milliways_bar | (no subject)

(no subject)

Antigone steps in from outdoors, finally wearing shoes. She'd sat on the grass for as long as the gray light lasted, and it's well past dark now. Tonight, she skips the tea and heads straight for the fire, dropping down into the armchair nearest to the warmth.

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Nita's also sitting by the fire, scowling slightly at a History textbook and not really making notes on it.

After the immediate need for warmth has been satisfied, Antigone notices her.

She seems to be a little disappointed by the contents of her book.

Well, so's Nita.

After a minute, she sighs and closes the book with a thump, looking up and catching Antigone's eye. She smiles a little.

"Hey."

"Hello," she replies, regarding her with solemn eyes. "Did you decide it wasn't worth the trouble?"

"Pretty much." She shakes her head. "These things are so dense. I can't stand it."

She wrinkles up her nose.

"I never had much of a head for study."

"Me neither. Not for this stuff, anyway."

"Other things are better?"

"Some of it, yeah. English." She shrugs. "At least it's not Statistics."

Antigone appears slightly baffled.

Princesses don't learn advanced math unless they really want to; and besides, the kind of knowledge that she sought in life is the sort not found in textbooks.

"I wouldn't know."

"Lucky you."

She holds out a hand. "Dai. I'm Nita. Where're you from?"

She stretches her own thin one to reach it.

"Antigone," she replies. And frowns. She never seems to answer this question the way people expect.

"I don't think it means anything, anymore."

Her eyebrows go up. "Really? Nice to meet you." She shakes the hand firmly, and tilts her head.

"Why not?"

A shrug.

"I died there."

"Oh."

Nine months at Milliways, and Nita still doesn't know how to respond to that.

"I'm sorry."

She smiles faintly.

"I was, too. But I don't know if I am anymore. As much."

"When did it happen?"

The smile fades.

"I ... before. Before I came. Felt like a long time."

Oops. Foot, meet mouth.

"I'm sorry," she says quietly. "How long've you been around here? I don't think I've seen you around before."

She shakes her head.

"Ten days, a little more. I'm not sure."

"Yeah, your time sense gets screwed up when you're living here."

She pulls her feet up onto her chair and considers the other girl. "You adjusting okay?"

A faint snort.

"That might be difficult to define."

She raises her eyebrows. "Yeah? How so?"

"First I have to know what you mean when you say 'okay.'"

"Have you gotten turned into anything or met an enemy you thought you were rid of for good?"

Would you like to be a blindworm? To know what true lack of vision is?

"No," she says slowly.

"Then you're not doing too bad," Nita assure her, with a smile.

"Will my enemies come here?"

"Some friends of mine have had enemies come here." She shrugs. "But it's a relatively safe place."

Antigone thinks of Serpentine's cold, cold eyes and Coyote's hot, smoky breath.

"Safe."

And Nita, in turn, thinks of Angie and Oberon and a body with a hole through the forehead.

She sighs a little. "Well, for a given value of 'safe.'"

Antigone rolls her eyes.

Nita shrugs, and tries to think of a graceful subject change.

"I think I might prefer it, anyway."

"The bar, you mean?"

"Not being safe," she replies, starting to smile faintly. "It makes everything mean more."

She raises her eyebrows.

"I guess it kind of does. Some of the time, anyway."

"When you have to earn every minute ... fight for it."

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