Quentin & Jessica, Saturday morning
Aug. 19th, 2023 11:06 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
xp_erverse posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
xp_logsQuentin introduces himself to the new (OG?) Jessica. An encounter with a telepath could go much worse than it actually does.
The knock on her door that had caught her attention repeated itself. Jess, nursing a cup of coffee that she was desperately wishing was doctored, sighed; apparently they weren't just going to go away.
She opened the door - not the whole way - and squinted suspiciously at the man on the other side. She was beginning to recognize the odd double-vision feeling as a sign that she had met someone before. But pink hair? Really?
Quentin had kept to himself when Haller announced Jessica's rescue and recovery. Not like he had much to say, but in light of recent dialogue, he felt it was safer for everyone that he not to pipe up about someone who had been telepathically imprisoned for nearly a decade.
But he and Jessica had a history. A small one, but nevertheless significant to him. He couldn't keep himself away from her.
"Quentin. Munchies?" He held up a few choice snacks from one of the bodegas near the XFI office.
Jessica's eye twitched, and she made sure her grip on the door was robust enough to withstand intrusion. She repeated what had become her mantra in the last few weeks, although one that usually brought no prospect of inner peace: "Who the fuck are you, and how do you think you know me."
"I said already: Quentin. You need Q-tips for your ears, too?" He knew he should be gentler with this convalescing invalid, but something her aura bypassed any phoniness he could muster. "Haller said you don't remember shit from when you were here, but you helped me with something. So I'm here to return the favor with cheap processed snacks. So do you want or...?"
She very clearly considered shutting the door in his face, but the prospect of actual snacks - not artisanal pistachios or organic cold-pressed juice or whatever the fuck she kept finding in the kitchen - clearly weighed in Quentin's favor. She opened the door, stepping aside to reveal an almost completely bare-bones suite. "Those had better actually be cheap," she said.
"Nothing with this much MSG and pressed peanut sweepings costs more than a nickel to make." He dropped the bags on the coffee table and leaned against the half-wall separating the kitchenette from the rest of the living room, giving Jessica enough space to interrogate the snacks herself without him up in her business.
"Do you remember anything about X-Factor Investigations?"
Jess, investigating the snacks with her full complement of private investigator skills, raised her eyebrows at him. "Not . . . really," she said neutrally, neither inviting nor forbidding explanation.
"Mutant private investigators and general community support, based out of District X," he explained. "You were a PI there and you recruited me. Some 18-year-old jackoff who couldn't be fucked to do anything except whine about how unfair the world is, and you found a way for me to do more than be a bitch. I'm still a jackoff, but a certified and licensed private jackoff now."
The expression on Jessica's face shifted too rapidly to land on a single emotion. "I did - fucking what," she said blankly, a bag of chips dropping from her fingers.
It occurred to Quentin as he spoke that the motivational poster captions the old Jess had thrown at him years ago to get him an interview with Frost and Worthington were complete lies. Worse than lies: a script downloaded into her servile brain to manipulate and distract. Was his team origin story foundationally a lie?
He swallowed his upset and answered Jessica's rhetorical question. "You got me a job and now I'm the boss. I guess I just wanted to know if you remember any part of that." He paused. "So I know if we have to start at the beginning or if you've played through the tutorial," he added to scrub over any hint of sentimentality.
The video game reference flew over Jess's head. She looked at Quentin with her brows drawn together, then shook her head slowly. "Honestly, you do seem kind of familiar, but that's it."
"People do find it hard to forget me," he admitted, "So I'll take it. Are you back for good or just stopping by while Haller fixes your head?"
Her jaw tightened, and her flat stare communicated that she felt none of your fucking business would be a perfectly reasonable response. "Well, thanks for coming," she said, standing abruptly.
Oops, touched a nerve. Old Quentin would have ignored her and continued pressing her buttons, but this all-new all-different Quentin would not risk getting punched through a wall just for the lols. Keep up appearances, as Hope had advised him. So he shrugged and sauntered across the room to the door, taking a wide berth from Jessica to avoid an errant fist to the jaw.
