Chameleons don't shed their skin

[shifting_skin]

She could not breathe.

She could not breathe.

The smell of ozone lingered in her nose as she tried, gasping against the taste of rust in her mouth. Mystique had, in her panic, bitten the inside of her cheek and while she could not remember when, could not think of anything but of the betrayal of her body, the taste of blood only served to keep her in that frantic state.

She had been walking down the hallway in the guise of a sharp-lined man, generic enough in coloring to go unnoticed in a crowd even where months and months within the hotel had offering nothing of evidence to a danger within its walls. She had stumbled, she was sure of it, and thrown out a hand to brace herself against the nearest wall as her body shifted, one shape trading for another without the least bit of her will behind it. That loss of control had been frightening enough, but to discover that no matter how she tried, she remained in the shape into which she'd been thrown.

It was very much like her own. That blonde form she had worn as her default for so much of her life. Yet it was different, just shades of it then as she was aware. Nothing of its shape, but her hair was darker and river straight, her skin lacking the warmth of the that golden tan.

Only after recognizing that she had lost her clothes along with that borrowed shape had she managed to get to her feet, fleeing directionless until she had found the laundry and stolen something to cover herself. She sat huddled at the bottom of a stairwell then, in a too large shirt and shorts that were inexplicably lettered with the word 'juicy.' She could not breathe. She could not stop shaking.

What had been done to her?

Probably should have left the alcohol to Athos, really.

[at_your_side]

Intoxicated. Yes, that was- that was the word she was looking for. Intoxicated was just the very thing she could use to describe herself...or her state...the state of herself?

While the details of it had become increasingly fuzzy with each of the delightful, oh so colorful cocktails the bartender sat in front of her (how many had she had again?), Constance was fairly certain the day had begun well enough. There had been a bath, a bath! One with an endless supply of hot water piped right into her room so she might lie in her tub with the dawn light filtering in through the glass of her colored windows and wiggle her toes in easy contentedness.

But then there- ah! There had been the issue of dressing. Or, rather, not of dressing but of what to dress herself in when her only...dress, yes, had been worn already for the day before. She could have made do with it if she had had to, had even pulled it on while not pulling too much of a face, but had been all too grateful upon meeting the lovely Ruby in the hallway not far from her door.

Never had she seen a woman who wore so little out in public. It had left her gaping in the second before she had recovered herself, to see so much skin on display with not so much a flicker of concern in the other woman's expression as she had smiled and introduced herself. Somehow - now here the details were particularly fuzzy at that moment - they had gotten onto the subject of Constance's singular dress and somehow further the conversation had become one of the other woman, still a stranger, but so earnestly friendly, had volunteered her help.

All of which led to her sitting there at the bar of the Smoking Room, wearing pants of all things while Ruby slid a drink in front of her. She was certain there had been sense behind the action, and no, she did not feel the least bit overexposed with the buttoned shirt she wore beneath her corset or the coat she wore that hung down to her knees (she tried not to giggle at the thought of needing to cover her bum, but was only partially successful). What was even more certain was that these - those little cocktails, they were delicious.