Haller & Arthur | Do the Logos-motion

[xp_longshot]

Jim and Arthur review what influence Arthur's powers had in the Askew World in a shared telepathic mindscape.


Bleached. That was the word for it. What color existed here was muted, as if seen through a cataract. The structures that could be seen were rust-stained derelicts slouching against a sunless grey sky. A world running down.

But not here.

Jim paced around the portal, fascinated. On one side of rent, reality. On the other, the Askew World. Normally there would have been a clear division between the two worlds, but this time that was not the case.

The telepath knelt to inspect the ground immediately beside the threshold. Here the crumbling pavement had begun to cohere into a neat stone pathway. Color, too, seemed to be bleeding into the environment; it was difficult to describe, but the area around the gateway was more saturated, more solid. A little bit of reality imposing itself on an unreal world. And in the center of it, a foot.

Jim stood.

"I guess you don't know how you did this?" he asked.

"I had my eyes open," came in reply.

These words didn't come from the mouth of the blonde man Haller was inspecting, but from somewhere over his shoulder. Arthur was doubled, here. The stock still version of him held open a doorway between two worlds, while at the same time another version – more casually composed in a light hoodie and joggers, unarmed – inspected the scene like a tableau. A memory laid out like a still frame.

"I see things," Arthur added. "I have a good memory. Helps with my job."

Jim smiled. "Not the scene, the . . ." he gestured vaguely towards the edges of the portal where the strangeness was stained by reality, "stabilization. The way you kept the portal open?"

"Oh, that's easy! I didn't think at all, and it just worked. A lucky gamble," Arthur said. He glanced at his doppelgänger like the starburst of light was case in point.

"Lucky," Jim repeated, as if the statement could be anything but rhetorical with Arthur. The man held a hand to the edges of the portal, paying no particular attention to the fact it was his own telepathic reconstruction. "All things considered, it makes sense that if there was any chance for a portal not to bisect you, that is clearly what would fail to happen. What I'm trying to figure out is why you also seem to be affecting the world on this side of the door. It looks more . . . normal?"

This drew the other man's attention from inspecting where the simulation was fuzzing at the edges. "Normal? Huh. Let me try something." Arthur squinted, and the vision jerked forward frame by frame. The other figures slowly advanced toward rescue as the area around the blonde man quivered. Another blink and everything retreated back in rewind. Disappointed, he shook his head. "No, no. There was a feeling. Like being in the spotlight – all eyes on me, you know?"

"You mean the Slenders?"

"Right. Them. I guess I was keeping the door open, although it was easy enough to get in. Marie-Ange had an app for it."

"Well, she did once have to make a door out of a pocket dimension from a scribble. I'd probably figure out ways to get more efficient, too." Jim gazed thoughtfully at Arthur's frozen simulacra, eyes fixed on the man's blazing eye.

"Your powers were activated," he mused. "But I don't see how luck could change the Askew World. Although . . . the other demonic dimension I've seen did have some malleability specific to its victims."

The proper Arthur waved a hand with a shrug. "Well, my luck did work in reverse in the Dark Dimension that one time. Not sure why they called it that, though. It wasn't even that shady."

Jim raised an eyebrow. "Reverse? Are we talking naturally inverted, or a luck snap situation?"

"Eeh," and this noncommittal sound was matched with an unsure gesture, "Not positive? Jenny used to talk a lot about order and chaos in what we do, but it was less of the first and way more of the second. I caused bad things on purpose."

A soft chuckle. "You? Cause problems on purpose?" Idly, Jim held a hand up to the simulacra's glow like a man warming himself by a fire. "It does seem like your power has a preferred, uh, I guess you'd call it 'alignment'. It skews towards good luck, and it prefers if it's not consciously invoked. If you weren't consciously trying for that here . . ." The telepath dropped his hand and turned back to the current Arthur. "You know, it's strange. It almost seems like you're bringing something into the Askew World. Reality? Stability?" He hesitated. "Or order."

