2019-11-09 - Hospital Hospitality

(TXT to Byron) Alexander: Thorne.
(TXT to Alexander) Byron: (No immediate response for at least five minutes)
(TXT to Byron) Alexander: Byron. Answer.
(TXT to Byron) Alexander: (Calls exactly three minutes later.)
(TXT to Alexander) Byron: (It take about 20 seconds after his phone rings to pick up. He sounds weary) I'm here.
(TXT to Byron) Alexander: "What's wrong? You sound done in."
(TXT to Alexander) Byron: We found Lilith at Firefly Forest. She's at Addington Memorial resting.
(TXT to Byron) Alexander: (There's an exhalation of relief.) "Alive, then. Thank God." (A pause.) "Does Isabella know? Do you need anything brought to the hospital? Was it a dream? Are you okay?" (The questions are rapid fire, brisk.)
(TXT to Alexander) Byron: (The sound of him inhaling deeply) Alive. Bloodied and burned. The only people who know is de al Vega, who is the one who contacted me about someone finding her. And a friend of mine. (His voice sounds firmer) I've been looked after and took some rest, which is why I didn't get a chance to call you, Bella or anyone.
(TXT to Byron) Alexander: (There's another huff of breath. And a long silence. But when he speaks again, his voice is even.) "That's fine. I'm glad you got some rest. I'll let Isabella know that you and Miss Winslow are safe. Is there anything that you need brought to the hospital? Or something for her?"
(TXT to Alexander) Byron: Food is always a good option. May need to speak to the Addingtons to improve the menu here.
(TXT to Byron) Alexander: Hospital food is always wretched. What's your fancy?
(TXT to Alexander) Byron: Cheeseburgers with the works. And I know it's out of the way, stop by Julia Velez' shop and pick up a box of popcorn shrimp. Get something for yourself. (He then adds) I'll pay for the food and service.
(TXT to Byron) Alexander: (There's a sharp irritation.) Don't be an ass, Thorne. You can pay for the food, and I'll grab some of the shrimp for myself, because they're very tasty. But you try to pay me like I'm a fucking delivery boy, and we will have words. I'll be there when I can. (He hangs up)
(TXT to Byron) Alexander: Thorne is feeling well enough to be a condescending ass, so i'm going to say 'yes'.
(TXT to Alexander) Byron: I read that.
(TXT to Byron) Alexander: (...)
(TXT to Byron) Alexander: Well, it's true.

More of an outpatient, only having checked in to get some of his injuries tended to, Byron is still at Addington Memorial for Lilith's sake. After finding her bloodied, burned and shivering out in the forest, despite his own aches and pains, he's seated in a chair beside her bed. He's no longer wearing the business attire which he was when she was found, having changed into a thick gray sweater and black pants combo with sneakers black boots on his feet. He likes as tired as he sounded over the phone, having skipped a trim earlier that morning. Rather than the slicked back business style that he goes for where his hair is concerned, while there's gel to keep it in place, it's brushed up in a more casual style.

Right now, he's keeping the resting Lilith company, with his laptop on his lap. He's obviously doing some work.

Alexander arrives with Isabella, which means that the food is actually hot and dry, rather than bags of mush. He's also picked up some puzzle books - crosswords and sudoku - from somewhere, and has them tucked into his jacket pocket while his hands are full with the bags. It only takes a brief conversation to figure out which way to Lilith's room, and with Isabella, he heads in that direction. If he's still feeling irritated, it's not on his face when he appears in the doorway, lifting the bag in a quiet display. He slinks inside to put the food down, and then the puzzle books on the table by Lilith's bed. "How's she doing?" he asks, voice pitched soft to not wake her.

When she and Alexander arrive, Isabella has that unmistakable air about her that suggests that she has spent the entire day running around and working, her restless energy drumming through her veins and keeping her green eyes keen, sharp and alert. When she appears in Lilith's room, she is helping Alexander carrying all the things he has brought and palpable relief can be tasted from the very air when she sees both of her friends alive.

"Thank god," she breathes, setting down her own burden so she could cross over to see how Lilith is doing, her expression twisting faintly, before moving to give Byron a quick, but careful hug if he lets her - not just because of injuries she can't see, but also the laptop, unwilling to disturb his work too much. The investigator has already asked about Lilith, so she directs her question to Byron: "Are you hurt anywhere?" she asks quietly.

Perhaps due to Alexander's supposed mis-text, Byron had an idea that Isabella would be in his company, so when both show up instead of just the one, Thorne's not surprised at all. Pulling himself into an upright position in his chair, there's some interest in the delicious aroma of food once they pair have entered the room. It's been hours since he even really thought about eating. Alexander's helped to remind him that food existed.

For now, the laptop is closed shut and set aside off his lap so that he can rise to stand. "I'm glad to see that my requests weren't going to trouble you much," This is said to Clayton, "The weather's been terr-- typical and it was only after afterthought that you could've dropped by and borrowed my car, "The rented Benz, "to help run these errands." After all of that is said, he greets them both with a smile, "I've felt better. We may have been fighting against actual toys and things of that sort, but despite their diminutive size, with their numbers and TK abilities," He believes that's what it was, "Those little bastards hurt like hell."

Alexander gives Byron a wary sort of look when he stands. "No. It wasn't any trouble," he agrees after a moment. "Nice of you to think of offering, though." One would be forgiven for assuming it's sarcastic, coming from anyone but Alexander, but there's no indication that it's anything but sincere. He separates out a large popcorn shrimp for himself and Isabella, but there's another for Byron, and two cheeseburgers with all the works. His eyebrows go up as he slips around to Isabella. "...toys? You had to rescue her from living toys with telekinetic abilities?" He frowns. "Have you already been tended?"

"I'm glad you were able to find her," Isabella says, reaching out so she could gently stroke a lock of hair from Lilith's face. "Oh, Lil..." The words are absent, as if she's not fully conscious that she's uttering them, but her eyes are brimming with concern. Word about the toys with telekinetic powers, though, brings forth a look of utter resignation on her features. "She was looking forward to being with you during the festival, also." It didn't seem so long ago that her fellow brunette was telling her that she intended to look like a princess for the festival.

