[ are you gonna stay the night ] (open)

"Hey, Lisette," he said cheerfully. "Your eyes are really-cool looking right now. Maybe it's just the lighting in here, but it's awesome. I know a girl in Boston- that's where I'm from- she had this whole thing going on with her eyes, they were two different colors. I think it's called hetero-something...heterochromia, that's it. One was dark brown and one was this hazel color. It looked really cool." The other girl stayed quiet; maybe she was shy?
At that moment, he thought he heard something- the door squeaking open just like it had a few minutes ago when he left the men's locker room. When the teen looked over, it seemed someone else- a tall guy with an impressive physique- was here to join their little party. Before Maxwell could open his mouth to call out, the stranger turned around and began to walk away.
Maxwell considered whether or not he should call out to him for a brief second before deciding to go for it. The more the merrier, right? "Hey!" he yelled. "You don't have to leave so soon. We won't bite- well, at least I won't. I can't speak for those two," he said, jerking his head towards the girls in the water. "But I promise I'll help you fight them off if they go crazy."

Esha was nodding along with their conversation as Lisette further introduced herself. She was beginning to have a calm sort of feeling that she rarely had when speaking to other people when she was as exposed as she was currently. She wasn’t comfortable enough to consider doing this on a regular basis with others, she’d still prefer the guise of her full body saris, but that wasn’t an option for her currently. A British person was somewhat unique, but frankly when she usually engaged in conversation the nationality of the other person wasn’t always something she was trying to wrap her brain around.

As Esha was about to answer the woman and continue on with their casual conversation, she said something about not suggesting something. It caused her a bit of confusion, but as she turned to see what the other emerged girl was looking at, a young man was tumbling into the pool. The mere presence of the boy was enough to set off her caution, but with the way he violently smacked against both the pool deck and the water startled her to no end. She pushed herself backwards like a jellyfish as her quills went erect. The frills that were trapped within her suit either poked straight through or began to pull the material upwards. It gave her an unimaginably horrid wedgy, but it hardly caught her concern. Her jaw began to stutter, she might have been leaning toward being okay with one person seeing her quills, but not two and not in the same day.

As her buggy eyes detached from the boy though, she saw a more uncomforting image. Chase was standing at the poolside. He hinted to knowing about her spines in his note, but she could have talked her way out of it if they had ever met once more on better terms, but there was no way she could work around this one. Even taking her exposed body out of the picture entirely, the events of the other night were still fresh in her memory. Even if she had still had feelings for him, she didn’t want to see him. Not this soon.

Esha chose to retreat, underwater where she knew that Chase couldn’t follow her. “*Why’s karma punishing me so?*” she released in a panic in her native tongue as she re-submerged into the depths of the drink. She dolphin kicked her way to the floor until she tried to switch her breathing systems. In her state of panic, she began to choke as her body switched between her lungs and her gills. She had to resurface, so she aimed for the other end of the pool, the one opposite to Chase. Her coughs were deep and throaty as she finally breached into the air. She swiftly swam to the edge of the pool and pulled half of her body out, leaning her chest on the deck. Even though she escaped the water she was still having a rough time breathing hinted by the fact that she was gasping for air loudly after a couple intervals of violent coughs. While half of her body was dripping on the tiles, her gills began to spurt out water like a waterfall.

(OOC: Casualmatch, there’s nothing wrong with you skipping my post turn since you’re still new, but could you please follow the posting order next time around? It’s just that things flow better when everybody posts in order)

#6ba0dd

Maxwell made an unusual comment about her eyes.  It was called heterochromia, but she told him, "My eyes aren't heterochromatic.  It's probably just the lighting; I can assure you that both my eyes are the same blue-gray color."  No one had ever told her that her eyes looked heterochromatic... because they weren't.

The door squeaked again, and a tall, muscular boy walked in.  Lisette thought he was quite handsome, but for some strange reason, Esha dove underwater, only to resurface moments later, choking and spluttering.  Maxwell told him to stay, saying that they wouldn't bite, and that he would help the other boy fight the two girls off if they did.  She merely raised an eyebrow and thought to herself, Like he could.  The girl was not at all tall, but even from her position she could tell that she was taller than Maxwell by at least a couple inches.  The newcomer was the only one who seemed to actually pose a threat.

Come to think of it, the Brit was sure she'd seen him around somewhere.  Perhaps he was in Emerald dorm as well?  It seemed as likely a possibility as anything.

