User blog:Promestein/Crossovercross - Meltdown

Alice looks at Vayla's empty plate, and then brings her gaze up to meet her eyes. "That's it? You don't want any more? I made plenty, so there's no need to skimp on the portions, you know." She taps her foot against the floor under the table a few times, and then forces herself to stop. The repetitive movements only agitate her more, and it won't be any good if she ends up making it obvious just how irritating Vayla's lack of interest in dinner is. No, so long as Vayla eats everything Alice made for her, it'll be fine, and they can go on to have a nice night.

So eat it, Vayla.

Venus, of course, has already picked up on what these words mean, and she immediately stands up with her plate, saying, “I’ll have more! I’ll eat it all, mom! It’s really good!” This isn’t about her, though, so Alice shoots her a small, disapproving glance, and Venus blinks a few times, looks away, and then quietly takes a meager second portion and sits back down.

Vayla, who had her mouth open to respond, looks from Alice to Venus, evidently confused, and sits there for a moment. “... Nah, I’ll pass. I ate a bit earlier, so I’m not very hungry.” She says this, but Alice notices her sneak another glance at Venus, obviously thinking about that weird interaction. It’s not about hunger, she feels like there’s something amiss. Alice grits her teeth and curses herself for overreacting. She should’ve just let Venus kiss up to her.

Keeping her expression normal, Alice smiles, a bit. “Ah, really? Too bad. I guess I’ll have to save it for later.” Yes, that’s it, just stay calm, don’t - “Hopefully you’ll be able to stomach it again so it doesn’t go to waste.” God fucking damnit, Alice! Even though she whines on the inside, her mouth, defiant to the end, keeps going, “Sorry to have made something so obviously contrary to your tastes.”

There’s a long, awkward silence. Venus stares at Alice, trembling a little bit, and then quietly picks up her plate and runs off, in the direction of her room. Alice doesn’t spare her a glance. This time, Vayla doesn’t either, instead staring straight forward at Alice with a steadily worsening expression of angry disbelief. “Uh, excuse me? I just said I wasn’t very hungry. That doesn’t mean it was bad. What’s your problem?”

Alice’s head is suddenly pounding with anger. Barely contained, visceral anger. The look on Vayla’s face, the words that just left her mouth - it takes a lot of willpower to not kick the table over onto her. Instead, Alice just shoves her thumbnail between her front teeth and takes a few deep breaths. With each, the world slips further out of a pulsating haze of red, and back to reality. She opens her eyes, and almost loses it again the instant she sees Vayla glaring at her.

“Pretty insensitive,” she mutters, “to eat before you came over. Thoughtless, even. I cooked all this food for you, so you’d be able to have multiple servings. You’re basically spitting in my face.”

“I - what?” Vayla’s expression gets even angrier, and she slams her hands to the table, pushing herself up. The chair screeches against the ground, and then falls over. Alice winces at the thud, grinding her thumbnail back and forth, as rage spills forth worse than before. “What the hell are you on? What kind of mental gymnastics do you have to perform to get all the way there!? I just said I wasn’t hungry! I ate earlier because I was hungry! It’s that simple!”

Before she even thinks about it, Alice is standing up to, and her hand is surrounded by the broken shards of her plate. This only elicits a small flinch from Vayla, who looks down at the plate in what seems to be confusion. “Don’t you fucking call me stupid!!” Vayla blinks a few times, furrowing her brow, but before she can say anything, more words rip into the air, “You’re the one who was stupid here, anyways! Definitely thoughtless! Just can’t resist the urge to stuff yourself before a date, huh!?” Vayla says something, but Alice continues, screaming over her. “I did this all for you, but you won’t even fucking bother to take another bite, even just to soothe my heart! What the hell is wrong with you!?”

“ALICE, WHAT THE FUCK!?” Vayla pounds the table, and Alice stops, for a moment, breathing heavily, everything in her vision a haze. “I didn’t mean anything by it! What’s wrong with you!? What the hell happened to you to make you think this is at all reasonable!?”

What?

That’s not something Alice says out loud. The moment she hears those words, disbelief and shock ring out in her head, and, in an instant, everything goes white. She doesn’t even fully process them. The thought ends as soon as it begun, and Alice feels so nauseous with rage that she can almost feel the bile rising up in her throat.

She feels something against her hand, and when she blinks, she’s no longer at the other end of the table. A few more blinks, and the world comes back into focus. In front of her, staggering back, is Vayla, clutching her cheek. Alice’s arm is outstretched. Vayla’s eyes are fluttering, and her expression is one of total, utter shock.

And then,

“You hit me!?” Vayla’s voice is shaking with anger.

Alice blinks, and steps back, a bit overwhelmed. “I… I just slapped you,” she mutters, more to herself. “I…” All at once, reality hits her, and she looks around, glancing at the table. Fuck. Fuck. She gave in and snapped over nothing important again, like she was just waiting to be given a reason, and now she’s done something she can’t take back, and now Vayla’s gonna -

Vayla punches her in the stomach.

