OOC: Raptor Wrap-Up, Nadia, Dazzler, Tobias and Tim
X-Men: Movieverse 2 - Monday, November 24, 2008, 11:19 PM
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=XS= Medbay and Lab - Lv B2 - Xavier's School
Walls are sterile white and surfaces gleam in polished stainless steel, the large room a vision of cool science tinged with the faint medical smell of antiseptic and filled with the soft whirring of autoclaves, refrigeration units, and various medical scanners and devices. Four hospital beds are present near the entrance, curtains rigged to allow for privacy, but pulled back when not in use. In shielded alcoves off the back wall are the resident doctor's pride and joy: A full-body X-Ray machine, as well as an MRI unit and other heavy-duty imagery equipment. Between the alcoves, through a thick glass window, a small operating theatre can be glimpsed. In the lab section, an electron microscope and a pair of gene-sequencers take place of pride, glassware and smaller equipment kept securely locked away in the cabinets underneath and above the work surfaces.
[Exits : [M]ain [H]allway]
The air has that peculiarly aftermath feel of just a little too quiet. The young mutant boy has found a corner to himself, and while he ate the food pressed on him to stave off collapse after using his powers continuously through a difficult birth, he's withdrawn entirely now. In his lap, something that looks like a dinosaur hatchling from a science museum--perfectly formed, curled up, and perfectly lifeless. He's male, so his manner carefully projects that he would never even /think/ of crying, and definitely isn't holding back tears now. Nope.
The local veterinarian, after a few minutes' meaningful low-voiced discussion with the resident doctor, opts to leave the post-fatality consoling to the person specializing in people. He gathers a case of drugs and equipment that proved ultimately ineffective, extracts a sotto voce promise for necropsy involvement, and quietly takes his leave up to where coffee has been promised him, shoulders slumped with weariness, and the realization that, once again, he is not God, no matter what beliefs his med school professors instilled in him.
Jean does not immediately run over to hover over Todd, aware of the prickliness of the average totally-not-crying teenaged male, but eventually there's a rustle of a lab coat, and the soft sound of rubber-soled shoes stepping over to him. The first thing to enter his field of view are a pair of legs, the next an offer of a bottle of overly-sweetened juice. "You did a remarkable thing," says Jean.
"You're probably glad they're dead. You probably think it's better that way." Todd smooths a finger along the top of a tiny head. He doesn't look at her. "It wasn't what I did that killed her." He hesitates for a moment, urgent needs of his body getting louder, and then takes the juice.
"Why would I think that?" Jean turns the assumptions back on Todd, with a quiet tone and a crouch down to both hand off the juice and join him on his level. There is juice for her, as well.
"Because it's unnatural. They burned the first ones I made." Todd takes his hand away from the body in his lap, unable to stand the feel of dead cells any longer. "It's not--it's not cruel. They don't understand what they look like! They don't care!"
"I've got a Ph.D. in molecular biology, Todd," Jean points out, with a sidelong look at him as she tears off the foil cap of her drink, and takes the first, wincing, sip of it. (High-glucose drinks are much more palatable to the young.) "I got it by making mice with X-Factors in them. I think I might have different views on 'unnatural'."
Todd frowns over his drink. "That kid said you saved one of the ones that escaped." He gulps, desperately needing it, and having no problems with the taste.
"She's over in the isolation room," Jean confirms, with a tip of her chin towards where a glimpse of a few scattered chew toys and the corner of a dog bed can be seen through the observation window from their angle. "We've been making friends."
Todd draws in a breath like a dry sob. "They killed them! I can't believe it. They /shot/ them. I worked on them for months, they were my /friends/--" He pushes to his feet so he can see in the window, holding the dead baby with as little skin to skin contact as possible until he can put it down.
There are utilitarian metal basins for holding dead things. Jean opts instead to rises as Todd does, and collect a soft bit of terrycloth towel to offer over instead. "I'll take it," she offers. "And they were attacking people, Todd. I know you probably didn't intend it to happen, but they got loose, and put a few people in the hospital. People got scared, and when you yelled at them to sic people, well... they followed your commands."
