Room 307, Thursday Afternoon

[justbeingbay]

The night in Los Angeles had been uncomfortable. Nico and other-Victor had disappeared into a bedroom, and no one else felt like doing much beyond staring dumbly at the television. Xavin was the only one who seemed able to speak much, and she wasn't exactly a great conversationalist.

In the morning, Bay took the first portal back to Fandom because she couldn't think of anything better to do. She could mourn anywhere, and it seemed likely the rest of Gert's friends had crimefighting to do that she would just get in the way of. (Not that she understood how they could want to be heroes after they lost Gert, but her comments to that effect went nowhere.)

She took Old Lace up to her dorm room and made a phone call she didn't much want to make, because it made everything that much more real. Only knowing she owed it to Gert got her through leaving the message for Evan. Then she curled up on her bed, the dinosaur resting her head against Bay's shoulder as if she knew comforting was needed.

[OOC: Closed door, open post. Extreme emo warning.]

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[genesishero]

Well... that phone message had been... foreboding. Evan had listened to it a few times before finally making his way to Bay's room, because there was something about the way her voice was shaking (and just something in the air, it seemed like, that was different today) that left him feeling a bit shaken himself.

He took a deep breath outside her room, squaring his shoulders, and then knocked.

"Bay...? Bay, it's Evan."

[justbeingbay]

It took a long moment for Bay to answer, long enough that Evan might have wondered if she was there at all.

"Yeah," she finally said, and went to open the door. "Yeah, um, hi. T-thanks for coming."

Curious about the movement, Old Lace leaned way over and sniffed at Evan.

[genesishero]

"Hey, girl," Evan murmured, a little surprised to see the dinosaur there as he lifted a hand to give her a pat on the nose. And, at the same time...

He glanced up at Bay again, his expression etched with worry. There was one person conspicuously missing from the room, given Old Lace's presence.

"What...?"

He didn't want to ask it. He wasn't sure he had the heart to hear the answer.

[justbeingbay]

Bay's red-rimmed eyes might have given the answer away, anyhow.

She stepped back to sit on her bed, gesturing for Evan to do the same. "Um," she said, intelligently. "So ... I talked Portalocity into letting Gert buy a ticket home. And I went with her, and -- she got stabbed, Evan."

She hadn't meant to tell it all at once like that, but once she started talking drawing it out seemed cruel.

[genesishero]

Evan flinched as Bay explained, and Old Lace's whine seemed to echo the stabbing feeling in his heart perfectly. He pulled in a shaky breath and let her nuzzle her face under his arm.

"But... she'll..." What? Be okay? Of course she wasn't. Bay wouldn't have told him like this if she was. Old Lace wouldn't have left Gert's side if she was just injured. "No. No. That's not... I mean..."

He bit his cheek. Pulled another deep breath. Swallowed heavily. Gert had always been one of the people around here that he could actually talk to about what he was. She was the first one to tell him that he didn't need to be a hero or a villain. All he really needed to be was Evan.

"Oh no, Gert..."

[justbeingbay]

"I know," Bay answered in a thick voice, and reached a tentative hand to rest on Evan's shoulder. "I -- I keep thinking there are about a million ways it could have been different, and she shouldn't have been there, and none of this is okay, and ... nothing can bring her back."

She sounded like she was on the verge of crying again by the time she finished talking.

[genesishero]

Evan wasn't going to cry. He wasn't. He made his mind up then and there, and if he pretended those weren't tears making their way down his cheeks, then they weren't, really, were they?

Not for the first time, he felt himself aching for his old life, where nobody ever got hurt, where his heart had never ached the way it had been since Tuesday when Sholeh told him she was leaving. He wanted his parents back and he wanted Gert back and he wanted Sholeh to stay, and that wasn't the way the world worked.

He was grudgingly coming to accept that.

He sniffled - he still wasn't crying, damn it - and he leaned toward Bay a little.

"It's not fair," he murmured, because that was the best he had.

[justbeingbay]

"Really really not," Bay agreed, with an ache of her own.

She had long gotten over the idea life was fair, but this was a cruel kind of unfairness. Gert never got to have a real boyfriend or graduate from high school or drive a car or have kids or anything. How was it okay for her to be dead? It wasn't. At all.

"Anyhow, she -- she wanted you to have Old Lace," Bay said finally, with a fond glance to the dinosaur. "I'm jealous, but I can't take her home with me."

[genesishero]

"She kind of stands out in a crowd," Evan agreed quietly, leaning against Old Lace, a little. "I'll take good care of her, I promise."

Or Old Lace would take good care of him. One or the other, really.

"We can visit you, though. I mean, or you can visit us. I'm just downstairs, room 330." Oh man. Hopefully Cosette wouldn't mind sharing a room with a dinosaur. She'd been pretty happy about the puppy, but Ozzy was... smaller. He swallowed again, and looked sadly at Bay. "Is there anything else I can do? I mean, if you need anything..."

