2019-11-27 - A Friend In Need

They each got separate texts explaining that Bennie has sprung herself out of the hospital against medical advice but could use a little help with the Ealing-hay of her Urn-bays. Yes, she texted in Pig Latin, because CLEARLY the Dark Men don't speak it. A note has been left on the door, likely in Easton's writing, that says 'Door's Open' and a TV is on in the back master bedroom so that's likely where she's laid up.

It takes little time for Erin to come over. Parking her car she heads into the apartments she used to live. The same ones her uncle tried to kill her in. Pushing past that thought she forges on to room 400. The note left? Not too bad since there were guards here, but she steps inside and goes for where the noise is. "Bennie? I'm here for the eal Hay." A smile at the attempt to throw off the Dark Men.

Aidan is, generally, available. The life of Aidan Kinney is not what one would call heavily scheduled. Still, it's a couple minutes before there's a 'mw-ohay' back, and probably ten or so more before he's actually gotten past the guards (who do not apparently find the calf-length faux-mink coat convincing evidence that he and his ancient boots and ripped red jeans and black t-shirt with a rhinestone-bedazzled skull on it really belong in this building) and made it up to 400. Open or not, there's a knock on that door before he pulls it open and steps in, pushing it shut behind him. He opens his mouth to call a greeting, but sees Erin ahead of him not being Bennie and it instead turns into a slightly startled but quieter, "Oh, hey," as he follows her bedroomward. A pause, studying her back. "Didn't you hit that big dude at the Firefly that one time?"

"Back here!" Bennie calls out, a touch less cheer in her voice than normal but then again: pain. She's been settled onto her and Easton's bed, resting on top of the covers with every pillow they own arranged around her for comfort. She's wearing a pair of his sweat pants and an open asian style robe over a torso covered in gauze. There is a chick flick on the obnoxiously man-sized TV, the volume low because it was irritating the Blonde. Everything is irritating the Blonde because of discomfort.

Erin turns around when she hears the movement behind her and widens her eyes at the picture he presents. "Um, that note was for me. I don't think you were supposed to come pushing your way inside like that." So maybe she doesn't know Aidan, but she watches him while blocking the entrance to Bennie's room back there. "Yes, actually, I did take a swing at him. And I'll take a swing at you too, if you don't get out of my friends apartment."

Aidan pauses, looking tall and slim and somewhat disreputable and now also fairly confused. "Uh, please don't?" he ventures, turning a hand over; they're both empty, apparently, though one then moves to a pocket of his jeans under the coat. It doesn't, at least, look like he could easily fit a gun or anything in those. "I'm pretty sure it was for me," a tiny pause, considering Erin's words, "too. Bennie texted me." Which is where he raises his voice to call, "Hey, Bennie! You okay?" Of course she isn't, that's why she texted them.

"OHMYGOD would you two stop bickering and get in here? I texted you both." It's probably the first time she's ever sounded grumpy around either of them, but this is a special case of Bennie. Uncharted territory, Bennie. Bennie of the Upside Down. Ooooh, maybe this is a Dream. Nah, if this were a Dream Bennie would be even MORE cheery to doom them all.

Erin studies him and watches his hands, withholding judgment, protective of Bennie. Her stance relaxes when he says Bennie's name and he calls out to her. It's with a sheepish look she steps aside as Bennie calls out to them. "Pardon me," letting him go around her and in the room first, but following up immediately behind him. She offers no apologies for being overprotective, and she remains near him as they enter, just to be doubly sure he's the person she texted.

One of Aidan's brows does lift slightly at the grumpy-sounding, but no-one's at their best around the time they're texting friends to come heal them, right? Plus the words themselves are kind of a relief, like maybe some part of him had half-expected to find out the world was not as expected. He's lived here six months now; that's plenty of time to develop that niggling paranoia, whether or not he might've had it before.

He doesn't seem to need or expect an apology from Erin, and does his part to make up for the lack of cheer in the apartment by giving her a smile and apparently sincere, "I'm Aidan. Nice to meet you," as he goes around her and slips into that back room.

Bennie gives an exaggerated whimper of pitifulness as they finally enter her room, her bottom lip jutting out an impressive amount. "I'm sorry guys. I tried. I really tried, but the last time they went to change my bandages I just had had enough and suddenly Alexander and Easton's suggestions suddenly made perfect sense and I'm sorry to even ask this of you and I know what it is you're going to be risking and oh, Aidan doesn't know, but there is this psycho hose beast who was targeting healers because we take all their fun away when we take away the pain and it just hurts so much and I..." Cue the chin wobble, cue the tears.

