Do I Know You? — I Am Also a We

[xp-erverse.livejournal.com]

The group discovers that it won't be so easy to get back on track.


"Do you even know where we're going?" Quentin asked as they ran down the street, dodging pedestrians like they were obstacles on a course. The clinic was fading from view behind them, but as far as he was concerned, they couldn't be far enough away.

Jean-Paul didn't bother scoffing aloud, just shoved a vague sense of 'yes, stop pestering me' at Quentin and took a sharp right into an alley. This town was familiar to him in the way many towns in Quebec were familiar. He'd spent just enough time in the area to know where he did and did not want to go.

Right now, he felt like heading toward the slightly less respectable places would be best, but he had to skid to a stop in this body that was much smaller than his because as he came to another intersection, he found himself facing three people.

Two men he didn't know in regular clothing and one very large male nurse. The scrubs gave him away. "Ah..."

"Do not panic," Wanda snapped, pulling them to a stop. She could feel Jean-Paul's desire to run and run and run and she fought against it, using all the willpower she'd ever thrown at her brother in her efforts. Their shared body stopped moving and grew still, keeping a wary eye on the three men in her. Them. What the hell was wrong with her life?

They were scared. Gabriel could feel their fear, all three of them. His own was there, too. But Gabriel knew fear. Not long ago, it was his only constant. So he figured it was best to take charge. "Hombres," the girl's voice came out in a sluggish Spanish that sounded like nothing Gabriel had really heard before. He hoped it would be as disorienting as he expected. "Que pasa?"

Quentin too knew fear. In this young, tiny body, he found himself back in high school again, cowering under the threat of Chad Matthews and his gang of bullies. It brought terror to him even so many months later, and without thinking, Daniella stepped back and raised her arms to fend off the blows that were to come.

They had all known fear. Terror. Different flavors but it was still fear. And Wanda knew a thing or two about the flight, fight or freeze reactions that flowed through them. She and Quentin ... had not seen eye to eye but her mental touch that drew him away from the front was almost gentle. This was not her body but the training resided in her mind so that when the male nurse grabbed her wrist, she was already moving.

The shock on his face was something to be remembered as Wanda broke the hold but then stepped in, not away, slammed her weight into his instep. When he stumbled, she pursued, trying to find the balance between what her mind wanted and what the body could do. It wasn't an effortless thing but she managed to lay him out with a few well placed strikes.

"Now we run," she snapped.

"Oui," Jean-Paul agreed, dodging the two men in plain clothes as one attempted to make a grab for them and the other went to check on the nurse who was no longer standing. It had been very quick, much faster than he would have expected. Not easy, the fight, but certainly something. Something, he decided, he would have to think about later because the one man was still following them as they dashed out of the alley and onto the main road. They were not nearly far enough from the clinic.

No time to stop for the bus, no one would give them a ride with pursuit so close behind them. The best thing to do was to get lost in the crowd and the crowd was... not on this street, but the one over. Weaving through traffic, brakes shrieking behind them followed shortly by the shouts of the man, Jean-Paul ran. The body was still sluggish but not as bad as it had been before. It was obvious, however, that this body was not an athlete's. It was winded. "Mon Dieu," he muttered, finally finding a street busy enough to hide them. "We need... to not be dressed this way. And also, also I know where to hide."

"Stop!" With little warning, Gabriel mentally took the steering wheel, stopping the girl's body at a busy street crossing. He turned his head slowly, scanning the crowd. A man eyeing them across the way gave him pause. Without meaning to, he shuddered. Something about the stare. Something about being this young, and this vulnerable.

The light changed, and a sea of people began to enter the crosswalk. No time to get lost in thoughts. He joined the herd, but as they stepped across the street, he hopped and fell in front of a heavy-set woman wearing madras pants, hitting the asphalt. "Mon dieu, mon dieu, I'm sorry," he said, taking her accepted hand.

"No, no, it's fine." The traffic sign changed, and the light went from green to yellow. "Just as long as you're okay." The woman started to lift him - well, them - up, and Gabriel leaned against the woman a bit for support. The signal switched to the red hand, and the woman, satisfied to see them standing, scurried off.

A horn honked, and Gabriel scurried to the side of the street from which he came. "Busy intersections," he said, his hand opening to reveal a wallet. "Always surprised when that one works." His eyes returned to the crowd across the street. The man he'd been so concerned about was gone.

"You stole from someone who clearly needs money for a new wardrobe more than we do," Quentin muttered. He kept back, metaphorically, letting the other three determine their course of action. They were clearly much better suited to this rough life than he was. "We need to get a phone, too. Call the mansion. Someone to get us out of here."

Jean-Paul riffled through the wallet without a second thought, pocketing the loonies and the credit cards as they moved through the street. He kept them mostly in the shadow of a group of women who seemed to be out shopping. It was a simple matter to follow them until they passed a thrift store. Ducking inside, he frowned because... this... was not going to be as simple as he'd initially thought. At least not for himself. "Pah," he muttered, sliding the wallet onto a shelf. "Someone who is not me, find clothing. The woman at the desk, she will maybe let us use the phone. Also, I will do the talking, none of you speak right."

There was an awkward moment of mental silence before Wanda let out a long suffering sigh. She shoved the others to the back, whatever the back really was, and slid her consciousness into the driver's seat. The woman behind the counter was giving her/them a strange look but Wanda paid her no attention. They had to get out of there sooner than later, so she concentrated on her task.

It concerned her that the three of them were so loud and awake but the person whose body this was ... wasn't. Was she still all there? Was she trapped? Wanda shuddered and gripped some shirts tightly at that thought; she struggled for a moment as a long distance memory threatened to wash over them all.