"My first ones couldn't defend themselves," is all Todd says, but he dumps the dead body as quickly as possible, and goes to press his nose to the window, making a small noise to see a dino in the bed, happily asleep with head lolling. "But I just wanted you guys to run away. I was trying to move everyone, so we could be safe again."
"Not a bad idea," Jean murmurs, not unsympathetically. "Just what turned out to be very bad tactics. But what made you decide on dinosaurs?" is asked conversationally.
"Because I'd read about them, and it would be all like 'some experts say that they couldn't have run balanced like that' or whatever. But if someone could just /make/ one, it would be so much better than computer models." Todd still stares after his remaining dino. "I like dinosaurs." He frowns thuderously, instantly repudiating something that sounds so young.
"My son is pretty keen on them. He's trying to convince me to let him take her for show and tell," Jean allows, with a slight shake of her head at the image of a velociraptor brought into a class of five year olds on a leash. "She's magnificent to look at. It's a shame she's still very sure she's a dog, though -- she keeps running up against things she used to be able to do that don't work so well now."
"Brains go weird if you try to do anything to them." Todd is very matter-of-fact about this. "That's why I wanted--" He chokes up, and looks back over his shoulder at where the babies are. "So they could grow up thinking they were the right animal--"
"I can see that," murmurs Jean, studying the sleeping not-raptor through the window, and sneaking another sip of juice on herself without looking, in hopes of likewise sneaking the cloying taste past herself. It half works. "Developmental biology is a tricky thing, though. There's so much going on in such a short period of time, with so many cellular and genetic checkpoints to hit. But I'm glad you were trying to work your way through to something ethical and humane, even without anyone there to guide you."
"You have to make it so they can't feel it happen." Another lesson that speaks of some unpleasant mistakes along the way, dryly given. "I don't want to stop," he whines, finally looking at Jean. "I tried not doing it, but I just kept getting better and better ideas--"
"I see," says Jean, taking a moment to see that the stillborn raptor puppy is decently covered up by the towel's wrappings. She looks back again, and gives Todd a small smile. "Well, if you were to come here to Xavier's, or even if not, and you wanted to talk over email, I could give you some help with experimental design. When we work with live animals in the lab, we do a lot of planning and fact-checking on paper before we ever take it to a live model. There are a lot of good books and papers published on how to conduct animal tests ethically. I'd be glad to guide you through them, if you're looking for how to do the right thing."
"Parents won't let me," Todd mumbles. "Guess it's only three years 'til I'm eighteen. Could do it then. If I had the money." He puts his hand on the window. "I can't take her with me, can I?"
"I think, after all this, I may want to arrange to meet with your parents. You might be looking at some charges because of the ones that got loose and injured people," Jean warns, before a crooked smile blossoms for an instant, soon snuffed out. "Although I want to be a fly on the wall as they try and figure out if this still falls under dangerous dogs."
"I don't want to go to jail." Young and vulnerable again, before Todd crosses his arms, taking control of himself. "What are you going to do with her?"
"I don't think it would be juvenile detention, unless things went -really- screwy with our legal system while I wasn't looking," Jean assures, tone steady and her expression solemnly thoughtful once more. "Fines, probably. Perhaps a ban on owning animals. I might be able to help mitigate some of it it if the fact that you're a young mutant experimenting with his powers is brought up. Xavier's is on hand to help in cases like yours... and I think we're probably going to keep her," she answers, with a glance in at the raptor. "If we can get her to unlearn some of the behavioral issues, there's no reason she can't run with our dogs here. If not... well, we'll give her a nice enclosure and a warm sleeping space out in the woods, and see that she gets plenty of visitors."
"I'd visit." Todd apparently can't bring himself to say /thank you/, but it's hovering around unsaid nonetheless. "She's a sweetie. I'm glad she's not dead." He turns away. "I gotta go home or whatever."