"Erin Addington," she relays to Aidan just then, realizing he must be a friend of Bennie's so he must be an okay person. "Nice to meet you too." Following him inside, she looks first towards Bennie, uncertain what condition she'd find her in. Awwwwwwww. Erin steps closer even if she has to step around Aidan again and she walks over to kneel down beside the bed. "Aww Bennie I should have come anyway, before. I don't care what happened, like I told Easton, this is who I am, it's all I have. Every thing else has been taken from me. I'll do this as long as I can. Especially for my friends." A quick look to Aidan, the other side of the bed is available space for him. "We'll get you, Bennie." So, looking at Aidan, "How about I offer support and you do the actual healing this time." She could sense it was strong in him, probably stronger than herself.

Aidan's brow furrows when he sees Bennie, deepening as she talks, and ending up with a blink. "Yeah, I didn't know that," he says, but that may not be the distress. "When did this happen? How come I didn't know about this?" He moves to the other side of the bed with no reluctance. "I mean, you probably didn't have to go through all that," ...says the guy whom she scolded about not coming to her about an axe to the chest a while back. "I do care what happened but, I mean, just 'cause I'm nosy and worried about you and shit, I'd try to fix it whatever. Like she says, especially for friends. And if the psycho comes for us I... guess we come for her back." Weird combination of anger and reluctance in that. Unease. He shakes it off, and nods to Erin. "Okay. Let's try it that way." A small smile, and he leans in to get a closer look at Bennie's current state, what's visible at least, and starts to focus himself.

Bennie gives an embarrassed bit of laughter as she swipes moisture away from her eyes. "Sorry, it's just been a rough couple of days. I asked to be taken off pain killers, and I will never make that mistake again. Turns out sometimes I don't actually know what's best for me. But there's second degree burns over, you know," She makes a vague swirling gesture to encompass her torso. "It was a couple of days ago, I've been in the hospital but they started talking about skin grafts and ...Okay so I freaked and when Easton was released I made him take me with him."

"Oh honey, I wish I'd come right after it happened. I'm so sorry." Erin nods to Aidan and she doesn't go about explaining how or why it happened, she'll leave that to Easton as soon as Bennie is well enough to do more talking. She does offer moral support to Bennie while offering healing support to Aidan. She smiles at him, then at her. "We can do the talking once she's out of pain."

Aidan winces at the description of the burns, the kind of wince that suggests familiarity with that sort of pain and the certainty that it is indeed not the best time either of them ever had. And then it's mentioned Easton was in the hospital too, which he also clearly didn't know, but he nods at Erin's remark about heal now, chat later, and focuses more clearly again.

Maybe he can feel it when Erin's power bolsters his; maybe he just figures it's about the right time. Either way, there's a pause of a few seconds, and then he reaches out to carefully ease a bit of the robe aside, just enough to bare an unburnt spot he can settle his fingers. It isn't entirely necessary, but he finds it helps. A breath, and warmth flows from his fingers against and across and through her skin, suffusing it. It's fast, fast enough that it feels itchy as well as warm as the skin and flesh heal and reknit themselves into the proper configuration, and the flame-touched injuries are gone. A glance to Erin, making sure she looks still ready as well, and he takes another breath; the second wave of warmth is a little slower, but it finds the tracks of the electric shock and travels up along them, out through all the little feathers of those burns, mending as it goes.

Aidan straightens back up, taking one more good breath, this one coming out as a near-silent sigh. "That felt about right," he says, with another glance to Erin, "Thanks," and then to Bennie. "How is it?"

Bennie just closes her eyes against all of it: Erin's apologies for not attending to Bennie earlier (even though earlier she would have outright denied help), Aidan settling aside her robe, setting in to heal her. It's just too much, asking others to take this risk on her behalf even though most healers she's ever met would do the same. Including herself.

As the sensation starts to spread through out her torso, the Blonde holds her breath against it. It's like the sun spreading its rejuvenating rays on her skin, leaving healthy tissue it its wake. It's not just a fireball blast to the chest that she took, but an electric shock that left little crackles of its path across her tummy. All that eases away.

A shuddering exhale is given when Aidan finally speaks again. "Right as rain." Bennie murmurs.

Erin does look ready, in fact, her eyes are slightly unfocused as she checks out the burns, medically speaking instead of glimmery, from the inside out. Just from a medically practiced eye. She flinches a little and she's there even as the healing starts from Aidan, watching the parts rope back together and the angry burns lessening. She remains there for the second healing, still bolstering Aidan as Bennie is put back together again, hopefully easing the pain. Only when her eyes come back into focus again does she smile warmly to the two. "It looking good, medically speaking too. Everything is being put to rights."

