Jo's jaw is still so hard set it's like her molars are sliding into whatever base is after married-and-conjoined. She can't look at Dean. She can't. Can't—doesn't want to explain. Not when he says again, and she wants to swear at her own mouth. But she can barely breathe around something so big it's beating the edges of her head and also curled up, dying in the cage of her ribs. And she can't do that here.
She can't look at that any harder than she was just forced to.
She can't look at him again just yet.
This leaves only one option, which means her eyes focus on Geralt, and there's bitter determination in her copper eyes, and words materialize, beating the back of her teeth. Even when she's not going to say them, she can feel them too clearly. What they would be. What her expression is. Still haven't thrown up.
Like it's some dick-measuring survivalist bravado, right through the broken glass of her shattered teeth.
(You had one empty room, one tiny closet, and your own personal potpourri catalog ghost, and you lost your lunch; I've had my guts ripped out without warning twice, so wholly it killed me, twice, and I still have my breakfast.) Like that's something she'd imply a score card on to anyone but other hunters.
Jo swallowed, "Yeah, we should—" Breaks as a hand catches her arm, and she swings a little too fast, "Fucking da—" is as far as the words for Dean get when it's not Dean who decides to get in on the killer queen movie party in her head again, but Ciri. And that makes her sway back. It catches her flat, and she stiffens, bracing for the slam: but it doesn't happen. It nearly makes Jo sag, and beyond instinct and relief, Jo's other hand settles on top of Ciri's. "I'm, I'm okay."
There's no other acceptable answer, is there? They're still stuck here. There's no time for anything but being able to move. But that off-kilter swell of relief that it's not everyone (and no, she doesn't look at why them) makes her take a breath in, lightly squeezing Ciri's hand. Warmth slipped gently, and utterly unnoticed, through her fingers into the hand beneath it.
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She can't look at that any harder than she was just forced to.
She can't look at him again just yet.
This leaves only one option, which means her eyes focus on Geralt, and there's bitter determination in her copper eyes, and words materialize, beating the back of her teeth. Even when she's not going to say them, she can feel them too clearly. What they would be. What her expression is. Still haven't thrown up.
Like it's some dick-measuring survivalist bravado,
right through the broken glass of her shattered teeth.
(You had one empty room, one tiny closet, and your own personal potpourri catalog ghost, and you lost your lunch; I've had my guts ripped out without warning twice, so wholly it killed me, twice, and I still have my breakfast.) Like that's something she'd imply a score card on to anyone but other hunters.
Jo swallowed, "Yeah, we should—" Breaks as a hand catches her arm, and she swings a little too fast, "Fucking da—" is as far as the words for Dean get when it's not Dean who decides to get in on the killer queen movie party in her head again, but Ciri. And that makes her sway back. It catches her flat, and she stiffens, bracing for the slam: but it doesn't happen. It nearly makes Jo sag, and beyond instinct and relief, Jo's other hand settles on top of Ciri's. "I'm, I'm okay."
There's no other acceptable answer, is there? They're still stuck here. There's no time for anything but being able to move. But that off-kilter swell of relief that it's not everyone (and no, she doesn't look at why them) makes her take a breath in, lightly squeezing Ciri's hand. Warmth slipped gently, and utterly unnoticed, through her fingers into the hand beneath it.