ArchivedLogs:Nerds All the Way Down

Nerds All the Way Down
Dramatis Personae Micah, Shane, B, Nom
In Absentia	28 April 2014 Meeting the new student while Micah recovers from...sort of surgery. (Part of the Perfectus TP.)
Location <XS> Conservatory
Tall panes of glass keep this large indoor garden warm year round. Tended to by the school's groundskeeper, the conservatory is lush with plant life, a carefully cultivated paradise within Xavier's walls. The room serves as a classroom as well; in the center of the garden a ring of seats forms a small circle, a favorite locale for some teachers to hold court. Micah has been wheeled into the conservatory with his simple dinner of avocado and turkey sandwich, little pile of salt and pepper potato chips, and bottle of mango juice. /Been wheeled/...despite protestations that he's perfectly capable of operating his own wheelchair. But it isn't too surprising that Dr. McCoy was slightly overzealous in completing his care-taking of his recent patient. Micah is seated in his neon green ultralight wheelchair, which has come in handy more frequently than he'd like in the past year. A soft, fuzzy emerald green fuzzy blanket is spread over his lap, inadvertently matching well with the kelly green cartoon panda T-shirt that is the only item he's wearing that's visible, currently. That is, aside from the Oscar the Grouch sock peeking out from under the blanket, covering the single foot to be seen on the footboard of the chair's fixed front end. His auburn hair is more spectacularly messy than usual, legitimately bed-head today. Sniff. Sniffsniffsniff. There are PREDATORS creeping through the lush growth of the conservatory. Admittedly, they're not quite as stealthy as they /could/ be -- namely because the very /bright/ pink of B's sleeveless top (dotted with black stars) and galaxy-swirled purple skirt (it's layered over metallic silver leggings) doesn't really blend in with the greenery. Nor, really, does Shane's houndstooth vest (paired with neat-tied bowtie, neat-pressed slacks, crisp button-down, derby hat.) As dissimilar as they are in dress, the tiny blue sharktwins are strikingly identical in every /other/ aspect of their appearance, dropped into low crouches as they prowl the perimeter of the room, quiet-stalking. Sniffing. Working their way cloooser. Until with sudden SWOOP-pounces they emerge in tandem to hurtle towards their father, swarming up the sides of the wheelchair to throw arms around Micah's shoulders and /squeeze/. Shane buries his face in against Micah's neck, gills rippling with a quiet whisper of sharp edges against the starched collar of his shirt. "... Did it work?" B just hugs, tight and fierce. And says nothing. She doesn't arrive in any special way. No fanfare. No crazy surge up from the water. No gout of fountaining gore or such nonsense. No. She arrives with a couple of coconuts, and a side of beef clearly snitched from the kitchens. She's just so HUNGRY all the time. Still, when the girl slides up into the conservatory and sees B times two, she makes a whooping sound,"WHOOOOP." Yes. Really. A whooping sound. Nom is that excited. She drops her meat and coconuts on the ground, fishes in her pocket for a bag of glitter, and throws the whole thing up in the air, shouting the word,"GLITTER!" In her damaged brain, this equates to appropriate behavior for whatever is going on right now. Not that she understands it. Micah's hands grip down on his plate in attempt to keep chips from going /everywhere/ as he is pounced by twinsharks. He manages only to lose a few over the edge onto his blanket. "Hi, hon," he greets the pair, one arm freeing up to wrap around B's shoulders as he presses his cheek (carefully!) against Shane's. "Leg's gone. I didn't bleed out by accident or need t'get rushed to a hospital. An' the telepathy's gone /with/ it, good riddance. As t'the rest of it... Won't know how things like walkin's gonna go 'til after Luci's had a good bit of time t'mess about in m'noggin' an' I've done some serious therapy t'get m'muscles an' everythin' /else/ back in shape for workin' with a prosthesis again. Doc said m'body's had enough t'handle t'day, so I'm just s'posed t'take it easy 'til tomorrow. Joshua an' your pa did good work, though. Jax was just a ball of fret the whole way through it, but it's done now." Micah does look a little wan, but not nearly in the condition that the average person undergoing surgical amputation would be. He blinks at the sudden...glittercreature a few times. "S'Jax startin' t'manifest things without needin' t'be in the room or did the anaesthesia get t'me more'n I thought?" Shane keeps his face buried in against Micah's neck, still