"See you around, I guess. Enjoy the Takis. Ciao."
The door swung shut behind Quentin with finality.
The knock on her door that had caught her attention repeated itself. Jess, nursing a cup of coffee that she was desperately wishing was doctored, sighed; apparently they weren't just going to go away.
She opened the door - not the whole way - and squinted suspiciously at the man on the other side. She was beginning to recognize the odd double-vision feeling as a sign that she had met someone before. But pink hair? Really?
Quentin had kept to himself when Haller announced Jessica's rescue and recovery. Not like he had much to say, but in light of recent dialogue, he felt it was safer for everyone that he not to pipe up about someone who had been telepathically imprisoned for nearly a decade.
But he and Jessica had a history. A small one, but nevertheless significant to him. He couldn't keep himself away from her.
"Quentin. Munchies?" He held up a few choice snacks from one of the bodegas near the XFI office.
Jessica's eye twitched, and she made sure her grip on the door was robust enough to withstand intrusion. She repeated what had become her mantra in the last few weeks, although one that usually brought no prospect of inner peace: "Who the fuck are you, and how do you think you know me."
"I said already: Quentin. You need Q-tips for your ears, too?" He knew he should be gentler with this convalescing invalid, but something her aura bypassed any phoniness he could muster. "Haller said you don't remember shit from when you were here, but you helped me with something. So I'm here to return the favor with cheap processed snacks. So do you want or...?"
She very clearly considered shutting the door in his face, but the prospect of actual snacks - not artisanal pistachios or organic cold-pressed juice or whatever the fuck she kept finding in the kitchen - clearly weighed in Quentin's favor. She opened the door, stepping aside to reveal an almost completely bare-bones suite. "Those had better actually be cheap," she said.
"Nothing with this much MSG and pressed peanut sweepings costs more than a nickel to make." He dropped the bags on the coffee table and leaned against the half-wall separating the kitchenette from the rest of the living room, giving Jessica enough space to interrogate the snacks herself without him up in her business.
"Do you remember anything about X-Factor Investigations?"
Jess, investigating the snacks with her full complement of private investigator skills, raised her eyebrows at him. "Not . . . really," she said neutrally, neither inviting nor forbidding explanation.
"Mutant private investigators and general community support, based out of District X," he explained. "You were a PI there and you recruited me. Some 18-year-old jackoff who couldn't be fucked to do anything except whine about how unfair the world is, and you found a way for me to do more than be a bitch. I'm still a jackoff, but a certified and licensed private jackoff now."
The expression on Jessica's face shifted too rapidly to land on a single emotion. "I did - fucking what," she said blankly, a bag of chips dropping from her fingers.
It occurred to Quentin as he spoke that the motivational poster captions the old Jess had thrown at him years ago to get him an interview with Frost and Worthington were complete lies. Worse than lies: a script downloaded into her servile brain to manipulate and distract. Was his team origin story foundationally a lie?
He swallowed his upset and answered Jessica's rhetorical question. "You got me a job and now I'm the boss. I guess I just wanted to know if you remember any part of that." He paused. "So I know if we have to start at the beginning or if you've played through the tutorial," he added to scrub over any hint of sentimentality.
The video game reference flew over Jess's head. She looked at Quentin with her brows drawn together, then shook her head slowly. "Honestly, you do seem kind of familiar, but that's it."
"People do find it hard to forget me," he admitted, "So I'll take it. Are you back for good or just stopping by while Haller fixes your head?"
Her jaw tightened, and her flat stare communicated that she felt none of your fucking business would be a perfectly reasonable response. "Well, thanks for coming," she said, standing abruptly.
Oops, touched a nerve. Old Quentin would have ignored her and continued pressing her buttons, but this all-new all-different Quentin would not risk getting punched through a wall just for the lols. Keep up appearances, as Hope had advised him. So he shrugged and sauntered across the room to the door, taking a wide berth from Jessica to avoid an errant fist to the jaw.
"See you around, I guess. Enjoy the Takis. Ciao."
The door swung shut behind Quentin with finality.
