calmbeforethe | 00 . appointments

00 . appointments

If you would like to have your character(s) interact with Ororo without having to post a separate entry or log, feel free to comment here! This entry can be used for any threads that might not warrant the need for an entirely new journal post.

Action, voice, log or written threads all welcome! Please include what kind of thread it is in the subject header, as well as some kind of indication of date or time like so:

[Action, July 4th]
[Voice, before Storm leaves for the draft]
[Written, October 31st]

Thanks!

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Yeah, I know. See you in a few minutes!

[With that, Teddy shuts the book and makes his way to the house. It's just down the path from the plaza, so it shouldn't take him more than his given amount to get there.

Truth be told, he's slightly nervous, too. With the whole shard thing, he'd been missing out on training lessons, and while he's not really afraid of what Ororo will think... mm. He still feels bad about it, and is honestly more nervous about Logan than anything.

Still, sure enough, after a few minutes, there's a knock on the door, and Teddy waits outside with a hand in his pocket.]

[Luceti's a relatively relaxed place between experiments, really. So Ororo wasn't too worried when Teddy had skipped a couple of sessions. Logan griped, sure, but Ororo knew some of their students were busy and was a fair bit understanding of them. Teddy was just lucky Logan was out for most of the week.

When he knocks, Ororo answers the door pretty promptly and smiles when she sees Teddy on their porch.]

Well, that was quick. Good afternoon, Teddy. Come on in, won't you?

[Teddy returns that smile, genuinely happy to see her, and feels his nerves fade away for now. That can wait until he talks about it with her.]

Hey, Ororo. I was nearby anyway.

[Now that he's invited, Teddy steps inside, taking a quick glance around the house. He'd been here a few times, and a part of him can't help being a little jealous of the bonafied house that she and Mia live in. The more reasonable side of him, however, tells him that he's lived in an apartment all his life, and besides, it's just him and Billy, and their "kids". They don't need a house.]

I'm kind of surprised you're by yourself right now... How've you been? [He turns his attention to her again.] I haven't seen you in a while.

[Ororo chuckles a little, walking him in and leading him into their kitchen.]

You'd be surprised at how often this house happens to be empty. It seems like everyone always has a place to be.

But I've been doing alright, thank you for asking. [No point in mentioning the most recent 'experiment', really. She was recovering.] And yourself?

I've been... um. Okay now, anyway...

[He looks down at the floor, as if the topic makes him a little nervous.]

That's actually what I wanted to talk to you about. But how about we go to the kitchen first?

[And just like that, Ororo gets concerned.]

... Of course. Right this way.

[It's not far to the kitchen, and there's a table with a couple of chairs inside that they can sit on. Ororo gestures to one for him to take. And once he's seated, she takes the one across from him.]

Is this about why you've been missing sessions at the Dome?

[Teddy had been kind of hoping to cook and talk. Or just cook and not talk. The latter is sounding really good right now, actually.

Instead, he sits at the table and feels like a giant spotlight is on him for the world to see. Maybe this wasn't such a good idea after all...

It's why he's silent at first, eyes down on the table, lips pursed. He's always been so used to keep it inside and dealing with it on his own that this is honestly hard. It's just talking. But at the same time, it's talking about something wrong with him, and for a person who tried to cover up everything wrong about him for years...

Finally, he glances to the side and rubs the back of his neck, as if the touch is to coax him to talk.]

... Yes, that's why. I'm really sorry about that, by the way. I really had no excuse. It's just...

When everyone got possessed by those spirits, Billy ended up getting Twila. I didn't tell you because, well... [Ororo was Hyt. And he knew that Hyt and Twila didn't get along in the slightest.] And it was getting to the point where he needed it out of him.

I kind of... took a big risk. It was stupid and really reckless, but it worked. I thought that was the end of it, but...

[Ororo's eyes soften in concern. Really, the way she saw it she had no room to be mad at him at all - why he seemed to think so was beyond her. She reaches out to clasp his other hand on the table in support, wanting to dispel that notion immediately.]

Teddy. It's okay. [A tiny smile.] I think we all had a difficult time that week, in one way or another. And I am just glad that you are both alright now.

Can you tell me what happened? [She honestly didn't want to push, but Ororo knew better than anyone what it was like to have a hard time talking about your own problems. She didn't want to make him feel obligated to tell her anything, even if she knew he might want to talk.]

[His gaze moves from the wall to their hands, and the rubbing against the back of his neck stops, though he hasn't quite relaxed. It's enough to calm him down a little, at least; touch has always been the biggest form of comfort for Teddy. Her voice, calm and patient as it is, helps too.

This is starting to not sound like such a bad idea, though he doesn't shake out of that thought process entirely.]

You know Twila could drain energy, right? Not just energy, but like... life force, or something. It's the same thing Nala gave when healing people.

... I took a gamble. I let Twila take all it wanted and trusted Billy to fight it off before it got too far.