squeezing tight. "Thank fucking /god/ because fucking hell that was --" "... not good," B finishes in a relieved tone, arms tightening jus a little around Micah's shoulders. "Did Pa /really/ --" "-- Lop off your leg /himself/ that's fucking badass." Shane lifts his head, a sharp-toothed /grin/ on his face. He looks down at Micah's blanket-covered leg. "I mean, fucking /sweet/, just goddamn /laser/ it the hell --" "-- They use lasers in a lot of surgery," B points out quietly. "But, um, that's not really. /Pa's/ --" She looks up, wider-eyed when Nom arrives, a small smile creeping across her face. Bigger, at the sudden storm of glitter. "Holy fuck," is Shane's reaction to this. "Whatthefuck." But it's a wiiide toothy /grinning/ sort of what-the-fuck. "Oh, no, she's not. An /illusion/, Ba, this is Nom --" B is starting to explain. "/Nom/?" Shane's grin is just growing. "Why is there a /glitter-storm/." She seems very pleased with herself. Nom picks up her coconuts and beef slab, and goes toddling on over without waiting for invite to plop down next to Micah and the twins, right there on her bottom. For a moment, her head shifts and it's just a giant mouth full of sharp teeth, which she dumps one of the coconuts in. She crunches down on the thing, and chews noisily for a moment before swallowing loudly. Her head returns to normal, moments later, "B and B!" She points first at B, then at Shane,"Me nom. You B." She points at Micah,"B-glitterdad?" She's drawing a few inferences, sure. "GLITTER?" She says this hopefully, as if she does indeed hope she will be asked to throw more glitter. "Yeah, it's...a lot of a relief. How much quieter it is. Not /thinkin'/ as much about touchin' people." Micah's arm squeezes B's shoulders tighter as he pulls back to place a kiss to Shane's cheek. "An', yes, he did. Weren't nobody gonna do abilities-enhanced surgery on a colour-changin' leg. Ain't like we had an OR full of orthopaedic tools at our disposal. An'...Jax kinda /is/ an amazin' laser. Seemed like the best way t'do it, even if...ball of fret," he reiterates with a small chuckle. "Ah. New student, I'm guessin'? We ain't had a chance t'meet yet. I got so many comments 'bout migratory coconuts I'm not makin' right now, seriously." His head shakes, still a bit /fuzzy/ from what it's been through today. "That's B." This comes with a gesture to B. "This is B's twin, Shane. Though if you two ever wanna open up a bed an' breakfast, that'd be adorable... Um. What was I sayin'? Oh, I'm not glitterdad. Glitterdad's Jax. I'm more...cyborg dad, or soon will be. Micah. Nice t'meet you, hon." He giggles at the glitter enthusiasm. "Glitter's fine s'long as it stays outta the food. /I/ can't eat glitter." The emphasis on the personal pronoun implies some inferences Micah is drawing, as well. "I could be B. Are you saying I'm not good enough to be B?" Shane's continued wide grin kind of takes the implied /offense/ out of his sentence here. He goes straight back to /nuzzling/, now, face pressing gently back against Micah's cheek for the sheer joyful novelty of being /able/ to touch his father again without causing him /unpleasantness/. "B, I think there's some discrimination happening here." "You can be B," B allows generously. "I'll be Shane. We could have a B an B, though? I mean, you /are/ going into the whole service industry. Thing." "I bet Pa'd /enjoy/ running a B&B. Quieter kinda life than superheroing. Could just bake cupcakes and serve waffles and tend a cute little garden." For a moment Shane sounds wistful, his gills fluttering slowly. He leans more heavily into the side of the wheelchair, looking down at the glitter on the ground. "You /could/ be glitterdad. Nom /has/ the tools. It could be /arranged/." He's eying Nom. /Speculatively/. Helpfully, B reaches for Micah's sandwich, whisking it off to hide it behind the wheelchair. "I think my Ba needs more glitter," he tells Nom. "Especially like, in the lap-region." He gestures helpfully to Micah's lap in indication. "And the wheelchair. Doesn't that /already/ make you a cyborg?" Shane's brows raise. "Then you'll be glitter-cyborg-dad. Nom's helping." "Eat glitter!" She picks some specks off her stuff and tosses them in her mouth. "Nomnomnom." There's a reason Nom picked up the name 'Nom'. The girl is nothing if not helpful. When directed, she hops up to pelt the indicated regions with glitter... oddly careful not to glitter the man's food while doing so. Hair gets glitter, too, if Micah isn't quick enough in fending her off. Then she takes her fingernail and drags it in a circle around the coconut's circumference. It goes as smoothly as if someone were dragging a stick through a pool of