Inside Out
"Hey!" She half-heartedly yelled at him, grabbing his wrist and yanking him around to face her. There was legitimate anger in her voice, a tone she had never given him before and it bounced around in his head, his ears tingling and twitching.
They had all decided to head back to the house for the night after the events that had just transpired. The police were patrolling the campus to make sure nothing else happened tonight and to keep the public away from the school. However as they had approached the house Ambur had begun to call out to Mydnight, unable to hold her anger in any longer. The younger students and Olivier turned to her after hearing her tone of voice in concern, some even fear. Blake's ears in particular stung at the volume she had taken just as Mydnight's did.
As silence fell over the group, Mydnight starred back into the eyes of his girlfriend with a wicked look on his face, grinding his teeth together trying to control his own temper before he shot a glance at Qrow, who took the look as a queue to leave. At least they had made it back to the house so Qrow was able to start corralling the younger students inside. "Come on kids," he let out quietly, his voice sounding more sober than it had been in years after what he had witnessed today.
Only Olivier remained outside as the front door shut behind everyone and Mydnight looked back into Ambur's eyes. They were unfocussed, her muscles tensing as she gripped his arm tighter and tighter, her lips pursed and her eyebrows furrowed intensely.
"Ambur what the hell," Liv asked finally before Ambur pointed at her with her free hand.
"You stay out of this!" She growled before concentrating back on Mydnight.
"Ambur, calm down," he said through gritted teeth.
"No! Tell me why!"
"Tell you what?! What do you wanna hear?!" He yelled back, beginning to lose his temper as he shook her hand off of his wrist and stood tall.
"Why didn't you finish them off!? Why did you freeze up?!" The three went silent for several moments as the girls saw Mydnight begin to ball his fists tightly, smoke beginning to pour off of his shoulders as he fought off the urge to change forms and lose control.
"Why did you WANT me to?!" He yelled back, quickly losing his cool.
The darkness seemed to flow out of him, lamps outside the house growing dim as the smoke began to black them out, "Mydnight," Liv let out in fear, her voice shaking as she began to back away. "Ambur, relax!" Olivier yelled, ordering Ambur to calm down. Ambur's spine began to tingle as she heard Liv's words wash over her. The words seemed to shake her to the core as she began to take deep breaths as her shoulders sank, her eyes closing softly as she began to simmer down.
However just as she was feeling calm her eyes snapped open and she recalled the situation she had put herself in, looking ahead to find Mydnight struggling to keep control of himself and finding Liv now standing beside her. "Mydnight!" She gasped out softly as tears began to well in her eyes and she ran forward to embrace him, wrapping her arms around him and begging him to hold on. "Myd I-I'm sorry," she cried, "I don't know what came over me, please please calm down," she begged as she spoke into his chest, holding him tightly until she felt his muscles began to relax as the darkness began to dissipate.
He was silent for a moment before sighing, his shoulders sinking before he lifted his arms, breaking out of her grasp and taking a step back from her, his golden eyes piercing her to the bone as she looked up into his scowling face. She had never seen him legitimately angry at her before and she didn't like how it looked on him. "The hell is your problem," he growled out as he looked away from her and her heart sank. Her stomach churned, feeling as though she may vomit as she looked away from him and to the ground, then to her own hands, realizing that her glove was spattered slightly with blood.
For the first time in over a year she felt completely helpless, like a lost little girl unsure what to do, only able to get halves of words out and unable to finish any of her pleas to her partner, only looking back up when she felt Liv put a hand on her shoulder, Ambur jumping in surprise at her touch.
Her hands were cold, completely contrasted by Ambur's burning hot skin having been pent up by all of her aggression. "Mydnight why don't you just...cool off okay?" Liv pleaded as she looked up into his eyes. "I'll take her inside."
Liv saw her friend exhale heavily through his nose before turning away from the two women and headed through the door into the house, "Fine..." he breathed before walking out of sight.
Liv finally exhaled, having held her breath in worry for the entire event, before looking back at Ambur, watching her friend cry silently in shame, trying to understand what had happened. "...Come on," Liv encouraged as they too walked inside and headed straight for the bathroom, dodging glances from everyone who had stopped in the room, feeling their gazes watching them go all the way down the hall until the girls disappeared into the bathroom and shut the door behind them, flicking the light on Ambur finally lost control and began to audibly sob.
