The trip between floors was made with all of the bare-footed, golden-retriever-esque enthusiasm of a little boy on Christmas morning. He took the stairs instead of the elevator, because it was just one damn floor and it was probably quicker with his vampire speed, and maybe a small part of him hoped that he might use up a small fraction of that excited, relieved energy on the way.
His friends were back, and he could see. Presents on the horizon for everybody. It was a good fucking day.
He quieted as he neared that bit of the sixth floor that confused his brain into thinking they were actually heading to Gable’s room, considering that had been the only reason these days to come to this particular corner. No, Ori’s room today. Ori, because she was back, and fine, and soon to be in hugging range. As if suddenly remembering that Maya’s room was also nearby, a jolt of anticipatory delight coursed through him in realizing that any introduction between the baby-fresh vamp and the stunning, cool-as-hell vision that Ori simply was wouldn’t disappoint.
Ram’s room was also right there, looming almost forebodingly as he made the turn into the little hall the pair shared. He felt a little bad that he hadn’t reached out more, both since Ori’s initial disappearance and the whole “eating Hunter” situation. But he and Ram weren’t exactly friends. Ram seemed to, at best, tolerate him. Barely. Considering how awkward things were before Ori had vanished, he doubted that interaction was going to be easy or simple.
But she was here. That was the important thing. And he was there too, dressed down in a pair of fashionably tattered jeans and sleeveless band shirt showing off his ink, wondering if it might be disappointing that he hadn’t gone full regalia for her triumphant return. Would he seem different? Tamed somehow? Boring?
His drawing tablet and two bags of blood from his own stashed under one arm, he reached the other up to offer a reserved knock despite the energy broiling through him.
At some point between waking up somewhere else and waking up back in this tower again, Oriana had vowed not to make connections with others again, considering how fleeting this all seemed. There was no point in making friends only to miss them - she had always known that, it was how she lived her life, but it was even more meaningful now that she couldn’t pop by for a visit even if she wanted to. She was at Their mercy.
And yet, not even a full half day after returning, she was allowing Ford to come visit her as the best friends he seemed to think they were. And she was doing nothing to dispel that notion. She was being an idiot - and maybe it was this tower that just made people behave idiotically, she decided. After all, she’d had no trouble keeping everyone on the ship at arm’s length, just enough pleasantries to keep from anyone’s bad side. But Ford preceded the realization that she had been right all along in not bothering forming connections. And, what the hell, she deserved to have someone be happy to see her. Just this once, maybe she deserved a hug and a smile and genuine joy. So sue her.
Oriana had showered and changed into one of her satin pajamas that looked more put together than a normal set of cotton ones, because she couldn't be bothered to actually get dressed. She didn’t feel classy and regal and high society at the moment; not yet. Barefooted, she scampered across the carpeted floors as she went to open the door, a big smile on her face.
“Rockstar!” She greeted, standing aside to let Ford in once she realized he’d need to put down what he was holding. As she watched him she cursed herself, realizing she was actually happy to see him. As if the recent conversation with herself hadn’t even happened.
A hug, a smile, and genuine joy? Ford had all three ready and waiting for her. He barely fumbled the tablet and blood onto the nearest surface before he had his arms around her, picking her up off the floor in an enthusiastic hug. Just as cold as he was, which made him realize he didn't go around hugging that many vampires these days, but the distinct smell of her prickled something warm and nostalgic in him.
"God, I missed you. I'm so glad you're fucking okay," he warbled in between smooches to her cheek before gently setting her down again, his grin wide and-
"Holy shit," he paused, spinning in a slow circle as he took in the room. Everything was how he'd remembered it, his mind warring with the mental image of how it had been in the time between, empty and cold. "It's like you never left. I know we're supposed to be kind of used to that shit, but fuck."
It was unsettling, and it made the hairs on the backs of his arms stand on end, but he wasn't going to let it ruin the visit. He shook his head as if to clear it, getting back on track as he gestured towards what he'd brought. "So, extra blood. Like I said, we get fed daily now, but I didn't know if they brought you in with whatever stash you had left and it's always better to have some spares on-hand in case they turn the food bank off for whatever shitbag reason they come up with. Or if they weren't feeding you on the regular, chow down. It's all yours. I can swing a couple more if you need them too."
