The big big BANG

[shiloh]

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Shiloh winced as she pulled the dressing gingerly from her neck, examining the wound in the mirror as she touched it tenderly with her finger. Damn it hurt, and she hoped to hell it wasn’t going to scar. The last thing she needed was to walk around with a huge bite on her neck for the rest of her life – that would be hard one to explain. Maybe she’d get a tattoo over it... n’aaaw. She pulled back, Checking it out at a distance, and picturing the ink on her skin. No. Definitely not. Tats were cool, but she didn’t think it would suit to have a rose or something crawling up her neck. Signing softly, she opened the new dressing and pressed it to her skin, tossing the old one into the trash and replacing the scarf on her neck.

Turning, she grinned at Zoe in her cage, walking over and letting the small bundle of fur free for a few minutes before she went out. There was something peaceful about watching Zoë run around, in the way the small chinchilla would use her as a climbing frame and sit on her shoulder, observing the world. It was the same peace she got from painting, the same peace from curling up in her mother’s shirt, the smell of her perfume... a peace she had once found curled in Adam’s arms.

She wrapped her arms around herself and sighed... everyone thought she was handling it so well, to the point where her father was worried about it. She hadn’t cried when they found his decapitated body, hadn’t sobbed or screamed... she wasn’t cooping herself up in her room. But being out and about, pretending like he had not meant the world to her, flirting with boys and kissing strangers – that was her way of coping. It wasn’t healthy, and she knew it. But she didn’t care either.

Finally putting Zoe back in her cage, Shiloh grabbed her bag and left, leaving a small post it note on the fridge telling her father she’d be back later sometime. Hell, she was nineteen, It wasn’t like she had a curfew these days was it?

An hour later, Shiloh found herself in a part of town she didn’t often frequent. She wasn’t sure why she was here or anything, she had just been walking, listening to her music as it pumped through her ears from the small device in her pocket, and now she walked, lost in the tunes, and completely in her own world.

So she didn’t noticed the footsteps following behind her.

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[elijah]

Elijah might have been carving his place in New Orleans and doing well enough for not having a lot to go on, but that did not mean a person wanted to go through life with a name he only pretended to recognize at first. Much less with few chances of provoking memories of his past. Who was to say he would not instantly remember his past with the right visual prompt? After all, didn’t he remember a great deal when submerged in many situations? Being around people he did not know before was certainly not conducive to bringing anything back. It was not that he hoped that this Shiloh Raines was someone who cared about him. Even a full grown, logical man did not like the idea of being abandoned without memories by someone who was supposed to be close to him.

When Eli tracked the surprisingly young woman to Beaumont, Texas however, he did have hopes that she might have some information to offer him. Or perhaps that he was at least conscious during the discovery after his attack that she might trigger something. Granted the image he crossed, thank you internet connection services, could have been the next stranger on the street, but it was too short of a trip to pass up if there was something to discover there. But then, Elijah arrived at the residence, he was no sooner outside than he saw the ‘rescuer’ emerge alone and proceed to walk down the road. Following her for a length of time that he did not measure, only knowing that it was starting to test his patience, Elijah finally settled that she was not going to be settling any time soon for the hopefully enlightening conversation he planned to approach her with.

Finally catching her up, Elijah set his hand on her shoulder in as non-predatory fashion as a six foot one werewolf could making his pursuing presence known to a nineteen-year-old girl. [white]“Shiloh Raines, may I speak with you?”[/white] He asked, not taking into account how loudly a teenager might listen to her music.

[shiloh]

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”This is not where you belooong...”Shiloh sung along to the music blaring through her headphones under breath, smiling as she walked. It was hard not to be happy on a day like this – the sun was out, its wasn’t too hot or cold, there was no one around, she had some rocking tunes on her ipod, and she was seriously thinking about taking her aunt up on a trip to Massachusetts for a visit. Of course this was sweetened by the small fact that such a trip came with the chance of seeing one of the bands her aunt sometimes had in her bar, which was always a welcome bonus.

In fact, this walk had put Shiloh in such a good mood, she even did a little hop jump number and drummed her hands along with the chorus. Still, she was more than a little surprised when a hand clamped down on her shoulder out of apparently nowhere, and Shiloh practically jumped out of her skin, whirling around and stumbling over her own feet. Yanking her ear buds out of her ears, her cheeks turned a lighter shade of pink, mildly embarrassed that this man might have just seen her little dance number in the middle of the street.