Her make up ran as Olivier turned the shower on and began to help her friend get undressed, unsure of what to say to her. As Liv helped Ambur get into the shower she began to walk away before feeling Ambur's hand gently grab at her wrist, Liv looking back into the shower behind the curtain to find her friend looking down to the floor. "...Please don't leave..." She finally heard her whisper, her voice shaky before Liv nodded back to her.
"I'm not gonna," Liv smiled back to her before Ambur let go of her arm. Liv sat down on the lid of the toilet and rested chin into her hands. "What happened back there Ambur," she finally managed to ask.
Ambur meanwhile had sat down under the hot water and begun to hug her knees. "I don't know," her breath hitched quietly with fear in her voice. "I was just so mad I...I told him to," she began before she slapped her hand over her mouth, her stomach churning again as she tried not to throw up.
"Okay okay," Liv said soothingly as she pulled back the backside of the shower curtain and looked down at her friend, "Listen it's okay don't work yourself up," she said softly as she reached in and began to rub Ambur's back, her hand quickly getting soaked but she didn't care. Right now her friend needed help and a little water never hurt anyone. "Just take deep breathes and try to talk it out."
Olivier felt Ambur's back expand and contract as she began to breath heavier, trying to calm herself down as she sat in the now steaming water. "Somethings wrong with me..." she muttered out, the water drowning out the sound.
"I can't hear you Ambur what was that?" She asked calmly, trying not to raise her voice.
"I said..." She felt Ambur sigh heavily before she turned her head back to look at Liv, "Somethings wrong with me..." she said again, her voice shaky. "I can feel it I'm...I'm different..."
"What do you mean Ambur?"
"I've been...blowing up. I keep getting so angry and I just...I don't know why...that's not me. That's NEVER been me," she wept. "I keep losing control and I don't know why."
"Well we...we are all pretty beat up and tired...maybe you just need to rest and de-stress?"
"No..." she shook her head, "It's not that, it's something else..."
"Either way...some rest will do us all some good," Liv reasoned as she removed her hand from Ambur's back and closesdthe curtain before standing to leave. "Are you gonna be okay to clean up? I wanna go check on Mydnight."
"Y...ya I should be...thank you," she said quietly. "Tell him I...I'm..." She trailed off before falling silent.
"I will...Don't worry about it just try to relax a little."
As Liv walked out of the bathroom she found most of the crowd still around in the living room, but Mydnight nowhere to be seen.
"It definitely could have gone better but...no one's dead and we got the relic...can't ask for much more than that right?" Qrow asked before seeing Olivier coming down the hall. "How is she..."
"She'll be fine but..." Liv began before shaking her head trying to move the conversation along, "She just needs time. Where's Mydnight?"
"I think he went out back," Ruby answered quietly before Liv nodded her head and headed toward the stairs.
"Everyone please just..." Liv started as she paused on the stairs and took a deep breath and looked back to the group. "Try to give her some space she's...scared of herself right now..."
As the group nodded back to her she continued down the stairs and out into the backyard, finding Mydnight pacing back and forth in the dirt with his fists balled, clearly distressed. She knew of course that he would be aware she was there starring at him too afraid to speak up.
After several seconds of watching him he stopped and turned to her, "What," he asked a little too loudly as his hands twitched in a questioning fashion.
"She's...uhm...she's gonna be okay I...think," she said quietly, almost too quietly for a human to hear but she knew he could easily hear her.
She saw him bear his fangs as he turned away from her and went back to pacing in the dirt, kicking rocks as hard as he could, trying to get his frustration out as non-violently as possible. "What the fuck is her problem..." he finally muttered as he stopped again.
Liv folded her arms below her chest as she began to walk out into the yard to him, looking down to the ground. "I don't know and...neither does she," she shyly looked back up into Mydnight's eyes. "She says...something feels wrong with her."
"Hah," he fake laughed, "you can say that again."
"Mydnight I'm serious, okay!" She half yelled up at him, the two locking eyes. The longer she looked into his eyes the tension began to build within her. Not to mention that the last time she had been this close to him alone her actions had been less than morale and they began to burn in the back of her mind. "She's afraid of herself..." she finally said softly. "You know that Ambur would never act like that...she never has and she never would have so...maybe there really is something wrong with her..."
Mydnight shut his eyes and ground his teeth, stretching his neck as he looked up into the starry night sky, trying to bring himself back down to earth as well. He drew in a long breath and pinched the bridge of his nose before he exhaled long and hard. "I know…I saw it."
"Saw what?" Liv raised a thin white brow at his sudden admission.
"I think…I think the maiden powers are messing with her emotions."
