Logs: Walter, Alice, the Sikorskis
X-Men: Movieverse 2 - Monday, October 20, 2008, 2:16 PM
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=XS= Library - Lv 1 - Xavier's School
Light from bay windows gleams off glossy plastic dust jackets snugged over an assortment of old books, while volumes less delicate peek out from high oak bookshelves in a multicolored array of bindings and sizes. Stretching twelve feet high, ladders on rolling tracks are needed for access to the highest shelves, bearing the oldest books. On lower shelves, the bright colours of paperbacks catch the eye, along with binders of academic journals. A few marble busts compete with the potted plants scattered here and there to rid the room of any qualities of stagnation and Victorian must, Long wooden tables serve as group work spaces, or even teaching space in a pinch, but the majority of the furniture consists of comfortable armchairs and overstuffed sofas, with coffee tables in position for tired feet or coffee cups. The darkness of the wood panelling and the rich green carpeting is relieved further by a plethora of reading lamps, lighting the room where the tall windows leave off. Around a corner narrowed by two offices, doors lead out of the genteel history of the library and into the cool future of the main computer lab.
[Exits : [G]reat [H]all, [C]omputer [L]ab, [X]avier's [O]ffice, and [J]ean's [O]ffice]
[Players : Walter ]
It is not marking that holds Dr. Grey's attention today. It isn't SCIENCE! either. No, what has Jean out in the main area of the library and taking full advantage of a large study table's space is a series of maps, blueprints, and stacks of other Official Architectural And Surveying Stuff. In deference to stain-avoidance, she's forgone a cup of coffee while she pores over them, hair pulled back in a butterfly clip and neat black reading glasses sliding down her nose.
Walter has slipped down into the library to return a book, but is distracted by Jean's rather sprawled out study material. He sets the book down on a table and walks over, going up on tiptoe to get a better look from farther away, trying to make heads or tails of it.
Jean offers a vague wave in greeting, not looking up from squinting at the current blueprint to hold her attention. Stamped in one corner with the seal of approval of a New York City planning commission, the date is a couple years old. The words 'Worthington House' can be made out amongst the rest of the title of it, jumbled in with arcane shorthands and numbers whose meanings are known only to architects and bureaucrats.
Walter's eyes lock on the title, and he comes closer, trying to get a better look at the plans. "Why are you looking at the safehouse plans?" he wonders.
"To see where they went wrong," is Jean's answer, paired with a rustle of paper as she attempts to unroll the plans a little more, and pin them down with a stack of books. "The Sanctuary's building is in that pile over there."
"Doors that are really hard to open from the inside," Walter says with a frown, looking over towards the Sanctuary's plans with mild confusion. "Are you worried we'll get attacked too?" he wonders, the fear fairly obvious in his voice, but there's something else there. Almost a volunteering of assistance, albeit a hesitant one.
"No." Jean's responses are brief, but without the clipped tones of irritation. Indeed, as she resumes studying the plans with an abstracted expression, she seems simply lost in thought, with Walter and the other minds of the mansion present on the fringes of her awareness. "Well, yes," she amends. "But only in a what-if way. This is for something else."
"Can I ask?" Walter wonders hesitantly.
"Sure," says Jean, pulling a notebook from atop the stack of books holding the blueprints flat, and scribbling down both her observations, and, after a glance to Walter, his. It takes a moment after that to realize that the question was meant to prompt more of an answer than permission to ask another question. "Oh. Possibly just a pipe dream at this point, but since they both were firebombed there hasn't been any sort of outreach center in the City."
"Oh... I know Cassy suggested underground escape tunnels when Mr. Worthington asked for advice," Walter says. "You know, like the school has, but smaller scale. Maybe a nice sturdy basement you can't get to except from inside the building? Basically, the school, in miniature."
"The school also costs us a huge amount of time and resources to keep secure like this," Jean answers, thoughtful as she steps away from the map to pace a slow orbit around the table. "As Professor Summers pointed out to me," she admits with a crooked smile. "The Sanctuary also had below-ground access, which is, if I recall correctly, how they got a number of people out. We can't do the school in miniature, not the least because we can't drill drop-in visitors in escape plans like we drill you guys... but there's got to be -some- way."
"Well, just the architecture stuff, like the tunnels, and a basement. Don't need all the guards and cameras and blackbirds and stuff," Walter muses. "Make the tunnels more obvious?" he wonders. "Like, instead of a hidden panel, they even have the 'exit' sign, only secret is where they let out?"
"Well, it's an idea I'll bring to the table," Jean promises, even if she herself looks a little dubious as she studies the plans. (She does write it down in her notebook.) "Emergency exits are mandated by law anyways. I'm hoping to get some inspiration on how to prevent the firebombings from happening again to begin with -- I'll be studying some Israeli developments after this."
"Tie you to the front door with an IV of caffeine and sugar?" Walter suggests with a small, joking smile.
"Amusing," Jean grants, with a twinkle in her eyes as she looks up and over at him. "But, alas, not terribly practical. I was thinking more looking at shatter-resistant films for the windows, fire-retardant furnishings, that sort of thing. There have been some interesting advances, thanks to suicide bombers."
