no more hiding [complete]
WHO: Gar Logan and Danielle Moonstar
WHAT: Dani has Gar listen to her worries
WHERE: Seattle
WHEN: a few days after Rictor comes back from being Ported out (backdated)
WARNINGS: angst, wah, blah blah
SUMMARY: So if you're a mutant you have powers right?
Quiet pants broke the quiet of a trail in Discovery Park. Dani knew in the back of her mind she was pushing past her limit but every time she thought to stop, the brief message Ric had delivered about the Scarlet Witch, about Wanda, made Dani just want to keep running. To keep thinking about the trail ahead and get rid of the worry that arose in her mind. She panted taking another turn in the trial to take her deeper into the park, away from the sight of buildings. To give her the illusion that no one, not even the Capekillers could watch her.
As she got closer to the water Dani veered off, slowing to a jog when she didn’t feel like she had something behind her. When she had gotten to the water’s edge, she grabbed the first rock she saw and hurled it over the water.
The illusion that she couldn’t be watched was just that. Illusion. Gar was spending time in the park in order to live up any good weather and free time he could get, and, let’s be honest, he might have been doing a little girl-scoping when Dani ran by.
He’d originally just followed along in order to say hello whenever she finally stopped, but hung back when she did. She’d been running that she was determined to be somewhere... And the rock-throwing? His over-stressed senses were tingling.
He was in the trees, a green squirrel stuck somewhere in the foliage. After a moment’s hesitation, giving her a minute to breathe, he scurried down a trunk and left the treeline, stopping close by her.
“You seem troubled, champ.”
A squirrel was talking to her. Which would have been a lot stranger if it hadn’t turned out to be a green squirrel. At least she’d seen something like this before. Dani sighed, caught between trying to come up with an answer or telling him to get away from her.
But the run still hadn’t stopped her from still wishing she could be doing something--anything else--than thinking about Rictor’s news and what it could mean.
She let out a self-deprecating huff. “That is a really nice way of putting it.”
Dani raised her eyebrow at her new woodland friend. “And you’re out here what? Exploring the forest?”
“Getting out of the house. The city proper doesn’t hold a lotta prospects for green guys, these days. I figured, hey, why not get back to nature?” He took another scurry to get closer to the water, quirking his head at his own reflection before looking up and gesturing his small arms back into the wooded area. “Gotta say, the fauna ain’t so great, either.”
Has he mentioned he kinda dislikes this place most of the time? Because he kinda dislikes this place most of the time. Anyway.
“You wanna talk about it? I can turn into something a lot less laughable.”
“Anything to make me feel less like Pocahontas please,” Dani tried reply jokingly. It fell flat.
She waited as Gar shifted and took a deep breath, trying to reset herself. A slow breath in and a slow breath out later she was less edgy but still unsettled about the news from Rictor.
Since losing her powers, Dani had done a lot to find out what else she was made of. She thought she had gotten that down. But maybe she had only been fooling herself. She wasn’t sure. But she hadn’t wanted to talk about it with everyone else. They couldn’t understand. Or had their own wounds to deal with.
“Yeah. Yeah I guess I do want to talk about it.”
He shifted, grew back into a man with the bright-green coloring still intact. This would be easy enough, listening. She’d done the same for him. “Alright. Go ahead.”
Simple enough. He didn’t know if she wanted to move anywhere, but he’d let her decided where they were going and what they were doing. He’d just be ears and, if need be, an attempt at reason or consolation.
She pulled her hair back behind her ears and heaved a deep breath.
“Back in my world, there were hundreds of thousands, maybe even millions of mutants that populated the world. One of those mutants was Wanda. She was so powerful that for a time we all found ourselves living in a new world--kinda like our dark future, where mutants ruled the world. But it turned out that someone had tricked her into creating that spell and when it broke, she did too. After learning that she had been manipulated, she cast a spell that took away mutants.
Our powers, our abilities, whatever it was in our DNA that made us mutants was gone. And it was so sudden for some that they died right then and there. Or it made them easier targets. I was part of a race that was down to less than 200 mutants and I’d lost a part of myself too. It was enough to get me sent away for a little while. Well, enough to make me want to leave.”
She paused, thinking of past memories.
