Quentin and Jean, Thursday night
May. 17th, 2018 09:53 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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xp_logsJean realizes Quentin's Rave high is bleeding telepathically to her, and when she confronts him, she finally breaks past his barriers and gets through to him.
Finally, Quentin had what he needed. While the rest of X-Factor was wringing their hands and puttering around aimlessly like a bunch of wind-up toys, he had gone out and done the work. He could now prove this flatscan had embezzled from his own company and framed a mutant for it. And after the thrashing he'd just had, he'd never try it again. Assuming he would ever even be able to work again. Quentin smirked, and the front door, already barely hanging from its hinges, flew off into the sidewalk. Ah, that was satisfying.
Quentin was on a roll. He'd solved one case tonight single-handedly. How many more could he get done? He'd have to get back to the office quick to deposit the folder of receipts he held and check through Morse's desk. At this rate, he would clear their docket before daybreak.
At the bottom of the stairs, a redhead came from around the corner to meet him. He was easy enough to track once she figured it out.
"Quentin," Jean said, her voice a bottomless pit of scary as she took one look at the door, then narrowed her eyes.
"What the hell did you do?"
"Ah, fuck." Quentin stopped at the bottom step and rolled his eyes. His fingers twitched, and a small fracture — barely the width of a strand of hair — cracked through the stone handrail. The street lamp a couple feet behind Jean started to vibrate. "Go away, Doc. I'm on the clock. Busy busy busy. I don't get paid for talking to you."
"You're high," Jean said, stopping the trembling street lamp with a turn of her head.
"Know how I know? I am too. Our link reactivated."
She charged up the stairs.
"What did you take? Kick? Rave?"
They'd seen their share of mutant-centric drugs at Claremont. Mutants coming in, blasted out of their minds. One of them nearly destroyed the ER.
The street lamp's vibrations became faster, and it threatened to dislodge itself from the pavement. Quentin stepped down onto the sidewalk, leaving his shoe print in the step he had just left. He sniffed and rubbed his nose. "Yeah, no shit I am. And I'm making the most out of it while it lasts. You are still a telepath, though, not me. So close your mind and leave me alone."
With the cloud covering the moon, the violently vibrating streetlamp made the overhead light look like a crude strobe light. Jean clenched her fists.
"Do you think your teammates are going to be okay with your solving some case while strung out of your mind? How about the State of New York? None of this will fly in court." she said, shaking her head.
"What happens if you took too much and overdosed? We'd be looking at a leveled city block. Is that what you want?"
Psychokinetic energy radiated off Quentin, pulsing in sync with his heartbeat, each thump thump shaking the ground like a small, localized earthquake. He got up close to Jean, not caring that she would feel the brunt of his power, and she could clearly see his bloodshot eyes and sallow skin. His lips twitched. "Move. Shadow King might not be in my head, but I have no compunctions against using what little he left me to get what I need."
Quentin'd barely be able to get close to her before he came to a telekinetic wall.
"You'll hurt me? Really?" Jean said, a cross between anger and a sadness.
"Are you listening to yourself, Quentin?"
She fell silent a moment before the wall dropped and she spread out her arms.
"You want to hurt me? Go ahead. Do it. I'm not moving."
Pink energy shimmered around him, writhing like a sea monster's tentacles, but they did not reach out for anything, and avoided Jean altogether. He coughed into his hand, and frowned at the phlegm he spat. "I don't want to hurt you," he said, his voice and the psychic tendrils quivering. "I don't want to hurt anyone. What I want is to make things right, to make things back like they used to. I thought this would get me back to normal. Unlock some . . . some block in my head that's keeping my telepathy away. I needit."
"It doesn't work like that," Jean said. "Especially not those kinds of drugs. It's dangerous. I've seen them kill. Not just...the user...but others. When the power gets too much."
Jean sighed, glancing around.
"Let's get off the street, somewhere safer, okay?" she said. She did not want Quentin (or herself) to have an altercation with NYPD. Misty or Paul would have her head.
Assuming any of them survived such an altercation, which even in the best of times, Quentin could not guarantee. So he nodded and the pink aura transformed into large bird wings, oddly reminiscent of Worthington's, which lifted him into the air. A feat he could never perform under his own power, but a paltry exploit when enhanced by Rave.
Jean stared at the massive, attention-grabbing bird wings and rubbed her forehead. But she let it go, and shot off the ground to follow, wingless, and far less conspicuous.
~Head for that rooftop~ she said, pointing at a large rooftop with a water tower a few blocks away. It was easier to send her thoughts than yell it at him.
