The Young Ones

Chapter 3 Bracing For Impact

"Today's the day!" Allie cheers hopping out of bed excitedly, hair back to having lovely golden lights. The mishap of last night is all but forgotten. "I have a hair appointment at eleven, a mani-pedi scheduled at two, and a professional makeup artist coming at four, and then the limo will arrive at six. I've left two-hour pillows of time between each thing to prevent disaster. But without fail tonight at six I will be the prettiest f*****g thing in Los Angeles!"

"Yes, you will buttercup," Gabie murmurs in an amused tone.

"And you will be the most majestic!"

"I'm sure," Gabie murmurs. She's half listening and half preparing herself for another day at art school.

"Gabie, remember I'll be waiting to get you from school after my mani-pedi. Also, the makeup artist can do you too if you want," Allie offers.

"Why not? We're meeting Alaric Sharpe so might as well look my best," Gabie replies and smiles. "I'm going now, try not to get too nervous while I'm gone."

"Nervous me? Come on Gabie I'm on an insane dose of Prozac, I couldn't get anxious if I tried," Allie jokes and pushes her out the door.

"Don't forget to pack your meds in your bag so you can take them at dinner tonight!" Gabie yells as Allie shuts the door. As soon as it's closed Allie scurries around to get ready for her hair appointment.

~~~

After Allison’s hair is nicely styled, with each strand curled into perfect spirals the stylist pins it back with bejeweled bobby pins along with tiny garnet gems all over her head, a decoration that isn’t needed given the existing glimmers but Allie likes it anyway.

Moving on from hair she goes to the nail salon, gets her nails and toenails painted deep red with small black swirls on the thumbs and big toes. Allie’s favorite color to wear is red.

Once the girl has gorgeous dry nails she catches a cab to the art school.

~~~

"There's my favorite artist!" Allie greets loudly and jogs up to Gabie as she exits the double doors of the building. She's smiling widely. Allie can tell this school makes her friend happy.

"Hey, buttercup! You look amazing!" Gabie exclaims and Allie twirls for her enthusiastically.

"I feel amazing! My curls are so bouncy! Forget that you look so happy! This art school is doing wonders for your mental health," Allie rambles on and Gabie nods.

"I love it. I made a new friend," Gabie says as they start to walk down the street.

"You did! I'm so proud," the blonde muses happily.

The girls chat avidly as they walk back to the apartment about Gabie’s new friend, Izzy, and topics of conversation to bring up with Mister Sharpe.

~~~

The makeup artist made Allie’s face absolutely stunning with her skills. By the end of it her eyes are decorated with red glitter eyeshadow, a thick black cat-eye eyeliner style, and eyelashes curled up with dark red mascara. To top off the eye look she puts small red garnet gems at the corner of each eye. The blush has small sparkles in it and stands out on Allie’s pale complexion. To tie the look all together and add Allie’s favorite makeup item she applies a deep red matte lipstick.

Gabie ends up insisting upon doing her own makeup and honestly she did as good of a job on herself as the artist did on Allie. She did a winged look with her eyeliner and wears maroon lipstick. Her eyes have emerald green shimmery eyeshadow on them. Other than that she doesn't apply much of anything. She's always looked better with simpler makeup, she doesn't need all the glitter and blush; her natural beauty glows much brighter.

~~~

As soon as the artist is done Allie excitedly dons her chosen outfit. It is a scarlet dress that falls just above her knees with flowing off-the-shoulder sleeves and garnet studded embellishments. Allie prefers any dress that lets her show off her larger cleavage, something she’s always been quite proud of and something that drives most others crazy wondering how it’s possible given how skinny she is. A pair of cat patterned flats finishes the look, Allie could never wear heels. The outfit does nothing to cover the soulmarks on her forearms but does shield the ones on her thighs. The mark on her collarbone, crackling gold and white electricity dabbed with inkblots of various sizes, is like no other from this time, an anomaly Allie passes off as a tattoo to avoid suspicion and questions. Allie used to hate showing her marks because having five marks is a one-in-a-million occurrence which makes her stick out like a sore thumb.

Allie looks herself over and traces her fingers over each mark, smiling softly to herself.

' dammit she's so young and cute, I just wanna give her things' is scribbled down her left forearm and 'how is this girl fighting in a corset-oh my she's too precious for this,' is written down her right. 'that girl seems poorly dressed for a battle' is on her left thigh with 'wow that dame has a set of lungs on her ' on her right but neither show in the outfit.

