nookiepowered | 23 Sphinx, Sunday Evening

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23 Sphinx, Sunday Evening

Bo woke up coughing and clutching her neck, and for a long, kind moment, wondered ~~who~~ what the hell she'd eaten to make her dream about singing to a photo of a middle-aged woman in pink. Wearing pink herself and teaching a class. Ahahahaha. On good decision-making. Ahahahaha. With Deadpool. Ahahahahahahahahahaha. Ha.

Then the rest of it flooded back in, the details rearranging themselves into a clarity and order too raw to be just fragments of a dream. The things she'd done, done so many times in wispy memories from further back that now they'd been as easy as breathing. The thing she'd let herself become.

She didn't quite make it to the bathroom before she discovered the answers to what the hell she'd been eating. In every damn sense of the word, but especially the messy ones.

[For the wee Russian one who did not leave her TARDIS bathrobe in the hotel room.]

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That rattling noise is Kenzi letting herself in with food from the Cafe, including shakes again. It was that kind of day. "Bo!"

And the sounds of retching reached her. Ah.

"Awww, Bobo." Kenzi put the bag on the kitchen counter and wandered into the bathroom.

"Kenzi!" Ugh, and ugh, and ugh again, and that was Bo reaching for a washcloth. "So not a good time."

Kenzi got the washcloth before she could, wet it from the faucet, and held it out. Then grabbed a scrunchie for Bo's hair. "Yeah, I can see that. And smell it. Also, I'm really glad you're not dead."

That had been bad there, when she remembered, and looked around to find a few other people who'd been dead weren't any more, and had hoped like hell to find Bo here.

"That makes one of us. Maybe." Since she wasn't dead, though, Bo accepted the washcloth, burying her face in the cool dampness for a moment and not at all wondering if maybe she could smother herself with it. "Thanks."

"No problem." Kenzi reached out and gathered up Bo's hair, carefully wrapping the scrunchie to keep most of it out of her face. "Nothing smells worse than vomit on your own hair, and I should know." She sat back on her heels, watching Bo, face uncharacteristically sober. "It wasn't you, you know that, right."

"That's a lot more easy to believe when I turn into a flight-attendant or some wide-eyed boy scout from Indiana." Bo reached back reflexively to touch her hair, and murmured another thanks except it somehow came out "Sorry. Do you remember the same things I do?"

"Excessive pinkness? You worshipping a middle-aged freakshow sadist? Threatening me, other people, going all Big Sister on everything way more than usual? Yeeeah." Kenzi tilted her head, staring at her. "And there was a magic spell, hello, you would never wear that catsuit in your right mind."

Bo mopped at her face, rubbing off at least the worst of the gak, if not the smell. "It was still me. I remember what it felt like; I wanted to do those things."

"What was it you wanted to do?" Kenzi put the lid down on the toilet and flushed. "Kill people? Or just have all those rules and shit?"

It was times like these that Bo wished her bathtub was actually, you know. In her bathroom, instead of out in the middle of the shop floor surrounded by a screen. Because then it would be here to fall into, or at least sit on the edge of; instead she leaned on the sink.

"All of it, I guess." Though she didn't remember especially wanting to kill, just... "Take as much as I needed and know I wasn't breaking the rules." Bo shook her head and regretted it instantly, the joyless, boozeless crying-and-yakking hangover spiking in her temples. "There was a spell, yeah, but I remember...wanting it. So I didn't have to be me."

"You wanted things to be easy," Kenzi translated. "Not so fucking hard that you can't have sex without being scared you'll kill somebody, when you have to have sex to eat. What's wrong with that?" She paused. "Okay, a lot, but... she got to you when you were weak. Doesn't mean you're like that now." She pointed at the bathroom door. "There's ice cream out there. C'mon. Empty calories that you can afford. Also, water. Hydration."

"I don't exactly feel like I came away from that deserving an ice cream party." Which didn't stop Bo from moving toward the door anyway because air. And water not attached to a terrycloth square, that she could go for.

"Honey, we all deserve an ice cream party. And booze. Lots and lots and lots and lots of booze," Kenzi told her, heading toward the bags and pulling out one of the shakes. "You're back. Everyone else is back. It sucked a ton, but. It's as fixed as it's gonna get for now." She picked up a shake and took a slurp for herself. "No idea how it even happened, I should go ask people."

Water. Water first.

Bo, ice cream is not water.

Ice cream, however, tasted so much better than the previous flavor of her mouth, that she really didn't care to listen to the voice of her ~~narrator, but when does she ever~~ inner nutritionist.

"I'm gonna take a wild guess that it had something to do with the b--" Yes, she'd actually started to say the boss, which made Bo's mouth taste a lot less like shake for a moment there. "With her. That Umbridge woman."

"Yeaaah. Magic, and her, and... dude, it's gotta be some kind of time-travel thing, 'cause otherwise, this wouldn't be what we remember. Right?" Kenzi squinted, trying to remember, then hitched herself up on the counter. "Do you remember Professor Skywalker? I mean, he's real, and not dead, and he's got another kid on the way, right?"

