Evelyn was nothing if not smart, and logical to a fault. Maya still believed she could talk the kid down somehow, even if she needed a stern voice to hear it. If she could just find the right logic to...

... and then Eve was wrapped around her legs.

>>”Ha! I’d like to see you try!”

"Oh, for god's sake, Eve" Maya groaned, freezing. She knew better than to struggle with a kid, it was gonna turn out embarrassing for both of them, and possibly dangerous for Eve. Physically, she was a small child.

"Very mature." she frowned, peering down at Eve. "Alright, lil miss Better than Everyone, what's the plan here exactly? Because I have a building full of kids, actual children, I'm responsible for. And some of them don't know yet what an electric socket is, so I'd rather not waste my time trying to deal with one that knows better."

Evelyn tried to think through her options, brain powering through ideas. Honestly, she had burnt her bridges to a point she was committed to following through. She couldn’t run away, she dropped all her flammable, which left one option: fight.

Thinking of the most painful memory she could (getting punched in the jaw by that stupid brat girl from her old school), Evelyn grabbed Maya’s leg and focused. The pain registered through her mind as strongly as the punch had the first time.

Oooomph. Okay, I. Hindsight, that really gave her a headache... with her hands gripped to Maya’s ankle, the skin to skin contact transferring the info, she regretted what she had done.

”Okay, that.... was...stronger than... expected.” She flopped backward, holding her face.

Tiny grabby hands reached for he ankle under her pant leg, and Maya winced.

"What are you even..."

The playback hit her with the physical pain of a punch at her jaw. Maya reeled back, losing her balance, and landed hard on her ass as she blinked away the sparks dancing in her vision. Eve finally let go, flopping back; the playback must have hit her with the same force.
Maya had not experienced one of these for years, but had a recollection of how they worked.
More importantly: Who the hell punches a seven year old child?!

>>”Okay, that.... was...stronger than... expected.”

"No sh*t" Maya groaned, looking down at Eve "Who the hell hit you like that?"

Evelyn put her head against her hands still feeling dizzy from the experience. As snotty as she was, this power was still new and very unsettling. Why had it felt so real? She was rethinking whether she was enjoying being this age again.

Maya seemed to have an understanding what had happened, as evident by her response and the question that came with it, ”Oh, you know how those work.” she had the humility to look embarrassed for the first time. Hitting yourself with your own powers had a way of doing that. ”There was a girl, in school. She didn’t like that I rattled on her and she had a pretty decent right hook. Turns out, still hurts a year later...”

She wanted to rub away the growing bruise she knew wasn’t there. She was embarrassed there were tears in her eyes now. She no longer felt very tough. ”Maya...” there was a sudden, very quiet tone to her voice as she glanced down at her hands. ”Did my powers ever...scare me. When I was...older?”

>>”Oh, you know how those work."

"Yeah."

It would have been very problematic to say that punching a seven year old worked, but since she technically punched herself... yeah, it worked. Both of them were sitting on the floor now, nursing a ghost bruise.

>>"There was a girl, in school. She didn’t like that I rattled on her and she had a pretty decent right hook. Turns out, still hurts a year later...”

Oh, good, small silver lining: another kid had hit her. Mirror was not ready to deal with Evelyn's darling parents again, but she would it she had to.

>>”Maya... Did my powers ever...scare me. When I was...older?”

Maya sighed. This Evelyn was very different from the demon child she'd fought moments before. This... was an actual kid.

There she is.

"Yeah." she admitted. There was no use lying to Evelyn. "Sometimes. I... I was there when you discovered you could do this, the first time. Seems like this time around you are... manifesting things earlier, somehow. I can tell you more about it if that helps."

For the first time since she deaged, Evelyn was struggling to process things. Her brain was jarred by the lack of memories to help her, and her echoes were trying to piece it all together. The apartment she lived in, her blocked contact with her parents, the way Maya has said Who hit you? She swiped at her eyes, sniffling.

”You thought...no, they haven’t. My parents, that is. I guess they didn’t become better people when I got older...? I figured, since they blocked me, I mean. At least they would never do something that would leave a mark like that. Gossip is a dirty weapon when you’re upper class.” she mocked. She was not going to get into the fact she had been hit a number of times in the past, but slaps tended to fade quickly, and there were plenty of punishments that didn't leave a mark.

Things could probably be clearer to Maya the longer they talked. This Evelyn never had Jensen there to help her. She never had an adult who cared about her powers or what she could do. This was the Evelyn from the youngest years, the freak who her parents did everything to silence. The rebellion, the attitude, the fits of aggression. This was a child trying to find herself in a world that never gave her a direction. Only the echoes were there, the uncaring, calculating, emotionless voices. No wonder she was already a mess.