He faltered at the telepathic intrusion, shedding a few pink feathers that disintegrated as they fell away. That touch in his mind, the reason he had done all this, the prize he was still denied, was like a dunk into a cold water bath. He landed messily, his telekinetically braced impact cracking the rooftop. His wings vanished, and he remained kneeling where he was, breathing heavily and looking down at the damaged masonry. His hands still shook, whether from trembling muscles or unfettered telekinesis still coursing through him.
"Shit," Jean said under her breath, quickly landing beside him.
"Quentin? Are you okay? Talk to me."
A weak pulse emanated from him, enough to blow her hair back dramatically but no more. "I'm fine," he managed to say before his stomach revolted and expelled what little contents it held. He wiped his mouth with his sleeve when he was done, and grimaced at the mess he left. "Fuck, this is dry clean–only."
Jean had tried to take a step back when he threw up but it was too late, and some of it got on her shoes. Folding her arms, she watched him as he floundered, desperate to hold onto that high.
"Were you that desperate?"
"Wouldn't you be?" he countered. "It's like Shadow King cut my dick off. I need my powers back."
Jean was silent a moment, considering the question. And in all honesty, she didn't know how she'd feel. On the one hand, no longer having the burden of having to hold back the wave of thoughts and emotions seemed like a relief , but on the other, she wouldn't be able to help people.
It was complicated.
"I know it must feel that way if you felt helpless before. Before you had your powers. Then, to get them...and to feel that rush...to feel like you're never going to be defenseless again," Jean said. She folded her arms, shaking her head.
"But you won't be powerful at all if you're dead." Again.
"That's what could've happened. Or still can if you keep doing this." She looked down, then added softly.
"I've never been in this situation before so I don't...know what to do here."
The ground vibrated ever so gently as Quentin wobbled back to his feet. "Don't." The power behind that word damaged a pipe behind him. "Don't tell me I should be grateful. Without my powers, I am not me. Just a fake some French bitch painted on a canvas."
Jean cocked her head to the side, then regarded the broken pipe. She sat down. "So a ghost just did that? You still have powers. Yes...it really sucks that the telepathy's gone. Nothing I can say can make that better. And I'm sorry. I'm sorry this happened to you. I still feel guilty every time I see you, and every time I feel you through the link. Except for the last time," she said, shaking her head. She was tired.
"I can't turn it off. I can't close my mind. Not after what happened in Florida. So I just tried to fuck Warren and nearly got caught flying over the New York skyline because I was blasted. Your choices effect more than just you. They radiate. What if things got a little too heated with that man you were investigating back there? What if your powers went out of control? There are so many ways that could've gone south."
Quentin shrugged. "What if what if what if. It didn't. I stayed in control. Sounds like you're the one with awful impulse control. Maybe you should get that checked. And an STI panel while you're at it. Worthington? Seriously? You can do better, high or not."
Jean stared at him for a few moments, her features shifting from disbelief, to anger, to disappointment. "Don't be an ass. I don't question who you sleep with. And that's not the point," she said, clenching her fists. Even if, yes, that was a big mistake.
"Touche." He drunkenly stumbled away and sat down, leaning against the half-wall that kept him from falling off the roof. "Anything would've been worth it to get back to normal," he said. "Didn't know it would get to you. It shouldn't have."
"But it did," Jean said. She sat down beside him, watching the city lights. After a moment, glancing him over.
"I'm terrified I'm going to get a call one day, or find you face down in an alley somewhere. I don't---" she sighed.
"What can I do?"
"Stop, you're not my mother," he snapped at her, but then laughed at his own taunt. "Who am I kidding? You're a lot more invested in me than she is. She probably thinks this is a good thing. Like I'm less of a mutant. A step back to 'normal' for her." He snorted at the very idea of him ever being considered "normal."
Jean made a face. "Mother?" she said indignantly. " "More like concerned sister."
She didn't look old enough to be his mother, did she?
"And your mother can go screw herself."
Quentin fought to hold back a tasteless retort, the struggle painted clearly on his face. "How do we break this link between us?" he finally asked, settling himself. "It needs to go. I'm not going to stop at anything to be a telepath again, and you don't need to go down with me."
Jean shot him a look, then sighed.
"So it's hell or high water, hmm?" she said.
"Read thoughts or die trying?"
"It's not about reading thoughts!" he reminded her, perhaps too strongly, as another pipe shook and threatened to burst, too. "It's about getting all of myself back. Wouldn't matter if my powers were telepathy or coming out my ass. I. Need. It. Back. Stop being a 'sister,' and be a doctor, for shit's sake."
