I've Learned to Capture Time [Luka]

[MASLYNN LIA ROY]

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Massy could feel her adrenaline pumping like mad. It had taken her a few weeks of carefully observing the school grounds to decide where she could dance in peace.

Her first thought, naturally, had been her own dorm room. But that was entirely too small and the music was too obvious. Then, she thought about the soccer field. Now, the field wasn't an ideal place to dance barefoot, the way Massy preferred, but at least she could dance there. But of course, that would mean no music. And anyway, there was entirely too big of a chance of getting caught out there; it was so crowded. There would be no music in the forest or on the beach, either, so those were both out.

She could have gone to the gym or the school's gymnasium, but neither of those seemed quite right. An auditorium seemed to accommodate her much better. It was big and empty (at night) and sound proof.

So here she was, barefoot on the auditorium stage in the middle of the night. It was surprisingly easy for her to get in. Her heart pounded in her chest. Not because she had just broken into the school's auditorium, but because she would get to dance--really dance--for the first time in weeks. She was beginning to wonder if risking being caught by the government in order to be free to dance like she used to was really such a terribly awful risk.

Massy had pulled her hair back in a perfect ponytail. She was wearing grey yoga pants and a loose blue tank top, for ease of movement. She didn't look very graceful. Not yet.

She put her radio at the edge of the stage and plugged it in, putting her iPod in the dock on the top and hitting play. The notes that fell from the high quality speakers boomed with life and splashed color into the grey walls of the room. Massy let the music wrap around her like silk ribbons, making her a musical mummy of sorts. She walked to the center of the stage and waited for the end of the first song to end, the lack of movement driving her muscles to the very edge of sanity and back again.

Finally, the music trickled away and a few short seconds of white noise filled the room. It showered Massy in a thick sheet of anticipation and she arched her back a bit more, pointed her toes a little straighter. It seemed like years before she was able to twist her limbs around and drag her torso to and fro. She felt so light, like was gliding across the wooden floor and the soft thuds from her feet were beats in the song.

For the first time since she'd left, Massy did not feel homesick.

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[LUKA NIKOLAJ VRHOVNEK]

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Where is my mind? Luka gasped and held his breath, staring at his reflection in the bathroom mirror. His reflection frightened him terribly, staring into those open, soulless blue eyes. Mangled, emaciated features more feminine than masculine. He felt very uncomfortable staring at himself, as if he was some kind of creature or science experiment. Even halfway around the world the memories of childhood still haunted him, as clear and vivid as if they were still standing right beside him. Hatred boiled in his veins. His eyes began to burn aggressively back at himself, his skull was throbbing. He could feel the world turning beneath his feet, the rhythmic pulsations of every mind in the entire school and miles around. Flowers were blooming, stars were dying, and the whole cosmos became so vivid through Luka's shaking body. His pupils steadily eclipsed his eye, taking over the blue with an endless blackness. He could see nothing but those terrible eyes, staring directly back at himself, realizing what everyone else must have saw and felt just before it happened.

The entire cosmos of psychic energy seemed to possess him, and steadily started to overwhelm his body. Luka coughed a breath, holding his body up against the sink, and other hand striking out to press against the mirror. He was determined to maintain eye contact with himself, even though he could no longer see anything but his own eyes. A trickle of wetness cooled his hot cheeks as bloodied tears escaped the chaotic overload of his mind. Luka was determined to find something, somewhere so far away in himself. To find what it was, and kill it. And there was a smattering of redness, distant and shining within the darkest void. Luka had only to walk through it, to reach out and touch it... but within the last instant, the mirror burst at the center, and shattered into a hundred pieces that trickled to the floor. Suddenly there was nothing but cream colored tile.

Luka collapsed against the sink, gasping for breath as his combat boots crunched and slid against the glass, trying to gain a foothold. His knees shook terribly, and a violent shiver had gripped all of his muscles. But with a determined resolve to overcome his weakness, Luka clung to the sink, taking in breaths, trying to calm his nerve. After several minutes, Luka eventually was able to stand on his own, and left the bathroom in a daze, wiping away the bloodied tears from his strained eyes. He clumsily unlocked the door and stumbled out, grabbing a coat to throw over his shoulders. He couldn't stay where he was. He had to get out of that claustrophobic room, he had to find a peaceful place to divert his chattering mind. Even though the connection had been shattered, it still was whirring and spinning with unspent psychic energy.

Moments seemed to pass with little recollection. One moment Luka was at the dorms, and the next he seemed to wake up and realized he was across campus. Everything was so quiet and empty, devoid of life at this midnight hour. Luka slowly began to settle into the calmness of the barren campus, feeling quite relieved that he didn't have to deal with humanity just yet. He didn't even know how long he had been in that self induced trance - or even if he would've been able to get out of it unscathed if the mirror hadn't broken. And like a dream, he scarcely remembered what he had seen in himself. Just darkness, and that pale, sanguine thing. Luka shuddered and pulled his jacket closer to his body. He needed a diversion. A piano. And with a silent resolve, Luka changed course and headed straight towards the auditorium.