"How expensive would those aquarium walls be? You know, like the really big aquariums have. Or maybe just double pane the windows, like they do on some airplanes. Think it's supposed to save you money on heating too," Walter suggests after some thought, just throwing ideas out now.
"That... is something I'll have to look into," says Jean, but obediently takes another note. "Honestly, Walter, this is still extremely preliminary work. It may still amount to nothing," she cautions.
Walter nods. "I know... I... just don't really have much going on until Halloween, so... I'm just trying to keep help, not like I have much better to do."
Jean's eyebrows lift at that, in a look that's pure Teacher. "If you're doing that well in your classes, I could probably find some additional assignments for you," she offers.
Walter flinches at that. "Oh, um, I meant /aside/ from school work!" he defends quickly
"How are you doing in your science courses?" Jean inquires, bland of tone and gleaming of eye. "I'm sure Hank could find something in the lab that needs an assistant..."
"Good," Walter says. Apparently better than he is in English, at least. "And I think I'll be fine," he says.
"Well, if you're looking for something to do..." Jean offers a final time, before letting that drift out to a silence and a study of him. "Plans for Halloween, though?" she belatedly wonders.
"Not any big ones," Walter says. "Just thought I'd try and do a horror movie thing, since AMC doesn't look like it's doing one this year. Still say we should make a big, open to the public haunted house one year," he says. "Though that'd probably be a security nightmare."
"Well, not an -impossible- one," Jean reflects. "But something that should probably be proposed in the spring, so we can plan it out over the summer."
"Well, there's always next year," Walter says. "I think we could probably do some interesting stuff. Save some money on special effects, but not super scary or anything like that, fun scary. Super scary would be bad for PR, I think," he says with a smile towards the teacher.
"Is it senior year for you next year, or junior?" Jean wonders, returning to studying her blueprints, but with less intensity than before.
"Senior," Walter answers, blinking a little bit at the revelation that he's been here so long already.
"Goodness," says Jean, in a moment's startlement that suggests this is a revelation for her, too. "It's almost time to start thinking about what your next step after high school is going to be."
"College, not sure what one," Walter admits. "Thinking about getting into medicine, or something," he says with a shrug.
"Medicine... if you want to get some practical experience with that, I could use an extra volunteer at the Mustard Seed," Jean offers.
Walter flinches. "Um... maybe when I'm actually in college for a bit," he says. "Kinda... heard Tim's horror stories."
"It's not--" The words 'that bad' are bitten down on, as Jean opts to avoid discussing Tim's timidity and whether Walter shares it. She looks instead to the table and the blueprints, and offers a "I could also see about whether there are job shadow programs at Lennox Hill instead. Better neighbourhood?"
"I'll think about it," Walter says. "I still have a year before I really have to decide, right, and I can always change majors if Medicine doesn't work out, right?" he wonders
"Absolutely," Jean assures. "Medicine can just be tricky to get into, and what you do in high school can count. I don't want to make you feel like it's your only option," she assures still more, reaching over to begin rolling the blueprints back up. "But I also don't want to fail at giving you the tools you need to make it happen."
"Well, I've been taking mostly biology and stuff for sciences," Walter admits. "Anyway, I'm going to go back upstairs, see if Tim's up to anything. Maybe I can teach him how to play video games or something." He turns, heading for the door, the book he came to return still sitting on the table.
Walter, meet Outreach. Outreach, Walter.
X-Men: Movieverse 2 - Thursday, October 23, 2008, 10:53 AM
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=XS= Library - Lv 1 - Xavier's School
Light from bay windows gleams off glossy plastic dust jackets snugged over an assortment of old books, while volumes less delicate peek out from high oak bookshelves in a multicolored array of bindings and sizes. Stretching twelve feet high, ladders on rolling tracks are needed for access to the highest shelves, bearing the oldest books. On lower shelves, the bright colours of paperbacks catch the eye, along with binders of academic journals. A few marble busts compete with the potted plants scattered here and there to rid the room of any qualities of stagnation and Victorian must, Long wooden tables serve as group work spaces, or even teaching space in a pinch, but the majority of the furniture consists of comfortable armchairs and overstuffed sofas, with coffee tables in position for tired feet or coffee cups. The darkness of the wood panelling and the rich green carpeting is relieved further by a plethora of reading lamps, lighting the room where the tall windows leave off. Around a corner narrowed by two offices, doors lead out of the genteel history of the library and into the cool future of the main computer lab.
[Exits : [G]reat [H]all, [C]omputer [L]ab, [X]avier's [O]ffice, and [J]ean's [O]ffice]
Good light, a good book, and a cat behaving, for once, as a proper and placid cat ought to by sitting on the arm of a chair with a tranquil purr. Jean Grey, it appears, has taken advantage of certain percentages of teenagers being away in the City to indulge in some Me Time. That this is happening in a corner of the library, easily findable, suggests that Dr. Grey has a few things to learn about actually taking time for herself.
Or perhaps she's just prepared should an emergency occur, as one seems to have with the way Walter pushes open the library door, glancing around quickly. He hasn't even stopped to set down his shopping bag. He makes a b-line for the headmistress.