”Jesus man, wotchca! You’re gonna give someone a heart attack doing that sneak up looming thing!” She grumbled, looping the wires around her neck before she finally stopped to get a look at this man. Oh hello. Why did he look familiar? He was too old to be someone she hung around with – maybe he was one of her dads friends or something. Seen him at the shop – that one was probably most logical.

Realisation dawned in her eyes like the sun dawns on a new day to light up the mischief of the teens the night before. ”Hey! Hey! I know you! Your that guy who go hurt! Man you’re out of the hospital already? Fuck me, you look a helluva lot better now you’re not covered in all that blood. I mean, you got mauled pretty bad.” Shiloh realised she was rambling, and stopped, offering the guy a smile instead. ”Sorry, guess you don’t really wanna know how bad you looked i guess. Wait.... how did you find me? I know i rang the hospital once or twice to see how you were, but i figured someone would turn up for you soon enough.”

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[elijah]

Elijah might not have remembered much from his life before, but he was fairly certain that not many youth walked for so long, all on their own, and with such a merry step. More than once, the man’s heavy brow furrowed in slow pursuit of Shiloh. Could this really be the woman who saved his life? The one to find him and get him to the hospital, initiating an entirely new existence for Elijah Adair? This girl was at the beginning of it all… she chose how he would begin this life. An apparent loner with strange patches ruining a perfectly good pair of jeans and unnaturally bright red hair. He might not know why this disturbed him so deeply, but the convention within him expressed cynical skepticism. He was quite for a moment in his appraisal, as she jumped and turned to see him.

Eyes thoughtfully taking in the slightly familiar device from which the earphones draping across her neck were connected, he looked back to her face when she confirmed that she was the one he was looking for in as unconventional way as she was dressed. Quietly watching her mouth move at a mile a minute, asking questions that he was not given a chance to answer before she prattled on, he was silent for a prolonged moment after she finally shut up. He did not like being interrupted, and he was going to make sure she was done for sure before responding. After all… survival instinct might have just kicked in for whatever this girl’s natural hair colour was… thank God she apparently relied on air like the rest of them.

[white]“It’s quite alright, thank you.”[/white] He paused, still digesting all that she revealed in a short period of time without him even asking. Maybe this encounter would be more fulfilling than even he anticipated. She was certainly eager enough to talk. He already learned that was not true of everyone. [white]“And yes, they released me. As you can tell, I’m in much better health now.”[/white] He lied, peering his eyes at her slightly as he read her, [white]“You were quite a ways from home, I must say, Ms. Raines. It really wasn’t too easy finding you. I’m sorry, I’m not here to interrogate you on your business in Baton Rouge. I really am pleased that you found me.”[/white] Giving her an appreciative smile, [white]“It was kind of you checking after me. I hope that might mean you’re willing to answer a few questions I have? If you’ve the time.”[/white]

[shiloh]

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”Eh... I figured it was only fair. I mean, who wouldn’t want to make sure they guy the rode to hospital in an ambulance with, made it through the night?”It was more a rhetorical question as Shiloh shrugged and stuck her thumbs through the belt loops on her jeans, drumming on her upper thighs a little with her free fingers. ”Questions?”She glanced around and frowned a little. ”Sure. Don’t know how much i can tell you, but fire away and i’ll see how much i can. Can’t promise any epiphany inducing answers though ” She smiled, and rocked back on her heels a little, unable to keep still under his gaze for too long.

Shiloh was unsure why she was so readily willing to answer these guys questions – she wasn’t sure she even knew his name, though he obviously knew hers, but whether that was from not being told amongst the hub of the hospital, the shouting doctors and the haste in which he had been wheeled away, or her own forgetfulness she wasn’t sure. But Shiloh was a trusting person; it would go against her nature not to offer this man help if he requested it, and besides, what harm could be done from asking a few questions? Words never hurt anyone, at least not physically anyway. Unless said words were contained within a dictionary, because those things definitely hurt.

”You wanna walk and talk, or sit somewhere?” She asked, lifting a hand to her red curls and pushing them back behind her ears. Music still blared from the headphone’s draped around her neck, a comforting buzz of familiar noise for the girl in a situation that was really quite alien. And this was coming from a girl who liked to dress up like video game characters in her spare time and go to comic-con.