Gabie chooses a more tame path and wears a knee-length emerald green dress with lace sleeves and a Peter Pan collar; she prefers a more modest look and often finds her own boobs annoyingly big (a breast reduction may be in her future) and needing a more supportive bra. The dress goes to her mid-thigh and compliments her tanner skin tone. To add a little flare Gabie slides into studded black heels. Both of Gabie’s soulmarks wrap around her wrists, 'did that civilian just shoot fire from her hand?' on her left and, ‘no, she's not supposed to be here! on her right. Both are almost always covered with longer sleeves or a watch and thick bracelets.

"You look killer," Allie breathes and she smirks.

"And as promised you are the prettiest f*****g thing in Los Angeles," Gabie replies.

"Alaric Sharpe won't know what hit him," Allie jokes, trying not to be overly self-conscious and Gabie nods in agreement.

That moment is when Allie takes care to check the time.

"s**t! The limo will be here in four minutes! We have to go!"

"Don't forget your meds!" Gabie reminds as we rush out. Allie snatches the bottle on the way out and shoves it into a mini black cat backpack. “And try to rein in the lightshow on your head!”

Outside their apartment building, a long white limo is waiting with a larger man leaning on the side wearing a bright smile.

"That's flashy," Allie murmurs under her breath. The blonde is still in a state of disbelief that this is even happening. Gabie glances at the excited golden, shocked silver, and nervous purple shards of light in her curls and winces, there’s no hope for Allie to control her emotions tonight...well actually Gabie believes Allie will probably be in this same emotional state all night so maybe no one will notice.

"Hello! I'm Jordan Taylor, Mister Sharpe’s driver and head of security. You must be Gabrielle and Allison," the joyful looking man greets and shakes our hands. “You both look stunning.”

"It's nice to meet you, I'm Allison," Allie manages to squeak out. “And thank you so much!”

"I'm Gabrielle but you can call me Gabie," Gabie adds and pats her friend’s arm. Jordan nods and opens the back door inviting the girls to get in. Gabie steps in first then pulls Allie in after. Once they’re sat down Allie melts into the cushion and starts breathing heavily.

"Oh my gosh, this is actually happening," Allison gasps out. This cannot be real, they are not this lucky.

"Yes, it is," Gabie responds evenly, watching her friend and wondering if when the limo is cleaned Jordan will keep or throw away the colorful tiny shards left behind. They are different than glitter, better, but still similar enough to not cause suspicion.

That's when Allie notices the limo is furnished with jars of candy and bottles of soda and sparkling fruit juice. Instantly she lurches forward and grabs a whole bottle of sparkling grape juice. She unscrews it and chugs a few whole gulps down hastily; the effect is immediately relaxing.

"You know there's no alcohol in that right?" Gabie inquires and raises an eyebrow at the anxious girl.

"I know."

"Give me some," Gabie demands and holds out her hand. Allie passes the bottle and Gabie guzzles some down herself while her friend moves onto the jars of candy. Greedily she opens a jar of jellybeans and shoves some into her mouth.

"If I ever get rich I will buy Jelly Belly," Allison declares.

"Don't make yourself sick," Gabie advises.

"I can't help it! I eat when I'm stressed!"

"Don't worry Allie, he'll like you. He loved your writing so he has to love you," Gabie assures and Allie takes a deep breath. Slowly she puts the jar of jelly beans down and sits back in the seat.

"You have a fair point there. If he enjoyed my writing enough to want to meet me then he has to be open to the fact that imma writer therefore actually insane."

"Exactly, now pass me those lemon heads."

“Gabie do you ever think it’s kinda weird that superhero groups seem to always have some rich millionaire backing them who also fights alongside them with technology he’s made himself because he’s only human? Like The Avengers and Justice League; Tony Stark funds the Avengers and fights with them, Bruce Wayne too with the Justice League, albeit secretly,” Allie muses after a minute of thought, this has been bothering her for awhile.

“Allie, those are fictional,” Gabie reminds.

“Well yeah but in the words of Sheriff Stilinski: one’s an incident, two's a coincidence, and three’s a pattern.”

“Is this your way of saying you think Sentry is Alaric Sharpe?” Gabie inquires with a raised eyebrow and Allie nods.

“It is and he totally is. If Alaric Sharpe isn’t Sentry then he’s dating Sentry or maybe they’re related. Sentry and Mister Alaric are way too involved with each other for it to be a casual friendship and you definitely don’t casually back up an entire superhero squad.”

“You’re making good points but let’s not ask Mister Sharpe about Sentry’s secret identity or anyones for that matter,” Gabie concurs and Allie nods vehemently.

“Oh, of course! Gosh accusing your host of being a superhero and possibly exposing his identity would be so rude.”