A Lost Path [Klaus/Nicoletta]

Well. Getting Klaus food was definitely a good idea. He was done eating by the time she had managed to even make a dent in her cup of coffee. Or at least, that was what it felt like. She had noticed what he had done in reaction to her idea of what might have happened. That had been confirmation enough. It was taking every ounce of control that she had to not let her power run rampant and turn this building into the world's most detailed ice sculpture.

Of course, the pair remained silent as they ate, until Klaus spoke up and claimed he didn't realize how hungry she was. That made Nicoletta chuckle as she wrapped her hands around the lukewarm cup of coffee she had been given, only for steam to start emanating from the top of it after a moment, allowing her to take a sip of actually warm coffee now. It wasn't bad coffee. Just cold coffee. Unfortunately, Klaus was no longer being helpful in guiding her to where she would next explain things. Luckily, she knew what she had promised him, and his reaction had been enough for her to really put the pieces together. The lights above them hadn't so much as flickered since they entered. But as Klaus had gone into another stress induced moment, the fluorescent lights had started to flicker like crazy. That was all she needed as confirmation. However, she needed to take one last, long sip of coffee before she could really start explaining.

"Well, luckily for you, she said as she placed the cup down, the ceramic clinking against the wood of the table. I know exactly what to talk about next. I'm sure you were told what put you in the hospital, yeah? An 'oddly powerful' bolt of lightning. What they didn't get a chance to say anything to you about was that after you left, several of the machines had been fried. The sockets they were plugged into scorched, and several machines reset entirely. Almost like someone had caused a power surge or jolt in each of them." She said as she folded her fingers together, thumbs pressed against each other as she rested her hands atop the table.

"And I'm sure that you've noticed that the temperature hasn't exactly been..steady since I showed up, right? There's a reason for that. Dad's training didn't work because he was focusing on making you into the prodigy he wanted. But it wasn't completely ineffective." She explained as she reached out and slid her own glass of water into the middle of the table.

"Like most people, our family is full of spiritually aware people. But our abilities don't quite stop at seeing ghosts and all the other creepy crawlies that were thought to be myths." She continued as she ran a finger along the rim of her glass. Slowly but surely, the rim itself could be seen gaining the hint of frost. "We are capable of gathering ambient spiritual energy from the air, and shaping it. Usually into a bow and arrows. At least, that's what our basic abilities are."

"But everyone who has even a modicum of spiritual power will eventually develop abilities completely unique to them." She said as she slowly stopped running her fingertip along the glass. The water inside was now starting to freeze. And then she started to run her finger in the opposite direction. The frost began to melt.

The water began to turn back to normal, even starting to bubble ever so slightly. "For example, I can freely manipulate thermal energy. Heat and Cold. But with enough training, I managed to also learn how to solidify those concepts." She said as she stopped her little parlor trick and pushed the glass aside. "But when I first started showing signs of that kind of power, it only ever happened at random. I would work on a really important piece for someone who collects wall hangers of swords, and the stress would make the metal suddenly impossible to work."

"It would become too hot for the material to keep solid. Or too cold for it to be worked. I think something similar is happening here. The lightning. The shorted machines. And now the flickering lights. I think your own power is starting to manifest itself. And since you don't realize what you're doing, it's happening in moments of stress. That's why I said you'd keep getting struck if you ran again." She said before falling silent and pulling her coffee cake towards herself, slicing a small sliver off of it before dunking it into her cup and taking a bite. She would simply watch Klaus react, see how he took in this information.

Well, Klaus was at least listening. That was a good first step. And at his first question, she nodded. "When I was kicked out, the only place I could think to go was to our Uncle's shop. It's how I learned to make many things, and was where I ended up spending a lot of my time. It's why I live in Berlin, instead of someplace closer to home." She explained as Klaus mulled over what she had to say, only to ask if she was outright saying that he had power over electricity, and what they could do in the meantime.

"I don't think it's the only thing you'll have..but the signs are all there. Of course, I could be wrong. It could be a far more refined power than just electricity. There's a lot of routes you can go to explain an outcome like that. You could be a walking battery. Your presence could also simply cause electrical energy to surge. But neither of those would account for the lightning strike."

