xp_logs | Log: Gates-aftermath; Rahne, Haller, and venison

Backdated to last Sunday, late afternoon. Haller's walk takes a turn for the interesting, or perhaps messy.

It wasn't so much crashing as a kind of heavy, rustling drag now, Jim reflected as he moved further from the trail, but he wasn't sure that was an improvement. Whatever it was, it was loud and persistent, and a little too extreme to justify having gone about his walk as usual. It didn't hurt to check; if it was nothing, it was nothing. Dusk was just beginning to approach, but darkness didn't bother him anymore. It wasn't as if there was anywhere he had to be.

"Hello?" the telepath called as he approached. "Do you need some help?" He could see a large shape moving through the trees, and realized belatedly that at Xavier's he should possibly be a little more cautious. Man, I hope this is either a person or an animal and not the first stage of a home invasion or the demon attack people say we should be about due for . . .

As it turned out, the source of the crashing was only slightly less surreal.

"I think I'm all right, thank you," Rahne called back, her voice a bit lower and growlier than usual due to the semi-lupine vocal cords, and a little out of breath. She tied off her rope in a secure knot, shortening her claws to keep from picking at the fibers, and stepped back to pick up a knife. This was somewhat embarrassing. She had killed a good-sized and healthy buck, and from the taste of its blood she thought he was going to be delicious, but he was heavy. She'd been so involved in getting him up into the tree that she hadn't noticed Haller approaching at all.

Also, she was dressed only in her fur. She had chosen some time ago to regard this as an acceptable covering in her wolf and transitional forms, but it had been a while since she'd gone out without the shapeshifting clothing, nonetheless. Oh, well.

The sight that met Haller's eyes was a large buck with a torn face and throat, hung upside-down by the hind feet from a sturdy tree branch... and a bipedal wolf approaching it with a long knife.

Jim took a moment to adjust his personal universe around this particular scene. He'd had a lot of exprience with the graphically bizarre, but this at least warranted a blink.

"That's kind of impressive," Jim said, nodding at the buck. "I've heard people talk about hunting, but I never knew what you do after you take them down." From her post earlier and passing conversation with Nathan in the past he wasn't shocked that she'd literally spent an afternoon out killing things, but it was a little strange to see someone like Rahne expertly drawing a knife across the throat of a dead animal. That was dangling from a tree.

"Thank you." Rahne hesitated marginally. "Ah, the next part is to gut it and it's best done pretty quick; ye arenae squeamish, are ye?"

Jim shook his head with a slight quirk of his lips. "Not really. I used to volunteer at sanatoriums back in the UK. It wasn't emergancy medicine or anything, but I don't have a high discomfort factor for much anymore. Muir probably helped, too." Growing up it had taken him some time to fully appreciate how superhuman it had to have been for Moira to create a place like the Research Center. But then, she'd had her own reasons for that. "Where'd you learn how to do this? Nathan?"

"Just checking, if a bit late." She began at the rear of the deer (currently the top) and went about the removal of glands and closing up the waste openings so she could take out the bladder and digestive tract without spilling their contents. "And aye, Nathan taught me this part." She smiled a bit wistfully. "I learned to catch small game on my own, and deer in Asgard...."

"Oh, you're one of the generation that went on the weirdest accidental fieldtrip ever, too?" Jim grinned. "Jamie told me about that one when I first got here and I'm still discovering new people who were kidnapped. At least it seemed to have given people a lot of handy skills." The flow of blood fell with a pliping noise onto the dead leaves as she worked. Jim watched the way it slowly soaked into the leaves and ground with mild interest. "There's a truly unlikely collection of talents in this school. But I guess there's a lot you learn by necessity that comes in handy later." After a moment of hesitation he refrained from adding "in situations like Smichov." Rahne wasn't technically a student, and he didn't want to pry. Or be quite that blatant at leading, even though the obvious evidence of a dead animal dangling from a tree indicated a little residual stress.

Rahne proceeded efficiently with the disemboweling. "Aye. I had a better time there than most of the others, honestly. I was adopted by a pack of... well... sapient wolves. And their prince liked me, so I didna get treated like an incompetent puppy in a normal pack."

Jim grinned. "So does that mean real life is just catching up to the alternate-dimension? You're going out pretty often lately with Elpis and everything. I get the impression getting imported to foreign countries is how the vote of confidence goes around here."

Rahne blinked. "Well, I didna mean I'd been being treated like an incompetent puppy here," she said, laughing a little... if a little sadly, too. "I've... really appreciated the chance to work with Elpis."

