Kiden cracked open her eyes, and glanced upside-down from her lying position at the guy who had just called out to her. She wasn't entirely sure how to answer that question, because it seemed perfectly clear to her that she was, in fact, doing nothing more than laying in the sand.
“I'm working on my tan,” she said, finally, picking up the carton of cigarettes that she'd rested against her stomach. Kiden placed a cigarette between her lips, and carefully lit it.
“Hi. What's up?” she added, almost as an afterthought, as she blew smoke into the air.
“Good guess.” Kiden dragged on the cigarette, like she was trying to get through the whole thing in one go. Whenever she was on the verge of getting her thoughts into order, someone else turned up on the beach. “Kid. Kiden Nixon. Whatever makes you happy.”
“Uh huh, I'm freaking out alright,” Kiden said, staring up at his hand. “Like, really freaking out, even if stupid shit like this keeps happening to me, lately.”
However, seeing that Zell appeared to be relentlessly cheerful calmed Kiden a little; if he was grinning like that, then the island couldn't have been all bad.
“Can we pretend that I shook your hand? Because mine are covered in blood and dirt, and apparently I'm truly disgusting and can't be bothered to walk over to the ocean to wash 'em off.”
With Zell next to her, Kiden finally sat up, and shook the sand out of her hair. She rolled her shoulders back, irritated, because the sand had managed to get caught between her skin and the fabric of her shirt.
“Fighting monsters, huh?” Kiden asked, vaguely interested. She tilted her head to the side. “What are you? Some kind of reject from the X-Men?”
An Earth thing? Kiden furrowed her brow; she was under the impression that most things were Earth things. The day was strange enough already, but she knew better than to say that it couldn't get any stranger.
“Okay. We're not from the same world, and I slow down time and hang out with dead people.” No matter how sarcastically she spoke, what she said was, for better or for worse, entirely true. “Right. Whatever. I'll go along with this, because it sucks when people don't go along with me. So. The X-Men are a group of mutant heroes, and they run around dressed in spandex. It's pretty stupid.”
Kiden listened to Zell's explanation with a blank expression. Once he was done speaking, she fought off the urge to break into laughter. Partly because she wouldn't want to be laughed at in his position, but mostly because with the mood she was in, if she started laughing now then she'd never stop.
Still, she couldn't bring herself to disagree with him about the X-Men.
“I'm not making shit up,” Kiden eventually said, taking more time than was probably necessary to absorb all of the information. “Apparently, I just don't know when to keep my mouth shut.”
With her cigarette smoked down to the very end, Kiden stubbed it out against the sole of her shoe, and then flicked it out onto the beach. She knew that there were no real limits to what mutants could do, and while the comment about spells wasn't usually something she heard, she knew that magic wasn't entirely out of the question.
Kiden was willing to believe Zell, about things getting better. Right now, her mind was going at a million miles an hour, and her thoughts were bouncing around the inside of her skull, and quite possibly leaking out of her ears. Once her head cleared, Kiden was hoping that she'd be able to deal with all of this better; and maybe it'd even work out for her on the island, because nothing was working out back home.
Freaking out on a beach was a much better alternative to having her brains blown out, at any rate.
“Awesome. So I get to be part of the welcome wagon, and I can spend my days wandering around the beach, saying hi to people who are freaking out in the sand,” Kiden said, shrugging. “Not like I had much else to do, anyway. What about you, Zell? How long you been here?”
Kiden fixed her eyes on the spot that Zell was pointing out at. It was nothing more than an ordinary stretch of beach, and although she didn't expect to actually see anything, she kept staring. Six months was definitely a longer period of time than she was comfortable taking into consideration. She had been hoping for days, and expecting weeks, at the very worst.
“So, I could just vanish at any moment, and end up back in New York?” Kiden asked, and then shifted her gaze back out to the sea, “God. Ms. Palmer's gonna be pissed at me for disappearing like that. She's definitely not gonna appreciate that.
“Don't you have any friends here, though? It can't suck completely. Six months is enough time to get to know new people, right?”
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“I'm working on my tan,” she said, finally, picking up the carton of cigarettes that she'd rested against her stomach. Kiden placed a cigarette between her lips, and carefully lit it.
“Hi. What's up?” she added, almost as an afterthought, as she blew smoke into the air.
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However, seeing that Zell appeared to be relentlessly cheerful calmed Kiden a little; if he was grinning like that, then the island couldn't have been all bad.
“Can we pretend that I shook your hand? Because mine are covered in blood and dirt, and apparently I'm truly disgusting and can't be bothered to walk over to the ocean to wash 'em off.”
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“Fighting monsters, huh?” Kiden asked, vaguely interested. She tilted her head to the side. “What are you? Some kind of reject from the X-Men?”
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“Okay. We're not from the same world, and I slow down time and hang out with dead people.” No matter how sarcastically she spoke, what she said was, for better or for worse, entirely true. “Right. Whatever. I'll go along with this, because it sucks when people don't go along with me. So. The X-Men are a group of mutant heroes, and they run around dressed in spandex. It's pretty stupid.”
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Still, she couldn't bring herself to disagree with him about the X-Men.
“I'm not making shit up,” Kiden eventually said, taking more time than was probably necessary to absorb all of the information. “Apparently, I just don't know when to keep my mouth shut.”
With her cigarette smoked down to the very end, Kiden stubbed it out against the sole of her shoe, and then flicked it out onto the beach. She knew that there were no real limits to what mutants could do, and while the comment about spells wasn't usually something she heard, she knew that magic wasn't entirely out of the question.
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Freaking out on a beach was a much better alternative to having her brains blown out, at any rate.
“Awesome. So I get to be part of the welcome wagon, and I can spend my days wandering around the beach, saying hi to people who are freaking out in the sand,” Kiden said, shrugging. “Not like I had much else to do, anyway. What about you, Zell? How long you been here?”
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“So, I could just vanish at any moment, and end up back in New York?” Kiden asked, and then shifted her gaze back out to the sea, “God. Ms. Palmer's gonna be pissed at me for disappearing like that. She's definitely not gonna appreciate that.
“Don't you have any friends here, though? It can't suck completely. Six months is enough time to get to know new people, right?”
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