She said before dunking the last of her coffee cake into the cup, popping the small piece into her mouth before draining the last of the cup. Before continuing her explanation, she made sure to both ask for the check and gesture for Klaus to follow her as she walked up to the counter and paid for the both of them. With that done, she would lead him towards where she parked her car, finally speaking up again after they left the restaurant.

"Well, we can do a couple of things. We could either make you start wearing a few accessories that inherently limit how much spiritual energy you're putting out to attempt to stifle it. Or we can work on giving you the ability to control it. The former is easy enough. But the latter will probably be incredibly difficult for you. After all, you don't even remember what that necklace you're wearing is. It's a Quincy Cross. The one I wore before I lost my eye. Though for me, it was a bracelet. I'm willing to bet that you haven't been able to form a proper weapon, right?" She asked as she opened up the passenger door, gesturing for him to get in as she walked around and went into the driver's side. Once the doors closed, she started up the car again.

"That being said, I wouldn't reccomend that you be down on yourself for that. Everyone has a different growth curve. The only reason that not being able to form a weapon makes teaching you to control your powers harder is because that means we have to start from the very basics. But, if you're willing to stick with it, I think the two of us can get further along than you ever did back home." She said as they left the village, and got on the freeway. Next stop, Berlin.

Well, it wasn't surprising that Klaus had fallen asleep. According to his own words, he had only slept on two of the seven days he had been running. She would let him sleep for the night, or for however long he would stay asleep. With that in mind, she turned on the radio, but kept it fairly low. It wouldn't do to wake him back up. And as such, the ride home slowly began to feel like it was dragging on and on.

As such, she started to sort of zone out..until the scream. That made her jolt back to attention. For anyone else, that also would have come with jerking the wheel. But Nicoletta wasn't most people. She could smell the ozone in the air as electricity started to arc off of him. The radio shot up in volume, drowning out his screams as she slammed on the brakes..right as things started to quiet down. And when her foot hit the brakes, she felt a lot more resistance than usual. Shit. Shit! She was putting her foot down hard on the brakes. They needed to stop. Fast.

It felt like ages as the car slowed to a stop. One hand had come over to rest on Klaus's shoulder, trying to both pin him back into the seat as well as use her own power to try and quell the sudden surge. She could feel the burn of electricity running through her, making her muscles lock up..until eventually everything went silent. She had managed to mitigate the surge somewhat. But the engine wouldn't start anymore. As she removed her hand from her brother's shoulder, she realized something very quickly. He had fried the battery, and their guess had definitely been correct.

But that was something to worry about later. Thankfully, their car was dead on a road that wasn't very busy at this time of night. So, Nicoletta unbuckled herself..only to lean back in her seat and let out a deep breath as she felt her heart slow down. The panic in the air had been palpable. And she could feel a faint stench of charred rubber. She had panicked as well, her worry for her little brother overriding her own control for the moment.

As she calmed down, she opened up the door of her car. She had a call to make. The call itself was quick, calling ADAC for roadside assistance. They weren't incredibly far out, it turned out. But that meant that she had time to wake Klaus back up. So she walked around to the other side of the car, opening the door before gently putting a hand on Klaus's shoulder.

This poor kid. He couldn't remember anything before the hospital. But that scream..it had been more bone chilling than anything she had seen in Beijing. That single scream was worse than the wails of the damned for one reason: it came from a person she felt this immense urge to keep safe. So hearing that pure fear coming from him?

It made her feel such a deep ache in her heart, eclipsing even the immense rage that she knew was building inside of her. The fact that Klaus was immensely against running into their father was one thing. But this night terror was another. He had to have been far worse than she had ever imagined. But that was a murder to plan later.

"Cass. Come on buddy..you need to get up." She said as she started to shake him. It wasn't a good idea, probably. But if he was awake, she would at least have a chance to check on him. And right now, she needed to know if he was ok. She could hear that breaking in her own voice as she spoke, the remnants of panic still there as she tried to wake her brother back up. He had to be fine. Needed to be fine. She couldn't take it if someone so young was taken away so early..not when she was here to try and make things better.

