agree, but Damon shook his head. "Not to the market," he said. "That guy is probably still on the lookout for me."

Angelo guffawed and slapped Damon on the shoulder good-naturedly. "I bet you gave him and the cop a good workout."

Damon shrugged, but seemed moderately pleased by the comment. He turned to Aveira and said, "Follow me. I think we can find a way out through the other side of the alleyway."

As his twin started off, Angelo raised an eyebrow at Aveira. "Why would I want you to leave? If you did, I'd be stuck with Damon and I see him all the time. And, face it, he's not quite so easy on the eyes."

Damon shot Angelo an expression of false indignation. "You're not one to talk, Quasimodo."

"You only wish that you could pull off a black eye as well as I do." They both laughed. Angelo returned to talking to Aveira, as though the exchange never happened. "Nah. Anybody who accepts Damon right off the bat is cool."

Aveira smiled, blushing slightly. She wasn't used to such compliments. Compliments that were almost...flirtatious. V snickered in her mind. Awww, the cute one has a little crush on us. That's so cute! Aveira mentally rolled her eyes. He does not, she argued. He's just being nice. Even in her head, the thought rang false. You know he's not, V said seriously. Especially in the presence of his brother. He likes us.

Aveira paused as she followed the boys. Her steps stopped only briefly before she continued walking, struggling to keep a straight face. She didn't want to alert her new (and only) friends to the fact that she was having a conversation with her other personality. That would be weird, the two halves said simultaneously.

Aveira smiled. She felt like she had her own twin. You know, except that she only existed in her head and was the result of a severe childhood trauma. V mentally snorted as she caught the thought. They really could be friends at times.

You know, the little angel one's kinda cute. She paused before speaking again. The devil boy is too, I guess. And they're brothers! Maybe the three of us can get together...have some fun...I bet they're virgins, like us. Well, you. Aveira stopped again, but this time she didn't begin walking again. "Stop it, V," she said softly, eyes closed. "Don't bring that up. Just...stop it."

Damon reached the other end of the alley before the other two, looked around the corner, then turned back to the other two. "Coast's clear."

He raised an eyebrow at Aveira. Angelo had stopped and was peering at her curiously. He turned to Damon and asked, "Does this happen to her a lot?"

Damon frowned and didn't answer his brother. Instead, he brushed past the angel-boy to talk softly to Aveira. "Is V bothering you? I thought having Angelo here would make things easier. I can leave if you're still having problems."

He had hoped that things would ease up with his brother's influence, but she was another Gifted. Perhaps it was part of her power that they would affect her thus.

Angelo's frown mirrored Damon's and he asked his brother in muted tones, "Who the heck is V? Why would you have to leave...?" He looked around. Not another soul in sight.

Aveira blinked and looked up at them. "I'm sorry," she said to them and shook her head. "No, V isn't being mean. She's just being her usual self. She can't help it." She bit her lip and looked down. "V is my...well, I'm...we went through a trauma when we were little. The doctors said it caused me to develop someone who understood and cared about me. Like an imaginary friend, but worse...I'm schizophrenic..."

She shifted uncomfortably and looked away. "I'm sorry," she repeated. "Schizophrenia means I'm crazy. You don't have to hang around me if you don't want to. I mean, I'm safe to be around. I'm not dangerous. I just have another personality and sometimes I see things and...stuff." She took her head and forced herself to stop rambling.

V couldn't stop laughing. Oh god, that was great! Nice job there. Outstanding, really. Her voice was dripping with sarcasm and Aveira blushed angrily. It's your fault! she accused. You had to go and talk about...about...all that! V snickered in her head. Yeah. My fault. Okay.

Damon frowned. "That's a loaded word. Crazy."

Angelo made a quizzical expression at Damon. "Yeah, but it sounds pretty accurate to me." He folded his arms over his chest. "Don't they have meds for that kind of thing?"

Damon shook his head. "It doesn't seem all that intrusive, though.... Not like the guy at the bus station." Angelo would know who he was talking about. Back in their hometown, there was a guy who was psychotic (meaning that he could not function normally in society, not that he was on a murderous rampage.) He would go into garbage cans, picking up newspapers that people had thrown out. He would mutter constantly... and his tics and repetitive gestures were very interesting to watch. But their mother would always hurry them along.

Later they found out that he was at the bus station because he refused to take medication. And last March they were told that he had died after running out in front of a bus.

At this point, the twins came to an accord. "Don't say stuff like that," Angelo started.

Damon continued, "You don't have to apologize for who you are. Or for problems you think you have."

Angelo finished, "That's just dumb. We're not accusing you of anything. We just wanted to know if you were alright. Damon certainly doesn't need the police thinking that he hurt you or something." He tilted his head toward the alley's mouth, a lighthearted smile curving his mouth. "C'mon. Let's get out of the alley. You were the one who didn't like the filth."

Damon waited until his brother started walking to start walking as well. That way, he would not be left alone with Aveira, exerting only negative energies on her alter-ego.

Aveira smiled slightly. "Thanks," she said softly. She walked with them, smiling happily. "So if we can't go back to the market, where are we going?" she asked curiously. "I haven't been here all that long, so I'll probably get lost no matter where we go." She laughed softly.

V had become quiet again. She did that often, fading in and out of Aveira's thoughts randomly. Aveira wasn't sure where she went (if she went anywhere at all), but had come to accept that V wasn't going to tell her any time soon. Her mood having changed for the better, Aveira started humming a song she had stuck in her head.

Her eyes wandered over the twins. At first glance, they looked nothing alike, but upon further inspection, Aveira could see some similarities. She couldn't place exactly what it was the had in common. Maybe the bone structure, she thought to herself. Or their proportions or something...

