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xp_logsDarcy and Haller finally meet in person and have a discussion about the blow-up on the journals. Afterwards, she provides a little tech support.
Darcy was stretched out on a chaise in one of the first floor parlor rooms, laptop balanced on a chair and playing soft cello music. Her eyes skimmed over the pages of the book in her hand, letting her mind sink into the musical mystery unfolding. The playlist she'd chosen was excellent for the mood of the story, and soon enough she was so absorbed in her novel that she barely noticed there was someone else in the room.
The itch of awareness, that vague feeling of being watched finally dragged her out of the book, and she finished the current chapter before putting it down with a soft sigh. "Haller, right? In the flesh and everything. Might as well come sit."
Jim hadn't actually meant to lurk in the doorway, but when you were his height even honest hesitation was obtrusive. He supposed Darcy had just made the call for him.
The telepath followed her invitation, his own laptop under his arm. "Hope I'm not bothering you," he said, taking a seat in a chair opposite. "I was looking for a place to do a few modules."
"It's fine. If I really didn't want company I wouldn't be down here. I just don't want to deal with everyone yet, hence staying out of the more frequented areas." Her eyes flickered a bright blue-green as she sent a note to her laptop, watching it pop up on the screen with the book title and chapter number with a small smile. "What modules are you working on? School stuff? Personal enrichment?"
"Continuing education units, so a little bit of both, I guess. I need to keep up with it for my license in New York. It's thrilling." He flipped the laptop open without much enthusiasm. "What about you?" he asked, as if he could not plainly see the novel sitting next to her. He never had been good at the opening salvos of small talk.
Darcy waved the book at him. "Decompressing after living out of my suitcase for a week. Not that my time out there is particularly strenuous, but it's always a little strange adjusting to time zones and falling asleep alone in an unfamiliar bed. A book and some music to vibe to sounded like just the thing to get me settled back in before dealing with chores and people. How's Star settling in? The incident on the journals didn't spook him too much, did it? Most of us are usually less unhinged than that."
"He's doing okay. He's made a good connection with Terry. Thanks again for picking him up, by the way." Jim sighed inwardly and cut to the chase. "Uh, speaking of the journal thing, I just thought I'd ask how you were doing. It got pretty heated, and then you disappeared for a week, so . . ." He spread his hands.
"No worries, Star's a peach. Prickly one, but I am too when my life has a bunch of upheaval." Darcy waved the thanks off, lips pulling into a thin line at the weekend's mention. "I'm, y'know." She waved her hand in a vague so-so motion. "Poor timing. I already had plans to fly out and do some interviews for the X-Ranch podcast, but I'm fully aware a bunch of people, myself firmly included, were giant assholes in a way that doesn't facilitate an actual conversation with potential for change or progress. My sympathy for people behaving poorly has a limit, and one of the easiest ways to pass it is to insult the effort and dedication my friends have towards their work." That she'd bumped her flight up a day and extended her trip so she wouldn't have to be under the same roof as someone that'd threatened to kill her had played a part, but other than a minor slap from Barton nobody had really seemed to care about that and she wasn't in the mood to have another person tell her Quire wasn't usually like that or wasn't a threat or whatever bullshit she'd have to hear. She already missed being able to sleep without fear and she hadn't even been back 4 hours yet. Maybe she could just base herself out of Vegas.
Jim nodded. "Yeah, that . . . wasn't great. I was talking to Sooraya about that. She spends a lot of time on those programs. I know Kyle does, too. It's hard to see someone tear into it like that without really understanding all the work that goes into it." He leaned back in the plush chair, hands on his knees on either side of his laptop. "I don't know, I guess I just wanted to check in. It's not really my business, but that entire situation got really personal really fast." He gave her an apologetic smile, aware of how presumptuous he was being. "Feel free to tell me to get lost, by the way, I just happened to have the thought, and sometimes it's easier to vent to a stranger."
