Cold War

[Penelope Serrano-Blaise]

Had they been alone, requesting Lucy put her shirt back on would have been the last thing from her mind. More often than not, Penny was working it off the Australian; she'd always rather undo buttons than fix them. Her lips remained pressed firmly together as she looked back at Lucy - to the material that fell over slow beating wings. Living art on the Australian's skin that no boy should have been able to see. It drew out the most hostile of protective responses.

So the demand had passed her lips with ease. She wanted him gone, or rather, herself and her counterpart to leave. Any situation that resulted in privacy with the ink manipulator and the boy being far away.

And his reply immediately rang as familiar. A psychometrist who recalled details with ease, and the laugh Lucy offered proved that she, too, remembered the phrase and its original context when it passed her lips. When the Brit did make her cross the frame of her door.

Already finished with everything that had to do with the boy and whatever his intentions were, Penny began shifting her weight with the intention of moving. It wasn't a far walk to Lucy's dormitory, and she didn't want to play or stay. A familiar hand pressing to the side of her face, however, managed to halt the psychometrist. Her expression questioned Lucy, but when she went to meet dark eyes, she found them focused on another entity.

She took a quick breath, holding it barely a second before releasing it on a barely audible note. Still, she stayed, shifting under the weight of an arm at her shoulder; an inch closer. As much as she felt the frustration build up, there was an undeniable sense of ease that came over her through the contact.

[Lucas Blacke]

She laughed, the shirtless one laughed. He did wonder why momentarily but then came to the realization that he was pretty hillarious and she'd have picked up on that very fact. Or perhaps the reasoning behind her laugh had nothing to do with who said what as much as just what. He did see her hand going up to the shoulder of the stuck up one, so immediately his mind went places. He blamed being a guy.

Why did she..? Were they that thing he saw in certain movies a lot? How would they be, they seemed so different? ''Are ya both.. ya know.. bitch an' butch?'' He asked suddenly, not even getting it through his mind that the statement could potentially hurt. But as much as he tried to think of the implications of what he said and what kind of response it would get from them, though at this point it was mainly the stuck up one that got to him. The other one, who was now putting on a shirt and putting a stop to the show he needed to thank, so she had already gotten to him.

He wanted to say things to both parties, mainly the one who aside from a sigh had been pretty silent. He wanted to call her out, make her say somethhing that would amuse him, but as time passed that seemed like a bad idea. If what he asked was true and they were a couple insulting the one would also insult the other. He didn't yet know if they could take it.

''Anyway!'' He suddenly said as he raised an index finger that then went straight to pointing to the formerly shirtless one. He really needed to know her name. ''I need to thank ya.''

[Lucy Serrano-Blaise]

Social settings were not the psychometrist's forte. Anyone who met her in any capacity knew that. She remained silent as Lucy pretty much expect her two; after all, that's why she herself was there, dealing with the one she found crying and whining and failing in a student lounge at the mere mention of a girl's name.

"Just in that growing group of broads who'd rather fuck each other than dick around with you." Lucy told him; the immediate response passing her lips before she needed to think about it.

Settled comfortably with a Brit under her arm, Lucy looked at the boy who somehow found the means to become someone who'd actually spoken to Penny. Pursed lips and disinterested eyes gave him the once over, stopping low at his feet for a few spare moments before she flicked back up. Nothing caught her eyes long enough to get her to stare, not even the curve of his lips or the trajectory of his hand as he pointed to her.

Thanks? They were rare. Especially from strangers. She raised an eyebrow, the first stint of curiosity to catch her features since he'd started trying so hard to obtain her attention.

"Okay." She replied, tilting her head to the side idly. Waiting.

[Penelope Serrano-Blaise]

Silence felt fitting, it wasn't uncommon for Penny to fall to it, especially when the ink manipulator was there. She was better at this, although the Brit couldn't help but to wonder why on earth they were still there instead of making their way back to the dormitory from which Lucy had called her. Where she had been headed in the first place before she was caught up in this.

Looking back at the boy, Penelope didn't even give him the interest of a once over. There was nothing to look at, and a glance down his form was a waste of energy. Even as she looked at him, she could have easily been looking past him all the same.

Not even the curse that passed his lips drew a reaction out of her. Instead, the crinkle of her nose came with the one that Lucy offered, and the other that came shortly after - that although wasn't considered an offense, still made her want to cringe. The Brit's free arm moved to Lucy, settling lightly at the small of her back. Fingers curled into the material of the shirt she just threw on, a silent request to just abandon the boy and leave. But a thanks was in apparent order, and they had yet to make an actual move.

She was waiting. The only force that could bring Penelope to a halt. So she looked back at the pointed finger, eyebrows twitching upward as she, too waited.