Lisette swam over to where the other female was half in and half out of the water, leaning on the edge of the pool and gasping for breath.  "Are you alright?" she asked. "No imminent death?"  Choking on water obviously wasn't an ideal state to be in, but if Esha wasn't about to die, then she was okay in her eyes.

( WORDS ) 347 ( TAGGED ) @esha & Lisette & Max  ( MUSE ) here Surprisingly enough, the other boy in the water seemed to be perfectly fine with Chase staying. Perhaps he was one of those sociable and popular types of people, but even so, he had no idea what was really transpiring here. The young man, faced towards them and continuing to move away, shook his head slowly, "... No." They didn't need to know about what had happened in the past between he and Esha, all he needed to make clear was that he was leaving. Fear, guilt and lust battled in his heart as he surveyed Esha, unsure of how to proceed at the current moment. This wasn't the time to reconcile with her, especially with their previous encounter freshly ingrained into their heads. No, he wasn't prepared to face her yet, for the shame hadn't lessened enough to make him feel worthy of standing in her presence. As to be expected, she swiftly fled at the sight of him, though her protruding quills weren't new to him, more seemed to be occurring on her body. He briefly wondered what type of ability she actually held, rather than the one of 'power sensing' which she said earlier, but found it more and more difficult to believe. The young man sighed, watching helplessly as another young woman trailed after her. Each wet, wracking cough was enough to send a jolt of guilt throughout his system. This certainly wasn't going to work. "Sorry," he breathed, continuing to retreat backwards as every primal instinct he owned urged him to leap forward and attempt to reclaim dominance over the female that had bested his bestial form. Her neurotoxins were still easily scented through the atmosphere, and it was enough to keep him from losing control easily. A low and shortened growl habitually escaped his lips as he recalled that hazy yet brutal experience, combing his fingers through his tousled, brown locks briefly. Speaking in a fairly quiet tone, he ventured to say, "I'm very sorry, Esha." It was all he could say, really. Now, his steps back towards the locker room never ceased. AM I DIFFERENT FROM THE REST

MADE BY VEL OF GS

Unfortunately Chase’s attempts at apologizing to Esha were overruled by her own wet cough as she tried to regain a regular breathing pattern. She was so stupid to attempt what she did, she knew very well that it wasn’t going to end well the moment she was under the surface, but her flight senses were too powerful. She had nowhere else to turn to otherwise. Her gills continued to drool out the water slowly, yet her lungs were recovering at a far slower rate. It wasn’t to the point where someone would get the impression that she was dying, but it sounded like it would really hurt and it did quite a bit.

While the were-cat was too silent to pick up on, the girl that she recently met wasn’t as much. She did seem concerned about her health, as anyone should be at this point. She almost didn’t want to turn her head knowing that Chase was in the same direction as Lisette. She wanted to be blessed with ignorance to what the boy was doing rather than actually knowing it. It was a combination of her current state and the short history she held with the boy that she was too embarrassed and afraid to actually acknowledge him.

Esha’s back began to raise as push herself up slightly by using her forearms as supports. She released a mighty cough that spewed a couple droplets of the pool water from her gullet. She slowly angled her head down toward the other girl, making it a point to avoid eye contact with Chase and frankly any of his body parts regardless of him not wearing a shirt. “No, I think I’m going *cough* to be okay.” Her eyes peered upward afterwards due to mere curiosity, but she swiftly shut them and returned her line of vision to Lisette. “Physically.” She wanted to attempt another escape, but for the time being she was far too winded to try another attempt like her last one.

“Please… ask him to leave… politely” she whispered to the only person she could really trust in the room. She only got a glimpse at the boy so she didn’t really pick up that Chase was fulfilling her wishes already.

#6ba0dd

Lisette floated in the water next to Esha, using a bent arm and the pool deck to support herself.  From the slowing of her coughs and her own statement, the girl was assured that her companion would be okay eventually.  However, the woman's added word puzzled her.  Physically?  Added to her reaction to the boy, Lacey suspected that something had happened between the two.

Esha's next words only confirmed her suspicion.  Ask him to leave?   Why?  She could guess the basic reason, but her curiosity wanted her to ask for the details.  Patience, she told herself.

"Er, he's already doing that," Lisette said, glancing at the boy.  He seemed to be a thousand times more anxious and awkward than Esha, who was quite obviously avoiding looking at him.  He also seemed to be murmuring some sort of apology.