Telepath and high school teacher, Jean nods at the hovering gratitude, but does nothing so embarassing as pull it out of the aether for acknowledgement. "I'd like to keep you overnight for observation, since you poured out so much of your energy on this," she notes. "But if you want to call your family, I'll get you a phone."
"'k." Shoulders slumped, head hunched in, hands in pockets. Moody teen shield against the world and real emotion: go! But gratitude remains, hidden. Somewhere.
Closing discussion with the young master of raptors.
X-Men: Movieverse 3 - Monday, November 24, 2008, 11:20 PM
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The girls maybe get a little lost in the middle of one of the verses, what with the crying and the pain and the panic, but focusing on the song and the helpful flow of the crowd outwards is enough to at last get them out of the train station by the time they're just about finishing their second reprise of the entire song. And it's not the first time Alison's sung through tears. "I've got all my love to give, I've got all my life to give. I will sur-- oh!" Alison's a bit surprised when they're out in the clear air outside the subway station, panicked survivors still flooding out into the street, and she scrambles for her pockets, only /now/remembering the panic button hidden in there, as they're able to obtain at least a little space from the panicky crowd. Whoops.
"--vive!" Nadia finishes, her voice still shaky but distinctly louder. She is halfway supported by Alison by this point, and wobbles a little when they finally find room to breathe; her face it pale, tear-streaked and shocky, and her knee is still bleeding sluggishly. As people spread outward, away from them, the panic and pain are tamped down to just what she, herself is still feeling. (This doesn't stop her from projecting, but it is not /quite/ so overwhelming.) At a loss for what else to do, she keeps going on the song. "It took all the strength I ha-had--"
Alison is bleeding a little as well, a hole torn in her jacket (which is generally all-over grubby from falling wall and thrown rocks) and a shallow cut there high on her back, by her shoulder. "Just not to fall apart," she picks up after having managed to hit the panic button. "Tryin' hard to mend the pieces of my broken heart." They will maybe get through that song a time or two again (and then possibly a Britney Spears or Madonna song as well) before the help to the panic button can arrive, and Alison steers Nadia down the street just a little ways from the disaster, so they can sit and rest on the curb, singing while they wait.
Lennox Hill Hospital is, coincidentally enough, not all that far from the scene of the accident. The panic button goes off just before the ER begins gearing up for an influx of potential patients, and thus Dr. Grey, on call for a mutant medicine issue, has not yet been press ganged into lending a hand with her original trained specialty. Thus, as the crowd thins out, but still while there are enough people to leave her looking like an attractively auburn haired salmon fighting upstream, she appears, tracing the panic button's signal and emerging from the crowd near the bleeding, crying, panicking girls and their curb. "Good God," says Dr. Grey, dressed in the good skirt suit of a consultation, rather than the scrubs of a surgery. "Girls-- what happened?"
"'Cause I'm /li/-ving in a /ma/-terial world!" Nadia is in the process of belting through shocky tears, which are much slower and significantly less intense than the panicky ones or the i'm-in-pain ones. She breaks off to stare up at Jean, and the wave of relief that rolls off of her at the sight is a nearly physical thing. "/Exploded/," she hiccups, then leaks into a fresh round of tears. There is a hole in her shirt, exposing a burn that has already begun to blister.
"I /dunno/!" Alison just about wails. "There were -- we were just heading back -- and things started /shaking/ -- " she sets her hands in front of her and shakes them to demonstrate -- "And then things exploded and /everybody/ was panicking and scared and mad." She tips her head significantly at Nadia, to indicate the badness of this. "We're not going on the subway again. /Ever./"
"An understandable sentiment," Jean murmurs, eyes and tone going vague a moment as her mind goes darting after the emotions pouring off of Nadia, and sidles up beside them like an older racehorse pacing a panicked youngster. A nudge here, a suggestion there, and calm is projected, soothing and steadying, to wrap about both girls like an intangible blanket. It will, empathy suggests, be OK. "I think I'm going to call for an EMT pickup for you two, since Lennox is likely to be called in as an ER, because we're going to have to get you patched up. Can you tell me what the shaking felt like?" she asks. "Was it like an earthquake, or like something had gone wrong with the subway car?"