Powerless, in a never ending desert. Freshly ripped from her body and stuffed into a prison of sand and wind, a corner pocket of the Astral plane, Wanda struggled to even stand. She felt the wind upon her body but the silence was deafening...

"Wanda!" Quentin hissed, stealing the reins from her and burying their face in a rack of skirts to hide their red face and wet eyes from the increasingly worried salesperson. "Bitch, get a hold of yourself." The vision dispelled like a bad dream, and he took a moment to settle their composure before taking a floral maxi skirt off the rack.

"Uh, no. That's hot, patterned garbage." Gabriel immediately threw the skirt back on the rack. "We need boring and unrecognizable," he muttered. Kevin Sydney's words echoed through his brain as he turned toward a rack of pants and shuffled through the options. A pair of nondescript loose black trousers caught his eye, and though they struck Gabriel as clothes fit for the Amish, he grabbed them. Having no idea what their current size was, he strolled toward the counter, snagging a fairly plain blouse on the way. "We're changing in the dressing room and wearing them out. Ask for a bag for the gown, and ask her if we can use her phone to call a cab first."

"Oui," Jean-Paul muttered, slipping to the fore. He approached the woman and pasted on a self-deprecating smile as he made up excuse after excuse. Friends, a joke, horrible sense of humor, left my phone in my pants, need to call home, may I have a bag and also the key to the changing rooms? It was rapid and easy, moving from one lie to another while keeping his outward appearance as relaxed as possible. Angry, yes, and very annoyed at friends, but not panicking, not running for my life, definitely not that.

"Marde," he sighed once they were in the changing room with the promise of using the store's telephone once they'd paid.

As much as Wanda wanted to stop and ask everyone, but especially Quentin, what the hell was going on, it was not the time nor the place to be chatting with herself. So she dressed quickly and mentally thanked Gabriel for picking out clothes to blend in with the crowd. The hair would be a problem ... a hand swept across the shaved portion before sliding into what was left. It took some effort but eventually Wanda was able to style it so that it looked more like a sullen teens attempts at doing her own hair rather than a hospital escapee haircut.

She didn't talk much when she paid, too eager to hand over the money and get to the phone. Eventually the woman handed over the heavy landline and moved far enough away to pretend to be giving Wanda space and privacy.

Wanda dialed the mansion's main line first but frowned at the dial tone. She tried again and winced at the tingle in the small of her back. No luck. She tried Garrison's cell but it yielded only static this time. By the time she got to trying the office number, the pain in her back was building, the lights over head were flickering madly and the woman was looking more irritated by the minute.

"No one's home," Wanda smiled tightly, deciding they had to try somewhere else before they became memorable.

"The fuck was going on in there?" Quentin muttered under their breath as they hastily exited the store and slipped back into the stream of people walking down the street. "Brownout. And it felt like something was poking my back with a hot iron. You felt that, too, right?"

"Yes," Jean-Paul said, frowning slightly. This body - so small. And the scalp itched. At least they weren't feeling sluggish anymore. "It was very uncomfortable." Head down, eyes up, constantly scanning. "Marde, getting us to somewhere else will be more difficult, we are very young." He tried to keep his voice low enough that the others on the street wouldn't be able to hear them. "But I know where to go, it is just we will take a different route."

As Gabriel crossed at a crosswalk, a throng of foot traffic came in the opposite direction. He put his head down, pushing through. "We walking? Cab's probably too... I mean, if there's an APB or something, we're recognizable, right?" Someone jostled them, and he glanced over their shoulder as he kept walking. "Should nab a cell phone on the way. Maybe that'll work better."

Wanda's pickpocketing skills weren't at the level of some of her colleagues but they weren't bad, either. The woman waiting for the light had placed her cellphone in an outside pocket of her purse, a decision that Wanda simply couldn't understand. A determined thief could get into the purse but this was just asking to be stolen. She stood behind the mark to wait for the light as well and by the time they turned down the next street, she had it in her hand.

"Anyone know how to get past the security number?" she asked, knowing it would be useless if she tried.

"Try 1-2-3-4," Quentin suggested, snorting. He tapped in the code and barked out a small laugh when the screen unlocked. "Canadians are just as dumb and lazy as Americans. Lovely." He quickly typed the mansion's main number, the only one he actually cared to know, and raised the phone to his ear. He nearly yelped as a shock ran down the shared body, leaving an ache in their back. "It's dead. The fuck. It was at 50%."

Jean-Paul wiggled their stinging fingers after tossing the phone in a trash bin as they passed it. Obviously something strange beyond even their current circumstances was going on. Considering the four of them were trapped in a fifth person's body - still not letting myself think about that, most definitely not - he supposed he should have expected more complications.

Rolling his shoulders, Jean-Paul headed down the street, taking turns seemingly at random. In fact, he was familiar enough with the city to feel confident of his ability to lose anyone who might have picked up on their odd behavior. Which meant that, when they stopped outside a nondescript church with no obvious denominational affiliation, he didn't hesitate before pushing open the door. The quiet inside was profound but Jean-Paul didn't stop long enough to wait for someone to find them in the foyer. Instead, he hung a quick left and pushed open a door that led to a set of stairs.

Down the stairs was a hall and, midway down the hall, was a stretch of brick wall. Walking along it, he counted bricks from the first doorway, then sighed and pressed their elbow hard against one that was slightly discolored. It took a moment, but then it moved and a small section of the wall depressed with a hiss of escaping air and the smell of stale air. "I knew people from the former Front de Libération du Québec," he muttered, sliding through the opening and pushing it closed behind them as he reached to flip a light switch. "Or my guardian did, at least. It will be safe here. And if it is not..." With a shrug, he indicated the various weapons stacked on a table to their right. "I think we will be okay."