"Guter Mond, du gehst so stille. Durch die Abendwolken hin. Deines Schöpfers weiser Wille. Hieß auf jene Bahn dich zieh'n. Leuchte freundlich jedem Müden. In das stille Kämmerlein. Und dein Schimmer gieße Frieden. Ins bedrängte Herz hinein!" Even before fully reaching the door, Erik could hear the gentle tone of Liesel's voice. It didn't pick up much in volume, she just seemed to be happily, yet quietly, singing away to herself in her room. He leaned against the door frame, arms loosely crossed over his chest as he merely looked into the room. Liesel sat cross legged in the middle of the bed, hands in her lap and within her hands she grasped a lightbulb. Every few seconds it would flicker on, stay at a stable illumination, and then flicker slowly off; the filter within tinkering ever so slightly. Clearly not used to having her sort of electricity flooded into it.

"Interesting," the lightbulb stuttered in lighting as she heard his voice. Her attention having been speedily diverted to him. He smiled and nodded his head in her direction. "By all means, don't let me interrupt you." He got a hand waved at him.

"Come in!" Liesel smiled and patted the bed beside her. She looked down at the item in her hands, yet she was minutely aware to him shutting the door.

"New party trick?" Erik sat down and leaned against one hand as the other tapped a finger to the bulb.

"Ah, well...I suppose," Liesel didn't seem sure how to answer.

"Charles's idea I take it?"

"Definitely. Unlike your idea which apparently involved a gun! What were you thinking?!" Though she wasn't surprised by Erik's idea of training. Honestly she didn't know what else she'd expect.

"You know nothing would happen even if he did pull the trigger, right?" Erik asked looking at her with a curious look.

Liesel pouted and waved the lightbulb at him, he gave it a quick glance as it sparked up. "Not the point!"

Raising an eyebrow, he rolled his eyes and sighed. "So...you've been lighting the house then?"

"What? No! I am not touching a generator, no..." Liesel said while warily looking at him and shaking her head. "Charles had this thought that if I could sustain something akin to a flood light, and keep it stable, then I could do the same with something smaller." She explained while handing the item over for him to simply turn over in his hand. "Something along the lines of: me learning to keep a level power being used, both high and low." Liesel pushed her hair over her ear and thought over it before looking to him. "Because...I always use small spurts of power...whatever, I think it is working somewhat."

Erik thought over it and nodded. "We both seem successful then." Pushing away from his hand he reached out and held onto one of hers. He placed the bulb back in her hand and watched as she simply flickered it before putting it to one side.

Liesel smiled awkwardly, "What brings you here, Erik?"

"Well at first I was coming to fetch you for dinner. But then I got rather distracted by the fact that you were singing. It's a little strange, I've not heard you sing since you were younger." Erik said while simply leaning close to her as she laughed awkwardly and hung her head. She hid behind her hair, or attempted to until he pushed the auburn curtain away with a finger. "I take it you are happy." He stated. People usually did such things when they were happy, right? Liesel's embarrassment shifted and a wide smile appeared on her face. She gave a sure nod and frowned suddenly at the door when shouting could be heard from down the corridor, and down the stairs.

"Dinner?" She questioned while he looked at her with an expression she couldn't quite pin down. He seemed rather reluctant to leave. Like he was more than happy to stay here. "Come on," she rather quickly kissed him before shooting off of the bed and walking to the door. It happened all very quickly that he had a hard time to process it before turning and looking to her as she called his name. "I know you seemingly like my room, but surely after the events of training you're hungry?" Liesel smiled as she drummed her fingers on the door, stepping back she walked into the corridor and held a hand out to him.

Erik looked at the hand offered, she even wiggled her fingers slightly and waited until he had reached up and slipped his hand into hers, to pull him gently down the corridor. Lacing his fingers with hers, he looked down at her as she seemed to be thinking over something. "What is it?" He asked as they neared the stairs.

"Hm? Oh...nothing, really." She replied while he looked uncertain to believe her. "Just, how long do you think we need to train for exactly?"

"Depends on how people do, I suppose." Erik said thoughtfully. "Why?"