"Felt wrong," Nadia picks up the story after Jean's empathic soother does its work, "in my head, when the shaking started. Like, was in air? Not ground. Not like earthquake. Shaking in air, scared in head. I told Alison, we have to make me happy. So we put on music, like we practice, only it was not enough. We were on platform--" her face blanches, and she adds in a whisper, "Walls, things exploded bad. Girl got exploded. Think she's dead maybe."
"It was like -- a sound I couldn't hear," Alison explains practically overtop of Nadia. "It wasn't the /ground/. It was everything. Bones and clothes and the stuff in your pockets just /shaking/. It was /wierd/. And that's saying something, for me, now." It is only Jean's calm blanket of empathy that keeps this explanation from hiking up high in volume and intensity. As it is, Alison still manages a bit of drama and grumpiness beneath the calm. "I'm gonna listen to some /music/," she declares after listening to Nadia's explanation of the events, drawing headphones from her pocket and plugging them into the music player, drifting away a few steps to fiddle with it and try to get it to work, despite what it's been through, sending off a clear give-me-some-space vibe.
"Did it look like the girl was the center of the explosion, or just having the bad luck of being caught in the middle?" Calm of voice to go with the continued pulse of her powers, Jean reaches for her cell phone, and begins punching in the number for a paging system. "If it upsets you to talk about it, Nadia, then don't feel that you need to answer, but I'd like to try and know as much as I can, so that I can be best able to help people."
There is a slight keening noise that escapes with Alison's drift, but Jean's influence is a lovely thing: Nadia digs into the edge she teeters on, and holds on tight. "Maybe was her? Stopped when she -- after there was -- there were booms, lots of booms, before." A hand drifts to her side, as if she's puzzled by the pain there: it is there in her eyes as she frowns, and it pushes against the wall of Jean's gentling calm. "They were upset," she finally admits, face twisting. "Afraid, maybe. When people got off subway train. If maybe I was better, I could have stopped--"
"Stopping the mood of a crowd from going ugly is something that would be hard for -me-," says Jean, raising a hand to cut off this line of thought, and then using it to catch Nadia's and hold it with a gentle squeeze before she can poke at her burn. "You did well by realizing you needed to keep control of yourself as best you could."
"Alison is good," Nadia says, shifting a guilty-eyed look over at her roomate, still doing her best to ignore the entire situation. "We both try--" She frowns, switching to Arabic: her thoughts follow along right at the surface, translatable even if her words are not. "She keeps music she knows will make me happy, and she talked to me the entire time. It didn't work all that very well, but she /did/ try. It would have been worse without her. I have never been so scared, Doctor Grey." Her eyes are wide and earnest, but it is very obvious that she is still just holding on as tight as she can to that fine line between coherent and a complete mess. "It /hurt so bad/, when the train car exploded. I didn't get hit but they all did, and it hurt it /hurt/ it hurt so bad--"
Jean is a moment in replying to Nadia, because a brief conversation must take place over her cell phone: directing not an ambulance to their location, but a fellow doctor with a car. But when she does, it is without relying on the trickiness of spoken word and language barriers, and it is with a hand lifted to rest gently on her shoulder, warm through clothing, but without the added sensitivity of a bare hand clasping at another. << It's the burden of being a sensitive. When we get back, I'll try and add in some extra practice on teaching you how to build a shield for yourself. >>
Nadia leans in to the touch. Exhaustion leaks on the heels of dulled pain: there is a throbbing setting up residence in her head, as well as in her knees and side. (Her knee probably needs stitches.) << ... i would like it if you called Bahir, >> she answers quietly, << and told Alison I was very sorry. >>
<< I'll call him as soon as you two have been checked over. >> Jean promises, and rubs gently at Nadia's shoulder. << And you have nothing to apologize for, but I'll tell Alison that as well. >>
Nadia leans against Jean's leg, and closes her eyes as they wait for the car's approach. Once it arrives, both girls are bundled carefully in, and whisked away to Lennox Hill.
