Luz snarled, "Let her go!" and the closest Suit stepped forward to grab her arm. "Hey, man, hands off," she spat while both Steve and Clifford raised their voices in alarm. The green-haired brother had started over, his expression worried, the last Suit trailing him.

"Quiet!" Odalia barked at Steve, pointing a finger at him, and Clifford flinched and half sat down in his chair. One Suit next to Steve grabbed his arm while the other stepped out of the security desk and walked to stand behind the woman restraining the cowering girl. She turned an imperious eye on Luz, "Who are you to tell me what to do?"

Luz scoffed, "Lady, who are you?" She looked at Steve and added, "Karens, am-i-right?" before growling up at the Suit holding her arm, "Let go of me, man."

"You— who am—" Odalia nearly choked on her outrage, "Is she an imbecile?" she glared at Amity. The green-haired woman shot another angry glance at Steve, who had started laughing.

Amity gave her mother a furious scowl and shook her head as Luz laughed, "Yeah, why?" while trying to jerk her arm free from the Suit's hand. "Last warning, cabrón," the brown-haired girl hissed, pointing up at his face.

"Mother, i-is this necessary?" The brother asked, holding out a cautious hand, and Odalia wheeled around to glare at him. He startled, but opened his mouth to speak again, and his mother ignored him.

"You and your sister!" Odalia sneered, "Always disrupting the family's business. Disgraceful." She turned a baleful eye on Amity, "You have an important performance tomorrow evening, we have been planning this for ages," she rubbed at her forehead in a show of weariness, "and you have been such a headache today. We are leaving, now." Amity shook her head and tried to pull away from her mother's iron grip, borrowed cowboy boots slipping on the tile, her mouth moving so quickly—snarling and spitting—but the collar kept her silenced. Odalia curled her lip in disgust, staring down at her daughter, "Really, Amity. Such behavior," she tsked and pulled the audio device out of her pocket, pressing at its controls. "This is not how I raised you," she added with a disappointed tone and a dismissive shake of her head.

Amity blanched and pulled away again, harder, frightened now, and Ed jumped forward to try and catch Odalia's wrist, but the Suit behind him grabbed him first. "No, don't!" Luz yelled, lunging toward Amity, "Leave her alone!" The Suit holding onto her arm pulled her back, and he wrapped both arms around her torso.

Odalia gave her a wicked smirk and pressed the button. A different tune began to play, and soon Amity stood tall and confident, her hands folded at her stomach with elegant poise, her eyes half closed and blank, her chin raised. Commanding. The green-haired woman pressed a different button on the device, and the collar made a small click. "There, darling, you're not completely mute," Odalia drawled in her saccharine voice as a low hummed note, a thrumming musical resonance began to fill the rotunda. "Why don't you tell your—" she sneered, "—friend to leave." Amity's mouth opened slightly, and Luz could hear the faintest vocalized tone, vibrating the hairs on the back of her neck, the singing softer than a whisper. Was she actually hearing it? Or was she just imagining the sound?

"No!" Luz yelled, and suddenly she wanted to leave. "I'll just come back!" She knew she would, but she'd go home first, definitely. "I'll never stop looking for her!" She pulled and twisted in the Suit's arms, stomping at his feet as he hissed in pain, but she knew her mamí was making the soup she'd asked for, so she should probably head there for dinner. "I'll keep digging until I find her again!" Luz promised as she strained against the Suit's grip, but she decided it was time to go. She stopped struggling with the Suit and he loosened his arms, turning to push her toward the door, away from the golden-eyed girl.

"Fine," Odalia hissed, her eyes narrowing in anger, "Amity, tell her to forget about you."

