Julia hadn’t been taught much in her elementary school years about other states other than Alaska, and therefore New York State was no exception. However, she had been taught about the miraculous forests and landscaping in the Adirondacks. So of course when she had made her way towards upstate NY, she decided to travel her way there to explore the forests and although she wouldn’t admit it, to reminisce about her far past without having to backtrack all the way to Alaska.

She walked on the outskirts of the forest, but close to a valley and didn’t pay attention to anything but the sounds of the forest. She payed attention partly to what was ahead of her, but hadn’t expected to come across a black bear that noticed her before she had a chance to notice it. Granted Julia had assumed all bears were in hibernation in late October ( A thought process developed because of her knowledge that in Alaska the Bears hibernate quite a bit sooner). She went to run and given her slower than average speed of running, the bear had taken the opportunity to attack her back. It shoved her onto the ground just as she remembered that running provokes a bear, it went in for a bite to her shoulder as if to intimidate the individual to stay down, unknown to the bear that Julia can’t feel a scratch nor a bite.

Julia shouted a shout that she would have denied she made to maintain her pride even if she had been caught on tape. She was scared, and angered at her predicament. She had known to not run from growing up in Alaska and yet she didn’t remember it when it really mattered. She twisted herself to look at the bear despite her bleeding back because her inability to feel pain was helping her for once as she used her powers to attack the bear. The bear growled and appeared to be ready to attack again. She increased the power of her flames, but her forehead was already sweating despite the snow flakes that started to fall to the ground.

Her adrenaline was rushing, as her fear increased. She hated this world but she didn’t want to die hating it. Blood continued to leave her back, even if she didn’t feel the pain from it, she was feeling herself grow tired from the blood loss that she wasn’t even aware of was as bad as it was. She kept the fire going for a full two minutes, before noticing that the bear had left. She didn’t know when the bear had left, but she knew that she was tired. She went to stand up, succeeding but found her vision going in and out of blurriness. It was a sign of blood loss. Her back was a bit more resistant than most to sharp force trauma, a result of her physical mutation, but it still wasn’t much resistance, especially not with a bear attack. She had some deep wounds on her back, but Julia shrugged them off for small wounds( a combination of pride and inability to feel no pain, only pressure from the wounds). She stood there looking around a bit too dazed to remember where she was supposed to go to leave the forest. “ F***” she said, she had wanted to shout but had feared that the bear was going to come back.

A noiseless, tranquil resting position soothed her physical and mental state as she meditated near the outskirts of The Adirondack Mountains. The environment was garden-fresh, with a crisp scent and most importantly, sun rays that were beaming onto the young female which in exchange caused her to release endorphins. The atmosphere went undisturbed until a wail, supposedly from a female, could be heard in the distance as an indicator that they were in need of assistance.

The desperation that the unknown individual bellowed overwrought her moral compass, as her frame remained in an identical posture from beforehand. However, her movement then altered, her feet accelerating in the direction that the gruesome noise originated from. An additional sense of determination lingered in herself as she witnessed the initial increase of the mutant’s abilities and the ordeal occur, then beginning to generate a clamorous noise with bottles that she attained from her purse and thus, coordinating the bear to move elsewhere.

Furthermore, Larraine examined the impaired individual from beyond the treeline, investigating their characteristics from facial expressions and exasperation of their swearing. Their first interaction would be unpleasant for the youthful female either way, meaning that in that instance she allowed for her presence to be known. “They're gone now, the bear, I mean. You're not too badly injured, correct? I.. I observed the entire tribulation unfold." Her vocalization soothed the inauspicious situation, being thoroughly direct and authentic with the fellow-mutant. It would be evident that she would however not be aware of the full-extent of the injury that occurred.

Unfortunately, their brief normalized conversation would abruptly halt as Larraine’s mouth agape, ingesting the early contamination of rabies that was infested into Julia’s system through the bear attack. Julia’s mouth would agape too through this process as the early onset of rabies was transferred. She then stood in a similar position, bewildered, awaiting for backlash from the female.

Julia had heard the voice of Larraine before she was able to focus in and see her. She became more tense than she had been. Had this individual known that she was a mutant? Did she see Julia use her own powers to stop the bear from killing her? Her thoughts were cut off, saving Larraine from hearing Julia’s symphony of vulgarity for now as her mouth had been forced open which was a result of Larrain’s powers, unbeknownst to Julia.