The esteemed Dr. Grey would probably know something was wrong long before Alice and Walter entered the room. In Alice's white voided mind, the ever-present Lists are surging and churning as usual, but there is a strange... damp chill covering them, like the remnants of a spring thaw. She's also pretty clearly upset, a strange cloying desperate desire and longing coloring all her thoughts along with the normal selection of worry and paranoia. Physically, her eyes are red and puffy and she has the air of someone who is walking to the Principal's office for a scolding.
By the resigned intake of breath and the slow and steady stiffening of her spine as Jean sets her book aside, (Wyndham's 'The Chrysalids', by the state of the cover an old favourite.) emergency preparedness is seeming more and more likely. By the time Walter and Alice arrive, the moment's irritated Why-can't-I-get-a-break? that's come with it has been well-drowned beneath a tide of concern at what she's sensing across the mental aether. "What happened?" says Dr. Grey, green eyes intent behind her reading glasses.
"Telepath," Walter says, giving a little shudder and a concerned look towards his companion. He's not quite as jumbled as Alice, but anger, concern, embarassment, and helplessness all dance across the mental landscape. "She cornered us at the mall."
<< She knows! She's a telepath, too! She -knows-! >> the words leak out from Alice's mind, echoing on the Lists. She can't meet Jean's eyes and instead just focuses on the cat nearby. "There was a... another, too," she says softly, "T-the, um... t-the big terrorist g-guy who would be with Magneto on the n-news." An image of Creed, looking particularly scary, pops up in her mind.
"I know you're very distressed, Alice," Jean murmurs, answering strayed thought with spoken word, and a brief pat to the chair next to hers. "But only because you're broadcasting that just like your body language would say the same thing. Did this woman do anything to you?" is asked. "Was she there with Victor Creed?"
"I... don't know, we... I guess we lost Creed, then she showed up, and... well, she didn't do much to me but..." Walter glances towards Alice, frowning with concern. "She... messed with Cessily too, but... I think she went up to her room."
Alice hesitates, eyes looking at the chair before flickering nervously to Walter. In the end, though, she moves towards it and sits down. But she still doesn't meet Jean's gaze. "She... c-controlled me," Alice replies awkwardly. And it's the truth... but not the whole truth. That cloying longing surges a bit in her lukewarm thoughts before dying down again. "And, uh... y-yeah, Cessily was... was p-pretty bummed about the whole thing. I've n-never seen her that... depressed."
"How are you feeling about that?" Jean wonders of Alice, managing to keep an intent look on both her and Walter simultaneously, through the judicious use of splitting her glances equally between them. "It... can be pretty traumatic, to have your actions, your feelings, not be your own. It's one of the reasons why people fear telepaths... and I wish I could say it was groundless, but you've just had proof that it's not."
Walter is awkwardly watching Alice, a light blush on his cheeks. He chooses to stay standing for now, fidgeting lightly.
"I f-feel /fine/," Alice insists, frowning and crossing her arms over her chest. Of course, she's not fine and one doesn't have to be psychic to see it. "I've... I've had w-worse problems before." Quick! A diversion! "Do you t-think that, er... that Creed was w-working for Magneto? I m-mean... the whole Statue of Liberty thing..."
"Creed works as Creed wills... and we'll surely report this latest sighting to the authorities," Jean promises, answering the diversion with prompt gravity and a sitting-forward in her seat. Alas that the diversion is only temporary! Still sitting forward, Jean's eyes focs steadily on Alice's face, and her expression is brushed with a wincing sympathy. "Alice... I hate to ask this of you so soon after what's been done to you, but would you be willing to let me look at your mind? Telepathic influence leaves behind, well, a 'fingerprint' of sorts," she explains. "I'd like to try and find out who this woman was, and what she did to you."
"She dug around a bit in my head too, if Alice doesn't wanna let you," Walter says. "I'm... not sure if it'll help, but..."
Note to self: Work on diversionary tactics. Alice squirms uneasily in her seat, biting her lower lip. Ooh, that's a pretty ooky thought, to have another telepath wandering around in there. Walter's suggestion grabs her attention, eyebrows arching, and she looks about to agree, but stops and instead frowns. "N-no. No, it's okay, Walter," she finally says uneasily, "You... you at l-least fought back. I... I didn't do anything." There's more guilt attached to that statement than is strictly called for. She wanted it. She -liked- it. The green haired teen squares her shoulders and finally looks right at Jean, "I, uh... I c-can at least do this, if n-nothing else."
"I might still want to check you over to make sure you're all right," Jean murmurs to Walter. "But, in the meantime, could you go to the kitchen and tell Madame Vargas that I'm doing some psionic work, and we'd like a snack tray for three?" See, Alice? You may be having your psychic integrity violated again, but there will be cookies this time! With an inhalation and a squaring of her shoulders, she turns back to Alice, nods once, and offers the teen her hand. "'Fighting back' against a telepath, particularly a strong one, often isn't possible," she assures. "You don't need to blame -yourself- for anything, Alice. But take my hand," is directed. "It will help me make contact as gently as possible."
"There... wasn't much to fight back against," Walter admits. "Like I said, she... didn't do much to me, not like you and Cessily," he says to Alice, frowning. "And sure," he says to Jean, turning to leave, giving the two some privacy for the moment.