If she breathed, Oriana would have gasped when Ford came at her with a tight hug. She laughed for a moment, sighing when he mentioned having missed her. She had too and that was bullshit. She hated this.
“Hmm.” Oriana looked around in tandem with Ford, crossing her arms. “They’re very…resourceful.”
She wasn’t sure she had grasped the scope of just how big this operation was even after having been in a whole new experiment, the scope of which seemed smaller but might have been larger considering they had never, in the entire time she’d been there - and, according to others, since they’d been there - they had found no other ship, or oil tower in the middle of the ocean, or even received any sort of transmission. Nothing. That couldn’t possibly have happened under normal circumstances.
“My stash is still all there but I do appreciate it.” She took a bottle and sat down, gesturing for him to sit next to her. “They weren’t so charitable on the ship.”
Oriana sipped on the blood, sighing in relief. She hadn’t enjoyed having to glamour people into oblivion just to feed, despite the fact that she’d spent the last ten years doing it.
“So…What have I missed?” She asked easily, crossing her legs. “Sabina told me about…a few things. I haven’t scoured the network yet either. But I hear something came to light about Ari, and Ram… well… did something to Hunter?”
She tried hard to keep her demeanor more casual than she felt about wanting to know everything. It was half curiosity and half concern, although she couldn’t quite put her finger on whether the concern was for Ram or herself. Maybe both.
The mention of Ari caused Ford's eye to twitch a little as he grabbed the tablet and sat beside her, settling in comfortably.
"It wasn't his fault," he started, shaking his head. "Ram, I mean. They've been fucking with the weres almost nonstop since you left. All of them. The borns went feral one night. I had to fight Shay one night, and Theo got bitten by the big guy. He's a werebear now. It's been about a month and a half for him, I think. This last time, the full moon showed up when it was supposed to, but it was just...chill. Nothing bad happened. Gable and I just sort of sat around the arena while all the weres snoozed or chilled out in the rooms down there. It was fine. But then they somehow made the moon come back again a few days later. I guess there was no warning until a few minutes before it started, so everyone just sort of scrambled to prep how they could. That's when the thing with Ram happened."
He chewed lightly on his lower lip before continuing. "The details aren't really common knowledge, I don't think, but Hunter attacked someone that night. Maybe trying to get people to blame the weres for it. I don't know the details if Ram interrupted, or got him after, but Ram was feral and I guess Hunter was a bat at that point and...bite-sized?" He winced, because that was a hell of a way to put it, then shook his head. "Anyway, the person who got attacked hasn't been up to talking about it, so we're sort of keeping it on a need-to-know until they are because obviously the threat's been sort of...eaten." Smooth.
"But nobody blames Ram." That wasn't entirely true, though, was it. After a second of consideration he added, "well, nobody with half a brain. Ari and Royal have been assholes about it, but that's nothing new. Ari made kind of a huge stink about how the weres should get moved to a different building because they're a danger to everyone, which is a fucking laugh coming from him. Especially considering he doesn't actually give a shit about anyone's safety except Bastien’s. I guess the jerks behind the cameras weren't feeling the hypocrisy that day, so one morning not all that long after we all woke up to an Unsolved Mysteries episode about Ari butchering the woman who was taking care of him when he was human." Another pause and correction. "I mean, it happened after he got turned into a vampire, and it was probably an accident that time. His first feed, I think, but it was gruesome. And not his only kill, I’m sure. The way he’s always been so fucking nonchalant about murdering people…”
What Ford had said was, for the most part, what Sabina had already told her. She hadn’t thought for a moment that Ram had meant to actually kill anyone - at least not without cause. It surprised her, sure, but didn’t really horrify her. She hadn’t known about Theo, however, which did surprise her. Somehow Oriana didn’t think Grayson was too happy about that either. But at least he hadn’t killed anyone.