water. Virtually no resistance. That done, she opens it and offers half to Micah,"No glitter." The other half is offered to B and Shane." She points at B,"Shane now." She points at Shane,"B now." She nods as if that were settled, then begins biting off chunks of the slab, chewing and swallowing noisily as she ever does,"Cyborg. Micah. This meat." She points at her slab. "Me not meat." "I'm sayin' I love you /both/ an' I love havin' /both/ of you." Micah play-baps Shane gently in the back of his head. "Oh/gosh/, I could so see Jax doin' that? Maybe when we retire from bein' crazyfolk." His smile at this is fond. "Hey," Micah protests lightly at the stealing of his dinner, plucking the fallen chips from his lap now that he can see them with the plate out of the way. Lacking a better place for them, he just pops them into his mouth, also capable of playing the crunching game...on a much smaller scale. "Oh, if you're broad enough with the definition, /everybody's/ a cyborg. Eyeglasses'd count, even. The chair don't feel cyborgly t'me the same way as the legs do, though. Leg's /part/ of me. Chair's...kinda more of a self-propelled /vehicle/." He doesn't resist the glitter-attack, giggling as he is covered in the sparkly stuff. "Welp. This's gonna be everywhere forever. I'm gonna tell people it's a side effect of Jax surgery, an' I bet they won't bat an eyelash." He just keeps giggling until offered the half a coconut. "Ohwow, fresh coconut. Thanks, honey. An' not t'worry. Nobody's gonna try t'eat you. I meant nice t'/meet/ you. As in...be introduced to. Get t'know." "You're never going to retire from being crazyfolk." B sounds -- more than a little sad about this. "Oh my god. Can you live on a diet of glitter. Maybe you /did/ come from Pa and we just didn't know it before." Shane can't help a chuckle as Nom eats the glitter, dipping his head to bop against Micah's shoulder. "Glitter's part of a balanced diet, I'm pretty sure." B keeps Micah's sandwich out of the way until there has been /thorough/ glittering; she returns the plate to Micah's lap with a giggle, claws brushing lightly backwards through Micah's hair to watch a rain of glitter shower back down to the ground. "I think everyone's meat." Shane takes the coconut curiously, cupping it in his hands though he just sniffs at it rather than actually eat it. "Are you made out of knives, that was a cool trick." He's eying Nom's hands with a healthy dose of awe. "... Am I a cyborg? I don't think I have cyborg in me right now." Nom transforms one of her hands into an independent mouth and uses that to keep eating the slab, one chomp at a time. OMNOMNOM. This allows her to keep talking while she eats. "Made of eat. So hungry." Again the face that says 'I've never been fed, ever'. Well, at least her vocabulary has improved a little. "Crazy! Me! Banana!" She giggles as if this were the funniest thing ever. She decides to fully answer Shane's question. As best as she can, anyway,"Everything food, B. Everything." The last word is said with a very solemn tone. "Live on anything." She snatches a particularly big pieces of meat with her hand-mouth... and burps out her face-mouth. "UUUUURRP." Then she points at Micah's wheelchair and asks,"Vroom?" "Okay, maybe we'll /still/ be crazyfolk. Just not the kinda crazy that...does what he does right now. Can't keep that kinda thing up forever." Micah's head shakes before he tips the half-coconut up to drink whatever water remains inside it. "I can't eat glitter. Metal's bad for...most average GI systems." He sets the coconut to balance on his lap, picking up his sandwich to take a bite of that instead. There's avocado to be had, after all. "Pretty much most people are kinda made of meat, yeah." His head tilts thoughtfully at Shane. "Hmm...maybe y'don't have any cyborg parts /right now/. You heal too well to've needed surgeries. We should get you some sunglasses." He giggles at the banana-shouting, too. "Ohgosh, I'm totally...imaginin' Minions now. If she hasn't seen those movies yet, it should happen. Because banana." Sparing a hand for a moment to tap at the sideguard of the chair, he nods. "Well, it ain't got a motor or nothin', but it's how I'm gettin' 'round for now." "No, pretty much can just keep it up till you die." B's expression briefly twists into a scowl at this. "Soooo, Wednesday," Shane says, with a sudden sharp huff. It shifts into a lopsided grin, though, at Nom's answer. "Hey, I feel you there. Two hours away from food and I'm pretty much ready to eat Ba." He nudges his elbow lightly into Micah's side. "Crazy's okay, though," B assures Nom, "we're kinda --" "-- all mad here?" Shane's grin has spread to HUGE toothy-wide