"Yeah, I guess," Alice replies to Jean, but it's pretty clear she doesn't take the 'don't blame yourself' and 'there wasn't much to fight back against' mantras to heart. She takes a deep breath then hesitantly reaches out for the offered hand, grasping it lightly. "Okay, s-so... um. How do I d-do this? Do I have to, uh... focus my chi or s-something?"
"Chi... you know, I'd never thought of it that way," admits a Jean momentarily derailed by memories of too many bad kung-fu movies. Shaking her head slightly, she closes her hand around Alice's, touch the light clasp of a sensitive. "But no," she assures, letting her eyes ghost shut as she braces for the first impact of Alice's mind against hers. "I'd just like you to think back to the events. Play through them in your mind for me, and I'll watch as you go through them."
"Oh... okay," Alice replies uneasily, closing her eyes as well, her brow furrowing in concetration. Much of the trip to the mall, the mass breaking of things in the stories, the embarassing borrowing of funds from Walter and Cessily, is run through in Alice's mind in a fast-forwarded flurry of motion. Things return to normal time when Creed arrives, stepping in front of the trio and looking very menacing. 'If you give a good chase, maybe I won't carve up the back of your heads.' Much of the ensuing chase is blank, only a black expanse of fear and panic, then suddenly... the three are in that empty hallway. Creed is nowhere to be seen, but an attractive (if smug) blonde woman arrives around the corner. There is only a brief flicker of recognition from Alice, though Jean might recognize her as Emma Frost -- though she's aparently slumming it today in decidedly banal dress of blue jeans. A discussion about them not being terrorists ensues when, suddenly, there's a flash of cold wind and Alice's mind is flash-frozen. The Lists become covered in frost, some completely encased in crystal ice. And then... there's a feeling of peace. A feeling of pure, crystalized clearity; no panic, no fear, not anything. While there is no joy to the feeling, perse, those emotions frozen as well, it is very appealing to Alice. She is willing -- even eager -- to do the bidding of the one who had given this great gift. She attacks Walter, pinning his arms behind him while the White Queen works her cold magic on poor Cessily. A command is given and Alice lurches forward to kiss Walter on the cheek, no emotion attached to the gesture. Walter breaks free -- there is pain when she hits the floor, but it's merely an interesting sensation with no real emotive significance -- Alice immediately goes after him again, but is stopped by another command and gesture from her Queen. Walter and Cessily, in a spikey rage combat each other when the Queen asks, 'Do you like the fear?' There's a bit of a blurr in the memory here, but there is a sudden, painful rush of emotion and a desperate, seething desire to return to that wonderfully peaceful, clear state. Emma Frost looms ominously above Alice and a voice says in her mind, 'If you want it...' And then, she turns walking away and saying one last thing out loud, 'Tell your headmistress to begin jumping at shadows'.
The clasp of Jean's hand, once light, grows steadily viselike as the memories play out. Sparking orange rage flickers in her mind as the attack goes forward, threatening her chicks new and old, even as more analytical sections remark on how odd, how strange, how peculiar, and what could she possibly want...? But at the end, Jean's hand shakes loose before bruises can be left, and with arms wrapped suddenly about herself she sinks back into her chair, eyes open and eyes wide. "Emma..." she murmurs. "Oh, Emma, you -fool-. -Him-?"
If there's anyone who keeps a closer eye on the weight of the metabolic mutant than himself and the entire medical staff combined, it's Madame Vargas. WHen he returns, he's loaded down with treats and goodies and drinks, precariously balancing them on a large tray, enough to fatten him up several pants sizes, if his metabolism was normal.
Alice drags in a gasping breath as the telepathic link breaks, the green haired girl, shrinking back in her seat and shuddering while rubbing her hand. "Emma?" she asks peering at Jean curiously, "You... you k-know that woman?" Alice doesn't bother waiting for a response though. There are snacks. And she attacks them with vigor, her hands still shaking from the memory. At least eating gives her something to do, something to try and block out that horrible desirous want that still clings to her mind.
"I do," says Jean, dark of eye and voice alike. "And I will go deal with her." Rising from her seat as Walter arrives with the tray, she snitches a couple of cookies in passing, and then wafts out of the room.
Wherein Houston discovers that it has a problem.
X-Men: Movieverse 2 - Thursday, October 23, 2008, 8:38 PM
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=NYC= Sikorski Apartment - Queens - Apartments in the Sky
The apartment is roomier than its Manhattan counterparts, second-floor with wide windows overlooking the street. There is even a tree, huddled between the front of the building and the street on a thin scrap of lawn. The arms of its branches loom close to the window. There are two bedrooms branching off a main hallway with a large, creamy-tiled bathroom set between them. The living room has an old, dark green carpet and the kitchen, while narrow, is quite long and has room for a good many appliances and a much-vaunted gas range. It has a sort of pink and gold country kitchen feel, decorated with wicker baskets and many-colored flowers, vases, and potholders. The television is small, shoved up in one corner of the living room, and the couch is old but very soft, with two blue and white checked cushions against its warm brown upholstery.