The other man looked away in thought to where the memory of some blink and you'd miss them demons were beginning to form an assault. "This or that, I guess. If the opposite is Wanda's whole," and Arthur dipped into a voice that only loosely fit the Scarlet Witch, "beware my great and chaos magic, mortals!" He turned back. The silence of the scene invited questions he might not have considered with a broader audience. "It is just that luck's easier to say than 'probability mansplaination.' What I feel, though, is like everything's sliding into place, but I have to keep moving. Like I'm caught in my own headwind. Is that order?"

"The part about things sliding into place seems like it. The right push in the right place to get the chain reaction you need, but if you don't keep running ahead of it you might end up beneath the last domino in the row." Jim started to reach for a cigarette, his favorite thinking crutch, then remembered they were technically indoors. "Probability does affect natural laws. It would make sense that if you're in a place where reality is already fluid or compromised somehow your powers would have some sort of reaction. You . . . bring your own momentum with you, maybe."

A grin. "That's me. Good vibes and momentum. The X-Force folks did say that this place fed on doubt, uncertainty, and plain old misery." Arthur gestured wide. "Since I can't turn what I do off, it certainly looks like they were allergic to it. I bring some certainty into their world. They notice."

Jim raised three fingers, each one in turn. "Primary mutation: probability. Secondary mutation: psychometry. Tertiary mutation: reality-scorching optimism. One of us is more popular at parties than the other."

"I contain multitudes," Arthur said. "And you are, in fact, a hit at parties."

"No, that's Cyndi, and I still regret she wasn't fronting during that thing with Scott. It was over a month ago and I'm still exhausted."

"Everyone loves an attentive listener," was offered with a shrug, "and I've heard people say good things about sarcasm." Of which there wasn't a drip of in the blond man's cheerful tone. Jim's comment did, however, make Arthur reconsider the scene. "We are getting old, aren't we?"

"Depends on how you look at it. Jack and I scale, but neither of us have ever really been the energetic type, and you could arguably subtract Cyndi and Davey." Jim quirked an eyebrow. "What's up, demon dimensions have you thinking about retirement?"

He held up his hands. "Please. I'm still clearly in my leading man era. Just, what's a guy gotta do to get a cowboy dimension? Why's it always gotta be clowns and demons?"

"Good question. I've never been to a good alternate dimension. That leads me to believe this is a good one, and that's upsetting." The telepath hesitated. "How's Shatterstar doing with all this? Do you know?"

In answer, Arthur squinted again and the scene shifted. It was an entirely unnecessary gesture – the two astral figures did not even need to breathe, here – but, for him, some actions were easier with additional blocking. The witches moved away in a blur to place their wards. Around the two lone observers, the suffocating mist burned with colored light. Unseen battles fought in fast forward.

The memory sped up until it snagged on the sudden emergence of children and adults in retreat. Specifically, a freeze-framed Shatterstar in the company of Jessie, a purple cat, and a collection of escorts. The teen gripped a katana and was dripping in monster gore.

"He was . . . shaken," Arthur said in the silence. "After."

Jim watched the scene in silence, the only indication of his mood a subtle thinning of his mouth. "I'll bet," he said at last. "It's funny, last year was almost calm. I knew it wouldn't last, but I guess I hoped the kids wouldn't. . ." He drew a sharp breath and sighed. "It can't be helped. But he talked to you?"

"He needed to be sure I was real."

The telepath smiled, just a little. He reached out and gave Arthur a gentle squeeze on the shoulder.

"Lucky him," said Jim, "you're good at being the realist thing in the room."

The blond visibly perked up at the touch.

"Certified in multiple dimensions," Arthur said with a theatrical bow as he swept a hand to gesture around them. The additional light from Team Magic's glowing ruins helped to demonstrate that the other, remembered, Arthur's growing aura has gone as far to suggest architecture in this void of a place. An insult of detail. "A service I'm happy to provide."

"And always appreciated." With a final squeeze, Jim released Arthur's shoulder and disengaged the projection.

"Okay . . . back to reality. Hopefully we'll get to stay here for a while."

Comments

[xp_shatterstar]

"That leads me to believe this is a good one, and that's upsetting." I loved this line. Also the hints of Jim/Arthur