There’s a crunching sound.

Vayla pulls her arm away, quickly, grabbing at her fist with her other hand. “Wh - what the fuck? Did I - Fuck, I broke something...!”

What?

Alice twists her hips, throwing all her weight into a kick, straight into Vayla’s stomach. She doesn’t pay attention to any sounds of pain. Vayla sails through the air a few feet before slamming into the wall, which cracks on impact, and then falls to the ground. Groaning, she starts to shakily rise, saying, “W-what…”

“YOU FUCKING HIT ME!” This time, though the haze of blinding rage still tickles at the edge of her senses, Alice can think. Yet, no guilt threatens to rise up in her chest at the sight of Vayla coughing and covering her mouth, probably trying to stop herself from puking up her dinner. Poetic, really. She doesn’t deserve to eat any of her food if she’s just gonna insult her like she did! “What the FUCK is wrong with you!?”

Too busy gagging, Vayla only manages to mutter out, “Y-you hit me first!” a few seconds later, and Alice responds by stomping on her stomach, hard, before kicking her a few more times. These words fully register, but she pays them no mind. She hits her, and hits her, and hits her again, hearing her grunts of pain, and, soon, the cracking of ribs. Eventually, Vayla coughs, and sputters, and spits up the food she had eaten only minutes earlier, then the meal before that. Her vomit is bloody. Alice crinkles her nose in disgust and steps back, covering her face as the smell wafts towards her.

Vayla shakily starts to push herself up, coughing. Tears fall to the ground from her face. Alice stares, still panting, as her body begins to calm down. Neither of them say anything. Not for a long couple moments. Closing her eyes, Alice stops herself from slapping a hand to her face. What did she just do? There was blood in Vayla’s vomit. That’s internal bleeding. She could die. God fucking damnit, Alice. After a few more deep breaths, Alice opens her eyes, only to see a wall of fire rushing at her. On instinct, she recoils, raising her arms to shield her face as the fire washes over her.

For a moment, the fire burns her skin, somehow, and then, it’s gone, and Alice stands there, shocked. Magic. Vayla just used some kind of magic? She’s pushed herself up a bit, with one hand, blood running down her chin, and the other is pointed in her direction. But her face is distorted by distress, and she looks over at her own hand, and then at Alice, unharmed.

Alice slams her foot into her outstretched arm, pinning her wrist to the wall and shattering it. Vayla barely reacts, this time, teeth dug into her lip, but Alice really doesn’t care, she couldn’t care less. She steps forward, closing the distance, and reaches out towards Vayla’s neck, soon grabbing hold with both hands. Kicking out, Vayla slides against the wall, slipping out of one hand’s grasp, before Alice pushes her down to the ground, beneath her. And she squeezes, hard, first with one hand, and then with both.

Kicking, struggling, Vayla squirms underneath her, but… but what? The haze over Alice’s mind recedes a bit at this, though it takes a few seconds. Vayla’s resistance isn’t getting any weaker, not from strangling. Her chest is heaving, up and down, but she’s not going pale, she’s not running out of air. Does she not need to breathe? May as well snap her neck, the - Alice’s eyes flutter, and she grits her teeth. Vayla’s a lot more special than she thought.

One last time, Alice lifts Vayla off the ground, and then slams her down, letting her head crack against the floor. She lets go of her neck, and then grabs her by the sides of the face, but doesn’t do anything more. Breathing in short, fast spurts, Alice glares into Vayla’s eyes, and then drops her head to the floor, letting go. She says nothing. Vayla sputters and coughs, spitting up bloody saliva. Tears stream down her face, and, when she realizes Alice is staring, she crawls away, lifting an arm to hide her expression. Or is she protecting her face?

“I…”

Vayla wipes at her eyes, trembling. The floor under her head is sticky with blood. She looks scared, and hurt, and weak. Alice wants to reach out, she wants to say something, but… there’s no way anything she could say could change what just happened. What she just did. She’d like to tell herself she lost her temper and blanked out, but… she was very, very conscious of it all.

“I’m sorry,” she mumbles, anyways.

Quietly, Vayla says, “You’re sorry?”

Alice whimpers, and then hangs her head, feeling tears welling in her eyes. She feels Vayla staring at her, in what seems to be disbelief.

“Yeah,” she says, crying, “I’m sorry. I don’t know what - that wasn’t… it won’t happen again, I-I swear…!”

Vayla stares at her, and then whispers, “You nearly killed me, and you’re… you’re just saying sorry?”

A flare up of anger.

Alice bites it back, and nods, sobbing.

Vayla just stares, and when Alice reaches out, she flinches, closing her eyes for a moment.

Alice is just a little bit pleased.

“Don’t go,” she pleads, almost silent.

Vayla opens her eyes, and for a long time, she just stares at her. And then, with a spark of something Alice didn’t expect showing itself in her eyes, she mutters, “I won’t.”