Layla and Catseye - Zombie mousey
Dec. 27th, 2011 05:36 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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xp_logsCatseye experiences a melancholy Layla's powers firsthand while attempting to rid the mansion of vermin.
As the end of the year drew closer and closer Layla closed herself off more and more. On the bright side, a number of people had taken off for the holidays and it was easy to avoid people left behind for the most part. She was still skulking around and only emerging for trips to the kitchen when she was least likely to run into people, which was why the kitchen was currently occupied by the blonde. Because no one else was in there. She just wanted a sandwich and to escape before she had to try to fake it for anyone.
The purple cat zoomed into the room after the little mouse, having spotted it while emerging from the Danger Room after a sparring session. Catseye hadn't hunted mice in ages, but then again this wasn't really hunting. This was protecting the mansion from vermin that was heading to the kitchen to get into the food supplies. Mice could cause disease, make people sick, not to mention ruin the food.
She caught it easily enough, her tracking skills and physical abilities the best they'd ever been with her rigourous X-Men training brought on by not having anything else to do except work a part-time job in a diner. When she realized there was a young woman in the room, however- one of the students- she took the squirming mouse in her mouth and went outside the kitchen door before killing it, not wanting the student to see. She shifted back into girlform, headed back into the kitchen for a baggie, returned to the hallway to put the mouse into it, and brought it back to the kitchen where she threw it into the trash.
Layla watched the cat and then the girl from the corner of her eye. She didn't want to have to do the small talk thing. And while she was pretty sure she recognized the girl from the journals it was only a vague hint of recollection. The girl seemed to be on her way out of the kitchen after throwing away something, though, so lay didn't hurry up what she was doing. Many sandwiches meant not having to emerge again for a while.
And then the sound of rustling plastic started.
Catseye turned back to the trash bin curiously, keen sense of hearing picking up the rustle of plastic. "What in the name of...?" When Catseye killed something, it stayed dead! How had she failed to kill it properly? She didn't bring it up in front of the student, catching a scent about the girl of dark feeling, wanting to be left alone, and instead just pulled the plastic bag out of the trash and walked out of the kitchen, shifting back into catform as she pulled it out of the bag and dispatching it properly this time. It was dead. Dead as a doornail. No heartbeat, no breath. Putting it back in the bag, she shifted once again and re-deposited the dead mouse in the trash, then washed her hands at the sink, still not saying anything to the girl.
Layla tried really hard to concentrate. Nico had been trying to teach her to control her emotions but it was a little hard. The mansion was decorated for Christmas, everyone else was happy and cheerful and all Layla could think about was that terrible, black pit in her stomach and how badly she wanted her parents to miraculously show up and tell her the last eight years were a mistake.
But controlling her emotions wasn't working.
The rustling started again. Layla couldn't hear the gasping, rattling breath from the collapsed trachea or the scratching of tiny claws as the mouse fought determinedly to get out of the bag and somehow save itself.
"Okay, this is just... sorry, you should probably look away," Catseye said to the student offhandedly as she shifted right there in the kitchen and leapt into the trash can, tipping it over and spreading garbage out over the floor. She wasn't hungry in the least or she would just eat the damn thing, despite knowing that eating vermin could be dangerous to her health. The purple cat dispatched the mouse once again, tearing out its throat in a businesslike manner and using her prehensile tail to toss it in the upended trash and straighten out the bin. Back in human form, she started to clean up the garbage. "I don't understand this at all... why is this... it makes no sense," she muttered quietly, shaking her head and staring at the trash.
Layla stared at the purple-haired girl. She changed into a cat. Clothes and all. Like it was nothing. Sure, she still had a tail but Herr Wuschelig had a tail, too. Layla cut each of her four sandwiches in half and started to put them in zip lock bags, trying all the while to think happy thoughts or something.
Then the high pitched noises started and the scrambling. Sighing, Layla put on the rubber gloves for washing dishes and went over to the trash. She fished around inexplicably and then pulled out the mouse, once again alive. This time it was spewing blood from its throat, struggling to live somehow. Without much obvious compassion or emotional response, Layla took up the knife and sliced through the mouse's neck, severing its head as she held it below the edge of the trash can. Each piece of mouse was dropped back into the bin, then she peeled off the gloves and wrapped them around the knife. The lot got dropped into the trash can as well.
Layla turned her back on the trash can to grab her zip locked sandwiches. When she turned back to face the cat girl she acknowledged what had happened with a glance at the garbage. "People probably shouldn't use that knife again," she offered by way of explanation, voice detached and oddly empty of any emotion. Then she headed out of the kitchen.
