ANN: Heading for a breakdown

[Anya Deila]

Anya sat, curled up in a ball, on the floor in the corner of the auditorium. She'd finished a long day's worth of classes and having to push her way through a large, loud throng of students in the hallway was the last string in a slew of upsetting occurrences.

Her shoulders shook as she sobbed. She couldn't hold it in. She'd tried all day and those people touching her and yelling over her head just threw her off the edge. She'd found the nearest unlocked door of an empty room and threw herself inside.

The floor was cold tile underneath her, and the echoes of her sobs ricocheted off the walls and filled the room.

She clutched the hem of her skirt and balled her hand up into fists as she tried to get herself to calm down. The crowds weren't the real reason, if was honest with herself. She missed home. She missed her cabin in the woods and the serenity that came with it. She missed having the time to paint or to think without constant interruption. She knew Hammel was the necessary place for her, but she also knew that it was making her terribly sad and nostalgic for home.

Logical thoughts and attempted self-control could only keep Anya's tears at bay for a short time. Soon, the floodgates broke again and sobs shook her body even harder than before. Mental pictures of the forests at home flicked through her mind. She remembered how the wind felt against her skin as she sat on the highest branches of an oak tree, looking out at the horizon as the sun set.

She hugged her knees tight to her chest and pressed her left cheek to her kneecaps. There were already dark dots on her black leggings from her tears.

[/blockquote]

[Ann Hudgins]

If someone had come up to her nine months ago and told her that in less than a year she would have a harem of friends, and a network of trainers that helped her immensely she would have told them they had the wrong person. The real Ann wouldn't be able to make friends, she wouldn't have trainers that actually helped her. She wouldn't be a happy person. She just wouldn't.

However. She was. She had friends. She had great trainers and her good days drastically outnumbered the bad ones now. She wasn't close to mastering her power, but she could walk down a hallway with people in it and not lose herself. Her shields were stronger than every and she was starting to feel real. As she was walking down the hallway now, she did went through the dance between people so she didn't touch anyone because she wasn't yet over the physical problem, but she could do that now with a tiny smile.

She passed by the auditorium, on her way to the lunch room, when she hit a wall of pain and sadness and a bazillion other things that reminded her of her past, Ann froze in her tracks. Someone needed help; in all likelihood, that person didn't want help but Ann had been there before. She glanced around and looked at the auditorium door, it was the only one nearby and where she had hit this cloud of raw and painful emotions. She opened the door slowly and stepped in, her eyes flitted everywhere. At first she didn't see anyone, but she heard the odd inhale and whimper that came with crying.

She rubbed the side of her face as these powerful emotions chipped away at hers shields, her face was the mirror of concern. She followed the sounds of the crying as softly as she could and when she came across the girl crouched in the corner she sat down close enough for the girl to notice her presence, but not close enough to reach out and touch her. "I can help," she whispered softly, "just nod if you want my help." She continued. Ann was OK at getting people to return to calm--good even. She succeeded nine times out of ten while trying on one person, and seven times out of ten with two people. She was confident that she would be able to ease this girl's emotional burden enough to calm her tears and stress levels.

She tucked her hair behind her ears and wrapped her arms around her knees while she waited, patiently.

[Anya Deila]

It had been months since Anya had had this kind of a breakdown. Normally, she was able to keep herself more or less in check. This had been easy enough back at home where she spent most of her time alone in her cabin in the woods. There, everything was more or less predictable. There were no people Anya could inadvertently affect, or who could throw Anya's fragile emotional balance over the edge. The forest was calming for her. There was no stress in the wind, or in the trees, no anger or sadness in the broad expanse of horizon uncut by buildings or smoke. Her entire surroundings were peaceful and serene and helped her to balance on the tightrope stretched above a deep canyon, a cesspool, of painful, cutting emotion.

For a few seconds, Anya lost herself in the memories of her home. Forgetting her place on the cold tile floor in a school exuding stress and unhappiness, her mind brought her back to the serenity of the woods. Her face was still buried in the space between her knees, but her sobs had become softer and slower as the waves of her sadness had begun to fade into smaller and smaller ripples.

She froze, suddenly, as a female voice spoke, only feet from her. Inhaling sharply, she held her breath and hugged her legs tighter, pressing her face hard into her knees. Maybe if she willed herself into nonexistence, this girl would just leave her alone, Anya thought. Nod if you want my help, the girl had said. Anya didn't want her help. Anya just wanted to be left alone in her peaceful reverie until she became stable again. But after ten seconds of silence, Anya could still hear the soft and steady breathing of the girl next to her.

Slowly, Anya raised her face in the direction from which the voice had come, her face a mask of wariness and distrust, her eyes still red from crying. "What do you want?" Anya questioned her brusquely, concentrating hard on her words to keep her voice from shaking. She stared at the girl's face. On it, patience and goodwill were reflected plainly. Though these positive emotions did little to quell the negativity of Anya's initial sadness, her distrust of the girl, and the surprise of the girl's presence.

[/blockquote]

[Ann Hudgins]

She felt the girl calm on her own and felt the first signs of rejection when the girl realized she wasn't alone anymore. Ann had been in this girl's shoes before and knew she probably didn't want any help from someone, because she was too prideful to admit it. She had no idea what this girl's power was, but that didn't really enter into it. She needed help from someone, whether it was just for a shoulder to cry on, or some half-assed advice of some kind. Ann wasn't about to just get up because the girl didn't want her help.