[Lucas Blacke]

Not all that much talk out of the two. He mentally rolled his eyes as his finger was still pointing at her, the other her waiting with her in tandem for what he wanted to say. It took him a while, waiting for something else they would say but it seemed that one of them had been tongue tied and the other was just waiting for him to say something. He wanted to think about it some more, mull over her comment about girls fucking each other rather than fucking him and how wrong she was. Still, he failed to stifle a laugh as she said that. It was so.. straight to the point.

''Not much talk outta stick-girl is there?'' He asked the inked up one as she seemed to be doing the talking for the both of them at this point. Or rather just the only talking that came out of their direction. He did have to admit he didn't mind that one being silent as she would just tell him off every chance she got. Maybe if she spoke he'd even try to shut her up as has crossed his mind before.

He coughed slightly as he lowered his arm and turned his gaze to the girl from the lounge. It'd been a long time since a stranger saw anything of him, but then again it had also been a long time since anyone took the time to be so frank with him. ''Thanks!'' He joked with a fake smile, obviously trying to get some kind of reaction out of just saying thank you like he had said.

''Really though, thank ya for bein' so up front with me. Don't think I'd have figured that one out meself. 'Bout not lovin' her an' shit.''

[Lucy Serrano-Blaise]

The familiar hand at the small of Lucy's back was, if nothing else, encouraging. Though she felt the pressure of fingers curling into the material, she hardly saw it as a means to pull away. Still, she'd been called worse. She'd called the psychometrist worse than what anyone else could likely ever throw at her, so what was the harm of staying?

"It's not like you're really talking to her." Lucy replied. After all, it seemed he'd been looking for herself first and foremost. More to the point, it wasn't as if Penny wanted to talk to him in the first place. Few reached such a placement in her mind.

Both eyebrows raised at the eccentric vote of thanks, and she pursed her lips, because it was expected. What little she knew and had seen of him, both during the lounge incident and before such - as he was the roommate to one of her best - told her he was one to play easy games for easier laughs.

"Yeah, I figured you'd figure it out when you said you thought you might." She pointed out, but really, it was a good thing. The less likely he was to go bug the ever loving shit out of Captain Hetero, the better. "So there is a silver lining to having a person who isn't gonna hold your hand and kiss your ass and tell you you didn't colossally fuck another person's life up."

[Penelope Serrano-Blaise]

Name calling was something Penelope had grown used to. By then, she'd heard it all - more often the one that this boy chose than likely any other. It was a go to insult - one that she started long before they had ever gotten into a relationship. It wasn't hard to understand the reference when it was overplayed. Such was proven with the expression she offered him. Nothing. She didn't hate him, she nothing'd him.

With such, she had no desire to reply to him. Lucy did well enough to get a word in first, and it was likely better that way.

The thanks offered hardly seemed like he was serious, and Penny kept her hand at Lucy's back, even if the slight falter in her breathing proved the memory of Lucy Serrano drawing her shirt off while on the phone with the psychometrist took over. Barely a second. Barely noticeable.

Her lips pressed together, forming a hardened line. How she wished they were back in that room. Refusing to address the boy at all, Penny tilted her head towards Lucy, voice dropping just enough to be heard. "I want to leave."

[Lucas Blacke]

A sigh of relief left him as he briefly thought back of the times spent with the so-called 'captain hetero' and came to the conclusion that that chapter was just about over, he had moved on and he needed stern words to be able to see it himself. Though one single question remained, why was she nicknamed captain hetero? ''I wouldn't really mind if ya did.'' He smiled, ignoring his own question for the time being. Maybe just having a normal talk would ease things for him, for them. The stick girl would need that if she was to accept him at all, which in the end was all that he really wanted.

Still, the question seemed to be wanting to be asked as he suddenly noticed that the stiff one moved her head towards the other one and said something. Normally he could make out the words instantly by just seeing lips move even if he didn't hear anything but in this moment the lack of sound and visuals made it so he couldn't make anything of it. He chuckled a bit and shook his head at how she pretty much acted like an 8 year old dragged to a party she didn't want to go to.

''So, why's she called -sorry, why do you call her captain hetero? She got somethin' against gay people?'' He kind of hoped she was, it'd make it easier to forget her. Like she was too good to have ever been true.

''I don't get it, ain't everyone up for some girl on girl action?''

[Lucy Serrano-Blaise]

Lucy's gaze promptly turned from him to her, attention settling on Penny the moment she spoke. The fact that she wanted to leave had been obvious to Lucy from the moment she'd encountered the pair, but verbalising that desire was different. It signalled the fact that her patience was thinner than ever. That she'd given the ink manipulator enough time to humour herself, or the person in question, and that she was about to be done.

She crinkled her nose, pursing her lips at the words and what she knew they meant. It hardly mattered that he wouldn't mind, but his chiming in was worth considering all the same. A small lean through the minimal distance between them and Lucy pressed her lips into her hair for a moment.

