themidnightson | (no subject)

The Back Door opens and closes.

Two people leave, one dressed for the weather and one decidedly not.

The snow is still covering the ground except for well worn paths that have turned slushy and gray-brown. But it isn't falling right now. And Edward paused, while the door swung closed, to look across the expanse. Would anything feel far enough here to him? Was it just another distraction from?

Except he could not chance these things;
And he did not trust the Front Door after all the things it had thrown at them.

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From:

noteful

The baseball field.

She can't say it's a surprise.

And not just because she knows where this path goes.

But his comment is unexpected.

(She's kind of still more used to being told she's not trying hard enough, with things even vaguely like this.)

"I don't have try so hard with what?" she asks.

From:

themidnightson

He thinks it should be simple, but words stick. Things he never had talk about with Isabella due to the extenuating circumstances of her endless silent mind. Making the last people Alice and Jasper decades ago.

"Earlier, with my being able to hear you."

From:

noteful

"Oh."

That.

"Was I shouting?"

Or whatever the mental equivilant of shouting would be?

From:

themidnightson

There's something resembling a shrug, small and graceful and entirely miss-able if she isn't looking. "It doesn't have to be any more focused than the normal flow of thinking."

It isn't even so much that the yelling could distract him. Even at over decades it's still and endless maelstrom in his head, albeit a known one.

Which was not the same as a manageable one.

From:

noteful

Still, shouting is rude.

"All right," she says.

And takes a moment to wonder just how much focus the normal flow of anyone's thinking has.

From:

themidnightson

"It did take some getting used to."

The way people focused and how they thought.
If it was a very, very, very long time ago.

From:

noteful

It seems, to Meg, like it would take more than some.

"When you said . . . when you said you can hear me, hear people, thinking . . . does that mean you can choose to hear what people are thinking, or that you have to hear what people are thinking?"

From:

themidnightson

Edward settled for the walk and the snow, more of a curve than an outright frown to mar across his golden features.

"You have far more options in ceasing your hearing than I ever have."

From:

noteful

The latter, then, she supposes.

Or something closer to it, if it's not an either/or.

And she can't think of what to say about that, because, honestly?

To her, it sounds all together too awful for words.

Which is either an extremely apt turn or phrase, or an extremely, extremely poor one.

From:

themidnightson

He doesn't frown at her opinion of it, or even really stop. It's all he's ever known. Silence in his mind is as foreign as an idea can get now. Even in madness they reigned.

No power over how it happened or why or when.
No power over the level or direction or submission.
If anything did bother him at times, it would be that

He can still hear building even now.

From:

noteful

When they reach the field, Meg brushes the snow off one of the team benches (the Enigmas, Edward's team, and Castiel's, and Laura's), and sits down.

"So what do you want me to know?"

From:

themidnightson

He won't say anything.
He's not that forthcoming on the spot.

"There are rules where we come from. We don't tell humans--" there's a faintly apologetic ripple to his expression, here and then gone as though it never was. "--anything about us. It's death sentence should they be found out."

And still two wild nomadic vampires know about Bella.

Humans learned it for only two purposes;
To enlighten them to being a meal or to change them.

From:

noteful

There are rules that one sets for oneself, and there are rules that others set and make one follow.

Meg had initially thought he might mean the former.

But those kinds of rules don't usually come with death sentences.

So.

"Whose rules? And . . . why don't they apply here?"

From:

themidnightson

"Carlisle and Alice are certain they don't."

It's his tone more than his phrasing that shows his indecision toward that assumption. Though it's more toward the decision, the risks toward them, than the actions in his head even.

Even for all he's done this year to their life in Forks, even Jasper has been more forthcoming toward those he's interacted with in Milliways.

From:

noteful

She thinks that answers the second question.

"All right."

And then she waits, to see what he says next.

From:

themidnightson

Or it's that they'll delight in the rebellion, and release, until noted to be in flagrante delicto. It takes preparation to get around to the word, when even the name still shoot lividness into him. It was all still recent. The whole debacle with Carlisle's earlier self.

"The enforcers of our laws are called," Which all manages it, until the name. Where there isn't a way to hold back the vicious bite deadening the assumption of any humanity in the word, his voice, his entire posture. "The Volturi."

From:

noteful

There is no doubt in Meg's mind that The Volturi are formidible, or that their laws are not to be taken lightly. Words like enforcers don't get used by people like Edward for slaps on the wrist, after all.

She also doesn't miss the bite in Edward's statement of the name.

But she does, personally, think that The Volturi sounds like the kind of name a bunch of boys at university pick for a secret society, because it sounds cool and scary.

From:

themidnightson

It's hard to tell what his reaction is, or whether he has one, from looking at him. When in fact, the inside is the turbulence of black anger and almost annoyed appreciation.

Eventually, with more effort toward restraint.
"They are the closest thing to royalty our world has."

He'd be only be too glad to show them how grateful he is them.
Except in the same hand they are already dealing with so much now.

From:

noteful

Meg assumes it's royalty in the tradition of absolute monarchs and the like than we-put-her-picture-on-the-postage-stamps.

Meg has a queen. Most days, HM doesn't matter all that much.

"You don't like them, do you?"

It's an inane thing to say, but she's human, and though she knows rationally that she's contributing to this conversation whether she says anything or not . . . she still feels like she needs to say something out loud.

From:

themidnightson

Her queen doesn't snap necks for one out of place glance.
Or ransom eternities for entertainment.

"I came into this life with good reasons to hate them."

Edited Date: 2010-02-01 01:14 pm (UTC)

From:

noteful

Meg looks down at her hands and then back up at him.

Should I ask what those are?

From:

themidnightson

It isn't his to give.

Just like it wasn't his to take.

He knows more than anyone in his family.

More than Esme has been told. More than Emmett or Rose would put forth the effort to know. More than Jasper and Alice have seen even after Milliways bathed them in it.

That boy was put here to mock me.

"In all the ways they could, barring execution, they abused someone," there is a discernible pause between the two words. "-of paramount importance to me."

From:

noteful

She could guess who he is talking about.

Not with absolute certainity, but most people consider very few people to be of paramount importance.

(Well, all right, most people don't use the phrase paramount importance for anyone, but the sentiment is applied to very few people.)

"More than reason enough."