“I spent a lot of time trying to figure out who I was after I lost my powers. Turned out I was still Danielle Moonstar. And most days, that’s all I need--I don’t have to prove anything. But I couldn’t really explain it to the rest of them. Sure, I didn’t need my powers, but it was like telling someone that they didn’t need an arm to live. Life’s what you make of it, I get that. And probably a few were happier without it, but something that had been mine all of my life had disappeared because of Wanda and I had to live with that.”
She sighed, “It didn’t stop there. War broke out and mutants were being hunted down. Most of us left ended up living on one island. And after all this time, Wanda’s now been found and giving people back their powers.”
As Gar listened, and he did shut his mouth and listen, he couldn’t help but recall his own feelings about similar matters. It was all about relating, right? That was part of understanding. He tried to take all of that, what he knew from experience and what he’d always thought about himself, and regurgitate it as words that made sense.
It took a second. He breathed and shrugged, reaching up to rub at the back of his neck.
“I got shut off for a couple days, not too long ago. Back home, I mean, not part of some crazy flashback where everybody’s Beaver Cleaver. I felt like I couldn’t move, or hear, or smell... It’s the little things, you know? So. I understand that, to a degree, I just... I got to go back, which is great, ‘cause... Who knows if I’m as awesome as you? I’m not much more than this.”
Too much about him, though. Doofus. He paused and scrunched his nose up. “That whole thing sounds like a raw deal, though, especially if people died and suffered. What? ‘Oh, sorry you had to live like shit for a while and go on a journey of self-discovery while witnessing all this crap. Never mind, then.’”
This was the lady Leonard was all up-in-arms about, right? Phenomenal cosmic powers... “Day late and a dollar short, huh?”
Dani appreciated that he took a moment before saying anything. A quick answer would have been a simple answer. And Dani didn’t think there was anything simple about this. She did send him a small smile though.
“You are pretty awesome. I just dumped a whole mess on you.”
She sighed, picking up another rock and throwing it over the water with less frustration.
“Yeah, a raw deal. But compared to a lot of people I got off lucky. Amara lost her boyfriend, Sam lost brothers and before coming here Illyana was missing most of her soul. I got over feeling sorry for myself. But I didn’t really stop being angry. Especially when it seemed like more people came after us.”
She paused. “I don’t think I could ever forgive her. But...I don’t know if I would have her give me back my powers.”
“Yeah, I... I’d be wary about that kinda thing, too, I guess. It’s probably best to stay away from that kind of power in the first place, much less letting it tamper with you more than necessary.” And that was just the technical side of it, not considering the emotional part of why Dani might not want her powers back.
It wasn’t like he could be much more advisable than that, however. For all that he was told, he couldn’t feel exactly what she felt or apply her reasoning to it. He just knew that she sounded right; she had a problem she was trying to figure out and she was making headway.
“I guess you just gotta weigh the pros and cons, huh? Easier said than done, but... Yeah.” He looked down, kicking at the ground a little. “For the record, you’re... You know. A gorgeous, fun, deep, complete person. Whatever you decide is just icing on a pretty sweet cake.”
Gar had a point about that, Dani admitted. Rictor may have his powers back but who knew what else Wanda had done to him. Was she afraid of that? Dani asked herself. Or was she afraid of what she could get back? Her power had been fading before Wanda’s world of mutants. Did she want to go through that again?
A look of pain crossed her face before it cleared. The questions weren’t any easier but at least she knew what she was dealing with. She took a deep breath. Held it. And let it out slowly.
She turned to face Gar as he kicked the ground. Yeah, he was cute, she thought with a smile. When he looked up she threw her arms around his neck and gave him a big hug.
“Uh.” Gar let out a little noise of surprise, and he stilled upon being grabbed up, immediate and sure reaction not coming to him. He hadn’t been expecting a hug, really. Maybe just a snort at his cheesiness or something along those lines.
But, hey, he’d take a hug.
After the second of processing, he returned the hug with care, maybe something like hesitance, and patted her a little awkwardly on the back. “No worries, ‘kay? Everything works out one way or another.”
Dani smiled again as he awkwardly returned the hug and she took a quick breath before letting go and stepping back. She took a moment looking down before facing Gar, looking a little more like herself.