The thought of forgetting Amity broke something loose deep inside. Luz snatched the rape-whistle flashlight off her belt and spun on her toes, screaming as she slammed the notched metal ring at the end of the tool against the Suit's jaw. The impact made the ring depress a quarter inch with a mechanical clunk, which pierced the seal of the CO2 cartridge housed in the handle. The shrill, piercing shriek from the lovingly crafted compressed-gas-powered whistle ripped through the air, echoing, reverberating against the concrete and marble walls of the rotunda. Luz had understood the principle of the device based on Eda's maniacal description, but experiencing it was worse than she'd anticipated. Her world was pain, and all she could hear was static. The Suit had reeled to the side from the impact, her follow-through leaving a bloody circle stamped into his face with a trailing gouge, but then he stumbled further away, crying out in (what looked like) agony, covering his ears, his eyes flaring wide and unfocused as the whistle blew right in his face. She grit her teeth and snapped out a fist, catching him in the throat with the backs of her hooked fingers; he jerked forward, clutching at his throat, and she kicked up and slammed her knee into his groin; when he doubled over she stepped back and drove a heavy fist into his temple.

She snapped her eyes over to Odalia as the Suit crumpled to the floor. The green-haired woman had jumped back and hunched her shoulders, putting her hands to her head in surprise—trying to plug her ears with those ridiculously ugly long red fingernails—and the growing look of pain on her face sent a thrill up the brown-haired girl's spine.

She glanced at Amity. The pale girl's eyes had opened completely, and she was starting to look around in pain as she reached for her head. Anger had started to bloom on her face as well, red rage surging up her cheeks and ears, and Luz saw her start to turn toward her mother.

Luz looked back to Odalia's hand: the device was tumbling to the floor, near the terrible woman's knees, dropped in the shock from the deafening alarm. Luz was certain—knew it in her bones—everything would be over for them if that woman recovered quickly. She pulled her arm back and whipped the flashlight toward the green-haired torturess, if nothing else just hoping to hit her with it. Odalia saw it spinning towards her, the flashlight still shrieking its penetrating banshee howl, and she (looked like she) cried out in shock and leaned away. Her fancy high heels slipped on the tile floor and dumped her to the ground. The Suits behind her grappled with the green-haired man on his back, Amity's brother biting and kicking at his mother's men.

Suit #2 and Suit #3 had started to recover quicker than she had hoped, and Luz focused on them. They moved toward her shaking their heads and (it looked like) groaning in pain. Suit #2 swung wide, and she ducked under his arm, driving a punch into his stomach and another into his chest. He took a step back and she sank her foot into his crotch. He lurched back, hunching over, retching, and she moved to follow when Suit #3 stepped into her space and planted his fist in her gut. Her breath clogged in her chest as the impact drove her sliding back; she covered her stomach and winced for a second, then put her arms up to block his right-hand haymaker, leaning to her right, when his left fist crashed into her face. She spun around and stumbled, falling to the floor, then scrambled away from the man advancing on her as she rolled up into a crouch in front of the coat check counter. Her ears were still ringing, and a punch to the head wouldn't do her any favors.

She shook her head as she stood, fists up as Suit #3 reached out to grab her with both hands. Luz batted out with her right fist and drove her left elbow forward as the Suit wrapped his arms around her shoulders—pushing her elbow into his collarbone—and he leaned away with a pained grunt as he tried to lift her off the ground. She slapped at his face with her left hand, heel of her palm to his eye, then grabbed his nose and twisted up; He howled and let go long enough for her to slap her palms against his ears. He snarled in anger and kicked out with his knee, catching her in the side, and she gasped and twisted away when his right fist caught her just above the eye. She dropped to the ground, head swimming as a white-hot pain in her face stole her breath. He kicked at her stomach again, and she caught his leg as she coughed, her chest heaving for breath. He laughed and grabbed a fist full of her hair to pull her head back, ready to drive another punch down at her face. She bared her teeth at him and pulled her feet back; prepared to move—

Clifford swung a fire extinguisher over the counter into the Suit's unprotected face with a crunch, and the man stumbled backward and fell with a groan. Luz looked up at him in surprise and grinned, "Thanks, Cliff."

The old man looked down at her with a worried frown, "You got folded like an omelette, kid."