”I didn’t have memories of my powers manifesting, so I figured it must have been from back then...From older me? I, I don’t like this...” she swallowed hard, gripping her hair in her fists. Her head hurt, her brain hurt. It felt like her body was revolting against what was happening now.  She could smell gasoline everywhere from the bottles, trying to prevent the sensation of regret. It was there, that human strand that had grown and flourished as an adult. The desire to do things, be better than the people who raised her. There was the adult emotions that had not gone away even with her memories: an instinct to protect someone she cared about, the wish to make someone proud, the fear of being a disappointment. She could not remember things, but it was in her heart that she had been something different, grown into someone better. And now, that person was gone. 

"Telling me more won't make these stupid powers go away! Telling me more wont stop the fact that whatever happened to put me back to this age is only speeding up whatever chaos my powers were already creating!” the unwritten fear was there the more she thought about it. The old Evelyn disappeared, ran away from the people who cared about her. She lacked the age and experiences of that life, but her heart felt the same jolt of panic. What if her powers had really caused her to break? What if they were set to do it again? Was there any way to stall her decent into insanity. 

Would she really go insane? How often could those painful memories come back? Was there a limit on the play back? Memories, over and over and over. No....nonononono. 

Okay so now they were both sitting in the hallway, and Kid Eve was having some kind of an emotional moment. Maya was not sure if this was an improvement from imminent arson or not, but at least it was easier to empathize with.

>>”You thought...no, they haven’t. My parents, that is. I guess they didn’t become better people when I got older...? I figured, since they blocked me, I mean. At least they would never do something that would leave a mark like that. Gossip is a dirty weapon when you’re upper class.”

Maya frowned. She remembered the parents. They'd hated her and her relationship with Eve, and Eve had no love lost for their behavior either. And this time, there was no Jensen. She would have to do her best to make up for the difference.

>>”I didn’t have memories of my powers manifesting, so I figured it must have been from back then...From older me? I, I don’t like this...”

Getting all your powers at once, instead of discovering them over the span of many years, had to be shocking for a kid. Eve looked like she was hanging on by a thread; very different from the brat just minutes before. Maya sighed. This was going to be hard work for everyone.

>>"Telling me more won't make these stupid powers go away! Telling me more wont stop the fact that whatever happened to put me back to this age is only speeding up whatever chaos my powers were already creating!”

"Hey. Hey. Alright, take a breath." Maya sifted, putting a hand on Eve's back, careful not to make skin contact again. She was not going to out and hug the little devil child, but she clearly needed comforting. "I am telling you because this is not a jump in the dark this time around. We know a lot about how your powers work. But that's not the important part. I know a lot about how your dealt with them, before. And you did. You learned to control and use your powers, and you can do it again. And you don't have to do it alone."

Evelyn felt a hand on her back and her entire figure went ridged. Despite the meltdown she was having, the comfort was equally surprising. People didn’t do that. She was not uneducated enough to lack knowledge of hugs completely, but this type of reassurance was foreign to her.
Her first instinct was to push Maya away, but she felt frozen.

Breathe... she gave a struggling attempt to compose herself, and then made the slow and stiff movement away from the other girl. She had a moment of weakness, true, but they weren’t friends. She only had one friend. Elke.. Elke with her grandnplans and large ideas. Elke who liked her but didn’t pity her or try to change her.

Maya was right, she didn’t have to do it alone. The only problem was the companion Evelyn had chosen was a bad influence. ”I don’t think I did as well you remember. But I have to do better this time.” her brow was knitting with resolve, and the traces of older Evelyn seemed to be pushed aside again. In this bridge between times, compassion was still losing in her heart.

Evelyn eventually moved away. That was alright. Honestly, Maya was surprised she'd let her touch her at all, in a moment of weakness. But it had changed everything: now Maya knew that there was still a scared kid in there somewhere, and still the potential for her to become the kind of person Evelyn had been, even if not the same.

>>”I don’t think I did as well you remember. But I have to do better this time.”

"Oh, I don't doubt you will." Maya smirked, getting up "I can schedule some power training for you in the DR if you need. In the meantime, Lil Miss Scientist, do you have any guesses on how to clean up all the gasoline in the hallway?"

Ah, the heart to heart was over and they were back to the incident of the broken Molotov bottles. She sighed, and stopped, pointing down the hall to a closet. ”Janitorial supplies are in here. I’ll get the monkey powered and a broom. But only because I want danger room access!” she insisted. She daintily darted to the closet and pulled out what she mentioned then returned to her crime scene.

The white powder absorbed liquid like magic. Science at its best. She let the liquid turn into solid goop and then took a broom and swept it up. She was a little short to manage the actual sweeping though. They needed more kid friendly tools.

>> ”Janitorial supplies are in here. I’ll get the monkey powered and a broom. But only because I want danger room access!”

"Supervision only!" Maya smirked, getting to work alongside Evelyn. Maybe danger room sessions would do the trick once again. Maybe they would take more time, but letting her work out her issues in there was definitely preferable to throwing Molotovs willy-nilly. The kid was smart enough to learn. She just also had to be smart enough to understand.