[Since he's still here, Billy obviously won. But still.]

It did get pretty far. All I wanted to do was stop, but I knew if I did, Twila would probably just tighten whatever he had on Billy...

[Ororo nods, her expression turning serious. Yes, she knew. She'd had to live with three of her closest friends when they'd all been possesed by Twila. Her greatest regret of that week was turning from them for most of it after Hyt had taken her. It wasn't until the very end of it that she came back to her senses enough to help them again.]

... That's very noble of you. Billy's very lucky to have you, Teddy.

It sounds like it was a close call, but you're here and you're whole. [She tilts her head curiously.]

[He glances up at her with a tiny smile; it's nice, hearing that. Most other adults he knew would probably call him out on his recklessness, and certainly not call him noble.

And thanks to that, he's able to see the tilt of her head, which just makes him lose eye contact again. Right, on to the other part of that...]

I guess you could say I was really, uh... devoted. And I needed a lot of it too, to keep going with that. So that's... when it happened, though I didn't realize it until after I got rid of it.

[He purses his lips again.] Have you ever heard of heart shards?

[Well, Ororo did happen to be the kind of person who willing to make some controversial moves if the end was a noble one. It was just the kind of person she was.

But at his question, Ororo goes quiet for a moment, giving it serious thought. It sounded important, but... She shakes her head, frowning.]

I don't believe I have, no.

I'd be a little worried if you did.

[Teddy frowns, now pulling his hand back so that he can cross his arms over his chest. This whole thing makes him frustrated and ashamed, especially when talking to other people about it. It wasn't so bad with Billy, but anyone else...]

They apparently belong to someone's heart, and they all have different emotions. They get attracted to someone who's really feeling that emotion strongly, and they kind of dig into that person and really turn that emotion up. Kind of to insane levels. I ended up getting devotion right then... which I know, it sounds nice. But it made me act like a jerk to everyone, even Billy. Every time I looked at people, I'd feel this... pain everywhere, like I was actually really sick. Like I needed to only look at Billy.

That's... why I skipped out on training. I didn't know what was wrong with me, and I didn't really even care. Not while it was still in me, anyway.

[ Ororo frowned, trying to absorb what she could of what Teddy was telling her. It sounded a little like the work of an empath, an outside cause influencing what he felt. And that worried her.

But first. ] Teddy, it's alright. Don't worry about the skipped training sessions for now. It sounds like you had more than a good excuse, and Logan doesn't really have to know. [ A smile, but a brief one that turns into concern. ]

But let's see if I understood this correctly. Something, a shard, from someone else influenced how you felt about Billy, yes? It amplified your devotion to him until it eclipsed your concern for anyone else and caused you pain should you even try to look at others.

[He smiles in response to hers, and the fact that hey, Logan doesn't have to know. Sweet, Storm's got his back.

It's as brief as hers though, and as Ororo explains, Teddy glances off to the side. She pretty much got it in one there, and hearing it like that, it's just shameful. Not just embarrassing, what with him turning into the epitome of the clingy boyfriend, but also guilty, because he kept everyone else away from him, only went to places because he had to, only talked to people because he had to, and even then, it'd be brief at most. And the fact that he was blind to it...]

You sure explained it better than I could. That's pretty much all of it. I was kind of aware of what was going on? Like, I knew something was wrong with me, and I tried to fight it sometimes. But I didn't feel like it was enough to do something about it. I just... accepted it. Like it was a part of me all along.

Edited 2013-06-21 10:02 (UTC)

[ Ororo nods. Alright, she gets it. But then - ]

... But here you are, Teddy. Safe and sound and whole. What happened? You were able to fight it off? More importantly, are there other shards like this out there?

There might be more of them... I don't know. Mine was something specific, so there might be more out there.

[There's a little pause, before a hint of a smile quirks up.]

And you can thank Billy for helping me out. He talked me through it. I was... I was just so convinced that he was the only one who...

[He trails off and briefly presses his lips together. This is why he doesn't like talking about these things: it's hard, and he knows he was wrong, so why keep going?

... Nngh.]

Ororo... meeting the Young Avengers really turned my life around. They gave me a purpose. They gave me an identity. They gave me something to do with my powers that wasn't just using it for attention.

But Billy was the one who really set me straight. The Young Avengers gave me something good to do with my powers, but Billy helped me figure out who I really was. I'd been spending so long hiding it that even I didn't know.

So... [He leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees, and rubs the back of his neck, forehead close to the table.] When that shard made me just see him, I thought... It felt like he was my entire world. Like he was the only one who cared enough to try. And I know that's not true; I know now. I was so caught up with him that I didn't even think about anyone else.

But Billy... He set me straight again. We talked a lot, he tried to use his magic on me, and even that didn't work... But he told me about the friends I do have. Here and back at home. People who have been there for me.

And... I think that's what made me want it out.

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