She remains standing - too restless, and too alert, really, to do anything else, but when Alexander gravitates towards her with the popcorn shrimp, she reaches out to use one of the long toothpicks in the box to fish out a morsel, popping it in her mouth. By the way she's gnawing on it, it looks like she hasn't eaten all day again today. The moonstone pendant swings gently at every movement and gesture, refracting the light in Lilith's recovery room and leaving faint shimmers of rainbow color against her top.

"She was in costume when we found her," Byron says, his attention turning back to the resting woman. "Which is probably why she was freezing out there. I haven't been able to talk to her in depth yet to know exactly what she's gone through." Though he's been tempted many times to try and pull those memories and emotions directly from her, "She missed the entirety of the festival," Though he doesn't put importance on the festival here when he says this, "While that's just something minor in the scheme of things, I'm sure that she'll be disappointed." He, himself, spent much of the festival trying to find her.

Reaching into the food package, he plucks out a couple of popcorn shrimp himself. He does this by hand, rather than using toothpicks, and pops one of them into his mouth immediately. There's a bout of chewing and then he swallows, before he nods, "Toys. Plastic things dressed as soldiers, though I think there were also," He's not sure what the others thing were, "Imps? Elves?" Gnomes.. "My injuries aren't as dire as Lilith's, but they've given me some pain killers to keep me comfortable." Only after he frees his hand of the second shrimp does he slip a hand into his pocket to pull out his wallet and then a few bills which he hands off to Alexander, neatly folded and held between his index and middle fingers. "Here. Thanks." He looks back at Lilith, "She should eat, but I don't want to wake her just yet. I'm sure she'll be excited to know what you've brought her when she does though." That is, if she even has the stomach to eat.

"No doubt she will. I'm sure it's something she was looking forward to." Alexander frowns with concern as he looks over the woman's sleeping form. "But at least she's back. I haven't seen a lot of dreams last that long and have someone come back at all." Something he's more willing to admit now that she is back than he was when it was still a question that was up in the air. He lightly bumps shoulders with Isabella, and lets her feast on the shrimp.

He takes the money when it's offered, careful to avoid touching the man's fingers, and slipping it into a pocket without looking. "You're welcome," he says, and even offers Byron a sheepish sort of smile. He offers a nod. "Well, depending on what she's had to eat and how long she was over there...I wouldn't recommend fried food or hamburgers. Was there any sign of dehydration or malnutrition?"

They both love the popcorn shrimp. Isabella raises her own toothpick at Byron's in a toast before she nibbles more on hers. Her eyes are lowered, busily glancing out the door when Alexander makes it a point that not many who get lost return, either through the Veil or through the Dream.

"Lil's always been a force to be reckoned with, I'm certain she didn't make it easy for them to hold her," she opines, taking another couple of bites of shrimp but leaving the rest to Alexander. Her head tilts to rest against his shoulder when he nudges her and for a moment, she falls quiet again, simply watching the two men as they exchange bills. There's a hint of a smile, but one that she attempts to quell.

"So what's her prognosis, exactly? Will they need to keep her here, long? I don't think all the cheeseburgers in the world is going to make her happy and compliant if she has to stay here for more than three days."

Thorne tucks his wallet back into his pocket once the exchange is done. It's when Alexander brings up the fact that, yes, while understanding Dreams was still a little new to them, no one that they've known were gone for as long as Lilith was gone for. Of those who had returned. "That was my concern as well, especially with some of her most recent Dreams where things that dwell in them, the dreamland, blame her for their own pain." If anything had been going through his mind during the time Lilith was missing, it was that.

Saving some of the shrimp for Lilith, he takes up the burger instead and unwraps it and takes his seat next to Lilith's bed again. "I think she's a little dehydrated and I'm not sure if she had anything to eat there." But for all they know, no one should eat any Dream or Veil food. "But the doctor said that it wasn't something extreme." Despite her being gone for a little over a weekend. Maybe Dream time moves at a different pace.

"Her arms were either cut up or burned." Both of which are things that Lilith can inflict on other people. "She was also unconscious when we found her. Physically, I believe, she is in no danger. Mentally," This is Isabella all over again, but different, "We'll see when she comes to." He then takes a bite out of his cheeseburger, his eyes staring out at Isabella, "How are you feeling, Bella?" He finally asks after swallowing.

Alexander brushes his fingertips over the back of Isabella's neck when she offers him the shrimp. He takes a couple of pieces, though - Fried Fish's shrimp is nothing to be refused, and he makes a pleased sound as he crunches down on them. Even so, he listens to the catalog of injuries, and breathes out. "There will probably be some lingering trauma," he admits. "Nightmares, hypervigilance, that sort of thing. But she'll have friends around her, to help her get through it." Each word is toneless, but his expression is concerned. And at Byron's question, his gaze flicks towards Isabella, to hear her answer.

"All I know about Dreams so far is the fact that they occur in part of the Veil that's slightly removed from its actual physical characteristics," Isabella says softly. "At least, that was what Sid's theory was when he and I would explore them as children. Even when we had separate rooms, it was as if walls didn't matter." Her eyes take on a more far away cast as she remembers, though clarity returns to them at the brush of Alexander's fingers against the back of her neck. There's a glance towards him and flashes him a quick smile, a brief press of her mouth against his cheek as he crunches on shrimp.

"I wouldn't take anything from there to eat, either," she tells Byron. "There's very old lore in some cultures when people would get lost and find other realms - taking anything from them, food, especially, would keep you trapped. Persephone and her pomegranates, fae luring wanderers into their rings, that sort of thing. Every myth's got some basis in reality, after everything else, I'm starting to wonder if they weren't inspired by other thin points - I mean, a pattern exists." She lifts a hand to rub her fingers against her nose bridge. "I think I mentioned before that August intends to look at a thin point he knows in Portland, see if what happened here with abilities and the shortened ranges also happened there. If the effects are similar, I can't help but wonder if all thin points are linked, somehow. Like a web, and what happened here caused a ripple effect. We won't know until he comes back with data, though."