Looking between the two, she demanded, "What exactly happened between you two?"  It had to be something serious.  Either that, or they were both overreacting, and her first impression of Esha was not someone who overreacted often.  Then again, maybe she was wrong.

Perhaps it was something romantic.  Although, if Luke had showed up, she would have told him off herself, without Esha's added 'politely' request.  The only way to know for sure was to get an answer from one of them.  And since the woman didn't seem too capable of speaking, she turned to the boy with a raised eyebrow.

Once her constant wheezing and cough began to cease, she could hear the boy’s cautious footsteps as he left the room. Or at least that what she could gather he was doing. Lisette said he was leaving. She still refused to look at him. It was not out of fear or hatred, it was the mere sight of him that just made her uncomfortable. It was like being good friends with a person for years then suddenly learning that they had some sort of horrid hobby that quickly changed the way you thought of them. It was like that feeling. Not one that she could put her finger on, she didn’t hate Chase, she wasn’t scared of him per say either.

Esha hated to have to avoid him in such a way because she already knew that he was suffering from so much. She wanted to help him, she really did, but she had no clue what she could say to him. Could she just forgive him? She needed more time to consider these things, she didn’t think she’d wrap herself in so much trouble so early on in her first couple weeks at Foresta. She had to let him leave, she wasn’t ready to face him. Not yet. She wasn’t certain how soon or late she could get back to him though. Lingering too long on it would probably make him worse off.

She began to reposition herself so that she wasn’t just flat on her belly on the deck and began to lean a little bit more on her side while curling her body in a less awkward position to be speaking to her fellow student in. She was curious about what had happened between the two of them. Again, Esha had no clue what to tell her. She couldn’t just straight up say that he sexually assaulted her, the best that could possibly do for Chase was lower his already bad reputation. Saying something like that would just ruin him for a lot of people. Then what could she say?

“It is not something I have a uh-good memory of. I don’t think he’d be um… comfortable with me telling you either.” She couldn’t leave her off with that much. She hadn’t taken the time to mock her quills and promised to not speak of them to anybody else, so she owed Lisette a bit more than just that. “I tried to date him, Chase is his name. He’s a um-were beast, so that’s where things kind of became… complicated. Things only got worse after that…”

There was a long stretch of silence before she got any answer to her question.  She had guessed right--romantic problems.  That seemed to be a common issue with people these days.  At a school for people with powers, though, she would have expected something different from normal schools.  She supposed that it was just something that came with being in school and being at this age.  

A werebeast... basically, a shapeshifter, but perhaps more like the werewolves of stories--uncontrollable transformations, and uncontrollable once the transformation had occurred.  She supposed that if her temper was more controlling of her powers, she could be considered some sort of a werebeast.  A werewolf, actually, considering that one of her alternate forms was that of a wolf.  

"Dating a werebeast... That must be bloody complicated," Lisette commented in agreement, with a raised eyebrow.  However... "Why do you not want him around, though?"  With any set of powers, a relationship could be complicated.  But that didn't really have anything to do with emotions.

Esha went through the process of deep breaths and even larger exhales, she just wanted to make sure she coughed up the last of the water trapped within her lungs. A silent cough afterwards proved that she would be safe from choking on water for a good little while. At least there was some sort of good news to be had on this day, though recovering from self-inflicted harm hardly felt all that rewarding.

Bringing Lisette up to speed on her relationship with Chase became more and more questionable as she became more curious on the finer details about it. As she said before, she didn’t want to incriminate Chase for what he did because there was a chance that he was innocent in the act, but Esha was too afraid that the truth was going to be something she didn’t want to hear. Even if she asked him about it he would probably choose the answer that would most benefit him over the truth. Regardless of how often he spoke the truth around Esha, it was still hard to say. Who would actually admit to doing such a horrid thing when there was low hanging fruit of lies so close within grasp? Even if it the were-beast was behind it what would stop it from just doing so again? Besides her quills of course.

Over this contemplation, she stared off into the calm waters almost craving a return to them, but not wanting to envelop herself within it just yet. “It was complicated. I could barely touch him without setting him off.” She had to think a moment about her words before answering the woman’s next question. Esha couldn’t actually tell her could she? That’d be too many secrets to entrust with a person in one day. Besides, the less people that knew what he did the better. “I-I can’t say, he wouldn’t like it if I told anyone what he did. I uh-tempted him and karma punished me for my actions. What he did- it just… it makes it hard for me to look at him the same way.”