Jean laugh-snorted faintly. "Oh, now you want to listen to me as a doctor?" she said. She sighed again, her smile fading. "If it isn't your telepathy than what is it? What part are you missing? Because I'm beginning to think it's something not physical or biological that I can fix."
"How about I give you a back-alley hysterectomy. How would you feel then? Because that's what's going on."
Blinking, Jean shook her head. "I understand, Quentin. But you asked me to be a doctor and that is my medical prognosis. It may be psychological, rather than physical. I can run more tests but..."
"I asked you for some fucking bedside manner, not your amateur engineering!" Quentin snapped, and so did the pipe. He winced, not at the property destruction, but the sudden mental feedback from exerting his telekinesis at levels it was not meant to be. Good thing he was sitting down, else he might have fallen. When he looked up at her again, his face was pale and moist from sweat. "What isn't getting through your fish brain, Jean? I got brought back wrong. I'm not me. It doesn't matter that I can read thoughts. What matters is that part of me is missing and I'm still fucking dead unless I find it. And if I don't, then, well, it's like I was never here, anyway."
Jean flinched at the 'fish brain' part like a slap to the face. It was like pouring salt into a wound, a reminder of her weakness.
"Am I supposed to guess what you're talking about? Because right now it just sounds like you want someone to tear down to make yourself feel better and I'm one of the few people you haven't managed to push away yet so you're trying very hard to add me to the list."
Quentin rolled his eyes. "You read me like a book," he said sarcastically. "So how come you haven't run screaming yet? Why do you care so much you keep trying? You're the only one. Even G had enough . . ." He snapped his mouth shut before he said any more.
Jean tilted her head. "Because even though your default mode is asshole, I know you're still a good person underneath. You were in my head for awhile so..." she said simply, leaning against the side of the building.
"I think freaking the hell out about dying and coming back to life in a new body is pretty understandable. Even saints might be a little unnerved by that."
He wiped his face with the back of his sleeve, muttering something about perspiration, but when he looked up again, his eyes were red. "It's been seven months. I can't keep living like this."
Closing the distance, Jean sat down beside him.
"Probably not," she said. Especially the way things were going. But she didn't know if he meant it the way she did.
"Please. Fix me." The plea came out a whisper, barely loud enough to be heard over the sounds of the city below them.
Jean met his eyes. "I'll do everything in my power," she promised. It was hard to make a promise she couldn't keep, but she would try everything she could.
Finally, Quentin had what he needed. While the rest of X-Factor was wringing their hands and puttering around aimlessly like a bunch of wind-up toys, he had gone out and done the work. He could now prove this flatscan had embezzled from his own company and framed a mutant for it. And after the thrashing he'd just had, he'd never try it again. Assuming he would ever even be able to work again. Quentin smirked, and the front door, already barely hanging from its hinges, flew off into the sidewalk. Ah, that was satisfying.
Quentin was on a roll. He'd solved one case tonight single-handedly. How many more could he get done? He'd have to get back to the office quick to deposit the folder of receipts he held and check through Morse's desk. At this rate, he would clear their docket before daybreak.
At the bottom of the stairs, a redhead came from around the corner to meet him. He was easy enough to track once she figured it out.
"Quentin," Jean said, her voice a bottomless pit of scary as she took one look at the door, then narrowed her eyes.
"What the hell did you do?"
"Ah, fuck." Quentin stopped at the bottom step and rolled his eyes. His fingers twitched, and a small fracture — barely the width of a strand of hair — cracked through the stone handrail. The street lamp a couple feet behind Jean started to vibrate. "Go away, Doc. I'm on the clock. Busy busy busy. I don't get paid for talking to you."
"You're high," Jean said, stopping the trembling street lamp with a turn of her head.
"Know how I know? I am too. Our link reactivated."
She charged up the stairs.
"What did you take? Kick? Rave?"
They'd seen their share of mutant-centric drugs at Claremont. Mutants coming in, blasted out of their minds. One of them nearly destroyed the ER.
The street lamp's vibrations became faster, and it threatened to dislodge itself from the pavement. Quentin stepped down onto the sidewalk, leaving his shoe print in the step he had just left. He sniffed and rubbed his nose. "Yeah, no shit I am. And I'm making the most out of it while it lasts. You are still a telepath, though, not me. So close your mind and leave me alone."
With the cloud covering the moon, the violently vibrating streetlamp made the overhead light look like a crude strobe light. Jean clenched her fists.
"Do you think your teammates are going to be okay with your solving some case while strung out of your mind? How about the State of New York? None of this will fly in court." she said, shaking her head.