"The…Maiden powers?!" Liv asked, suddenly shocked, "you don't mean that she's," Liv paused and looked back up toward the bathroom window.
"I think so. She had this, yellow-ish glow around her eyes and her fist during her last attack. Right afterward Yang came up the elevator with the relic. Whatever happened down there, I don't think Cinder walked away from it."
"But if Cinder's dead, wouldn't the power go to whoever was in her thoughts last? Or a random host?"
"Look I can't explain it, it's just a feeling. Maybe I imagined it," Mydnight shrugged. "But I can't shake the feeling.
"Well...I don't know, maybe. We could ask Ozpin? Surely he should be able to tell, right?"
"You would think," Mydnight huffed and headed back into the house with Liv in tow.
"Maybe she just needs a break? We're all pretty stressed out. It could be that simple?"
"...I guess we could all use a break at this point..." He replied. "But what are we supposed to do, just ditch everybody? It's not like now is a good time to be taking a break."
"I know just...just let me figure things out okay? Don't worry about it...trust me," she pleaded softly as she looked up into his eyes, taking hold of his arm and stopping him on the back steps.
"Alright..." He breathed out solemnly.
"Don't hold it against her okay? Just...try and hear her out maybe...she will be able to explain herself better to you than she did to me."
Mydnight watched her climb the steps up to the living room before sighing heavily and headed up after her. He passed through the open space, only locking eyes with Oscar for a moment before he headed into the narrow hallway to the bathroom. As he headed inside and shut the door behind him he heard Ambur whimper in the shower. "What'd he say...?" She asked, not realizing it was him.
"Ambur it's...me," he said as he sat down on the toilet and heard her crying through the noise of the falling water.
"Mydnight...I!"
"I know don't...just, don't worry about it okay just...tell me what happened."
She couldn't believe how calm his voice was. It almost stung in her ears to hear him speak that way after all the yelling she had done. "You..." she whispered, her voice shaky. "You're not mad?" She said in disbelief.
"Of course I'm mad, I'm just...not gonna take it out on you because that's not gonna solve anything...now what's this Liv said about you thinking something's wrong with you?"
Before he could answer he saw the curtain get peeled back incredibly fast. Ambur had got to her feet and ripped the curtain open before she reached down and grabbed his arm. He let himself be yanked to his feet and pulled toward her. He barely even caught a glimpse of her face before it and the rest of her soaking wet figure was pressed against his, half in and half out of the shower. It wasn't often that Mydnight had to comfort Ambur when she was crying but now it had happened twice in just a few months. He raised his hand and began to rub her back as best he could, his hand getting stuck several times from the difference of his dry skin and her wet skin. "I'm sorry I...I don't know why I said those things but why...why aren't you mad at me? Why aren't you ever mad at me?!" She yelled frantically into his chest.
"Because you've never done anything that deserved me being mad at you. And now that you have you've immediately apologized and it seems you may have an excuse. Just tell me what's up Ambur. What got you so heated before? Did I say something wrong?"
"No!" She nearly cut him of and threw her arms around him and held him tight. Maybe a little to tight, almost knocking the wind out of him. "You didn't do anything wrong at all I just!" She began searching for the words to finish the sentence. "I've just been so angry lately and I keep having these weird episodes of losing my temper and I don't know why."
"Huhh," he gulped down a desperate breath of air, trying not to complain about the lack of easy breathing. "Hhwell do you have any idea why?"
She could barely hear the strain in his voice over the water but it was definitely there so she let up on the grip she had on him. "Sorry for getting you all wet..." she muttered before retreating into the shower, leaving the curtain open slightly. "You may as well come in at this point," she sniffled as she wiped her eyes in her hands.
"Gee don't sound so disappointed about it," he chuckled before he began to undress, garnering a small laugh from his partner as well.
"I'm not I just...wish the invitation had been given under better circumstances," she smiled softly. When he had joined her in the shower he began to get the rest of himself wet, feeling awkward only being drenched halfway.
"So come on what's the deal. Why have you been so mad if it's not because of something I did?"
"I don't really know...I don't feel like I'm bottling up anything I just...keep exploding. It's been happening more and more over the past month. I never used to say shit like that to people you know?"
"You used to not say shit to anybody," Mydnight shrugged his shoulders before receiving a slap on his arm, forcing him to laugh a little. "But yeah I know what you mean. You've never really blown up on anybody before, even if they deserved it."
"Yeah well now I am. First Yang, then Qrow and now...even you."
"Yeah well in your defense at least two of those three people deserved it," he smirked before turning to face her and leaning up against the linoleum wall. "I don't know if that qualifies as needlessly blowing up on somebody."
