Owner Pose
Cael Becker     The cage Cael has been confined to - in large part at her own insistence at this point - has been retrofitted for her comfort. She has her cellphone, and Agnes' Nintendo Switch to keep her entertained. They've also added some cushions, carpets, and blankets to make her more comfortable. She's settled into the corner - a nest of blankets around her, and Bear just outside of the bars. Her hand rests on his fur, scratching idly at his shoulder while she thumbs through a website on her phone. The sun has recently set - something she's keenly aware of, and which has slowly been causing rising anxiety as she wonders if she'll change once again.
Lydia Dietrich     The smell of something spicy heralds the arrival of Lydia as she makes her way to the room, holding in one hand a thin plastic bag with a container inside it (it's the thing that's giving off the spicy smell) and a plain brown paper bag in the other.

    "Knock, knock," she calls out, before letting a tendril of twinkling lights open the door for her. "I brought you some food." She holds up the hand with the plastic bag, "I got you some chicken pad-thai, four spice." She holds up the other hand, "And I baked some banana nut muffins. How are you holding up?"
Cael Becker     Cael looks up from her phone at the voice - her smile small, and tight, but present. She's dressed in a loose, borrowed shirt, and a pair of baggy pants - and her posture fairly radiates anxiety, from the tightness of her back and shoulders, to the way she practically grips at Bear's fur. "About as well as you can expect. I, uhhh... I heard I tore into you pretty bad. ...I'm sorry, for what it's worth."
Lydia Dietrich     "Pshaw," Lydia says, another tendril reaching out and opening the cage. She sits down, cross-legged and reaches in to deposit the pad-thai and muffins in her lap. She moves without showing an inch of fear, and when she's done she considers Cael for a bit with her strange, but not unkind golden eyes.

    "You did," she says eventually. "But, in your defense, you weren't exactly in control of yourself." She shrugs, "It was half my fault, too. I wasn't prepared for you to be so fast, so I let my defenses down. I won't make that same mistake twice, but I don't think we'll get to that point. We have something of a plan." She cocks her head curiously, "Did Jon tell you about it?"
Cael Becker     Cael's anxiety spikes the moment Lydia touches the lock - nothing short of fear showing on her features, as if she believes she'll change any second, and attack Lydia for a second time. "Uhh... Something about runes, and an amulet. Something to hopefully... keep it repressed, or at least allow me awareness and control," she confides, without moving any closer to the door, or the noodles, as long as it remains open and unlocked. "I'm, uhhh... I'm sure whatever you guys'll come up with, it'll be..."
    She sighs heavily then adds more quietly, "I keep hoping I'll wake up. It doesn't feel like something like this can be real."
Lydia Dietrich     Lydia doesn't move to close the door, instead choosing to remain sitting outside the cage, back straight with confidence that Cael won't change. She looks at Cael, and then at the noodles pointedly, but when Cael doesn't budge, she lets out an exasperated sigh, and closes the cage. "You'll have to come out sooner or later," she gently chides.

    "I know how you feel," she says. "When I woke up after I died, I was hoping that it was all a dream. When they explained to me that I was a vampire now it made me kind of... numb I guess. 'This can't be happening.'"
Cael Becker     "Yeah, well - I have to come out whenever I want to take a pee," Cael mutters quietly. The cage doesn't exactly have accomodations for such... intimate needs. "It feels safer in here," she murmurs to herself. "For everyone. I don't- the last thing I want to do is hurt anyone. ...again."
    With the door closed, she moves forward finally - retrieving the food before retreating to her position in the far corner of the cage. "Thanks for this," she adds, tearing the lid off the noodles, and taking a deep breath in of the spicy aroma. "Creature comforts, yeah?" she says a bit wryly, before digging in with a fork.
Lydia Dietrich     "The full moon has passed," Lydia says. "If you were going to change you would have by now." She falls silent as she watches Cael eat, contemplating what to say next. Eventually she settles on, "I have to think about it, too. There is a part of me... I used to think of it as a kind of different entity, though. The Predator, is what I called it, but most vampires call it The Beast."

    "It's the thing that comes to the front if I lose control. It doesn't distinguish friend from foe. It only sees /food/ or /threat/, oftentimes both at the same time." She drops her eyes to look at her hands. "I have to be careful when I fight, lest it takes over. Like... when /we/ fought, after you grievously wounded me, I had to not only keep you under control and focus on /me/ who could take the hits, but keep my Beast under control, because all it wanted to do was tear you apart and sink my teeth into you to reclaim the blood you made me lose."