"Well, not really treated incompetant. It's just the shiny newness. I think people here worry about overshooting on responsibility so much they grind it away." Jim ignored Cyndi's addition of Hey, just like what happened to Scott and Ororo! Some snark could be ignored as pure reflex. "When the emphasis is on shielding when possible it can be hard to figure how much is too much. Too much, and it starts getting annoying for the person being sheltered. Or that's how I felt sometimes, anyway." The corner of his mouth raised in a smile. "So balanced responsibility -- good."

"Aye, well... I really was quite literally an incompetent puppy as far as the wolves went, but I did learn a lot. Some of which has helped, working with Elpis, come to think of it. Not so much field-dressing deer, mind...." She had taken out and bagged the heart and liver, and was considering whether the entertainment value of making a variation on haggis from her deer was worth the trouble of actually cutting into the digestive tract to get the stomach. "'Twas strange coming back from there too," she added, half to herself.

"Smichov, or the alternate-dimension?" Jim inquired, raising an eyebrow at the girl who was currently storing entrails. "Because, you know . . . either way." So that resolution not to blatantly lead lasted -- two minutes, maybe? Oh well.

"Both," Rahne said, "hence the 'too.'"

The telepath was glad Rahne was preoccupied with her kill so she couldn't see the sardonic quirk of his mouth. Wow, someone's obviously trying to keep track of way too many voices at once. He shook his head. "I guess they are kind of equal in the 'different worlds' department when you think about it. It just takes a while to . . . reset."

"I'm sorry... I didna really mean that to be snippy. But still... aye. 'Tis odd trying to get used to being home again." She decided not to bother with the stomach. "And... I'm not sure if anyone mentioned we spent a few months in Asgard while we were only gone for about a week, but it feels almost like we were there longer than we were gone this time too."

Jim nodded. "It's being cut off from everything familiar, especially if you don't have a lot of time to prepare. You adapt, so coming back to reality feels like trying to take the same mile you just ran backwards." In the pocket of Jim's jacket his hands closed around a beaten pack of cigarettes, but he made no move to bring it out. "The world you came back to didn't change. But you had to."

Rahne had dropped into a crouch and was cleaning her hands and knives, slowly and systematically. "Asgard was beautiful," she said softly, "the parts of it I saw. Though it would have seemed much harsher, I think, without fur and four feet. I ken some of the others had it far worse. Most found... someone to attach to, I think, but some were more trapped than anything else. Some of it is cruel. And for all I miss it sometimes, I know what they went through was just as real. But... not any more so than where I was." She inspected the knife, her eyes and the blade bright in the dimming light, and then began re-sharpening it. "I know here's as real as Smichov...." She trailed off with a sigh. "What we were trying to do the weeks before we left was real too," she muttered.

Again, an eyebrow raised. "Has someone tried to tell you differently?" he asked.

Rahne sighed and looked up at him. "No. And I do know they didna know any better."

"Knowing people don't know any better kind of makes it worse. You still get the same amount of frustration, but less entitlement to take it out on the people causing it." Jim smiled wryly and gestured with his free hand at the deer hanging from the tree. "Lucky for you the local wildlife is actually a productive option."

Rahne laughed at that, surprising herself a bit. She had made that pretty obvious. "Ye have a point about that," she murmured. "And the hunting... 'tis something I can do to work off my temper that I'll be happy about the results later," she said. "I cooked one of the last roasts from last season on friday. I do hunt when I'm in a good mood too, though with Catseye gone I've lost a partner."

"The best hobbies are multi-purpose. I think, anyway. Yours is probably more useful; the CrazyPainting might work to fill up a blank wall, but less delicious." Jim regarded the now gutted deer, then the girl standing beside it. It was almost as big as she was. He wasn't sure how strong Rahne was when she was shifted, but they were a ways from the school. "Um, how do you usually get the kill back, anyway? Just drag?"

"I prefer to carry over drag if I can. With one this size, I usually clean up the organs and then I'll either come back and butcher it and take it in piecemeal, or wait and get someone to help."

"I can help you there. Usually anything I carry this large is trying to kick me, so this isn't going to be much of a challenge." Jim took his hands out of his pockets and rubbed them together in the cold air. He added, more quietly, "And . . . don't let the other stuff get to you. There are always going to be people who don't understand, or misunderstand. Nothing makes that less frustrating. But the important thing is you know what you did -- and you did good. In the end, that's all that matters."

"We did right," Rahne sighed, "or as close to it as we could find at the time. How much good it did in the end is a question yet, but we canna always control that." She looked up at him. "Thanks. The buck here is a bit beyond kicking, but still a bit messy. Are ye sure?"

"Right is always worth the effort. Even if no one will ever know just how much went into it." With another slight smile, Jim moved next to the small girl and began to push up the sleeves of his jacket. "Don't worry about it. Blood can be washed off. Let's go take up space in the freezer."