[Exits : [O]ut]
[Players : Tom ]
Tom is usually home a little before his mother on nights that there is no practice, so Sam is quite confident, as they approach the apartment building, that he will be there to greet them when they reach the door. Suited in lilac beneath the beige warmth of her trenchcoat, she has been chattering at Jean all the way from Gradient Genetech with the slightly breezy air of a woman who is more nervous than she feels she ought to be; her hair is twisted back in a neat French braid, her cheeks flush with the cool October afternoon, as they blow into the lobby. High heels clicking lightly over the floor as she moves for the stairs, she has somehow gotten onto the topic of chocolate chip muffins. "--except I don't ever make them that big anymore because the trouble with having large muffins around is that then you have ... you know, very large muffins. I think the school thing has been going okay, mostly -- I mean, you know, he's never been the most social with his peers so I don't know if anyone would have noticed anything, especially since like I said he's had a bit of help ..."
"Just how big a muffin are we talking, here?" Dr. Jean Grey, doctor, scientist, activist and fellow mom, is apparently all too happy to aid and abet the chattering. Following in Sam's wake up the stairs, she frees her own hair from the butterfly clip it's been conscientiously escaping from over the course of their journey, twisting it back up and clipping it back in place with absent precision. "Grapefruit sized? ...But honestly," she admits, with a serious look drawing slight and tired crinkles at the corners of her eyes, "Just knowing what's happening might be a thing. Tom's been spared having to question his sanity, at least..." She trails off, hands now free of hair and hair clip finding their way to the pockets of her charcoal wool coat. "Has he been showing any signs of interest in experimenting with these abilities?"
"About yea big," is the absent-minded response as to muffin size, sketched in the frame of hands. Sizeably. "As to that, well, I'm not sure," Samantha says with a faint crinkle to her brow. "I mean, I'm no telepath, Doc -- I don't know how I'd tell." Her nose crinkles with the bright flash of her grin as they move down the hall toward the door to their apartment.
Inside the apartment, Tom is watching television with boredom writ across his face, his head propped on his palm. Minds flit at the edges of his attention, reception cast in a wide net to catch the familiar flavor of his mother's thoughts on the approach.
Jean's mind is a contrast to the flatscans around her, simultaneously a bright spark and a muffled voice, where surface thoughts are shielded, but the psyche they belong to all the more distinct. There is power present, but above all there is control, letting only the barest thread of awareness loose to brush past Tim's net in greeting. "Well," says Jean to Sam, "Some kids talk to their parents. Some don't. But you might tell he's using his abilities more intensely because he's gotten a recurring psionic headache, or you can't keep anything with sugar in the house longer than half a day... although that could just be pre-teen."
Chasing the thread of power and awareness like an astral kitten with a ball of string, Tom whirls into a sharper alertness with the sense of a new presence. Hello! He turns off the television, sitting up sharply on the couch with his hands on his knees as he turns to face the door. He is looking towards them when Sam opens the door, unusually bright-eyed and fresh with curiosity.
She does so midsentence. "Oh, well, yeah, you'd be amazed how fast we go through cookies and stuff," she tells Jean on the breath of a laugh. "But I've been baking like crazy the last month or so, so it's not like it's, you know, going missing or anything. Hey, Tom!" she carols. "C'mere and say hello."
"Hullo, Tom," greets Jean, a smile half-crooked on her lips, and a twinkle in her eyes as the interest, noticed down the hallway, now has a face to go with it. << A few changes since I saw you last, I see. >> is offered mind to mind. Her mindvoice is reasonably congruent to her speaking one at this level of shielding, if more resonant and with faint hints of burning leaves and pie spices to season it in ways that words alone can't share. The autumn weather is foremost in the thoughts lingering near the surface, it seems.
Telepathic communication, from Tom, is not sophisticated: he is pleased as punch at the moment, cheerfully smug about those blossoming changes. << You could say that. >> Embodied curiosity in bright, brassy hue shines at her, multifaceted. The underlying strain of the abnormal (and self-proclaimed genius) trapped in a mundane world is a quiet ember beneath the happier flash and bang of his psyche. He rises from the sofa, moving with an air of distraction across their apartment as his mother shuts the door and starts unbuttoning her trench coat. His spoken greeting is a mumbled afterthought, his focus entirely on what is going on several figurative meters above his mother's head.
"Your mom was telling me you've been getting some pointers on telepathy," Jean continues, switching back to spoken for the benefit of the non-telepath in the room, but with some echo of her words still transmitting to Tom's mind all the same. (Split focus is apparently less of a problem, 27 years on.) "But I offered to swing by and see if you want or need any more... that, and I can't bake, your mother can, and enough cookies have been left at the lab to make me want to trace them to their source." A neat movement has her coat pulled off and folded over an arm, a second and a third see her shoes shuffled off to be tucked in against the wall by the door.
"She bakes a lot." Tom follows Jean to the spoken word reluctantly, and speaks shortly with an almost diffident shrug. He spiders contemplatively against her shields, not trying to plow through them so much as to comprehend them: almost a slickness, flavored with autumn air and spices. "The cookies are pretty good. I'm glad she hasn't been dumping them in the garbage. -- I've had some help," he adds vaguely. << What can you teach me? >> he asks, eagerness sparking like electricity against her shields. Associations wind through the question, 'teach' connected to Adel, who will be Hair Guy on some level until the end of time, and to whom Tom has attached big brotherly significance.