    "I don't..." she shakes her head and looks up at Cael, "I don't really talk to people about how close to the surface The Beast gets. I don't want to scare them. I don't want to scare /myself/."
Cael Becker     Cael listens in silence, poking at the noodles with her fork, more than actively eating the food. She twirls them for a while before offering softly, "I wouldn't blame you if you had. I... was a threat. I'd harmed you. I'd- I tried to kill Agnes. I hurt Bear." She shoots a guilty look to the pup sitting beside her, outside the cage. "Nothing scares me more than the thought of killing one of you. So... I dunno." She stabs with more than the necessary amount of force at a piece of steak. "Until we're sure that only the full moon will change me, I just- I don't want to risk anything."
Lydia Dietrich     "Sure you were a threat," Lydia says, waving a hand dismissively, "but you were also a /friend/. It's not your fault that this happened." She ducks her head down to meet Cael's eyes. "You hear me? It's /not your fault/. If you're going to blame anybody, blame that asshole Elias who created these bastard things in the first place."

    She continues to stare at Cael until she gets the point. "We will /find/ the cure, Cael, and now that we know what's going on, we'll make sure that not only are the people around you are safe, /you/ are safe, too."
Cael Becker     "Wait-" Cael says - her eyes widening, and her back straigthening. "Elias?" Something akin to a growl passes her lips. "Jon didn't say anything about- that asshole. He's- that sick fucking prick is the one who- he's caused this?" Her hand tightens around the plastic cutlery - which snaps in half, much to her frustration and chagrin. "Well... fuck."
    She forces herself to relax a little, but a heavy frown remains evident on her features. "Fucking Elias," she mutters under her breath.
    She forces herself to take a bite with the nub of her fork, her gaze staring down at her bowl as she remarks quietly, "Not everything that happens can be undone. I'm not... naive enough to believe otherwise."
Lydia Dietrich     "I'll be back," Lydia says, when she sees that Cael has snapped her plastic fork. She gets up and goes to the kitchen and rummages around until she finds a metal one and comes back to hand that over. "Here you go."

    "But, yeah," she says, settling back into place, "Jon recognized the math behind the sigils as Elias' work, so while he might not have /made/ the werewolves, he /did/ do the work to keep them under control."

    Her gaze turns downcast when Cael suggests that her condition might be permanent. "I know," she says quietly. "Believe me, I know. I haven't told Jon this, but I have plans in case we /can't/ cure you. I still have a bit of orichalcum dust left for tattoo ink, and I'm pretty sure, once we decipher Elias' sigils, that I can create a tattoo that will let you stay in control when you shift." She lifts her eyes to Cael, her jaw set in determination. "I will /not/ let this end with a silver bullet in the brain pan."
Cael Becker     "Better that than anything happening to Agnes," Cael mutters quietly, under her breath, taking the fork from between the bars. "But... yeah. Preferably neither." She's silent for a moment before adding a quiet, "I appreciate it, Lydia. Really I do. And maybe, if we're lucky... this ends with my teeth at Elias' throat, instead of my bullet in his brains, like I've been saying. I mean, I think we can //all// live with that outcome."
    She takes another bite, and stirs around the noodles in her bowl before asking quietly, "You think of us as friends?"
Lydia Dietrich     "Of course," Lydia says, brows furrowed as if she can't imagine why Cael would think otherwise. "Why wouldn't we be?" She looks thoughtful for a second, "I mean, there's this whole werewolf versus vampire dichotomy thing going on, but if Jacob and Edward can get along in the end, why can't we?"
Cael Becker     Cael responds with a snort, and stabs at her noodles again, taking another small bite. "Nothing like that. I guess- I just... Long, sad story no one really wants to hear. I didn't grow up with too many friends, as a kid, and I just- I have a hard time recognizing it when it happens. I guess." She glances towards Lydia with a brief, small smile, before letting her attention shift down to the noodles once more.
    "This whole thing... all of it. It terrifies me."
Lydia Dietrich     "I know. I wasn't the popular kid in school, so I didn't have very many friends either," Lydia says. She wiggles her fingers through the sparkly field of her ectoplasm, "Being a mutant in a posh school kind of ostracizes you."

    She nods in understanding. "Becoming something... /else/ is terrifying no matter what it is. Things you were always so /sure/ of are now kind of tossed up into the air. You've always had control over your body and now you don't. I've been through that. Twice. Didn't get easier the second time around."
Cael Becker     "For me," Cael confides quietly, "my mom was a drug addict. So I often had to make sure we had clean clothes, and food, and that the house smelled alright - regardless of if we had electricity, or water, or if we were living out of a car..." She shrugs her shoulders helplessly. "Couldn't invite friends over. It made things hard."
    Taking a deep breath, she lets it out slowly before adding, "I know we'll get through all this somehow. Jon's... too stubborn for anything else. I just... I don't know. We'll figure it out."
Lydia Dietrich     Lydia nods in agreement. "We'll figure this out. One way or another."