Her mind is already turning over the possibilities - the two men who know her best can practically see the tumblers and gauges of it spinning, only derailed by Byron's question. There's an uneasy glance down at the linoleum tiles.

"I'm alright," she says. "I mean, it could be worse, I could have been so traumatized by the experience that I'd refuse to leave the house." There's a defiant tilt to her chin there as she looks up. "But I still feel...a little off, somehow." She lifts her hand to look at her fingertips. "Like something changed, or something broke off and is rattling inside me. I don't know if I'm describing it very well."

Her eyes find Byron's. "What about you, B? After the chanting and everything? How do you feel?"

"Isn't that what we're all suffering now anyway?" Byron says with this ghost of a smile before taking another bite of burger and chewing. "After everything that we've experienced here in Gray Harbor, how we were molded by this town." There's only light chewing when he's speaking, but he soon swallows. " Nightmares are definitely nothing new. But you're right. She has friends to help her get through with this," His lips part, he wants to say something, but it's best to leave it unspoken.

There's a nod of understanding given to Isabella. It sounds like good advice, for certain, not to partake of anything within the other Realm, Dream or not. But sometimes temptation is difficult to resist. He knows that much. Then she brings up the thin points again. "Why Portland? I mean, is that where he's from? That's how he knows?" He never spoke to August at any length after their initial meeting and then for brief moments there after-- even after he'd helped to heal Lilith that one time.

"And I think I'm fine. I don't know what the chanting was about, but," He shakes his head, "I don't think I was affected by it at all. It's probably nothing."

Alexander makes a tired sort of laugh, and rubs at his face. "Thorne has a point. Still. Direct violence done to someone can be more difficult to work through than the other delights of Gray Harbor, in some ways. Harder to rationalize." He takes another couple of shrimp, pops them in his mouth, before pacing just around Isabella, like he might somehow wall her off from the rest of the world with just his restless motions. "Yes. He's from Portland, I believe." His mouth flicks down at 'it's probably nothing', but he doesn't interrogate. Instead, glancing back to Isabella. "Something inside you was freed that you'd had locked away. We restrained it again, but...if I'm honest, I don't know that's the right long term solution."

How we're molded by this town.

"Equipped to survive it, equipped to combat it," Isabella tells Byron with a hint of a grin. "The question, though, is always why." Why this town is the way it is, why this is happening to everyone they know and care about, why these abilities even exist.

And most importantly of all, why them? The cursed children of Gray Harbor.

As Alexander paces a worry-circle around her chair as she answers Byron's queries. "He was local - there, at least, and if he already knows the terrain, he'd be more successful in obtaining data. August is a field researcher, just like me. I'm sure he'll know what to look for, though...I worry sometimes that he's using a lot. Too much." Byron and her have always been relatively restrained when it comes to using their powers, but she can't say the same for others that she knows. There's a glance at Lilith on the bed, and Alexander's tall, lean shadow attempting to buttress her from half-formed dangers. Her hand comes up in an effort to catch his as he passes.

It's probably nothing. Skepticism wreathes her fine-boned face. "Your old house is still after you, though," she reminds him, quietly. "And if it wants you that bad, I don't know if Lilith is safe from it, either."

To Alexander's words, her green eyes lift to meet his, before they lower again to leave a thoughtful glance at her lap. But there's a rueful smile. "It's a crude method, at best, but the only one I knew. They don't exactly educate therapists for this sort of thing."

Spending a quiet moment indulging in his meal, Byron listens as the others talk, responding to his inquiries and lending further insight into things. "I didn't mean that," He says of their powers, "I always thought that because we had our powers, that's why--" He shakes his head before continuing further, "This is all news to me, so I really shouldn't say a thing. There are others who have known about their powers their whole lives, even studying it-- but how do you even begin to do that? Are there books about this? Teachers? Because I know, that I really could've used one back in the day." And probably even now, but he's more reluctant and jaded as an adult.

"So Portland is like Gray Harbor? Interesting." Byron says, setting his half-eaten burger down. "I've driven by there and I can't say that it got me to remember things from here, but it's probably somewhat different in its own way. I guess I was far enough from these 'thin points' down in L.A. that I'd forgotten about everything completely. Much like Seattle, when using your powers isn't on the forefront of your mind when it comes to problem solving." He says this as a man who might have had a need to do just that while there.

Whenever his childhood home is brought up, he'll try to challenge any conversation regarding it if just to keep people from being too nosy. He's even contemplating this when their gaze meets. "Like I told Clayton, I'll handle this. Once Lilith wakes up, I want to know exactly what happened to her. What she saw there. Where she was. Who else was there. I'm hoping that it had nothing to do with the place."

Alexander stops as soon as Isabella's hand settles on his. He turns and takes her hand, lifting it briefly to his lips and he squeezed. But his expression is worried. "August definitely uses too much. Itzhak, too. I have concerns about them." He sighs, looking tired. "But they're adults, and there are some things that you...have to learn for yourself. If you're ever going to learn it."

He leans in to snag another shrimp and eat it. As Isabella goes where he hadn't, he gives another little sigh, and turns his attention back to Byron. His response is...about what Alexander expects, so aside from a certain stubborn set of his jaw, there's no real visible shift in his expression. But what the man says about learning about his powers strikes a flicker of interest. "Experimentation," he says, after a moment. "Helps with a partner, rather than just practicing on unknowing people. Some things, it helps having someone able and willing to tell you what's happening on their end."

The brief token of affection has her smiling ruefully, though her eyes fill with it - concern and the things she is unable to express within company. For some reason, she is worried about him, also, even when he names other people in his mind. Her fingers thread through his, leaving them linked.