"Uhh, yeah," was all Catseye could manage to reply as she stared at the trash bin some more. She could tell that the girl was upset about something and didn't want to be making idle conversation, so Catseye didn't follow her out of the kitchen, but after a beat her curiosity was eating away at her so she went to the doorway and called out. "I'm sorry! Sorry to bother you. But is it dead now? You... you know, the mouse? Did you know why it kept coming back to life? Is that why you... cut it up like that?" She remembered a journal post from someone shortly after she'd returned to New York about them wanting to sit around in their underwear bringing dead mice back to life, but not living at the mansion, Catseye hadn't encountered the mutant or her gifts before. "I'm gonna take the trash out to the shed," she added and ducked back into the kitchen.
Oh great, someone didn't know she made zombies. After sighing Layla decided to explain but the girl was gone. She considered just leaving but she would probably just get asked some other time. Might as well get it over with, right?
Layla walked back to the doorway and watched the catgirl pull the trash bag out of the bin. "It's dead. Like dead dead. It can't live without a brain, a heart or a while spinal cord. Just like us. But it can live without it's throat. At least until it bleeds out. But then it might come back again. Sometimes they just...keep coming back to life." In that same disaffected tone she added, "And it came back because of me."
"Oh." Catseye nodded, keeping her tone level and serious. "That's sort of what I thought. I remember a journal post, I just wasn't sure it was yours... about wanting to sit in your room in your underwear bringing mice and insects back to life? I wasn't sure if you were the one who... brought them back to life or if you just knew how to... make sure they're dead." She picked the trash bag out of the bin and knotted it. "I should have just decapitated it like a real cat," she added ruefully. "That would have taken care of the brain. Or just eaten it. I wonder if it would have come back to life in my belly if I'd swallowed it whole..." she couldn't help musing.
"Uh...I dunno. No one ever swallowed something my powers wanted to bring back before. I don't think so anyway." Also that was hella disturbing. What the fuck? Wasn't Layla supposed to be the creepy one?
Catseye made a face. "I do not think it would be very good to find out, though it would be quite interesting from an... academic viewpoint, honestly," she admitted. "Anyway," she said with a smile and a shrug of her shoulders, "I can smell that you're sad and don't want to talk to anyone, so I won't keep you. Though if you want to talk to me about why you smell sad I'd be happy to listen. Or if you want to talk about other things. But you don't have to."
Layla was caught rather off guard. She smelled sad? Seriously? Jesus, like telepaths weren't enough. Now people could smell emotions. "What do you mean I smell sad?" True, she didn't want to be here. She didn't want to talk to people. But she wanted to know what the catgirl was talking about because somehow her being totally fucking weird was better than running away right now. Mostly because Layla would wonder all night otherwise.
"Oh. Well, I... I suppose that was kind of rude of me. Sorry," Catseye said apologetically. "When I'm in catform I pick up on pheromones, moods based on scent and things like that. With you it was a sort of... pricklyness, this crackle of energy that was almost like this 'do not disturb' sign you'd see on a hotel room door," she admitted. "My... ex-boyfriend used to project that around this time of year, because he missed his family." Of course Nick hadn't been accompanied by the pricklyness about not wanting to talk about things, but it was familiar enough to Catseye. "My name's Sharon, by the way. I train here."
"Layla." The response was perhaps a bit abrupt but it was the only information she really needed to give so why bother with another twenty words she didn't feel like saying anyway? Cats smelled emotions. Layla guessed that made sense. Animals always seemed to have this intuitive way of knowing when someone was feeling shitty. Maybe that was why, pheromones. "Uh, nice meeting you. I'm gonna, uh...go. Away. Uh, now." She was trying not to think about how everyone missed their family during holidays. Because she kept thinking about how it wasn't just holidays. It was her birthday. It was how her parents died while she was asleep the night after her birthday. It was how a year later her brain started to kick back the fuck in and she had to confront the fact that they had been gone for a year already and she hadn't dealt with anything yet. Dealing...what a joke. How the fuck do you deal with your parents being dead?
"Okay," Catseye replied with a kindly smile. "Bye then. If you ever want to talk about it, or just have a cat to purr in your lap so you forget what's eating at you for a little while, I'm always available." She turned away and opened the fridge door to grab a glass of milk.