She rolled her eyes and grunted sarcastically, "Thanks, Cliff," as she stood. The brother—Ed? Emira had called him—was on the floor gasping by the metal detectors, his opponent turning purple and clutching between his legs. Amity was reaching for the device on the floor, but the Suit near her mother had grabbed her arm. She was kicking and straining against the man with his hand around her elbow, teeth bared and snarling, her fingers almost touching the audio player on the ground. Steve was still behind the security desk, but his hands were raised as the Suit held what looked like a gun—Luz growled and turned her gaze toward the green-haired woman on the floor. She was groaning, sitting up slowly, rubbing at the back of her head. Suit #2 staggered close, waving his fists, and she took a stalking step sideways as she wiped her left hand across her mouth and spit blood on the floor, "Alright, Pulp Fiction," she sneered as she pulled the baton from her belt, extending it with a snap of her wrist, "One more for the road." She leapt for the man, swinging, and he fell backward with a crack and a high-pitched shriek. The Suit holding Amity's arm looked up at the noise and let go of the girl to fumble for the pistol holstered at his hip. The silent girl's fingers closed around the device, and she looked toward Luz as she held it up in triumph.

Pounding footsteps from the Atrium brought the two missing Suits and the other security crew that had left with Emira; the green-haired girl herself running in panting a moment later. Those men drew their guns at the sight of Luz kneeling over an unconscious Suit #2 holding a bloodied baton. "Freeze!" the Suit near Amity yelled, stepping past the silent girl to point his weapon toward the brown-haired girl. Amity's eyes widened in fear, and then looked up when a harsh hand fell on her shoulder. Odalia was a step beyond furious, the veins in her neck and face pulsing with her anger. "You ungrateful—" the woman howled, savagely backhanding Amity onto the floor, her black beanie falling off as her shock of green and auburn hair fanned out around her head, the device skittering away toward Luz as she fell, "—pathetic child!" Odalia leaned down and grabbed the girl's arm and wrenched her to her feet, "You will do as you're told!" Amity held her free hand to her bloodied face where she had been struck, shook her head once, then mouthed Never.

Odalia rolled her eyes and waved toward Luz, "Get rid of her," she said to her guards. The Suits took a step forward, their handguns at the ready.

"Mother, no!" Emira yelled as Amity curled her fingers through the white cat-head medallion hanging at her chest, yanking it free from its chain to slash up the inside of her mother's forearm and the side of her face. Odalia shrieked in pain and let go of Amity's arm in her surprise. The guards had paused, pointing their weapons down before turning back to the woman when the silent girl scrambled in front of Luz and stood with her hands out. She mouthed five words, then glanced down at the audio device and stomped it to pieces under her heel.

The green-haired woman put a hand to her face, where Amity had cut her, then looked at the streaks of blood on her fingers. "Amity Blight," Odalia ground out, and the Suits looked back at the two girls, their guns still lowered. The silent girl shook her head and took a deep breath, her eyes shining as she opened her mouth again.

stop.

The golden-eyed girl's near-silent whisper swelled to a thunderous roar that drowned the rotunda in a smothering, oppressive, all-encompassing appeal—desire—order to be completely inert—static—unmoving. The Suits were frozen in place, trembling, slowly turning red as they struggled to breathe under the suffocating command. Odalia's face was caught in a look of horrified anger, and even Steve and the twins were still and silent. Amity fell to her knees to clutch at her throat, gasping, and Luz dropped the baton to catch her shoulders. "Amity!" she cried out as the girl clenched her teeth and squeezed tears from her eyes, hissing in pain. Luz yanked the obnoxious flashlight from the pocket of the other girl's backpack and slammed the strobe switch on the handle, giving a bloody smile when the guards and Mother Gothel cried out in pain, unable to look away from the nauseating flicker of near-daylight. She scooped the smaller girl up in her arms and made for the doors, leaving the flashlight blinking rapidly on the floor behind them.

She ran for the closest subway station, cradling the silent girl to her chest. She was so still, so light. It made the anger in her chest burn brighter than ever. Luz made it through the turnstiles, pausing briefly to crouch and set Amity on her knee long enough to pull her wallet from the pale girl's backpack. Amity was still breathing fast and harsh, air whistling through clenched teeth and tears falling from cloudy, glazed eyes as Luz bridal-carried her down the dingy, echoing stairwells and onto the noisy station platforms. Luz was on high alert, eyes and ears searching for threats from every side. If she closed her eyes for too long, she'd see Odalia standing tall and livid, slashing at Amity hard enough to send her to the floor.