”I think i saw like... a cafe or something back there?” Shiloh commented, twisting her body a little in the direction they had just come. ”But ye like, whatever, i don’t mind. My brain is an open book; you just have to give it a good old read.”

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[elijah]

It did not immediately occur to Elijah that Shiloh might feel insecure with his steady gaze. He was not aware that his experience with teenagers was limited and domineering, but it would not surprise him at all to find out. After all, the most immediate thoughts jumping to mind were not to do with him at all. He wanted to get her out of those pants she drummed against and into something less… ridiculous. After all, the rest of her apparel was decent – leave it to a teenager to rebel against style by choosing acceptable garments and accenting it with something obscenely unattractive. It was a good thing she was not dressed for comic-con, because Elijah experienced little shame. He would have no qualm about dragging her back home if she tried to walk out looking like a cartoon character and submitting the world to her freakish lack of sense.

Smiling lightly, the lines around his eyes crinkling slightly as a testament to his age,[white] “I don’t know that I have that many, but I appreciate your cooperative nature. What if we walk back in that direction and see along the way?”[/white] Turning back, he began walking, tucking his hands into his coat and trying to hear what was blaring through her ear buds. It sparked nothing, but that was not surprising. Surely a girl who saw fit to blast her hearing cells into oblivion would have little in common with a guy like him. [white] “So when you found me… did I happen to be awake? Maybe say something to you?”[/white]

[shiloh]

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There was absolutely nothing wrong with spending a weekend dressed as Xena the warrior princess and running around in a short tasselled skirt hurling battle cries at people. Hell, it was a lot of fun, and Shiloh – given half the chance- would recommend anybody and everybody spend a weekend in her shoes dressed as a storm trooper, or sonic the hedgehog or... or...Sarge from Halo, just as long as they didn’t go as Xena. She’d worked long and hard on her costume, never mind her battle cry, and she wasn’t about to let these fantasy maybe people steal her spotlight.

But less about Shiloh’s fantasy world where everyone walked around with swords twice the size of the people carrying them, and more about the man now walking beside her. That night had been... hectic to say the least and most of what she remembered was a blur of noise, booze, and brightly coloured costumes. ”Sure, sounds like a plan” Shiloh smiled as she reached into her pockets to turn down her music – she could be pretty scatter brained, and there was no way she could listen to him, and the versaEMERGE pumping through the ear sized speakers.

Hooking her thumbs back through her belt loops, Shiloh found herself having to quicken her pace to keep up with the taller mans strides, and thought about his question for a moment. ”well, yeh” She answered his question, chewing the inside of her cheek a second. ”But not for long. I’m not surprised really, like, you’d lost a lot of blood yah know? But yeh! You did say something, it was something like find Elli? Eliese or sumthin – i looked through your phone but the only number in there for that name was disconnected. I was gonna give her a call, let her know where you were and stuff, since they wouldn’t let me in the ambulance with you” she stopped a second, rifling through the canvas bag that hung at her hip. ”damnit i took it out. I still have your phone, but it’s back at my house – i was gonna bring it back to the hospital for you ya know? I didn’t find it till after the ambulance had gone, and only then ‘cause i had stood on it, but i completely forgot. I’m gonna take a stab in the dark and guess you might want it back, to find Eliese, so you mind if we head to mine, i’ll grab it for you?”

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[elijah]

There was absolutely nothing wrong with spending the weekend dressed as Xena the Warrior Princess if you were a right loon. If this was how teenagers acted, Elijah would just as soon keep all memory of his sister wiped from his memory. Elijah might not know whom he was, but he was pretty sure he still had an image to uphold. If he was at all privy to the fact that he was depending on a comic nerd, he probably would have preferred breaking into her house and finding out what he could on his own.

Granted, he would not have known his phone from the next guy’s and, although the name meant nothing to him, he would never have known the name Eliese. He frowned with disappointment. Shiloh gave him exactly what he had come for, but it sparked nothing as he hoped it might. Glancing at her, she did not even look the least bit familiar. So who was this Eliese person? Another character like her? Why hadn’t she been there instead? Who was she that he would want her specifically found and contacted? He had to hand it to the young woman striding along next to him, she had certainly done quite a bit for him and for seemingly no reason. Would he go so far for another? Was this how people worked and it was one of the things he had forgotten?