Narrowing her eyes, Oriana sighed when Ford elaborated, somehow also unsurprised that Hunter had been up to some covert bullshit. “I did not miss this…” She murmured. She was, however, curious who the person Hunter had attacked was, that made Ram act like that. If both occurrences were even connected. But of course there was no point in asking Ford, who was loyal to a fault and probably would never reveal the name. So, Oriana kept quiet and continued to listen.
Oriana had to roll her eyes as Ford told her about the usual shit-stirrers doing as they were wont to do. It didn’t surprise her, either, that Ari had committed murder, and done it to someone so close and to whom he owed so much. She chuckled. “Figures. It all figures. No one’s tried to actually hurt Ram, though, right?”
She took a swig of her drink. “Now, what about this fire?”
"No one's dumb enough to have tried, unless he's keeping it quiet," Ford replied with a shrug.
The mention of the fire caused him to laugh a little, shifting a bit on the couch as he tried to figure out where to approach the topic from. "Yasiel and I are...really close now." He made a playful heart shape with both hands, tossing a playful little smirk at her. "L-worded and everything. We got through some serious shit together." He moved his hands into his lap, his shoulders tensing a little at the memory even as he tried to play it off as casually as he could. He failed, already feeling his throat tighten a little as the words came out.
"They took him. One night he was here, the next, all of his shit was gone. Some other shit was going on at the same time, so it seemd like it might have been one of their bullshit tests at first, I tried to deal with it for a few days, but it wasn't sticking. Finally, I just got angry. And then I got angry with some friends. We cleared out a couple of the abandoned houses on the ass-end of town and lit them up. A bunch of the trees went too. Pretty sure they beefed it up somehow, but no one got hurt and nothing important got damaged. Got a lot of people pissed, though. The next day they had this survey on whether or not anything should happen to us because of it, and most people were pretty understanding, but some people have a real hard-on for punishments. It's just about the only thing you can get some of them to lift a finger to be involved with around here."
He shrugged. "Anyway, I felt a little better for a few minutes. It was a good fire. Smelled better than the camera bonfire, that's for sure. They also had this thing going on at the same time where the vamps and weres were all different kinds of sick, so I was pretty fucking loopy too. Not that I wouldn't have done it anyway, but, you know, layers of bullshit. Did they do anything like that on the ship?"
“Good”. Oriana replied simply. She wasn’t sure where she and Ram stood, but even through it all Oriana decided she would not leave him to fend for himself now that she was here.
As Ford described what he had gone through and done after Yasiel was taken, Oriana found herself feeling a pang of sadness. Nobody had gone to such lengths when she had gone missing, she was certain of it. And nobody ever would. She didn’t know how to make that happen. And the sad thing was, as much as her entire life had been geared towards not caring about that, it still made her sad and there was nothing she could do to stop herself from feeling that way.
She hid any emotion she might’ve shown on her face behind the bottle she was drinking from, blinking back any hint of a tear or two. Instead, Oriana focused on the self-righteous anger some people seemed to need to live. Pricks.
“They did. Not exactly the same, but they tried really hard to divide us, make us feel like we were crazy, they did those little experiments we got over here too, you know the kind. But there were fewer supes there. I think I was the only vampire, and there were a few I smelled, but most of them were plain humans, so the punishments and tests were different.”
"So, not only did they do all the same brand of shit, but you had to fake that you were human the whole time? Like...the obstacle course where we officially met, but for weeks? No fucking thank you. God, we lasted, what...a few days here?"
He was frowning before he realized it, feeling that pull of his brows that caused a faint ache, and he tried to smooth it out to no avail. She'd made the remark that she didn't know what was worse, remembering or not remembering, but as far as he was concerned from all the stories people told upon their return, fuck remembering.
"Did you know any of them?" he asked after a few seconds. "Or, did any of them hint that they'd been doing the same kind of shit we were going through here before you got moved? And sorry if this is shit you've already answered on the network."
“That’s basically it, yeah.” Oriana nodded. She had been so used to being “out” that having to go back in had been a terrible experience to tack onto the rest of it. “Pull back all my strength, glamour people in order to feed…it was the outside world all over again and let me tell you, I honestly didn’t miss it.”
