ArchivedLogs:Hugs, Bugs and Murder

Hugs, Bugs and Murder
Dramatis Personae Ivan, Jackson, Peter
In Absentia	2013-04-28 '
Location <XS> Ivan and Peter's Dorm
Jackson's phone does a ringing thing! It takes a moment before the phone is picked up, but then: "Hello? S'is Jackson." There's music in the background. It is sort of folksy. "Hello, Mister Jackson." Ivan's voice, unusually hoarse though the words are spoken flatly. There is no music on his end, but there IS something else. It's... crickets? Quite a lot of them from the sound of it. "I think I killed someone." There is silence. Kind of a long silence, actually. The music turns off. "-- You -- I'm sorry, what --" Another silence. Jackson's voice is veeeeery calm. "Where are you? What happened, Ivan?" The crickets continue on. Ivan sounds equally calm over their chirping, though... perhaps a bit too much so. Deadish calm. "I am in my dorm room. Sitting on my bed." A pause. "I hit someone at Salem center. He did not get up. His eyes were open and he fell. I do not understand." "OK. OK, you're at the school." There's another pause, and Jackson is -- still calm, maybe /determinedly/ so. "You're safe, that's good. What happened? Why did you hit someone? Did -- did you call a hospital, did someone look at him?" The sound of crickets dies down just slightly at the word 'good'. "I do not know. Rasa called the emergency services." Ivan continues, without pause. "I hit him because he said..." The cricketchoir flares up again again, but his voice remains the same. "Things about Rasa. Ze told me to leave. I left. He was not moving."' "You hit him because he /said/ --" There's a moment where Jax's words come a little faster, and then he stops to take a breath. "OK." Quiet. "Is Rasa OK?" "Yes." This is all that comes back, for the moment, scratchy but certain. Jackson's next question is quiet too. "Did you tell the school?" "I did not..." This sounds less rehearsed. Next, Ivan's voice sounds more strained and uneven. There's a sniff. "I did not- I... no. I'm..." Then, quietly, somewhat muffled as if through fabric. "I did not understand." "Didn't understand what, hon? Do you -- do you want me to come over there, I can be there -- soon. I can be there soon." The crickets quiet down, now. To hardly a hum. There is another sniff from Ivan, a ragged breath, and a complete lack of answer followed by, simply and quietly, "Please." "OK. You hang tight. I'll be there quick as I can be." Jackson swallows; perhaps he's going to say more. But in the end it's just: "Be there soon." He hangs up. Sunday is Petersleepday. Peter's currently curled up neatly, tucked into bed, clad in boxers, a loose fitting t-shirt, and a pile of comforters. He is laid out like some sort of murder victim; one hand dangling over his head, the other over the side of the bed - head off to the side, mouth open wide, little drool dribbles emerging from his mouth to wet the pillow. Drool, drool. Every so often, tiny foot-twitch and an uncomfortably loud 'snrzzltkt'. "Peter." Ivan's voice comes from above Peter's bed. He has not been sleeping today. Oh no. He did things. Things like being impulsive in a good way, for once, and asking Rasa to go visit Salem Center with him. And then he actually did it. But also maybe some other things, leaving his eyes red and his voice hoarse. He's just standing there, next to his roommate's bed, in a grey T-shirt and jeans, head cocked as he stares. Sadly. "... /Peter/." "Snnnzzz... *znkt*." Peter's eye pops open, peering up at Ivan. And then there's stretching - noisy bone-popping, limb cracking, /toe/ curling - and Peter's getting up. Slowly, bit by bit. His left leg is currently hidden beneath the comforters, but his right thrusts out, /shoving/ toward Ivan's. As if to poke him. Poke, poke. "Ivan," Peter replies, sleepily, grinding his fists into his eyesockets. "Ivan you look sad. Am I dreaming. Nnooohhu..." Lip smack. "This doesn't taste like a dream." Ivan stands, unwavering, until that poke. He /sways/ all too easily. Yes, he /does/ look sad. He is also breathing a little fast, for standing perfectly still. "Peter." Again, flatly. "I killed someone." Boxed crickets in a corner of the dorm somewhere /stir/. And start chirpin' away. There is also the distinct sound of a few of the bigger creepy crawlies restlessly moving in their respective terraria. "Ooooh..." Blink, blink. "...notadream," Peter says, somewhat /lazily/. Like Ivan has just confirmed this in the mildest way. And then - eyes widen a bit more, as the Thought Train finally makes a stop in Realization Station. Eyes /bolt/ open, and Peter is suddenly sitting up: "Wait. Somebody - died? /Somebody