Darcy nodded. "None of us were great but it's. Levels of not-great. Terry and I share a suite, I see first-hand how much she does on international efforts. Arthur's usually one of the first to volunteer to help. Some of the other lawyers that offer pro bono time are human, so are some of the people that help navigate health care, schools, all those other resources. I'm not going to say any of them - of us - are perfect, but at least at the volunteer level? If you're an asshole to the clients, you're banned and blacklisted."
The telepath bobbed his head, mirroring her body language. "It's the same at Muir. We have human specialists, and there are support structures in place for human family of patients, if they have any." Pensively, he rubbed a hand over the nape of his neck. "I do take Madin's point that sometimes you want a space where you can just feel safe. There are plenty of non-mutant communities that set themselves up around that. The problem, at least in the US, is that even within communities robust enough to allow you to basically do all your shopping and business with members of your own group, there have to be people willing to do at least some business with gentiles, or non-Mormons, or white people, or whatever. It may not be you specifically, but it's almost impossible to have a totally closed community. Especially if membership in that group is as random as mutation."
Darcy could agree with that. "Sure, and if they were wanting times or days or more events that might be mutant only, or something like that, I could see that getting some support. Maybe a lot of support. After all, there are plenty of events at public spaces with age limits or gender and orientation restrictions. But you're right, mutants as a whole don't have the same sort of ease to even create a closed community. I mean, fantasy novels about partially hidden worlds within worlds have covered a lot of those negative aspects. What might happen to children that don't fit - baselines born to mutants and mutants born to baselines that manifest at puberty. Heck, people with powers so slight or subtle they could go their whole lives without knowing they were a mutant. I was in that category. If not for petty vengeance, I might still be on the Hill fighting for the rights of a people I didn't even know I was part of. And some of those same people would despise me for it just as much as the people who want us all dead." She shrugged. "There's no perfect world or answer to questions and events regarding the care and safety of entire peoples. The world isn't that black and white. It sucks, but it's the reality of things."
"Right. And all the variables make it more difficult. . . we all have different ideas of what a 'safe space' entails. Someone like me, who's cis, white, and human-passing, is basically going through it on easy mode. I'm not going to be instantly singled out like someone like Clarice or Kurt. When I walk into a room not even other mutants would necessarily peg me as anything but human. I admit I sometimes forget about that." Jim gave a soft snort. "Then again, I didn't really grow up in much of any community, so I'm always a step behind on this sort of dynamic. I know dissecting identity is fairly common in any activist space, though."
"Yeah, I'm the same. I pass in all the easy ways. But just because someone passes in those easy ways... that doesn't mean they have had it easy. Easier, maybe. In some ways. But maybe harder in others." Darcy's grin was wry. "Not me, I get that in mutant and other ways I mostly hit the jackpot on the way down, and I can't relate to being visible, having a bad family, any of that, because I'm not ever going to live those experiences. And as long as nobody sees me with Inez, I pass as presumably straight too. So there are some things I will never get, but harassment, discrimination, assault? Those are universal. Sure, the more visible you are as someone to other, the more vulnerable you become to people behaving poorly. And that's exactly why some of the more visible people working there don't want to be the face of the center. Of a whole community. That's why I told Madin if they wanted to see that change, they needed to put in the work to be the visible face the community wanted representing them to the rest of the city, if not farther. Admittedly, I didn't go about it the best way, but I am a believer in putting in the work to make the changes you want to see. They've got Xavier's backing now, so it's quite possibly safer for them to be visible than it is for someone that's got to worry about job or housing discrimination."
"True. Maybe being a public face would be a bit much for them to start with, but if it's something they're passionate about it'd be good to see what community actions they are interested in. I might check with Alani. I know she reached out to them." Jim drummed his fingers against the keypad thoughtfully. "Ironically the best place to figure that out is probably the community center, but they don't sound as if they consider it safe."