“That was kinda cheesy Gar,” Dani said in a dry tone. But it was without criticism. “But I appreciate it.” She picked up another rock, throwing it out again to see if she could skim it, this time paying attention to doing just that.
More quietly she continued, “Thanks for that. For everything you said. I know not a lot of it made much sense.”
“Yeah, well...” He shrugged, back to playing it cool. “Nothing makes much sense, you know?”
And that was the truth. He idly bent down for his own rock to toss, also trying for a skid. One, two, and bloop! Into the water. He was out of practice, though, couldn’t be helped or blamed.
“I’m here whenever you need a cheeseball pick-me-up, though. That’s straightforward enough.”
“Being in this world, I guess not. Magic markings, superhero capekillers, it feels like they’re playing with us aren’t they?” Dani rubbed at the base of her throat where her star stood out for anyone to see. “But we’ve gotten this far.”
Dani looked around the park, it was still quiet where they were but the sun was shining a little brighter as the sun starting crawling up. If they had been anyone else this could’ve been just a normal day.
“And cheeseball works every now and then. Just...not too cheesy.”
Gar tended to forget about his own mark, a circle behind his right ear at the base of his skull, unless he caught it in the mirror. Impulsively, he reached up to touch it as she touched her’s, frowning for a second. Yeah. That was still kind of a weird thing. And the chip... His was still in place.
He cut off that stay thought, though, and cracked an easy smile instead. “Alright. I’ll be careful about that. I’d hate to disappoint you.”
Dani gave him an easy smile of her own in return. “Good.”
She took one last deep breath in and let it out. It felt a lot better than any of the other times she’d tried to do that this morning.
“I’m feeling better now than I was earlier this morning.” Dani checked over herself, “Though I could probably use a shower later. But first, food.”
“So,” she said putting her hands on her hips, “unless you’ve had your fill of forest acorns and nuts, wanna come with me and find some breakfast?”
“What? Am I gonna eat everything I find on the floor? Come on.”
The joking was still a little faulty-sounding in his ears, on the tail-end of more serious discussion. No point in worrying about it, though. He shrugged and turned away from the water, ready to head back out of this faux wild-wood.
“So, yes. That’s a great idea. I love it.”
Dani nodded and they walked away from the water and out of the park.
WHAT: Dani has Gar listen to her worries
WHERE: Seattle
WHEN: a few days after Rictor comes back from being Ported out (backdated)
WARNINGS: angst, wah, blah blah
SUMMARY: So if you're a mutant you have powers right?
Quiet pants broke the quiet of a trail in Discovery Park. Dani knew in the back of her mind she was pushing past her limit but every time she thought to stop, the brief message Ric had delivered about the Scarlet Witch, about Wanda, made Dani just want to keep running. To keep thinking about the trail ahead and get rid of the worry that arose in her mind. She panted taking another turn in the trial to take her deeper into the park, away from the sight of buildings. To give her the illusion that no one, not even the Capekillers could watch her.
As she got closer to the water Dani veered off, slowing to a jog when she didn’t feel like she had something behind her. When she had gotten to the water’s edge, she grabbed the first rock she saw and hurled it over the water.
The illusion that she couldn’t be watched was just that. Illusion. Gar was spending time in the park in order to live up any good weather and free time he could get, and, let’s be honest, he might have been doing a little girl-scoping when Dani ran by.
He’d originally just followed along in order to say hello whenever she finally stopped, but hung back when she did. She’d been running that she was determined to be somewhere... And the rock-throwing? His over-stressed senses were tingling.
He was in the trees, a green squirrel stuck somewhere in the foliage. After a moment’s hesitation, giving her a minute to breathe, he scurried down a trunk and left the treeline, stopping close by her.
“You seem troubled, champ.”
A squirrel was talking to her. Which would have been a lot stranger if it hadn’t turned out to be a green squirrel. At least she’d seen something like this before. Dani sighed, caught between trying to come up with an answer or telling him to get away from her.
But the run still hadn’t stopped her from still wishing she could be doing something--anything else--than thinking about Rictor’s news and what it could mean.
She let out a self-deprecating huff. “That is a really nice way of putting it.”
Dani raised her eyebrow at her new woodland friend. “And you’re out here what? Exploring the forest?”
