Deedee

"I am not... entirely sure." She had been slowing down from the moment Flute smiled, but only now completely stopped balancing on the soles of her feet to really consider the matter at hand. "I've never done science stuff in a science lab, but I've never done cooking there, either. They, they have ovens there, though, I think. And cups to prepare mixes in. At best we could make some bread and at worst some juice, but we should be able to make something!"

She found the whole thing pretty exciting, even if for now 'the whole thing' was just finding her classroom and the hopes of baking. She turned to ask Xavier if he'd like to help with it too, but found him on the other side of the room, talking with two other people. When had he got there? For a second she just stood that way, before turning back and giving her new classmates the best grin she could manage. "I really hope we'll make a good team!"

Fiona had been so lost in thought that she barely noticed the half-asleep girl smiling at her and the others, seeing her reflection through the window. She was, uh...

...huh.

She wasn't half bad.

"Uh, thanks. Name's Fiona." She would've smiled back, but it wasn't like she could see it through this thing. Hell, if she could see it, she'd think she was about to eat her or something. Still remembered when that researcher's punkass nephew was snooping around her tank at one in the morning.

Kid was screaming so hard, she'd swear he'd have a heart attack.

But hey, it wasn't like she could see her through this hunk of metal, could she? Besides, she was nice. Least she could do was be nice back. "My thing's blowing shit up. And being stuck in this thing like a sardine. Bet I smell like one too." She lifted up her armpit, sniffing it as if getting a whiff.

"...huh. Nothin'. Guess it's better than smelling like cat piss, yeah?"

She wasn't sure whether to be grateful or give herself another reason to be pissed.

Flute

“I like your suit. It looks cool,” Flute noted in regards to Fiona, staring at her blankly for a moment before looking her up and down curiously. “It's... um... sleek? It was fire, right? That's your thing? It's cool.”

...or wouldn't it be ‘hot’– wait, no. That means something else.

“I don't think you smell of anything bad? The little guys would tell me if you did,” she added in an absent tone, letting an ant crawl across her fingertip as she studied it intently. “But it wouldn't matter anyways. Sorry you have to wear that all the time. I overheard a little.”

She let the ant burrow into her hand, before looking up to meet Fiona's eyes again—or at least where she assumed they would be, and tried her best to give her a sympathetic smile.

“Maybe we can do that cooking thing all together. Could be nice.”

Am I doing it right, Mom...? Hope so... it feels nice to make friends. If I am. Am I?

...

I think I'll just keep going.

Xavier

He watched the muscular girl walk away a moment, before turning back to Johnny. Xavier put his smile back on.

"It's nothing." He said, offering a hand to shake. "Xavier Mayberry. A pleasure. Are you actually psychic, may I ask? I'm curious as to what kind of powers you might have to be causing psychic resonance like that. I'm an ESPer myself, as I said."

To demonstrate, Xavier casually lifted his earbuds from his armrest without touching them, spinning them around a few times for emphasis.

"So we've got fire, bugs, an armor guy, psychic powers and of course, me!"

Lewis just kinda swings into this conversation, back to flowing some metal to occupy his powers.

"I can do some real nifty things with silver. Technically I'm not 'never without a weapon' but like, it's a close thing!"

Nathan

Nathan hadn't really been paying much attention to the conversation, too lost in his own thoughts. But now, it looked as though they were all making friends with each other.

Except him.

He should probably try talking to them, huh?

Steeling himself, Nathan walked up to the closest person—a boy who seemed to be controlling metal—and held out his hand.

"...h-hi..."

This was a terrible idea. Why did he do this? With any luck, the other boy wouldn't notice and Nathan could flee the scene.

Fiona

She... she thought it was cool? No-one ever said her suit was cool. Most she got was 'hey, wanna go rev up our motors? WINK WINK NUDGE NUDGE KNOW WHAT I MEAN?'

...maybe she should start wearing a coat or something.

"Thanks! And hey, it's..."

...okay, no, it wasn't okay, why was she lying to her face, the fuck was wrong with her?

"Okay, no, it's not okay. But thanks anyways."

She got a better look at Flute. She was skinny and sorta pale, wearing nothing but a hoodie and a bunch of bandages underneath. She noticed the ant burrowing beneath her skin, and would have done a spit-take if she wasn't wearing her tin can. "Uh, not gonna judge, but does it always do that?" Either she was hallucinating, or it'd be the third strangest thing she saw today.

First was whenever she looked in the mirror.

