The rest of the day passed painfully slowly. Her amplified senses, which she assud were sohow showing her electrical signals, had faded about an hour after she left Mr. Luxnor's office. While disappointed, she'd realized that the energy from her illicit affair was still coursing through her body, and she couldn't get herself to relax. She felt as if she were crawling from class to class, and it seed like the clocks had all joined a conspiracy to move at half their usual speed.
When she joined her friends for dinner, it barely took them five minutes to realize that she couldn't sit still. Her legs were bouncing, she kept drumming her fingers on the table, and she'd long ago exhausted all the new updates on her socials. Tessa had offered to help her burn off the extra energy, but Amara had assured her that would only make the problem worse.
Thankfully, after what seed like an eternity, she managed to make it to the end of the day. Her true form manifested the instant she closed the front door, and she began looking around the apartnt for sothing to keep herself busy.
Ultimately, she decided the place needed a good cleaning. The kitchen was already in fairly decent shape, but much of the apartnt still had visible damage from so of her demonic mishaps. During her first week with her wings, she'd damaged many of her walls and ceilings, and there were a few dramatic spots of heat damage scattered around.
Over the next few hours, Amara did her best to restore her apartnt to a halfway respectable state. She vacuud every room at least twice, reorganized all her clothes, and even took the ti to wash all the walls. Without the proper materials, she wasn't able to fill in the gouges from her wings, or restore the heat damage, but she felt better knowing she'd done everything she could. Unfortunately, her energy had barely waned over the course of her impromptu cleaning session.
Her next attempt to burn off her energy was much more literal. The fridge was still full of Nick's groceries, and she pulled out everything she needed to cook herself dinner. She used her tail to cut up the ingredients, which let her practice both her shapeshifting and her tail's dexterity, and she used her hellfire to cook everything. The finished product certainly wasn't high cuisine, and she knew she could stand to learn more about cooking, but she enjoyed it nonetheless.
After dinner, while she attempted to find sothing to watch for the evening, she opened a package of cookie dough for her next experint. She pulled off pieces of the dough and balanced them on her tail, doing her best to try and make cookies. She saw about as much success as when she'd made garlic bread, and barely a third of the cookies were anything close to edible. However, she couldn't help but notice that her control was definitely improving, and she burned fewer and fewer cookies the more she practiced. She'd finished the entire bag before long, and finally decided she should try to get so sleep.
As she brushed her teeth and got ready for bed, her mind raced with ideas. She was really hoping to enter Derek's dream again, and she wished she had a better way of making it happen. She thought of what she might be able to do if she gained control, and what might push Derek to finally confess what had happened.
Sadly, the excitent that had perated her body all day was now refusing to let her fall asleep. She tossed and turned, her body unable to get comfortable as she tried to wrestle her excited mind into submission.
She continued like this for the better part of an hour, alternating between counting the cracks in her ceiling and imagining nightmares she might be able to inflict on Derek. She tried her best to avoid checking the ti, to focus on the ambient rain noises that normally helped her sleep, but nothing worked. Her thoughts unexpectedly returned to Chloé's charity, and she realized she had the perfect outlet for her energy.
After rummaging through her freshly organized closet, and grabbing old clothes she didn't mind ruining, she reverted to her human form and left her apartnt. The campus was cloaked in soft moonlight, and the night breeze felt wonderful as it danced through her hair. The sky seed heavy tonight, and the humidity hinted that rain might be in her future, but thankfully her plans wouldn't be affected either way. She caught herself staring up at the sky, watching the clouds as they periodically covered up the moon, but she knew it wouldn't be safe to fly up to et them.
Instead, she crossed campus to a building that was growing increasingly familiar to her. The sll of ashes and burnt lumber filled her senses, and she stared at the empty lot of the Jade Palace, now with an empty dumpster just waiting to do its part in making things right.
She looked around, thankful that the property was sowhat isolated, and opened the large tal door to the dumpster. It was still empty, as Chloé was planning to start the cleanup effort this weekend, but Amara had been itching to co back here ever since she'd last hung out with Chloé. She tore the caution tape, freeing up a path to the burnt remains of the party house, and cracked her knuckles as she moved closer.
While Chloé and the rest of the volunteers needed protective gear to keep themselves safe, Amara had no such disadvantage. She manifested her chitinous exoskeleton, watching as it covered her hands, and decided to do the sa with her legs as well. Even if she sustained any cuts, she was sure she'd be able to bounce back quickly.
With the logistics taken care of, she dove into the wreckage and got to work. She imdiately noticed how light everything felt, as if she were simply throwing around large pieces of styrofoam. Piece after piece went into the dumpster, though she had to snap so of the large pieces of lumber in two before tossing them in. She thought about how a regular group of volunteers might tackle the cleanup, and it dawned on her how difficult the work would be. Many of the larger pieces would have required multiple people, and the need for caution would have kept everyone moving at a much slower pace.
In hardly any ti at all, a large chunk of the plot had been cleared of its bulkiest pieces. Amara wiped so sweat from her brow as she looked around, wondering what to tackle next, when her focus landed on the two walls that had managed to stay upright. Moving closer, the rain she'd predicted earlier finally arrived, coupled with the low rumble of thunder in the distance.
She circled the building until she'd positioned herself out of view of the street. She pulled off her shirt, manifested her wings, and pulled them close. Connecting with her inner fire again, she tried to cover her wings with protective chitin. It took longer than she'd expected, likely because she'd never tried before, and she imdiately noticed how much heavier they were. She made a note not to try this while flying, and moved up to the first wall. After taking a deep breath to hype herself up, she lunged at the wall, striking at its supports with her fists.
She broke through surprisingly easily, and quickly wrapped her wings around herself to act as a shield. She felt the rest of the building collapse, debris bouncing off her impromptu fortress, and soon enough everything ca to rest again.
As Amara unwrapped her wings, she saw a flash of light out of the corner of her eye. She imdiately looked skyward, wondering if the storm was picking up, but nearby trees were blocking her view of the heaviest clouds. Thunder continued rumbling above, and the rain continued to ebb and flow, but it still wasn't enough to deter her.
She repeated her maneuver with the second wall, which took a little more convincing before it was ready to co down. Soon enough, there were no more freestanding structures, and a quick look inside the dumpster revealed it was roughly half full. It took another hour of labor before she'd moved the rest of the larger pieces into the dumpster, and around the sa ti she finally felt her boundless excitent start to wane.
She closed the door to the dumpster, locking it tight, when suddenly an idea popped into her head. An idle curiosity that she'd been able to ignore in the past, but now had no reason not to indulge. She squatted down, grabbed the bottom of the dumpster, and tried to lift it off the ground.
Her breathing intensified, and she felt her muscles straining as she attempted to move the massive structure in front of her. She even engaged her inner fire, wondering if it might be able to enhance her strength, but it was hard to tell if anything was changing. In the end, she gave up after a minute or so.
Well, I might not be strong enough to lift cars yet, but this was a hell of a night.
Amara reverted back to her human form, grabbed her shirt, and started the trek back to her apartnt. Before leaving the lot, she looked back, and felt an unexpected sense of pride as she saw how much work she'd finished tonight. She may have been the cause of this disaster, but this felt like proof her abilities could be used for sothing other than destruction.
The walk ho took longer than expected, and the activity of the night finally started catching up to her as she opened her front door. She collapsed on her bed, completely and utterly exhausted, and was asleep within seconds.
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