"What happens if you took too much and overdosed? We'd be looking at a leveled city block. Is that what you want?"
Psychokinetic energy radiated off Quentin, pulsing in sync with his heartbeat, each thump thump shaking the ground like a small, localized earthquake. He got up close to Jean, not caring that she would feel the brunt of his power, and she could clearly see his bloodshot eyes and sallow skin. His lips twitched. "Move. Shadow King might not be in my head, but I have no compunctions against using what little he left me to get what I need."
Quentin'd barely be able to get close to her before he came to a telekinetic wall.
"You'll hurt me? Really?" Jean said, a cross between anger and a sadness.
"Are you listening to yourself, Quentin?"
She fell silent a moment before the wall dropped and she spread out her arms.
"You want to hurt me? Go ahead. Do it. I'm not moving."
Pink energy shimmered around him, writhing like a sea monster's tentacles, but they did not reach out for anything, and avoided Jean altogether. He coughed into his hand, and frowned at the phlegm he spat. "I don't want to hurt you," he said, his voice and the psychic tendrils quivering. "I don't want to hurt anyone. What I want is to make things right, to make things back like they used to. I thought this would get me back to normal. Unlock some . . . some block in my head that's keeping my telepathy away. I needit."
"It doesn't work like that," Jean said. "Especially not those kinds of drugs. It's dangerous. I've seen them kill. Not just...the user...but others. When the power gets too much."
Jean sighed, glancing around.
"Let's get off the street, somewhere safer, okay?" she said. She did not want Quentin (or herself) to have an altercation with NYPD. Misty or Paul would have her head.
Assuming any of them survived such an altercation, which even in the best of times, Quentin could not guarantee. So he nodded and the pink aura transformed into large bird wings, oddly reminiscent of Worthington's, which lifted him into the air. A feat he could never perform under his own power, but a paltry exploit when enhanced by Rave.
Jean stared at the massive, attention-grabbing bird wings and rubbed her forehead. But she let it go, and shot off the ground to follow, wingless, and far less conspicuous.
~Head for that rooftop~ she said, pointing at a large rooftop with a water tower a few blocks away. It was easier to send her thoughts than yell it at him.
He faltered at the telepathic intrusion, shedding a few pink feathers that disintegrated as they fell away. That touch in his mind, the reason he had done all this, the prize he was still denied, was like a dunk into a cold water bath. He landed messily, his telekinetically braced impact cracking the rooftop. His wings vanished, and he remained kneeling where he was, breathing heavily and looking down at the damaged masonry. His hands still shook, whether from trembling muscles or unfettered telekinesis still coursing through him.
"Shit," Jean said under her breath, quickly landing beside him.
"Quentin? Are you okay? Talk to me."
A weak pulse emanated from him, enough to blow her hair back dramatically but no more. "I'm fine," he managed to say before his stomach revolted and expelled what little contents it held. He wiped his mouth with his sleeve when he was done, and grimaced at the mess he left. "Fuck, this is dry clean–only."
Jean had tried to take a step back when he threw up but it was too late, and some of it got on her shoes. Folding her arms, she watched him as he floundered, desperate to hold onto that high.
"Were you that desperate?"
"Wouldn't you be?" he countered. "It's like Shadow King cut my dick off. I need my powers back."
Jean was silent a moment, considering the question. And in all honesty, she didn't know how she'd feel. On the one hand, no longer having the burden of having to hold back the wave of thoughts and emotions seemed like a relief , but on the other, she wouldn't be able to help people.
It was complicated.
"I know it must feel that way if you felt helpless before. Before you had your powers. Then, to get them...and to feel that rush...to feel like you're never going to be defenseless again," Jean said. She folded her arms, shaking her head.
"But you won't be powerful at all if you're dead." Again.
"That's what could've happened. Or still can if you keep doing this." She looked down, then added softly.
"I've never been in this situation before so I don't...know what to do here."
The ground vibrated ever so gently as Quentin wobbled back to his feet. "Don't." The power behind that word damaged a pipe behind him. "Don't tell me I should be grateful. Without my powers, I am not me. Just a fake some French bitch painted on a canvas."
Jean cocked her head to the side, then regarded the broken pipe. She sat down. "So a ghost just did that? You still have powers. Yes...it really sucks that the telepathy's gone. Nothing I can say can make that better. And I'm sorry. I'm sorry this happened to you. I still feel guilty every time I see you, and every time I feel you through the link. Except for the last time," she said, shaking her head. She was tired.
