Tiffany winced and shied away as David's halo emitted a bright flash for the second time that day. God dammit, this hurt! Why did she get to do this stupid light-thing? It wasn't even like Tiffany had attacked her!
"STOP IT!!!" she snarled. Why did she have to be weak to this stupid light!? She didn't feel hurt by sunlight, so why this?
David bolted to her feet, indignant and hurt, tears stinging at the corners of her eyes. "I'm supposed to stop?" she said, her voice quavering. "I d-didn't even do anything to you! W-why are you s-s-such a jerk?" She looked down at herself; these stains were never going to-
Actually, the stains were gone. So was the gravy in her hair. What, was this a self-cleaning robe? She just stared for a moment. "Aww," Adora sighed, "I could've cleaned them off for you..."
Tiffany was seething now. "Stop it!" she snapped. "Stop being all goody-two-shoes at me! Stop doing your stupid light thing! Stop acting like you're too good to respect someone more important than you! Just STOP!!!"
Damn, damn, damn, she sounded so stupid when she said it like this! In front of the whole cafeteria, too...why couldn't she think? That stupid light had knocked her silly or something! That stupid angel must have planned this! She'd make herself look stupid and nobody would think she was cool anymore and she'd be all alone, like that awful dream... She turned and dashed out of the cafeteria, trying to keep from being any further embarrassed.
David watched her go. She was still upset about having gravy dumped on her, and she still didn't like Tiffany, who had been nothing but mean to her from the moment they'd met, but...she felt a twinge of regret. The way Tiffany had cringed...did it hurt her when David's halo went off? She hadn't meant to hurt her or anything... She wondered why Adora wasn't affected.
The angel-girl considered going after her, to offer an apology, but...as violent as Tiffany had been that morning, and as mad as she was now...that probably wasn't a good idea. She wondered if there even was a way to resolve this peaceably...
Sarah was not far away from where the angel-girl and devil-girl were sitting when that whole thing went down. She watched, wondering what was going to happen; it seemed like everybody was on Tiffany's bad side this week.
Looking at Tiffany's behavior, Sarah thought she understood what Mrs. Crawford had been talking about that morning. Still, it seemed like the teacher might have been projecting someone else's issues onto all the students who were taking on characteristics of their new forms. Sarah doubted that it was personal issues Mrs. Crawford was projecting, as sweet as she was, but in any case, it was hardly fair.
She couldn't speak for everyone, and with some people, like Tiffany, she thought the teacher might be right, but the harpy knew that for her, at least, it had nothing to do with "inner chaos." She was just coming to accept that she wasn't human anymore, and she was going to stop acting like she was. Being a harpy didn't mean being a monster, it just meant doing some things differently than a human would; she went naked, she flew where others would drive or take the bus, and she realized that she wanted to build a proper nest in her room...
Still...she wondered what this would mean for her in the long term. Would she always need someone like Iris around to help her with the things she had trouble with? Maybe. She supposed she could simply abandon anything she couldn't do on her own and make do by herself - hunt her own food, bathe bird-style - but while the idea of going feral didn't repulse her as it might once have (and a small part of her actually found it exciting,) she didn't think she wanted to just abandon everything society had to offer.
And what would this mean for what people thought of her? She could deal with the stares her form and her nakedness got her, but would she have to live with them for the rest of her life? Or would there come a time when she was seen as something normal? She didn't know.
Muriel passed by the guest-er, Jenny's room on her way to the laundry room. Peeking inside, she smiled; the girl was snug in bed, taking a nap, with Tetra curled up halfway down the bed like a real cat. That wasn't so surprising; she'd had a busy week, and she hadn't slept very well before she'd come to stay with Muriel.
The cop still wasn't sure what she thought of all this; if Jenny's parents were out there somewhere, looking for her, she didn't want the girl imprinting onto her instead of her own flesh and blood, and frankly she'd never thought she'd make a good parent anyway...
On the other hand, wasn't her whole job to serve and protect? Whether it was best in the long term or not, Jenny was depending on her implicitly; the girl seemed to have no doubt that Muriel would look after her. Indeed, she seemed to be one of the only people Jenny really trusted, and she wasn't about to let that trust down.
And what if Jenny's memories, vague though they were, were accurate? What if her parents had abandoned her to wander out in the sun? Jenny seemed to think it was because of something she did, but Muriel had seen enough battered wives and husbands to know that people could blame themselves for absolutely anything.
Who else could she trust to look after her? The other people at the station were trustworthy, but Jenny wasn't nearly as comfortable with them as she was with Muriel. The orphanage could be trusted, and probably knew a lot more about childcare than a single cop with no kids, but they were full to capacity, and Muriel just couldn't bear to think of explaining to Jenny that she had to send her away...
No, this was the only sensible option. And...Muriel had to admit, something about Jenny just made her heart melt. Still, all the sentimentality in the world didn't change the fact that this might not be easy. Unless some solid evidence cropped up in Jenny's case, who knew how long she'd be staying here?
Muriel knew she'd have to go back to work on Monday, and she'd have to put Jenny in school, both for her own good and because she couldn't very well leave her alone eight hours a day. Things were about to get complicated...
The two digital fairies sat in silence for a while, pondering. Finally Effie spoke. "Y-you haven't asked me what I did..." she murmured.
Dennis shrugged. "It doesn't make a difference," he said. "You're my friend, end of story."
She stared. "B-but...you don't even know!"
He smiled. "Maybe not. But what I do know is this: you risked yourself to save me when you barely even knew me. You've spent lots of time trying to figure out ways to help your host. And you volunteered to help figure out how to secure the school's computers when they don't even affect you! I know you're a good person, Effie."
Effie felt so encouraged by his words, but she couldn't quite believe she'd heard them. "R-really?" she asked.
Dennis nodded. "Really. Maybe you have done some bad things, but that doesn't make you a bad person. Everybody does bad things sometimes." He smiled, holding out his hand. "C'mon, there's a whole world waiting for us out there, and we're safe on our host anyway. It'll be okay, trust me."
Effie couldn't help but smile back. She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and took his hand.