It's only once the pair of them have confirmed things are indeed back how they should be that Aidan relaxes further, and a grin breaks free. "Awesome," he says, and gets around to sliding off his coat, even if it might not be for all that long. He's starting to get warm himself. Folding it over his arm, he half-sits, half-perches on the very edge of Bennie's bed. "So what happened?" he asks, now that the 'heal now' portion appears to be handled, "and is Easton still hurt too?"

"There was an invitation from the Dark Men and yes. Easton was hurt too. Apparently the invitation wasn't a RSVP because it ended up being mandatory. Of course a fight ensued. Mostly those hurt were Bennie, Easton and August. Bennie and Easton weren't too keen on anyone using their powers on them after what had just happened. Maybe you could get Easton to allow you to heal, but he seemed adamant on working it out himself." Erin watches Bennie then back to Aidan. "I have someplace to go for now, but give her my love when she's back to being more coherent. Sometimes the healing is enough to let you catch up on the sleep you missed by being injured." A smile is given, "I do apologize for earlier. Just a little overprotective after I saw the condition she was in last I saw her. Thank you for coming."

As if to prove she's feeling leaps and bounds better, Bennie lurches forward and rings Aidan around the shoulders, tugging him back into the pillows with her. "Thank you. Both of you." Bennie's hand juts out for Erin, just like when they were the other side of the veil, making the grabby motions so she can grasp it gratefully as the woman leaves.

As she listens to Erin weave through the apartment, she further explains to Aidan. "At first, our glimmer did nothing. There was this lantern thingie that just absorbed it and used the energy against us. Trying to teach us a lesson about balance or something. Isabella thinks it's the Furies? When I get out of this bed, I'm going to go ask her more details." A pause. "Tomorrow at the earliest." She clarifies.

Aidan makes a startled noise that turns into a laugh when Bennie tugs him down, and resists not at all, wrapping an arm around her for a hug. Which would REALLY have hurt if she weren't healed now!

"An... invitation?" he says, looking from one of them to the other, and nods slightly at the note about Easton. Not that it necessarily means he won't look into this. But Erin's taking her leave, and he gives her a smile. "'sall good. I mean, I could've been some kinda weirdo or something." Could've! "Thank you, too. Definitely easier with both of us." He watches a moment as she leaves, before turning the smile on Bennie and adding, "You're welcome, obviously. You'd do the same, anyhow. I mean, you have."

"I, um..." he says when she gets to the teaching-a-lesson thing, blanching a bit, and falls silent for a second, a little stiffer before he shakes whatever it is off, or at least appears to. "Furies. Like... vengeful Greek women with... wings?" He's not totally up on his mythology. "But yeah, don't go trying to do anything today, you gotta rest. What'd you guys do about the lantern thing?"

With Aidan firmly in her evil grasp, Bennie proceeds with the ultimate torture known as cuddling. It feels good just hug someone again after being afraid of the slightest bump or jostle for days. Rubbing her cheek against his dark curls she answers, "No wings that I saw, just this black tendril thingies like the room we were in was alive?" She gives a shrug about the lantern, "Someone shot it. Either Easton or Isabella, I think. I wasn't really, you know. Conscious?"

Aidan is all about that cuddle life, yo. The coat ends up flopped over the end of the bed, and he wriggles his head to rub said curls back against her cheek in return, grinning again for a moment. It fades but doesn't entirely disappear when she goes on, even with a little wince at the unconsciousness bit. "Maybe I oughta learn how to shoot things or something. I'm not really... I mean, I've kinda done okay when people try to hit me? But between this lantern things and that flu thing, I dunno." He doesn't sound that enthused about the idea, though.

"It couldn't hurt. I know it's not ideal but...the more prepared we all are..." Bennie's shoulders shift in a light shrug, "You should talk to Easton. He can teach you, or maybe we should just consider finding someone to set up a class. I was absolutely useless, Aidan. I don't ever want to feel that way again. Well. Useless you consider the great human target I was. Aidan? Would you mind hanging out? Just until I fall asleep."

"It's a shitty feeling," Aidan says quietly, about being useless. Feeling useless, at any rate. "Plus I mean, you know medical stuff and that's usually useful though I guess kinda during a fight..." A faint sigh, and he gives her a squeeze. "I just kinda don't much like guns," he admits, "but..." But. Slightly brighter, "Maybe I could get a taser like Bay's and run fast. Anyway, yeah, of course I'll stay. I can stay while you're sleeping, if you need, but at least 'til you sleep, sure."