"Well." Darcy paused, thinking. "I did get intel about a new commune up in Oregon while I was in Vegas. I'd never suggest it myself, and I wouldn't want Madin to think they were being punished or kicked out, but I've seen them around the X-Factor offices with Quire, so maybe it'd be something for their group to look into. Had some of them come through Sunset because they already had plans to travel elsewhere, but they were decently fed, in good shape, mostly just needed a rest and a place to work up a little more cash before traveling on. Supposedly that's been the norm for mutants stopping in from the place. Would you be willing to pass that on to one of them from an unnamed source?"
"Huh, maybe. Thanks for the tip." She was right -- it might be difficult to present that option without appearing to insinuate the young mutant wasn't wanted at the Institute, but if they truly weren't comfortable here it was good to have options. Jim tried to open his calendar to make a note reminding himself to circle back on it in a few days when things had settled more fully, but the laptop froze.
"Crap," he muttered, giving the track-pad a few disconsolate flicks.
"What's wrong?" Darcy propped herself up, leaning forward to look at his computer. "Frozen? You want me to take a look at it? I'm one of the techy people, should be able to figure it out without calling Doug or Kitty over."
Jim pivoted the laptop for Darcy's inspection. "Yeah," he said, apologetic, "it runs slow anyway, and sometimes it just locks up. There's probably some garbage on it somewhere."
Her eyes flashed that bright blue-green again as her fingers settled on the keys, carefully feeling her way into the system. Garbage was... not a completely incorrect description for what she encountered, fingers unknowingly tapping at the keys while she mentally dismantled the first bit of virus she encountered. She quickly learned that trying to navigate a virus-riddled device was not great, leaving her swimming through what felt like a miasma of sick and gross. It went on that way for what felt like hours, but was only a few minutes, and when she pulled back to awareness her skin felt flushed and her nose was itchy. A few final clicks to finish installing her preferred ad-blocker and setting better security in place, and she turned it back to Haller with a tired smile. "Yeah, you had a few -" Darcy managed to pull her shirt over her lower face and get her forearm over that before she let out a series of loud, thankfully unmessy sneezes. She wiggled her nose a few times under the shirt once the sneezing had seemingly stopped, then slowly dropped it and her arm. "Sorry about that. You had a few nasty viruses poking around, but it's clean now and I've tightened the security and updated your ad-blocker. Stop downloading weird porn or whatever it is you've been pirating, dude. Just ask, I'll find you a clean copy or legit sites." She leaned back against the chaise, relaxing into the cushion with a sigh that turned into a cough. "I must've picked up something on the plane, damn."
Jim snorted. "I wish it was porn. That's a lot easier to manage than kids using my laptop to pirate shows and install random games." And that kid is usually me, he thought with resignation. He thought Davey probably understood internet security, but he'd never let that stop him before. Jim accepted the laptop and quirked an eyebrow at the younger woman, slightly puzzled at the sudden onset of symptoms. "Do you want me to see if the Medlab's got any cold medicine on hand?" he asked. "I'd say the tech support is at least worth a trip down there."
"Well, they should get a blocker now if a site's particularly naughty on the virus scale," Darcy replied with a wan grin, "and I keep cold meds in my room. Appreciate the thought though." She sat up slowly from her reclined position, letting her elbows rest on her thighs for a moment before she pushed to standing. "Lemme leave you to your modules, and I'll go take some meds and a nap, see if I can't power through this. Nice to meet you in person. Oh. Do you prefer being called by your last name, or something else? I'm usually a firsts and nicknames type, is why I ask, but I know some people prefer last."
"David is the simplest option," Jim smiled, but did not elaborate. That was more of a three-beers-in sort of explanation. "And Darcy is all right? I . . . don't think I know your last name, actually."
"David, then. And it's Lewis, but Darcy is fine. Most of the people that call me Lewis either don't like me or are weirdly formal about last names. I'll answer to almost anything as long as it isn't terribly insulting."
The telepath glanced down at his laptop, which had successfully rebooted itself in less than fifteen minutes for the first time in months. "Shouldn't be a problem," he said, sincerely.