proportions here. B ducks her head, cheeks flushing a little darker. "Pretty much yeah." She rests a hand on Micah's wheelchair thoughtfully. "... could /put/ a motor on it. How do you feel about levitating?" "Still crazy!" She stands up with her beef slab, and while still chewing on it with her mouth-hand, she approaches Shane and Sebastian. Nom holds up the slab as if to show them, then informs them,"Good meat." Well marbled, actually. Before she started taking chunks of it, it would've been perfect for a brisket. Not so much now. Saves on power cooking it though. She DOES point at Micah's sandwich, with its avocados and informs them,"Cow-food." Well. There's her opinion. "Eat shoes. Cars. People. Vespa, once. Burp lots. Gas are burpy." She shares this with a tone that suggests she's sharing a trade secret. "Madhouse. Chairfloat. Go vroom. Make go vroom. Happy cyborg. Glitter?" She really likes throwing glitter. "Hey...no. B, no. I told you it wasn't gonna be like that. I'll be /here/. I'm not just stayin' here 'cause I just had surgery, neither." Micah nods slightly at Shane, however. "Wednesday." He pauses for another bite of sandwich. "Ohgosh, I don't need no hoverchair. I'll be back on m'feet soon enough as it is. Hopefully." He grins before taking another bite of /delicious/ avocado-y sandwich. "S'good. Glitterdad doesn't eat any meat /at all/, y'know." His nose crinkles. "Maybe don't eat cars so much. Seems like it wouldn't agree." "Also it'd be a fucking /expensive/ meal, I mean, you could go grab a deer from the woods. Just as filling, /way/ the hell cheaper." Shane leeeans in towards the slab of beef, though. Salivating just a little as he sniffs at it. "Ba eats a lot of rabbit food." B is also eying the meat hungrily. Not so much Micah's sandwich. "On account of our other dad's vegan so --" "-- they eat a lot of hippie food." Shane's nose wrinkles. He's still sniffing hungrily towards the beef. "You might not /need/ a flying chair but fuck why wouldn't you /want/ one. /I/ want a goddamn rocketchair. B, make me a rocketchair." He sets his half-a-coconut gently down in Micah's lap. "I'm pretty sure," B agrees, "that /everyone/ needs rocketchairs." And, after some small consideration: "Glittery ones." Nom points at Shane,"Pottymouth!" Judgement? No. More observation. "Was hungry. Car there. Meat not. Always hungry." Her mouth-hand transforms back into a normal hand, and two quick motions slice off extra chunks of beef for the boys. "Vegan? Plants. No move. No fun." She looks over at Shane and B again, then rises up in that seemingly boneless way of hers. She leans forward, as if examining Micah. Her nose extends, on a tendril of flesh, and begins sniffing the man. For what, she's not sure, since she doesn't have super-smell. "You need new parts. Grow new things. Need many foods. You not have enough foods. Why not have many foods?" The nose 'retracts'. She looks back to Shane and B and says,"Cyborg need mechanic. Car parts." Well, at least the logic is followable. "Deer, definitely cheaper. Fairly plentiful 'round here, too. Got us through a few tight spots durin' the plague," Micah observes between bites of sandwich. His lap is getting a little /full/ between the plate of food and the bottle of juice and now /two/ halves of coconut. He just chuckles and shakes his head at the rocketchair discussion, a louder snort of laughter at the pottymouth accusation. "Yup, that's pretty much Shane." His head shakes slightly at the 'grow new parts' comment. "I can't grow new parts. Was actually...born without the leg. Just had one put on for a bit, but it was problematic, so it had t'go. I /got/ m'cyborg leg upstairs. Only gotta wait 'til I can use it again. Cyborg also /is/ a mechanic, so that's handy." He lifts the sandwich, a rather nice layered whole wheat number with turkey, tomato, avocado, red onion, and baby kale. "I got plenty of food, don't worry 'bout me." His lap is /full/ of it, after all. "I know a plant that moves. Big tree-dude. Pretty badass." Shane bounces happily on his toes, dipping his head in a nod of thanks as he takes one of the chunks of beef, skewering it on a suddenly long-extended claw and lifting it to his mouth. "Oh, thanks!" B's eyes light; she takes the beef in a more delicate prickle of claws, nibbling it slowly. "Hunting plants /is/ kind of boring. Um -- I think Ba's got enough food for --" "-- a skinny-ass cyborg." Though really, Micah's not skinny compared to Shane. Just skinny when it comes to /appetite/. Shane's hunk of beef has already vanished. "What'd you /do/ with the leg anyway? I mean the not-cyborg one?" B shudders. "Burn it, I hope." She scowls, downing her meat too in one quick