xp_logs | Rictor & Match: Wuxia Films and Real Talk

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(backdated)While watching a movie, Rictor accidentally meets the newest reclusive mutant of the mansion, Match.

Rictor was sure that he could live in this mansion for the rest of his life and never remember its layout. He could go from the front entrance to his room, but any deviation from that and he was lost. After 10 minutes of wandering, he had come to the large central kitchen and came away with a party-size bag of peanut M&Ms, and it took him another 15 to find the stairs and get to the second level. But he got turned around on the way to his room and instead found himself in a large common area that housed a TV bigger than anything he had ever seen in his life. Figuring he could kill some time here, he settled down on the couch and flipped through channels until he saw a black-clad Donnie Yen wielding an umbrella to beat the stuffing out of a bunch of pickpockets.

"Ooh, Iron Monkey!" he exclaimed to no one in particular. "I love this movie."

Match had been slinking away from the kitchen, backpack freshly stocked with cans of food and some dried stuff that promised to be nutritional, from all he really understood from his health class years ago at least. By his math, taking into account the supplies he already had, he'd be good for another week and a half, maybe two weeks if he stretched it and didn't hand out anything in DX. The shout shout startled him, almost sending him booking it until he understood what had been said.

“Oh, that’s a good one,” it was mostly to himself as he poked his head into the tv room — and god, did they really need a tv almost as big as the entire wall? Really? The guy didn’t look familiar, but aside from the handful of people he’d kept around few people did. “Yo, ‘m Match. Can I join you?”

"Huh? Oh, hi, sure." He slid over on the couch to make room and held out his hand when the other kid joined him. "I'm Rictor. I just moved here. Do you like wuxia movies?"

Removing his backpack, he seemed to fall into the rather than just seat himself. “Cool, thanks, yeah my dad liked them.” He stared at the proffered hand, puffing out the air in his lungs a bit as he tried to keep himself… what he assumed was a normal human body temperature before reaching out to shake it. “Sorry, I’m… hot.” Match finished lamely. “Power problem.”

The delay in returning the handshake was a little weird, and Rictor almost pulled back his hand, but he offered Match a smile at his explanation. "No te preocupes. Are you always so hot?" The alternate meaning of that question was lost in translation.

It was weird to hear it out of someone else's mouth, he was almost sure that he just stared blankly, mouth opened before he finally nodded, shoving his hand back into his pockets. "Yup." Entirely deadpan as he focused on not having waves of heat pour off him. "What do you do?" He asked more to keep himself distracted, eyes flicking between the guy and the movie.

It would be rude to move because of the other guy's powers, and Rictor could tolerate it for now, but he pushed the bag of candy away to avoid inadvertent yet unfortunate melting. "I create earthquakes. I used to think it was small, but last week I . . . I made a big one." He turned away from Match, suddenly embarrassed.

"Oh... I thought earthquakes were something that just happened on tv." Match would have grimaced at the words if he hadn't immediately mentally left that plane of existence once he realized what he'd said. It was true, but, Jesus Christ. "I burnt my house down. Shit happens." He hoped that sounded reassuring.

The admission elicited a little laugh from Rictor and emboldened him to look over at the other boy again, smiling softly. "I assume from your tone that no one was hurt. Is this common among mutants? For their gifts to be so destructive at first."

“Hm?” He blinked back out of the movie, eyes flickering from the fluid movement of Yen back to Rictor. "Nah, no one was hurt." That he knew of. "Ehh, I don't know, I mean, not everyone can do what we do, so maybe people with - fuck, softer? Less destructive powers? What's the word for that, but them, I doubt they're breaking the earth and melting shit. But if you did it too, I think it's gotta be, right?"

"It's another thing I can ask Amanda. I didn't know much about mutants until she and her friends told me I am one. I don't think there are many in my home in Mexico. Maybe in Ciudad de México, but I didn't meet any at university."

"Could be in the sewers," Match offered with a shrug. " I did it for about a year, and apparently it's not crazy unheard of. Though, yeah, I don't know anything about Mexico, Mexico mutants, all lost on me."

"In the sewer?" Rictor must have misheard, so he asked for clarification. "Like living in the pipes? Super Mario mutants?"

"Except no Mushroom Kingdom," Match nodded, then frowned. “Well, actually maybe it was closer to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. We still, like, came up to get food and stuff.”

Rictor grabbed the remote to turn down the volume, now much more interested in Match's story than Donnie Yen's traveling medicine man. "Why were you living in the sewers? Is that okay to ask? I have never heard of anyone doing that before, except the Ninja Turtles, ¿sabes?"

"I didn't want to get arrested?" Match raised a brow slowly as he spoke, trying to decide if that had been a question or not. "I wish I'd been a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle! I got two outta four and we didn't have, like, any pizza. Sometimes we had combos, but that's not the same - does Mexico have combos? Oh, right, uhh, I got arrested after I burned a park, then I got out and lived with a group in the sewers because it was harder for us to live out of the sewers. So... maybe in Mexico they do that too..."

"Maybe. That's . . . huh. I never thought about that. There is so much I don't know about mutants." Rictor smiled again, softly, self-deprecatingly. He ran a hand through his unkempt hair and sat back on the sofa. "Amanda said I shouldn't worry, but learning about all this, I feel like I am taking an exam I did not study for."

"Oh, no, I mean-" Match had begun to pull at a loose thread of his sleeve, worrying it further as he looked at Rictor with something bordering on concern. He knew for once that an unnatural heat had begun to radiate off of him. "I didn't mean, I just, that's what I know, I don't know, like, anything about any other mutant things, in America or Mexico. I don't think there's an exam..." He mumbled out after a pause. "I hope there's not an exam. I'm bad at school."

"But you had your friends who lived with you, and you knew you are a mutant when you first got your powers. I never met one until Amanda and her team. I don't know anything. I worry . . . that I'm going to do it wrong. That doesn't make sense, does it?" Rictor tried to smile again, but it fell flat, so he covered it up with another handful of candy. "I don't know what made me think about this. I'm sorry for making you listen to me."

"You're good, bro, it's all uh, new, right? It's not like you've known and just weren't like acknowledging it." That sounded like something that someone here might say. Reassuring? Match hoped, at least. "I only met more mutants because of the whole not wanting to get arrested thing, then I got brought here." Later, but there didn't seem to be a point in bringing it up, so instead he flashed a quick lopsided smile. "Now you're surrounded by mutants, so I think you're fine. Especially if you need to figure out your powers."

It was in fact reassuring, especially coming from a peer and not a teacher who had to say such pleasantries. Even if it seemed Match wasn't totally sold on it himself. Maybe they could figure it out together.