Darcy was stretched out on a chaise in one of the first floor parlor rooms, laptop balanced on a chair and playing soft cello music. Her eyes skimmed over the pages of the book in her hand, letting her mind sink into the musical mystery unfolding. The playlist she'd chosen was excellent for the mood of the story, and soon enough she was so absorbed in her novel that she barely noticed there was someone else in the room.
The itch of awareness, that vague feeling of being watched finally dragged her out of the book, and she finished the current chapter before putting it down with a soft sigh. "Haller, right? In the flesh and everything. Might as well come sit."
Jim hadn't actually meant to lurk in the doorway, but when you were his height even honest hesitation was obtrusive. He supposed Darcy had just made the call for him.
The telepath followed her invitation, his own laptop under his arm. "Hope I'm not bothering you," he said, taking a seat in a chair opposite. "I was looking for a place to do a few modules."
"It's fine. If I really didn't want company I wouldn't be down here. I just don't want to deal with everyone yet, hence staying out of the more frequented areas." Her eyes flickered a bright blue-green as she sent a note to her laptop, watching it pop up on the screen with the book title and chapter number with a small smile. "What modules are you working on? School stuff? Personal enrichment?"
"Continuing education units, so a little bit of both, I guess. I need to keep up with it for my license in New York. It's thrilling." He flipped the laptop open without much enthusiasm. "What about you?" he asked, as if he could not plainly see the novel sitting next to her. He never had been good at the opening salvos of small talk.
Darcy waved the book at him. "Decompressing after living out of my suitcase for a week. Not that my time out there is particularly strenuous, but it's always a little strange adjusting to time zones and falling asleep alone in an unfamiliar bed. A book and some music to vibe to sounded like just the thing to get me settled back in before dealing with chores and people. How's Star settling in? The incident on the journals didn't spook him too much, did it? Most of us are usually less unhinged than that."
"He's doing okay. He's made a good connection with Terry. Thanks again for picking him up, by the way." Jim sighed inwardly and cut to the chase. "Uh, speaking of the journal thing, I just thought I'd ask how you were doing. It got pretty heated, and then you disappeared for a week, so . . ." He spread his hands.
"No worries, Star's a peach. Prickly one, but I am too when my life has a bunch of upheaval." Darcy waved the thanks off, lips pulling into a thin line at the weekend's mention. "I'm, y'know." She waved her hand in a vague so-so motion. "Poor timing. I already had plans to fly out and do some interviews for the X-Ranch podcast, but I'm fully aware a bunch of people, myself firmly included, were giant assholes in a way that doesn't facilitate an actual conversation with potential for change or progress. My sympathy for people behaving poorly has a limit, and one of the easiest ways to pass it is to insult the effort and dedication my friends have towards their work." That she'd bumped her flight up a day and extended her trip so she wouldn't have to be under the same roof as someone that'd threatened to kill her had played a part, but other than a minor slap from Barton nobody had really seemed to care about that and she wasn't in the mood to have another person tell her Quire wasn't usually like that or wasn't a threat or whatever bullshit she'd have to hear. She already missed being able to sleep without fear and she hadn't even been back 4 hours yet. Maybe she could just base herself out of Vegas.
Jim nodded. "Yeah, that . . . wasn't great. I was talking to Sooraya about that. She spends a lot of time on those programs. I know Kyle does, too. It's hard to see someone tear into it like that without really understanding all the work that goes into it." He leaned back in the plush chair, hands on his knees on either side of his laptop. "I don't know, I guess I just wanted to check in. It's not really my business, but that entire situation got really personal really fast." He gave her an apologetic smile, aware of how presumptuous he was being. "Feel free to tell me to get lost, by the way, I just happened to have the thought, and sometimes it's easier to vent to a stranger."