Layla gave her the best smile she could, which was weak and had only a hint of real warmth to it. "Thanks, Sharon." Then she turned and made her grand escape, sandwiches in hand.
As the end of the year drew closer and closer Layla closed herself off more and more. On the bright side, a number of people had taken off for the holidays and it was easy to avoid people left behind for the most part. She was still skulking around and only emerging for trips to the kitchen when she was least likely to run into people, which was why the kitchen was currently occupied by the blonde. Because no one else was in there. She just wanted a sandwich and to escape before she had to try to fake it for anyone.
The purple cat zoomed into the room after the little mouse, having spotted it while emerging from the Danger Room after a sparring session. Catseye hadn't hunted mice in ages, but then again this wasn't really hunting. This was protecting the mansion from vermin that was heading to the kitchen to get into the food supplies. Mice could cause disease, make people sick, not to mention ruin the food.
She caught it easily enough, her tracking skills and physical abilities the best they'd ever been with her rigourous X-Men training brought on by not having anything else to do except work a part-time job in a diner. When she realized there was a young woman in the room, however- one of the students- she took the squirming mouse in her mouth and went outside the kitchen door before killing it, not wanting the student to see. She shifted back into girlform, headed back into the kitchen for a baggie, returned to the hallway to put the mouse into it, and brought it back to the kitchen where she threw it into the trash.
Layla watched the cat and then the girl from the corner of her eye. She didn't want to have to do the small talk thing. And while she was pretty sure she recognized the girl from the journals it was only a vague hint of recollection. The girl seemed to be on her way out of the kitchen after throwing away something, though, so lay didn't hurry up what she was doing. Many sandwiches meant not having to emerge again for a while.
And then the sound of rustling plastic started.
Catseye turned back to the trash bin curiously, keen sense of hearing picking up the rustle of plastic. "What in the name of...?" When Catseye killed something, it stayed dead! How had she failed to kill it properly? She didn't bring it up in front of the student, catching a scent about the girl of dark feeling, wanting to be left alone, and instead just pulled the plastic bag out of the trash and walked out of the kitchen, shifting back into catform as she pulled it out of the bag and dispatching it properly this time. It was dead. Dead as a doornail. No heartbeat, no breath. Putting it back in the bag, she shifted once again and re-deposited the dead mouse in the trash, then washed her hands at the sink, still not saying anything to the girl.
Layla tried really hard to concentrate. Nico had been trying to teach her to control her emotions but it was a little hard. The mansion was decorated for Christmas, everyone else was happy and cheerful and all Layla could think about was that terrible, black pit in her stomach and how badly she wanted her parents to miraculously show up and tell her the last eight years were a mistake.
But controlling her emotions wasn't working.
The rustling started again. Layla couldn't hear the gasping, rattling breath from the collapsed trachea or the scratching of tiny claws as the mouse fought determinedly to get out of the bag and somehow save itself.
"Okay, this is just... sorry, you should probably look away," Catseye said to the student offhandedly as she shifted right there in the kitchen and leapt into the trash can, tipping it over and spreading garbage out over the floor. She wasn't hungry in the least or she would just eat the damn thing, despite knowing that eating vermin could be dangerous to her health. The purple cat dispatched the mouse once again, tearing out its throat in a businesslike manner and using her prehensile tail to toss it in the upended trash and straighten out the bin. Back in human form, she started to clean up the garbage. "I don't understand this at all... why is this... it makes no sense," she muttered quietly, shaking her head and staring at the trash.
Layla stared at the purple-haired girl. She changed into a cat. Clothes and all. Like it was nothing. Sure, she still had a tail but Herr Wuschelig had a tail, too. Layla cut each of her four sandwiches in half and started to put them in zip lock bags, trying all the while to think happy thoughts or something.
Then the high pitched noises started and the scrambling. Sighing, Layla put on the rubber gloves for washing dishes and went over to the trash. She fished around inexplicably and then pulled out the mouse, once again alive. This time it was spewing blood from its throat, struggling to live somehow. Without much obvious compassion or emotional response, Layla took up the knife and sliced through the mouse's neck, severing its head as she held it below the edge of the trash can. Each piece of mouse was dropped back into the bin, then she peeled off the gloves and wrapped them around the knife. The lot got dropped into the trash can as well.
Layla turned her back on the trash can to grab her zip locked sandwiches. When she turned back to face the cat girl she acknowledged what had happened with a glance at the garbage. "People probably shouldn't use that knife again," she offered by way of explanation, voice detached and oddly empty of any emotion. Then she headed out of the kitchen.