She switched subway lines at random, riding the blue line until she found a junction station where she'd switch to the green, then the yellow, then the blue again in the opposite direction, looping her way across the city. She dipped into Eda's cash to buy different colored rain ponchos or hats for them to wear until they switched lines; loud, colorful backpacks to carry until they threw them away at the next double-back. If there was room on the train, she'd let Amity lay across two padded seats while she prowled back and forth, worry slowly stealing away with her hope. If there wasn't, she'd prop Amity up as carefully and comfortably as possible at her back and glare at all the other riders. Most kept their distance from the bloodied, snarling girl, but one little old gray-haired lady had offered her a few bandaids she had in her purse. Luz had swallowed and whispered her thanks, wiping at her eyes as she turned to place them gently on the pale girl's cheek. When she felt comfortable that they had lost any possible pursuit, she had them ride the train past where she normally would have gotten off. She carried Amity on her back, the girl's arms wrapped limply around her neck, hissing pained breaths into her ear. She felt like hell, but being able to hear the silent girl breathe was the only thing keeping her calm. That, and knowing they were close to home.

She had managed to get her away from her mother, for now. But was she any better off? Amity hurt herself to keep me safe, Luz growled at her own failures. She shouldn't have been so sloppy, all evening, that left hook had opened her up for a beating that she deserved. Eda had taught her better than that. She was still collared. The hateful device was humming away around the slender girl's neck, leaving her voice frozen and her throat numbed. Even Luz's shoulder was tingling where the girl was leaning, through several layers of clothing. Eda can help, Eda can help, she repeated to herself, over and over—Eda can help!—until she almost believed it. She had another mile left to go, but that gave her plenty of time to shed some tears in silence without bothering anyone else. She walked along, under the darkened moonlit sky, and took a shuddering breath.

"—uz?" a faint whisper slipped into her ear, "Y'... 'kay?" Then came a yawn, as if the pale girl on her back had just been taking a nap.

Luz sniffed and laughed, which came out as a disgusting wet popping sound, then she turned her head back a bit, "You alright, cariño?"

The limp arms around her neck moved slightly, then curled to wrap tighter around her. "Luz," Amity sighed, "You're safe."

"Pshyeah, thanks to you," the taller girl scoffed, "I wasn't doing so hot in there." She sighed. She knew most plans didn't actually work out as designed, but they had almost made it out unscathed. Maybe I should have used the smoke bomb.

"No, Luz," Amity shook her head slightly, tightening her grip on the brown-haired girl, "You did more for me than you realize." She sniffed, and Luz felt the quiet girl's tears run down her neck. "I don't know anyone who would have helped me the way you did."

Luz gave a half-smile, "Maybe you're right." She sighed, looking back up at the stars, "But you're worth it."

The brown-haired girl walked for another twenty minutes, listening to the golden-eyed girl hum a soft, gentle melody. Now that Amity was awake and talking again, Luz felt so much better. Her aches and pains were largely forgotten and soon, Luz turned the corner of her mom's street. "Welcome to Clawthorne Heights!"

Amity laughed, a light, airy sound, "What? I've never heard of—"

"Yeah, well," Luz added, "It's actually called Hawthorne Heights, but I think it sounds better the other way." She bobbed her head toward a tall, square building; what looked to be a small odds-and-ends style shop on the ground floor with living space above. "That's my moms' house," Luz said, "Eda's shop is on the first floor, and her workshop is in the basement. We live above the chaos."

The smaller girl snorted, "Above? I don't believe that for a moment," then she shifted her arms from around the brown-haired girl's neck, holding onto both of her shoulders, "Let me down, please? I-I'd like to be on my feet when I meet your mothers."

Luz nodded, "Of course, cariño, I'll set you down when I get to the steps." She tried to look back over her shoulder into the golden eyes hiding there, "You've been out of it since the museum." She trudged up the slight grade in the sidewalk, passing an insect-swarmed streetlamp. "I was getting really worried, Amity," she admitted softly, once her face was hidden in shadow.

Amity whispered, "I'm fine, Luz," but hugged Luz tightly for a moment, and