"Sometimes it's a family art," Isabella tells Byron. "When she was alive, Mom used to teach us some tricks...especially Sid. He always wanted to learn, he always asked questions. She indulged him in his earliest years because she didn't want him to fear what he was. And I guess that's understandable, for a parent - she didn't want that for any of her children, but she always warned us, too, not to use too much." And we didn't listen. "She was a talented healer, when she put her mind to it. A reader, after, but she didn't have any proficiency with my skillset. But when Mom refused to teach him any more, he learned on his own and took me with him. Like Alexander says, it's best with a partner and like my mother, I indulged him, too."

She shakes her head. "I don't know if Portland's completely like Gray Harbor, I think even compared to other thin points in the world, it's unusual even for them. But there are some places there that are like here, I guess. Like I said, we're just going to have to wait for August to report back. Thankfully, he's not doing that trip alone - I think Miss Lake's coming with him, and Itzhak Rosencrantz, also." Her thumb traces absent patterns on Alexander's knuckles while she holds it in her grasp.

Regarding the house, she nods - she doesn't press it but her look is open with its concern. It's twisting her up, a little, not to, because it's Byron and out of everyone in Gray Harbor, he's the one who has known her - truly known her and her brother - the longest.

"I don't mean now." Byron says and could go into a full rant about what it was like growing up, but that always leads to opening up a can of worms that ought to remain sealed shut and buried in thick concrete. He will, however, state, "Growing up, those of us whose powers manifested that early and had little idea of what we could even do." Sounding just a little annoyed now, he ends that thought with, "I'm surprised that no has taken up the mantle of training the potential young. Believe me, and I'm sure many would agree, that it would make a world of difference." There was no need to go into personal details there.

Then Isabella goes on about this needing a partner and he's quick to point out, "I was alone in that." He had friends, yes, but no one who had offered to assist. Not even Tobin, who was warned about using his own powers. "It doesn't matter /now/" He makes it a point to state, though he tries to hold his agitation. "It's been years," Three, "Since I regained my abilities and I've been using them ever since." He'll come out and say that much. "But back then?" He shrugs. He knows how weak his abilities are compared to others, but he's not even certain if that's just what you're born with, as luck would have it, or something to train. Despite using his abilities to gain some sort of advantage over people, he's never felt that innate potential grow.

A slow nod is given when random folks are rattled off when names are brought up on who is going with August. Not that he showed interest in heading that way himself.

"You're not wrong," Alexander says, quietly, towards Byron. His gaze falls to the floor and he frowns. "Getting training younger would help people." A pause. "But who do you trust with that, exactly? Someone who wants to shape how children use these abilities isn't...perhaps the right person to be given that sort of influence." He grimaces. "I could barely control mine until I got out of this town. They were too strong, and people here hurt too much. I had to get away from the thin spot, turn down the volume, make it harder to...touch things before I could figure out how to protect myself. And," a wave of his hand, "things."

The rest gets a thoughtful shake of the head. "I don't know what makes you grow. I don't think it's all...practice, or use. I've met one person who thinks something in the Veil unlocked part of it for them. I've seen people get stronger." A pause. "I've seen at least one person who seemed to have gotten weaker, too."

Truthfully this is the first time that she's openly hearing about the two closest people to her in her life talk about their Glimmer use as young children and she can't help but marvel, silently, at how different their experiences are. Byron's and Alexander's personal stories regarding growing up Talented are far removed from her own, silently wondering what she had done to deserve the kind of support structure she had managed to receive while people like Byron are forced to handle their growing abilities by himself, or Alexander cutting and running in hopes that their effects would be alleviated somehow.

"I'm not discounting that some of this is probably innate, also. Instinct," she tells both. "Humans are still animals. We learn to walk eventually, for instance, and fish don't need to be taught how to swim. Might just be a combination of nature and nurture in the end, depending on the environment and circumstances." She finally picks up the long toothpick again to spear a shrimp on the end, so she could eat it.

Lilith was utterly exhausted and missing a lot of blood more than anything. Her arm had been flayed open vertically on the left side forearm, just shy of reaching the wrist that would have bled her out the rest of the way over time. Naturally, it's bandages now, much like her upper arm covering the burn there on opposite side. Other than cuts and bruises on her feet and legs, though, and all that ungodly fatigue and energy loss from lack of food or water with time's passing, she's actually okay overall.

Lilith wasn't sure how long she was gone, but she knew it was a long, long time that she spent traveling, to the point of literally dropping and she refused to sleep or eat or drink while in the compromised reality she lived during the days she was missing. Those kinds of normal things felt like a trap to her, like the suffering needed to be full-circle for her to be set free in some odd sense. That and who knows what consuming or lying out vulnerable in sleep on the other side of things... who knows what it does, honestly? At any rate, she hasn't been awake in full since she's been found, save for those tiny bouts of murmuring to Byron or crying when her addled brain thought he was dead because he had fallen down and she saw the aftermath of it.

Lilith's awake now, though. There's no groaning, no stirring, no much of anything other than a less deep rhythm of breath for natural breathing and an open of her eyes to stare around at company, taking a moment to orient. In fact, she seems to like the fact that they're all there talking around her, despite the fact she's probably not really listening so much. She almost seems to be trying not to interrupt by waking, to keep people normal and talking and focused on eating instead of on her.

Buuuuuuttt.... she smells popcorn shrimp. And eventually once Byron no doubt hawks in on her state of awake, she just opens her mouth expectantly like a baby bird.

For someone who does hold a lot of distrust with people, Byron is quick to respond to Alexander's statement, "You're being too cynical. Tobin said that his mother was like us," He means the three of them: Gilford, Clayton and Thorne. "If she wasn't afraid of having children learn to use their powers due to it luring the darkness in, I'm sure she would have done it. Instead, she brought all of the town's children into the fold because she felt that was the only way to care for them." Far too dark eyes stare down at his mostly forgotten half-burger, "There are other things she could have done," his tone is level when he says this as he continues to try and hold back his own anger, before he adds in a somewhat resigned tone, "But she did the best that she thought she could for all of us."