Darcy nodded. "None of us were great but it's. Levels of not-great. Terry and I share a suite, I see first-hand how much she does on international efforts. Arthur's usually one of the first to volunteer to help. Some of the other lawyers that offer pro bono time are human, so are some of the people that help navigate health care, schools, all those other resources. I'm not going to say any of them - of us - are perfect, but at least at the volunteer level? If you're an asshole to the clients, you're banned and blacklisted."
The telepath bobbed his head, mirroring her body language. "It's the same at Muir. We have human specialists, and there are support structures in place for human family of patients, if they have any." Pensively, he rubbed a hand over the nape of his neck. "I do take Madin's point that sometimes you want a space where you can just feel safe. There are plenty of non-mutant communities that set themselves up around that. The problem, at least in the US, is that even within communities robust enough to allow you to basically do all your shopping and business with members of your own group, there have to be people willing to do at least some business with gentiles, or non-Mormons, or white people, or whatever. It may not be you specifically, but it's almost impossible to have a totally closed community. Especially if membership in that group is as random as mutation."
Darcy could agree with that. "Sure, and if they were wanting times or days or more events that might be mutant only, or something like that, I could see that getting some support. Maybe a lot of support. After all, there are plenty of events at public spaces with age limits or gender and orientation restrictions. But you're right, mutants as a whole don't have the same sort of ease to even create a closed community. I mean, fantasy novels about partially hidden worlds within worlds have covered a lot of those negative aspects. What might happen to children that don't fit - baselines born to mutants and mutants born to baselines that manifest at puberty. Heck, people with powers so slight or subtle they could go their whole lives without knowing they were a mutant. I was in that category. If not for petty vengeance, I might still be on the Hill fighting for the rights of a people I didn't even know I was part of. And some of those same people would despise me for it just as much as the people who want us all dead." She shrugged. "There's no perfect world or answer to questions and events regarding the care and safety of entire peoples. The world isn't that black and white. It sucks, but it's the reality of things."
"Right. And all the variables make it more difficult. . . we all have different ideas of what a 'safe space' entails. Someone like me, who's cis, white, and human-passing, is basically going through it on easy mode. I'm not going to be instantly singled out like someone like Clarice or Kurt. When I walk into a room not even other mutants would necessarily peg me as anything but human. I admit I sometimes forget about that." Jim gave a soft snort. "Then again, I didn't really grow up in much of any community, so I'm always a step behind on this sort of dynamic. I know dissecting identity is fairly common in any activist space, though."
"Yeah, I'm the same. I pass in all the easy ways. But just because someone passes in those easy ways... that doesn't mean they have had it easy. Easier, maybe. In some ways. But maybe harder in others." Darcy's grin was wry. "Not me, I get that in mutant and other ways I mostly hit the jackpot on the way down, and I can't relate to being visible, having a bad family, any of that, because I'm not ever going to live those experiences. And as long as nobody sees me with Inez, I pass as presumably straight too. So there are some things I will never get, but harassment, discrimination, assault? Those are universal. Sure, the more visible you are as someone to other, the more vulnerable you become to people behaving poorly. And that's exactly why some of the more visible people working there don't want to be the face of the center. Of a whole community. That's why I told Madin if they wanted to see that change, they needed to put in the work to be the visible face the community wanted representing them to the rest of the city, if not farther. Admittedly, I didn't go about it the best way, but I am a believer in putting in the work to make the changes you want to see. They've got Xavier's backing now, so it's quite possibly safer for them to be visible than it is for someone that's got to worry about job or housing discrimination."
"True. Maybe being a public face would be a bit much for them to start with, but if it's something they're passionate about it'd be good to see what community actions they are interested in. I might check with Alani. I know she reached out to them." Jim drummed his fingers against the keypad thoughtfully. "Ironically the best place to figure that out is probably the community center, but they don't sound as if they consider it safe."