"I can't turn it off. I can't close my mind. Not after what happened in Florida. So I just tried to fuck Warren and nearly got caught flying over the New York skyline because I was blasted. Your choices effect more than just you. They radiate. What if things got a little too heated with that man you were investigating back there? What if your powers went out of control? There are so many ways that could've gone south."
Quentin shrugged. "What if what if what if. It didn't. I stayed in control. Sounds like you're the one with awful impulse control. Maybe you should get that checked. And an STI panel while you're at it. Worthington? Seriously? You can do better, high or not."
Jean stared at him for a few moments, her features shifting from disbelief, to anger, to disappointment. "Don't be an ass. I don't question who you sleep with. And that's not the point," she said, clenching her fists. Even if, yes, that was a big mistake.
"Touche." He drunkenly stumbled away and sat down, leaning against the half-wall that kept him from falling off the roof. "Anything would've been worth it to get back to normal," he said. "Didn't know it would get to you. It shouldn't have."
"But it did," Jean said. She sat down beside him, watching the city lights. After a moment, glancing him over.
"I'm terrified I'm going to get a call one day, or find you face down in an alley somewhere. I don't---" she sighed.
"What can I do?"
"Stop, you're not my mother," he snapped at her, but then laughed at his own taunt. "Who am I kidding? You're a lot more invested in me than she is. She probably thinks this is a good thing. Like I'm less of a mutant. A step back to 'normal' for her." He snorted at the very idea of him ever being considered "normal."
Jean made a face. "Mother?" she said indignantly. " "More like concerned sister."
She didn't look old enough to be his mother, did she?
"And your mother can go screw herself."
Quentin fought to hold back a tasteless retort, the struggle painted clearly on his face. "How do we break this link between us?" he finally asked, settling himself. "It needs to go. I'm not going to stop at anything to be a telepath again, and you don't need to go down with me."
Jean shot him a look, then sighed.
"So it's hell or high water, hmm?" she said.
"Read thoughts or die trying?"
"It's not about reading thoughts!" he reminded her, perhaps too strongly, as another pipe shook and threatened to burst, too. "It's about getting all of myself back. Wouldn't matter if my powers were telepathy or coming out my ass. I. Need. It. Back. Stop being a 'sister,' and be a doctor, for shit's sake."
Jean laugh-snorted faintly. "Oh, now you want to listen to me as a doctor?" she said. She sighed again, her smile fading. "If it isn't your telepathy than what is it? What part are you missing? Because I'm beginning to think it's something not physical or biological that I can fix."
"How about I give you a back-alley hysterectomy. How would you feel then? Because that's what's going on."
Blinking, Jean shook her head. "I understand, Quentin. But you asked me to be a doctor and that is my medical prognosis. It may be psychological, rather than physical. I can run more tests but..."
"I asked you for some fucking bedside manner, not your amateur engineering!" Quentin snapped, and so did the pipe. He winced, not at the property destruction, but the sudden mental feedback from exerting his telekinesis at levels it was not meant to be. Good thing he was sitting down, else he might have fallen. When he looked up at her again, his face was pale and moist from sweat. "What isn't getting through your fish brain, Jean? I got brought back wrong. I'm not me. It doesn't matter that I can read thoughts. What matters is that part of me is missing and I'm still fucking dead unless I find it. And if I don't, then, well, it's like I was never here, anyway."
Jean flinched at the 'fish brain' part like a slap to the face. It was like pouring salt into a wound, a reminder of her weakness.
"Am I supposed to guess what you're talking about? Because right now it just sounds like you want someone to tear down to make yourself feel better and I'm one of the few people you haven't managed to push away yet so you're trying very hard to add me to the list."
Quentin rolled his eyes. "You read me like a book," he said sarcastically. "So how come you haven't run screaming yet? Why do you care so much you keep trying? You're the only one. Even G had enough . . ." He snapped his mouth shut before he said any more.
Jean tilted her head. "Because even though your default mode is asshole, I know you're still a good person underneath. You were in my head for awhile so..." she said simply, leaning against the side of the building.
"I think freaking the hell out about dying and coming back to life in a new body is pretty understandable. Even saints might be a little unnerved by that."
He wiped his face with the back of his sleeve, muttering something about perspiration, but when he looked up again, his eyes were red. "It's been seven months. I can't keep living like this."
Closing the distance, Jean sat down beside him.
"Probably not," she said. Especially the way things were going. But she didn't know if he meant it the way she did.
"Please. Fix me." The plea came out a whisper, barely loud enough to be heard over the sounds of the city below them.
Jean met his eyes. "I'll do everything in my power," she promised. It was hard to make a promise she couldn't keep, but she would try everything she could.