It's true. Hearing Alexander speak of his powers growing up, he realizes how very different their similar abilities manifested within them. "I only took real notice of my... powers when I was twelve." Shortly before his father killed himself. "But something tells me that I had them all along. There was no tapping into emotions or reading objects of memories back then. Not that I can remember anyway. And--" He stops himself, right when he's about to mention what he believed his father's 'super power' was. "I don't get a sense of other people's intentions, their emotions automatically. Not normally. I need to want to know. Which might make me a late bloomer in all of this, even if I have a strong feeling that I've been able to tap into people's mind all along."

Hearing mention that someone's own light had grown gets just this faint arch of his brow. But he's seen it himself, while his continues to glow dimly. While he can't see his own light, he can feel it. "Someone's light actually dimmed?" He has some concerns about that as well, though he adds, "I wonder if by losing what makes them special, if it means they'll live a happier, possibly safer life."

With this to think on, Byron notices that Lilith's eyes were open, before he sees her part her lips for some food. It's enough to bring a smile to his lips, at least, making him stand and reach over for the rest of the shrimp in the package he'd been saving. Taking one of them out, he holds it just a short distance from her mouth. "Someone woke up hungry."

Alexander studies Byron with interest, nodding slowly. "Everyone seems to be a little different. Things they can do, or how easy certain things come. I was...receiving from a very young age, and at a fairly wide range. Neither of my parents stand out at all - if these abilities are genetic, they must be recessive. Or it's just never been triggered in them." He falls silent, thinking about that. "So they couldn't help me. No one ever seemed to believe me, but mostly I think it made them uncomfortable so they didn't want to."

"I think most people who get to adulthood in Gray Harbor and manage not to be complete mental cases try not to use their abilities that often, and try not to encourage others to. I'm not sure it's the best route - I don't like wasteful applications, but if you can't control something like this, then it'll control you. I feel." He clears his throat when he notices Lilith has come to, and his voice softens as he says, "Good evening, Miss Winslow. It's good to see you."

Byron's anger and the memory of Tobin's hopeful and optimistic outlook - that Mrs. Gilford could still be found - has Isabella balling her fingers tightly on her lap. Her eyes are on Lilith as both men speak, unwilling and unable to contribute. Both men could always talk candidly to one another, but not usually anything this personal and within other people's hearing, even if it is her and Lilith, so she is reluctant to say much. That and this is helpful, too - it expands her knowledge base regarding other people's experiences, and there's a quiet nod towards Alexander when he concludes that whatever gene carries this, if there is any, is recessive.

"I'm not completely convinced that there's an actual genetic marker for this. It might very well be that all humans have it and it just takes a certain catalyst or a series of them to trigger its development. But I'm not a geneticist or a scientist, I can't even begin to contemplate where we'd start looking if we were interested in looking further into it." Her eyes lift to look at Byron and Alexander. "What I do know is that there were no real records about this area before the Baxters came and established Gray Harbor, so there's no way of knowing whether it's always been like this, or some event triggered it." Unless someone actively started digging. Another curious question to add into her growing mental list of them.

She'd probably say more, but she catches Lilith stirring on the bed and she's suddenly alert again, slowly rising from her seat. "Hey, Lil, we brought a lot of food, and diversions. Byron says your prognosis is recoverable."

Lilith leans up just a touch as if she's going to bite at Byron's fingers holding the shrimp too, but in the end, she just teeth-snares the shrimp to chew a bit thoughtfully as she starts to actually listen to the tail end and pieces of what the others are talking about. Being awake, though, the focus was eventually going to turn to her, and after swallowing down, she reaches for water nearby on the tray table, though she honestly does it more as a gesture instead of trying to lean and grab it herself, letting the man at her bedside dote instead of stubborning up to do things herself right away. Her eyes don't look too hazed with pain medication, most of the sleeping seemed to be actual knock-out fatigue, but she does seem to look a touch disoriented still, all the same.

After turning up a small, but utterly affectionate smile for Byron with gratitude, she looks between Alexander and Isabella there too with their greetings and visiting presence, the tinge of slanted lips kept upward in semi-pleasant fashion, despite the state of her, "Hi guys. I actually... like the noise of having people around to sleep to, even though I wasn't in a way to pay mind to what any of it was. I liked the murmur. And... not being alone anymore."

Then she has a question she's not sure she wants to ask, looking at Byron briefly with guilty cut of her lashes, "... is the festival over? How long was I..."

"Maybe if I knew about what was going on," Byron starts, speaking of Alexander's experience of taking in everyone's emotional states, his eyes staring directly at the other man when he says this and holding his gaze there, "Then I could have tried to do something about it. In my case," There's a shake of his head, a tight smile on his lips, "Things were going on. I just didn't know that I was the cause." Thorne knows full well that both of his parents had the Talent. His father could read minds! Which may or may not be truth. But he could do other things. Mary Thorne, however, it's only since his arrival back home that he noticed that she had that light within her too, a faint one, like his own.

"It's not the right way." He then states, "I only say that because if people weren't hiding the fact that they could do things, then maybe there would be more offers of help to those who are struggling with their own abilities."

Settling down onto the side of her bed with the bag of popcorn shrimp and the second burger in is lap, as Lilith chats with her visitors, Byron quietly watches her, taking in any wounds that are clearly visible, even if wrapped beneath a mile of bandages. When the festival is brought up, his eyes shift for a moment before resettling on Lilith, his head nodding, "The Festival is over. You were out all weekend long." And then some. "We were all worried about you." He'll lean in close to wrap her up in a comforting embrace, holding her close to whisper, "I'm just glad that you were able to come back to us."

Alexander meets that stare head on, although his expressions are never anywhere as controlled as Byron's are - deep guilt and sharp regret are there, but also a sort of tired exasperation. He starts to say something, then catches himself, glancing at Isabella, then Lilith. Instead of speaking, he rakes his fingers through his hair in obvious agitation. He turns, abruptly, and kisses Isabella on the temple. "I'm going to go for a walk around the ward," he mutters to her. But before he leaves, he turns back to Lilith and nods to the books by her bed. "Hospitals are boring. I brought you some puzzle books. If there's something else you'd prefer, let me know. I'm glad you didn't die," he adds, before walking out, shoulders hunched and head bent.

