[Vignette 2/2011] Brotherly Love (Jack of all Blades)

[Dr Archeville]

Ellie Espadas sat at the desk in her bedroom with a thick textbook borrowed from one of the public libraries downtown open on one side while she carefully poured the contents of one small glass bottle into another, reaching for a third as she reread a passage. Her mother had once again thrown out the last of her black nail polish that morning, forcing the vocally morose teen to mix together whatever other colours she had lying around. Still, even righteous rebellion couldn't interfere with her studying; the book had to be back by the end of the week, and there was a lot of material left to cover.

A sudden noise from downstairs startled her, sending magenta spilling over the lip of the bottle and over her fingers. Swearing irritably under her breath, she nudged the book further out of the way with her elbow and grabbed a handful of nearby tissues to wipe off her hand before jogging into the hallway and down the stairs to see what was going on. "Oh, Dios!"

In the kitchen she found her older brother leaning heavily against a cabinet, his expression pained. Erik more a royal blue greatcoat, one sleeve dangling uselessly at his side, while his crimson bandanna mask and wig were already lying on the floor, revealing an already swollen bruise around one of his eyes above a split lip. "Oh, uh... hey, hermanita," he managed thickly with a grimace.

"I told you this was going to happen!" Ellie scolded furiously as she rushed over to her sibling. "You can’t just go around picking fights and... argh!" At a loss for words, she balled her hands into fists and began pounding his uninjured side.

"Hey, hey!" Erik protested, trying to raise his good arm to fend her off and succeeding only in nearly stumbling to the floor. "Man, I’d be safer - ngh - with the dealers."

Glaring at him, his sister took a step around him and began examining the arm hanging limply at his side, probing it gently despite a grunt of pain. "It’s dislocated, not broken, at least. Ugh, idiota! Alright, this is going to hurt," she warned him.

"What? What's going t- gaugh!" he exclaimed unintelligibly as Ellie slammed her shoulder into his own with surprising precision. "Ghn! What the hell are you... huh." With a considerable amount of pain and difficulty, the fencer managed to roll his shoulder and lift his injured arm. "That's actually better. How did you know how to do that?"

Failing to completely conceal a relieved look, Ellie scoffed. "What did you think I'd been reading all those books for?"

"I guess, but, nhn, that was a little beyond basic first aid," Erik insisted, putting his back to the cupboard and sliding down its length to sit heavily on the kitchen floor. "That's pretty cool." Despite his bloodied face and strained voice, there was a definite note of pride in his voice.

"You know what would be cooler? Not getting beat into a pulp!" Stepping over to the fridge, Ellie emptied a pile of ice cubes into a dishrag and handed it to her brother. Sitting down beside him with a irritable huff, she put her arms around her knees. "...so, did you get them? The drug dealers, I mean," she clarified off of his perplexed look.

"Heh, those guys? Yeah, do sweat. They look way worse'n me," Erik assured her with a lopsided smirk he immediately regretted as it pulled at his split lip. Trying not to move too much, he held the makeshift ice pack over his eye. "Probably don't have a genius hemanita to patch them up, either."

"Yeah, you kinda lucked out," Ellie agreed with a small grin. "And, y'know... good job."

Erik grinned again, ignoring the pain. "Heh. Thanks." For a few long moments, the siblings simply sat in silence. Finally, he asked, "So why's your hand all purple?"

"It's magenta."

"Oh, well then."