Deedee

Leader was funny, and Deedee reasoned she couldn't really blame him for skipping counting her in. Maybe she should stick to the dreams motif more and buy a Morpheus themed T-shirt or something. "Awesome. Name's Deedee. My superpower is being able to think in all of the languages in the world. The problem is, I don't understand what I'm thinking half of the time, which is why I'm mostly an idiot."

The lie may have worked if she hadn't bursted out laughing right after saying it. It was a half-hearted, extremely tired laugh, but still genuine all the same.

"I'm joking. I can watch people's dreams, but uh, just if they're like, stupidly close, so I'm not going to be snooping around anybody's head anytime soon. If you ever got a nightmare to deal with, call me up and we'll suffer through it together. I'd most likely do it for free."

Fiona

"I mean, I'm kinda my own waking nightmare in action, so I've got plenty to spare."

She wasn't completely bluffing. It wasn't like she never had good dreams, but over the last few months, she'd have some real nasty ones at least once a week. Only reason she didn't wake up in a sweat was because she was already hot enough to sweat buckets as is.

...maybe calling her up wouldn't be so bad.

"But seriously, yeah. Might have to take you up on that. Always get some real nasty stuff every few nights or so, ya know? Most of 'em nuking the city and turning into an ogre- demon-rage-monster or something. It's not fun. At all. At all at all. So having someone there, well, it might not be as not-fun, yeah?"

As she explained she had enough bad dreams to make the caped crusader blush, she couldn't help but notice the bags under her eyes. Like, she didn't think she was all that rested or anything in the first place, but when was the last time she got any sleep? Last year?

"Uh, didn't want to say anything, but you sure you're okay? Look like you're gonna fall over and use me as a pillow any second now. Not that I'd mind, but maybe you should start taking some nyquill or somethin'?"

Edited by kkhohoho on Dec 31st 2020 at 11:11:08 AM

Hearing Xavier’s question, Johnny seemed to ponder his response. He’d never really thought about whether or not having a psychic brain mate made him a psychic.

“Well...technically ''I’m’’ not psychic. I think.”

He tried to be as vague as possible without sounding nonsensical, but failed, so he continued instead.

“I have an...anomaly living in my brain. It’s probably the source of whatever you’ve been sensing. Hehe...”

He won’t believe. He’ll think you’re lying, that you’re insane!

Johnny ignored the anomaly’s jeers.

With a downright exuberant eagerness, Lewis grabs and shakes the offered hand.

"Hey there! What's your name and your power, friend?"

He pops a little smile that in the right light faintly glimmers (likely due to silver particulate in the enamel).

Flutura

“Always do what?” Flute queries with a slight tilt of her head, either not noticing or not caring as a an earwich wriggled its way out from her left shoulder and scuttled its way over to her right only to burrow back in again. At which point she seemed to finally peg onto Fiona's meaning, and plucked a beetle from her arm in order to cradle it in her palms.

It was perhaps around this point that the sore parts of her skin would be noticeable. Evidently, her bugs broke through it faster than it could heal up most of the time.

“Oh, that. That's normal. It's just my bugs. Don't worry, they're friendly.”

At Fiona's question towards Deedee, Flute also peered towards the latter with a slight frown, noticing her apparent tiredness as if for the very first time. After a short pause of consideration, she realised that she should probably speak up again instead of just staring blankly, and coughed slightly into her fist as she did so.

“Is that to do with you sharing dreams? You being tired?”

Deedee

She fumbled with her pockets for a moment before producing a small piece of paper with something scribbled on it, and handled it to the person on the robot suit. Fiona? Fiona. "Just give me a call, I'm a light sleeper. I was thinking about setting up a, uh, lounge of sorts, you know? For people that just don't want to try and sleep for the rest of the night, but would rather stay awake. We'd have snacks, some silent movies and Fight Club-styled rules. I still have to find a, a place for it, but it can't be that hard."

Against her first instinct, she actually stopped and thought about how to word her answer about her... sleepy self. "Yes and no. Even if I slept, which I do, I wouldn't be able to rest properly if I'm not 'actively using my power' or whatever. I can't dream by myself, my brain can't even reset properly by itself, it's, uh, it's a mess. My brain is stupid like that." It felt weird explaining it, as if it were the plot of a movie and not her last nightmarish year. At least the insomniac numbness filtered out most emotion out of it, which she was very grateful for. "Thing is, it took me so long to figure that out that even if I, hypothetically, sleep well everyday from now on, it'll take a very long time until I, uh, stop being a ditz for good. But I don't really mind it that much."