They would leave, just not yet.

Because they were talking about Penny's roommate in a round about way; he seemed glad to be rid of her and in truth, Lucy couldn't blame him for the fact. She exhaled an amused breath of laughter at his question. Maybe it was just her encounters that were riddled with homophobia. Really, that made sense.

"She's not the best kisser, that's for bloody sure." Lucy replied, rolling her shoulders at the fact, "I mean, there's being rough for the fuck of it, and then there's her." No, he didn't need to know things got physical in an obviously negative sense; details were hers to keep, but she could imply to the best of her ability.

[Penelope Serrano-Blaise]

It wasn't often that Penny would go as far as to verbalize her thoughts - at least not in public where she, more or less, remained in the background. It was more comfortable there. The look Lucy offered was more than enough to prove she understood, yet they still didn't move. It forced her own lips to purse, and only the light kiss to her hair was enough to settle her features again.

The boy finally caught her attention, and Penelope offered something of a response to what he had said. Or rather, an acknowledgement - a twitch of her eyebrows upward as her gaze fell back to him. Despite his crude wording, she couldn't help the slight amount of surprise at the idea that her roommate's boyfriend - or, ex-boyfriend - was unaware that she was so noticeably bigoted.

Still, she didn't speak, even as she spared a sidelong glance towards her counterpart, nose crinkling at the occurrence of Lucy kissing Karalie - not for the fact that she was jealous, but because she lived it out in the memory herself.

[Lucas Blacke]

Hold on, they weren't -she wasn't dicking with him? They were really a thing? Two girls? They confirmed his thoughts a light bit by moving close to each other but they never really verbally said they were, and until the kiss had taken place, if only on the head, he would blindly chalk it up to them being related or the stick one being a mute or something. This changed some things, for one the fact that she was a gay hating person, which would have to mean she did more to Luke than he wanted to admit if he missed that tidbit, but also that he was now not talking to a potential girl for him to boink but someone he never knew could exist.

''So, yer really gay? I wouldn't have figured out,'' He said as he smiled lightly as if it would translate his words into some other language that was less.. harsh. ''I mean, awesome an' all, respect for ya an' all that jazz.'' In the end all that mattered was finding love, right? If they had found it who would anyone else be to judge? Especially, as he had figured, Karalie had. She might have been religious and think that the gays had to be stoned or something, but surely she could see they had found that which they obviously hadn't?

Wait.

Did she just say she kissed Karalie? ''Ya wha?'' He very nearly stumbled over his own words. He didn't think as much as he should about her being a rough kisser but more about how she managed to do that and maintain a relationship, nevermind freely speak about it in front of the one you're sharing a life with. ''And ya have no problems talkin' 'bout it?'' He pointed at the stick one, who he thought was fully capable of biting his finger off at any time. ''In front of her? Ya two trust each other that much?''

''Color me impressed.'' He nodded with a smile. ''Then if ya don't mind I wouldn't say no to somethin' that'll make me see she's a rough kisser.'' He was only half joking. He hadn't gotten anyone else to kiss with him in the meantime anyway.

[Lucy Serrano-Blaise]

Months ago, Lucy was sure she'd never be so remotely connected in a public setting. She recalled a very distant, unspoken rule which depicted that neither would ever properly acknowledge the other. That things wouldn't change. It was painful. And really, it caused nothing but a fluent amount of arguments pertaining to harshly negative things said in the heat of a moment. No one knew the power of Lucy's verbal arsenal quite like Penelope Blaise did.

Her free hand balled into a fist, hit against her chest twice before she held it up. As if the respect she'd earned for her apparent sexual status was worth saluting in its own way. "For a second I was shitting myself thinking you wouldn't approve." She offered, the genuine humour to the curve of her lips impossible to deny. But they'd moved forward, and he seemed to be searching for some kind of clarification over her physical encounter with his ex. Easy enough to answer.

"It's not like I fucked her. I'm only fucking her," Lucy replied, the easy jab too simple not to take advantage of and a small tilt of her head to the side to indicate the her briefly in question, "Call it trying to prove a point. I know a lot more about memory-based powers than I probably should."

Lacing her lips with intrusive thoughts to sell a homophobe on the fact that she genuinely loved the person beside her? It was all part of the proverbial game.

A brief look towards the girl at her side. She scanned the expression she wore in that exact moment, wondering how long she could linger. If she'd find any kind of encouragement; something burned at the back of her throat. She wanted to ask. Her eyebrows raised. She had to ask.

So she looked back towards him, a fleeting sense of curiosity taking over again. "What makes you think you even really need to thank me?" Lucy asked him. Some questions were too difficult not to ask, even if she felt the pressure rise from the person at her side and her obvious desire to leave. It was strange to even remotely ignore something Penny wanted, but this was important, too.