"Okay well...even if that's true...you didn't deserve it at all..."
"I mean you could just be stressed right? We aren't exactly in a low stress environment like we used to be. We always felt safe at school and you didn't have much reason to stress back then. Now you have a reason to be stressed out."
"Okay but...even if that's true I shouldn't be letting it get out of hand like that. It's way too dangerous for me to be getting angry like that. I could seriously hurt somebody that doesn't deserve it,"
she whispered out and he could feel the worry in her voice as she looked down to her own hands.
"You know that being afraid of your semblance didn't do you any favors before," he said softly, taking her hands in his. "It's not gonna help you any now either."
"I know but...I guess maybe you're right...maybe I'm just too stressed out. But it's not like we can just...take a vacation from all of this."
"Why can't we?" he asked genuinely. "I think we kinda earned it to be honest. Besides we just stopped a major plot. Surely Salem can't retaliate immediately after committing that much focus on one job.
Ambur was silent for a while as she began to think. "Well...maybe we can talk to Liv about it and see what she thinks hmm? I'm sure she could use a break too."
"She's the one that suggested we take a break actually, she said she'd handle it," he shrugged, "whatever that means."
"Oh," Ambur cocked her head to the side. "We'll what do you think about it then?"
Mydnight was silent for a long while as his vision dropped to the floor as he tried to pick his words carefully.
"Mydnight?" Ambur asked after a few minutes.
"You say you feel different," he finally said softly. "Different how? Just angry? Or is there more to it?"
Ambur's mood seemed to melt back down as she hugged her arms to herself. "I don't know how else to say it…I feel like I'm…not me anymore…"
Mydnight's ears perked up. "Like in relation to how you were at Signal or…"
"No, not me…changing on purpose. This is different….worse, somehow. I feel like somethings…in me…pulling my strings and I can't…push it out," she whispered, her eyes seeming wet again as she hugged herself tighter. "That probably doesn't make sense."
"It uh…" Mydnight started. "It makes…perfect sense actually," he admitted, and felt Ambur's eyes on him in an instant.
"Oh," she realized. "Oh my gosh Mydnight I'm…im sorry I didn't…" she tried to apologize but Mydnight just waved his hand.
"You don't have to do that," he cut her off. "It's a weird feeling, just say how you feel, this isn't about me right now."
Ambur's eyes softened even more as the tears began flowing again. "I'm supposed to be the one helping you."
"Who ever said we weren't allowed to help each other? Partnership isn't a one way street Am," he said as he pulled her to him, letting her cry into his neck again. "I think I know what's wrong," he admitted finally.
"You do?" She pulled back and looked up into his eyes.
"Yeah but, I can't be sure. Let's get cleaned up and go find out okay? There's ten other people in this house who I'm sure are dying for a shower," he smiled gently and wiped the tears from her eyes.
"Shiiiiiit," she groaned. "I didn't think about that. Yeah let's hurry it up," she agreed.
"Oscar, would it be possible to talk to Oz real quick?" Mydnight asked, breaking up the many conversations going on in the living room as he, shadowed by Ambur, entered the room.
All eyes were on then and Mydnight could feel Ambur shying away from the attention behind him. "Yeah," Oscar cleared his throat. "He seems to want to talk to you too."
The younger students backed away from their younger counterpart and took seats around the room or went into others. Mydnight noticed that Ruby in particular was nowhere to be found, and neither was her heavily wounded partner. Jaune had done his best to heal Weiss with his aura but she was still in incredible pain after he'd done all he could for her. Mydnight hadn't been able to watch much of their fights but they sure did look demoralized, even more so than Ambur. At least they had won, all the younger students seemed like they'd had their asses kicked.
Oscar's eyes began to glow yellow as he switched places with Ozpin and Ambur Mydnight pulled Ambur's arm so that she would stand beside him.
"Something you wanna tell us, Oz?" Mydnight asked sarcastically.
"I didn't know that this would happen if that's what you mean."
"But you hoped?" Mydnight raised an eyebrow. "An educated omission?"
"No," Ozpin shook his head. "No Mydnight, I had no idea at all."
"Well that's…new," Mydnight looked over to his confused partner.
"What?" Ambur, asked quietly. "Why won't either of you just say whatever it is?"
"Miss Magnaria," Ozpin collected himself. "I believe the power of the Fall Maiden has passed to you," he paused, watching Ambur's eyes widen and her lips part. "As it always should have done."