[white]“That’s very kind of you, thank you.”[/white] He was sincere, but he did not lose his controlled, businessman tone. Glancing down sideways at her again as they walked, appraising pretty much just the top of her head,[white] “You seem to have gone to a lot of trouble for me. Is in your nature to be so helpful, or are you simply nosy?”[/white] Probably not the best thing to say to the girl who had done so, but Elijah did not mean his blatancy as insulting as it had come out. He was simply making conversation, and he would not judge her for motivation. Either way, it was working to his advantage.

[shiloh]

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He was safe. Not all teenagers acted the way Shiloh an her friends did and dressed up as comic book and video games characters on the odd weekend – only the cool ones. Taking him back the way they had come, now she wasn’t dawdling with no destination in mind it wouldn’t take them too long to get back to her house. There were shortcuts and the such along the way where Shiloh had taken longer routes and doubled back on herself last time, if she had to take a guess at how long before they got there, she would say twenty minutes.

Whilst they walked, Shiloh answered his question, taking a few seconds to think how best to answer. The truth was, she was a nosey person, but not in such a way that might get her into trouble. She wasn’t snoopy, she was just naturally curious. ”A bit of both if i was being honest.” She answered with a shrug, glancing up at him. Damn, he was tall. He hadn’t seemed that tall when he’d been laid out on the floor, but hoowa she wondered if he got good reception up there.

”I mean – I started looking because you asked me too. I figured Eliese was your wife or something, and like... you wanted her to know where you where ya know? So when she didn’t answer her phone, i started looking for her, just to tell that you were in the hospital and how to find you. I mean, i’d hope somebody would do the same for me if i was in your position and asked them to find my dad right?” She looked over to him, expecting to see something on his face in reference to what she said, some flicker of emotion. He’d been so.... nonchalant ...? Was that the right word? So far, and she hoped he was alright. Like.. this was just him or something and not a result of what had happened.

Soon enough they were turning down the gravelled path to her house. Reaching the front door, Shiloh reached up to grab the key from behind the loose timbers and let them in, kicking of her shoes next to the door. ”I’ll be a sec... wait here.” She told him, darting up the stair,s she paused halfway and turned round, bending to peer down at him. ”If something white and furry runs past you, don’t worry, it’s just my chinchilla got out her cage. If you can, grab her!” She told him, and darted the rest of the way upstairs and into her room. It took her only a moment to rifle through the carious tubes of paint and paper to find what she was looking for, and soon enough she was coming back down the stairs, phone held like a trophy in her hand. ”Got it!”

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[elijah]

If all the teenagers acted the way that Shiloh and, to Elijah’s unknown mortification, her friends did, even he might fear for the world’s future sanity and structure. They were going to be taken back to a boggle-eyed, goofy sworded, ridiculously-outfitted version of the middle ages. Fuck if he knew it was otherwise though. He might walk around like he knew the score, but the fact was that a great deal was a façade to mask the vulnerability of his condition. Recollections of what things were sometimes felt like smoky shapes that he could only describe, but could not settle into a clear image until someone reminded him what it what it actually was.

Such was the case with being told to keep an eye out for something called a Chinchilla. He was not sure if something like that was even something he should know. But his mind did not linger on it for long as he waited. He had been relatively quiet for the duration of their walk, but he could not help but linger on ideas that Shiloh had brought up. What if Eliese was his wife? What if he had a family? Why would they not try to find him? Was he really so cold that a family would sooner be rid of him? He liked to think he had his charms about him. He had not done so badly at interacting with women, was his charm to fade away? It was likely. He was not entirely so sure that he would have helped if their roles were reversed.

Watching what seemed to be an oddly shaped rat run towards him, Elijah stepped in and shut the door to keep it inside. Raising his brows in crude assessment at the creature, Elijah looked up as she came down the stairs triumphantly with what she claimed to be his phone and surrendered it to him. Slightly bewildered at what he might find, he frowned down at it. After a moment, he said in a hard voice, [white]“Thank you.”[/white] Looking up, he nodded curtly, [white]“You’ve been a tremendous help. And I’m sure I owe you my life.” [/white] Not that he was eager to repay any life debt, but he did nod to the couch. [white]“I saw your… thing run under the seat.” [/white]

After checking that there was nothing else, Elijah was eager to be on his way. Not so much anymore because he thought the girl was a little strange, but because she had put some very unsettling ideas in his head and things that he would definitely like to look into. And yet, he did not immediately take to flipping through this device of his. He would not admit why.