Post-subway asplosion, Jean gets a call.
"What really /is/ going on here besides the school?" (Tobias)
Tobias questions. Jean answers.
X-Men: Movieverse 2 - Saturday, November 29, 2008, 5:37 PM
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[Exits : [F]ront [D]oor, [Li]brary, [T]he [E]levator, [R]ec [R]oom, and [H]allway]
=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.
[This room is set watchable. Use alias XSLibrary to watch here.]
[Exits : [G]reat [H]all, [C]omputer [L]ab, [X]avier's [O]ffice, and [J]ean's [O]ffice]
It's a rather loud series of thuds that follows a metallic twang. Books falling into the floor landing on something with the sound of hollow wood. An unmistakable sound to any librarian. And as the cringes subside, and silence sets briefly in... a few more land on the pile to add insult to injuries. Underneath the pile shuffling around is the large figure of a boy showing exactly why he earned the nickname 'Dumpty' back in Queens. An annoyed grunt dispels the urgency of possible serious boo boos, as his hands begin to swat the books away and begin the process of digging himself out. A foot or two away are two bundled and stapled photocopied documents. They are mostly unharmed.
"Ooooops," comes from over at a nearby table, Dr. Grey with a vague tone of voice. Distracted by the collection of news reports, journal articles, and technical documents that she's laboriously turning into a series of talking points, there's a brief look upwards to make sure that Tim is all right, lagging on the heels of an even swifter and shorter sweep of a thought to do likewise. "Everything survive?"
Save for a small bruise on the kid's cheek and a small scrape on his chin (both of which Tim is completely unaware of), he's quite fine as the pile begins to spread out around the mass instead of on top of it. "Everything except the rest of the evening." Tim jokes out as he manages to find his feet again. He gathers the pile together, shuffling the books out of order until they form a set of neat (if completely unorganized) stacks against the base of one of the shelfs. The toppled stool is placed as a sort of warning flag or road cone to ward off other patrons from the area until its fixed back up. "I found the article asked for." Tim recounts. "And another one she wrote about adult education in Southern Africa, if that helps any."
"Depending on the adults being educated, it definitely could..." Jean holds out a hand for the article in question, lower lip worried between her teeth with gentle thoughtfulness. "I'll have to give it a read-over. Any luck finding Dr. Lensherr's reflections on his time in Israel? I could swear I'd read them once when I was about fourteen." she murmurs, and squints at the pile of references already on the table before her. A sigh later, she turns to look at Tim, and notes that "You've really been a big help with this."
"Thanks." Tim answers back followed by a quick "Just glad I could. Glad someone asked me for something other than a final or a research paper for once. Things been getting kinda predictable in here lately." before his mind turns back to the question and he hands over the articles he's copied so far. That name, no matter what form its in, manages to get a reaction out of the kid, this time only a quick breath and skipped hear beat instead of the usual flush of panic. "Sorry, not this pass. Still looking, though."
"Do you think you could see yourself helping out still, once we actually get this off the ground and into a building?" Jean wonders, taking the papers but giving them only a cursory glance through her reading glasses. Tim, it seems, has caught her full attention at last.
"Huh?" Tim asks a little surprised by the question. "I think I'll find the article before then... Oh!" And the hamster inside trips on his wheel a little bit, but manages to find his pace. "Uhm... yeah. I guess. If there is anything I can do to help. That is... if the clinic stuff didn't disqualify me already." This last part was /mostly/ a joke. "You really think we'll get this thing to actually /be/ a building?"
"One way or another it has to happen." Call it optimism, pragmatism or raving idealism, Jean's voice is even and her eyes steady. "The news over the past week makes it abundantly clear that Xavier's alone is not the answer, and we're impractical for most people to try and copy."
"Yeah..." Tim says slowly with his face sobering. "Even here at the school, things break and the we have accidents. I know it isn't the same, but if the school wasn't here, what do you think the state would have done with kids like me and Cassy?"