Out of trying to dispel attention, Deedee tried to fake a yawn, which ended up becoming becoming real one, and tried to rub her eyes out of any leftover heaviness, physical and mental. She failed, but that made her chuckle again, which was enough for now. "You're stuck with me as is for now, though. My condolences. Would you really not mind becoming a pillow, Fiona?"

Fiona

Pretending as though she hadn't seen anything with those creepy crawlies and deciding not to deal with that hot mess for now, Fiona took the piece of paper, reading it over. She didn't like hanging out or anything these days, mostly cause she wasn't sure if anyone would want to hang out with a 6'4 demon-robot looming over them. But she didn't seem too bothered by it. Hell, half her classmates didn't seem bothered by it. She wondered if they were really that accepting or if she'd started hallucinating or something, but she wouldn't put it past her. But it'd be nice to have somewhere to go when everyone else was snoozing. She could sleep, but it happened so infrequently and was over so damn quick that she could be up 24/7 and it wouldn't make a difference.

But she wasn't the one who needed sleep, was she?

"Not really? Hell, look at me. There's more than enough to go around. You ever feel like you're gonna konk out or something, then go nuts. But you gotta do somethin' for me first. And that's not calling yourself stupid. Or your brain stupid. Cuz you're not, ya know?"

She wasn't an idiot. Both of them weren't. She didn't think much about it when she made that dumb joke at the start, but she was starting to sense a pattern. Maybe she was reading too into it, but she wouldn't let her go beating herself up more than she'd already done herself.

"I mean, maybe there's something in there that's sorta messed up, sure. But it doesn't mean you're stupid or anything. If anyone's a stupid dumbass, it's me. I've done enough dumb shit to set a damn record. Like, if someone looked up 'dumbass' in the dictionary, they'd probably find a photo of me in there, ya know?"

She wasn't sure if she was being serious or joking. Maybe a bit of both?

But she wasn't gonna let someone else beat themselves up more than she'd already done herself. Cuz that would be stupid.

Flutura

“I'll offer the same. It's only fair,” Flute considered, flicking her eyes between Fiona and Deedee before shrugging slightly. “Don't know if my dreams are any better, but I don't think they're nightmares. They're usually about bugs, though.”

She managed a small smile at this, as if in self-awareness. Which then turned somewhat saddened as she registered how the other two were getting along mostly well already, while she herself was still sort of standing there as the awkward third wheel that occasionally made people uncomfortable. Letting out a small sigh, she cast her gaze over to the board again, if only to give her eyes something to do more than anything else.

A few hornets crawled out from beneath her skin across her body, buzzing their wings in an angered fashion for a moment. But then they flew off just as quickly, scattering down the corridors and looking to leave through the nearest open windows.

Deedee

It wasn't a contest, she knew it wasn't a contest, but the opportunity to laugh at past stupidities was way too good. "Not to doubt you, but I was so out of it last year, I tried to get to the next city over by walking. By myself. In the middle of the night. Twice! I managed, I think, 5 kilometers? Then I passed out." Should she feel bad about it? Sad? Angry? It probably shouldn't be this funny, that's for sure. "It's better than the time I climbed on top of a car and fell asleep there. Or the time I figured out jumping from a third store window couldn't hurt ''that'" much. Good Lord I'm glad they stopped me from trying-"

She winced.

Oh, OK, that one's still a sore spot. Good to know, brain! You frustrating good-for-nothing freeloader...

"I guess it's not entirely fair to call my brain dumb, but it's better than saying it's, it's not..." She sighed, and even if massaging her forehead did nothing of value, the motion was still soothing. "I'll stop, but I'll rather you did too, you know? There's much more of a chance of blowing things up being you than being me but it still, it can't be, it can't be entirely your fault, doing things like that, whatever those things are. So I don't think you're an idiot either, whatever my opinion's worth."

The first day shouldn't be this draining, right? "Thank you both. Bug dreams sound pretty fun, I look forward to that. I am, uh, out of paper though. Maybe we should try to find our homeroom."

Fiona

...well shit. She'd really stuck her foot in it, hadn't she? Like, she still didn't think Deedee was a dumbass or anything. But if any of what she said was true, they were both fuck-ups.

But maybe that's why they clicked?

"Maybe. Fair's fair, yeah? But tell you what. Either of us starts calling us dumbasses, we'll beat the shit out of ourselves till we stop, yeah?" She clapped her hands, a small spring in her step as the wall separating her from... everything dropped about an inch. "Well, c'mon people! Least we can do is see where they're lockin' us up, yeah?" That one was meant to be a joke, but what was the saying?

