starter for: @mascncollinslocation: at the school, after having collected chairs and brought them all to the gymnasium
Val slumped against a wall in the gymnasium, slowly sliding to the ground as exhaustion made it nearly impossible to remain standing anymore. It wasn't that collecting the chairs had been that physically tiring, but the whole situation was proving especially draining for her. She was in the middle of a natural disaster, an actual emergency, and her cochlear implant had run out of battery, making it near impossible to hear. Normally, she wouldn't mind walking around not hearing for a while as it gave her brain a chance to take a bit of a break. Trying to interpret the vibrations her implant sent through her brain took a lot more focus and energy than one might think. But in this situation, where she already felt so off kilter, so unsure of what might be going on, to not be able to hear announcements made on the loud speaker, or a warning shouted in her direction, had Val constantly on edge. She felt like she was at a disadvantage and in a emergency like this, everyone needed every single advantage they could get.
Leaning her head back against the cold wall behind her, her eyelids begged to close to allow just a few minutes of rest. But Val was terrified of not being able to see if an announcement was being made or if people began to move somewhere else, knowing if she didn't see it happen, she wouldn't hear it and would likely be left behind. So she sat there, resting while she could, but refusing to let herself sleep as the night wore on.