Samantha laughs, meanwhile, as she hangs up her coat on one of the hooks by the door. "Make yourself at home," she invites, "and you're more than welcome to any of the cookies and stuff that's around, too. Can I get you anything to drink? We've got milk. Or diet soda. Uh. That's about what we've got."
"I think milk is traditional with cookies," is Jean's mock-grave analysis of the drink situation, as she and her coat head over to the couch and take a seat. "A glass of it would be great." Thus at a natural break in the conversation, she drifts her attention back to Tom and telepathy like a swirl of bright leaves caught in the wind. A wide field, rich with possibility and all the delights of the harvest, stretches out before the mind's eye, and the eager sparks meet a laughing answer of << Well, what would you like to know? >>.
<< Everything! >> is the obvious answer to that. Tom actually snorts aloud, scrubbing his hands over his jeans. He doesn't think it is funny, though; his greed for knowledge is endless, an avaricious ocean lending its depths to the sense that accompanies the single word. He lays out lessons learned and half-learned and a month of solid and intensive practice, often with his mother as an unsuspecting and unknowing guinea pig to extremely minor tampering: without shame and without bright earnest, he proudly lays the dead bird of information at Jean's feet. << I have been learning how to not listen, and how to listen a little. And how to hide. >>
Samantha turns and strides briskly into the kitchen, following the bright smile that goes with her nod, and sets about arranging for a few tall glasses of cold 2% milk. She also starts collecting various baked things from their receptacles in areas of the kitchen to layer into a handy basket to bring into the living room. These hostessly duties keep her well occupied for the moment.
Jean's eyebrows twitch a little at the more ethically-dubious areas of Tom's tutelage, but as kittens are not cats, the matter can be addressed at some other time. << That, >> she notes, unstinting in her praise for all her assessment comes in cooling shades of wintry analysis. << Is really amazing progress, all things considered. >> Shuffling herself more comfortably onto the couch, she interlaces her fingers, purses her lips, and wonders << Have you learnt about the Astral Plane yet? >>
Tom's smile flashes wide and bright, lighting his young face as he bounces on his heels, turning in a slow swivel to follow her vaguely driftily toward said sofa. He mops up praise readily, though hardly ego-starved, and weaves them neatly into his private tapestry of happy arrogance. Distracted from possible swaggering by potential new information, he pounces upon the phrase and tries to concoct a mental image from the question -- the result is a wispy, ghostly sort of fighter jet. << What's that? >>
Jean's lips twitch at the mental image, despite her best efforts not to laugh, and one hand lifts to rub across her treacherous mouth and smooth it all away. << Well, personally I think whoever initially called it that was indulging in a few too many interesting mushrooms, >> she notes, a dry vein of humour glinting through her words. << In reality, it's nothing more than letting yourself be aware of the network of mental activity that makes up our minds and the minds around us. That doesn't really do justice to what it feels like, though. It's a little like being Neo in the Matrix. >> she suggests, with a mental voiceover of "Whoah..." in the background.
Sucking in his cheeks, Tom peers thoughtfully at Jean, for a span of heartbeats looking more at her face than he is focusing on the telepathic connection between them. << Network? >> He shows her a new mental image, comprised of LAN cable and routers, connecting some random stick figures at the head. Why in his own mind he sketches people as stick figures is not immediately clear.
Meanwhile, his mother emerges from the kitchen bearing cookies and milk on a tray, which she carries over to the couch. "Here you guys go," she says. "I'm sure you've got a lot to talk about so I'm going to duck in my room and change real quick, okay?" With a sunny smile and the tip of what might be an imitation salute up by her temple, Sam gestures toward the hall and her closed bedroom door.
"No problem," sayeth the Jean to the Sam. "Although when you're done, if the lessons go well, I might want your help as a spotter. I'm going to show Tom the Astral Plane." With this framed in approximately the same tones as a science teacher might explain a demonstration of water and cornstarch, Jean flashes Sam a smile, and turns back to Tom. << In a way. >> is her answer. << You can think of it as a network, or as a web, or as grains of sand in an hourglass. However you want to visualize it, we are surrounded by all the other minds of the world. And on the Astral Plane, the only thing you're aware of -is- the minds. And because we are telepaths, we can shape it. It's like sharing a mental image, >> she tries another angle, popping up an image of an excitable kitten chasing a glittering thread. << Except you're sharing more than just the picture. >>
"Er, okay!" Sam says, tipping her head with a slightly puzzled blink. "Whatever you need me for. I'll be right back," she adds, chipper as much as ever.