If Nicoletta had been just ever so slightly more panicked before Klaus woke up, she would have let out the laugh of a madwoman at his question about what happened to the car. Instead, she just sighed softly as he looked around. He was ok. That was good. But he didn't remember what had happened. Interesting. "Well. For what it's worth, I wasn't wrong. You fried the car battery while having what I'm assuming was some kind of night terror. I could see and smell the electricity coming off of you. I had to put a hand on your shoulder and try and forcibly funnel the energy away. The only reason that I didn't burn is because of this. She said as she lowered her right hand off of the roof of the car, the moonlight catching off of the darker ring..which almost looked like parts of the metal had burned.

"Come on. You're gonna need to get out of the car." She said as she stood up straight, smacking the roof a couple times as she walked around back. Her roadside assistance provider loved to say that they were closer than they were. She knew better though. They had at least an hour before they would get another call to 'confirm' that help was on the way, and where exactly they were. That was usually when they actually sent someone out, in her experience. If you were still there when that second call came through.

"If your powers activate in your sleep like that, then we don't really have time to let you properly rest. We need to at least get you started on the basics. Make you aware. That might help make the next..incident less severe. Right now, it's all completely uncontrolled." She said as she popped the trunk of her car, pulling out what looked like one of those tap lights that late night As Seen On TV commercials advertised. However, when she put it on the ground and tapped it with her foot, it lit up like a goddamn beacon. Unlike the as seen on TV ones, this one had extremely bright LED's.

"Take a seat, Cass." She said, gesturing to a spot in front of the light. She spoke with a kind of stoic, strong authority, but deep down..she didn't know if this was really going to help. She had never seen this kind of deep seated terror before. She was so far out of her depth. But she didn't want to leave her brother floundering just because she didn't know what to do about his trauma. For now, she would soldier on with the usual path, making whatever tweaks that were needed.

She wouldn't let her little brother fall apart like that. Not while she was still breathing, at least. There was no way she would allow the kind of rift that her father and uncle had to develop between the two of them. This wasn't going to get a chance to be a cycle. She would pull her family back together, stitch by agonizing stitch.

When she was asked if she was simply going to try to suppress Klaus's power, Nicoletta could really only chuckle softly. "I suppose I can understand why that would be the assumption you jump to. After all, it's what we do. Medication to suppress things that we find harmful, laws to suppress actions that we deem immoral. But in this case, that's not exactly the best idea. Now that you are starting to display power, you'll be on their radar." She said as she took a seat across from Klaus, having waited for her eyes to adjust before moving the light just enough for the pair to be able to look each other in the eyes.

"And just throwing a punch at them won't do anything. It's why we wear these 'crosses'. They allow us to gather ambient spiritual energy in a focused manner. Without them, we can still gather the energy. But we have no way to shape it. Not for lack of attempts, from what I've come to understand." She explained as she crossed her legs, clasping her hands together in a meditative pose, one that with just slight modifications could look like prayer. It was the pose she had been taught.

"Of course, this is all going to sound ridiculous without a practical explanation. I want you to close your eyes. Since you are starting to manifest power, then it's more than likely that this will be easy. I want you to focus not on yourself, but on what you can feel around yourself, and tell me what you feel." It was indeed a very basic exercise. But it was important. She was able to get a general gauge on the spiritual energy of an area passively now, after years of training. But knowing what was in the area was the very basic foundation of the abilities of a Quincy, as well as many others. They just happened to be the most direct out of them all at it.

Of course, she was cognizant of how roundabout this was. If she wanted him to learn how to control his power, then it only made sense to focus internally. If he had any degree of control, then that would have been where they started. Unfortunately, they would have to start at square one. Teach him to be aware of the spiritual energy around him, as well as the basics of manipulating it. Then move inward. Of course, they weren't in the best area for it. The spiritual energy here wasn't strong.

Thankfully, it wasn't as thin as some areas she had been, where she could only have made a few knives before starting to struggle to gather anything. If it had just been a touch stronger, it would have been ideal in her opinion. But, they would have to deal with what they had on hand.