[Penelope Serrano-Blaise]

As the conversation continued, Penny quickly felt that that it was growing into new levels of ridiculousness. Whatever point the boy was trying to make, it seemed lost as he became well distracted by their sexual orientation - a touchy subject for the Brit who had been shoved out of the closet by her girlfriend with a single, careless comment. Although, that was months ago, and she didn't hold it against the ink manipulator anymore, it was still something Penelope was sensitive to given their somewhat recent encounters with someone who didn't approve.

A logical mind never quite understood why it had to be considered so different. Why someone needed to point out they respected it when it should have been that way without saying it in the first place.

Given the context Lucy had spoke with - which was really none at all - it was no wonder that he seemed shocked by the news. She raised his eyebrows at him, dark eyes glancing to the finger pointed in her direction. It wasn't as simple as anyone made it out to sound, but Brit was one that enjoyed privacy. He didn't need to know her opinion on the matter.

Unfurling her fingers from Lucy's shirt, she pressed her palm firmly against her back instead, and with a slight shift of her feet, she did start to move, but was held in place by the question she posed, even if it wasn't directed at the psychometrist, it was a sure sign that Lucy was making an attempt to push this conversation forward and just end it, which was all Penny was interested in at that point.

[Lucas Blacke]

''Well..'' He thought for a moment on what he should say. It wasn't like she didn't give him material to go with but the fact that she gave him too much. That little chest bump she did? Yeah, it was obviously just a joking way of saying she didn't need his approval but she laced it with enormous amounts of delicious sarcasm. Luke only knew of two people who could dish that out, and the second one wasn't her. Nor the first. He wasn't quite sure what to say. He was not speechless, it was like words were trying to claw their way out of his mouth in bulk.

He smiled as she continued about fucking and how she didn't do that, obviously he couldn't care less what she did with Karalie because, well, he would pay cash money to see that. Even if he would just get to see her face. ''So.. ya didn't fuck her to prove a point? Fuckin' ace!'' He grinned from ear to ear by now even as he figured out she probably didn't mean what he saw it as. But still, it was funny. ''I sure as hell didn't get that far. She wanted me to save myself. An' don't get me wrong, I wanted to an' it pains me to say I didn't, but it is still freakin' hillarious.'' To say it didn't irk him was a bold lie, and she'd probably know that just by looking at him and how he was trying to save face right now.

''An' what do ya have to know of memory ba- wait, is stick girl someone with memory thingies?'' He asked finally. If she was he would need to adore her if just for that reason. Karalie had one and she never touched him, so this had to be either true love or someone who didn't care. And seeing as the stick demanded he go away from the girls dorm earlier he simply assumed it was the first. '''Coz that's awesome. The way she's copin' with it an'still touches ya. That's love, dude.''

''Anyways, back to the things that make sense,'' He said finally as his mind snapped back to the question at hand. ''I felt like I should thank ya 'cause lots of people tried to get me to see somethin', but the words that got through were yers. Dunno why, not really.''

[Lucy Serrano-Blaise]

There were some things even Lucy Serrano couldn't handle. Her own reputation gathered enough evidence to suggest she like to irk anyone who irked her. She had little patience for people she deemed to be too stupid to follow her own clear thought line. It was a shame, really, when people highlighted that lacking quality relatively square off the bat. Her nose crinkled.

"From bitching on a couch to thinking it's funny." Lucy denoted, pursing her lips and nodding her head once. There was denial and then there was this.

But what had her wearing a sliver of newfound confusion was the assumption that followed. "That's a bit of a stretch, I reckon." Lucy pointed out, eyebrows furrowing at the far jump between a broad statement about memory-based power experience to the person in question. She was fortunate enough to be known to have an ample circle of friends and an ample amount of rumours in tow.

Tired of - or perhaps relatively sure that - she should be well on her way by now, Lucy worked to remove her arm from its resting place on her counterpart's shoulders. She felt the tug at the back of her clothes; the shift of her feet as she tried to make that first move. Without the weight of the ink manipulator on her, she was free to move as she saw fit.

Forward steps, encroaching on the distance marked between herself and the boy who tried to skulk towards her in the student lounge not too long ago. After a few, she stopped.

"So what is it about what I said, then?" She asked, tongue racing the length of her lower lip in the break, "What about it got you going? Cause if you've got friends to boost your bloody ego, you sure as shit don't need strangers telling you what you did." Hands pressed to her hips, and the inhabitants of her left arm worked to turn their inked eyes to him. "I think it's funny, too. How another person in the room means you've got a pole shoved so far up your ass it's in your throat talking for you. If you want I can ask her to leave so you can have another pissy little breakdown about it. That way it'll be our little secret that you're not such a cunt about what you did wrong."