She paused after saying those words, brow bunched up into a frown. They had made her admit to enjoying being locked up in here more than being in the outside world, essentially, and Oriana wasn’t sure how to feel about that. “I-I miss everything about the world outside, just…not that.”
Oriana shook her head at Ford’s question. “I didn’t know anyone but they’d been doing the same kind of mental torture crap over there, just human-oriented. I mean, first off, being lost at sea is already doing a lot of heavy lifting. But yeah, they definitely played us there like they do here. After I was there the ship toppled sideways for a while without sinking but the fear was there, you know? I mean I suppose I’d make it but still.”
Ford opened his mouth to add that "making it" in that scenario actually sounded like kind of a horror show, especially if she couldn't get out of the ship somehow as it sank, or after it sank, but promptly clamped it shut again. He doubted that was a mental image she needed, particularly considering she'd been there firsthand.
It also hadn't really occurred to him that a return to the outside world likely meant he'd have to do the same thing again, at least on some level. Especially considering how good it felt to be able to feed every day. He couldn't expect that from Yasiel, and it wasn't like he was going to ask Yasiel to steal supplies from work. Something for them to talk about at some point, he supposed.
"Everyone who's gone and come back and remembers all have different places they went. Different people. It's....hard to think about them doing this with so many," he admitted instead. "Like, just knowing how many people have come and gone from here was one thing, but whole other...fuck...what do we even call them? Communities? Biomes?" How many people could they really grab like that? And how long had they been doing it for without anyone catching on? The idea that they'd been one of the first groups was probably wishful thinking.
"That's so fucking depressing," he mumbled, rolling his shoulders a little uncomfortably. Then he shook his head. Because fuck that. Ori deserved better than being stuck with a downer her first day back. "Is it more or less depressing to switch the subject to Kidnap Christmas?"
It had been sobering to realize that this would have to be her life outside of the tower wherever she was. Oriana had gotten so used to having blood at hand - fresh or at least handy - that the idea of having to go back to glamouring everyone she fed sounded terrible.
But Ford had a point; ever since others had gone and come back with tales of having been in similar places, and now after having gone through it herself, Oriana had admitted to herself that the scope of this operation frightened her. They were too powerful to take down, and there was a very real possibility that none of them would ever be free. That this was their life now. She didn’t wish to share this thought with Ford, but it hung there in the air, and the way he spoke made it sound like he was thinking it too.
Blinking, Oriana tilted her head at the subject change.
“What the hell is a Kidnap Christmas?”
"The thing they posted this morning. Giving presents and all that. And the shindig," Ford replied with a shrug that felt more casual than he was feeling, but probably not authentic enough to entirely pass as authentic. And maybe that was a shitty thing to do considering everything she'd just been through, and was coming back from.
A hand moved, running through his hair, his fingers digging lightly against his scalp. "Sorry. Thinking too hard about the mechanics of this place sets my brain on a weird doom spiral sometimes. Especially considering how long we've been here and how little we still know about what the fuck's going on. Figured sparing you on your first day back was the least I could do as your coolest, favorite friend."
Despite the mild tension, the teasing was more genuine than trying to brush things off had been a moment before, and he went with it, leaning into her with a fond half-smile. "And I want to get you fancy shit. Or whatever it is you actually want that they'll let me give you."
“Ohhhhhh yeah. I didn’t… I mean it didn’t really register, to be honest.” Oriana confessed. Surely Ford would understand that some kind of faux Christmas party was the furthest thing from her mind when she’d first woken up back here this morning. She wondered whether to reveal that she had never really celebrated Christmas, at least not in her youth, and certainly not with any sort of feeling. She dismissed Ford’s apology with a hand gesture, smiling. Oriana also refrained from mentioning that he wasn’t just her favorite friend; at this point and as far as she knew, he was the only one.
“There’s a present giving component too, well, well, well!” Oriana was more used to “taking” them than receiving them too, but she also did not reveal this to her only friend. “I never say no to a new expensive fragrance or a nice expensive cashmere shirt - or angora, great for the cold.”