[justbeingbay]

Bay smiled bitterly. "I need my best friend to still be alive, but I don't think you can help with that."

[genesishero]

Some other, decidedly evil Apocalypse might have been able to. But it most certainly wouldn't have been Gert standing there when he was through with her.

Evan swallowed again and shook his head.

"I can't," he agreed. "I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry, Bay."

[justbeingbay]

"So am I," Bay said. "You lost her too, right?"

She swallowed hard, trying to sound calm. Like everything was okay, or at least vaguely normal.

"Do I need to tell people?" she wondered. "Or should I just let everybody assume Gert randomly went home, the way people do? I can't --"

She twisted her hands in her lap instead of finishing the sentence. She couldn't have this conversation 20 times. But it also didn't feel right for people to not even know that Gert was dead.

[genesishero]

Evan gave Old Lace a scratch under the chin, and shrugged his shoulders a little.

"I don't know who knew her," he admitted quietly. "I... I don't really get out much."

Deep breath.

"I'll figure out what to do, okay? I can talk to a teacher or... someone. Dean Skywalker or Principal Winchester, and if they think people should know..." He shrugged again, and then wrapped his arms around Old Lace's muzzle and just sort of clung, there. "Knowing this place, she probably isn't the first person who... who should have been able to come back..."

And didn't.

[justbeingbay]

"No," Bay said, in a long sigh. "Probably not. Just ... the first one we know."

That sort of hung in the air there for a while.

"She knew Jim," she said finally. "Maddie was her roommate, I think, and she knew Victor and Karolina at home. S-some of them might want to know, too. I'm ... not really sure who else."

[genesishero]

Evan nodded, committing those names to memory as best as he could. Jim, Maddie, Victor and Karolina. He only really knew Victor, and he'd met Karolina once or twice. Jim and Maddie?

He'd... figure it out.

"I'll talk to them and see if they know who else," he decided. "I wonder how many of them are still around. Didn't Victor just graduate?"

[justbeingbay]

Bay nodded. "Jim and Karolina were in my class too," she said. "And Maddie. Maybe some of them have left already."

In a selfish way, she hoped so. That way they wouldn't have to know right away. Their lives would be easier. Their hearts wouldn't have to hurt like hers.

"What if you do that and I talk to a teacher?" she asked. "I want to feel like I'm doing something, and that way I can -- explain exactly what happened."

[genesishero]

Evan nodded a little, quietly thankful that she was delegating, now.

"That would work," he decided. "I'll ask around, then. Old Lace can help. Won't you, girl?"

The dinosaur responded by nuzzling her way a little deeper into Evan's armpit.

[justbeingbay]

"She better," Bay said, reaching out to scratch the back of Old Lace's neck. her smile at the burrowing was tiny but genuine. "Wow, I'm glad she likes you. She must be so confused Gert's gone."

[genesishero]

"She... is, I think," Evan replied, nodding a bit. "Or she's upset too, or maybe she just knows I need this right now."

Probably that last one. There was some sort of link between them, a connection that hadn't been there before. Evan chewed his lip as he mulled over that.

"She'll be okay, though. She's a tough girl. Aren't you, Old Lace?"

More burrowing.

[justbeingbay]

"She has to be," Bay mused. "Only dinosaur around, right? Bet she gets lonely."

She was maybe projecting a little, yes.

"But she'll be okay," she said. "Somehow. We will too. Just ... not yet."

[genesishero]

"I don't think we have to be, just yet," Evan replied softly. "I think right now, we're allowed to be every bit as not-okay as we feel we need to be."

Gert would probably agree, he figured.

[justbeingbay]

"Yeah, I might be pretty not-okay for a while," Bay told him, sniffling again. "But I'm glad there were other people here who cared about her."

Gert would think that was sappy, she thought. But she wouldn't argue that it was true.

[genesishero]

It was sappy. It was super sappy. But Bay was in good company when it came to sappy people who were going to miss Gert.

"Yeah," he murmured. "Me too."

And then, after a moment, he gave Old Lace a little nudge. It looked like Bay could use some more dino-nuzzles, too.

[justbeingbay]

Old Lace nuzzled into Bay, and she smiled at the dinosaur. "She's really good at cuddling for a big lizard," she noted. "It's nice."

[genesishero]

"She is," Evan agreed, nodding. "She's kind of more like a cuddly bird, or a really big dog. Just... not fluffy."

Funny how that worked.

"There's a lot of her to cuddle, too."

And she probably got a lot of practice with Gert.

[justbeingbay]

"I think that's the best thing about a pet dinosaur," Bay said. "Well. That and the fact she can tear your enemies to shreds in seconds, but the cuddling comes first."