died/?" Calm down, Peter. He forces himself to take a breath, slow and steady; then, Ivan might see him mouthing the words '5' through '1' before he speaks again - reaching out to touch Ivan's shoulder. Tug, tug. Tugtug. "Okayokay, uh, tell me - what's - um, going on." Ivan's reddened eyes narrow slightly, before opening again. Beyond the sad, he just looks a bit... empty. Tired. Confused. "There was a man in Salem Center and he said things. We were leaving. Rasa was there. And then I hit him." He lifts a hand, curls it into a fist, as per illustration - he hit him with /this/, Peter. "Okay," Peter says, looking at Ivan's fist - a little confused, eyebrows scrounging together. Thinking. "Okay, Ivan. You hit him I mean - I guess he said /bad/ things, right? That's why you hit him - did he fall down? Hit his head on something?" Peter's brain, still sluggish on sleep, begins doing calculations. /Thinking/. Possibly about how much a pair of CANADIAN BUS TICKETS would cost. RUN, RUN FOR THE BORDER. "He fell down." Ivan's eyes momentarily slide acrooosss Peter's face, down to the bed, then to the floor. His brain is slow enough at the moment to require this for /thinking/ apparently. "He fell down, and... his eyes... were open but he did not move. And there were cockroaches but I did not have cockroaches, I only had /gnats/ for the spiders. Rasa was there-- but ze..." He just sort of... trails off, wordlessly, hand dropping down by his side again. Not understand. Now Peter frowns quite sternly. "Okay," he says, and now he is reaching - for his laptop. Tugging it off the desk, /dragging/ it atop of the bed. Booting it up. "Salem Center, right? This was - how long ago?" Tap, tap, tap. Taptaptap. "Were there any police - Ivan did you tell any of the teachers, yet?" Peterthinking. Moving immediately to SEARCH ENGINE. Typing in 'mutant murder salem center' and seeing what comes up. "...cockroaches? Like, cockroaches were crawling on him?" As Peter moves, Ivan comes back to life-- if only just to peer at his roommate some more. He sinks down onto the floor with his legs awkwardly folded in front of him, hands palm-up on the floor beside him. He is maybe a little broken at the moment."I do not know." He responds, deadpan, before looking back towards the floor again, "It happened. I left. I came here. I called Mister Jackson while you were sleeping." A pause, then. "There were cockroaches. I do not understand." Thud. That's the sound of him leaning forward to let his head hit Peter's bedframe. Typetypetypetype, and then: "I'm not seeing anything - on the news about - anybody," Peter says. "Like, nothing about a violent attack or -" His voice fades off. Looking down at Ivan as he sinks to the ground, frowning. "Ivan, are you sure... okay, look, just - don't worry." And now Peter slinks /out/ of the bed, thumping down behind Ivan - bringing the comforter with him, still wrapped around his waist. Apparently he does not wish to abandon it. An arm on Ivan's shoulder; the laptop still perched precariously atop of his knees - a tangle of wire now threatening to spill the contents of the dresser above him to the floor! "We'll figure this out, okay? It sounds like - there's probably something /weird/ going on here. I mean, you just hit a guy and he died I mean how /big/ was he you are not super-strong, Ivan, I mean I guess you could have but it would be /weird/ and..." Eyebrows still scrunched. Still /thinking/. Ivan response to Peter's arm on his shoulder is minimal. A twitch, no more. He just sort of stays slouched over with his head pressed against the bedframe, eyes open but staring at nothingness down on the floor. Sorry, Peter. Ivan isn't here right now. Leave a message. Peter's mouth purses into a little tight knot; the slow typing (one handed!) continues for a while - then ends. And then, not seeing much else he can do, Peter closes the laptop with a delicate *clkt*, and reaches forward - wrapping both arms around Ivan to give him a backward hug. SQUEEZE. Small head-butt to the back of his skull. The hug garners more response- even then, it is only a leeaan back and away from the bed, arms uselessly at his sides. Somewhere in Ivan's shocked little brain, life remaaains. For hugs. It takes Jackson a little while to reach the school, although perhaps not as long as it /should/. Maybe he's been /speeding/. But eventually he arrives, anachronistically cheerful in bright flowy purple top, metallicky-silvery sheened black jeans, sparkly silver sneakers. Vivid magenta hair. A wealth of makeup. He knocks quick but quiet on Ivan and Peter's door. Knockknockknock. The hug garners more response- even then, it is only a