After a moment, she looked off into the distance, thinking about how she also wouldn’t say no to her sire’s head on a beautiful silver platter. But somehow preserved, so she might keep it to look at whenever she liked. A smile passed over her features as she imagined it.
“What about you, what can Santa’s Elf Oriana get for you?”
"I don't blame you, you had enough shit going on," Ford replied with a breath of a laugh, which turned into a real one as it became apparent that Ori realized she could actually get stuff.
His mind was working on a way to try and get her all three, tapping the screen of the tablet to wake it up and write himself a note. If push came to shove he could always get her one and ask Yasiel to get her another. When she asked what to get him his expression turned thoughtful, knowing that answering the same way he had on the network was a good way to end up with multiple fish tanks, or a closet full of fish food.
"A printer," he said without marinating on it too hard, realizing that, yeah, he actually did want one now that it had magically popped up as an idea. He looked at the tablet, blinking, then reiterated. "One of those ones that prints photographs from digital. This thing takes pictures and I have a ton of them I'd love to do something with." Which led to the whole reason why he'd brought the thing to begin with, suddenly looking a little sheepish. "I....sort of wanted to get a picture with you too, if that's okay. I missed you, and I realized that we didn't really...have anything like that. That was us."
It occurred to him that it might not even be something Ori would want, but it didn't hurt to ask, right? "And if I can print them then I can give you pictures too. I'm learning how to make frames, so they'll actually be kind of legit if you wanted to do something with them."
Oriana had briefly wondered whether she would even get presents from anyone, but she supposed Ford, vampiric golden retriever that he was, would see to it that she would get at least one.
His answer came out a little faster than Oriana thought it would, but she shrugged and nodded. He was getting a printer if she had any say in it. Then Ford elaborated, and Oriana decided she had to remember to add printer paper to the request. For the first time she acknowledged the tablet he had in his hands. She eyed Ford, then the tablet again, as Ford’s explanation warmed her heart despite herself. “Oh damn you.” She muttered, hoping he’d take as a joke what was actual exasperation. “We’ll need to be looking our best, though, so how do I look?”
"Stunning, as always," Ford replied with a wide smile, leaning in to nudge then settling against her as he tapped the screen to wake the device up. "We can totally do a fancy fashionable shoot some time. Or, I also have a polaroid camera that Shay gave me with some shots left if you want to go old school at some point."
Maybe he should check to see if there were actually books on photography in the library. He supposed he could also, maybe, possibly ask Cal, but maybe after more time had passed since the ramble about how Ford deserved to be punished for the fire.
Navigating to the camera function, he glanced back at her with a laugh. "And I promise to delete any photos you want me to. Unless they're really funny."
Oriana could have said something self-deprecating but she thought she owed it to herself and Ford not to be coy. It was unlikely that she didn’t look stunning, even after all she’d been through lately. “If you want to do the polaroids, all you have to do is ask, honestly.”
She laughed, nudging closer to Ford and adjusting her pose. “We won’t need to delete any of them.” She told him confidently, then added playfully, “I’d say not having a bad side is one of my vampire powers but I had it long before I got turned. And I doubt that pretty face would look bad even if you tried.”
After a number of pictures, she leaned over to look at them. “So, what do we think?”
"We're gorgeous," Ford reported, flipping through the collection and turning to toss her a radiant, charming smile. "And so humble," he added with a laugh, planting a smooch on her cheek much in the same way he had in one of the pictures just a moment before.
He wanted to add that it was no wonder they'd both snagged such stunning partners, but without knowing what was going on with Ori and Ram at this point, and doubting she really did at the moment either, he shelved it.
"I missed you," he said instead, genuine, nudging her lightly just to feel the weight of that lean against him. Solid and wonderful.
Unable to disagree in the slightest, Oriana merely laughed, basking in the affection and familiarity that she insisted with herself she had not missed. Which was a lie.
As if reading her mind, Ford stated that he had missed her and because Oriana couldn't bring herself to say the words out loud, she instead wrapped her arms around the man she reluctantly and against her better judgment considered her only friend, and squeezed.