It saved some time but not for long. The only saving grace now for Larraine to not feel like she just killed ten people, was the fact that Julia’s energy had been sapped from the blood loss. So instead of being completely hostile, her words that had been spoken next lacked the hostility that usually accompanied the vulgarity. “ Who the f*ck are you?” She would say, though a bit flatly as she rubbed her forehead so she could focus on looking at the individual in front of her.

The vulgarity in her speech would lack the necessity of its intimidation. There were two practical replies that could apply to her question, however, Larraine would decide to go with the latter. “Someone who heard your screams,” Larraine answers. “That’s the reason I’m here, I directed the bear elsewhere. That’s why they’re not attacking you right now.” Her practical comment was feasible, even to someone with limited awareness of her surroundings, such as the injured-teenager.

For all resourceful purposes, a resonant rummaging would appear as her hand searched for basic essentials during this situation; bandages, e.g. “You have two options, either you allow for me to bandage you or you can do it yourself.” A casual statement was addressed to Julia with concerned and yet unfeeling facial expressions. It was clear from her words that the female was skeptical of the mutant’s reactions, specifically as she attempted to aid her from her excessive injury.

A breeze swept against her textured-hair, prompting for the young woman to move her hair away from her sight. “We should call an ambulance. I would but unfortunately, I don't own a phone.” She suggests, a signal or expression that the woman was authentically attempting to support her, opposed to placing her in danger; moving moderately closer to the female. A various of inconsistent thoughts progressed in her mind, which predominantly concentrated on how to aid and remain guarded near the offcomer.

Julia had started to feel dizzy when Larraine responded back. Julia usually would have chuckled insincerely back, and would have given some type of aggressive response back given that Julia didn’t want to admit that she couldn’t save herself. However, Julia was feeling too drained to react verbally unless she felt it was necessary. She listened the best she could without wasting energy to respond to Larraine’s words, but the words had bothered her.

As Larraine rummaged through her stuff, Julia started to back up a bit, crunching on dry leaves as she was ready to run. She assumed Larraine was an aggressor even if everything pointed towards an ally. Her thoughts were clouded by adrenaline, and by blood loss. The sweat on her forehead has stopped dripping and the blood was still coming but had luckily slowed down. Her energy however was still low or well decreasing. She wanted to have the energy to run, and yet the lack of energy was making Julia p*ssed off at herself and therefore p*ssed off at everything that included Larraine.

Larraine’s words about the bandaging had not been heard by Juliia. They had not been heard because Julia was too focused on the sound of her own heart pumping, and the roaring of the wind picking up. However seeing the bandaging in Larraine’s hands Julia was able to assume, or well more like respond in an accusational way to Larraine’s offer. “No, I don’t f*cken need it” She would say, the hostility mixed with tiredness made it come off as more fearful than anything else. After all, her overly aggressive overly prideful attitude has always been a way to distract from her fear.

She had been backing up slowly when one word finally stood out, the word that meant more to Julia than to most people. Ambulance. A word that to many people seemed like a symbol of help in distress, something that comes to the rescue when a hospital is too far away. This was not Julia’s definition nor symbol she made for the ambulance. The ambulance in fact meant something that makes things worse when in distress, that always had the possibility of exposing her and of treating her differently and tipping off others to do the same. It was one of the symbols on a whole list of things that symbolizes fear for her. “No-No-no” she said as she had been shaking her head adamantly. In the right mind and health she would have been able to spule ten swear words within twelve seconds, but she wasn’t and so a stuttered out no was all she could muster.

Larraine was seeing a rare sight, and that was Julia being tired enough to express her true emotions and not mask them behind anger. She gave a shriek of fear as she saw the bear come from behind Larraine. Julia instantly went to grab her knife despite the fear that it had raised. She had debated throwing it but knew even despite the fog of her mind, that her knife throwing skills had never been great( and that was an understatement). It was riskier given her hand was shaking from both weakness and fear. “Duck?” She would say, waiting to throw. She was crazy but she wasn’t a completely bad person. Even in her fog she had a moral compass and that meant she wasn’t going to kill someone in the midst of fighting a bear, she didn’t even want to risk it.

Contemplating whether or not to approach her, Larraine’s movement was stalled as the aftermath of the attack occurred in front of her bare eyes. Ultimately, her reaction to deny assistance, especially the bandage seemed thoughtless considering their situation. The atmosphere shifted swiftly as the teenager was still in shock from both the woman’s nature and the bear attack. Momentarily, she remains still as the gust of the wind directed her vision elsewhere, then furrowing her brows as she noted Julia’s fright.