"Well." Darcy paused, thinking. "I did get intel about a new commune up in Oregon while I was in Vegas. I'd never suggest it myself, and I wouldn't want Madin to think they were being punished or kicked out, but I've seen them around the X-Factor offices with Quire, so maybe it'd be something for their group to look into. Had some of them come through Sunset because they already had plans to travel elsewhere, but they were decently fed, in good shape, mostly just needed a rest and a place to work up a little more cash before traveling on. Supposedly that's been the norm for mutants stopping in from the place. Would you be willing to pass that on to one of them from an unnamed source?"
"Huh, maybe. Thanks for the tip." She was right -- it might be difficult to present that option without appearing to insinuate the young mutant wasn't wanted at the Institute, but if they truly weren't comfortable here it was good to have options. Jim tried to open his calendar to make a note reminding himself to circle back on it in a few days when things had settled more fully, but the laptop froze.
"Crap," he muttered, giving the track-pad a few disconsolate flicks.
"What's wrong?" Darcy propped herself up, leaning forward to look at his computer. "Frozen? You want me to take a look at it? I'm one of the techy people, should be able to figure it out without calling Doug or Kitty over."
Jim pivoted the laptop for Darcy's inspection. "Yeah," he said, apologetic, "it runs slow anyway, and sometimes it just locks up. There's probably some garbage on it somewhere."
Her eyes flashed that bright blue-green again as her fingers settled on the keys, carefully feeling her way into the system. Garbage was... not a completely incorrect description for what she encountered, fingers unknowingly tapping at the keys while she mentally dismantled the first bit of virus she encountered. She quickly learned that trying to navigate a virus-riddled device was not great, leaving her swimming through what felt like a miasma of sick and gross. It went on that way for what felt like hours, but was only a few minutes, and when she pulled back to awareness her skin felt flushed and her nose was itchy. A few final clicks to finish installing her preferred ad-blocker and setting better security in place, and she turned it back to Haller with a tired smile. "Yeah, you had a few -" Darcy managed to pull her shirt over her lower face and get her forearm over that before she let out a series of loud, thankfully unmessy sneezes. She wiggled her nose a few times under the shirt once the sneezing had seemingly stopped, then slowly dropped it and her arm. "Sorry about that. You had a few nasty viruses poking around, but it's clean now and I've tightened the security and updated your ad-blocker. Stop downloading weird porn or whatever it is you've been pirating, dude. Just ask, I'll find you a clean copy or legit sites." She leaned back against the chaise, relaxing into the cushion with a sigh that turned into a cough. "I must've picked up something on the plane, damn."
Jim snorted. "I wish it was porn. That's a lot easier to manage than kids using my laptop to pirate shows and install random games." And that kid is usually me, he thought with resignation. He thought Davey probably understood internet security, but he'd never let that stop him before. Jim accepted the laptop and quirked an eyebrow at the younger woman, slightly puzzled at the sudden onset of symptoms. "Do you want me to see if the Medlab's got any cold medicine on hand?" he asked. "I'd say the tech support is at least worth a trip down there."
"Well, they should get a blocker now if a site's particularly naughty on the virus scale," Darcy replied with a wan grin, "and I keep cold meds in my room. Appreciate the thought though." She sat up slowly from her reclined position, letting her elbows rest on her thighs for a moment before she pushed to standing. "Lemme leave you to your modules, and I'll go take some meds and a nap, see if I can't power through this. Nice to meet you in person. Oh. Do you prefer being called by your last name, or something else? I'm usually a firsts and nicknames type, is why I ask, but I know some people prefer last."
"David is the simplest option," Jim smiled, but did not elaborate. That was more of a three-beers-in sort of explanation. "And Darcy is all right? I . . . don't think I know your last name, actually."
"David, then. And it's Lewis, but Darcy is fine. Most of the people that call me Lewis either don't like me or are weirdly formal about last names. I'll answer to almost anything as long as it isn't terribly insulting."
The telepath glanced down at his laptop, which had successfully rebooted itself in less than fifteen minutes for the first time in months. "Shouldn't be a problem," he said, sincerely.