Liesel looked a little sheepish, she swung her hand which held onto his, before she ran a thumb over his knuckles softly. "It's a little boring..."

"And you wanted to join in so much!" He couldn't help but laugh. "Don't let on to Charles though, he may feel a little disheartened seems he made a special case with you."

"You are right, I suppose..." Liesel pouted and smiled simply when he slipped his hand out of hers and walked into the kitchen. She wasn't wholly surprised by this. Public displays of affection seemed like a possible alien thing. Or rather, very un-Erik like, Liesel thought. She laughed to herself, earning a worried look from him. He didn't need to know that she found that the day he openly showed emotions, other than the usual anger, was the day he may have had a personality transplant, was unwell, or had been swapped with another person.

"I'm recruiting you for help tomorrow." Raven suddenly sat by Liesel's other side. She leaned her head against her chin and looked at her curiously. "I refuse to have Sean's help for meal making!" She exclaimed exasperated by Liesel's lack of following.

"You should've called for me to help to begin with. I would've come and helped you! Then you wouldn't have to keep swatting Sean away from the food." Liesel laughed as Raven smiled over her words. Clearly she had hit the nail on the head. As food was being made, Sean was going around acting as a hoover and picking.

"I resent that remark!" Both females looked to Sean as he pointed a finger at them both.

"Really?" Liesel raised an eyebrow. Even as they sat his gaze was distracted by the food laid out on the table. It was a bit of a squeeze to be honest for them all to crowd around. But somehow they had all managed. Dinner seemed different than the other meals where everyone seemed to be scattered, but in the same room.

"Are you feeling better?" Raven asked while leaning out of the way as Alex reached past her slightly to get something.

"Well," Liesel mused over the question. She was aware that others had diverted their attention to hear her answer. "Yeah."

"Brilliant answer, really expansive!" Raven laughed and got a grin from Liesel.

"Sorry! Just...I am better, I can't really say how I feel improved. I just...yeah." Liesel said awkwardly with a shrug before sticking her fork into the pasta she had previously just spooned onto her plate. She just sat humbly eating her meal while looking about herself as the others animatedly chatted away. A few times she got pulled into a brief talk with Raven and Darwin.

"So, if you've got the all clear. Are you able to train tomorrow?"

"I trained today. So yes, I can't see why not." Liesel replied while leaning back in her chair and looking to Raven. She had to admit this was perhaps the most she had ever talked to the blonde. 

They didn't seem to have problems coexisting and then Angel and everyone else appeared and Raven got distracted by new people. Liesel wasn't bitter about being shirked. She really, really didn't mind. Mainly because it gave her the opportunity to get to know Hank, spend time on her own, and of course any other time was spent with Erik or Darwin. Raven looked at her before flicking her eyes around to make sure no one else was listening. At the moment everyone seemed to be having quite animated talks amongst themselves. Sean and Alex had rather speedily become friends, and were seemingly joking about something. Hank was shockingly out of his lab and talking about some simple topic with Darwin. Whereas Charles, Erik and Moira were chatting away in quiet tones, clearly talking about whatever plan would be possibly undertaken next.

"I didn't mean that sort of training. There's a gym area here, only no one else seems to wish to come with..."

"Well, it would entail them fighting against a girl. What would happen if you won, huh?" Liesel joked and nodded at Raven. The mere thought which came into her mind when hearing Liesel's words caused her to smile. She hadn't quite thought of it like that. "Sure. As long as we don't go totally guerrilla warfare, then yeah, I'll come with, as you say."

"Excellent!" Raven clapped her hands together, finally happy that someone agreed to join her. Everyone seemed so busy with their training to control their powers. They were to fight, so surely that'd mean having to do physical training too? Apparently not according to everyone else.

----

"Are you much of a fighter?"

Liesel tied her hair up and off of her neck and looked at Raven oddly. "What a bizarre question to ask."

"I ask because you've had moments of being confrontational. We heard about your little scrap with Erik. That's why I ask." Raven explained while putting her hands on her hips and watching as Liesel made sure the bandages around her ribs were secure. She was getting better, the healing process was surprisingly fast, but she was still a little stiff.