"The best they knew how," is Jean's answer, but with a face that says she knows all too well just what limited resources, and even more limited time, can accomplish. "Without the school... well, Deborah Anders would still throw herself into looking out for you two, at least until Cassy set her hair on fire and ran away. Maybe get in contact with me or another mutant researcher, if they were smart."
"I guess that is what they are doing now, then, itn'it?" Tim asks as he circles around the pile of research material, obviously intimidated by it. "I mean, people calling you up all the time trying to figure out what to do, people visiting the school. Confused, worried, scared." As Tim begins to tell this last part, his eyes make it clear that he's channeling his own experiences before his time at Xavier's.
"Pretty much," Jean murmurs, shuffling the nearest pile into some semblance of order before resting one hand atop it. "To be honest, we're all just going off of our best guesses for most mutations. We have enough experience to have some basic ground rules, but everyone in the practical side of the field is just trying to do what seems right to them. Xaviers' philosophy is learning to control it via your own actions and will as much as possible. I have other colleages who favour medication. It's... well, at least we all get to be confused together, here."
"I'm learning better since I came here..." Tim answers as he waves at all the research and books. "...but it still surprises me sometimes when you or the Professor or Dr. McCoy /don't/ know about something about... mut... uhm... about us. I mean..." Tim turns around and picks up a random book from one of the nearer shelves. "I guess its like expecting a..." he looks at the cover of the book to check. "Geologist to know /everything/ about geology. Or Kitty to know /everything/ about computers... even though I think she does."
"Well, a geologist has centuries of people studying rocks to draw off of," Jean notes, with a crooked smile and a wistful sigh at the thought of That Much Data. "Modern genetics as we know it is only sixty or so years old. And X-factor genetics didn't really start openly until Moira published in '89. That's before -you- were born," she admits, with an even greater level of crooked appearing in the smile. "But consider that the entire span of what I can draw from is, at best, younger than my father, and the X-Factor was announced when I was nineteen."
It is probably best that Tim is not exactly good at math, and any attempt to calculate Jean's age based on the numbers he was given is quickly abandoned. "Wow... so without centuries of study and stuff we might still find out that the world is flat, so to say?" Its a mixed metaphor, of course. Geography is not geology, or even theology.
Jean is, happily, still on the high side of thirty, rather than the low of forty. "Well... not -that-, so much," she offers. "I mean, even if the specifics of How Things Work have to be figured out, we do have a formal scientific tradition to help with. It's mostly the applications where people are guessing as educatedly as possible. -Usually- as ethically too, but educations and ethics are tricky. Who's to say that it's not more ethical to put someone like Nadia on high doses of mood stabilizers?" she wonders, with a twitch of a shoulder. "Even allowing for the lead-up period, it's still faster than teaching her control via meditation and practice. Obviously, I disagree with medicating and feel that it's more ethical to teach her methods that don't rely on external control. Others would favour lobotomizing the psi center -- solve the problem surgically and permanently."
Its slow at first, but the mention of solving things "surgically" gets a quick flush of genuine anger form Tim, intense and pointed. It doesn't fit him, and is rare as a Cony at a vegan bar, but its his. His eyes tighten, his fist clenches, and... he eventually shakes it off. "I think I like your way a lot better." Tim answers. "I mean... the other ways assume its a disease or mental illness or something, and maybe it is kinda... but... I guess I'm a little bia- bissed-- uhm... biasss... I guess I got a stake in the answer."
"Well, obviously I agree," Jean says, just a touch too light as she processes that flash of anger, looking more absently thoughtful than truly concerned . "Since they're the methods I use. But it's important to keep an eye on what others think -- we do use outside aids ourselves, if needed. Like Noriko's gloves," she notes, before shuffling at the papers again. "Now, that aside, I'll definitely put you down on the volunteer list for the outreach center."
"Or Mr. Summer's glasses." Tim nods and agrees, as he turns for a quick look back at the stacks he messed up earlier. "Definitely. And I guess I better get that cleared up... and I'll find Dr... erm... his article for ya." And with that brief farewell... Tim goes to clean up.
References, Outreach and the general state of mutant research.