If people weren't hiding the fact that they could do things, then maybe there would be more offers of help to those who are struggling with their own abilities.

Conflict wars within her at that, but Isabella says nothing else on the subject. Instead, she finishes her share of the popcorn shrimp and uses a paper napkin to wipe her fingers. "I'm glad you're back," she tells Lilith instead with a smile, before she rises from her seat. Watching Byron move over to embrace her garners a palpable softening of her features watching the two of them curl up against one another and remind themselves of the anchors they've kept in each other since they were children. It's relieving in a way, heartening in a way - not many people can find something like that in a place like Gray Harbor.

It kind of also makes her feel like she's intruding, and there's a wry twist to her lips after the realization sets in. When Alexander kisses her temple, she curls her fingers into his. "I'll walk with you," she murmurs. To Byron and Lilith, she winks. "We'll be back later," she tells them both. To give them the time.

And then she'll follow Alexander out.

Lilith folds into Byron and inhales his very scent as he wraps her in the embrace to speak lowly with gratitude for her safety, but she still seems a little stunned or guilty sounding when she realizes she was gone the entire festival. There's a noise that comes out of her throat like a wilted 'oh' that's tinged with concern for Byron himself, suddenly, because she realizes that she not only wasn't here for the fun (yes fun) of the festival that he so meticulously arranged, the festival she was proud of him for, the festival she wanted to be pretty with him at...

Lilith realizes he had to deal with her missing in the middle of life happening and she knows his propensity to keep juggling, even if she hasn't a single clue what the actual festival events turned out like given her absence. Breathing out a soft sigh, she hugs tighter with her better arm around his back and nuzzles in with apology, even though it's not anything that could have been helped, "... I'm so sorry." And she is. She's sorry about what he must have feared the whole of the while. She was afraid she was lost too and there were even points where she was afflicted by forces that made her start to feel somewhat resigned to that fact in partial, which is dangerous in and of itself while in such a place.

After turning her face out of breathing the dark-haired man in, she looks at Alexander addressing her about the puzzle books with her cheek at Byron's sweater and a sudden smile quirks with gratitude and surprise alike, "... I like puzzle books. Thank you." Then Isabella is offering to walk with the man and as they move out, she calls after the pair, "Thank you for..." She's not sure. Taking care of Byron? Just showing up and caring? Both those things and other things too? After trailing off, she says, "If I'm stuck in here forever, come back and see me. And if I get sent home, we'll all have to have drinks at my place and play catch up because... I know this place doesn't stop when my back is turned."

That sentiment suddenly leads to her next question, attention turning up to Byron in the close quarters when the other two are out for walking time and space from the hospital room. Lashes batting a few times, she wonders, "... did everything go as planned? I wish I had seen... you standing and talking and opening it, handsome, tall, and confident. I'm proud just imagining it."

Uncertain as to how long Lilith had been awake for, Byron feels that he would've sensed something if she had stirred much earlier fro when he'd taken notice. He hopes that she hadn't been up for very long. Withdrawing briefly to get a good look at her, he leans forward again to place a kiss, first at her cheek, then another atop her crown before pulling her in closely against him once more. "This being Gray Harbor, we had the usual hiccups. One of them was a racing event where, I swear, I wasn't going anywhere fast." If at all. He doesn't mention the more serious things, well, he does add, "Isabella was... she went missing too." She can feel his hand behind her, brushing down her back and giving her a few gentle pats every so often. Then it stops, his arms loosen.

"Where were you, Lilith? I mean, I'm just trying to figure if there's any connection between your disappearance and Isabella's." He's not sure what LIlith's been through at all. Now that Izzy is out of the room, he says with a heavy sigh, "Whoever captured Isabella was using her as a battery to power up their illusion. Or something, I'm not even sure. I thought I was crashing some wedding in the beginning, until things got dark real fast."

"Isabella was being used as a battery for someone else's..." Lilith listens to Byron for a time in quiet with her brows making a gradual knitting, soaking up the touches and even reaching to put another shrimp in her mouth for tempered chewing and swallowing graze of something to eat. Of course, she doesn't seem inclined to go to town with food at the moment, it's a simple pleasure right now, just the act of having food and chewing it, something the man knows she likes. It takes a bit of work to swallow before she's speaking, though.

The piece about Isabella being missing too tenses her back some and her eyes flit toward the doorway where the other female left prior before starting that blurt out with a certain amount of abject horror in echo of what Byron just explained, in brief. Her eyes widen some and when they look up at the man again, they're clear enough with the general terror of the idea, "No... it wasn't that. Not with me."

Lilith's not addled mentally, he's seeing that the more she's awake and talking and looking around. It doesn't mean she's not going to be twitchy or clingy or traumatized in some way after so many days, of course, but whatever she went through, it didn't break her mind like it did her body, at least not in a way that has stuck with her now that she's out. But all the same, when he asks where she was, she withdraws a bit out of habit a little visually, lashes dropping to her covered lap where her hands rest and scrape at a loose nail cuticle as busywork. The brunette sits for a moment doing that, quite thickly quiet before she tries to explain.

"But I... don't know. It wasn't quite like other Dreams, I think it took me a while to even realize what was going on and there's some holes or overlap between what I think is real or altered. I know that I was going to come let you see me in costume before the race so you could have a kiss and be cheered on by a pretty pretty princess. And because... I was impatient and I wanted to go to your place after and let you take it off of me while you were still run-high. The last thing I remember is stepping out onto the sidewalk and deciding there were too many pedestrians to drive. Then..."

There's a breath and Lilith puffs out the intake of air over her lips, still looking down, "I thought I was Lost, everything was taking too long and it seemed like I just kept wading deeper instead of... mm." Her brows draw into frown as she tries to formulate how to say exactly what happened, then she finally looks back up at Byron to say, "Kiss me while I think. It was a long time and I want to know I'm awake and you're real."