Straightening the black vest top she was wearing back out, she raised an eyebrow. "You did?" Liesel bit her lip thoughtfully. "I...that...that was unavoidable, though I suppose truthfully it was. I am not much of a fighter, no, to answer your question. How did you hear about that?" Liesel's asked as a second thought.

Raven rolled her eyes. "I overheard Charles telling Moira all about it."

"You eavesdropped!" Liesel laughed and pointed a finger at her.

Raven timidly smiled. "Well...I like to call it accidentally listening. But sure," Liesel shook her head and nodded to the padded mat to one side. There was all manner of equipment down here. Liesel didn't even know the room existed, it certainly wasn't on the tour she was given. "So, what was this fight even about? We've hardly got this team built, please tell me it isn't falling apart already." Raven joked as she stretched one arm across her chest, and used the other to push it gently.

"He was in the wrong." Liesel quite easily stated with a shrug. She didn't see how she could answer Raven's question in any other way than the blatant truth.

"And you were in the right?"

"Yes." Liesel blinked slowly, that she was certain of.

"So...to further get that point across you fight him...?" Raven asked, wide eyed and a little bemused over the simplicity in which Liesel spoke.

"He started it." Liesel wished to point out while stretching too. A pulled muscle was really something she didn't need right now.

"Real mature," Raven grinned with a quiet laugh, Liesel just beamed back and couldn't help but laugh too. Yes, okay, nothing which Liesel said was mature, but she wished to state that obviousness, Raven did ask after all. Liesel followed suit and copied her stance. "Can I ask you something?"

"Uh-huh, sure, go right ahead."

"Have you two always been together?" It was something which flitted through her mind a few times. They were rather like herself and Charles. Only, they did not see each other in a sibling light. That she had picked up on rather easily enough, along with everyone else it seemed.

"Not always," Liesel said while jumping back from a punch. "We have been apart before." Which they had been. When Liesel thought about it, those times were very weird. She couldn't think of a time where Erik wasn't in her life in some manner. She didn't get up to much without him, her job was dull, she didn't really do anything spectacular. She couldn't help but muse over what Erik did without her.

"But not often?" Raven asked dodging out of the way of a rather high kick.

"Nein."

"Why?" A small frown appeared on her face, Raven was curious.

Liesel stood and looked at her. "For the same reason you have not been away from Charles." She said simply, Raven lowered her arms and looked at her for a continuation. "He is all you've ever known, and he is all I've ever known. Trust me when I say, I know what a fellow waif and stray looks like when I see one."

"So, what was the longest time you were apart?"

"You're so curious! That or you're very nosey!" Liesel laughed and yelped at the end to dodge again.

"I'm curious. Trust me when I say everyone else has had twenty questions thrown their way too." Raven said honestly. She wasn't interrogating Liesel, and she was telling the truth; everyone else did get the same curious barrage of questions.

"Three years, almost four." Liesel replied while catching a hold of the fist which was hurtling towards her. "I was nearing the end of school, he had already left and had stayed around to make sure I actually finished and didn't drop out. School life was hard, we were always moving from one to another for some such reason. We got into a lot of trouble, between us that is." Liesel explained while pushing the blonde back. Raven easily got her balance and moved out of the way of Liesel's attacks. "I was fifteen when he left, I don't know where he went or what he got up to. But I'm rather sure at a stretch I could figure it out."

"Did you miss him?" Raven asked as she countered a kick from Liesel by blocking it with her own leg.

"Of course. Losing your best friend is horrible."

"You didn't lose him though," Raven smiled and pushed her away. "Because he came back."

Liesel tilted her head and nodded slowly. She had got her on that one. Though at the time she certainly felt like she lost him. "I was eighteen, almost nineteen when he reappeared, on my doorstep no less! I don't get any advanced warning, he just appears as casual as ever!"

"You still seem surprised at that!" Even Raven had to laugh. What more did Liesel honestly expect?

