Day 46: Sun Room

[human_sponge]

Peter woke up suddenly, his body twisting in the bed and then forcing him to catch his breath in pain. Pain, which was coming from his middle because of the thing that had scratched him last night, and after that

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[gothamsfuture]

At least someone was okay, in some sense of the word. Peter looked about as cheerful as Terry felt just then, and Terry couldn't help but wonder what he'd found out that had him so obviously down. But they'd gotten the whole "don't ask, don't tell" thing pretty established, so Terry decided not to pry. He'd listen, sure; he liked Peter and all. But possible friendship didn't equal spilling out their deepest darkest secrets. He hadn't even told Dana that he was Batman yet (and hadn't had to, since Max found out and helped him cover). For all he knew, Peter kept it the same with the people he was closest to back home. So just opening up to a relative stranger? Yeah, not something that happened in their line of work.

Instead, Terry turned away from the bulletin and shook his head. "Don't think I need to. You look slagged enough as is." Terry had fallen into bed on more than one night feeling the same way even back home. And here, they didn't have the luxury, or comfortable mattresses. "Night ended pretty quick for Kurt and me too. Kitty never showed up, so we didn't leave the room. M1, by the way. Kurt and I are roommates."

At least that was something done. Congratulations, Mr. McGinnis. You finally managed to accomplish a task that should've taken you all of five seconds at lunch yesterday.

...Yeah, not getting much comfort from that one.

"So I'm guessing you haven't seen him yet." Terry pointed to the note Kurt had left for Peter and Kitty, which remained unanswered. "He's worried, you know."

[gothamsfuture]

"Technically, we met just before you decided to show just how stubborn you could be." Terry knew it wasn't something they needed to talk about, but it was one of the precious things he could bring up that was safe. He'd long forgiven Peter for that night, having his own idea of just what it was like to be manipulated that way thanks to Spellbinder. And it didn't reach into any of that private territory, so Terry shrugged. "Then in the showers. Kind of surprising the first time you see him without the fur."

He could understand the whole deal about a roommate wanting privacy. "That's fine. We can keep the meeting place to our room or Kitty's, whenever we find out where she is. It's just good to know in case of emergency." Like if someone mysteriously disappeared for days on end. And now that he'd ripped that wound right open again, Terry yet again kicked himself mentally for not getting Bruce's room number. Peter might have felt guilty about Kurt, but at least he had a way to just ask about him.

"Yeah. As much as any of us can be. He was more angry about why the nurses took down his note than anything else. Except maybe everyone thinking he and Kitty are an item." Terry would've still bet on rejection himself, but whatever the reason, Kurt made the answer clear each and every time it was brought up. Enough so Terry was feeling a bit bad for the guy over it.

What Peter brought up next was unexpected, but when he thought about it, Terry had to nod. Things that had been brought up, like his enemies knowing who he was and where he lived, along with how he'd seen Kurt act in a few situations kind of pointed in that direction. Along with another conversation they had. "Yeah, I can see that. Even powers aren't going to be much help in deal with how this place tries to mess with heads." Nowhere near as good as experience, or so Terry thought. Considering that he was pretty much an ordinary human hanging around a bunch of super-powered teens, he figured the assumption was reasonable.

"Kurt brought up something the other night too. He's worried about having to kill." And before Peter could go making the wrong assumption, Terry quickly continued. "I told him I'm not exactly a fan of the idea either. Truth is I've made it a point not to go there back home." Not that he hadn't wanted to; Blight, Fixx, even Big Time. They weren't people that Terry was exactly quick to mourn. But at the same time, there were moments when he'd almost had to kill someone. That time when Superman tried to off the entire JLU came to mind, and what had Terry done then? Hesitated and almost gotten them all killed.

"I told him that it's better for us to take on the burden than letting innocent people get sucked into this mess. The kind who don't have any sort of experience or powers." And if the comparison Peter had made held true, Terry knew there'd be just as many faces popping into Peter's head then as there were in his own. "It's not comforting, but it's the truth, and I think Kurt agreed with that. Still though."

Saying, doing. Two things that were farther apart than the worlds they were all from. Even Terry couldn't say with certainty that he could kill a human being when the time came. Just thinking about it made his stomach tighten enough to make him think Peter had been lucky to miss the waffles.

"All we can do is be there for them, you know?" They couldn't stop Kurt and Kitty from fighting; not only did Terry think the other two wouldn't go for it, the truth was that even people like Peter and Terry needed the help. Hell, even someone like Bruce Wayne needed the help in a situation like this, and that was saying something. "They've got a good start, so maybe they'll be able to toughen up okay. At least I don't think they'll break."

Or so he hoped. But the lingering voice in the back of his kept reminding him that Wayne was missing, and as much as Terry wanted to deny it, that it could mean he was broken too.