Picking up the thread, Tom pulls it for the kitten as he lifts his thumb to bite at the skin where nail meets cuticle. "Huh," he says aloud, concentrating on the glitter of the thread and making it glow instead like a thin ribbon of white light. << We shape it? >>
Pounce! POUNCE POUNCE POUNCE. The thought-kitten explodes after the ribbon of light in a series of joyful leaps as Tom's change is incorporated into the image, and reacted to in kind. << We shape it. >> Jean confirms. << Like you're doing right now with the thread, except even moreso. >>
Tom laughs, watching the kitchen follow the glow of the ribbon. He twirls it, letting it spin in front of the kitten's nose. He doesn't exactly try to commandeer the kitten, but he knows -- knows -- what kittens do when the string they are chasing does unusual things: they spaz the heck out! << How does it work? How does it be more than now? >>
Obligingly, the kitten spazzes. A wall was not part of the mental image previously, but one adds itself in, just in time for the kitten to carom off of it, rocketing around to try and sneak up on the spinning ribbon from an angle it will clearly -never- see coming. Jean, it seems, is also familiar with the ways of kittens. << Right now, the kitten is a picture, an image shared between our minds, but we're both still aware that we're sitting here in your mother's living room, in an apartment, with people around us, the street outside... >> Further expansions in words are unnecessary, as the sensory impressions from where Jean sits are wrapped up, analyzed, and presented to Tom with a metaphorical ribbon wrapping them. << When you are on the Astral Plane, the only thing you're aware of, the only thing you're sensing is the thought. It surrounds you, is part of you... the kitten, on the Astral Plane, would be as real as your knowledge of kittens and your attention on making it appear could make it. On the Astral Plane, >> she offers, swapping the kitten-image with a crooked smile. << You could have a dragon. >> Indeed, something small and red and bristling with spines is now flapping after Tom's ribbon, puffing little gusts of fire at it.
Closing his eyes to better focus on the image Jean is sharing with him, Tom's face scrunches with the crease of his forehead. The glowing ribbon catches with a spark of flame, curling thin blue smoke as its tail dissolves to cinders. It doesn't quite work like a real fire; the ribbon seems to melt away into ash, rather than burning properly. << So like ... when you're asleep and it's all in your head? >>
<< Exactly. >> Sunlight's warm approval shines from Jean's mind, leaving the dragon to pause and curl and bask in it, although not without a cheerful corkscrew roll at the ribbon's demise. << In fact, sleep and dreaming is often when your connection to the Astral Plane is the strongest. With training, you can learn to go there conscious, though. And if your mother's all right with it when she comes back, I can show it to you today. >>
Tom tips his head, considering. His mouth curves in the slow slide of a smile, and he reaches out with a plaintive spark of summons into his mother's mind, in her room, where she is hopping into her jeans. << Mom! Hurry up! >>
Jean observes the edges of this interplay with a soft snort, and the reflection of "I'm glad -my- son is still too young to do more than emote very pointedly at me." But there is no malice in the musing, and she opts to take a nibble of a cookie while she waits. Telepathy takes care of good manners while her mouth is full. << So, has Hair-- Adel taught you anything about meditating? >>
<< Meditating? >> Tom reaches for a cookie of his own, as though reminded of the existence of cookie, although he wolfs down the peanut buttery thing in only a few bites. << Not exactly like -- yoga. >> The thought that accompanies that is somewhat baffled by the idea. Adel does not strike him as a yoga sort of person. << So you aren't listening to everything at once. >>
Samantha bounds back out of her bedroom, dressed down in jeans and the light pink blouse from beneath her suit jacket. "Okay, I'm here," she says, and makes a sort of 'tantaRA!' noise. "Whatcha need?"
<< A very important thing to learn. My telepathy showed up when I was ten, and it wasn't 'til I was eleven that my parents and Dr. Xavier found each other. >> Heavy gloss is applied to the background thoughts behind this story, smoothing over darker memories of the time with a blur tool that Photoshop would be jealous of. << Meditation is about clearing and focusing your mind, learning to tune out the outside world. Very important if you're going to learn how to get to the Astral Plane on your own, some day. >> And aha! A Sam! Jean pops the last of her cookie in her mouth, chews, swallows and smiles. "Just to keep an eye on us. I'm planning on showing Tom what the Astral Plane looks like. It's a level of telepathic awareness that most people only see while dreaming, so while I'm an old hand at this, and can take him there and back safely, we'll be out like a pair of lights to all intents and purposes. Just in case anything goes wrong -- which I can't see happening -- a good shake of the shoulders should bring us back awake again."
"Okay," Samantha says after a slightly frownish pause. She moves across to sit down in a chair, turning it slightly to face the couch as she hooks her arms over its rests. "I'm here."
Moving to sit down beside Jean on the couch, Tom turns his ankles inward to balance his heels against the front of the furniture. He takes a breath, giving her an expectant look. << My telepathy showed up ... >> The turn of memory is unpleasant, still edged with anger and discomfort. << It's lucky Hair Guy was here. >> He is firm about this, resentment quashed.
<< Ouch. >> is Jean's comment on the memory, for a moment bereft of the remove between teacher and student, woman and child, and left merely human-to-human and wryly sympthetic. She offers Tom a crooked smile, before drawing in a breath, closing her eyes, opening them, and then pronouncing an "All right, let's do this. Now Tom," says she, slipping back into the spoken word/mental echo of earlier. "I'd like you to close your eyes, let your muscles all relax, and let your mind relax too, so that I can make contact with you. I'm going to count backwards from ten," she intones, the words given the weighting and phrasing of some small ritual. "And then we'll make the shift to the Astral Plane. Ten... nine... eight..."
At the end of it all, witness one Jean with her head lolled bonelessly against the back of the couch in Sam's apartment, and the rest of Jean standing expectantly in the middle of an expance of white. Matrix indeed.