There's so many details that he leaves out of his explaining of what happened to Isabella. Though just the thought that she was being used as a battery, or that any of them, especially those who shined brightly, could be used for the same, should be disturbing enough that there was no need to mention the state she was in or any of that. If anything, there's this look of relief on Byron's face, hearing that she did not suffer the same fate. Head lowered, a heavy sigh breezing past his lips, he lifts his gaze slowly to make direct contact with hers, "Good."

That doesn't mean that what she went through was pleasant, however. Just different. "That's when I noticed that something was off. I mean you could've been busy. The fog was getting pretty thick by then. But you weren't answering your messages either and... I should've checked." He'll admit that much. "After the race." He goes on to admit, "I thought maybe you were asleep and since I knew we'd be meeting up tomorrow, I didn't want to bother."

A small grin begins to form on his lips while one hand brushes the back of his knuckles over her cheeks, near her lips as she's finishing chewing. "I really could've used a good luck kiss, but then I may have been wiped out in the aftermath." That small grin turns into a full smile, crinkling the edges of his eyes, "But I'm sure you'd be able to get me going again."

At this request to kiss her, Byron doesn't hesitate, though he moves in slowly to keep to some semblance of eye contact before his own eyes gently close and his lips brush against hers at first, before she feels him pressing firmly into the kiss.

"I'm very confident in my ability to get you going again. I think I'm getting pretty good at coaxing out the second wind, in fact." Lilith moves her head into a tiny shake at the 'should have checked' bit because honestly, it wouldn't have mattered a whit, probably, all told. Unless he got caught with her in it, which... everything might have been different then. But then she's speaking into Byron's kissing brush with quiet, low-pitched innuendo, you know, other than the fact that she can actually kind of adrenaline kick start a second wind out of him much like it's a stabbing with a psychic battery needle. She hasn't cheated to do it yet when she wants performance out of him, anyway. He's been game on his own.

Lilith takes a moment in silence as her words trail off, then, the brush of the man's lips turning into full press. Her lips mesh and mold to his with parting, breathing in their mingled air as she's shallowly winded by a sudden growing and gradual ferocity in the kiss, despite the passion being solid and slow. Then reluctantly, she breaks and murmurs appreciatively with nudge of nose tip to nose tip, "Real enough for me."

The woman lifts her less-bandaged arm to put her palm of hand to the side of Byron's jaw and face while looking at him in close quarters, breathing out, "I was in the woods and I was lost. I heard the child version of me and she seemed in danger or lost, so I followed her to protect her. Then she became..." There's a pause here, her fingers curling in resting place on Byron's bristled face, "Me, but the bitter, resentful, lonely and angry teenage me. And I had to hunt, I think. It took... so long. But she found me and fought me with Hank and my mother, I guess as... ghost representations, and it..."

She makes a frustrated noise in her throat, these things are so hard to streamline, then her voice softens, "There was a lullaby or mist making me want to hurt myself to stay after I fought them. The only one left standing was... that version of myself that hurts and she... made me hurt myself after we burned each other with flames." A pause, "They all wanted me to stay. They tempted me to have family where there was none before, and there was something influencing me that..." Visibly, there's a thick swallow, "I stopped before I got to my wrist. I wanted you. They would never have been my family, none of that was real, I took them out because I had to. Even myself."

She draws in a shallow breath to hold, hand sliding to the side of Byron's neck while concluding, "It was very emotionally taxing and physically difficult to be lost there so long. Facing personal things like that was... less like a challenge threat or means to an end and more like... a trap to try and keep me there? I don't know. I was very bloody and I remembered passing the broken toys and their traps. And since the Dream still wasn't spitting me out after I did what I thought I needed to do, I went to them for help and fixed them all. And they... made me their Queen and gave me what I wanted? Maybe. I don't know. I passed out afterwards and then I remember seeing you as beautiful as anything hovering over me when my eyes opened again."

Her mouth goes to his again in a hurry when she's finished trying to explain, and the weight in her tone kind of implies words don't quite explain what she faced there, what those things represented inside her as far as damages go. But for all her hesitating, she sounds so sure when she speaks there at his mouth, "I knew you'd come. I just needed to be somewhere you could get me. It's what kept me moving when I thought I couldn't do it anymore."

The playfulness and comforting intimacy gives way to something more serious when Lilith starts to tell him exactly what she went through in this Dream. Byron falls silent, though every so often he'll brush his lips against hers or press his forehead to her as he takes in everything that she dares to reveal. There are moment during her retelling that he can't hide this quiet anger at all, she can get a sense of his jaw tensing as his gaze lowers to stare down at her lap.

He then ask curiously, "Your mother was there?" And only then does he lift his eyes to meet hers, "What did she look like? In your Dream?"

Once those words are spoken, he's silent again, though she can feel a soft squeeze at less injured hand which he had taken within his own now. "You were gone so long that I was worried--" It's the same concern that was probably on Alexander's mind as well. "Nevermind, you're back now." He'll even force a reassuring smile, which slowly fades. "I wonder if this is how it starts. But I can't see Mrs. Gilford deciding to say in that world rather than with her son." There's some disappointment in his features now. "I guess it's foolish of me to try and give a blanket theory to everything we've experienced. Now, I'm just reminded that the Dolorphage, the Dark Men will try to get at us in any way that they can."

"It's hard for me to explain how it was different. There's less... I mean, the things we've been through together when it comes to my dreams personally, it's more about choice and confronting fear, running a torture gauntlet to get out whole. But this was more manipulation and traps and paths that go nowhere with other influences that tempt you to give up or stay and it's... easy to get lost or dead, I think." Lilith is more contemplative about this particular part than quiet or distressed, despite the continued serious drop of her tone, "Mm. Anyway, my mother was a wraith, like the version of me with black fire, and Hank and I... couldn't make out a face on her or anything. But I knew it was her."