leeaan back and away from the bed, arms uselessly at his sides. Somewhere in Ivan's shocked little brain, life remaaains. For hugs. Peter gives an extra squeeze at the sound of the knock - and then he is up, shifting reluctantly away from Ivan, the laptop deposited back on the dresser, the wires untangled, the big thick comforter left behind. Peter's clad in a t-shirt, boxers, and socks; the boxers /might/ have the Bat-signal on them. His stitches are out; the bandage has been removed - and the chitin has spread. A dark black /blob/ that extends past his knee, calf, and up his thigh; it has a metallic-like /sheen/ to it, with a deep, dark blue tint. He reaches the doorknob - pauses, looks back to Ivan, then asks, very quietly, to the knocker: "...this isn't the po-po, right?" Then, as if realizing how /crazy/ that would be, Peter proceeds to open the door. Jackson is /very like/ the po-po except. For the part where he is a glittery largely-peaceful anarchist. So pretty much exactly unlike the po-po. He wears a slight frown, worried, and looks over Peter -- the worried look /deepens/ as he sees Peter's leg -- and then shifts his gaze to Ivan. "Hey," he says quietly, to both boys, "'kai come in?" Thud. Three guesses what that noise was. No, actually, no guesses, seeing as it happens right in front of both Jackson and Peter -- Ivan's head hitting the bedframe again now that he has no Peter to lean into. Then, very quietly, weakly, "Hello, Mister Jackson." Quieter still, "Thank you." "JAX." This might be a bit louder than Peter intends to say it. He proceeds to hop back out of the doorframe, as if to make a huge chunk of room for him. Hop, hop. Back toward Ivan, although giving Jackson enough room to move in. Peter proceeds to - just, /gesture/ at Ivan. Almost flailing. Like, LOOK AT THIS, ARE YOU SEEING THIS. FIX IT, JAX. /FIX/ IT. "He - uh there was some thing - he thinks he /killed/ a guy but it doesn't make any /sense/." Then, quite suddenly: "Wait you are not calling... the police right?" Then, a little more firmly, eyebrows squishing together, stance shifting into something more rigid - as if he just realized, Jax is both an adult /and/ a teacher: "You are not calling the police." This, Peter /commands/. "Peter, if Ivan killed someone I would almost definitely call the police," Jackson says this quiet but it's pretty firm. He slips into the room, closing the door behind them, and moves over to gesture questioningly at the floor beside Ivan -- may I? What he says next, though, is: "You didn't kill anyone, Ivan. I think whoever it was was just playing some kind of mean trick on you. After y'all left the man got up and left." The gesture is easily missed by Ivan, still somewhat deadishly slouched over until-- wait, what? He blinks, straightens, and peers up at Jackson with a tired-eyed look that is nothing short of /befuddled/. What's left of the crickets chirping in the room fades to nothing at all. He does not say anything, though, instead looking to Peter now. As if to wonder if /he/ was in on this, as well. Though only briefly! Then it's back to staring at Jackson. "... I do not... what?" When Jackson mentions under what circumstances he would almost /definitely/ call the police, something hard slips into Peter's expression; for a moment, he's hip-checking the desk behind him, hands behind him, gripping the edge tight enough to make the wood slightly creak. But - then - Jackson is on the floor, mentioning this is some sort of trick, and - Peter's grip instantly loosens. /Befuddlement/. Followed by -- "...a prank?" Just an /edge/ of vitriol to it. "The man isn't dead," Jackson repeats, head shaking slightly. "Just a /jerk/, I don't know how on earth anyone could think that's funny. You didn't kill nobody." He doesn't really look too /thrilled/ with this information, either, lips pressing together thin and hard. "He got up and left. He was totally fine." For a few seconds, Ivan just sits and blinks. Like this will somehow help him process the information provided a little easier. Between blinks, Jackson's face is studied. Words seem to fail him still, though at least the shock seems to slowly wash away. His right hand, most notably the knuckles of his index and middle finger, is rubbed absently with his left. Concern creeps slooowly onto his features, furrowing his brow. "Okay," Peter says, still at the desk, a little distance away from Ivan and Jackson. "Okay, so that's - good, then. I guess - that means - nobody's dead." Peter sounds a little unsure of this; he's not exactly positive what to make of it. Beyond... "This is /good/ Ivan, I mean. I guess..." He looks to Jackson, as if for