“There’s no need to be afraid,” is the understatement of the century prior to the menacing animal approaching her with domestic maneuvers. In an instance to her warning, Larraine frets with an immediate leap to the ground, attempting to amend her attention being caught by the bear. Through this process, the bear swung in her direction, striking her across the arm. Fortunately, the wound caught her at an angle instead of gashing her severely.

Between the strike and sheer panic, an opportunity prevailed in the form of her abilities, as she subsidized distance from the beast. Her hand clutches, transferring affliction from rabies to the bear as it encountered Julia, increasing the content it had within the bear’s system and thus, causing its state into alarm. Among this transaction and Julia’s prior diversion of assaulting the bear, it eventually fled from the scene. Being an animal lover, a terminal grimace was shown across her face from both afflicting the bear and the excruciating injury itself.

Despite having endured the agonizing thrash, thankfully, her healing capabilities were supposedly apparent in another manner. The bleeding had discontinued, however, the puncture was visible and required a lengthened period to heal. Her disjointed clothing benefited her as she peeled her sleeve apart, sheathing it around the injury. During the onslaught, the bandage that she had assembled from her purse went missing through the daunting scuffle. Due to their injuries, Julia and Larraine now had to promptly exert together through their current condition. She restrained her fear from appearing, applying pressure to the abrasion as they sat on the ground in dismay.

Julia hadn’t mean to shriek in fear again, and furthermore hadn’t meant to be so careless as to not use the knife at hand as the bear approached her, and instead she had dropped the knife as she was stumbling backwards. Clearly Julia didn’t mean to do a lot of things in the heat of the moment even when they have had real consequences on her life. She backed up and tripped/ fallen back before Larraine had chased off the bear.

Julia tried to compose herself in a way that didn’t say ‘ yeah I was afraid of dying’ but it was bit hard when she had found it difficult to get to her feet led alone to stand. Her inability to feel pain was good for a lot of things, getting up despite excessive blood loss and knowing that that was the case, was not one of them.

Luckily her comrade in arms had sat down before it became obvious that Julia didn’t have the blood supply/ or as Julia’s pride had thought, the energy to stand up. “ Fu” she had started to swear but had decided to just say “thanks” as she wasn’t in the mood for displaying anger right now.

Julia laid down on her bleeding back to look up at the snow flakes falling. A good sign for her powers since they worked better or well longer in coldness. “ I can make us a f****n fire tonight” she said, a ‘peace offering’ of sort as she stifled a yawn, once again a false pride thing as she wasn’t aware that it was not because she was tired because of a lack of sleep, but because she had lost enough blood to warrant her to be overly tired.

Their wounds wouldn't seem as excessive from a view point from elsewhere, however, the teen's thrash was in more dire need of treatment due to the lesser capabilities of her physical healing abilities. Her mind grew to become vacant with dread as the severity of the situation became apparent. Larraine was in alarm over the fact that she authentically attempted to assist someone else and was successful in her attempt. Through a brief moment of conversation, she would contemplate whether it was truthfully worth it considering her current injury. 

As an alternative turn of events, the fellow teenager thanked her attempts and thus, Larraine wasn't so frustrated with her careless behavior. "You're welcome," a delicate comment was spoken back to her as an instinctive response. "What are we meant to do now? We cannot stay outside whilst we're injured. We wouldn't exactly want to have frostbite too." The woman complained thoroughly, desperately applying tension to the wound that she had endured. The unknown stranger opting to make the fire however soothed her anxiety somewhat. At least she was aware of her surroundings staggeringly, the other girl was too. 

Her expressionless facial structure would then alter as she moved over to the bandages that she had subconsciously dropped earlier, acquire them up and then begin to adjust them around her wound accordingly. It would be evident that throughout this process that she was in excessive pain. This wouldn't cease her from scurrying over to her newfound acquaintance with bleak eyes. "How about now? Are you going to allow for me to put the bandages on you now?" Her simplistic offering wasn't insulting in nature whatsoever, it was more so an exchange for her offering to start a fire prior to their conversation. Her companion's current physical state ironically distressed her, despite the fact that physically they appeared to be in a similar situation. "Neither of us are seemingly looking too hot right now," another ironic statement was commented in no correlation to the girl's powers. A transparent idea in her head was to call for assistance but unfortunately, there was no signal in the middle of the woods. As of right now, they were both stuck together; for better or for worse and especially in poorer health.