Oh yeah.

It's funny because it's true.

Edited by kkhohoho on Jan 1st 2021 at 11:40:01 AM

Nathan

"Eep!" Nathan jerked back as the other boy almost shouted at him, heart leaping a few beats. For a few moments, he stared at the other boy with wide eyes, before coming back to reality. "...s-sorry..."

He awkwardly took the boy's hand and shook it. "N-Nathan O'Neal...I-I'm Irish..." Anyone listening would be able to pick up the faint trace of an Irish accent. "A-and my superpower...is..."

How did he put this into words without scaring everyone off? "I-I do...fears, and...nightmares, and stuff..."

Why did you say that? Now he'll avoid you.

I wasn't specific. Maybe that'll help.

Edited by LilyTheLitten on Jan 1st 2021 at 10:06:33 AM

Xavier

"Ah." Xavier nodded at Johnny's explanation. "I think I understand, actually. You have something that's... part of you, but not you. Like your power has a mind of its own. I can sort of relate; my power either caused or is caused by a tumor in my brain. It's not life-threatening, at least at the moment, but it has adverse effects on my body. As you can see."

He folded his hands on his lap, closing his eyes a moment in thought. "I'd need to learn more about the nature of this 'anomaly', and how it functions, but I'm certain that I can help you deal with it. It's fortunate we're in the same class, then."

Xavier gave another earnest smile. "Speaking of, would you like to go meet our other classmates? A few of them appear to be conversing over there."

He nodded towards where Fiona, Deedee, and Flute were talking. "Perhaps we could all walk to class together."

Fiona

She didn't miss a beat when skinny boy #2 came rolling up in his fancy chair. "Sure, why not? More the merrier, yeah?" She was still in a good mood, or as good as she was gonna get. Least she could do was make the most of it.

"So, honest question, but you always had that floating chair thingy or whatever? I mean, maybe it's me, but it looks pretty damn neat! I had one of those things, I'd be zipping all over the place no time flat!"

Flutura

“Please don't jump out windows...” Flute murmured to Deedee beneath her breath, glancing at her in a somewhat worried manner before she diverted her attention again. “Okay then. Let's go. I'm glad we're together. It's nice.”

The guy on the ‘floaty chair’ (as Fiona had just described it) seemed to be a very polite and kind one from what Flute had gathered, though she couldn't help but feel sorry for his state no matter his apparent positivity. Despite her awkwardness in doing so, she offered him a sympathetic smile and then nodded in agreement to his suggestion; seeming to noticeably relax more and more as their group increased in number around her.

“Anyone know our first class at all, or...?”

Gotfried

   "You who would consider your lives without value, refrain."    The clanging of the rusted armor heralded Gotfried's approach, the nightmarish purple grimace the only thing visible about his "face". It remained still, no matter the words he used.    "There is future to be found for all of you; in that, the Erlking on stage had the right of it."   

   "...as for dreams... I know not if dead men have any, but cursed powers that be brought me here in the first place. If something about what you will see offends your being, strike at me until you have had enough."    He nodded along at Deedee before setting ahead with the rest of the group - but pointedly first, with some space between them. It seemed that for all his encouraging talk, Gotfried didn't think himself worthy enough to walk alongside them.

   "My father, my father, and dost thou not hear..."    He brought his visor down with a clang.    "the words that the Erl-King now breathes in mine ear?...?"   

Homeroom

Once the students of Class 3 finally made it to homeroom, they would be greeted with a stifling scent. An overpowering smell of... cheap air fresheners. The source wasn't exactly hard to determine either. The walls of the classroom were lined with air fresheners and air purifiers of varying quality.

Sitting in a chair in the back of the room, face buried in a magazine, was a grimy 20-something in messy, casual clothing, her tangled dirty-blonde hair pulled back into a loose ponytail. On the blackboard behind her, in big block letters, was written "Ms. Raleigh."

Lewis stumbled a bit as he hit that wall of scent, only barely getting to his seat before collapsing into it.

"L-lemme guess; stench powers, teach..?"

Nathan

Immediately after opening the door, the scent of air freshener smacked Nathan full in the face. He staggered backward and started coughing, eyes watering from how strong the smell was.

Hands over his mouth and noise, Nathan entered the classroom and almost collapsed into his seat. Slowly, he raised his hand, too shy to ask the teacher outright to get rid of some of the air fresheners.