confirmation. "...that means - everything's okay, right?" Jackson hesitates, and then shakes his head. "No. Things still ain't OK. Ivan, you still /hit/ a guy. I mean, he's fine and he's alive and that's good. But you still attacked a man and we still gotta talk about that." His fingers rake through his hair, his brow furrowing. "You look pretty much stressed, though, can I get you like -- some -- tea or something?" If Jackson's answer has come as a surprise, Ivan does not show it one bit. He's barely managed a shake of his head before he decides getting up is his next course of action. He's a little wobbly, though, and Peter's bed is used to push himself upward. "We will talk." He's on his way to his own bed now, past Peter in unsteady steps, frowning. "He is not dead. This is good." His voice doesn't do a very good job of conveying whether he thinks that's true, however. "Sleep." Then-- WHOOMF. Face down on his own bed, one leg off to the side. "He was - I don't know, Ivan just said he was /saying/ things, Jax I mean I know you're not supposed to - but - Ivan wouldn't hit someone unless -" Peter's mounted defense of Ivan ends rather abruptly when Ivan proceeds to collapse into bed. "... night Ivan," Peter announces, before moving - rather quickly! - toward Jackson. Reaching out a hand to just... tug-tug-tug at him, slightly away from Ivan. Out of /immediate/ earshot, at least. Suddenly very quiet: "J... Mr. H... Jax," he finally settles on. "Be --" a fervent glance toward Ivan, back to Jax, Peter's nose wrinkled. "...I /know/ he shouldn't hit people but - he's had - a rough time? He's worried at me because of my leg, and at the party when I saw one of the twins I shouted excitedly and I think it scared them off but Ivan thought they left because of /him/, and - and I guess you know all that it's just - you don't ever yell at anybody /anyway/ so I guess it's silly but just, um." Peter's chain of thought ends abruptly here; he stares at Ivan, eyebrows furrowed. Then: "... I'm worried about him." "Yeah, but /saying/ things ain't a call to --" Jackson frowns, slightly worried when Ivan gets up to go collapse into bed. "We'll -- yeah. OK. We'll talk, soon, OK, Ivan? And if you need anything, I'll be around for all night. So just give me a text or somethin'." His fingers rake through his hair again, and he steps back when he is tugged. His brows crease deeper. "-- I am, too," he admits, and he glances down towards Peter's leg sort of inadvertently when Peter mentions it. "You -- you know, we got -- there's therapists, if he needs to -- wants to -- like you can go to the medlab not just for /physical/ hurt and they'll hook you up with counselling too if --" His teeth sink against his lip. "All this stress really adds up." Whatever it is that manages to make it over to Ivan's brain over his slightly broken state of mind prompts him to lift one hand in... a thumbs up apparently. Sure. Yes. Okay. Then, still face down, he grabs the corner of a blanket, and /rolls/. And turns himself into a Ivan-cocoon on his mattress. Good bye world. "Nobody's dead," Peter says, /frowning/ - in a very un-Peterish way - toward Ivan as he gives the little thumbs up. Before glancing back to Jackson. Still frowning. "I keep thinking that but, things - the stress," and here, Peter's fingers /scratch/ into his hair, dragging his fingertips across his own scalp. "It isn't going to /stop/, is it?" He sounds a little... /angry/ about it, actually. But, then, a little softer: "I can talk to him. Dr. McCoy was talking to me about - something like that, too. I mean, he - yeah." A little deflated. Arms slip off his head. Jackson is quiet a while. A long while, his face turning away towards the door. Slowly, eventually, he shakes his head. "No," he says, soft, "it don't really stop. But you build up people, and support, and you get through it. And you keep getting through it. Cuz life don't get no less complicated but you kinda -- grow. Into it." The breath he lets out is shaky. He doesn't sound particularly /happy/ about saying this. His eye turns up towards the ceiling. "I think it could be good. For both of you. I know people think it's awkward sometimes, talkin' to someone, /admitting/ they talk to someone, but it's --" He shrugs. "Ain't no different than seeing a doctor, really. Sometimes you need a little more support, y'know?" "Yeah. Okay. Thanks, Jax," Peter relents, reluctant-but-yielding. "I'll - we'll - okay. Thank you for," and he just gives a glance toward Ivan, as if this was enough. He ambles over to his own bed, thudding down against it, apparently intent on going asleep himself - Batman boxers and all. "...g'night." Thump.