3rd Floor Common Room, Thursday Late Afternoon

[water-wonder.livejournal.com]

Not wanting to stay in her room any longer, Tori walked into the common room, her comforter wrapped tightly around her.

She took a seat on the couch and huddled up in a ball, still chilled. She didn't want to be alone, she hoped people would flock to the common room, which they usually did.

It was really freaky, what had happened and she wondered who else beside her and Annette had been attacked.

[OOC: Open post!!!]

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[connernotconnor.livejournal.com]

Conner's soccer ball came hurtling through the door, the red speedy blur of Conner right behind it.

Said blur came to a screeching halt at the sight of Tori.

"Whoa. You okay? What happened?"

[water-wonder.livejournal.com]

Tori had been lost in her thoughts when Conner appeared before her. She jumped slightly at the sound of his voice.

Looking up at Conner, she shook her head, attempting to form a thought process. "I was attacked... at the beach." She paused, a scared look in her eyes. "By shadows." It sounded silly, Tori knew that. But if anyone would believe her, it was Conner.

[connernotconnor.livejournal.com]

Conner did believe her. Shadows, compared to some of what the attackers they'd dealt with, were pretty mundane. But maybe that was what made it so freaky, after all -- the more out of the ordinary something was, the easier it was to dismiss it afterward.

He moved over to sit beside Tori, his protective instincts kicking in. "Are you -- no, that's dumb, you're not okay obviously. What happened? Can we stop them?"

[water-wonder.livejournal.com]

Tori shook her head. She still couldn't wrap her head around what had taken place. It was the how that was freaking her out.

She sighed. "I went for a walk, down at Serenity Cove, and stopped to look at the water. It suddenly got much colder and I heard whispers. But no one was around me. And then I saw a shadow on the ground, but there wasn't anything that could make it. I... slowly backed away but the shadow was upon me, in a millisecond. I didn't even have time to try and defend myself." Tori shuddered. "It was so strange. I was chilled to the bone and then as quick as it had come, the shadow disappeared. It left me feeling dizzy, cold and weak. Like nothing I'd ever felt before." She shook her head. "I don't know if we can stop them because I don't know what it is or who could possibly make something like that." Tori was genuinely afraid, for the first time in her life.

[connernotconnor.livejournal.com]

"Oh, man, that's brutal," Conner said slowly. "No wonder you're all wrapped up, huh? Do you know why it went after you? Did it get anyone else?"

[water-wonder.livejournal.com]

"Yeah. It was really freaky." Tori admitted. She smiled ruefully at Conner. "I've never anything like it before and I honestly have been wracking my brain to come up with an answer as to why it chose me, but I've got nothing." Tori was frustrated and worried. "Annette was also attacked, on the roof."

[connernotconnor.livejournal.com]

"On the roof," Conner echoed. "Great, they could be everywhere. They are everywhere, we just don't know which ones are dangerous. Or . . . what if they're all dangerous and we don't know it yet and I'm really not helping, am I?"

[water-wonder.livejournal.com]

Tori managed a small smile. "You're helping by being here." She admitted. It was nice not to be alone.

Her face turned serious. "Who knows where they came from in the first place? I was only attacked once. What if other people have been attacked more than once? What's happened to them?" Tori wasn't sure she wanted an answer.

[connernotconnor.livejournal.com]

"I can be here. Watch me be a big towering . . . tower of here," Conner said, hoping his forced cheerfulness might help a little bit.

"Maybe we'll find out more on the radio later tonight. Or I can poke around this evening, and find out what people know. I bet it's magic, though," he added, wrinkling his nose. "And you really, really don't want me going anywhere near that -- but we've got a lot of people who can."

[southernbender.livejournal.com]

Katara had left Teddy and Chad alone in the room after a while and wandered out to the Common Room. She saw Tori and looked worried. "Hey Tori. You okay?"

[water-wonder.livejournal.com]

"Hey Katara." Tori smiled ever so slightly. She shook her head. "Actually? No."

[southernbender.livejournal.com]

Katara looked more closely at Tori. "What's wrong?" she asked more insistently. "I...you're not quite all there?"

[water-wonder.livejournal.com]

"I was down at the beach and got attacked... by a shadow." Tori still didn't understand it. "I don't know why but it got really cold before it attacked and it stole part of me... my energy. It left me weak and dizzy." She explained. "I'm still feeling it."

[southernbender.livejournal.com]

She knelt in front of Tori. "That's horrible! You should have some hot chocolate. Chocolate's supposed to be good for dark magic attacks." Katara paused. "I could try to heal you? But I'm not sure about healing energy."

[water-wonder.livejournal.com]

"Really? I think Walter mentioned that before." Tori recalled. "You can heal?" She didn't know that. "If you want, you can attempt it. Is it going to weaken you?" She didn't want Katara sacrificing energy to try and help her.

[southernbender.livejournal.com]

Katara nodded as much to the chocolate as the healing. "We learned it in Dr. Orpheus' class. He's crazy though so I don't know how much it'll help. And healing, yeah, some waterbenders can do it sometimes." She reached back to her skin and drew out a flow of water.

Concentrating for a minute, Katara reached out with a water-covered hand towards Tori, looking for a place where she could help align Tori's qi. She frowned after a few minutes and lowered her hand. "It's...I don't know, it's like your qi's been drained rather than dislodged. I don't know how to fix it."

[water-wonder.livejournal.com]

"Oh, wow. I don't have that power." Tori admitted, watching with awe.

She raised an eyebrow. "My qi?" Tori smiled slightly. "It's okay. Thank you for trying. I'm sure sleep with help."

[southernbender.livejournal.com]

"Sleep and hot chocolate," Katara said. She was frustrated that she couldn't bend well enough to heal Tori, but she stood up to start making hot chocolate. "It's not totally common at home either, the healing," she said offhandedly. "I'm not very good at it yet. I just figured out how recently."

[connernotconnor.livejournal.com]

Conner waved at Katara from his spot nearby on the couch.

[southernbender.livejournal.com]

Katara smiled at Conner. "Are you okay?"

[connernotconnor.livejournal.com]

"Oh, I'm fine," Conner said glumly. "But people are getting attacked again, and not by anything I can hit."

[southernbender.livejournal.com]

"People?" she asked, glancing worriedly at Tori then thinking to Teddy earlier today. Katara bit her lip. "Other than feeding them chocolate and keeping trying to hit things, what can we do?"

[connernotconnor.livejournal.com]

"Nothing I'm any good at," Conner said with a sigh. "And they shouldn't let me near the books because you don't wanna know what happened to the card catalog at the Reefside library last time I had a term paper. So right now I'm just gonna be Morale Guy, if I can."

[southernbender.livejournal.com]

Katara looked a bit disheartened for a second. "And I can't even read the books to help." She frowned and looked determined. "Then we'll have to make sure everyone has lots of hot chocolate and regular chocolate to keep the dark magic again and tea and soup to warm them up."

[connernotconnor.livejournal.com]

"We can do that, right?" Conner asked her, very seriously. "Every team needs a waterboy. Only instead of Gatorade we're keeping them warm and fed and stuff, which keeps morale up, which makes us cheerleaders too, I guess."