chomp. She leans back in to wrap her arm around Micah in another hug, press a kiss to his cheek. "I should go do homework. I'll be your cyborg mechanic too, though. Any time you want an /upgrade/." She gives Nom a quick smile, and turns to dart off. "Deerdeerdeer! Huntdeersoonyes? She points at Shane, Micah, and B all in turn. Then her head turns into a giant mouth again, and she lowers the rest of the slab of beef into it and SWALLOWS. A satisfied sound escapes her, and then she's waving at B. "Babablacksheep! Threecyborgfull!" She looks at Shane and Micah as B moves to depart, and fishes in her skirt until she finds her flashcards, and holds them up,"Helplaterplease? Letters tomorrow. Numbers after!" "Gee, thanks," Micah replies dryly to the skinny-ass comment. His cheeks colour faintly at the question of the removed limb. "Left it with Dr. McCoy. Figured it might have some value, scientifically. I mean, how many samples of special ability reconstituted /body parts/'re out there? An'...I dunno. Maybe it could be useful for helpin' understand Rasa's abilities or somethin'. If they don't find any use for it, they can destroy it like any other...thing that gets removed surgically. I don't really care." His nose crinkles a little at that. Though it melts into a smile at the kiss from B. "Love you, sugar. Don't have /too/ much fun." He gives B a little pat on the back as ze heads off. "I'd definitely hunt with y'all, just... It'll be awhile for me. Got a fair bit of recoverin' t'do." The flashcards earn a nod, however. "Studyin' I can help with straightaway, though." "We hunt a bunch," Shane agrees. "But, uh, not -- always in ways that it's easy for most people to --" He tips his eyes up towards the ceiling, shrugging uncertainly. "Welcome to come, though. We'll sniff out deer for you to /chomp/." From /him/ the flashcards just earn a /grimace/. "Ohjeez. All that studying shit is really B's -- fff. Ze's the smart one. You want someone to teach you shit, ze's on the tutoring -- whateverthefuck. Oh and /both/ my --" He waves a hand towards Micah's wheelchair, "-- dads are goddamn teachers here. They live for being fucking pedagogic at people it gets their rocks off. /I'll/ stick to the fun stuff with you, 'kay?" Nom's been learning a lot by copying. This also means learning when it comes to expressing one's feelings. Like her gratitude to Micah. Which basically amounts to her lunging forward to try to hug the man. She's seen people hugging! She's seen B hug! As B is currently her bestest best role model... Then she decides to copy Shane in expressing how happy she is. "Fuck! Fuckyay!" Then she plops down, opens her mouth... and BUUUUURPS. "Most hunt water. Fish. Bite-sized." IS anything NOT bite-sized for her? "Learning. Figger reading." She points at Shane and asks curiously,"Read?" Pause. "Rasa smart! B smart! Smarties! Nerds!" She says it with a gleeful note rather than a scornful note. "Make Nom nerd!" She claps her hands happily. She points at Shane,"Strong-brother?" "Y'all teamed up with my slow-pokey self well enough for huntin'. Sure we can figure somethin' out." Micah nods at the mention of water-hunting. "An' fishin'...ohgosh, y'never seen more impressive fishin' than the twins get up to. Think y'all are gonna get along famously." He takes another bite of sandwich, needing to finish chewing before he can answer again. "Oh/gosh/, Shane. I ain't even a teacher here /yet/. M'first class starts in the summer." Micah doesn't seem to mind the hug in the least, though his return of it is one-armed as his other hand protects the ever-growing pile of food items in his lap from being spilled. He /facepalms/ at the further imitation of Shane, however. "Oh/gosh/. Nom, honey. The...pottymouth thing. S'likely t'get you in trouble. Prob'ly that /isn't/ the first thing y'wanna pick up from Shane." A smile tugs its way across his lips of its own accord at the rest, however. "Yeah, they're both real strong kids. An' we'll make an honest nerd of you yet, not t'worry." "We fish every day. Hunt less often." Shane /grins/ bright at Nom's exuberant cursing. "Whaaat. You're just really fucking /huggable/. -- My dads are /both/ great for hugging," he tells Nom cheerfully. "You should hug 'em both. Lots. Just, fuckin', all the time." He leans in to join in the hugging, bonking his head lightly into the side of Micah's before he pulls back. "Oh, shit, this school's goddamn /full/ of nerds. Nerds freakin' /everywhere/. B's a huge nerd and Rasa's a huge nerd and /hell/ have you met Peter yet or Daiki or Kisha or Anole. S'just. Nerds /all/ the way down. They've got whole clubs for it, s'pretty great. B's club makes pretty kick-ass robots."