The woman opens her mouth after looking at Byron for a moment, then closes it, as if she were about to ask something, then thought better of it for the time being. That and she's visibly distracted in the eyes while her gaze is on him, hand turning in one of his to return squeeze, "You thought I was gone like one of the others. I can't imagine what it started to feel like, to feel like I was ripped from you. All that worry. I would have been beside myself if the tables were turned." Then she pauses a little awkwardly, "You didn't think I left you, though, did you?"

She did set the precedent there, once upon a time, afterall.

"It was scary." Byron admits, shaking his head a few times, "Really scary. And I was so busy with the opening ceremony, checking in on the other events, but I just knew that I had to go back and look for you." His body twisted so that he's facing her from where he is seated at the edge of her bed still, he continues to brush at her cheek with the back of his hand, before that touch brushes away so he can feel the strands of her dark hair within his fingertips. "I kept returning back to the shop in case you showed up." A slight pause, "James also helped, uh... to man the register in your stead. So if the money is more than a little off, let me know." He can't help but smile when he says this.

He then lets out a heavy sigh, his lips part, before he paused, idling licking at them in thought. "I thought it could've been Turner at first, but I wasn't picking up any readings of that nature. Or his presence. But.. no, I didn't think that you left. Not voluntarily." Those lips form a pleased smile as he leans in close to move in for another kiss. "You're back. You're safe. That's all that matters. That and to ensure that they don't to get their claws into you again."

"Good. I won't do that to you again. Not like before. I'm not stupid, I know that... whatever we are, it may not always work out the way we want or feel we want. But I meant it when I said it before, and I mean it now-- if I disappear, I didn't leave you." Lilith seems relieved and more solid somehow after Byron confirms that he didn't, in fact, worry that she skipped out with overwhelm or fear while things were so good. When his lips come to hers for stealing another kiss and sealing his words on what matters, her posture changes and she sits up straighter to meet him and press into it, parting her lips to slip him a rush and dance of tongue with pass, then a tiny noise of frustration, "I could maybe talk you into sex in a hospital bed to relieve the rest of the fears we both have leftover from the scare, but the bandages and any accidental 'ow' I make really make it harder."

After a lamenting sigh, Lilith scoots over some with wiggling instead of using her arms to push, making more room on the bed for Byron to cuddle up more with her, "I have a confession to make. Then I want you to tell me all about what I missed with the festival so I can feel included and more like I wasn't on a whole different planet while it happened. You worked so hard and we were going to be the most fabulous looking couple, honestly. Photographers would have loved us." The woman pauses and her lips twitch some, "But as for confessions, don't take this the wrong way, but I had a dream during all this sleeping with drugs... I dreamed I saw your mother at the grocery store and I told her I was pregnant with twins she'd have no part of. Then I tripped her and walked off. Also I bought fish sticks for some reason, which is gross, but..." Her lips twitch up a little more as she bats lashes at Byron innocuously, like it's not a totally bitchy dream, relish clear for the fake circumstances, "Her face was priceless."

With this cheeky grin on Byron's face which hovers so close to hers, he says, "When you 'disappeared' back in school, all I had to do was get a hall pass to walk past your classroom just to see you. Or ride my bike by Huckleberry, especially in junior year when I was working at the saw mill. So though you were gone from my life and kept trying to avoid me-- you were never really gone from my life." His eyes take on this distant cast, considering a few options. "At one time, I probably would've thought it would be easier for me if we never saw one another again, rather than watching you walk across campus, but ducking away whenever I tried to get close."

His lips purse together, now allowing his eyes to meet her gaze, "Now I know that I'd prefer to suffer by seeing you without being able to have you rather than having you completely gone from my life." He did do several years in California without her, however. And with limited memories of his time back in Gray Harbor.

She mentions sex, then informs him of just how awkward that could be at the hospital, all while making room for him o the narrow hospital bed. He scoots in close, laying down beside her with his arms carefully wrapped around her lithe form. He feels a stretch in his legs now that he has more space without needing to sit uncomfortable with the lean to one side. There's this look of surprise and curiosity at first followed by amusement when she tells him of her dream with his mother. "I wonder what she would say if any of that were truth." He says of the twins as he tilts his head to rest against the pillow. "I can't say whether she'd make a good grandmother or not, but I can understand if you'd prefer not to have her be a part of their lives." It's strange to hear him say that as if the option is completely hers alone and the idea that otherwise, he may be fine with experimenting on how his mother would reach to grandkids.

"I mean, I'm not gonna lie. She wasn't the most supportive person in my life." That much he is and always has been willing to admit, even if he covered a lot of his what his father had done.

Since she asked, after talks of dreams, he'll fill her in on the most excruciating kart race, followed by the fact that she should really see what Roen did to Addington Park. It's only been a few days since the Festival, but preparations were being made for the winter events coming up. Then he'll fill her in on the various other aspects of the Festival, all while leaving out anything that pertained to him being in any danger. She didn't need to hear that.

"Honey. Baby. Darling. If we have twins that are half a you and half a me, we're going to have much bigger problems than your mother having ice water for blood. Sanity and general coping mechanisms might be compromised. In fact, I think we'd only keep them because they'd be pretty enough to get away with driving us batshit crazy. But I have implant birth control, we're probably safe. Assuming you aren't insanely virile, which..." Lilith settles in with Byron scooting to cuddle with her, carefully turning some on her side to start nuzzling into her spot against the solidity of his body after another nip and press and meander of kiss at his mouth, "Looking at you, who knows, you manly bastard."

Then she listens for a good while about the festival. And maybe it's a good thing she hasn't quite found out someone kidnapped him while she was stolen away by strange because given the affection and safety she's exuding and soaking up from Byron's arms... that'd be a hell of a thing to have threatened with her temper and capabilities what they are. He might have trouble keeping her in the bed if she knew enough.

Especially right now. There's no place in the world she'd rather be, even if it means this damn hospital again. Her time away and alone and afraid solidified one simple concept when it comes to having Byron. The place doesn't matter at all. Right now, his arms are everything real. She's safe and content and stays that way well after she's gone and drifted back to sleep.

Safe, sound, secure. She needs that right now.