But upon reaching the theater from the backstage door, Luka immediately heard the trinkle of music and knew that somebody was there. However, it peaked his interest. He wanted to see just what was going on that midnight, another lost soul perhaps? Luka trailed through the dressing room catacombs, sliding through the darkness towards the stage. Eventually he came to the back curtains, brushing his fingers against their fine burgundy velvet to find where the slit was situated. Eventually he came to the opening and peeked through, where his now normalized eyes adjusted to the low light and settled on the young girl who was there. Luka's lips parted as he watched in silent fascination.

The girl was like a ribbon, circling and twirling tragically through the wind. Her face was the perfection of marbleized innocence, a true Lolita without pretense. He watched her dance, so vividly and so soulfully, as if she was desperate to claim something that she had lost. They were all lost souls and lonely hearts here, but some people seemed far more genuine, and far more special. He wanted her soul. And so, when the music faded and her body slowed to a standstill, Luka stepped through the curtain with a methodical, slow clap that echoed through the entire theater. He was ambivalent to any sudden fright he would cause her, and remained icily calm as his gaze hawked her every movement. "You're a true swan, my darling," his voice was deep and misleading against his thin physique, glazed over with a strange accent. He stopped and stood a little ways away, turning his shoulder towards her in a non-threatening stance. His long, messy platinum hair flowed down to the small of his back, and he seemed to glow in the dim moonlight. His gaze never wavered from her eye. "I hope I didn't frighten you. My name is Luka. What brings you to this place? Isn't it past your bedtime, dove?"

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[MASLYNN LIA ROY]

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As Massy danced, she lost herself in the movements and the rhythm and everything she knew of herself was gone in an instant. She was no longer an empath with no father or a lonely child with no social skills or a dancer with no one to dance for. She was just a girl with blonde hair and an affinity for dance. It was beautiful and she felt like she was flying and everything was perfect with the world and-

The sound of a solitary, solemn applause hit Maslynn's ears and pounded against them. She turned around to face the source, her heart roaring and her breathing ragged. The light, powerful feeling she'd gotten from dancing a few moments ago evaporated, and she crashed into the heavy feeling that was vulnerability.

Her first thought was to go and turn off the music, but her feet were nailed to the stage's hardwood floors. One nail was weighted with shock and the other with the alluring oddness that encased the boy who was applauding her. She couldn't take her eyes off of him. From his build to his hair to his face to the way he carried himself, this intruder set Massy on edge. He seemed haunted, too, by demons she had never met the likes of. Everyone had demons; even she did. But this guy's demons must be a whole new brand of grievous.

Massy figured that it could have been a power that would do that to him. There were some dangerous, flesh-eating-virus powers out there that would tear up a person's insides and leave their bones in the dust for an archaeologist to discover them and wonder what creature's muscles had once held them together and moved them around.

Massy tried to calm herself down and loosen her muscles, but he started speaking and his speech and accent were just as enigmatic as the rest of him. If truth be told, he frightened her. She wished she could teleport like Nate; it would have really been useful right about then. Or turn invisible like Tony, so maybe she could full him into thinking she had teleported. As it was, she could do neither of those things. She was stuck. So her best alternative was to act normal and pretend that she wasn't on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

Masylnn had a bad habit of overreacting to things because she had a very small comfort zone and a very sensitive set of nerves. She wasn't particularly paranoid, exactly, but it didn't take much to set her off. Something had to actually happen in order for her to freak out, but when she freaked out, she did it well.

She used to take medicine for panic attacks. She had them very frequently when she was younger; every time she took a test, every time she got test results, every time she got a report card, just before a performance. She learned, with time, to reign in her emotions and she very rarely succumbed to one. However, since starting at this school, her nerves had been put into a big leather bag and jostled about for hours on end until they were returned to her, bent and bruised and broken. She had been hoping that a chance to dance a bit would calm her down and bring her back to earth, but this interruption had done a great bit of damage to any progress she had made.

She took three deep breaths and tried to concentrate on how to respond to him. She knew, no matter what, that she was going to sound like a stumbling, ignorant fawn after his eloquent, cryptic statements. "Uh, thanks." Someone who possessed the elegance of a swan would not sound this childish, she knew. But she had learned that you only sounded immature and attention-seeking when you argued against compliments, even the ones that had the potential to have been mocking like this one.

Massy found that his stare was becoming a bit too intense for her and she told her eyes to move to a point just to the right of his head, above his shoulder. They didn't listen to her, and for some reason, this made her feel panicked. So, the next time she blinked, she focused on looking away. This time it worked. "I could ask you the same thing. A-and I'm not a little kid." Rather than sounding cool and uncaring, Massy sounded like a scared little girl. She bit the inside of her cheek hard enough to draw blood and dragged her eyes back to meet his with a pang of remorse. She wasn't going to be scared of looking someone in the eye. That was silly. She just needed to calm down and then everything would be alright and she would be able to function like a normal human being.

Obviously.

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