Grumbling Liesel waved a hand and the two of them sat down opposite each other. She tentatively rubbed her midsection and smiled thinly. "I shouldn't be really." She leaned back on her hands and looked up at the ceiling. "We stayed in Poland for a few years then. He said he had business, yet again at a stretch it doesn't take a genius to figure out what, and I was finishing a typing course...it was as you say: a fat lot of good." She laughed and Raven did too. "Since then we have been together again. And soon that would've been four years ago. Four years ago next week because it was near my birthday." Liesel said with a nod.

"And now?"

"We are all the other has. Though sometimes it looks like there's a thin line between anger, hate and love. It is nothing...though I don't think he'd be in as much of a loss as I would be if we parted ways again."

"Oh, I don't know about that. When you was in the hospital he was really on one. He'd either ignore someone speaking to him, just give them a dirty look, or reply bluntly. He really wasn't dealing well with you being gone. Even though it was for a small space of time." Raven confessed quietly while guardedly looking around as if someone was listening in. Or even as if Erik would spring up and glare her way for telling Liesel this snippet of information. Liesel smiled slowly at this. She was rather sure deep set guilt played a part of his behaviour too, but she wasn't going to bring that up. "One more thing, how old were you when you met?"

Liesel laughed, "You are so curious! I was roughly thirteen, I believe."

"You can't remember?"

"Not a time I'd rather remember." Liesel admitted with a sad smile. As ways of meeting people went, their meeting was way down on the list of ways. "What about Charles and yourself?"

"I was a few years younger than you were when we first crossed paths." Raven confessed remembering too well their meeting and her breaking into the house via the kitchen doorway.

"It is nice," Liesel said while laying slowly on her back. She tilted her head to the side to look at Raven, she looked a little confused by her words. "That two waifs have someone to look out for, and who are looking out for them."

"Though mine is more brotherly concern than whatever yours is." Raven said with a chuckle.

"Yeah, I'll give you that one." Liesel laughed quietly while looking up at the ceiling.

"Sounds like your training is going well."

Liesel and Raven stopped laughing and looked to the door. "I've already beaten you once, would you care for a rematch?" Liesel beamed up in Erik's direction while he simply rolled his eyes and pushed away from the door frame.

"That didn't technically count as a fight."

"What? Yes it does! You both took part, and were both willing of it, so therefore it was a fight." Raven said while Liesel pointed at her and nodded against the mat before pushing herself upright.

"Yeah! See, she is right! It totally was!" Liesel said a little too enthusiastically. Erik frowned and looked between the two females. He didn't even know how Raven knew of their little squabble, but he didn't exactly care much to ask. "You know what I said yesterday?" Liesel looked to Raven and saw her nod slowly. With a smirk, she looked up at Erik with a sidelong glance. "It is one of those moments where a man does not wish to admit to losing to a woman." Raven tried to hold in her laughter, but it didn't work. Liesel's sly expression and Erik's evident annoyance was too much. She laughed and Liesel ended up laughing too.

"Would you like a rematch?" Erik asked and watched as Liesel leaped to a stand and walked quickly over to him. He said what he did mainly to get her to stop, he wasn't being serious in the slightest.

"No! No, of course not." Liesel looked up at him and smiled softly. She clasped her hands behind her back and nodded slowly. "In a fair fight, if it were to ever happen; you'd win. You know it too, so yes, let's drop this topic now." Liesel looked back to Raven, she was watching them with a rather childish smile and a bright shine in her eyes, like she was witness to something truly magical. Liesel mused, a rare moment where Erik wasn't being sarcastic, too much, and being civil was something everyone wasn't exactly privy to, unlike herself. So yes, that must've been it, if only Raven wasn't giving her a look with a raised eyebrow and knowing smile.

----

(A/N: Cue another copy and paste job, thank you Google!

Dear Moon, You Go So Quietly:

Dear Moon, you go so quietly
Through the evening clouds.
The wise will of your Creator
Directs you in your course.
Kindly shine for the weary one
In the quiet little room
And your light will pour peace
Into the oppressed heart!

----

Edited: 10/June/2019

Reedited: 17/August/2021