When the girl looked at her and asked her the question, she thought about her answer before she gave it. What did she want? Ann wanted to ease this girl's overload of emotions to calm her down, so maybe she didn't feel so bad anymore. "I just want to help. I'm an empath..." She knew that didn't explain it, "I felt your distress in the hallway, and I just want to help." She'd already said that. She pulled her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around her knees.

"I definitely know what it feels like to be overloaded like that. Like...on a daily basis." So not so daily anymore, but she left that little bit out. "I can ease it...and calm you down. Or...like if you wanted to talk about it. I'm good at listening." Mainly because she did nothing but listen to people for three years in this place. She tried to smile hopefully at the girl, but she wasn't sure if her smile conveyed what she wanted it too.

(I am so sorry it took me so long to get a reply to you!)

[Anya Deila]

Anya was surprised that her own extreme emotions were having little to no effect on the girl. As a pheromone manipulator, she was used to spreading emotion, saturating the room with it. Whatever she was feeling, most likely the people around her were feeling it too. Especially when it was this strong. Over the past couple days, she'd kept a careful lid on her emotions to make sure that she wouldn't cause disruptions among school. In an environment filled with meta-humans, she knew they would be quick to sense the disturbance and even quicker to point at her to blame. She didn't want to cause trouble, but the only way she knew how not to was not to feel.

But that could only go on for so long. There was only so much deep space inside herself that she could stuff her unwanted emotion, until it filled up and all came spurting out like a shook can of soda.

She returned to her first thought. "Why do I have no effect on you?" she asked, addressing the stranger directly for the first time. Her tone was accusatory, though inside she was more just curious. "Why aren't you feeling what I feel?" she continued, her tone softening a bit. But when she realized its softness, she immediately put up her shields of aloof standoffishness again, and pulled her eyebrows deep down over her eyes, brooding. Outside, she was angry. Inwardly, there was some truth to this: she was a little frustrated that the girl had decided to invade on her private breakdown session. But mostly she was curious about the girl's words. She understood? How could she understand. And why wasn't this girl bursting into tears and shouting along with every dip and turn of Anya's emotion? What was different about her?

Anya broke out of her protective ball in a sharp movement, slapping her hands and feet down on the ground in frustration. "Sometimes," she said, staring at the wall straight ahead of her and talking more to herself than the girl, though Anya knew she could hear her, "I wish I didn't have to feel anything at all." She sat still, still staring at the wall, contemplating what had just come out of her mouth before conscious thought had time to analyze it. It was true. She hated the constant daily battle against herself. Against her emotions that blew so easily out of proportion, against her will to do well at this school, despite the many ways she knew she could screw it up. Things would be so much easier if she was apathetic and stone cold. It would be an empty life, but an easy one. One that, at this particular moment in time, she desperately wanted.

[/blockquote]

[Ann Hudgins]

Now she felt surprise, towards herself from the girl but she didn't have a clue as to why. It was either because of her actions, or something, but she didn't want to speculate to much in case she got the wrong idea about something...or something. In all actuality, Ann had been in her spot countless times before; she'd been absolutely overloaded and broke down wherever she had been standing. In some cases she could hold off the break down long enough to isolate herself in case someone felt a bit of pity and tried to help her, which never actually ended up doing any good.

In this case, however, she hoped she would help the girl cope, even just a little bit. She looked up when the girl asked her a pointed question and for a minute Ann looked lost. Effect on her how? Did she have some sort of...manipulation ability? Something akin to empathy? It would explain the question and her breakdown (if it was related to her power). "I'm an empath," she said slowly though she wasn't sure if she had understood the girl's question correctly. "I used to not have any control over it at all and was always influenced by other people's emotions. But now, that doesn't happen anymore ((that was a bit of a lie, it did happen sometimes)). I can also ease what it is you are feeling, if that would make it easier for you? I don't want to do it without your consent though; that's wrong." Ann looked a bit sheepish as she spoke and looked down at her knees, even in this motherly-must-help-you mode, Ann was a timid creature.

She felt the girl's frustration, and could tell it was pointed at her. Maybe it was because of her invasion or maybe it was because whatever 'effect' it was was surprising her that it hadn't happened to Ann. Ann also knew what it was like to be surprised, or to have the game change quickly like that and it ruffled her feathers too. She rubbed the side of her face, however when the girl slapped her hands and feet down quickly, she jumped a bit; shocked. She looked at her for a moment with a sharp expression because she didn't like sudden things, but it softened into a completely understanding one as the girl opened up a little.

Ann had been there and back again. "That's no way to live. Having emotions is as natural as breathing, and in my case, I'm built to handle more than your average dose. It was so hard to handle it--for three years I just let it rule over me, let me turn into this scared and nearly incapacitated thing that barely functioned. I hardly ever spoke...never made eye contact. IT was miserable. I always lost myself in the see of teenaged emotions all around me.....but I couldn't live like that." She hadn't meant to make a speech about it, but she understood this girl's problems so well it was like looking at herself. She let out a slow breath and looked at the girl. "I didn't want to live like that, so I started to train, as hard and as much as I could. And now...the emotions no longer rule me. I can sense them, but they no longer drown me out. You can do that too."