[gothamsfuture]

Talk about Kurt being naked in every sense of the word instantly lost it's interest when Peter said two words: Bat Signal. Terry had reasoned early on that Kurt and Kitty couldn't be from his world, just based on what Kurt had said about mutants. He'd kind of lumped Peter in with that, particularly since nothing about his abilities or his costume rang any bells. Terry had spent enough time reading Bruce's files to know that no one would or could be more thorough in terms of keeping track of people. That made the casual remark all the more striking; someone Bruce didn't know about who was a hero, knowing about that? Anyone else, it could've just been an oversight. But it wasn't, and Terry knew it.

"Yeah, they would be." It was easy to tell from Terry's voice that the rest of the conversation was over. He'd wanted to keep his connection to Wayne and Batman secret for as long as possible, but he couldn't risk Peter throwing out the tidbit to the wrong person. So he looked around, then without warning or ceremony Terry caught Peter by the upper arm and headed towards what looked like the most empty spot in the room. It wasn't the first time he'd wished for privacy, but Terry would've given just about anything to make sure he wasn't going to be overheard just then.

"Okay. No games, and no pretending you don't have a clue what I'm talking about." Terry kept his voice purposely low, and his wariness had to be apparent to anyone who looked. Some might have called it careless, but given the hell they were in, Terry couldn't help but think it wouldn't stand out too much. "I need to know everything you know about bats right now, so spill."

[fuzzy_diablo]

"Come on now, Kurt. You can't spend all day in the Cafeteria!"

"But I'm not done!" the mutant protested, his nurse dragging him by his (perfectly round) ear out of the Cafeteria. He'd still managed to hold on to a paper plate with two waffles still on it, though. Apparently some nurse thought he was 'terribly thin' and wanted him to eat more. Not like Kurt was complaining.

"At least here you can talk to someone. I worry about you, Kurt, you're so shy!"

Yeah, he thought. Because I feel like I'm lying by just standing in a room and looking normal.

With a warning not to spill the rest of his breakfast onto the carpet, the nurse left him. Kurt idly tore off a bit of one of the waffles and walked over to the bulletin board, hoping that Peter and Kitty had responded. When he saw Peter talking to Terry, though, he had to blink in surprise. Well, this was even better than a note!

"Hey guys!" Kurt said, inserting himself into the conversation without even pausing to see if they were talking about something serious. He was far too excited to see Peter was alive, after all. "...wait, what's this about making out?"

...maybe he should have stopped to listen first.

[gothamsfuture]

Okay, so maybe Terry had been a little impatient. Chalk it up to his frustration over being here, over Wayne being here and then being gone, whatever. What it meant was, that when Peter gave his reply, Terry let out a sigh and put a hand to his head.

Really, couldn't anything ever be simple?

"You brought it up, remember?" No, he probably didn't. Peter had thrown out the term Bat Signal as if it was so common, anyone should know about it. "You joked about Kurt having his own Bat Signal. That hits close to home for me. Too close for me to just let it go, understand?"

He'd better. Even Peter couldn't be that thick, or so Terry hoped. What he hadn't been hoping for was their sudden visitor, and it was really hard not to let his frustration show when Kurt walked up. Trying to reassure himself that Kurt had very likely seen his emblem the night before wasn't really helping, but Terry had to resign himself either way. The bat was out of the bag, so to speak.

"Okay, no one is making out unless you two have a thing I don't know about." Terry, for one, had a girlfriend he cared for a great deal back home, thank you. And he certainly wasn't in the habit of kissing strange superheroes. "More importantly, I need to know what Peter knows about my world. And you too, Kurt." Because if Peter did somehow have knowledge about a completely different dimension (or whatever it was), then it was possible that Kurt or Kitty did as well. All in all, it was a slagging heap that Terry really wasn't too pleased to be dealing with. "What do you guys know about Batman?"

[fuzzy_diablo]

Kurt blinked.

What did he know about Terry's world? Well... that people made themselves look like him, for one (which seemed like a stupid thing to do, really, though Kurt thought he might like to visit if that sort of thing was normal). They used words Kurt had never heard before, like 'slagging', and mutants weren't around. That... was pretty much it.

Kurt was going to ask if 'Batman' was some mutant he should have heard of, but then Peter filled in some blanks. It would have been a dumb question anyway, given that Terry didn't know what a mutant was.

"I've never met him either. And where's Gotham?" Kurt asked Peter with a raised eyebrow. "Should I know him too?"

[gothamsfuture]

Well, at least someone seemed to be taking this seriously. Kurt didn't exactly give off the impression that he'd be a convincing liar anyway, and Terry wasn't picking up anything that screamed 'hiding something' from him. Peter, on the other hand? Terry had seen terrified street punks put up a better front than that.

"No. Neither of you should." But Peter still seemed to, somehow, and that was the problem. "Gotham's my home city, and yes, Batman protects it. But knowing about the signal and not about the cape?" Terry's raised eyebrow should have been more than enough to tell Peter that no, he wasn't buying his story or the Eiffel Tower, thank you very much.

But when it really came down to it? What was more important was making sure no one else got a hint of what Peter might know. Landel's might have lacked crazy snake-men trying to turn everyone into reptiles--and even that wasn't a given--but it had it's share of bad guys already. If the wrong person got wind of what Peter could know, then superpowers or not, the kid would be in trouble.