“Getting out of the house. The city proper doesn’t hold a lotta prospects for green guys, these days. I figured, hey, why not get back to nature?” He took another scurry to get closer to the water, quirking his head at his own reflection before looking up and gesturing his small arms back into the wooded area. “Gotta say, the fauna ain’t so great, either.”
Has he mentioned he kinda dislikes this place most of the time? Because he kinda dislikes this place most of the time. Anyway.
“You wanna talk about it? I can turn into something a lot less laughable.”
“Anything to make me feel less like Pocahontas please,” Dani tried reply jokingly. It fell flat.
She waited as Gar shifted and took a deep breath, trying to reset herself. A slow breath in and a slow breath out later she was less edgy but still unsettled about the news from Rictor.
Since losing her powers, Dani had done a lot to find out what else she was made of. She thought she had gotten that down. But maybe she had only been fooling herself. She wasn’t sure. But she hadn’t wanted to talk about it with everyone else. They couldn’t understand. Or had their own wounds to deal with.
“Yeah. Yeah I guess I do want to talk about it.”
He shifted, grew back into a man with the bright-green coloring still intact. This would be easy enough, listening. She’d done the same for him. “Alright. Go ahead.”
Simple enough. He didn’t know if she wanted to move anywhere, but he’d let her decided where they were going and what they were doing. He’d just be ears and, if need be, an attempt at reason or consolation.
She pulled her hair back behind her ears and heaved a deep breath.
“Back in my world, there were hundreds of thousands, maybe even millions of mutants that populated the world. One of those mutants was Wanda. She was so powerful that for a time we all found ourselves living in a new world--kinda like our dark future, where mutants ruled the world. But it turned out that someone had tricked her into creating that spell and when it broke, she did too. After learning that she had been manipulated, she cast a spell that took away mutants.
Our powers, our abilities, whatever it was in our DNA that made us mutants was gone. And it was so sudden for some that they died right then and there. Or it made them easier targets. I was part of a race that was down to less than 200 mutants and I’d lost a part of myself too. It was enough to get me sent away for a little while. Well, enough to make me want to leave.”
She paused, thinking of past memories.
“I spent a lot of time trying to figure out who I was after I lost my powers. Turned out I was still Danielle Moonstar. And most days, that’s all I need--I don’t have to prove anything. But I couldn’t really explain it to the rest of them. Sure, I didn’t need my powers, but it was like telling someone that they didn’t need an arm to live. Life’s what you make of it, I get that. And probably a few were happier without it, but something that had been mine all of my life had disappeared because of Wanda and I had to live with that.”
She sighed, “It didn’t stop there. War broke out and mutants were being hunted down. Most of us left ended up living on one island. And after all this time, Wanda’s now been found and giving people back their powers.”
As Gar listened, and he did shut his mouth and listen, he couldn’t help but recall his own feelings about similar matters. It was all about relating, right? That was part of understanding. He tried to take all of that, what he knew from experience and what he’d always thought about himself, and regurgitate it as words that made sense.
It took a second. He breathed and shrugged, reaching up to rub at the back of his neck.
“I got shut off for a couple days, not too long ago. Back home, I mean, not part of some crazy flashback where everybody’s Beaver Cleaver. I felt like I couldn’t move, or hear, or smell... It’s the little things, you know? So. I understand that, to a degree, I just... I got to go back, which is great, ‘cause... Who knows if I’m as awesome as you? I’m not much more than this.”
Too much about him, though. Doofus. He paused and scrunched his nose up. “That whole thing sounds like a raw deal, though, especially if people died and suffered. What? ‘Oh, sorry you had to live like shit for a while and go on a journey of self-discovery while witnessing all this crap. Never mind, then.’”
This was the lady Leonard was all up-in-arms about, right? Phenomenal cosmic powers... “Day late and a dollar short, huh?”
Dani appreciated that he took a moment before saying anything. A quick answer would have been a simple answer. And Dani didn’t think there was anything simple about this. She did send him a small smile though.
“You are pretty awesome. I just dumped a whole mess on you.”
She sighed, picking up another rock and throwing it over the water with less frustration.
“Yeah, a raw deal. But compared to a lot of people I got off lucky. Amara lost her boyfriend, Sam lost brothers and before coming here Illyana was missing most of her soul. I got over feeling sorry for myself. But I didn’t really stop being angry. Especially when it seemed like more people came after us.”