"Uhh, yeah," was all Catseye could manage to reply as she stared at the trash bin some more. She could tell that the girl was upset about something and didn't want to be making idle conversation, so Catseye didn't follow her out of the kitchen, but after a beat her curiosity was eating away at her so she went to the doorway and called out. "I'm sorry! Sorry to bother you. But is it dead now? You... you know, the mouse? Did you know why it kept coming back to life? Is that why you... cut it up like that?" She remembered a journal post from someone shortly after she'd returned to New York about them wanting to sit around in their underwear bringing dead mice back to life, but not living at the mansion, Catseye hadn't encountered the mutant or her gifts before. "I'm gonna take the trash out to the shed," she added and ducked back into the kitchen.
Oh great, someone didn't know she made zombies. After sighing Layla decided to explain but the girl was gone. She considered just leaving but she would probably just get asked some other time. Might as well get it over with, right?
Layla walked back to the doorway and watched the catgirl pull the trash bag out of the bin. "It's dead. Like dead dead. It can't live without a brain, a heart or a while spinal cord. Just like us. But it can live without it's throat. At least until it bleeds out. But then it might come back again. Sometimes they just...keep coming back to life." In that same disaffected tone she added, "And it came back because of me."
"Oh." Catseye nodded, keeping her tone level and serious. "That's sort of what I thought. I remember a journal post, I just wasn't sure it was yours... about wanting to sit in your room in your underwear bringing mice and insects back to life? I wasn't sure if you were the one who... brought them back to life or if you just knew how to... make sure they're dead." She picked the trash bag out of the bin and knotted it. "I should have just decapitated it like a real cat," she added ruefully. "That would have taken care of the brain. Or just eaten it. I wonder if it would have come back to life in my belly if I'd swallowed it whole..." she couldn't help musing.
"Uh...I dunno. No one ever swallowed something my powers wanted to bring back before. I don't think so anyway." Also that was hella disturbing. What the fuck? Wasn't Layla supposed to be the creepy one?
Catseye made a face. "I do not think it would be very good to find out, though it would be quite interesting from an... academic viewpoint, honestly," she admitted. "Anyway," she said with a smile and a shrug of her shoulders, "I can smell that you're sad and don't want to talk to anyone, so I won't keep you. Though if you want to talk to me about why you smell sad I'd be happy to listen. Or if you want to talk about other things. But you don't have to."
Layla was caught rather off guard. She smelled sad? Seriously? Jesus, like telepaths weren't enough. Now people could smell emotions. "What do you mean I smell sad?" True, she didn't want to be here. She didn't want to talk to people. But she wanted to know what the catgirl was talking about because somehow her being totally fucking weird was better than running away right now. Mostly because Layla would wonder all night otherwise.
"Oh. Well, I... I suppose that was kind of rude of me. Sorry," Catseye said apologetically. "When I'm in catform I pick up on pheromones, moods based on scent and things like that. With you it was a sort of... pricklyness, this crackle of energy that was almost like this 'do not disturb' sign you'd see on a hotel room door," she admitted. "My... ex-boyfriend used to project that around this time of year, because he missed his family." Of course Nick hadn't been accompanied by the pricklyness about not wanting to talk about things, but it was familiar enough to Catseye. "My name's Sharon, by the way. I train here."
"Layla." The response was perhaps a bit abrupt but it was the only information she really needed to give so why bother with another twenty words she didn't feel like saying anyway? Cats smelled emotions. Layla guessed that made sense. Animals always seemed to have this intuitive way of knowing when someone was feeling shitty. Maybe that was why, pheromones. "Uh, nice meeting you. I'm gonna, uh...go. Away. Uh, now." She was trying not to think about how everyone missed their family during holidays. Because she kept thinking about how it wasn't just holidays. It was her birthday. It was how her parents died while she was asleep the night after her birthday. It was how a year later her brain started to kick back the fuck in and she had to confront the fact that they had been gone for a year already and she hadn't dealt with anything yet. Dealing...what a joke. How the fuck do you deal with your parents being dead?
"Okay," Catseye replied with a kindly smile. "Bye then. If you ever want to talk about it, or just have a cat to purr in your lap so you forget what's eating at you for a little while, I'm always available." She turned away and opened the fridge door to grab a glass of milk.
Layla gave her the best smile she could, which was weak and had only a hint of real warmth to it. "Thanks, Sharon." Then she turned and made her grand escape, sandwiches in hand.
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