The boys looked at each other and shrugged. Damon was the first to say, "Maybe Leo's... or the docks?"

Angelo shook his head. "I didn't bring my wallet and I know that you don't have enough cash to treat everybody. The docks are safe, but boring. Unless you feel up to stealing a boat or picking a fight with a sailor. I think we should sneak around to the church and mess with their religious little heads a bit. Pull some stunt with angels and demons and see how they react."

Damon looked appalled at this suggestion. "Angelo, you do realize that I would be the one to get in trouble for that. Nobody would blame the angel. With my luck, they would not stop to think before finding some kind of weapon and destroying the 'demon'. No churches. How about we just go back to school? It might rain soon anyways."

He was looking at the sky as he said this. Clouds were rolling in. Sure enough, it looked like a big one was going to be upon the town within the hour. Angelo shrugged and glanced upwards as well. "Wanna fly before the storm gets here, Aveira?"

Looking back and forth between the two as they talked, Aveira wasn't paying attention to where she was going. She stumbled slightly, but heard Damon refer to himself as a demon. She looked at him, appalled. "You are not a demon. You don't even look like one." Confused, she looked him over. The horns, genius. He has horns and a tail. That look angelic to you? "Oh," Aveira said as realization dawned on her. "But lots of animals have horns and tails. Why should you be a demon just because you have them, too?"

Angelo's next words hit her and she blinked. "I can't fly," she said simply. She looked up, seeing the storm clouds and fidgeted. She hated storms. "Is it even safe to fly with all those rain clouds? What if lightening strikes you?" She blinked again and looked back at the twins. "Have you ever been struck by lightening?" she asked, a note of awe in her voice.

Damon didn't have the heart to point out the shadow-light difference between himself and his twin. Or his forked tongue. The biggest thing, though, was his influence over others. That alone should have given him demonic status. After all, most of what demons did was influencing others to do evil. He kept his silence.

Angelo, for once, was also silent. This was not because he was protecting his brother. He was staring at the clouds, trying to decide if they would get here before they could fly. He shrugged at Aveira's question. "I haven't. It might be safe if we head inland, towards the school and away from the storm. We'll probably have to land before we get there, though."

Damon piped up. "Angelo, we don't have any rope."

Angelo sighed. "I guess you're right." He looked back at Aveira to explain. "We can't fly right next to each other because our wings would get in each other's way. Back at home, we would sometimes fly our siblings up to the roof to watch the sunset."

Damon scoffed, "No, you had us fly them up there so they would get stranded. Good thing Mom figured it out and opened a window because you were not going to help me get them down." He shook his head. "Three weeks with no dessert thanks to you."

Angelo laughed and changed the subject back to going back to the school. "I guess we can start walking now, then. Maybe we can get halfway there before it starts raining."

Aveira looked up at the clouds again and started walking faster. "I hate storms. I really, really hate storms!" She looked at the two of them and stepped up her pace even more. "Please hurry," she said in a small voice. "I didn't notice them and the clouds are getting closer and I'm scared." Soft thunder sounded in the distance and Aveira held back a sob. She didn't know how storms would effect her. There were so many variables in them. The water couldn't hurt her, but would they still make her cold? Wind couldn't hurt her, but what if the wind pushed a tree on her? There was just no way of knowing until it happened.

Calm down, V warned her in a steady voice. If you get too worked up, you'll give us a hallucination. Aveira shook her head and muttered back to V, "I can't help it! Besides, what if they're real visions? They could be part of our power." The twins had vanished from her thoughts almost completely, so strong was her fear.

Angelo seemed more distant than Damon. Damon looked very worried. He kept to Aveira's side and said softly, "Things will turn out fine. If we don't make it back to the school, we'll find somewhere to wait out the storm."

Angelo nodded. "Maybe if Damon makes a face at the clouds, they'll get scared and go away."

Damon frowned, "What was that supposed to mean?" He shook his head. "Maybe if you try to taunt the clouds, they'll go away."

Angelo sneered back at his twin from over his shoulder, picking up the pace a little bit. He didn't have anything else to say, though, so he wound up returning his gaze to the street they were walking along. He heard Aveira mutter, but not the content of that muttering. He said lightly, "She doing 'talking to her other self' thing again?"

Damon spat, "Angelo, if you can't be nice, go take a hike."

"Hey, hey. I WAS being nice. I care about our new friend's mental health!"

Damon asked Aveira softly, "Are you going to be alright?"

The winds picked up a bit as they reached the edge of the village. Angelo's light hair and Damon's dark hair might have provided quite the contrast, but they both whipped about their heads the same way. Angelo frowned. In a diversion from the subject at hand, he called over his shoulder, "Might need to put the wings away."

Damon nodded. His felt like sails in this wind.

Aveira heard them talking, but she couldn't make herself concentrate. She only snapped out of her internal conflict briefly when Damon spoke to her. She made herself concentrate on his words and shook her head. "No," she said in a shaking voice. "No, we need to find some place to wait this out. When I get scared like this, I start seeing things and then I can become dangerous. I need to be somewhere that feels safe so I won't lash out in my delusions."

She spoke quickly and quietly, needing him to understand. The last thing she wanted to do was hurt one of her new friends. She turned forward and her eyes widened. In front of them was a large black dragon. At least, Aveira saw a dragon. Though it was a figment of her imagination, it was real enough to terrify her. As she stared, the dragon reared up and roared. Strangely enough, the roar sounded like a roll of thunder.

Aveira cried out in surprise, but covered her mouth quickly. She backed up, eyes trained on the dragon that had become real to her. V was hiding in her mind, afraid to react and make things even worse. "It's starting. We need to go!" Aveira's voice held pure terror and she was trembling. She really believed what she saw.