Relaxing completely is actually difficult for Tom, even with guidance. When he closes his eyes, he scrunches them very hard, and concentrates on their being closed, for example. But after a false start, he gets there, lids lightly closed and breathing slowed as he follows her guidance out into the white.
Tom takes a deep breath of what isn't air, and looks around at the white with a faintly critical gaze. It is like approaching Jean down a long hallway, without walls or ceiling or floor, but he can still imagine that he hears his own footsteps, even though in real life he isn't actually wearing shoes. He does not appear as anything much, beyond the sense of his /self/, and the sound of footsteps.
Jean is dressed differently than she is back in the apartment, sporting a beloved sweater, comfortable jeans, and bare toes upon which there is a glimmer of electric midnight blue polish. "As you can see, you show up wearing what your mind is most comfortable wearing. You can change that with a thought, though." Jean herself doesn't change, but an encouraging hand is waved to Tom. "It's also all white here because I'm keeping pretty neutral, and most of my mind is shielded away. But go on," she encourages. "Make the kitten here."
"Okay." Tom seems to find having a mouth to be weirdly novel here, or at least, he is awfully focused on the two syllables: O, and K. Huuuh. He looks at Jean, his sense of self firming as he considers. Then he stares at an indefinite point in the blank white backdrop, focusing on the image of the kitten from before. It starts as color, mostly: a hint of tabby marking, the distant memory of a loud, rattley purr. But as he thinks about it, he infuses it with more of the idea of kitten, like the platonic ideal of baby cat -- and then with a more specific kitten shape, bright-eyed, long-whiskered, clumsy-footed. It is a slow process, like a kitten being built out of K'nex or Legos by a mind geared as much towards putting things together mathematically as to leaps of imagination.
As the kitten takes shape, Jean provides the background for it, slipped in to help anchor it with ideas of what kittens do when presented with a fluffy cat bed, a rattling toy mouse covered in fur, and, finally, a cat dancer consisting of feathers, string and a long wand to wave them by, appearing in her hand. Enticingly, she wriggles it at the Platonic kitten. "-Wonderful-," she approves, and offers over the thought-stuff cat toy.
Taking the cat toy, Tom beams with happy self-satisfaction as his tabby-marked grey kitten leaps at the feathery fluff, performing wild flips and tearing back and forth over the white space with a madcap carelessness as to the fact that there doesn't appear to be a floor as such. He laughs with delight, any jaded sullenness or resentment or anything else that might make a 12-year-old crabbily precocious faded to the flash of even teeth and bright green eyes. "I /made it/," he tells Jean with wonder in his voice.
"I couldn't have done as well, at your age," Jean murmurs, not without a slight touch of wonder herself. Wriggling her fingers at the dancing kitten as it passes close by on one of its zoomings, a smile blossoms even as her eyes go vague, and her mind scans the areas of the Plane outside the safe white bubble, alert for signs of shadow. "And now that you've made it, it will be easier to make the next time we visit... but we should probably head back before your mum gets too worried, or I start drooling."
"Oh." Tom lowers the cat dancer even as his kitten pounces Jean's hand to hug onto her wrist, he coughs and folds in on himself a little, blinking a few times. "I bet we look weird." He gives Jean a slightly worried, as well as puzzled glance. "How ... do we get back?"
"Like this," Jean says, and ruffles the kitten's fur before closing her eyes, puffing out a breath, and, with a pulse of concentrated will, returning them both to awareness of the living room. One hand lifts to her mouth in a surreptitious drool-check.
Tom blinks awake slowly, and rubs his palms at his eyes, making a low mumbling noise in his throat. He frowns slightly as he inhales, looking around his living room as with new eyes. After a moment, he says, "Huh."
"Oh," Sam says, "good, you're -- up?" She seems puzzled by her own choice of words, since no one was exactly asleep, and scratches at her head, her hairstyle still largely in place from the workday. "Right," she says. "Did ... are you both all right?"
"All right," Jean confirms, with a light to her eyes. "And your son is quite gifted, Sam. I'll let him tell you about it, though." Jean herself is reaching for another cookie, and the long-ignored milk.
"Haha," Tom says, instead of laughing, and he looks sort of sheepish. "I made a kitten," he tells his mother. He looks a little baffled, not by his experience, but by the idea of relating it. Twitching slightly in his seat on the couch, he gives an itchy glance toward the kitchen.
"Really? A -- a kitten?" Samantha grins, laughter in her breath -- pleased by the praise even if she can make little sense of what Tom just said. "Oh, good. I'm glad to hear it. I think. I really appreciate your coming down, I mean, I know you must be really busy..." She shakes her head, clears her throat, and slaps both hands lightly against her knees. "So I really hope you'll stay for dinner, since you've come all the way out here!" Queens, of course, being back of beyond.
Hungry telepaths make excellent dinner guests. Jean's smile is bright and genuine as she assures that "Sam, I'd love to." Because hungry Jeans are also aware of their limitations in the kitchen, her offers to help out are limited to place-setting and salad-making, with liberal bits of telepathic trivia thrown in. If there is a bit of morality woven into some of the tales, well, this -is- Jean.
Houston takes a break from hunting down the problem to do a little tutoring.