She paused. “I don’t think I could ever forgive her. But...I don’t know if I would have her give me back my powers.”
“Yeah, I... I’d be wary about that kinda thing, too, I guess. It’s probably best to stay away from that kind of power in the first place, much less letting it tamper with you more than necessary.” And that was just the technical side of it, not considering the emotional part of why Dani might not want her powers back.
It wasn’t like he could be much more advisable than that, however. For all that he was told, he couldn’t feel exactly what she felt or apply her reasoning to it. He just knew that she sounded right; she had a problem she was trying to figure out and she was making headway.
“I guess you just gotta weigh the pros and cons, huh? Easier said than done, but... Yeah.” He looked down, kicking at the ground a little. “For the record, you’re... You know. A gorgeous, fun, deep, complete person. Whatever you decide is just icing on a pretty sweet cake.”
Gar had a point about that, Dani admitted. Rictor may have his powers back but who knew what else Wanda had done to him. Was she afraid of that? Dani asked herself. Or was she afraid of what she could get back? Her power had been fading before Wanda’s world of mutants. Did she want to go through that again?
A look of pain crossed her face before it cleared. The questions weren’t any easier but at least she knew what she was dealing with. She took a deep breath. Held it. And let it out slowly.
She turned to face Gar as he kicked the ground. Yeah, he was cute, she thought with a smile. When he looked up she threw her arms around his neck and gave him a big hug.
“Uh.” Gar let out a little noise of surprise, and he stilled upon being grabbed up, immediate and sure reaction not coming to him. He hadn’t been expecting a hug, really. Maybe just a snort at his cheesiness or something along those lines.
But, hey, he’d take a hug.
After the second of processing, he returned the hug with care, maybe something like hesitance, and patted her a little awkwardly on the back. “No worries, ‘kay? Everything works out one way or another.”
Dani smiled again as he awkwardly returned the hug and she took a quick breath before letting go and stepping back. She took a moment looking down before facing Gar, looking a little more like herself.
“That was kinda cheesy Gar,” Dani said in a dry tone. But it was without criticism. “But I appreciate it.” She picked up another rock, throwing it out again to see if she could skim it, this time paying attention to doing just that.
More quietly she continued, “Thanks for that. For everything you said. I know not a lot of it made much sense.”
“Yeah, well...” He shrugged, back to playing it cool. “Nothing makes much sense, you know?”
And that was the truth. He idly bent down for his own rock to toss, also trying for a skid. One, two, and bloop! Into the water. He was out of practice, though, couldn’t be helped or blamed.
“I’m here whenever you need a cheeseball pick-me-up, though. That’s straightforward enough.”
“Being in this world, I guess not. Magic markings, superhero capekillers, it feels like they’re playing with us aren’t they?” Dani rubbed at the base of her throat where her star stood out for anyone to see. “But we’ve gotten this far.”
Dani looked around the park, it was still quiet where they were but the sun was shining a little brighter as the sun starting crawling up. If they had been anyone else this could’ve been just a normal day.
“And cheeseball works every now and then. Just...not too cheesy.”
Gar tended to forget about his own mark, a circle behind his right ear at the base of his skull, unless he caught it in the mirror. Impulsively, he reached up to touch it as she touched her’s, frowning for a second. Yeah. That was still kind of a weird thing. And the chip... His was still in place.
He cut off that stay thought, though, and cracked an easy smile instead. “Alright. I’ll be careful about that. I’d hate to disappoint you.”
Dani gave him an easy smile of her own in return. “Good.”
She took one last deep breath in and let it out. It felt a lot better than any of the other times she’d tried to do that this morning.
“I’m feeling better now than I was earlier this morning.” Dani checked over herself, “Though I could probably use a shower later. But first, food.”
“So,” she said putting her hands on her hips, “unless you’ve had your fill of forest acorns and nuts, wanna come with me and find some breakfast?”
“What? Am I gonna eat everything I find on the floor? Come on.”
The joking was still a little faulty-sounding in his ears, on the tail-end of more serious discussion. No point in worrying about it, though. He shrugged and turned away from the water, ready to head back out of this faux wild-wood.
“So, yes. That’s a great idea. I love it.”
Dani nodded and they walked away from the water and out of the park.