"Yeah." Which was...weird, two sets of memories warring for control. "I didn't, then. I mean..." Bo took another drink, swishing the ice cream around in her mouth. "She killed him before I got there, but everybody knew about it. She was into reminding the staff, if they looked like they might get out of line."

"Dude." Which reminded her. "Ooooops. I left Topher in a supply closet. That's gonna be awkward tomorrow. Or later." She'd decided not to duct-tape his face, because what if he couldn't breathe? "...anyway. Somebody took her down, and turned off whatever spell she had going. Your office will be normal again when you walk in tomorrow ~~just like the comms!~~"

Edited 2012-07-30 05:14 (UTC)

"I have to walk into my office tomorrow?" Or...ever?

Bo'd tried to make it sound like a joke, but it wasn't. "'Cause I'm thinking blanket fort for the next... did Trick ever happen to tell you how long succubi live?"

"I'm pretty sure they'd let you take a sick day. I mean, being dead: awesome excuse," Kenzi said. "Blanket fort! And maybe more duck fights in the tub! And-- um. No?" She bit her lip. "Why?"

"Just trying to predict how long I can last in the fort before I have to come out. A couple centuries would be okay..."

"Dude, seriously." Kenzi poked the bag of food over to Bo, and shook her head, then looked guilty. "I could ask him. When I call. 'Cause I gotta check something, anyway, and, uh..."

Yes, that was Kenzi's I stole something and I broke it and now I can't give it back, whoops? face. Or something close to it.

"Check what?" Yes, Bo had met that face.

Kenzi squirmed, then blurted out, "So don't be mad, okay? I kinda... called the other Trick, last week. Or the same one. Whatever. And, you know. Askedforawaytostopasuccubusfromeatingpeople." She took a breath. "Tara and Cara helped!"

Okay, that impulse to deflect blame was alive and well, anyway. Or give credit? Both?

Bo stared at her for a moment, and only half of it was devoted to figuring out she didn't need a Russian translator, just a Kenzi-to-earthspeed one.

"That thing Cara had? You did that?"

"Don't freak out," Kenzi begged her. "Look, we had to! You were outta control! And we didn't know it was going to wear off and stuff, or that we'd get a big old do-over, and Cara promised she'd make it quick, and she didn't even get hurt so I'm guessing she did and..." She winced. "There was an amulet. I was gonna ask Trick if it was a real thing, when I called him."

Bo shook her head and dropped the shake to the counter to clasp Kenzi's arms. "No, no, Kenz, I'm not mad at you. Oh my God, you found a way to stop me!"

It was like some crazy aftershock, flashing back to that other world as if this Bo had been there, trapped in her own head and cheering the rebellion on. It wasn't true, as much as she wished it was, but that didn't stop the sudden, weird, bittersweet joy.

"What? Oh, whew." Kenzi grinned, slumping in relief, then reached up to pat Bo's hair. Where it wasn't sticky. "Yeah. Well. Trick did, he told me about the Koushang, which, well, you saw how it works." Aaaack. "And Tara bought it on Ebay for us, after I asked her, and she found it. Cara... agreed." She leaned forward to hug Bo. "And when we all came back to normal I was freaking out that I got you killed!"

"It needed doing." Please to not be gauging Bo's levels of fuckeduppery by how easy that was for her to say, because she was already on that project. No point in duplicating effort.

"What's it ca--" Wait, seriously? "You did not buy the only thing I've ever seen that can stop a succubus from feeding on EBay."

Kenzi hooted and sat back, looking very pleased with herself. "Ask Tara if you think I'm making this one up. They had it advertised as some Celtic protection amulet, but Trick said it was older than that. It wouldn't give anybody super-strength though, so, Cara had to be the one. Since she can fight and all." She tilted her head, and then had to smirk. "Although she said something about 'other' methods?"

Look, she was curious! Cara started it!

Bo rolled her eyes, which was actually kind of a good sign. "A lady does not get her neck broken and tell."

Sort of a good sign? Except she couldn't help her head following that roll, fingers to the knob at the top of her spine like it might detach again if she didn't make sure.

Kenzi reached out for Bo's shoulder, and squeezed it. "Did it really suck? I'm so sorry. Jeeez."

"Well, the dying part wasn't fun. The part before was..." Weird, and ouch, and better and more terrible than she could or wanted to put to words. "Oh god, I made out with a teenager!"

No, that wasn't the takeaway here; it was just so much easier to freak out about that than focus on her own fucked-up self-image, in that world or this one.

Kenzi snickered, reaching into the bag of food to pull out a burger and fries, starting to unwrap them. "Yup. Go you!" She took a bite, then offered Bo some fries. "Really sorry we couldn't just break the spell, though. I felt so sorry for you there. Even when I was scared of you." She frowned. "Probably 'cause you should've zapped me more than you did, you know?"

Bo grinned, which felt weird, but good. "Well, nothing's changed there, at least..."

"I don't know what you're talking about," Kenzi said loftily. Then stole Bo's shake.

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23 Sphinx, Sunday Evening

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