"All right. Here's the deal." And though he was also speaking to Kurt, who had learned far more than Terry ever wanted him to thanks to circumstance, his focus was almost entirely on Peter. "I know you know more than you're telling me, and I can't help that. But don't breathe a word about anything related to Gotham or Batman to anyone else. There are people from my world here, good and bad, and maybe some I don't even know about yet. If you let the wrong thing slip, someone could get seriously hurt, including either of you. Just because we're locked up in an insane asylum doesn't mean they won't have their way with you. In fact, some of them couldn't ask for a better setting."

[fuzzy_diablo]

"H-hey, come on, guys," Kurt said, moving himself surreptitiously between the two just a bit. If there was one thing he could smell, it was a fight--from miles away. Probably came from hanging around Rogue so much. "We're all a little tense because of this, secret-identity thing. I mean, it's tough enough being here, but with all the other stuff we have to deal with, it's even tougher.

"Alex--" Fortunately Peter had said Terry's fake name just then, so he caught himself before he totally blew it. "--Peter's dealing with the same sort of thing, so I'm sure he's not going to go posting it all over the bulletin board. He hasn't even mentioned that I'm a mutant on the board because he knows how nervous I am about it.

"And Peter, Alex is just worried that someone from his world is going to like, jump him or something. You know the feeling too, right? If you thought someone was going to blow your identity, you'd be worried too, I think..."

Kurt looked between them awkwardly. He didn't want to see them fight, but he didn't mean to get all preachy and ramble on like that. The mutant looked down at his plate.

"Erm... either of you want a waffle?" He didn't really feel like eating them anymore. Plus, he couldn't think of anything to say.

[gothamsfuture]

Maybe if he wasn't so worked up himself, Terry would've handled the whole mess differently. Probably better. But as it was? Kurt was right to think that a fight just might have been in the near future. Terry at least had enough self-control to keep from throwing a punch at every little provocation, but that didn't mean he wouldn't jump into an argument if he saw the need.

Like now, pretty much.

"It's not a secret in my world, sure. But you aren't from my world, which means you shouldn't know about it. So what else do you know that you shouldn't?" Luckily for them both Kurt stepped in before Terry could get anything else out, and said what they were both trying to without the sacrasm or accusations. And then, as if that wasn't enough to make Terry feel like a bit of an ass? He offered them waffles.

"...Kurt, I am never going to be able to look at you without thinking of a puppy." Terry meant it in the nicest way, really. But keeping up the fight beyond that would've made him feel like he was kicking said puppy. Definitely time to let it go.

Terry sighed, then shook his head. "Look, I didn't mean to jump on your case. I don't think you're an idiot. I just made a stupid mistake once--took off my mask to save a kid. Then the kid nearly gets killed because the wrong people found out. It kind of drove the lesson home a bit hard." Especially since it had only been the kid's imagination that had saved Terry from being outed as Batman. He'd be hard pressed to name a time he'd been more relieved than when that action figure's face showed up on the screen instead of his.

"And it doesn't really help that no one has heard from the original Batman in days." Terry was almost reluctant to add that in, but at the point, he probably owed the other two the honesty. Plus, if he was really truthful, Terry kind of wanted to tell someone. He hadn't realized how much he needed a confidant until Max found out his identity. Maybe he'd missed it more than he'd realized. "He's here too." Or he was. It was a thought Terry wasn't about to say, but couldn't help adding in his head. "And he's not exactly the most talkative guy, sure. But this isn't like him."

There weren't many things that the silence could mean. None that Terry could think of, anyway, and certainly none that were good. For a long moment, Terry didn't say anything else, or even look at Peter or Kurt. It was easier to look out into the room then, at least until Terry was sure that Wayne still hadn't showed. He sighed again, then turned back to the others to get the rest out. "I know none of that doesn't give me the right to be a jerk, but maybe it'll make it a bit easier to make peace when I say I'm sorry."

[fuzzy_diablo]

If Kurt had still had his tail at this point, he would have been flicking it happily. He thought there would be an argument (mostly because Terry didn't seem like the type to let things go and Peter was definitely on-edge today), but it seemed as though he'd helped avoid it. They were actually talking and considering each other's points of view.

His happy mood, though, crashed and burned when Peter told him the news about Matt and Logan. No wonder he hadn't seen Matt for a few days. He'd thought he might be sick or something--but Logan gone too? It was like he'd been punched in the stomach. The last thing he remembered was Logan telling him to stay awake after he'd been burned.

Kurt looked down at the waffles both Terry and Peter had refused, as though looking for Logan and Matt in the little indentations. He didn't say anything, though. Not when Terry might have lost someone too. Maybe that was what the red insignia on the front of that suit had been--a bat. He hadn't gotten a very good look at it before the night had ended. And Peter's girlfriend had been thrown off a bridge... the worst Amanda ever got was disapproving stares.

"I think the milkshakes are a good idea," Kurt muttered. He could use a cheeseburger right about now.